The HO is rarely despised on grounds of its 'reality'. Rather, its the nature of the HO itself which many seasoned game pilots seem to have a very loathesome attitude towards - and frankly I think its completely understandable.
The fundamental purpose of evey aerial combat maneuver is to shoot down the enemy and not be shot down yourself. It can be viewed as an art and science - not all that different from the art of boxing a prize fighter would strive to learn. In a psychological sense, to many of such 'vets' seeing a relatively novice pilot going guns blazing in every HO merge in a blatant disregard to his own surivival might be even insulting.
In the real life, the price of death justifies smart ACM, but in the game, since 'death' is hardly a factor to consider most obviously the result of combat is usually measured in whether one has shot down the other or not. Since nobody really cares about one's own virtual death in the game, why should anyone try hard to learn something, when they can just fly straight and leave it upto Lady Luck to decide who's gonna be the winner?
No matter how much one may be skilled, the deciding factor of the HO is basically luck. By going Head-to-head both parties are given a chance to shoot, and no matter how good a shot you are, if the other guy lands some rounds on your plane you will suffer for it. That's why the vets hate it. It is basically a factor of combat they cannot control, and ACM is all about control - forcing the enemy plane into a bad position, never giving him a chance to fire back, getting that perfect opportunity to finally saddle behind his rear and let 'er rip.
Therefore, the perfect fight for a vet is a fight where he is in total control. The worst fight for a vet, is a fight which win or loss is decided by a factor he cannot control - which in essence makes all his ACM training somewhat in vain. The worst moment for a vet, would be being suckered into a HO situation and getting the worst of it. The skill factor dictates the vet himself should be a winner, and yet, luck factor overrules the skill factor in the HO.
Man, that'd suck.
