What am I doing wrong?

[The Fugitive]

Film every fight, before you engage, start film, then stop it after the kill, or when you are in the tower    which ever comes first. This will make short films, easier to send or post.

Another option you may have over looked in the above fight... the first spit may not have been the one that pinged you up, it may have been one "turnin and burnin" in the fight. Some of these guys have unbelievable timing due to years of experiance. A pony doing a BnZ pass is pretty easy to know where he will pass on his run. With the skills in timing some of these guys have they will turn to where they KNOW you will pass and just blast a few rounds out there. Some of these guys, thats all they need there aim and timing is so good.

Hang in there, it sounds like your getting the hang of it. Askin questions instead of complaining about what happened is a good sign

[Ast]

Thanks Fugative, I'm tryin. My situational awareness is my biggest problem. I just have trouble keeping my eyes around me instead of getting the bogie focus.  

[mars01]

I mistook this game for a regular flight sim, it's not. It's insanely fun and challenging.

Yes it is.  

How are your views set up?  How much time do you spend looking around, checking your different views?  Can you still manuver your plane while your view is loolking behind, up or sideways?

If you are looking forward more than a few seconds at a time in a fight, you are not looking around enough and you will miss alot.

[B@tfinkV]

at 10k the spit will push 300 mph in level flight no problem, the spit16 even faster.


you were going 500mph when you dived on the 109, but pulling hard for the shot and to zoom you would have lost speed to make you around 400mph.  


lets say the spit is flying at 300 in a slight dive during this moment.



you have zoomed back up and the spit followed, had you leveled off at the top he would be stuck 1-1.5k below you.

you instead looped back down, and the spit was stalling, hanging on his prop unknown to you.



if all you heard was a ping ping ping, there is a good chance the spit got a good crossing deflection as you zoomed past him, or her, which is not too hard to imagine.



then of course there is that fact it was another spit maybe.



heres a quick diagram to explain my thoughts.




this is using the theory that it was a spitmkV, that was already in the furball, not an unseen foe, that could have climbed alot higher with you.



sometimes its hard to remember that a single snapshot is all one needs to kill, an La7 zooming past at 550mph will still go down if a flak hits it from 1.5k.

[Schutt]

Originally posted by Ast
.............I pulled back up, but somehow, even at that speed, a Spit 5 or 9, can't remember which, caught my tail, and somehow he FOLLOWED me up to about a 3,000ft/m climb rate, while he was turn fighting?
HOW did he merge on me and keep up with me when he was going *much* slower than me?
I started a slow left not to bleed E, I then pulled an immelman, and came down back into the furball with plenty of speed, suddenly I hear the familiar ping ping, the dang spit 5/9 followed me up from a high E high speed dive zoom and boom tactic and pinged me on my way back down, I realize he was a MUCH better pilot, but explain to me what I did wrong here?
I used my advantages as good as I could. I'm tryin to learn but it's just so discouraging when I do what I can and it still doesn't work.

Definetly need a film here. My guess would be you pulled up to steep, lost energy on the immelman and didnt see the spit before he latched onto your six.

With p51d it would probably payed off to extend away from the spit instead of climbing, spit8/9/14/16 climb pretty good. Probably it was not a spit5 but a 9 or 8. Pony isnt bad but climbs way worse than the spit.
When you do a slow left turn you give him the chance to cut the corner considerably, if he sees the turn and hopes you continue it for a while he can shorten the distance by a big amount. So actually you see him closing (-) while he still is a lot slower than you.
Then when you turn around he again can cut the corner, because you had a lot of speed and did a wide turn or you did a tight turn and lost speed.
 
Spitfire has hispanos, if the pilot doesnt care for how much ammo he uses he can ping you up from 600 or 800 out if your going in a predictible path.

So basically he did cut the corner 2 times and you lost energy by turning around, he did a more energy efficiant turn around and used the gained distance to build up speed.

You didnt say from where he pinged you. You can verry well shoot someone from below, and since altitude is feet and distance is yards you can get a nice 400yards shot from 1000feet below the other guy while still being a lot slower, which essentially means that you dont need to have the same energy to ping someone.

How do you know it was the same spitfire? You wrote that there were 8 enemys, i can not keep track of more than 3 at a time. And if its 8 enemys they are not all at 10k standing still, might well have been this guy was 3k above the one you pinged.

- Film it
- Get better overview
- if you try to get away dont let the persuer cut corners
- check with some good bnz pilot if he gives you a ride (eg swoop,skatsr)

Good luck in future!

Fly knight, see the light

EDIT: just saw batfinks post, good explanation. Another point coming to my mind is that diving for a long way looses you lots of e since at some point the dive speed does no longer improove much but you loose alt to keep it. So maybe thinking "i have 10k alt advantage in E" is an mistake because the real advantage was only about 6k worth in alt once you were down to 10k. And some of the turnfighting enemys might have been coasting with high speed in a big circle around the furball, so the "slow spit" might have already had 350mph

[Schatzi]

Good points so far.


Another thing i noticed. You said that youre practicing "tracking a target" offline *despite blacking out.....


Be aware that the higher G forces you pull, the more Energy youre loosing pulling that maneuver. You being close to blackout often (ie high G) means youre burning a *lot* of Energy.

If you want to turn quick/tight without loosing too much E, go vertical (unless you have someone on your tail - see Batfinks diagram).

[Ast]

Originally posted by Schatzi
Good points so far.


Another thing i noticed. You said that youre practicing "tracking a target" offline *despite blacking out.....


Be aware that the higher G forces you pull, the more Energy youre loosing pulling that maneuver. You being close to blackout often (ie high G) means youre burning a *lot* of Energy.

If you want to turn quick/tight without loosing too much E, go vertical (unless you have someone on your tail - see Batfinks diagram).

That wasn't in the pony, that was in the spitfire and those enemy planes flying above the friendly airfields fly mighty slow! It'll just take time and I believe what Batfink said is either what happened, or there was another Spit that I did not see. But the diagram looks dead on to what I did. Back to reading Netaces!

[jetb123]

Or one suggestion is. That he could of been high as u just waiting for u to come down? Thats why I dont like to relay on the rope alot. Speacily trying to rope a good climbing spit. Id rather just put some flaps down and try to turn fight it thats where it gets really fun Film ur fight next time, always good to look back on old films, and lets better people help u easyier.

[Pooface]

netaces is a great site, but once you start to understand the basics of the game, its not going t help you much. the best experience you will earn is by flying. fly into crowded areas in the MA to practice SA, go to the TA for help and explanation, and a lot of indepth training, and if you want to practise dogfighting skills stop by the duelling arena, that's where you will learn to turn fight and learn how to evade people.


keep up with what you're doing. you seem like a nice guy, and you're learning fast, so just stick with it

also, if you're tuned to channel 200, and someone shoots you down like they did here, or if you see someone pull a move you dont understand, ask them on ch200, most of the time they will answer

and welcome to AH:)

[Ast]

Originally posted by Pooface
netaces is a great site, but once you start to understand the basics of the game, its not going t help you much. the best experience you will earn is by flying. fly into crowded areas in the MA to practice SA, go to the TA for help and explanation, and a lot of indepth training, and if you want to practise dogfighting skills stop by the duelling arena, that's where you will learn to turn fight and learn how to evade people.


keep up with what you're doing. you seem like a nice guy, and you're learning fast, so just stick with it

also, if you're tuned to channel 200, and someone shoots you down like they did here, or if you see someone pull a move you dont understand, ask them on ch200, most of the time they will answer

and welcome to AH:)

Will do, just relearning all my BCM/ACM stuff! I'm having trouble shaking a bandit on my 6 no matter who it is. I'll get there, just need more practice. I'll be out of town after today til monday but then I'll record another try at this(BnZ in the Pony).  and Let you guys critic it so I can get some good feedback on everything I did wrong. My biggest problem is situational awareness, but it's getting better now that I've adjusted my views to how I like them, and swivel my head instead of target focus. I've started to be checking all around me constantly, if I get a target, I'll focus in on him but keep my eyes peeled for someone coming in on me.

[Pooface]

thats good. what i suggest is that you move out of the pony just for a little while, and try something like a spitfire in the TA. spitfire is great learning plane, and if you need to learn how to shake a bandit, you will be a lot more successful in a spit than a pony. im not saying use spit in the MA all the time or anything, but i suggest if you're practicing on your own or in the TA/DA, jump in a spit mk5, things will come much quicker to you. once you can do it right in a spit, you just import those skills right into other planes. pony can turnfight pretty good too if you want, goes really nice in rolling scissors, but thats another, more advanced lesson lol

have fun most of all. if you're getting bored of being killed over and over in the MA, just log into the TA or DA instead, where you can learn stuff as you play

[Ast]

Originally posted by Pooface
thats good. what i suggest is that you move out of the pony just for a little while, and try something like a spitfire in the TA. spitfire is great learning plane, and if you need to learn how to shake a bandit, you will be a lot more successful in a spit than a pony. im not saying use spit in the MA all the time or anything, but i suggest if you're practicing on your own or in the TA/DA, jump in a spit mk5, things will come much quicker to you. once you can do it right in a spit, you just import those skills right into other planes. pony can turnfight pretty good too if you want, goes really nice in rolling scissors, but thats another, more advanced lesson lol

have fun most of all. if you're getting bored of being killed over and over in the MA, just log into the TA or DA instead, where you can learn stuff as you play

With everything I ahve to do to succeed, theres simply no way to GET bored!  I really do appreciate you guys here, this community is great! And I do use the spit at times, but I cannot get used to it in the MA. I will try and use it in the TA and DA some. Although the DA seems to have some uh, childish issues at times. The other night I did do something very useful though! We had 2 sets of buffs going in on a field, I flew high and ahead, and dove in, I brought there fighters out with me chasing me halfway across the area, so that by the time they realized the 24's where about to blow there base to smitherines, there was no reaction! WAHOO FOR ME! It doesn't matter if they killed me, I had a great time zooming in and making success for my teammates! and I am having alot of fun, but I do get discouraged at times.

[Pooface]

Originally posted by Ast
With everything I ahve to do to succeed, theres simply no way to GET bored!  I really do appreciate you guys here, this community is great! And I do use the spit at times, but I cannot get used to it in the MA. I will try and use it in the TA and DA some. Although the DA seems to have some uh, childish issues at times. The other night I did do something very useful though! We had 2 sets of buffs going in on a field, I flew high and ahead, and dove in, I brought there fighters out with me chasing me halfway across the area, so that by the time they realized the 24's where about to blow there base to smitherines, there was no reaction! WAHOO FOR ME! It doesn't matter if they killed me, I had a great time zooming in and making success for my teammates! and I am having alot of fun, but I do get discouraged at times.

lol, its only natural, especially if you're new. the game learning curve can be quite scary to some people

[Ast]

Originally posted by Pooface
lol, its only natural, especially if you're new. the game learning curve can be quite scary to some people

Challenging yes, scary, no! Luckily we have great people here who like to hear scenarios and love to help!

[mars01]

I'm having trouble shaking a bandit on my 6 no matter who it is.

The only thing outside of training that is going to help this is flying low and into greater odds.  When you get tired of it then go do some BnZ or something else.

For Shaking guys you need to use alot of power management, you need to be able to read you opponents "Thrust Vector" and their "Shot Vector".  Once you can see these things, while looking behind you, only then do you know how hard to pull to stay out of his bullets.  

Thrust Vector = the lline the plane is flying due to inertia, control and power elements.  (Some I'm sure will have  a better definition.  I hope. )

Shot Vector - as you know bullets can not turn corners, so if you look at where their  nose is pointing you can read where their bullets are going to go in relation to you.

Combine this with adjusting power and knowledge of the plane on your six and you can start to develope ways to shake people.

Flying the spit, hurri or FM2 are the best ways to have early success at this, buit you have to allow your enemy to get on your six.  This is called baiting.

Once you have an enemy zooming down on you...    When they are 1.5 out start a gradual left or right turn, then when they are 1.0 increase the turn pull hard enough that you are not on their "Thrust Vector" and you are out of the "Shot Vector", but not so hard that you end up perpendicular to their flight path.  What you want to have happen is, they go flying by missing you by a few feet so that you can roll in behind them and get off a shot.

When you see the point that they are going to pass you, (usually when their canopy is about at your tail, roll back in on them.  This is where the power adjustments are critical.  If you notice they are slowing, you need to come off the power fast.  If they are speeding by and going to overshoot keep the coal on so they dont go by so fast that you cant get a shot.

What you learn in doing the above will help you create tactics of your own to shake other people.

Search for posts from wildthing on reversals or anyone else.  Learn to scisors effectively and what planes you can use it against.

Again save BnZ tactics for when you have had enough low and slow and dogeing other dropping in on you.

Go to the TA and ask people to show you what a reversal looks like.

Join other pilots planes  to watch them in action.  Most usually they will accept your request.  If you do, thank the pilot when it's over.