Why will my guns on the bomber not fire online sometimes?

[kozzm0]

When your gunner can fire, the crosshairs are bright, and when the crosshairs are out of the firing cone, they go dim.

Most bombers will not let you fire below the plane, except to about 4 or 8 o'clock low. You'll notice the crosshairs go dim if they're near the elevators or rudder. A smart fighter will approach these fighters from below or above, so you can't hit them unless you abandon your bombing run to maneuver.

If you want a bomber that can fire nearly every direction, get the b-17. The BOP b-17 is more deadly than the real b-17's which had very limited ammunition, couldn't maneuver as well, and didn't have just one gunner controlling all the guns. With the b-17 you can fire almost directly below the plane via the waist gunner, you have a good field of fire in front of the plane, and above it too. The most significant blind spots are at 3 and 9 oclock.

Once you've got a b-17, you can practice against my fighter 1 on 1 if you want, in sim, as long as you fly it like a bomber instead of dogfighting. Goes for anyone - I like to practice against b-17's.

[Crosshair14]

Well if you r on realistic the gun will reload and it takes a while. but if u r on limited ammo u literally run out of ammo and it never comes back untill u die.

[kozzm0]

Originally Posted by Crosshair14

Well if you r on realistic the gun will reload and it takes a while. but if u r on limited ammo u literally run out of ammo and it never comes back untill u die.

lol that's realistic, all right. Even b-17's often ran out of ammo long before making it out of enemy territory, at which point they were sitting ducks especially if they fell out of formation.

A couple months ago I linked a guncam video I found of a winchestered b-17 being leisurely done in by a bf-110 from 6 o'clock level. The 110 casually lit up all 4 of its engines in one strafe.

I've got one effective way of improving bomber fire, but I had to sacrifice the rudder. Make a custom controller layout, similar to aviator, but eliminate the rudder and move the trigger to the shoulder buttons. Then you can move the crosshairs and fire at the same time.