Quote:
Originally Posted by AndyJWest
Absolutely. And even in a turn fight, one can use yo-yos etc to take advantage when appropriate. The whole sustained round-and-round dogfight scenario is so unlikely that I don't think it is even worth considering as historically significant - and of course anyone engaging in it is a sitting duck to an outsider...
It probably helps to know things like best-sustained-turn-rate speed etc, but as TheGrunch has pointed out, you need also to take into account the performance of your adversary.
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-Excuse me but let me quote this again as this is too unbelievable: "The whole sustained round-and-round dogfight scenario is so unlikely that I don't think it is even worth considering as historically significant"
Have you ever read a SINGLE WWII fighter combat account in your entire life?!?
I will post a few here that went on for 15 minutes to one side:
Most of them go on for at least a full minute (2-3 360s), two minutes being extremely common also: 4-6 360s... Almost
none of them last for less than over one full 360°, regardless of the types involved...
By comparison with turn fighting, "Boom and Zoom" is far less significant, except mostly by P-38s against Japan, and on the Eastern and Desert Front by Me-109s (apparently a centralized armament helps). Even then, turn fighting is at least as important as anything else anywhere, and "Boom and Zoom" is virtually non-existent on the 1944 Western Front, which was the most technically advanced front of WWII...
You need to actually read a few WWII combat reports now and then...
For the Me-109G, vertical maneuvers are clearly a compensation for its deficient turn performance, until superior US vertical performance in 1944 forced it out of its stereotypical "see-saw" (the reason Rall called it a "floret")...
I guess you don't realize that once you have committed to a turn fight, and the enemy is close enough behind, you cannot just "step out" of it at will: Any slackening of the turn will give the pursuer an easy kill...
The trouble with Il-2 may be that the roll and especially the pitch response has too little inertia delay ("mushing") to impose a life-like turn contest "lock".
Or it could be that the issue is that the restricted in-game field of view angle is giving too much escape possibilities with a large maneuver...
Once the turn fight has slowed you down (which could be as quick as after 180°), the real-life pitch response may no longer be crisp enough for a fast enough split-s (remember that in WWII fighters, "Corner Speed" is mostly near
maximum level speed)... That's why they tend to go on forever unless the pursued uses the pursuer's under-nose "blind spot" (necessary to gain enough sight lead for the pursuer) to push down on the stick and "disapear" at the very moment it was about to be hit...
Even then, you'll note from Hartman's description of this tactic that there is no time for a much more confortable split-s...
In addition, any downward escape (and by definition, most of the time, an escape from a turnfight can only really be downward: Zoom or spiral climb escapes are very rare and require a very large climb performance disparity) will put you in a lower position, which is usually catastrophic: In real-life you cannot easily raise your nose fast and accurately while turning from a lower position: Simply by virtue of being higher, the pursuer can lower his nose easily and accurately while tracking your movements...
Losing the "high ground" is probably not represented severely enough in Il-2, as it meant everything in real-life WWII combat, and is likely the main reason why horizontal turn battles where so common and so prolonged.
(BTW, Anybody outside the turn were offered only limited high-deflection shots that were of not so great value to a real-life 2% gun hit rate, until the introduction of gyro-sights, and maybe even then...)
In jet combat, being lower can actually be an advantage, but that is far removed from the reality of WWII propeller combat...
As to the comment about the real-life guns versus the "magical" ones in-game, it has nothing to do with me complaining about my playing Il-2: I have never played Il-2 and don't intend to do so in the near future. I am playing little enough as it is my own air combat simulation, which I have to admit also fails to reproduce those 15 minutes turn battles, but for reasons of boardgame mechanics.
At least a full 360° is common enough...:
http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/t...708#5031083708
The research took 14 years, and all the profile drawings except the P-47D were made especially for it, given inaccuracies in most drawings...
Gaston
P.S.: The "weakness" of actual guns is based on Luftwaffe assesments of a 2% average hit rate in real-life...
G.