I'm sure I've posted on this sort of topic a million times but I will do so again for the sake of this discussion. As most know I am a survivalist, let me define that for you. A survivalist is a person who seeks to sustain his life through adversity however possible. Allow me to illustrate how I think it, I abide by these laws everytime I take-off in a fighter it's kind of like the 3 laws of robotics:
1) Engage the enemy in an effort to preserve my life and the lives of my squad/teammates.
2) Destroy enemy aircraft as long as it does not conflict with the first law.
3) Fascilitate the strategic objectives and goals of my Country/Squadron within the context of the area I am fighting so long as it does not conflict with the first two laws.
So, we can summarize my laws as Life, Death and Country/Squadron in that order. I have played with these three laws in different orders but none are as fun to me as 1) Life, 2) Death, 3) Country. The game takes on an added excitement factor when self-infused with a genuine fear of dying. Yes, I suppose this makes a person more timid, but prudently so, selectively timid is the same as selectively aggressive. Blindly aggressive is the same as reckless abandon, blindly timid is the same as cowardice. So there is a constant balance.
One thing I know about myself is I fight better when I care about dying. By that I mean, yes, I am more descriminating in my engagements but even when caught at a disadvatage I really, really want to live so fly like my pants are on fire. The old saying desperation is the mother of invention applies. When I am flying with no concern for my virtual demise I am not so inspired, I'll get lazy and do things that I would not normally do just because I am not thinking of the outcome. For example, I will latch onto someone's 6 who did something dweeby to me this hop or the last and make sure I kill him even if it means letting one of his buddies kill me. This I would not do if I was flying to survive. Flying with no concern for dying makes for very unrealistic fights. I'm doubting many pilots were willing to accept certain death just to knock another plane down if they had other alternatives.
Just because people are running don't assume they are cowards or even survivalists. People do run out of ammunition and gas, people do like to egress from a fight to regain some altitude before re-engaging, people do like to return to base after they get several kills, people do not like to blow the E required to reverse 180 degrees into an enemy who is conserving E some distance away on their 6 o' clock. These are all facts and reasons to leave a fight even if there are co-alt/co-E planes that wish to engage them.
Flying to survive does not mean you do not fight at a disadvantage. Flying to survive simply requires you not fight at a disadvantage if other options are available. I don't care how good you are in this game as a survivalist or not you are going to find yourself at a disdvantage ALOT. There is always a balance between getting kills and making yourself vulnerable to attack, everytime you engage you are making yourself vulnerable to attack in some way. Show me a survivalist who never fights at a disadvantage and I'll show you a career vulcher or a guy who gets very,very few kills few per unit time so is basically harmless anyways. We all fight at a disdvantage, the difference is a survivalist doesn't go out of his way to put himself in situations of disadvantage.
Zazen