Training help, perhaps?

[Fenin]

I think a bit of pretext might be helpful.  First off, I don't think I'm an amazing stick by any means, I try to remain humble at all times.  This has lead me to a place where I normally do not ask for help, preferring not to bother the 'professionals' as one might call them, and learning to do things on my own.  So far, this has worked out okay for me.  At times I can be relatively clever. 

But yesterday I got into two very good dogfights (though I sadly only recorded one, which I will post a link for below) both of which I felt were completely winnable (or, at least survivable)  on my end, only to have my lack of skill kill me in the first one, and net me what I can only assume was a pilot wound on the other guy, leaving him walking away (Something I consider a win.)

The specific help I'm asking for is ACM tips (It often feels sloppy to me) and perhaps some tips on gunnery at targets crossing in front of me.  Though, I feel the best teacher for the latter would be just plain trying to shoot at more people.  It's odd though, because the flight sim I probably have the most time in is Rise of Flight, where the aircraft are much weaker in engine, and gunnery power than most aircraft in Aces High.  At times though, I want for my Halberstadt D.II in the Main Arena.  It feels so much less sloppy to me than the ride of choice that I've been using lately, the Ki-43.  Though, I realize that this may be the cause of my gunnery problems.  WW1 aircraft are much slower, and almost all share weapon calibers of give or take, .303.  Which leads to not much lead needed to shoot at most other planes, though, accuracy is vital.


Before you watch the video I post below I would like to bring up that I understand my eventual major downfall is the loss of an aileron due to target fixation.  (The cowl machine gun loss isn't great either.) 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/k2pk4s0mrkfdmyq/Ki-43%20vs%20Dora%2C%20Dora%2C%20and%20LA-7.ahf?dl=0

Hopefully the link works.   

[1stpar3]

Nice flying! That was some fight,man. Counting the B-17's was 7 to 0ne? I am no top stick but you looked sound in the ACM. Only thing I could see,well couldn't see for sure, maybe tracers were off? I am guessing maybe a guns convergence tweak.  If most of your fights are like this one maybe closing up your convergence would help? I don't know, now that I think about it, does the ki-43 have only cowl guns, and might be just a bit under powered? I really enjoyed watching your film either way.   

[FLS]

Fenin I have some time this weekend after noon eastern time. Let me know if you want to make an appointment.

[Latrobe]

That was some very nice flying! You had to work with many disadvantages and flew excellently to stay alive that long.

The biggest disadvantage you had to work with was speed. You were up against some pretty fast planes there, so you were going to have to use overshoots to try and line up quick shots, or deceive your opponent into thinking he can get a shot in order to force him to bleed off speed.

A few times you turned to defend against an attack and got yourself into a head on pass with them. This is very risky as the planes you're up against (La7 and 190D9s) have some mighty big firepower. You did avoid the shots very nicely though so there was nothing wrong with what you did but I personally would have flown towards their 2 or 11 oclock. This would avoid a risky head on pass and set me up for the next turn. By positioning for their 2 or 11 oclock I'm already part way into the next turn whereas a head on pass I would have to pull a much bigger turn to get guns on them once they've missed their shot.

Your gunnery is pretty ok but I noticed 2 points that you could improve on. One is you were leading your target just a little too much. This isn't too terrible as you can just ease up on the stick a little when you notice this and let them fly into your bullets (as you did a few times). Maybe fly around offline a little bit and use the computer guided lead sight on the drones to get a feeling for where you need to aim, or even better, find someone who will go to the TA with you and try it against a real pilot (I don't remember how to turn on lead computing sight but I'm sure someone here knows what it is)(also I don't really know any good way of improving gunnery besides shooting at more stuff as well ). The other thing I noticed about your gunnery is you took a little while to pull the trigger. You'd get the lead but then it looks like (to me) that you take 1-3 seconds to line up the shot. You want to be pulling the trigger as soon as you can when you get lead. The quicker you kill your opponent the less time he has to kill you, and in a multi-enemy engagement like this killing quickly is a vitally important thing to be doing. The more time you spend on someones six trying to line up a shot the more time the other enemy pilots have to get turned around and line up a shot on you. Again, getting used to how much lead is needed will help you line up those shots much quicker.

Hope this is helpful. 

[Someguy63]

In case you didn't know Fenin to turn on the gunsight like Latrobe said is to press Shift+Tab to enable friendly lock, then press tab again to select an icon and the sight should appear.

This can only be done in the TA or offline.

Edit: And custom arenas.

[Fenin]

Nice flying! That was some fight,man. Counting the B-17's was 7 to 0ne? I am no top stick but you looked sound in the ACM. Only thing I could see,well couldn't see for sure, maybe tracers were off? I am guessing maybe a guns convergence tweak.  If most of your fights are like this one maybe closing up your convergence would help? I don't know, now that I think about it, does the ki-43 have only cowl guns, and might be just a bit under powered? I really enjoyed watching your film either way.   

Thank you.  I have considered pulling in my convergence but you are correct, the Ki-43 only has two cowl mounted 12mm Machine guns.  Despite that, I find she packs quite a wallop.  Deceivingly so, I believe.  A lot of pilots are okay with taking a few hits from me, only to find out a few hits too many that it's not quite a spitwad chucker.

Honestly, I didn't really count the B-17s as anything other than an obstacle.    
I was hoping one of the guys on my butt would hit them on accident, that's why I dived towards them.

Fenin I have some time this weekend after noon eastern time. Let me know if you want to make an appointment.

Is 3pm CST (2pm Est?) Good your time?  I'd be getting up around then. 


 

That was some very nice flying! You had to work with many disadvantages and flew excellently to stay alive that long.

The biggest etc...

 

Honestly, sir, that means a lot coming from you. 

When it comes to turning into them head on, despite the huge disadvantage of firepower.  A large part of my reasoning is that I knew that THEY knew I was under gunned, they would commit to it totally, hoping for that lucky hit.   I figured if I could trying and keep the area between their cockpits and tails in sight then I should be safe.  Though, flying through the La-7s fire was sheer luck that I blame to its cannons slow rate of fire.

On my speed of acquiring targets, I do tend to hold for a second.  I detest wasting ammo when I have so little to work with.  I forget, but I believe it was the Israeli Air Force that used to use what... a 3 second rule?  The main reason I do this is because the Ki-43 doesn't have the most punch ever, and I tend to loiter for some time around targets, I like to make my ammo last for a long time.  But I will try and fire a little earlier. 

[FLS]

3 PM CT is 4 PM ET. I have to be done by then.

[Fenin]

Whoopsies, 1:00 CST (that'd be 2:00, right?)  Is that good?   

[FLS]

2 PM ET is fine either day, just pick one.   

[Fenin]

Sunday it is then, I've got a sort of... thing to go to today.  Some sort of city holiday thing.  . _.  Arkansas is odd.