Fact:: Buff guns
do have more hitting power if they are firing backwards into the "face" of an enemy chasing the buff. In the same way, a fighter's bullets have more hitting power in a head on attack than in a six attack. I believe this is modeled in AH, but how accurately, I don't know.
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Fact: It is much easier to aim buff guns in AH than in real life: The guns don't kick back; there's no smoke from them to trail back and obscure the gunner's view; the plane is perfectly stable (if no structural damage).
As a result, it's possible to get decisive hits at distances over d1.0 on a fighter coming up on a buff's six. In WW2, buff gunners didn't usually fire until enemy fighters were 250-400 yds out, from what I have read.
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Some say buffs are too easy to shoot down:
Fact: Unescorted buffs were regularly massacred, just like they are in AH.
But only by fighter pilots using intelligent tactics. And no, sneaking up slowly on a buff's low six is not intelligent.
Fact: Buffs are too easy to shoot down in AH because they are used in ways never intended. For example:
*Dive-bombing with B-17s comes to mind, though thankfully it's rare.
*Lancs were made to fly at 18k-22k, on dark nights (with icons off:D), in a bomber stream (not a formation). In AH they are regularly used at 8-12k, in daylight, in small formations of 3.
*B-17's should be flown in formations of 36-54 aircraft at 18-28k. In AH, even a close formation of 6 B-17's is rare.
*Because there is no rolling plane set, early and mid-war bombers are sitting ducks for late war planes like La-7's.
I'm sure you can all think of many more examples. On the other hand...
...Some say buffs are too hard to shoot down. Most of these pilots, I think either:
*Don't have the patience and/or ability to climb above and ahead of the buffs and then make head-on attacks.
*Don't have the flying ability, aim or imagination to make slashing attacks. That is, attacks coming from one side and then the other.
*Don't realize how
fat a target they are as they come up slowly from behind, straight and level.
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Fact: The Luftwaffe estimated that
on average it took 20, 20mm shells to bring down a four-engine bomber. That's an average. Some took only a handful, some took 40. The Luftwaffe estimated that it took, on average, 3
"well-placed" 30mm rounds to bring down a four-engine bomber.
Of course, these are only statistics, probabilities. Consider this account by Lieutenant Commander Marvin R. Novak:
"The most memorable combat experience for me was a fifty-mile chase of a Betty during the Marianas campaign. With a division of four Hellcats we caught and shot up a Betty cruising not more than ten feet above the water. We four Hellcat pilots loaded the Betty with 50-caliber slugs from highside, level, rear and frontal attacks. There was no opposition at all, and we could afford the time for careful aim. We poured a fanstastic volume of lead into that one bomber, expending all our ammunition. Finally, there were only one or two guns still firing. Twenty minutes had passed. Then the Betty, almost as though from the sheer weight of lead we had pumped into it, slammed into the water amid mountainous flames and debris." --"Fighter Aces of the USA"
And think of the B-17's and B-24's that came back after
direct hits by 88mm AA shells. How many more were there that survived 88mm hits, only to picked off by fighters?
Then again, British children's author Roald Dahl (yes, it's "Roald"), a Hurricane pilot early in the war in Greece, brought down a Ju-88 with a brief burst from his .303's in a steep, poorly planned high-speed pass. The Ju-88 just nosed over and dove straight into the water from several thousand feet. Dahl said it must have been a pilot kill.
So, I conclude that sometimes buffs were easy to shoot down. And sometimes they weren't.
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As always, I look forward to your comments and ideas.
MRPLUTO VMF-323 ~Death Rattlers~ MAG-33
