Bob Johnson was a friend of mine. His memory wasn't perfect, but I don't recall any penchant for exaggeration. Moreover, I find it distasteful for folks who play an online game as their reference to belittle a pilot who was considered by many to be the most talented fighter pilot to serve in the 8th Air Force.
Widewing, it's possible that Johnson was an exception to the rule, I'll give you that. Please don't suggest that the only reference point I have is AH when I said that he could've been exaggerating. That's far from the best way to interpret my beliefs or opinions. Moreover, the attribution a near-universal character trait to Johnson, e.g. exaggeration, belittles him no more than saying that he exhibited confirmation bias, or whichever non-rational psychological habit you prefer. Lastly, whether or not Johnson was a talented pilot does not tell us if he exaggerated.
I have read a lot of aviation and combat history, and being prone to exaggeration about the capabilities of their own aircraft is shown by nearly every pilot. This was the sense in which I suggested the Johnson could be exaggerating, and it's also the reason why we have test pilots to produce hard data like you provided for us here. I can almost say that it's never reliable when a pilot makes a blanket, universal statement about the comparison of two aircraft that were belligerents, or even which flew together against opposition. The pilot is thinking or remembering specific scenarios and specific events, which occurred at certain altitudes, in some kind of whether, etc. And the similarities to AH really far apart when we remember that ETO pilots considered 20k feet to be low altitude.
On the other hand, it's never blameworthy to expect some kind of correspondence between the performance of AH aircraft and the real thing, because that's what this simulation is supposed to deliver. That would seem to be the expectation of the original post, and I think it has been answered well.
