Priorities
I spent a little more time in the New Wings training server tonight. Morale is important, even in a game simulation. Flying with and against a number of newbie pilots and a few seasoned ones is good experience for a couple of reasons.
1.) You get a kill every once in awhile, which is good for one's confidence.
2.) If you're flying with a set of tactics in mind, making one mistake against an opponent doesn't seal your fate. Odds are good that the guy you're flying against won't pounce on you with an unshakable fixation and dead-eye aim. He's doing what you're doing – which is trying to figure out where the heck his opponent is.
3.) You can try things out and not worry too much about the consequences. It's a quick re-spawn, gain some altitude, and you're in the thick of it again. Some of the realism maps have quite a bit of flight time between engagements. That causes a pilot to fly very carefully, because you know if you get shot down you'll have to re-spawn and make that trip all over again. The problem is that a fighter pilot can't fly carefully and win. You have to know and operate on the edge of your plane's abilities.
With those things in mind, and thinking about training while I was flying, I started making a mental list of training steps for this sim.
1.) Basic flight. This seems like a no-brainer, but it's important. Some of the planes are pretty tricky. Everyone needs to start with basic mastery of takeoff, common maneuvers, stall and spin recovery, and landing. Some crates can perform maneuvers that others can't, and they ALL seem to have different stall characteristics. At first this frustrated me. I wanted another Red Baron NFM where everything kind of flew like everything else, with just enough variety to keep it interesting. Now, however, I'm really liking the challenge of truly unique aircraft. Every dogfight is different, and you have to adjust your tactics to your own plane, as well as the one you're facing.
2.) Gunnery. THIS IS THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT SKILL FOR SURVIVING IN COMBAT. The planes are frighteningly flimsy, and your pilot is very vulnerable. You can take an opponent down with a single bullet if it is well placed (and vice versa). I say that not because I think it's a good idea to try to snap off single rounds, but because your best chances of prevailing in a fight are to be able to put shots on your target when you have the chance. In some fights you only get one chance, and if you miss it you'll suddenly find yourself on the defensive, unable to turn the tables back in your favor. Once you have a handle on basic flight, good gunnery will be your best friend.
3.) Energy fighting. Or Boom 'n Zoom tactics. I've found so far that mixing it up in a turn fight is a good way to make a really nice crater in the ground. You either slowly lose ground by trying to constantly pull lead pursuit on your opponent (who may be in a better turn fighter than you anyway) until he gets the upper hand – or you get bounced by another enemy while you're fixated on your first opponent. The answer is to fly using energy tactics at all times, only resorting to Turn 'n Burn when your opponent is damaged, severely disadvantaged, and completely alone. I'll address the specifics of energy tactics in a subsequent post.
4.) Teamwork. When we have a sufficient number of pilots who can fly, shoot, and know at least the bare bones of Boom 'n Zoom flying, we'll work on flying as a team. Two or more average pilots working together are more than twice as deadly as one skilled pilot. Bombing missions will require coordination as well, as the bombers definitely have a hard time defending themselves against well-flown pursuit planes.
One more issue, but I'm not quite sure where it fits into this all yet, is situational awareness. It's tough to keep your eyes on your opponent. You maneuver and lose him, and all of a sudden don't even know where he went. The realism servers disable padlocking, which I try not to use anyway. I'm thinking we'll all have head-tracking devices, because frankly I'm not sure how a person could play this game well without it. So it becomes a matter of knowing what's going on around you and re-acquiring your target if you lose it. I'll have to think more on this.
Experience this evening:
Tonight I took the SE5 out for quite awhile, the Spad 13 for a bit, and about two missions with the Sopwith Dolphin. The SE5 is my favorite of the 3. It's fast, stable, has an excellent roll rate, good visibility, can dive hard and hang together, and climbs very well. It can even turn a little if you need it to. The Spad is even faster, but its visibility is much poorer than the SE5. It climbs just as well, but Its roll rate is also quite a bit slower, and I would say confidently that you should NEVER use it as a turn fighter. It's got a much heavier feel to it. Jury is still out on the Dolphin. It's not nearly as fast as the previous two, dances around a little more and seems maneuverable, but I haven't gotten into a good fight with it yet.
S!
-Amish
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