Buff toughness

[g00b]

Last night I put 50+ rounds of hispanos into a B-24's fuselage. I think he got a fuel leak. I have the film though I cannnot view it due to current viewer bugginess. I fired over 200 rds from my tempest in verticle passes and I'm confident I hit between 50-100 rds. Is this how it is supposed to be?

I can envision a tough buff taking 10-20 hits if it was very lucky. but 50+? It seems like this would likely kill every one on board, start fires, set off munitions, etc...

And this is not a random event, B-24's and B-26's take considerably more damage than I think realistic. Does anyone have any photos or stories of these buffs routinely taking this kind of punishment and surviving?

I will post the film if needed.

g00b

[Furball]

i have to agree, bombers can be frustratingly hard to kill in AH2, especially since you can put all those rounds into them, then they 1 ping out your pilot or oil.  

If i remember correctly the luftwaffe did a report where they stated it took about 20 20mm hits or 3 30mm hits to down a 4 engined bomber.

[XtrmeJ]

Originally posted by Furball
i have to agree, bombers can be frustratingly hard to kill in AH2, especially since you can put all those rounds into them, then they 1 ping out your pilot or oil.  

If i remember correctly the luftwaffe did a report where they stated it took about 20 20mm hits or 3 30mm hits to down a 4 engined bomber.

Not sure about that Furball. There is guncam footage out there of a 110 lighting up a B17 and it was deffenetly more than those hits. I know it's lieing around in one of these forums.

I'll see if I can dig it up. Not saying your wrong, just not sure is all.

[Furball]

Originally posted by XtrmeJ
Not sure about that Furball. There is guncam footage out there of a 110 lighting up a B17 and it was deffenetly more than those hits. I know it's lieing around in one of these forums.

I'll see if I can dig it up. Not saying your wrong, just not sure is all.

Yeah, you cant say it will always take 20 / 3 hits, sometimes it might take 1 20mm shell to the cockpit, other times hundreds of shells to the fuselage and not hit anything critical.  

I know the video clip you are talking about, i think the crew had already bailed out as you can see no movement in the a/c, return fire or anything.

[OIO]

take down buffs not by shooting at the fuselage but at the wing roots or wingtips.


think about it.. you hit the fuselage...hits go in and go out the other side and you will have to drill out the fuselage to cause any critical damage (i know i know ah2 does not model bombs being hit and exploding).

hit the wing roots and you will either saw off the wing or set the fuel tank on fire..which will explode about 30 seconds later.

[frank3]

I think the buff toughness is modelled correctly.

Like OIO says, don't aim for the wingtips. In real life pilots tried to shoot at the engines and cockpit.
But ofcourse, you don't really have a choise at where you hit something

g00b says that his hispano rounds didn't really bother the bomber, I think this is ok, because most bullets just went trough the aircraft! (this is what happens mostly in real live)

[g00b]

Frank and IOI,
 I was firing 20mm cannon rounds which do not "pass through" the fuselage. They were specifcally designed to penetrate inside the structure of an aircraft and explode. Each one is more than equal to a grenade in explosive power. Do you think you could detonate hundreds of grenades in a bomber and it would only suffer a fuel leak?

What I was hoping for was any sort of evidence that buffs regularly (50% or more) took that kind of damage and survived.

[Krusty]

Bomber fuselage strength is pure BS. Had a flight of B17s (3 of them) and I was in a yak9T (37mm gun)... Well it took more than 10 minutes and about 2 dozen passes to nail all 3. I was HITTING. REPEATEDLY. The 37mm hit and hit and hit and hit AND NOTHING happened. I didn't even get a fuel leak or a smoking engine UNTIL the plane totally lost a wing or blew up. I got so annoyed that on the last one I stopped making passes and just sat there pouring combined hits into the damned bomber (mg and cannon) until I flamed an engine and blew  HALF a friggin' wing off.

It's BS. If they get formations they should NOT get uber toughness. Formations make up for weakness in the bombers ability to defend themselves. Thus there should be NO formation if you can't shoot them down with about 300 37mm rounds (HTH room, 10x ammo, lethality at default, because I had no problems shooting fighters down, JUST the damn bombers!)

[Furball]

Originally posted by frank3

g00b says that his hispano rounds didn't really bother the bomber, I think this is ok, because most bullets just went trough the aircraft! (this is what happens mostly in real live)

The hispano was introduced from the lessons learned in the Battle of Britain,  The .303's were fine fighter vs fighter combat but the weight of round was a bit small for bomber intercepts.  I would doubt very much that 20mm hispano rounds would pass straight through a bomber without any effect...

Tried to find the video clip of Glacier Girl's cannon shooting a barrel after they raised it, without any luck, that might change your mind

[Shuckins]

I regularly tackle buffs with .50 calibers, flying the F6F, using a diving approach if at all possible, from at least 3k above and slightly to one side of buff's line of flight.

A couple of short bursts to correctly establish the correct amount of lead, then hold the trigger down.  If I misjudge their speed, and appear to be falling into a trailing position on the 6, which is not where you want to be, I will fire a short burst and then dive through.

I will fly for 10 minutes or longer to set up such a pass, especially if I am alone.   I have a fair amount of success against the heavy buffs with these tactics.

Patience, speed, and gunnery appears to be the key to success.

[Raider179]

seems right to me. Also seems like the buff guns have decreased in effectiveness. Whereas  I used to be able to kill 3 to 5 guys (straight 6 attackers) now it seems difficult to kill 2.Seems like the guns have a lot of recoil now.

[Easyscor]

Buffs seem too fragile to me.  I usually fly them but last night over A63 there were 2-3 Bish guys who just wouldn't take a hint and kept coming back in low Lanc's, B-24s and even a formation of Ju88s.  It was very costly for them but you have to admire their determination.

It's not how many hits you land, it's where and how well concentrated.  I've had guys make one pass at me in a spit and kill two of my B-17s but fortunately most guys can't do that or I'd quit flying them.

When I go after buffs, I usually spray hole into them from wingtip to wingtip and I get killed for the trouble but last night it was easy to judge when those guys where busy calibrating and you could take all the time in the world.  The only problem was staying out of  AKAK’s line of fire, ouch.

[Overlag]

Originally posted by g00b
Last night I put 50+ rounds of hispanos into a B-24's fuselage. I think he got a fuel leak. I have the film though I cannnot view it due to current viewer bugginess. I fired over 200 rds from my tempest in verticle passes and I'm confident I hit between 50-100 rds. Is this how it is supposed to be?

I can envision a tough buff taking 10-20 hits if it was very lucky. but 50+? It seems like this would likely kill every one on board, start fires, set off munitions, etc...

And this is not a random event, B-24's and B-26's take considerably more damage than I think realistic. Does anyone have any photos or stories of these buffs routinely taking this kind of punishment and surviving?

I will post the film if needed.

g00b

b24s and 26s "suffer" from this... other bombers seem to be ok though.

If you have issues downing bombers though, just go for the pilot... a good plane with a dead pilot is still a kill......

[jpeg]

They seem a bit too fragile to me also, esp. the b24, it catches on fire real quick and eventually it explodes.

This topic comes up every other month it seems and I'm too tired to re-write my thoughts over and over, bottom line is ppl who complain about buff strenth aren't shooting at them in proper places with the right angles.

Originally posted by Easyscor
Buffs seem too fragile to me.  I usually fly them but last night over A63 there were 2-3 Bish guys who just wouldn't take a hint and kept coming back in low Lanc's, B-24s and even a formation of Ju88s.  It was very costly for them but you have to admire their determination.

It's not how many hits you land, it's where and how well concentrated.  I've had guys make one pass at me in a spit and kill two of my B-17s but fortunately most guys can't do that or I'd quit flying them.

When I go after buffs, I usually spray hole into them from wingtip to wingtip and I get killed for the trouble but last night it was easy to judge when those guys where busy calibrating and you could take all the time in the world.  The only problem was staying out of  AKAK’s line of fire, ouch.

[dedalos]

Originally posted by XtrmeJ
Not sure about that Furball. There is guncam footage out there of a 110 lighting up a B17 and it was deffenetly more than those hits. I know it's lieing around in one of these forums.

I'll see if I can dig it up. Not saying your wrong, just not sure is all.

Have you ever noticed that in those films, the attacker seems to completly ignore the fact that the bufs have phasers and photon torpidos in the tail gunner position?  

I was in a dog fight with a 51 last night and I had already put a ton of rounds in it.  It kept going without any maijor damage.  During the fight however, a set of B17s flew by at 1K.  Thre pings and I lost my wing.  I dont mind them being tough to kill as long as we get a chance to take a shot at them too.