Some Guys Just Make You Laugh

[dolomite]

Just finished getting pasted bad- really bad- trying vainly to defend F23 from a vastly overwhelming force. Score means nothing to me, and I'd been chasing Runstangs all over the earth in my c205, so when I finally had to land (gas) F23 was under attack. I replane in a spit (point defense) and try. And try. And try. Probably 19 out of 20 times I get strafed by the 15 or so planes sitting above the runway. I finally do get airborne and get a couple. I strafe the drunks to keep base open. This from a Spitfire. This went on for over an hour, and still I get whacked over-and-over.

On one of the last sorties, I got a C47, a 109, and a Mustang (which has alt on me) is diving on me from high 12, me on the deck. I have only one option left; I pull the nose up and open fire. I kill it, but am mortally wounded in the process.

What does the brave pilot say?

"Nice HO". Oh brother    



[This message has been edited by dolomite (edited 01-09-2000).]

[Swoosh]

Hahahahaha etc etc etc

[janneh]

I must admit I take lots of HO's. I just don't know how to avoid them. If I'm starting to maneuver for not taking HO, I'd be killed immediatly.Also La-5 is quite good for HO's  
Almost 90% of my HO's I'll get serious damage too and it's the end of the flight  

I hope AH someday has trainers, I didn't use trainers in WB (I should have!), but when we get trainers here, I'll be there  

[leonid]

janneh,
If you have speed HO is not too hard to avoid.  What you try to do is keep your position changing from about 1.2-1.5km.  If attacker is on left side of nose, wait until 1.2-1.5km, then slide over to make attacker on left.  Same if attacker above nose, pull down.  And as range gets to 900-1000m, maneuver harder to spoil attacker's aim.  Other thing is to make a big, slow roll around attacker's dot as you approach 1.2km.

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leonid, aka grisha
129 IAP VVS RKKA

[juzz]

I remember seeing a video of a Navy ace from Vietnam (Cunningham?) talking about an encounter where he went HO with a Mig-21 (in an F-4 with no gun!) - when the Mig started shooting he went "pure vertical" and eventually after about three zooms and dives the Mig stalled out and he shot it down. The best bit about the video was the way he explained it all using his hands as the airplanes!  

[Dingy]

 

I must admit I take lots of HO's. I just don't know how to avoid them. If I'm starting to maneuver for not taking HO, I'd be killed immediatly.

Over half of the guys going for the head ons in here are banking that they are going to get a kill with the initial HO.  Once they lose the HO, they are suddenly without option.  I ALMOST ALWAYS attempt to avoid the headon to maneuver for a "safer" rear quarter shot.  The only time a HO is in the cards for me is if a bogie is floundering below me after he tried to zoom into me.

My favorite HO avoidance tactic is to begin a wide barrell roll once the bogies distance off nose closes to 1200.  Once past him, I begin the kill  

-Ding

[dolomite]

I might further express that I never take HO's as a first option; in this particular case I had too little energy left for any of the previously mentioned maneuvers, and the place was swarming with bad guys. What struck me as odd about the comment was he didn't mind at all racking up free kill after free kill (cheaply), but was upset because his lunch bit back, nailing him with a lucky snapshot from low 12 (really low!).

A similar episode happened in another sim on another day; our base was being suppressed by a rather aggressive group of enemy pilots. The kill buffer rolls a particular name over and over, declaring his rising streak. I pop in, and begin rolling. Passing right before my guns was a friendly trailing a bad guy. I opened fire, and killed it, from the runway. What happened next? I got a 5-minute lecture on open channel on how I'd cheated! I had sortied a fighter, was rolling, he was silly enough to fly right in front of me, and yup, I was the cheater because I shot him down.  

My point? Nobody likes someone whining about being vultched, and I didn't. I chose to be there, had a wild hair I guess, and oddly, had fun. Transversely, nobody likes to hear someone whining because they screwed up something as simple as a vultch.  

[janneh]

Another point of view;
If You start maneuver and nme not, he's gaining E advantage over You?
Which could be fatal after passing.

Perhaps one way is to make little dive and apply some rudder to have yaw and then just before meeting, pull up.

Dive is quite dangerous too, it's easy to hit You when there's so much plane airframe visible, and of course, pilot kill could occur.

[pzvg]

Since it's nearly impossible to make an actual "bounce" in these games, I would think that people would get used to HO's
since the last defense left to a pilot is to point his nose at the incoming bogey.
Now the lecture about E and barrel rolls,
don't really stack up, after all you're just pulling a tactically sound HO, instead of coming straight in. In real life, planes met headon in combat situations, main diff here being they don't whistle up the bad guy on the radio and say "nice HO" or anything else for that matter. (hmm, I wonder if the elimination of the common channel would put a stop to most of the complaints?)
 Naaah they could still come here


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pzvg- "5 years and I still can't shoot"

[Jochen]

 

If You start maneuver and nme not, he's gaining E advantage over You?
Which could be fatal after passing.

It's not all about E advantage...

After half a year in WB Fw-190A I fought purely E status in my mind. On one JG 2 squad training I flew Spit IX in many merges agaisnt zamba-'s Bf 109F-4 and learned that E advantage is not enough.

Merge tactics and maneuvers are tradeoff between angles advantage and E advantage. In pure vertical pullup you can get E advantage but enemy can get angles advantage which could be fatal. Trick is to learn when to go for angles and when for E maneuver. Of course you can mix them.

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jochen
Geschwaderkommodore
Jagdgeschwader 2 'Richthofen' (Warbirds)

If you ever get across the sea to England,
Then maybe at the closing of the day
The bars will all be serving German lager
Which means we won the war - hip hip hooray!

[dolomite]

In this particular case I would do the same thing again. I was on the deck, slow, and nowhere to turn or run. Facing the mustang (he was bearing down at about a 45 degree angle relative to me) at the last second seemed to be the best option. Even if I somehow managed to escape that pass, his friends were right there waiting for their turn. At the very best, he would have missed, climbed to his perch, and repeated. Next time I might not get a chance.

This was occurring during a massive vultch-fest, and I had no illusion of living through it. I was trying to defend the base by taking as many with me as possible (wish I could remember who the one other pilot was with me). We together held it for over an hour, and that was satisfaction enough.

I do appreciate the attempts of advice on ACM in the situation. Though no stranger to flight sims or ACM (I spent a lot of ladder time in Brand W) I am not foolish enough to think I know it all. Was it Einstein that said "The more I know, the more I know I don't know."?

[Rojo]

I remember reading an account of Charles Lindberg's one kill in WWII.  It was against a Zero, and it was a head-on shot. Lindy commented that head-ons were, despite their inherent dangers, a favored tactic, especially of the Japanese.  This may have been because by this point in the war Allied pilots had learned not to play T&B games with Zekes, so a head-on shot was likely the only shot a Japanese pilot was likely to get against the American iron.  Lucky Lindy was flying a P-38, btw.  He was hired as a consultant to the USAAF to teach range-extending engine management techniques to the American pilots.

Frankly, I take my share of H/O's, when I have no streak to protect, and I've got at least comparable firepower to my opponent. I would likely have done the same as Dolomite, given his situation, too.

As for avoiding the H/O, the slow role is my favorite technique, with a shallow S-turn at the merge as a second option.

Sabre (a.k.a. Rojo)

[Minotaur]

I seldom try for HO attacks.  It is better to manuver and get a better angle to attack from.  

If I am at an angle disadvantage or want to even the angles, I most often go for a "HO Merge".  Which is not the same to me as a "HO Attack".  I "Turn Into" the attacking plane.  Because of heightened SA, due to game play concessions, this happens frequetly.

IMO this is better than giving up angles from the "Get Go", by steering clear of "HO Merges".

When a HO is un-voidable, I manuver to force an oversteer.  By faking a HO pass, I might get the NME more focused on a HO kill and less focussed on the angles they are giving up.  It is often "Win the Merge, Win the Fight".

However, I almost always shoot during HO's if the seperation is close.  Hopefully, I can get a fast rudder kick in and make some hits.  It makes them think about dodging and I might get lucky.  From my experience, HO's are ussually 30/30/40.  Where 30% you win, 30% you lose or 40% you both lose (both get shot down - one gets the kill).  

I am much more concerned with not getting shot down and setting up my merge angles, than I am with scoring a HO kill.

My strategy changes for an ongoin fight, depending on comparitive E states, other NME around, how I am doing at angles or what my confidence level of winning the fight is.  Sometimes you just have to take your chances.  

Good Luck in the Unfriendly Skies!  

Mino

[Hans]

Dolomite.

Remeber this one, very, very important detail.

It takes TWO to make a head on pass.  If the other guy didn't want to go head on, he should have turned away.  He took his chances anyways and lost.

There is nothing wrong with head on passes other than the fact they are generally a 50/50 toss up.  There is little you can do to make a Head On Pass more successfull.

If that particular Mustang pilot wanted to shoot you down he should have pulled up way above you and came down on you while you leveled out and took a direction to head away at.  He grossly wasted his advantage in speed and altitude.  He turned a meat-on-the-table kill into a 50/50 toss up and came out the loser.

Instead, he didn't have any patience, did a dumb thing, and died for it.

Hans.

[This message has been edited by Hans (edited 01-11-2000).]

[Hangtime]

Rgr that last; Hans.  

Hang; out!

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PALE HORSES
"I looked, and behold; a Pale Horse, and it's riders name was Death, and Hell followed with him" Rev 6.8