Real Life Projectile Precision vs. AH Precision

[Stoney74]

I don't want this to turn into a cannon vs. .50 cal debate, but I had a question regarding the precision of cannon rounds during WWII.  I'm no ballistics expert and I couldn't find anything among Tony Williams voluminous information online...

What sort of real-life dispersions were typical for some of the more prevalent cannon?  I'm assuming that the larger, lower velocity rounds, like the Mk108, would have a pretty high dispersion relative to some of the higher muzzle velocity weapons.  Perhaps someone can enlighten me on what factors of a weapon create precision (and by precision, I'm talking about a situation where, all outside factors being constant, the rounds either have or do not have a tendency to hit the same spot during repeated firings).

The second part of the question is how this is modelled in AH.  It seems like folks are able to "bloop" the taters (or tater-tots) at ranges in excess of 600-800 meters.  Is the vertical drop the only thing that is modelled?  I know you can set up the flying target and see the dispersion patterns, but they don't appear to have a relative difference other than drop, which can be countered with extreme convergence settings.

I'm just having a hard time buying that 800 meter tracking shot with the bigger cannon rounds.  I accept it as a game-ism, but from a historical perspective, were these rounds capable of the kind of precision we see in AH?  If so, why did most pilots only fire within 300 meters or so?

[1K3]

bullets and cannons rounds go farther when fired at high altitudes.  I'll try it again offline to see if this is true.

[Vudak]

I don't really know about the first part of your question, but as to the second...  If the real life pilots from WW2 had free ammo and thousands of hours of practice (with planes to be found to shoot at), they'd hit crazy shots too.

I wouldn't be terribly suprised if the current AH subscriber base has more accumulated "hours" than the entire USAAF by now

I'd imagine guys regularly get more kills in a campaign or two than some squadrons did in the entire war, and so on and so forth.

Under those conditions, some people are going to become pretty good shots.

[Karnak]

I seem to recall that the Hispano had less dispersion than the M2 .50 calibre, particularly if mounted in the nose/engine as on the Whirlwind, P-38, Mosquito, Meteor and D.520.

EDIT:

Wing guns are going to be less accurate regardless of gun type simply due to the fact that wings flex and warp a bit just due to manuvering.  The further out on the win the gun(s) are the worse this effect will probably be.

[Kweassa]

I've written a lot of posts in the past concerning this topic, Stoney, and while I'm by no means a munitions expert or game engineer, my theory is that there is a lot more factors in works than just the ballistics alone. Particularly when it comes to the problem of "probability" (of long distance shots) as opposed to the "possibility" of it happening, the determining factor has actually more to do with general game environment of AH2 rather than the ballistics itself, at least according to my line of thought.

[gripen]

Generally the dispersion of the gun itself is a quite minimal factor in the shooting accuracy; the other factors like aiming and gun installation issues etc. has far larger effect.

[Lusche]

Originally posted by Vudak
I don't really know about the first part of your question, but as to the second...  If the real life pilots from WW2 had free ammo and thousands of hours of practice (with planes to be found to shoot at), they'd hit crazy shots too.

I wouldn't be terribly suprised if the current AH subscriber base has more accumulated "hours" than the entire USAAF by now

I'd imagine guys regularly get more kills in a campaign or two than some squadrons did in the entire war, and so on and so forth.

Under those conditions, some people are going to become pretty good shots.

I completely agree.

In two years I have now accumulated more than 10,000 air to air kills and get another 500-1000 per tour - that's an incredible amount of target practice a real pilot could not even dream about.

I might also point out that there are only very few guys who are really capable of hitting other fighters with the 30mm MK 108 at D600. We just notice them more than the average AH player, because they kill us, not the average guy.

If you just assume that there are about 5000 regular MA players, the average pilot seems to have a hit percentage of only 3.5 %. (3.1 % currently ranks you # 2800, 3.7% is needed for rank # 1800).
The guys with hit consitently >10% are actually quite rare, less than 2% of all AH pilots are capable of this.

[Stoney74]

Originally posted by Lusche
I completely agree.

In two years I have now accumulated more than 10,000 air to air kills and get another 500-1000 per tour - that's an incredible amount of target practice a real pilot could not even dream about.

I might also point out that there are only very few guys who are really capable of hitting other fighters with the 30mm MK 108 at D600. We just notice them more than the average AH player, because they kill us, not the average guy.

If you just assume that there are about 5000 regular MA players, the average pilot seems to have a hit percentage of only 3.5 %. (3.1 % currently ranks you # 2800, 3.7% is needed for rank # 1800).
The guys with hit consitently >10% are actually quite rare, less than 2% of all AH pilots are capable of this.

I understand what you're saying, but...

With the Mk108, he only has to hit you with 1 round and its insta-tower, so with a 3.5% hit ratio, 30-40 rounds are all he's gonna need.  I haven't been shot down by a low-scoring (or quality) 110 pilot in some time...

Regardless, I'm still having a hard time understanding the ballistic properties of these bigger but lower muzzle velocity rounds.  They seem to track straight and true, just with a little more drop.  Given the lower muzzle velocity, they should lose precision at a higher rate than .50 cal or 13mm right?  Not to mention the shorter relative barrel length?

[Lusche]

Originally posted by Stoney74
I understand what you're saying, but...

With the Mk108, he only has to hit you with 1 round and its insta-tower, so with a 3.5% hit ratio, 30-40 rounds are all he's gonna need.  I haven't been shot down by a low-scoring (or quality) 110 pilot in some time...

The 3.5% is overall hit percentage. Including attacks on buffs and at close range. Add to this that most of that average players don't use 108 equipped planes much (except 110G for ground atttacks), but rather hizooka or .50 cal planes. I would bet that in fighter vs fighter combat, the average players hit quote would be well under 1% when using the Mk 108.


(And like you, I haven't been shot down by a 110 for a long time. But not because of their crappy aim, but because I try very hard not to get in front of that gunship... I would think you do the same )

[Krusty]

Well, I landed 8 kills in a K-4, but the last was 13mms only. So that comes out to 9.28 rounds per kill (65 / 7). Not bad, almost 10%.

It's possible. The gun just sucks for most situations.

As Lusche said, we all have more kills than even the top aces had. Who was the highest scoring LW pilot? Hartmann? 390-something kills? Hell I get that many in a month sometimes, he took years.

AH pilots definitely have a LOT more practice, but we also don't have air turbulence (sitting 200 yards behind an enemy plane would be hard, methinks), and a lot of other realistic concerns that would limit a pilot's ability to get kills. Fact is we can do whatever we want, and if we crash we just take off again. Real pilots couldn't do that because life was precious. In AH it's wasted nonstop with suicide porkers, dive-bombing lancasters, and suicide cv killers.

Without the worry, we're free to hone the skills well past what the "average" person in WW2 could ever be. Consider that most couldn't hit shots outside 250 yards. Most US P51 pilots went their entire career without seeing an enemy.

[Kweassa]

Actually, it's the ammo counters and distance indicators, more than anything that attributes to the long-range shots happening in game.

[Krusty]

Disagree... When I'm shooting I'm not looking at range. I'm looking at sight picture.

Even if you handicapped people by removing closing/opening indicators (what the range does) folks would still learn to fire at the sight picture, because we STILL have unlimited lives in which to learn our lessons, real pilots had but 1.

Ammo counters don't matter if you are only looking for 1 fight then going RTB, as they did in real life.

In this game it matters because you can fly around in a VERY hostile VERY target rich environment for an hour and get into a dozen fights. The ammo counters reflect the environment, not the other way around.

[Viking]

Originally posted by Stoney74
Regardless, I'm still having a hard time understanding the ballistic properties of these bigger but lower muzzle velocity rounds.  They seem to track straight and true, just with a little more drop.  Given the lower muzzle velocity, they should lose precision at a higher rate than .50 cal or 13mm right?  Not to mention the shorter relative barrel length?

Why do you think precision has anything to do with muzzle velocity? The rounds take a little longer to get there (fractions of a second) and thus they drop a little more. What do you think is missing?

While the MK 108 is a so-called “low velocity” gun the muzzle velocity is still more than half a kilometer per second. It’s not a blowpipe.

[Kweassa]

Disagree... When I'm shooting I'm not looking at range. I'm looking at sight picture.

 Well, I expected as much, since you disagree with everything and everyone.

Even if you handicapped people by removing closing/opening indicators (what the range does) folks would still learn to fire at the sight picture, because we STILL have unlimited lives in which to learn our lessons, real pilots had but 1.

 Amusingly, such unlimited lives don't really seem to help all that well in some of AH's contendors when a few crutches are removed. As a matter of fact, your often derogatory comments about IL2/FB/'46 damage modelling is somewhat a clear indicator in the difference of gunnery effectiveness between the two seems.

 I mean really, why would you bash one game if you weren't terrible in it?

Ammo counters don't matter if you are only looking for 1 fight then going RTB, as they did in real life.

 Unfortunately, the MA is a multiple engagement. Although you may be able to control your number of desired fights to some extent, in the end there's no knowing how many bad guys you would have to exchange blows with. It is quite nervous thing to be living in the Wild West, with no indication of just how many bullets you've got left in your revolver.

In this game it matters because you can fly around in a VERY hostile VERY target rich environment for an hour and get into a dozen fights. The ammo counters reflect the environment, not the other way around.

 People react to what they are given with. Take away something, or put in a different thing, and they start reacting differently.

 It's as simple as that.

[Krusty]

First of all, it's very insulting for you to say:

"I mean really, why would you bash one game if you weren't terrible in it?"

My comments about IL2's damage model have nothing to do with "being terible in it"... Matter of fact I *DO* hit in IL2 almost as well as I do in Aces High. End result is IL2 makes almost every round that isn't 30mm or greater do jack watermelon to the target.

That's neither here nor there, because I'm not talking about trouble HITTING the target. I said, if you scroll up you'll see it, folks would quite easily learn to fire based on how large the plane is in their gunsight.

Take your lame defensive attacks elsewhere.

I disagree with you because you present flawed arguments at times. THIS is one of them. You're blaming problems on icons and ammo counters. I'm not going to fault you for liking realistic flight sims. I am going to fault you for placing blame on these features where it does not exist.

Icons don't change the end result -- players in this game would still be able to know when the target is still within "sniping range."

Ammo counters do not change the way the game is played. If this game had 1-time encounters, where you had to RTB when you spotte the first enemy, regardless of the outcome, ammo counters could be removed easily. The problem is that there's always an endless stream of cons

How's that for your desire for accuracy? I see no comments that would actually change gameplay! What about the endless streams on reupping planes, the Ability to up, die, reup, die, reup, and fight the same person 5 times in a row until they run out of ammo and fuel and die near your start field?

In the environment that AH has, you need to know how much fuel you have, how much ammo you have, and judge when its time to get the hell out of Dodge. In real life this was EASY. In this game it is the opposite. You can't compare this game to real life in any way other than the performance specifications of the aircraft.


So take the defensive attacks and consider that you might be wrong. I wasn't rude I didn't warrant that type of reply.