Vertical Scissors

[Angrist]

Looking for some film/video of this, if anyone can assist!

Thanks:aok

[Krusty]

Search for it. There's tons.

[Angrist]

[RATTFINK]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=lWWxHvzEd1I

[Blooz]

That's a vertical turn fight with a lame horizontal scissor attempt at the end.

No where near a vertical scissor.

[BaldEagl]

I assume you mean the defensive spiral.  I don't have a film but here are some excerpts from a thread in the Aces High General Discussion forum titled Your Favorite Kill:

Me:

Favorite of my career? I honestly can't remember them all but I had a memorable fight about a month ago.

I got a clean merge in my Spit 16 with a 109 (don't remember which model). We turned and played for angles for a while at 10-15K. I was gaining ground on him. He was pretty good in that 109 but I knew I could beat him. Just keep playing the angles and he'll be mine I thought.

Suddenly he broke and I chased him into a defensive spiral (a rolling scissors going straight down). As we danced at full speed headed to the deck I was near blackout. Just the slightest "window" of visibility in the center of my screen. I've got to keep him in sight I thought but knew that pushing any harder would cause an extended blackout sending me plummeting to earth in what would have probably been the fastest straightest lawn dart ever. Worse yet I knew he was faster than me in a dive and now my sure kill might be slipping away from me. My airframe started to shudder adding to my anxiety but I hadn't totally lost sight yet.

Just then he made another sudden move. He broke into a slight climb about 2K over the deck. By now my heart was racing and I was thinking just a quarter turn more and I can follow but I can't push it any harder or this thing's gonna break apart. Finally. I broke, almost in total blackout, my plane barely willing to respond to controls thinking God, I hope I haven't lost him.

As I leveled and regained sight I was 600 on his six. I opened fire and hit taking him down instantly.

Once in the defensive spiral that whole chase probably lasted about 10-15 seconds but it felt like a lifetime. I don't remember who it was but that was one fun fight.

This was replied to be uberhun:

I am pretty sure that was me BaldEagl. I was in a109 K4. It was a good fight. I could not get you locked in for the kill. You got position on me and all I could do was go defensive and hope you would make a mistake. I was going nuts.

Me:

Thanks. It probably was you because I think it was a K4. That fight sticks out in my mind for several reasons beyond your obvious ability.

1. Not many pilots actually use the defensive spiral.
2. When one does the attacker usually decides to hold alt and not to follow.
3. If 1 and 2 are met, the defender usually chops throttle hoping for the overshoot.

The fun part was that we did it at full speed. What an adrenaline rush. .

BTW, were you nearing blackout like I was? It seemed you had a lot better control but it might have just been the difference in planes.

uberhun:

Yes! In that ride I am always pushing the plane to the limit. I remember that fight because we were constantly trying to get position on each other and I finally burned up all my e riding the flaps trying to stay inside the spiral. It was a great fight!

[humble]

A vertical scissor is totally different from a climbing spiral. A climbing spiral is used by a plane with superior ssustained climb to counter a plane with superior "zoom" that has established a position in the rear hemisphere and has a potential shot. The spiral nature of the climb helps to bleed off the E from the zoom and let the superior sustained climb rate come into play.

A vertical rolling scissor is an attempt to force an overshoot in the vertical using superior AoA.

clip

This has some climbing scissors mixed in (a-20 vs pony). If you look on the site the view from the other side is there as film 166 I think...

[TequilaChaser]

as humble has mentioned the "Spiral Climb" & "vertical Scissors" is 2 completely different types of maneuvering

you can go Vertical up in a rolling scissors and also vertically down in a rolling scissors... to aquire a vertical scissors would be to basically take a rolling scissors ( in the horizontal plane of flight ) and  add the vertical (up or down )attribute to it......... ( you can also do a basic scissors without the rolling component added in....)

going down you will need to pay more attention to your forward progression, for you will be increasing your speed ( E ) very quickly........and when going up you need to pay attention to the drop off of speed, and the quickly approaching stall.....

http://trainers.hitechcreations.com/   has a Rolling Scissors AVI film from the game with Badboy breaking down the mechanics of what to do and why you would do it in regards to the rolling scissors maneuver

--->direct AVI film link: http://trainers.hitechcreations.com/rollingscissors/rollingscissors.htm

here is the link to the  original Help & Training Thread : http://forums.hitechcreations.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=184939


hope this helps ya......

[humble]

This clip happens to be from earlier tonight. It's a pretty good primer on how you integrate various scissors into a fight. It's got a flat scissor start to a kind of ocillating scissors (not really a rolling scissors but with a vertical component) and then a transition to a kind of a vertical scissor but again not a rolling scissor.

The biggest key in a scissors fight is understanding exactly what your trying to do and what type of scissors fits your needs based on both the enemy plane type and the circumstance.

By definition the scissors is a defensive move initiated from an inferior position. Learning when a scissors provides you the best option is a trial and error thing. Basically I use the scissors when a more vertical neg E defense would yield to good a shot window. The "flat" part of the scissor is both the defensive move and the "hook" to the more "offensive" rolling scissor type component. A scissor can always be denied by the aggressor in a variety of ways...the primary goal is to get the bogey out of the vertical and more in plane and in sync...then move him both out of plane and out of sync in a way that both denies a reasonable shot and creates an offensive capability.

scissors defense

[Fianna]

Originally posted by humble

scissors defense

Very nice!

 Makes me want to start playing again!:lol

[humble]

Come on in, the water is fine....

Love to see you back in the game:aok

[Angrist]

Guys, thanks for the videos and info.

This question resulted from a discussion on 190 tactics with a squaddie.  I'm familiar with flat/rolling scissors.  He mentioned "vertical scissors".  Now I've been in Rolling Scissors descending, but I got the impression he was referring to either a Flat Scissor using a vertical element, or an ascending Vertical Scissors ; which I was wanting to see if anyone had footage of cause it seemed to me that it would be difficult to maintain enough E in almost any WWII aircraft to make that viable.

Anyway, again, thanks for what you provided!:aok   It did give me some interesting ideas on my question.

[Agent360]

Angrist - Your right about the verticle scissor.

a "true" verticle scissor is a jet plane maneuver. WW2 prop planes do not have enough power to do a "true" verticle scissors.

What most people here are refering to as a verticle scissor is actually a rolling scissor that includes zoom climbs with each pass. This kinda looks like verticle scissors but it is carried out in the horizontal meaning as the fight progresses you are actually moving horizontally not strait up.

See this link. It has a short explanation and nice graphics of the "verticle rolling scissors" as it is correctly called. Which I believe is what you are reffering to in your beggining post.

http://combataircraft.com/tactics/index.aspx

I would like to point out an exception to my statment above.
The verticle rolling scissor can be "partially" done in a superior climbing plane such as the 109k4 or spit16/14. HOWEVER it can only be sustained for about 3 or mabey 4 verticle rolls and when you get at the end you will be at total stall.....defensless. If you do not deny the shot you will be dead. If you stall first you will be dead. If the bogey follows your move turn by turn you will be dead.

When I do this maneuver the goal is not to create an overshoot but to create stall condition on the other plane----basically its a rope. In addition I will take the first verticle turn in positive G and then the next one in neg G. This means "pulling" on the stick to go vert then begin a roll still going strait up. Complete one 360 roll and at the completon of this still going strait up "push the stick forward gently" and begin the second roll with the belly of your plane facing in ward - so your canopy is now facing out. Complete a 360 verticle roll and then pull back gently and roll the other way into positive G normal barrel roll at the top.

The bogey will attempt to get a shot on you the whole time. To do this he must pull lead. When you go to the NEG G roll (canopy out - belly in) he will be facing the wrong way. He will try to flip over in the verticle at near stall which will make him flop over and force him to dive out. It is at this point you have him.

I guarrentee if you try this yourself in practice you find out how hard it is to actually do. It takes a lot of practice. But if you learn to do it it will be one of those moves that gets the "how the freak did he do that" response. HEHE.

In fact some times you will end up stalled out together just feet from each others plane. IF you are upright (canopy facing up) and he is inverted when this happens the bogey had no choice but to dive. All you do in snap roll righ then and fire. You will be mear feet from him and cannot miss.

The goal of this is to make the bogey loose control of his plane while flying vertically. It is muuuucccch more difficlult to maintain control of a near stall airplane while pointed strait up becuase it be very disorientating. You MUST pay attention to your planes attitude and fly perfectly. The other guy is just trying to shoot you and is not paying attention to his aircraft which is why it works.

It is possible to create an overshoot this way if the bogey has a superior zoom. By pushing the neg G barrel roll immediatly upon going verticle he will usually fly right through the barrel roll and you will have a shot. But be carefull about following him up unless you had a ton of smash to start with. OR if you did the first neg G roll very tightly you can follow but only if you did it perfectly.

I will try to get this on film tonight and post it here

[humble]

I'm not sure I entirely agree with everything. A vertical scissor is just that...vertical (not always straight up for sure). The goal is similiar, to force the con out front by maintaining a high AoA. Now obviously a true vertical scissor in AH is  short lived for exactly the reason agent mentioned...but still very viable at even moderate speed. The real key is in understanding the concept of a spiral climb, rolling scissor and (for lack of a better term) "true" scissor. Often the "Vertical" scissor in AH only goes 1 to 1/2 revolutions (exactly what happened with M00t) but the end goal was achieved as the mossie flew right up and thru the A-20. The mossie simply cant match the A-20's AoA at lower speed and flew a looser path so it went out front. Both planes fell out of the scissor quickly and were in a semi controlled stall mode so a AH type plane is largely unable to capitalize immediately if it "wins" and even if the bogie "wins" it also might not have control surface authority available to gain a shot.

The climbing scissor (rolling or otherwise) is an essential part of a good defensive arsenal since it takes the fight out of both the true "turn" and the pure sustained climb and allows for planes with more modest capabilities to reset or reverse a fight in the mid or end game.

[Agent360]

By "definition" there are three kinds of scissors.

flat Scissors:
two planes fly a series of flat turns. Defender attempts to force the attacker out in front.

Rolling scissors:
two planes fly a series of barrel rolls. Defender attempts to force the attacker out in front.

Verticle rolling scissors:
Two planes fly a series of BARREL rolls at a 80 to 90 deg verticle angle. This can be either going UP or DOWN. Defender attemps to force the attacker out in front.

I will add a fourth variant that is I suppose is unique to AH2 or flight sims in general. I don not belive this would be performed in real planes engaged in combat. But I could be wrong here.

Verticle Flat Scissors:
One plane chooses to go verticle. Attacker follows. Defender performs a series of flat turns at a 45 to 85 deg angle going up. Defender attempts to deny the shot until the attacker stalls and must point his nose down. There are no barrel rolls in this variant. The maneuvers goal is to "rope" the attacker into a no energy state while remaing ABOVE the attacker.

Most rope maneuvers are performed using the "spiral" climb which is not a scissor at all.

With these definitions in mind one can now see that any one of the three classic scissors can evolve into one of the other variants at any time. One would transition into one of the other variants depending on his plane strengths. If you are a superior turner you may start with a rolling scissor then transition to a flat scissor (your advantage)
If one is in a weak turner but superior climber one would go from a flat scissor to rolling to verticle rolling scissor etc.

In my opinion the "scissor" is the basis for 95% of all sustained engagments. Givin two, more or less equally skilled pilots regardless of airplane who engage and an advantage is not gained by one of them in the first 15 sec of the fight, will evolve into some form of scissor.

The very first thing I show new pilots to the game is how to perform a flat scissor. The next thing I show them is a rolling scissor. The verticle rolling scissor is an advanced maneuver that I show later after they have some basic flight handling down.

If you can learn to perfome scissors with flawless precision you will kill 80% of your attackers...in my opinion of course.