Tonight I flew a sortie in AH for the first time in months, since November or October I think.
Actually had a fun time. Took a Mossie off of a field where the Knights were being hit, accidentally sent Grizz a check6 as I fumbled with my now unfamiliar HOTAS buttons and climbed on up to go after a formation of B-24s that had bombed our field. They were at about 16-17k, above the Mossie's critical altitude, but I caught up, mistimed my first attempt to attack and got pinged up slightly, mistimed my second attack, got pinged up some more but still took out the #2 ship in the formation. I rolled away and started setting up to try again when I saw a dot low ahead and to the right. A single dot meant a fighter, and fighter vs fighter is more fun for me, and I prefer keeping on the offense when I am using the Mossie, so I left the remaining bombers to go for the fighter.
Fighter proved to be a P-51D, which I passed about 7k over before turning to dive on him from behind. It was clear he'd been watching me as he began a gentle dive to try to even our speed, and then went into a split S. I knew what he was trying so I pulled up and went over the top to come back down on him, getting closer this time as again he resorted to an energy draining split S. As I went up and around in a yo yo to preserve as much of my energy as I could while draining his I figured he'd avoid me this time, but I'd get him on one of the following two passes. I drove him down again and as I pulled back up I saw a Typhoon that had snuck up on me at 1000 yards and closing, I couldn't tell if the Tiffie had a lot of smash on me or not, but I tightened my nose high turn and the Tiffie dropped low, so I rolled over on top and came down on the Tiffie, forcing him to break to avoid me. I climbed up, worried a bit that WEP was getting raw now, watching behind me as the Tiffie tried to follow and stalled out. I brought my Mossie around and dropped down on the wallowing Tiffie, easily dispatching it. The P-51D was now above me, but as it happened still lower on energy and as I pulled up I climbed above him and started to turn on him, taking a potshot as he crossed my nose, but missing. I pulled the Mossie around as tightly as I could, seeing the P-51D go into a flat spin behind me, but I couldn't get around and down in time to put any bullets in the P-51 before it hit the ground. Still, a kill I guess.
After that I took a low, fast flight back to the base I'd lifted off of. Listening to the chatter on the way in I knew it was under attack and I wasn't sure I had the fuel to make it across the channel to another friendly base. As it happened there were a couple of Tiffies and a bunch of friendlies at the field. The first Tiffe saw me coming in and tried for an HO, which I side slipped past, and the second also made a couple of tries at me before attempting, unsuccessfully, to run from the friendlies in the area. I landed with the three kills.
Not a bad flight for the first one in months, and having been very inactive in the game for years.
