The terribly frustrating night of Toonces the Flying Cat

[toonces3]

Hi all.

Ok first things first:



Now that I got that out of the way, last night was probably the most frustrating night I have ever had since I started playing this game.

I did pretty good last tour.  Got my normal 80-100 or so kills and managed to keep a K/D well over 3.0.  I realize most of you don't care about score, but I worked pretty hard to get that type of score.

This tour I decided to try something different.  I decided to a) fly planes that I don't typically fly and b) totally disregard score and fly into as many fights as possible.

Unfortunately I haven't been able to fly too much this tour due to real life.  But even when I did get to fly, I am absolutely getting my butt handed to me and last night was the worst.

A few nights ago I logged on and took up a Ki-84.  I haven't flown this plane too much, maybe a handful of sorties ever.  Anyway, I only had about 45 minutes to play.  Flew to the only dar bar I saw, came across a lone B-17 and sent him to the tower.  Landed, re-armed, lifted and got into a scrap with a co-alt, co-E P-38J.  Sent him to the tower.  Then ran into 3 Bf-109K's over my field.  Sent one to the tower and the other two RTB'd, which was good because I was out of ammo.  Altogether 3 kills in 45 minutes, including a 3v1 where I got one of em.

Now, I was feeling sorta cocky last night.  I lifted my Ki-84 into a furball, and started what became a sort of rinse repeat scenario.  Flew to the furball, mixed it up a bit and then, suddenly I either a) got HO'd on the merge or b) found myself all alone in a sea of red.  Every single fight it seemed.  I had one 1v1 all night.

Here's how my night went.

1.  Flew to dar bar.  Red all over.  Rolled on a lower P-51.  P-51 turns nose on.  I move left a little to keep from colliding and HO takes off my wing.

2.  Flew to dar bar.  Over water.  Numerous green dots on radar.  Get to fight, two green guys go down, 3-5v1 now.  Egress.  Run into two red heading in opposite direction.  Roll on F4U and P-47 winging with him sends me to tower (Crum22).  

3.  Flew to dar bar.  Run into lone P-47 at about 10k.  Get into 1v1.  Have what I think was a pretty good fight but get beat (Crum22 again).

4.  Go to new field.  Lift A6m5 from CV.  Get into scrap, full on furball, get two assists.

5.  Lift from CV, fly to dar bar.  All green die or leave.  Surrounded by sea of red.  Get hit by tempest.  Don't die.  Get into trees and egress like a little sissy while airfield is buried in a sea of red.

6.  Go to different field.  See two red dots coming in and one green dot over field.  Lift Ki-84.  2 110's coming in.  Awesome!  Porking 110's are easy kills!  110's don't pork but fight.  Joey04 hits my engine and I glide to field.

7.  Go to different field.  Lift Ki-84.  Someone is on area asking for help.  Fly out to him.  Somehow, he goes down, Cmustard goes down, other guy goes down or lands, and I'm left 3v1 with 2 spit 16's and a P-51.  Egress, hoping at least one will break off.  No dice.  Roll into all 3, get one, second spit kills me.

8.  I also augered a zero and an F4U-1a.

I don't know if this is typical or not.  I'm trying to get into furballs more and get down low and dirty more.  I feel fairly confident in a 1v1, depending on what plane I lift.  Generally, if I'm in something like a spit or Ki or N1k or some other turny plane, I don't fear the 1v1 against anything.  But I'm having alot of trouble this tour flying into a multiple con engagement at mid-alt and staying alive.  I don't know if this was just a bad night, or poor SA, or I just kept picking poor fights.  It seemed like I was always 5 minutes too late for every fight; right as I got to the fight the initiative had swung to the red guys and I was instantly defensive.

I want to furball, and I'm deliberately taking up slower Japanese planes so I can't fall back on the whole 'run' defense.  But, truthfully, it is working really badly for me.  

Alright, thanks for listening to my whine.

To top it all off, though, I logged and booted up Wings over Vietnam offline.  Went to Instant Action to take out some frustration on some AI Migs and the first Mig-17 I ran into HO'd my F-4.  At that point I just went to bed.  You know it's bad when the AI is HO'ing you.

[toonces3]

I'm going to go ahead and nominate myself for whiniest post of the month.

But seriously, I don't know if this is all part of the learning curve of learning a new plane set, or if I just had a bad night.  I don't know if I need to hit the TA to get beyond the skills I have.  I don't know if I'm trying to be like Kermit and Bnasty- flying to the biggest darbar on the map- and just doing it poorly, or what.

[Ghastly]

Suggestion...

Take the plane you don't usually fly - and fly it the way you fly your usual ride until you get accustomed to it.

- or -

Take the plane you usually fly, and fly it differently than usual (even if it's the suk at whatever you are trying to do).  


What you've described sounds like a combination of changing too much at once, coupled with what is probably the ebb part of the ebb and flow cycle of flying in the arena.  Every once in a while you find that that happens - every sortie goes against you in some manner.  That's part of the game.  Just like you'll find that sometimes, everything that possibly could will break your way.

[Angrist]

To top it all off, though, I logged and booted up Wings over Vietnam offline. Went to Instant Action to take out some frustration on some AI Migs and the first Mig-17 I ran into HO'd my F-4. At that point I just went to bed. You know it's bad when the AI is HO'ing you.

Ok, that was just funny....sad, but funny!:rofl


I'm really to new to this game to be picking difficult rides.  This is really my first complete tour and so EVERYTHING is difficult.  But I'm flying 109's.

For me, last night was a good night.  I came out a little better than 2/1 K/D, and only got HO'd 3 times; which amazed me.  I never go for the HO unless someone is repeatedly trying it on me, and even then I try to duck it.

That being said...most nights for me are like the one you had last night.  Can't win for losing....but oh well, always tomorrow:aok

[B@tfinkV]

sounds terrible!

dont forget the A6M sortie that had you furballing 800yrds above my field gun....i hope the fact that you are the only thing ive hit with a field gun in at least 6 months makes you feel a little worse!

[gpwurzel]

Lol, Bat...thats what I like to see, a sympathetic response......

Toonce, dont let it get to ya mate, so far this tour, I've had troubles getting kills, but no troubles getting assists..lol.......its par for the course as far as I can tell fella.....it'll turn around sometime, and everything you go to kill, you'll kill......


Wurzel

[toonces3]

How could I have forgotten that?

9.  Lifted A6m5 from CV.  Flew into furball.  Nailed RedTop's A6m (for the assist).  109 turns right in front of me.  Roll on his tail.  600 out.  Flying over enemy field lining up shot.  109 flies into smoke from ground fires.  I fly into smoke and then...whack whack whack!  Check 6, tail missing.   Enter enter enter...O..."BatfinkV shot you down."  "You have been killed."

Toonces:  200:  WTF Batfink?  What the hell were you in?

LOL, can't believe I forgot that one.

[TequilaChaser]

toonces,

you need to allow for the frustration factor that you started experiencing and how it played a hand into your night of flying as you progressed on........

frustration will make you upset, mad, po'ed angry etc etc...and this clouds your judgement and SA to make things worse than they really are......

and it happens to every single individual that plays this game at 1 time or another......


just shake it off, and better luck next time up.....

also, as Ghastly posted, experiment with other planes, but don't be changing up so quickly and hoping to experience triumph until you come acustomed to the whole plane set and  everything in between the lines...

SA, BFM, ACM, Energy Management, Gunnery Skills

stick to 1 or 2 planes as your main rides, and experiement casually with any others.but learn the complete ins and outs of those 1 or 2 main rides before moving on  to something else.......

[Jenks]

Toonces3,

Sometimes you're the windshield......Sometimes you're the the bug.

Don't let it get to you, take a deep breath and .......use  the force.



Jenks

[Bosco123]

I know how you feel right now, its no fun at all. There are days were, like today, were you land 13 kills in an ostwind. Then there are some days were you don't get any at all and seem to be the target for everthing.

Its just the simple case good day bad day, I know how it is.

[HomeBoy]

One of the hardest lessons I have had to learn about this game is how dynamic it is.  I mean, I got on Sunday night and flew with authority.  At one point, I think I landed something like ten kills in a row.  Amazing for me.  I got back on last night hoping to pick up where I left off and got nailed a couple of times in a row and just generally struggled the whole night.  Ok, I can blame Internet connection, fatigue, whatever, but in truth, you don't know until you kill or get killed, just who you are facing.  It's likely that on Sunday, I met up with players who were a little less skilled and last night, I got caught by squads with some experience.  Though I'm sure all these things are factors, you really don't know what you're going to face each night.  Once I get myself to understand that, the better I deal with it and in fact, the better I do as a result.

Actually, the unpredictability of this game is one of the things that makes it so addictive.

So, cheer up, it gets better [and worse]!  

[Gulp]

Sounds like fun night to me.  Sometimes I am in the mood to just charge into impossible odds just to see how long I can make it.  Dying doesn't bother me a bit so I go in with nothing to lose.  If I play it just right and kill a couple guys before making it out, great.  If I mix it up, overload my SA with 3+ enemys, and get shot down, great, I learn a little every time.

The one time out of 10 that I beat the terrible odds and take some scalps home makes the other 9 well worth it to me.

That said, sometimes I am in the mood to pick my fights carefully and place surviving ahead of killing.  It's all fun.  If your going to ignore your score for a tour, I would REALLY ignore it and just smile when you see your wing falling away.

Aspen

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by toonces3
Roll into all 3, get one, second spit kills me.

OK, call me a moron (hey!  that was rhetorical!), but I'm missing where the frustration comes in.  Sounds like you had some pretty interesting fights.

- oldman

[MajWoody]

I find myself in impossible situations quite often. Last night I got caught in a 8v1 & just decided to go ballz out & see how long I could live. I got shot down in short order & guess what? I fly right back into that gang again just for the heck of it. I do this way too often but it is fun & gives me an adrenalin rush the whole time.

 Sometimes the guy who shot me down in the 8v1 will me:rolleyes: Talk about adding insult to injury. I know that the reason i'm in that situation is because I put myself there but it's all good. (at least thats what I keep telling myself)  hehe

 Anyway, you were prolly just having one of those days. Tomorrow you'll go out & clobber everything in sight.

[toonces3]

Oldman,
I guess you had to be there.  It wasn't 'interesting' living through it.

Maybe it was a fluke.  I dunno.  Tonight I went 11-1, my one and only death on my first sortie.  Got jumped by a flight of K-4s on the deck and didn't do a strong enough break turn.

After that, it was all kills, including landing 3 deadstick on the CV in my perk F4U-1C.  Something like 4 Ki-84 and 4 more A6M5 kills.  

Even after losing the perks on that first C-hog (shoulda known better than to start off in a perk plane) I finished up 22 perks for the night.

Ah well, see ya all up there.