Living Longer to land?

[Noir]

It's really not that hard to get good scores.

tru dat bruh

[titanic3]

tru dat bruh

OBX?

[Sunka]

I was looking at the Scoring help page when I noticed the huge hit in your score for failing to  return to land.

They are plenty of threads on ACM so I thought selecting the right fight may help me live longer

Is returning to land more of a function of selecting the right fight to get into or more the skill of the pilot to win in more situations?

Do those with high kill to death ratios avoid things like furbals?

Do they avoid high ratios of reds to greens?

Do they always go in high?

I would prefer to say "don't push your luck", because "don't push your skill level' reads a bit more like 'don't fight if you aren't sure you will win'

And if you don't push your skill level, it will not really increase much

I just worry about killing they guy I'm against and nothing else,i kill many players with great scores and k/d % all the time.Have fun ,if your furballing or just out hunting that one good fighter,if making it home matters to you then try for that.

[Lusche]

Just looked at my own stats, one furball yesterday (first 9 sorties of the tour) bumped me from unranked to 84 in fighters. It's really not that hard to get good scores.

Only one with a good score could say that. It's like internationa chess grand masters saying to each other "Geez, it's SO easy to get an ELO >2000, everybody can do it!"

The majority of players can only dream about a <100 rank from just a few furballing sorties. It's way beyond their skill level.

[Kovel]

If landing kills is important to you then fly your plane at the edge of your personal skill limits.

It will give you fun and the satisfaction of landing kills. I mean, if you are unskilled, then vulching or picking and trying to land those kills would be a challenge to you. On the other hand, if your are pretty skilled, you could try furbals and scape when things are really bad for you. If you are one of those overskilled pilots, your challenge would be entering sectors with fat red bars, kill the more the better and even trying to land those kills.

So, It will depend on your own skills and flying yourself at your own edge to find a balance between challenge and rtb. As long as you improve with time, you could push yourself harder to do riskier things while still going to land the kills.

Another approach is going into the mud from your first flight. You always put yourself into the worst situations and try yourself to develop your skills from there, dying a lot at the beginning, but maybe learning faster.

One approach or another depends on many factors about your perspective of the game, so choose the approach which gives you more fun.

Edit: Trying my best with English language  

[mbailey]

Landing is overated 

[Kovel]

Landing is overated 

sometimes the whole game is overated 

[Brakechk]

My 2 cents.....

I rarely worry about landing when I head into a fight.  Ink already said it but to build skill past a certain point you have to risk your plane.  I look at each fight (not just individual but the whole flight) and think about what I could have done better.  To me there are a few components or levels of skill in this game.  

One is your individual skill in a plane against someone else so: control, ACM, gunnery etc.  Then there is the SA portion where you train yourself to see what's going on around you before the you engage so you can see, evaluate and prioritize red guys.  As you continue to build skills in ACM, gunnery and control coupled with SA you get to the point where you can actively dogfight while looking around during the fight and recognize and respond to immediate threats and see potential threats building in the future while continuing to dogfight.

The only way to learn how to do all of this is to go do it and then to watch others (ingame or films).  If you watch films pay attention to all the info in the film.  The really good guys can do all that stuff I listed while getting kills and surviving multi-bogey encounters fairly frequently.  Certainly watch what they are doing in terms of their flight style, acm and gunnery.  However don't forget to check the box in the film viewer that shows their views.  Really pay attention to just how much they look around, even in the middle of a difficult fight.  You will see them working for a shot, look back, do some defensive maneuver against another plane in on their six, then go back to the guy they were originally fighting.  Some of those films show the pilot looking forward through the gunsites less than any other view.

While practicing this stuff ignore your chances of survival or landing kills.  Worry more about good gunnery for quick kills, ACM and threat identification and prioritization (SA)...i.e. avoid target lock and pay attention to attackers so you can evade attacks.  I am no expert but I work on this stuff alot and try to improve.  The most fun I have in the game involve fights with more red than green.  It's constant SA and defense interrupted by a couple seconds of offense for a kill.  Basically you're trying to stay airborne as long as possible while still getting kills.  Do that enough and you will eventually find yourself surviving until you run out of fuel, ammo or red guys and actually rtb'ing.  When the flight is over identify why you survived or didn't survive then adjust accordingly.  

Oh and don't forget to leave your ego on the runway.  You're gonna die, everyone dies cartoon deaths, even the guys the are really really good.  In fact the really really good pilots die way more than you would expect.  It's how they got good in the first place.  Most of the fearful flying styles and venom on 200 is nothing more than bruised egos.  Worrying about player X shooting you down sucking because you just "know" there is no way that guy is better than you will just keep you from getting better because you will be playing it safe.  If you aren't taking a risk of losing in a player vs player game then you really aren't playing, nor are you showing any particular "skill" at the game.  

OR.......

you can spend alot of time climbing to 25k in the fast plane of your choice hoping to find some guy fighting an enemy (or two or three enemies) and swoop in at 500 mph for the pick.  This method is conducive to landing kills.  However you will likely also live in fear of seeing a co-alt or higher enemy, more red than green or an enemy in a plane that flat turns better than the one you're currently in.  Also be aware it may be one of those really talented folks you are attempting to pick, who saw you arrive, then saw you dive, then evades your attack, forces the overshoot and pops you with one burst as you fly by.

There is nothing inherently wrong with method two....it's just not very fun to me.  The beauty of this game is that it's your 15 bucks and entirely up to you how you play.  Having tried both methods at different points over the years I have played, I much prefer method one.  You will die frequently but a victory under those conditions is much more meaningful to me than low risk flying.  Besides there is no shortage of free planes so I say go for it.

[Triton28]

I know of a better aeroplane that pwns your choice of said aeroplane with relative ease.  I fly it daily and pwn, with substantial frequency, pilots such as you as if they are flying toys (TwinBoom and Mercy excepted, of course).

If you look to the left side of your screen, you'll see a picture of one.

 

Too bad you cannot follow through on promises with substantial frequency.   

[Shane]

It wouldn't hurt to also either find a dedicated wingman or randomly pick up one when you're in an area (let them know.)

This gives you another perspective and experience layer, it will help you either get more kills, learn to get more kills (and live) by assessing situations better - you'll find winging and getting kills might lead you wanting to land them and start improving your SA in knowing when it's time to head home.

Plus later on, if you're lone wolfing, that winging experience will help you better read situations when you're going in to help someone, i.e., what Fugitive tried to do - he was also expecting you to break off the one you were chasing, to focus on helping him clear your six of the one chasing you.

[BaldEagl]

Often the best way to help your country is to fly over the fight between bases then get down and dirty at the opponent's field.  Even alone you'll likely stop the red guys in their tracks while your countrymates advance to take your place because you most likely will not make it out alive.

It doesn't do much for any of your stats or your score but it sure can be fun and when you're country mates arrive at the enemy field it can be gratifying to know that you single handedly accomplished that for the team.

I'm actually surprised more people (like all those guys who say they don't care about score  ) don't do that as it can be a game changer in a battle between two fields.

[VuduVee]

from my personal experience only, i believe you can get a good score and do it within the context of helping your team. and i think it really is about picking your spots. i find that my score naturally gets better if am reasonable and aggressive in my approach. im thinking, what would a real combat pilot do? he has one life. hes goin to be reasonable and cutting edge aggressive. with the hope of landing after a combat run. so for something like base defense, im not dying 20 times to save a base, even if the base taker, wirble monger crowd pisses and moans about that mindset, let em gripe, bc its not reasonable to me, im no lemming. instead, ill come from a different base with an alt/ E advantage and bnz em to death if i can, expecting those guys to use the best tactics they know to do their part, and hopefully we save the base. but, when my E-bank is close to empty, im haulin bellybutton to go fill my E-bank back up. rinse and repeat till its RTB time, hopefully a rotation gets goin and someone replaces me when i rtb. by using reasonable and aggressive tactics, decent score seems to just be natural. and more important, is my attitude doesnt go sour, bc im not gettin smoked every 2 mins. for me, no matter what type of fight, its all about reasonable and aggressive tactics that get me what i want with idea of completing my run and getting landed.

[VuduVee]

It wouldn't hurt to also either find a dedicated wingman or randomly pick up one when you're in an area (let them know.)

This gives you another perspective and experience layer, it will help you either get more kills, learn to get more kills (and live) by assessing situations better - you'll find winging and getting kills might lead you wanting to land them and start improving your SA in knowing when it's time to head home.

Plus later on, if you're lone wolfing, that winging experience will help you better read situations when you're going in to help someone, i.e., what Fugitive tried to do - he was also expecting you to break off the one you were chasing, to focus on helping him clear your six of the one chasing you.

yeah, this is the way to go. its so much easier to learn if you can see your lead in action. bc of the angles you have to make to cover him and still have E the whole time. you start finding subtle ways to bank E. and they make good bait to! doh!!

[Noir]

OBX?

oops! 

[Randy1]

The different views of the topic are interesting for sure. 

I used Fugitives lesson and broke off several times after a warning from a fellow country man last night.  It was not easy because I was just seconds away from making the shot most times but it is the right thing to do.  I saved a couple of guys bacon and they saved mine several times.

I will say this.  Landing feels good after a good fight.  It is very satisfying to land with short fuel or ammo or both.   Landing though with full ammo, not so good.

Lusche noted that it is a learned skill to select the right target,  I try now to think before I try to saddle up although it is not easy.

VuduVee noted defending a base being over run will sure drag down your score.  This is a big weakness for me.  I do love the challenge and the excitement.  Not much landing.

Shane noted picking up a wing-man.  I do have one but we need work on our wing-man skills.

Brakechk noted gunnery skills.  That is a good point and needs to be my next concentrated effort.  If you can make the shot quicker you can break off before someone has a chance to line up on you.  That makes sense.

As always, I appreciate all the advice.  Solid as always.