Countering High-Yoyo countering

[Kweassa]

The high-yoyo is one of my favorite moves in pursuing planes with better low-mid speed maneuvering in turns. It helps gain pursuit angle all the while keeping the E-advantage and forcing the defender into tighter turns so he drains E a lot.

 However, it's been some time since I've noticed the more experienced players quite often deploy a certain sort of counter-maneuver for high yoyos - as the attacker breaks off horizontal chase and angles up, begins the high-yoyo sequence, the defender seems to immediately stop turning, and breaks hard upwards turning into the attacker. Since the attacker was superior in E-status (thus choosing the high-yoyo for his pursuit), this seems to cause sort of a sudden vertical overshoot, creating a momentary attack chance for the defender.

 Now, what gets me stumped is this. The most frequent cases I meet this situation is when flying my favorite 109G-10 against some experienced people in Spitfires. I know it's not a wise move to try and turn with a Spitfire, but I've always thought if you have a certain amount of confidence in managing the 109, you should try to follow the target, since no Spitfire would just fly straight for you to shoot at. After all, the coup-de-grace is what really matters.

 But the tighter you pull the high-yoyo, the better you manage the move, it seems the more you are likely to get in trouble since the 109 momentarily spends all his E advantage in climbing+turning+adjusting angle for the decending part of the high-yoyo. While this happens, the Spitfire casually turns into you while you climb, and bears its guns to you long enough to bring you down - it handles better at low speeds, (fatally) stalls later than the 109, recovers control quickly with small amount of acceleration, and has guns that hit comfortably up to 500~600 yards. Geez, I know I'm whining, but sometimes the airways seem just too generous against low-speed Spitfires..

 Now, the only solution I thought of was when the enemy tries the counter move, I change my direction too, and head straight up, knowing the Spitfire will have to stall and head down faster than me. But this still seems to give only about 50% chance of success, since the Spit would stall first, but all the time before it stalls - it would still be shooting. Besides, after the Spit stalls, and I reverse down, the recovery time for regaining control takes a lot more in the 109, and the advantage in acceleration seems to be neutered because of this. As I recover control, the Spit is already turning away again, and I lost too much E to just go pursue it. I'd need to get alt-advantage again, the Spit would start turning again, and it's all back to the beginning of the whole BnZ sequence.

 Now, I realize I would not have to go through this if I can knock out the target in my first boom pass. But this seems to suggest all the Spit has to do is just turn a few times and avoid a few shots, and no 109 will want to engage it after that. That's really demoralizing for people like me

 Any suggestions on countering this 'counter move for High-yoyos'?

 
 [Pic attached to explain better the situation I meet]

[dtango]

That's a great question Kweassa.  Good pics too.  I was doing some training with a squaddie last night practicing Hi Yo-Yo's and he brought up this very question.  I was the target flying the Spit and did a "you mean like this?" move to try this out and was thinking about this myself.

Typically I have a lot more energy than the other guy in these cases so that I don't have any trouble zooming away out of danger.

Here were some of my rambling thoughts I was going to try though:

(1) Go into a spiral zoom climb in the direction of the yo-yo.  In your "figure 2" the Spit may have a chance at a snapshot but if your making it a high deflection shot with changing angles then it will be much harder for them to get a hit.

(2) In the case of a G10 vs. Spit V, or IX since you've got a better rate of climb you might try a "corollary" to #1?  Go into a sustained (sustained meaning zero E loss) spiral climb to bleed his E and then drop back on him when appropriate.

(3) As they come up, level out or go into a shallow dive to gain energy.  As they reach the top of their pullup or immelmann then go back into the vertical and execute a "pitch-back" or a hammerhead maneuver.

(4) As they come up, execute a zoom and pitch-back so that they have to execute more of an immelman to try and get their nose on you- in other words their wings/lift-vector ends up more in the horizontal plane than the vertical.  The intention is to have gravity working against them so that that can't keep their nose pointed at you without stalling since they will be very low E.

Anyway, these were some of things I was thinking about trying.

Tango, XO
412th FS Braunco Mustangs

[humble]

I was thinking along the same lines as dtango...I started spending a lot of time in the 38 a few months ago...it seems to require similiar tactics vs the spitty. The two most common defenses were the split-s to the face shot...spitty looking to face shoot you as you re-engage from vertical...and the low energy "tail stand"...you describe. The whole logic seems to be pretty simple...let me get my hizooka's pointed at you while your "floating" and I'll take my chances. In both cases I found my best "defense while on offense" was a tight FLAT turn as I topped out. I'd zoom as far as I could then pop flaps and pull into a hard flat turn on the edge (usually a little nose up but not alot).

I found the spitty had a much tougher time with this then any zoom or spiral climb. The moment the spit tried to follow my turn in gunsight it seems to break the tailslide. Since I'm almost standing on the lower wing I've got great vis to rebounce. It obviously doesnt work well if you misjudged the relative E state (had a couple where spit climbed right up my prettythang) but the G10 has a decided edge over spit (or 38) in climb.

[Seeker]

Nice pics, they really help.

I do this counter my self, and I can add a couple of pointers from the opposing side:

1) What the Spit is doing is actually turning the fight into a verticle scissors, if you think about it. If you can, unload and continue up in a barrel roll.

2) It's a bit of a lasp gasp move, as normally the Spit only has enough E for one real attempt at the snap shot, after that, typicaly the Spit will go nose down in a low yo-yo to try and build speed up again. He knows you'll be coming down again, and at that moment, he'll be "E hoarding"; A spit can hold onto it's E like a Niki if he knows you have the initiative ( which isn't always the advantage it's made out to be).

3) The Spit's biggest advantage is that you lose sight of him

4) Then again, he'll lose sight of you during the nose down; so ultimatly, timing's more important than E management in this specific situation; you have to know when he'll roll over to make your move.

We're often on at the same time, I'd be happy to be a target drone for a half hour or so.

[funkedup]

Good pics.

In the third case you can do three things.
1.  If you have a lot more E than the bandit, cash it in.  Go for the vertical rope maneuver.  Try to read when he is going to stall and break the zoom off early if you have to.  Ideally you are heading down just before he stalls.
2.  If you have a moderate E advantage you can keep going right tighten it into a chandelle a little above best climb speed.  He will have to turn tighter than you and will either stall out or give up angles.
3.  If you don't have much of an E advantage you can just pull up until the closure rate is zero, then when you reach best climb speed, just climb away from him.

[Andy Bush]

Based on your drawings, I'd say your problem is one of not staying behind the bandit's 3/9 line in the yo-yo.

If the High Yo-Yo is flown properly, the attacker maneuvers to the bandit's high six area prior to the re-entry. The reason for this is the attacker wants to control closure and angle off at the same time. To do that, he must maneuver to the bandit's six. Your drawing makes it look like you are flying out towards the defender's wingline...and thus giving him a chance to pull into you.

When the yo-yo is flown properly, it will be very difficult for a bandit who has remained in a defensive break to pull up and force a role reversal as you describe. Why? In most cases, he simply will not have the energy to do so.

There is one "yeah but". One defensive counter to the yo-yo is to roll into a steep bank to give the appearance of someone entering a defensive break. If the attacker yo-yo's off, the defender maintains the steep bank but does not pull any G. Then when the attacker commits his nose down, the defender pulls up into him.

How to prevent this from happening? When you yo-yo off, be sure you rotate your lift vector about 90 degrees away from the bandit's plane of maneuver. Initially, try not to pull up with your lift vector oriented towards the bandit at all. Once you see that your yo-yo is going to keep you behind his 3/9 line, then you can roll back into the bandit as needed.

[humble]

Andy,

So the issue here is actually moving from a lag pursuit curve to pulling lead while executing the hi yoyo?....in effect you create an overshoot in the vertical PRIOR to the counter by the spitty. He's really pulling up into your rear quarter not your front quarter based on the misjudged flight path the attacker flew on the hi yoyo.

[Andy Bush]

>> He's really pulling up into your rear quarter not your front quarter based on the misjudged flight path the attacker flew on the hi yoyo.<<

This may be a matter of semantics...but the point is to keep the bandit in YOUR front quarter (at the bandit's six) rather than moving forward on the bandit's wingline (which would put you more to the bandit's beam).

Here's a simplified diagram intending to show the difference in the two pull up flight paths. Blue is rolling 90 degrees away from the bandit turn before he pulls up. The result is increasing angle off but a move towards the bandit's high six area.



Green begins his pull up while remaining banked in the bandit's direction. In the pull up, his angle off tends to remain constant and he stays out on the bandit's extended wing line.

To pull up into Green, the bandit will require less distance and degrees to turn. His pull will resemble a pitchback (oblique climbing turn). To pull up into Blue, the bandit will, in effect, have to do a half loop. The bandit will have to turn more degrees and pull more into the vertical to get up to Blue's altitude.

It should be obvious that it takes less energy for the bandit to reverse into Green than Blue.

If both Green and Blue flew identical pull ups (duration andG), Blue would gain more altitude relative to the bandit's plane of motion and would end up more to the bandit's six.

So...to fly the yo-yo, be sure to bank away from the bandit as you pull up. Maintain the pull up and let the bandit continue to turn as you move towards his extended high six. Approaching this high six area, roll back into the bandit and then reapply G as needed to pull down inside the bandit's turn. You may well have to follow with a Low Yo-Yo to regain closure, but at least you have prevented a flight path overshoot.

[akak]

Originally posted by Andy Bush


There is one "yeah but". One defensive counter to the yo-yo is to roll into a steep bank to give the appearance of someone entering a defensive break. If the attacker yo-yo's off, the defender maintains the steep bank but does not pull any G. Then when the attacker commits his nose down, the defender pulls up into him.

That's the counter I use in the P-38L when I face an attacker trying to use a High Yo-Yo maneuver.  
There are times when I even stall my plane out when the attacking plane is starting to go nose down on the end of the High Yo-Yo.  As the attacking plane starts to come down, I stall my plane inverted and catch the attacker as he comes down in front of my nose.  If I miss him with my shots, the ease of the stall recovery on the P-38L lets me recover fast enough to raise flaps and latch on the attackers six and gain the advantage.


Ack-Ack

[Mino]

Robert Shaw also explains "Lag Displacement Rolls" pretty well if you did not get Andy's explanation.

Thanks Andy!

[stynger]

great stuff guys!      ....more,give me mroe

[illo]

I would just unload when diving down from high yo-yo with opponent trying to pull up into me. Climb would be worst choice imho. He just bleeds hes E doing so and will be sitting duck when you reverse on him.

[raven 8]

fantastic guys.

i usually just sneak a peek and if i see the guy angling up i just keeeep climbing:) and wait for the stall.

ill read all the advice when i have time

[Hristo]

great thread...I noticed a number of Spits who just recentl learned this trick. To him it looks fairly simple. You did high yoyo and he sees a separation you gave him and he pulls, no more than that. With Hispanos taken into account he has a chance to win this one.

And Andy made a great point about 3-9 line. It was my mistake in most high yoyos.

[raven 8]

yeah those hispanos are deadly when u encounter them head on.