Author Topic: How high is too high in a B17?  (Read 708 times)

Offline Thunder

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #15 on: February 22, 2000, 01:50:00 AM »
I am sure that I am not going to get much agreement because this sounds like the same old tired fighter thread I have heard for eight years. Currently, the single B-17 litterally can't be flown effectively without an escort at low to mid altitude and survive a good fighter attack. They  only low level attacks that work are the ones in which there is no opposition or that friendly  fighters are tying up the enemy fighters. Lately even in a direct "dweeb" level six attack, the B-17 usually dies at low level. I would be all for lowering the altitude for the B-17 "drone" model if it had more BITE in the guns! But until that happens I say leave it alone. Last squad nite we lost our intire formation in route to target and there were only 3 enrmy fighters and we had 7 bombers. (we did not have an escort so losses are to be expected but not the entire formation. All fighters survived I beleive. Thats the flip side of the coin.. BTW congratulations to the Wrecking Crew last week! You guys had a big Buff Attack and had lots of hungery fighter escorts that did a great job taking out fighters coming up for you. You not only put our lights out (HQ)but you announced your intentions early --- we had no excuses. We knew you were coming and couldn't stop you. The key though was your escorts. They were very high and fast and did not all come down at once. They were diciplined and picked us off and returned to altitude cap. WELL DONE!!
My personel feeling is that unless you have a superior fighter escort that a formation of B-17's are simply "lunch" for a bunch of hungery fighters at mid to low altitude.  

Thunder
XO Dickweed Heavy Bomber Group
Aces High DickweedHBG: www.dickweedhbg.com

Offline Kieren

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #16 on: February 22, 2000, 08:12:00 AM »
Thunder-

Aren't you pretty much making the argument for us "fighter guys"? The key is escort. The Brits and Germans gave up on daylight bombing because of prohibitive losses; the 8th suffered horrendously without escort (and even with). Lone bombers should not be able to roam unmolested and strike with perfect accuracy.

[This message has been edited by Kieren (edited 02-22-2000).]

[This message has been edited by Kieren (edited 02-24-2000).]

Offline Dingy

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #17 on: February 22, 2000, 08:24:00 PM »
Well yesterday, I got sick of getting shot down incessantly and decided to take a buff up from 16, fly it W to the gridline and then turn N to grab alt on the way to hitting 24.  

About 30 minutes into the flight, I had a neighbor come by to drop some things off and ended up talked with him for about 20-30 minutes.  When I came back, I was at 35K, off the map to the north and completely in the middle of water.  Talk about disorienting when all you see is blue  .

I just ctrl-alt deleted cause I had no idea where I was at.  35K and off the map is DEFINATELY too high.  

-Ding

Offline iculus

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #18 on: February 24, 2000, 11:06:00 AM »
LOL ding!

combat23

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #19 on: February 24, 2000, 03:10:00 PM »
Another good  thread.

The major German fighters in wwII were not designed as bomber killers. They had to add extra guns to the 109 and added biger guns and extra armor to the 190. As bomber killers the germans had problems with fighter to fighter.

On a historical note the large US bomber formations when un escorted took tremendous losses. But they never lost every plane on the raid.

As to bombing, many times those formations of several hundred bombers droped several thousand bombs and only managed to put a few inside a 200 foot circle around the target. They even missed completely many times. That and the fact that the bombs that did hit didn't do as much damage as expected led to repeated raids on the same targets.

don't know how to work this into the game. Sounds like another thread where someone pointed out that you have people who want an historical areana (as much as possiable) and those who want a fantisy areana.

This one will be tough to solve. Those that want to buff and those that fly fighters are going to be far apart on this issue.

The raids like the Recking Crew put on,{S} are best but you may not be able to be on line when a raid is on. How is a single buff driver(who pays his money) to do his thing on a quick trip to the areana?

I fly fighters but I can understand the buffers point of view.

see you on line

Offline Kieren

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #20 on: February 24, 2000, 03:35:00 PM »
I fly bombers. I fly B26's in lone sorties, as do others. They are very survivable alone. B17's are very hard targets at 25K too. It can be done!  

Offline Downtown

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How high is too high in a B17?
« Reply #21 on: February 25, 2000, 11:04:00 AM »
but almost impossible targets at 32 or 35K.

------------------
Lincoln "Downtown" Brown.
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Wrecking Crews "Drag and Die Guy"
Hals und beinbruch!