Ahhh, yes, it is always nice to have an altitude advantage.
Well, dude, if You're in a -47, ANY 47 for that matter, but ESPECIALLY the D-11, that should be the desired position from the get go.
Further thoughts- if you're going in to furball (i.e. not attack the base/strafe town, etc.), take the light 8 50 cals.
Even with the light ammo, you'll find yourself gettin thirsty before you find yourself out of ammo (unless you're me, in which case God help you shoot straighter
)
In terms of fighting in the D-11... I've found that if you *do* wind up low and slow, don't despair. The thing can frustrate anybody with an altitude advantage, and has a GREAT way to thwart even a zero-
When they're into the attack, haul back on the stick, roll into the attack, and STOMP your rudder- and KEEP the pressure on the stick. If you're doing more then 350, pop out a notch of flaps. That roll/pitch maneuver is nigh impossible to follow provided you've timed it right.
What this does is gains you a brief amount of altitude, absolutely SLAUGHTERS forward velocity, and combines all 3 inputs- against a control stiffened enemy, you may even be able to get a snapshot off- the main objective is to force a horrible overshoot. Easy to do in the Jug - the D-11 most especialy.
After they overshoot, relax pressure on the stick and rudder, complete the roll, putting the lift vector where you wanna head to (base or friendlies), unload, punch the WEP, and dive as far as you can to pick up as much speed as possible- don't forget to rack in the flaps and "clean up".
By the time the other guy has reversed, you'll be back up to maneuvering speed.
Of course, the idea is you never find yourself low and slow, but don't go hauling back 6G's non-stop. The Jug just doesn't have the power to pull 7 tons of Jugly goodness around like that. But with this maneuver I've found that I can generally survive long enough to drag 'em to ack or to friendlies eager for a nice meaty kill.