In terms of pure loadout, which fighter has best armament?

[bozon]

262 - 4 nose mounted 30mm.
Fire 2 at a time and you have more ammo than you'll need.

[Karnak]

Originally posted by bozon
262 - 4 nose mounted 30mm.
Fire 2 at a time and you have more ammo than you'll need.

Way too hard to hit with from a Me262 though.  That is their downfall.

[Strich9]

Originally posted by Karnak
Which is upsetting as it was regarded with affection for being a tough aircraft that would get you home, like the P-47.

I've read that many times about the moss, however in this game it is a roman candle pilot wounding sponge

[Tony Williams]

For those of you who don't know it, this analysis: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm
gives you a detailed breakdown of the effectiveness of the guns, and of the armament of selected WW2 fighters.

The hardest-hitting fighter armament of WW2 belonged to the Me 262 (4x30mm). For other fighters to equal the destructive firepower it could deliver in one second, they would have to fire continuously for:

Fw 190A-8/R8 (2x13mm, 2x20mm, 2x30mm) = 1.4 seconds
Fw 190A-8 (2x13mm, 4x20mm) = 2.8 secs
Tempest (4x20mm) = 2.3 secs
Spitfire Mk XIV (2x20mm, 2x.50) = 4.5 secs
Ki-84 (4x20mm) = 4.8 secs
P-51D (6x.50) = 6.5 secs
P-47 (8x.50) = 4.8 secs
P-38 (1x20mm, 4x.50) = 5.3 secs
Yak-9T (1x37mm, 1x12.7mm) = 4.7 secs

This is just a selelction, there are lots more examples given.

You will also find other articles comparing WW2 aircraft weaponry on my site.

Tony Williams
Homepage: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk

[halcyon]

Are you talking about just pure A2A attack? Or a mix of ground attack as well?
I'll assume the question asks "pure loadout, overall."

In this case, the answer is the P-47D series. (I prefer the P-47D-25 myself.)

Eight .50 calibur MGs with 3400 rounds, plus you can slap on two 1,000 lb bombs, a 500 lb bomb on the center pylon, and (someone correct me if I'm wrong here) 10 HVAR rockets on the wing pylons. (this would be the loadout for the P-47D-40. The D-25 cannot load HVARs but the smaller yielding versions)

Each HVAR class rocket yields ABOUT 230 lbs of ordinance, which if you total it all up, the P-47D can carry a maximum of roughly 4,800 lbs.
This is more then enough to destroy any GV on the ground, or any hanger that stands on the field.
It's a little more than half what is needed to sink a CV, which means potentially two fully loaded P-47D's could drop a CV battle group (assuming it takes 8,000 lbs to sink a CV).

Dunno 'bout you fellas but this plane says "pure pwnage" to me.

P.S.
Btw, I'd rather fly a P-47D-25 light into A2A combat then any of the Fockewulf series.

[Spikes]

Originally posted by Wobblin-Goblin
Fw190A8?

I really like having guns that'll pound enemy aircraft, the manueverability stinks, though.

Which fighters do you like best (for armament)?

N1K2J

Potato Gunz

[Tony Williams]

Originally posted by halcyon
In this case, the answer is the P-47D series. (I prefer the P-47D-25 myself.)

Eight .50 calibur MGs with 3400 rounds,

There was once on the web an interesting account of a real-life test which took place during the Korean War, between the USAF and the USN, to determine whose planes were better at ground strafing. They set up an old truck on a range, and first the USAF plane strafed it with its .50 cals. After the pass there was no visible difference so they went to check and found that it had quite a few holes in it and the seats were smouldering, and that was it. Then the navy plane came in with its 20mm, and the truck disintegrated - it was scrap metal.

Each HVAR class rocket yields ABOUT 230 lbs of ordinance, which if you total it all up, the P-47D can carry a maximum of roughly 4,800 lbs.
This is more then enough to destroy any GV on the ground,

Provided you can hit it....

The Typhoon when firing RPs in combat (as opposed to in training) had an average miss distance of 60 yards (later improved to about 45 yards). On average, they needed to fire 200 RPs to hit a tank. When dropping bombs, they had an average miss distance of 120 yards. There's no reason to suppose that the P-47 would have done any better.

Tony Williams
Homepage: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk

[halcyon]

Originally posted by Tony Williams
There was once on the web an interesting account of a real-life test which took place during the Korean War, between the USAF and the USN, to determine whose planes were better at ground strafing. They set up an old truck on a range, and first the USAF plane strafed it with its .50 cals. After the pass there was no visible difference so they went to check and found that it had quite a few holes in it and the seats were smouldering, and that was it. Then the navy plane came in with its 20mm, and the truck disintegrated - it was scrap metal.

Unfortunately the only navy plane in the game with 20mm cannons is the F4U-1C, and from what I hear this plane is getting scrapped from the game.
What they need is that F6F version with the 20 mils.

Provided you can hit it....

The Typhoon when firing RPs in combat (as opposed to in training) had an average miss distance of 60 yards (later improved to about 45 yards). On average, they needed to fire 200 RPs to hit a tank. When dropping bombs, they had an average miss distance of 120 yards. There's no reason to suppose that the P-47 would have done any better.

It's pretty easy to dive bomb any GV on the ground. Even if you don't land a 1,000 lb bomb straight on it's hatch, the proximity explosion is usually enough to get the softer targets.
Hope you don't plan on strafing tanks with .50 cals hehe.

[Spikes]

Originally posted by MiloMorai
I thought it was .303" peashooters in the nose?  

[Kweassa]

It's pretty easy to dive bomb any GV on the ground. Even if you don't land a 1,000 lb bomb straight on it's hatch, the proximity explosion is usually enough to get the softer targets.
Hope you don't plan on strafing tanks with .50 cals hehe.

 Ofcourse, since we who fly AH, casually disregard potential dangers and neglect safety measures, it is farely easy to hit any ground target no matter what the risk. However, things seem to have been very different for real life pilots who were afraid of crashing to the ground. When that happened, they died on the spot, and didn't get to reup.

[halcyon]

Originally posted by Kweassa
Ofcourse, since we who fly AH, casually disregard potential dangers and neglect safety measures, it is farely easy to hit any ground target no matter what the risk. However, things seem to have been very different for real life pilots who were afraid of crashing to the ground. When that happened, they died on the spot, and didn't get to reup.

I'm not sure I'm really following your point.
You're saying that we should be comparing real life crashes to in-game crashes?

[Kweassa]

I'm not sure I'm really following your point.
You're saying that we should be comparing real life crashes to in-game crashes?

 
 I'm saying the figures Mr. Williams quoted shows what ground attack was like in reality. On average only one out of 200 rockets fired would ever connect at te target, and the accuracy of low-angle, low-altitude bombing was also horrendously low.

 This is why tankbusters were armed with powerful guns, and the preferred method of tank busting was by far strafing it with guns that can penetrate tank armour. Compared to these specialized planes, ordinary fighter/bomber aircraft were largely inefficient and ineffecitive in the tank busting role.

[mussie]

Originally posted by Flint
Yak-T, or the potato shooter on the 109. For sheer joy of slaughter hard to go wrong with the Typhie or Tempest though.

There is no better feeling than 1 shot 1 kill

i have even snap shot a spitty with that big mutha

[Masherbrum]

Ta-152, nothing comes even close.