MAW missions are great because the MAW have attacked so many bases that it's almost something you do by instinct. Within 2 minutes of a MAW mission arriving at a base the town acks are down, the VH is dead, and the city and field acks are being hit. Vulching works well IF you had overwhelming force and hit hard and get the goon in quick. I've played AH for over 2 years now. I can tell you that vulching is probably the most effective tactic for protecting the goon if there isn't time for the enemy to get fighters from an adjacent field. If that happens the enemy fighter will almost always suicide himself to get the goon.
Often times when I take off to attack a base and I see a goon, I will stay close and try to keep it safe. It isn't as effective as you would think (and I don't consider myself a bad fighter pilot
). On the plus side the goon driver realizes he has cover. (I usually buzz them a couple times just to keep them awake.
) Unfortunately if your goon is attacked you are ALWAYS lower and slower than the attacker. Since the enemy almost always goes right for the goon, your only hope is to turn and HO the enemy. If you miss, or only cause minor damage, the goon is dead. If the enemy knows what he is doing, he will avoid the HO, and the goon usually dies or gets damaged too badly to continue. Should the enemy actually miss the goon, he's still faster than you, which means your stuck going for the HO on the next pass if the enemy chooses to attack again, and they almost always do.
My current tactic is to fly close escort until I can see the field, then go to full wep and try to lure/engage any enemy I can see. This works better if there is only one enemy in the area, as often they won't even see the goon. The problem is that if the goon still dies they often complain that they had no cover.
I've also tried high cover, but that doesn't work very well either, as the enemy will dive right past you to get the goon. If they miss on the first pass you have a chance though. Fail and you get to hear about there being no cover again.
If there are multiple high enemy lurking about then no amount of close escort helps. They can just avoid you and take a shot at the goon before you can engage them. Germany found this out during the BoB...
I'm convinced that the only effective goon protection method is to hit the base fast and hard and then vulch like crazy. You need to get the goon in before enemy can arrive from another base.
What do you guys think? Have any of you actually found a better way to protect your goons?
