Avoid the HO

[CAP1]

I find a hard break at D800 usually screws them up. Oh sure, you may take a few pings as he changes to a crossing shot, but unless he has 30mm's you usually get away with a scratch at most.

Also, try a slow roll with full opposite rudder applyed. Seems many have trouble with that.

a few pings in a pee38 equals pilot wound, or #2 engine oil hit.

[Nemisis]

Depends on how good of a shot the pile-it is. I'm a crappy shot, but alwasy get golden BB's. Hell, I've a spitfire with the hull gun on an M4 with a 2sec burst  .

[Ack-Ack]

a few pings in a pee38 equals pilot wound, or #2 engine oil hit.

It's better to start out a little further out than 800 yards, unless you want to risk having your tail removed.  If I'm going to go for a lead turn reversal on the merge, I make sure that I have seperation so when the bandit is around d1.5, I'll start my lead turn into him so when we do cross, I end up saddled up on his six instead of crossing in front of his nose giving the bandit a quick snap shot at my tail.

Oh, and a slow barrel roll using full opposite rudder like someone suggested is not a smart thing to do on any type of merge.  There are more efficient and better ways of avoiding a head on shot then leaving yourself vulnerable like was suggested.

ack-ack

[Nemisis]

mind sharing? Always looking for better ways to avoid HO's.

[mtnman]

mind sharing? Always looking for better ways to avoid HO's.

I'll hazard a guess here, that Ack-Ack is referring not so much to how those moves (the hard break at 800, and the slow barrel roll with full opposite rudder) are effective in dodging the HO, but in how effective they are in setting you up for what happens next.

Both of those moves may allow you to dodge getting killed with a face shot, but neither sets you up at all well for the next stage.  Actually, against an experienced pilot, both of those methods practically ensure you'll be lifting a brand new plane a few seconds later.

An analogy that comes to mind is a pedestrian who jumps off a sidewalk to avoid a bicycle, and directly into the path of a truck.  Was the pedestrian successful at dodging the bicycle?  Yes, absolutely.  If the only goal is to survive the "moment", those options work.  If the goal is to survive the entire encounter, there are options that offer much higher chances of success.

In a very general sense, you "sell" or "trade" energy for angles.  Without any energy, you can't gain any angles.  You need to avoid "wasting" energy without gaining angles.

The basic problem with both of the options you mentioned, is that they both burn a lot of energy with no gain in angles.  They're very "expensive" options when it comes to energy.  They're also both pretty "obvious" to the guy you're merging with.  They're easy to see, and easy to use to measure your likely energy level a few seconds from now.  And easy to counter.  All he needs to do is zoom up, and attack you from above and behind.  This is going to give him a shot that's safer and easier to make than the initial shot on the merge.  You've given up too much energy, and allowed your opponent to gain angles on you.

Keep in mind, am experienced stick probably wouldn't have taken the HO shot anyway.  That means you've set yourself up like this for no reason...

[Ack-Ack]

I'll hazard a guess here, that Ack-Ack is referring not so much to how those moves (the hard break at 800, and the slow barrel roll with full opposite rudder) are effective in dodging the HO, but in how effective they are in setting you up for what happens next.

Yep. 

ack-ack

[Nemisis]

Any specifics? I have noticed what you described happens when I bump into expierenced pilots.

[CAP1]

akak.....i think what he's trying to do, is get an idea of what exactly makes a good avoidance maneuver, and what to do after the avoidance, in order to capitalize on it.
 i've been getting better at dodging them, but i still can't turn it to my advantage yet, so i'd like to know too, if ya don't mind?

[The Fugitive]

akak.....i think what he's trying to do, is get an idea of what exactly makes a good avoidance maneuver, and what to do after the avoidance, in order to capitalize on it.
 i've been getting better at dodging them, but i still can't turn it to my advantage yet, so i'd like to know too, if ya don't mind?

The best avoidance maneuver is to NOT POINT YOUR NOSE AT THE BAD GUYS NOSE! If you find yourself at 1500 out nose to nose you might as well close your eyes and pull the trigger because it's already a crap shot.

[Nemisis]

even if its something like a 110 or a mossie? Seems like it would be rather hard to pull a win out of that.

[Ack-Ack]

akak.....i think what he's trying to do, is get an idea of what exactly makes a good avoidance maneuver, and what to do after the avoidance, in order to capitalize on it.
 i've been getting better at dodging them, but i still can't turn it to my advantage yet, so i'd like to know too, if ya don't mind?

The best avoidance maneuver is to NOT POINT YOUR NOSE AT THE BAD GUYS NOSE! If you find yourself at 1500 out nose to nose you might as well close your eyes and pull the trigger because it's already a crap shot.

Basically what Fugitive said.  I always make sure that when I merge I have created seperation prior to the merge, in fact long before we get into merge distance.  When I see a bandit's dot, I'm already positioning myself so when we do get in range of the merge I already have sufficient seperation that I can turn into him for a lead turn for either the kill out right or reversal.  If the bandit decides to try and close the seperation to prepare for his HO merge, he has to maneuver and risk losing positioning on the merge, which makes my job even that much easier.


ack-ack

[Nemisis]

How exactly do you create that seperation? Do you have a preferance between verticle and lateral seperation?

[mtnman]

How exactly do you create that seperation? Do you have a preferance between verticle and lateral seperation?

Preference?  I like to have both, but fight harder to get vertical separation. 

With lateral separation, the other guy can still kick the rudder for a shot.  With vertical, he blinks into red-out if he forces the nose down (assuming I get below him, which is my goal).  Vertical AND lateral together makes his HO shot a complete gamble and waste of energy and ammo (but I'm ok with it if he wants to try anyway, hehe!).  Once in every couple-hundred HO attempts like this get close to me.  It's an odd thing if I take any hits at all...

You don't need a lot of lateral separation, and you get it just like you get it while driving a car- aim a bit to the left or right of your opponent.

As for vertical separation, I get my nose down the instant I decide to merge with someone, and "race" to get under him.  He'll generally follow suit, so you need to be aggressive and "take" the lower position.  At the same time, I don't want to get too much speed, or give up all my altitude either. 

In a case where my opponent seems to "know" that he also should be the low guy, I might change tactics and let him have the bottom (it generally makes his next move predictable; you never want to be predictable...).  If I do that, I try to make it look like I either couldn't get the bottom spot, but will fight anyway, or else that I don't know enough to try hard enough to get the bottom position.  I have a few options for the higher position too, and watch him very closely as we pass to decide which option I want to employ.  If he doesn't make the predictable move, no harm...  The predictable move is also the one that threatens me the most...

Check out the trainers site, and read up on merges.  Also, do a search for merges and HO avoidance, there's gobs of info and films available.  No sense in re-writing it all.  Also, I hesitate to a take an "Avoid the HO" thread and turn it into a merge thread.

[mtnman]

How exactly do you create that seperation? Do you have a preferance between verticle and lateral seperation?

Preference?  I like to have both, but fight harder to get vertical separation. 

With lateral separation, the other guy can still kick the rudder for a shot.  With vertical, he blinks into red-out if he forces the nose down (assuming I get below him, which is my goal).  Vertical AND lateral together makes his HO shot a complete gamble and waste of energy and ammo (but I'm ok with it if he wants to try anyway, hehe!).  Once in every couple-hundred HO attempts like this get close to me.  It's an odd thing if I take any hits at all...

You don't need a lot of lateral separation, and you get it just like you get it while driving a car- aim a bit to the left or right of your opponent.

As for vertical separation, I get my nose down the instant I decide to merge with someone, and "race" to get under him.  He'll generally follow suit, so you need to be aggressive and "take" the lower position.  At the same time, I don't want to get too much speed, or give up all my altitude either. 

In a case where my opponent seems to "know" that he also should be the low guy, I might change tactics and let him have the bottom (it generally makes his next move predictable; you never want to be predictable...).  If I do that, I try to make it look like I either couldn't get the bottom spot, but will fight anyway, or else that I don't know enough to try hard enough to get the bottom position.  I have a few options for the higher position too, and watch him very closely as we pass to decide which option I want to employ.  If he doesn't make the predictable move, no harm...  The predictable move is also the one that threatens me the most...

Check out the trainers site, and read up on merges.  Also, do a search for merges and HO avoidance, there's gobs of info and films available.  No sense in re-writing it all.  Also, I hesitate to a take an "Avoid the HO" thread and turn it into a merge thread.

[321BAR]

i dont understand the problem with getting out of head ons? just freaking roll out of them in a corkscrew... pure and simple that most players will not be able to hit the sharp angle shot when it is including a vertical and horizontal maneuver. with doing this, i can pull hard and get on their six fast because most flyers also dont expect this roll out followed by a 180 turn. in fact this almost always gets me their 6 or a kill