Ok, I've actually figured out how to keep a fighter level, and (believe it or not) shoot someone down. While playing in the MA, I've noticed that there seems to be some unwritten rules. Don't KS, don't HO, that sort of thing. In trying to comply, I finally just gave up and made up my own rules.
If you turn into me head-on, I play chicken. If I see a flash I open up. It seems that most of the fights I've seen have been ho, pass, turn, ho, pass, turn, ho. (That's why I play chicken and open up now)
Check 6 as often as I can. If another pilot is chasing a runner, shadow but don't engage. Check if other pilot needs help or not. If friendly is being chased, don't ask just dive.
Don't shoot burning bombers.
My question is, how far off am I? I want to be a respectable pilot, are these respectable actions?
Seems like a reasonable set of standards, everyone has their own as you can tell by all the head on attack/runner threads that pop up and drag on and on w/out resolution. I think the trick to enjoying fighters in this game is to find a mix of success and learning experiences. The quickest way to get a certain level of success early on is to up a very fast plane and zip around at high speed and blast anything that get's in front of you. Granted there are some lessons to be learned playing this way but I think it's a road that ultimately dead ends rather quickly, it doesn't leave the practitioner with any exposure to a large part of cartoon aerial combat. The same can be true for the head on artist, a lot of newer players like to use it because 50-50 odds are better than what they will have in a maneuvering engagement (at first).
Learning experiences are often not so pleasant, odds are good that if you find yourself in an uncomfortable situation then you're having a learning experience. For myself that meant that I started using a slower plane, I took the trump card (speed) out of my hand and forced myself to fight in the slower part of the flight envelope and I would just tell myself that I was going to die a lot for a little while, if I started getting frustrated I would go back to what was comfortable for a few sorties, switching back and forth. I've read a lot of articles and books trying to get better of the years but the best thing is still to learn by doing, having someone to work with can greatly speed up that process. I wish I had swallowed some pride years ago when I started and asked for more help.
One thing you can do to avoid the jousting style of fights is go to the training arena or email trainers @ hitechcreations . com and set up an appointment to work on merges. If it looks like the bad guy is going to go for the head on attack then you can predict what flight path he's going to take and anytime you have a pretty good idea of what his flight path is going to be then you can exploit it to your advantage.
A good fight versus another fighter is one of the best things that this game has to offer because I've been doing it for ten years now and I'm still learning things which keeps it interesting. On the other hand I think it can also be the most frustrating so ask questions, you'll find that there are many people here who will go out of their way to answer or work with someone who is politely asking for assistance.
