Yup, anyone who thinks flying extremely timidly is good for fighter rank has no clue wtf they are talking about.
I disagree. I'll compare a squady and I for an example.
I fly for the fun of it, and generally don't like to BnZ/pick (though I can and do do it depending on the situation and my mood). I've never cared for rank and it shows. These are my stats as of time of posting;
My overall fighter rank is 270.
Nothing spectacular as you can see; I don't expect it to be, I do a lot of stupid stuff that I don't expect to get out of, just to have fun.
Now, Gavagai (aka Anaxogoras) is a squaddy of mine who flies... 'smartly'.
Not like an idiot like I do.
Gavagai's overall fighter rank is 18.
As you can see, he not only has a much higher K/D than me, but he also has a slightly higher KpH than I do. (He has also logged more sorties than I) This correlates with my experience, as I seem to do a lot more killing myself while I'm picking through a furball than when I'm surrounded by 5 Spitfires 200 feet away from the dirt.
Now, if you'd look only at that you can make the assumption that Gavagai is a
much better stick than I. However I know from experience, having dueled him a few times (albeit a few months ago), that though he is undoubtedly a better stick than I, not to the point that the gap in our scores would suggest; even as he beat me the majority of the times, the duels were drawn out and fairly close (and very fun, we have to duel again soon
). Much closer, at least, than the large gap in our scores would suggest.
Picking/BnZ is far from detrimental to your score.
