All you buff gun whiners, please make note...
The buff guns are not more powerful than standard guns, .50cal or otherwise.
There are two factors that give the impression that the buff guns hit harder than standard guns.
1. ALL buff guns, not just those able to 'see' you fire at you, regardless of where you attack from.
PROOF
Fly a buff and have a friend be a gunner for you. go to external view (F3) and have your gunner pan the guns and fire in various directions.
What you will see is ALL guns firing at the intended target, regardless of angle. I did this several times with Pugg. I was the pilot in a B-17 and he was the gunner. He went to the chin turret and angled it up to +45 degrees. When he started firing, I saw all the guns (Including tail, ball turret and both waist guns) point forward and up +45 degrees. ALL guns had tracers flying. At that angle, the tail, ball and waist gunners had no shot, but fired anyway. I cold graphically see the tail guns reversed on their mounting to fire forward.
Did the same test in the B-26. Pugg shot straight back to 6 o'clock. The nose gun went backwards in the bubble nose (barrel pointing right down the centerline of the fueslage) and began firing. The ammo counters only go down for the facing guns, but all guns still fire.
What this means is that you are taking fire from 11 .50 cal guns when attacking a B-17 and 7 .50 cal guns when attacking a B-26.
2. In almost all cases, you are flying INTO the bullets of a bomber. As you attack, and the bomber shoots back, you are flying into the bomber's bullet stream. The result is a high kinetic energy on impact, causing more damage in a shorter time. The faster your closure rate, the higher the kinetic energy.
3. All .50s can kill fast at convergence. I have on many occasions, shot down other planes with less than 50 rounds when I hit them at convergence on a diving attack pass.
Yes, you may think you are getting killed too fast by a B-17, but how many rounds do you think are coming at you if he fires a 1 second burst?
Consider #1 as true, and you have 11x .50 cals firing 400rpm for one second. That is about 70 bullets hitting your plane. If they hit at convergence, do you have any idea what that would do?
I've not seen what 70 .50s (API) will do to aircraft skins and framing, but I have seen what 50 rounds of .303 (ball ammo) will do to a pair of beer kegs and 2x4 framing - TOTAL DESTRUCTION.
So I submit to you, that 50 - 70 rounds of API (Armor Piercing Incindiary) .50 cal ammo hitting an aircraft will tear through the skin, mangle the framing and cause fire and all sorts of other MAJOR problems to occur, such as hydralic oil and fuel leaks/fires.
Buff guns are the same as other guns. Don't get shot, you will be fine.
BTW, #1 will hopefully be fixed in 1.10, so that is one less thing to worry about.
