Krusty.....I usually am able to kill low buffs before they even get into ack range and usually I get first rounds going off before they are within icon range. BaldEagl is absolutly right on this and if your letting the ack kill them first you need training. I consider my dead zone 3k on fighters, if there not dead by then I am screwing up. My longest confirmed kill is 10k and I think there have been some farther than that. Also if your not gonna give proxies to manned guns I would think that should count out aircraft as well. Why would you want icons on manned guns? If I approach a cv and get ack fire I full well can bet some is firing at me in a 5 inch. You know where they are, you know how to kill them, and so when did range become important in dive bombing?
I agree if you get perks there should be a negative but on the same token people might start defending cvs more. This in itself is kind of scary. Just recently I had the pleasure of defending a cv with a few very good 5inch gunners. I am not kidding when I say there were lines of bombers coming in at 5-7k and more 110s than you could shake a stick at. Landed 20+ kills that day in about 15 minutes. I truely wish I had film of it too. It look like Berlin on its worse day....flack everywhere around any bomber that came within range. Id venture to say every manned gun in the fleet still working was manned.
Strip(er)