My applogies
I really meant to just come in here and say Hi! It was fun, and Goodbye for a while, I don’t seem to fit in AH at this time, and maybe I will be back in a year to try again.
I really used to enjoy AH, I found the gameplay fast, immersive, and fun.
There were massive furballs, intense quick fights, and glory of glories, the only thing perked was the Tempest and the Jets. C hogs were the King of the arena.
Over the years game play kept changing and I tried to change with it. The C hog was perked and about 700 lbs added to the weight, the awesome C Hog was turned (by comparison) into a mediocre dog.
So I adapted, and went to the Pony D, pretty nice ride, and there were no eny values to worry about at that time. The D has a decent ordinance package for the few times I wanted to attack ground targets. The 50s sucked, but you just had to really know how to attack other aircraft. Over all, a really-really sweet ride. No C hog (old model) but just a dream to fly.
In comes the Eny, game play changes, can’t fly the Pony half the time, so I adapt, I went to the 190A8, not that I like German Iron, it is just what works best in the game. I really started to rack up the kills and K/D in the A8. I was like 300/15 for a while. Those who didn’t know plane types thought I was a Dora, those who had a clue usually figured it was an A5. Pure synchronicity between man and machine, almost better than me and the C Hog.
Then HiTech changes the game again, he put the letters at the end of the name once you are under like 600 yds (or something like that) The cat was out of the bag, I was in a A8, not a Dora, people then knew they could run you down quickly in a Laa Laa, and the slavering Spits that followed would eat you alive once you had bled off speed to fight the overmodeled Lavochkin.
So now how to adapt? I believe in the philosophy that it is better to fly a poorer plane with excellence, than to fly a variety of great and poorer planes with mediocrity. The C Hog is perked and porked, Eny has you screwed for the Ponys, and the range now lets everyone know that you are in an A8 and duck soup. And no one of any personal integrity would fly a LaLa or a Spit, or a Niki. I nearly wanted to crash my airplane rather than have it broadcast that “AKfoder lands 4 Kills with a LA-7.” Or AKfoder lands 3 kills with a NIK2” How freaking embarrassing, I mean a man has to have some pride, right?
Then I discovered the 109F4. What a killing machine! Eny value guaranteed that you could fly it almost all of the time. Pack some guns out on the gondies, and you had awesome firepower, great maneuverability. The views sucked, and the plane (like all German Iron in AH) was under modeled, but flown well, it was a killer. Again, I have no preference for German Iron, in fact if I had my druthers I wouldn’t be caught in Luftwaffe machine, but real life politics has nothing to do with the game, or game play.
Then HiTech took the gondies away from the F4, and really porked the front views.
Back to the drawing board. What to fly, what to fly? Has to be either really fast, or really maneuverable, needs cannons, and a reasonably high Eny so you can fly it most of the time. Out comes the Dora, pretty, fast, long legs, and with the cannon placement, really adequate firepower for BnZ. She is a fast girl, who likes fast pilots, again, an under modeled ride, (other than speed), but just one awesome ride.
But the arena was changing, harder and harder to find furballs, more spread out fighting; ack was turning into 1990s technology-laser guide firestorms. And worse of all, I was starting to have rubber bullet problems, I could light up a bomber with the 30mms from the ME163 and it wouldn’t even smoke. Hammer fighters at under 200 yards, and not even a wing part came off. This went on for months, and months, I changed and upgrade motherboards, video cards, Ethernet cards, power supplies, more RAM, all kinds of video and other configurations, ran all kinds of diagnostics software, no luck; rubber bullets.
In short, it wasn’t fun anymore. HiTech seemed to zero in on my plane of choice for over 4 years, and pork it in some way. If I had stayed, he would probably have perked the Dora.
The AKcurly and a few others started to play World of Warcraft, what a dweeb game, but there were no rubber bullets. And the game is very addictive, and very immersive, and worse of all I started to have fun. So I went to Warcrack. I discovered the Battle Grounds, where you can fight the hordes of Horde. I eventually made a twink Hunter for the 19s. Took months and months, but I am sure the Horde hate Dewkiss, the Night Elf Hunter from hell.
But I missed AH, so I thought I would come back and give it a try. I took the name Kerthunk because I wasn’t an official AK anymore, and AKfoder is a used name. I came back in I tried, and all in all I wasn’t having much fun. I mostly took up the Dora, still a nice ride; But I kept getting a nose full of ack anywhere near a CV, or a base. I got frustrated with diving on scuds at our base, only to have the ack take him out before I could get a shot off. Sure you get a proxy kill, whoopee, but I have bled off the alt I had spent 10 minutes climbing to get.
And then flying over a group of 4 or 5 on your side, hammering a single low con, and after 4 minutes they kill him and then everyone is patting themselves about “great kill” on the vox. In the old days we did that, but it was called a gang bang.
Furballs now seem to be over a base where the bogeys are circling like sharks in the laser guided ack at the field or the town. Spit 16s seem to have replaced the LA7 as the ride of choice, but still lots of LAs around.
My last fights were pure desperation, it was either take a boring flight with a Dora, and spend the next 30 minutes looking for a fight, or up at a field that was being attacked and be one of the dweeb sharks circling in the laser ack. Pure desperation, I upped an L-Gay-5 (confession is good for the soul). I got on the tail of a Pony D, and in short work, he ate me for lunch. You have got to suck if you can’t kill a co-e Pony with an over modeled Lavochkin. OK, well, give me another month or so, and I will eat the Pony and spit him out.
Up again, get some alt, get on the six of a Hog 1A, he has a bit of e, but as I hammer his wing, he only loses right side flap and aileron, but not the wing, he dives down, (god my shooting sucks), I dive, and by now I have a Spit 16 on my six. I do some rolls, flaps out, rudder trim, he overshoots in the rolling scissors, I flame his engine. Got the hog on my six now, he wants paybacks, and so I am sure does the Spittie who is on fire at my 12. So I out roll the poor hog who is missing wing parts, roll under his belly to finish him, and then I get a face full of cannons from a 110. End of story; no kills. I am sure the Hog and Spit16 and 110 pilots were congratulating each other on the great kill. A good pilot would have killed the Hog before the Spit came near his six. Then used the Spit 16, and the 110 for a chew toys.
The problem wasn’t that I got shot down, the problem wasn’t that I was out maneuvered, the problem isn’t that I can’t shoot, the problem isn’t that I suck, the problem isn’t the ack or the plane modeling.
The problem is that I have been playing over a week, and other than some time with the AK’s, I am not really having any fun. I keep waiting for the fun to start.
And fun is the reason that I play on-line games.
