I completely agree on this point.
Where you and I part ways, however, is when you walk lock-step with your CO to defend his similar actions and attitude. Yes, IMO ditching in the middle of combat in order to then thumb your nose on 200 and say "ha, ha, denied you a kill" is essentially the same thing, especially when it is clearly intended to upset the opponent. It is the identical attitude at play: trying to turn a loss into some kind of a "win". I'm sorry that you don't see it that way. However, as a 3rd party observer, with no ego or squad loyalties at stake, I can say his displays of this are the same, if not worse. Personally, I believe they are worse because they also involve continuous baiting, half-truths and even outright lies to others, including even you and your own squad-mates on squad vox. Again, the unedited films don't lie. It's certainly understandable; he is a skilled player who has a big ego to match. But I would never defend it. The bigger the ego, the more hypocritical and extreme the actions that ego can justify.
Actually, I agree with you on one other point: I too think it's sad that a player (and a skilled player) would do this. But now we're talking about a different player.
Please produce one example of anyone from our squad saying "denied you a kill," "haha ditched it," or anything remotely similar over 200 or PM. Just one. I have over 20 hours of straight unedited flight footage on my Twitch and YouTube, so it shouldn't be hard (and no, pointing out that we survived in response to someone claiming we were shot down 1 vs many doesn't count). Here's a hint: you can't.
Further, find one example of ANY of us ditching 1v1 in any fair fight. Again, you won't find it. See, the hypocrisy here is pretty much summed up by the image I posted and by comments made directly. Flying a P-47M and running, ditching, and even bailing 1v1 vs an LA-7, for example, is ok, because a 47 is a plane that reportedly takes "skill" while the LA-7 is not; flying an P-51D or Ta 152 and ditching against multiple enemies, however, is not acceptable, because one is a late war nitrous monster and the other is a supposedly easy-mode cannon bird that should have easily been able to handle hordes of higher, more maneuverable opponents.
The thought process that leads to this line of thinking is quite intriguing to me.
Now, regarding ditching: diving into a furball to assassinate a target and then ditching quickly? Yep, I've done that. Going into a 1 vs many, shooting as many as I can, and then sliding into a hangar? Yep, done that too. In fact, I don't know of a single player that won't do that at least a few times over their career. If you think that's a reflection of skill, however, the DA's open... and I think I've adequately proved my point there enough times.
Regardless of how you'd like to paint it, most players do and enjoy the same things we do. I said very little last night and simply watched smack talk fly back and forth for hours between entire squads (actual cursing and filter bypassing). I watched certain members in this thread run repeatedly from mid-war planes. I watched several pilots up from a capped base, kill, and then quickly ditch and jump in a wirble. Admittedly far worse than anything I've been accused of. Yet, somehow simply "gaming the game" is far more detrimental.
The reality is that there's many, many different ways to avoid combat. Some bail out, some attempt to gang you to avoid individual skill, and some just run to ack. I've uploaded a few more examples of this to my YouTube channel this morning, you might be interested in some of them.
FESS' point is that there's outrage over bomb and bailing, so why not this? The hypocrisy shown here is typical. To clarify, I personally think there's nothing wrong with it. It's a bit ironic that someone doesn't want to die to someone so they kill themselves, but hey - it's their $15 and they're free to do whatever they want with it. I'm just interested in watching the reasoning of how it's defended. Continue.
