I flew a single B-17G sortie last night. My experience on this mission has suggested several things to me, some of which may be sound insulting to you guys.
First, I can't do any more tests because my friend has declined to do anymore. He likened you guys to Necromancer players in Everquest (they were the most powerful class, got nerfed so that they were still the most powerful, but not so ridiculously and then whined endlessly about how they were now useless) based on his experience with that and your posts here, which can only be considered complete exaggerations or outright lies by him.
Because he declined, I decided to fly a bomber mission and try to gather data that way. Here is what happened:
1) I took off from a rear field and climbed to about 15,000ft.
2) I proceeded south into Knight territory and dropped 2,000lbs of bombs on one of their cities.
3) Deciding that was not the best use of my bomber, I turned and flew to the Knight HQ.
4) In two passes over the Knight HQ I dropped my remaining 4,000lbs of bombs, destroying 3 Radar factories, however I also lost my #2 engine to flak on the second run.
5) Now empty, I turned north east and headed for the nearest Rook airfield, this course would take me close to a Knight airfield and would hopefully cause an encounter with at least one fighter. I need not have done so.
6) After making it about two thirds of the way home, I spotted two fighters in pursuit. I guess that they had climbed up to try to defend the HQ.
7) The first came into view and was IDed as a Spitfire.
8) I watched him from my tail turret as he moved into my 10 o'clock level position.
9) Just before he attacked, the second fighter was IDed as another Spitfire.
10) Bandit One moved to just beyond my tail turret's tracking capability before rolling in for the attack. In doing so, he sloppily slid to my 11 o'clock, well within my firing arc. I shot him down when he was about 500 yards out. He never hit me.
11) Bandit Two moved in to my 2 o'clock, just inside my firing arc before he rolled to attack. Like the first one he had a slight altitude advantage over me, but unlike the first one he did not slide significantly closer to my 12 o'clock. Because of his better position I didn't shoot him down until he was about 200 yards away. Because he had a better run, he hit me and did significant damage. He destroyed the following systems: Right Aerilon, Left Aerilon, Tail Turret, Ball Turret and Top Turret.
12) Using my rudder to stabilize my aircraft, as I had no aerilons, I proceeded to the friendly base and landed. After taking screen shots, I exited with a successful landing and return to my credit as well as the two Spitfires.
There are several conclusions I reached from this. They are as follows:
1) I am a poor bomber gunner.
2) The fighters made very poor attacks, basically feeding themselves to my guns.
3) The "Laser guns" (as you guys so like to call them) on the Spitfire will not give free kills to stupid pilots.
4) The fighter that did hit me sprayed all over my bomber (he managed to destroy both aerilons), hitting mainly fuselage (he destroyed my Tail, Ball and Top Turrets).
5) Bombers are VERY tough if the enemy is kind enough to distribute the fire or focus on the fuselage.
If this is an example of typical attack patterns, then Yes, I can see why bombers are complained about so loudly.
If I had been in one of the Spitfires, the B-17 would have been shot down. Period. The fighters failed to cooperated. They failed to make high-speed passes on me from an angle that would make it hard for me to hit back. The fighter that did hit me failed to focus on a wing, something I have done to nearly every bomber I have killed. If the fighter had focused, I would still have shot him down, but he would have shot me down as well (given his attack pattern).
This is only one experience and so could be grossly misconstrued. Maybe my luck continues to hold, but it seems to me that many of us could use a lot of work on the way in which we attack bombers. My friend was very surprised at the amount of damage that I had incurred. He chalked it down to the fighter pilot's incompetence.
Sisu
-Karnak
[This message has been edited by Karnak (edited 10-04-2000).]
