Changes in FM and DM?

[Holtzauge]

I preferred the previous FM and DM release: In the first the Dr1 spun more readily but immediately responded to opposite rudder and stick forward. Now you can mush about with the stick full back and get out of the spin as soon as you release back pressure on stick. Also, it seems you need more stick forward in level flight. In addition, instead of the more rugged wing DM that was part of the first release, we now have the old wing shedding that was a part of ROF. A step in the wrong direction IMHO......

[unreasonable]

Are you sure there has been any FM change? I have not noticed it, flying the Dr.1 seems the same to me.  Certainly no more stick forwards required than before on my HOTAS.  The hotfix notes only mentioned:

 

7. Flying Circus planes are more damageable;
8. Flying Circus planes have correct visible damage;

 

In testing a short burst on a SPAD from behind might now remove a wing even though it is flying straight and level with no extra stress, which I think should happen only very rarely.   On the other hand flying QM Dr.1s vs Dr.1s I could not see any difference: no-one was shedding wings.   I am not sure why the need for "7", and I agree that it is regrettable and can only reward poor shooting.

[Chill31]

The real Dr1 does not spin readily...in fact, I can bury the stick in my lap through a loop or a slightly descending turn, and no stall.  A level turn, with the stick buried, will stall and usually drops the inside wing because of the amount of rudder I am using.  I did a half rotation spin the Dr1 during my initial flight testing to see if I could in fact get out, and as soon as I put the stick forward with a touch of opposite rudder,  it was flying again.  The Dr1 does not like to spin, it prefers to fly at absurd AOA.

 

My personal theory is that all 3 wings do not stall at the same time.  This results in a graduated loss of lift instead of an all at once fall out of the sky.  During a fully "stalled" condition, the airplane falls almost flat, just slightly nose low.

 

The Fokker D7 is supposed to be the same way...Fokker himself, in a post war conference, said their advice to D7 pilots who found themselves lost in low cloud or fog was to hold the stick back and just wait to hit the ground.  It should be survivable!  The landing gear were designed to break away and reduce impact forces as well.

 

if you want it to fly like a fantasy fiction Dr1, then we should go back to the ROF version.

 

 

 

 

[unreasonable]

@Chill31

 

I think Holtzauge means that he liked the 3.005 FC release much more than the RoF version, but he thinks the 3.005b is different. If it is I cannot tell the difference.

 

I think we all like the FC version better than the RoF version: I know I do, I can at least fight AI in it even if not very well.

 

The only time I have managed to spin the FC Dr.1 was when all my controls were shot away.   What does happen though, is that sometimes in a left turn I let the pressure off the stick a little too much and I suddenly find myself pointing almost vertically up!  Very much your absurd AoA!

[Holtzauge]

30 minutes ago, unreasonable said:

Are you sure there has been any FM change? I have not noticed it, flying the Dr.1 seems the same to me.  Certainly no more stick forwards required than before on my HOTAS.  The hotfix notes only mentioned:

 

7. Flying Circus planes are more damageable;
8. Flying Circus planes have correct visible damage;

 

In testing a short burst on a SPAD from behind might now remove a wing even though it is flying straight and level with no extra stress, which I think should happen only very rarely.   On the other hand flying QM Dr.1s vs Dr.1s I could not see any difference: no-one was shedding wings.   I am not sure why the need for "7", and I agree that it is regrettable and can only reward poor shooting.

 

Of course I can't be 100% sure but before the latest patch then in most cases it was usually an engine or pilot hit that disabled the plane just like expected. I always found the frequent wing shedding in ROF kills weird since from a structural engineering viewpoint I would have expected wing shedding due to rifle caliber damage to be rather infrequent that's all.

 

28 minutes ago, Chill31 said:

The real Dr1 does not spin readily...in fact, I can bury the stick in my lap through a loop or a slightly descending turn, and no stall.  A level turn, with the stick buried, will stall and usually drops the inside wing because of the amount of rudder I am using.  I did a half rotation spin the Dr1 during my initial flight testing to see if I could in fact get out, and as soon as I put the stick forward with a touch of opposite rudder,  it was flying again.  The Dr1 does not like to spin, it prefers to fly at absurd AOA.

 

My personal theory is that all 3 wings do not stall at the same time.  This results in a graduated loss of lift instead of an all at once fall out of the sky.  During a fully "stalled" condition, the airplane falls almost flat, just slightly nose low.

 

The Fokker D7 is supposed to be the same way...Fokker himself, in a post war conference, said their advice to D7 pilots who found themselves lost in low cloud or fog was to hold the stick back and just wait to hit the ground.  It should be survivable!  The landing gear were designed to break away and reduce impact forces as well.

 

if you want it to fly like a fantasy fiction Dr1, then we should go back to the ROF version.

 

 

Well I was just assuming (wrongly it seems!) that spinning an IRL Dr1 would be more like the old patch but then as I understand it you actually fly the real thing and if that's how it behaves IRL then of course I'm glad that that is how it's now modeled as well in FC! Interesting about the D7 advice to fly with stick fully back and wait for impact: Had no idea that the Dr1 and D7 had such benign stall characteristics. OTOH they did share the same Göttingen 298 airfoil which may have something to do with it as well.

 

Anyway, really nice to have an IRL Dr1 pilot on board to do sanity checks on the FM: I will happily fly the Dr1 with stick fully back going forward content that this is how it should be. 

[unreasonable]

3 minutes ago, Holtzauge said:

 

Of course I can't be 100% sure but before the latest patch then in most cases it was usually an engine or pilot hit that disabled the plane just like expected. I always found the frequent wing shedding in ROF kills weird since from a structural engineering viewpoint I would have expected wing shedding due to rifle caliber damage to be rather infrequent that's all.

 

 

 

I agree that frequent wing shedding in RoF was wrong: not just from an engineering viewpoint, to which I defer to your knowledge, but just from looking at the empirical evidence recorded in MvR's claim reports. He mentions a fair amount of detail and wing shedding was very rare - expect in BEs where it was almost universal. Nice large sample, too! 

 

The 3.005b does seem to have weakened wings and I agree this may be a mistake, although we will have to have some more experience with the game to be sure. What with the handgun idiocy the DM is obviously work in progress.

 

The FM though I think is unchanged in 3.005b.

 

 

[Holtzauge]

29 minutes ago, unreasonable said:

 

I agree that frequent wing shedding in RoF was wrong: not just from an engineering viewpoint, to which I defer to your knowledge, but just from looking at the empirical evidence recorded in MvR's claim reports. He mentions a fair amount of detail and wing shedding was very rare - expect in BEs where it was almost universal. Nice large sample, too! 

 

The 3.005b does seem to have weakened wings and I agree this may be a mistake, although we will have to have some more experience with the game to be sure. What with the handgun idiocy the DM is obviously work in progress.

 

The FM though I think is unchanged in 3.005b.

 

 

 

Yup, I saw the handgun clip and it was fun to see: Quite often in these forums OP is a misused term but it certainly seem to be the right word in this case! But, as you say it's probably just a case of work in progress so they will most likely fix it later on.

 

On the subject of susceptibility to battle damage, I found the below attached section of a Dr1 wing section which looks pretty sturdy and you would need quite a few rounds before that box section looses it's structural integrity to the point that it fails in bending or twists to the the point of failure at moderate g-loads.

 

Of course the Dr1 is a bit different in that the spar box carries bending and torsional loads while in most other contemporary bi- or triplane designs the spars just carried compression/tension loads due to the strut/bracing wire design but the fact remains that you either need some very lucky shots that severs bracing wires, fittings or struts because most parts of the wing will just soak up FMJ rounds without compromising structural integrity meaning wing losses should be rare indeed....

 

Interesting info about MvR's claims records: Did not know that that backs up a lower frequency of wing shedding but IMHO common sense would also support that the pilot and engine are the largest "single point of failure structures" you can hit just as MvR's own demise proves.

 

[unreasonable]

I may have to dig out my "Under the Guns of the Red Baron" and recompile my spreadsheet: deleted during last PC changeover and when it was clear that RoF was never going to change.

 

At least with 80 reports over a wide range of types one can be a bit more confident than with just a few anecdotes.    

[Avimimus]

That is pretty neat... datasets are always fun to look through.

 

Just a quick note: Airflow produces a lot of pressure (including twisting pressures) on a wing. So damage that might not be noticeable on the ground can cause an aircraft to disintegrate in a dive or during a turn. These things were basically wood for compression and wire for tension... damage to one area, can lead to changes in another area, which can lead to changes in forces related to airflow, which can lead to feedback loops... so it really has to be considered dynamically.

[Holtzauge]

1 hour ago, unreasonable said:

I may have to dig out my "Under the Guns of the Red Baron" and recompile my spreadsheet: deleted during last PC changeover and when it was clear that RoF was never going to change.

 

At least with 80 reports over a wide range of types one can be a bit more confident than with just a few anecdotes.    

 

Sounds interesting: Would also be nice to know how often there was a fire IRL: Those tin can fuel tanks would be easy to hole and sparks from FMJ strikes on metal or tracer could of course set it on fire but OTOH I think it was nice that this feature was not overused in the ROF DM. But again, would be interesting to hear how often the Red Baron saw his victims go down in flames.

 

13 minutes ago, Avimimus said:

That is pretty neat... datasets are always fun to look through.

 

Just a quick note: Airflow produces a lot of pressure (including twisting pressures) on a wing. So damage that might not be noticeable on the ground can cause an aircraft to disintegrate in a dive or during a turn. These things were basically wood for compression and wire for tension... damage to one area, can lead to changes in another area, which can lead to changes in forces related to airflow, which can lead to feedback loops... so it really has to be considered dynamically.

 

For sure: Battle damage may lead to the wing twisting or bending out of shape but if you look at the Dr1 section I posted above it's a box structure which carries both bending and torsional loads and it would require a whole lot of FMJ damage close together for it to lose structural integrity since there are a lot of alternative load paths around local damage. Same goes for the braced wing: Your best bet is to hit a strut, brace wire or brace wire fitting and those are pretty small targets while there is an awful lot of canvas and ribs that you can shoot out without affecting the wings integrity.

Edited July 21, 2018 by Holtzauge

[unreasonable]

He sometimes specifically mentions "in flames" just as he sometimes specifically mentions "collapse of wings" or similar wording. So my working assumption is that if he does not say " on fire", or "the wings collapsed", that it did not happen.

 

The reason I am happy to make that assumption is that MvR needed his claim reports to be confirmed by other pilots or officers on the ground, so it was very much in his interest to be as accurate as possible about the kinds of things that other observers would have seen, like fires, or disintegration. He was also extremely accurate in his reporting of the locations of fights and where his victims crashed: even pretty good with identification, given the wide variety of RFC types. Norman Franks et al only found one of his reports they could not match up with high confidence with RFC records IIRC.

 

Anyway, I will get onto it once my current bout of sinusitis and bronchitis subsides: I do not want to splutter mucus all over my books!  Too much information, I know...., I will do it and post a spreadsheet with date, target a/c, MvR a/c, and notes on damage type recorded.  FC has revived my interest in WW1 aviation all over again.

[Holtzauge]

No hurry unreasonable and grab a glass of whiskey to combat the cold: Maybe it won't cure you but you will feel better anyway!

[US103_Baer]

Guys, what sort of effective gunnery range are you seeing now? I can't get to fly it till next week but from videos I've seen of the new low dispersion, and mention of easier damage post-hotfix, I'm concerned we could end up with serious damage being done from unrealistic distances. 

 

If there is one overriding message that comes thru the real life accounts, it was the need to get in close to do serious damage. Ie under 100m, though effective under 150 still feels ok to me.

[Chill31]

10 hours ago, Holtzauge said:

 

Sounds interesting: Would also be nice to know how often there was a fire IRL: Those tin can fuel tanks would be easy to hole and sparks from FMJ strikes on metal or tracer could of course set it on fire but OTOH I think it was nice that this feature was not overused in the ROF DM. But again, would be interesting to hear how often the Red Baron saw his victims go down in flames.

 

Richthofen lived long enough during the war to have a lot of changes in his personality and thought about fighting.  By the end of the war, it was his technique to shoot an enemy until it caught on fire or shed parts and crashed.  A post mission question he would ask squadron mates who claimed a kill "Did it burn?" To be met with a toast (no pun intended) if answered in the affirmative. 

[unreasonable]

3 hours ago, US103_Baer said:

Guys, what sort of effective gunnery range are you seeing now? I can't get to fly it till next week but from videos I've seen of the new low dispersion, and mention of easier damage post-hotfix, I'm concerned we could end up with serious damage being done from unrealistic distances. 

 

If there is one overriding message that comes thru the real life accounts, it was the need to get in close to do serious damage. Ie under 100m, though effective under 150 still feels ok to me.

 

If a wing is coming off a SPAD after a burst while it is flying dead straight and level, as in my test after the 3.005b change, then wing damage while manoeuvering is going to be inevitably disastrous. Having said that I did not see any wings coming off in a 8 v 8 all Dr.1 furball.

 

We need to get an explanation of why the DM change was made  and if we can get it reversed: does someone have a direct relationship with Jason or at least one of the testers who can ask by PM? I do not suppose just talking about it here will have any effect. Alternatively mention it frequently in the main 3.005 DD thread which does seem to get read.

 

Personally I cannot hit anything much above 100m in a Dr.1 since it is so difficult to maintain a constant direction of flight to line up a shot!  With the SPAD it is much easier, but people are only going to get hit at very long range if they are flying straight.  As for what is an effective distance, that depends on how you are attacking: if you are on the six of a wildly evading plane, then 100m or so seems about right. On the other hand, if you are diving out of the sun in a beam attack on a 2-seater that has not seen you 100m is far too close unless you are a superman: you would only have a single second of firing before you would have to pull away to avoid collision, so I would open up at about 250m to give a 3 second burst and pull up at 100m.

[yaan98]

A bit off topic, but somewhat related....

 

To quote a couple of well known phrases... "if you need to aim, then you're not close enough". "hit Meat or metal"

 

If I could change one thing about these WW1 crates, is that I would make the fuselage impervious to bullets and only collapse due to structural damage from dives/collisions.

 

Ace pilots would be almost a plane's length away before starting to shoot, while novice pilots would start shooting at longer distances. I have not read that WW1 pilots used deflection shooting like WW2. 

 

Dicta Boelcke - Only fire at close range, and then only when the opponent is properly in your sights

MVR - "I calmly let him shoot, for even the best sharpshooter's marksmanship could not help at a distance of 300 metres. One just does not hit."

 

 

 

[Garven]

The propeller on the SPAD XIII needs to be looked at as it eats through Dr1's as if it were a wood chipper.  By the way has anyone managed to light a DR1 on fire?

Edited July 22, 2018 by US103_Furlow

[unreasonable]

2 hours ago, yaan98 said:

A bit off topic, but somewhat related....

 

To quote a couple of well known phrases... "if you need to aim, then you're not close enough". "hit Meat or metal"

 

If I could change one thing about these WW1 crates, is that I would make the fuselage impervious to bullets and only collapse due to structural damage from dives/collisions.

 

Ace pilots would be almost a plane's length away before starting to shoot, while novice pilots would start shooting at longer distances. I have not read that WW1 pilots used deflection shooting like WW2. 

 

Dicta Boelcke - Only fire at close range, and then only when the opponent is properly in your sights

MVR - "I calmly let him shoot, for even the best sharpshooter's marksmanship could not help at a distance of 300 metres. One just does not hit."

 

 

 

 

"Only when the opponent is in your sights" is hardly consistent with  "if you need to aim, then you're not close enough".

 

WW1 pilots certainly used deflection shooting - people like Fonck and Mannock knew that dog-fighting was a mug's game and that the ideal attack on a 2 seater was a fast dive out of the sun, preferably from beam or even front quarter in order to unsight the gunner. If you do that then you have to use deflection. 

 

Deflection shooting for WW1 pilots was a lot easier than in WW2 since the speed of the aircraft was so much less, while the mv of their weapons was about the same.  If you halve the target speed you halve the deflection for a beam attack.

 

MvR was not so cocky about approaching 2-seaters so closely after being shot in the head by one.  The crew who shot him down remarked that his unit approached far more closely than German scouts usually did.  All of the FE2s involved in that engagement were able to RTB. 

 

Making the fuselage impervious to bullets is what RoF did - it is nonsense, and why RoF is not a simulation but an arcade game: canvas and wooden structures do not stop MG bullets. 

Edited July 22, 2018 by unreasonable

[1PL-Husar-1Esk]

I like tighter (realistic) dispersion - as we know from ROF bigger (unrealistic) dispertion increase  probability of been hit by cloud of bullets from longer distance (which often ends by leakage of oil/fuel/water  or damege to engine and in in both cases end of the aeroplane motor) Then when you are close  ready for that one deadly pass by concentrating fire on metal or meat bullets are flying everwhere. Shooting like that give no satisfaction to me. 

 

This is question of:

How many times you guys diving away or disengage after successful but not lethal ^^ pass to surpise been hit by probability and in the end shot down from long distance?

How many that one long awaited surprise attack did not end satisfying by not your fault?
How many times you have been hit after successful break ? Just becouse much gruped bullets (realstic) woud be much easer to avoid ? 

Edited July 22, 2018 by 307_Tomcat

[Reflected]

The last DM changes in RoF made it very, very arcade. I sure hope the devs don't make the same mistakes again. In RoF one had to spray and pray from 800 m and they'd surely cause a fuel leak or something. Make this one right. Make it necessary to close in to within 50 meters to hit vital parts. Don't let the wings get structural damage after 1-2 hits.

[US103_Baer]

13 hours ago, Reflected said:

Make it necessary to close in to within 50 meters to hit vital parts. Don't let the wings get structural damage after 1-2 hits.

This is the direction I hope for too. 

The Law of Unintended Consequences could come into play, for example as @Unreasonable mentioned re 2-seaters, but I hope we'd all support the Devs working towards a well-communicated goal, even if it takes a several iterations to get there.

[BlitzPig_EL]

One would think that pilot kills should be FAR more frequent than they currently are.

Honestly all you have between you and the great beyond is some doped linen, a few wood stringers, and a tiny seat, not really much protection against even the rifle caliber machine guns of the day.

[yaan98]

17 hours ago, unreasonable said:

 

"Only when the opponent is in your sights" is hardly consistent with  "if you need to aim, then you're not close enough".

 

WW1 pilots certainly used deflection shooting - people like Fonck and Mannock knew that dog-fighting was a mug's game and that the ideal attack on a 2 seater was a fast dive out of the sun, preferably from beam or even front quarter in order to unsight the gunner. If you do that then you have to use deflection. 

 

Deflection shooting for WW1 pilots was a lot easier than in WW2 since the speed of the aircraft was so much less, while the mv of their weapons was about the same.  If you halve the target speed you halve the deflection for a beam attack.

 

MvR was not so cocky about approaching 2-seaters so closely after being shot in the head by one.  The crew who shot him down remarked that his unit approached far more closely than German scouts usually did.  All of the FE2s involved in that engagement were able to RTB. 

 

Making the fuselage impervious to bullets is what RoF did - it is nonsense, and why RoF is not a simulation but an arcade game: canvas and wooden structures do not stop MG bullets. 

 

My mistake. I didn't really make myself clear when writing especially the part about impervious canvas or deflection shooting being common among WW1 pilots.

 

I am of the opinion that it is more historically accurate for most pilots to shoot at close range and I hope FC goes in this direction as was stated by Baer. 

 

Remember that combat and its techniques were still in its infancy during WW1 and most were only later taught in flight schools during the interwar years. A lot of folks play WW1 flight like they would WW2 maybe out of habit or other reasons. We are trained to read the AI and its patterns over and over again until we can shoot them down without a second thought. So, to fly and fight in these birds like a WW1 pilot out of training school is difficult task, but would be cool if it was hardcoded some where in FC to limit our flying and shooting abilities to that of a rookie until after say 5 confirmed victories.

 

Here are some interesting quotes taken from other forums:

 

"It is known that the US air service in the interwar years studied Rene Fonck methods and tried to teach them, coming to the conclusion that they were beyond the grasp of the average pilot. Partly because they were only of application to people with excellent gunnery skills. "

"in the 1920s the US Navy studied his methods and concluded that large numbers of pilots could be taught full deflection shooting."
(source theaerodrome.com)

 

"Some aces in both World Wars were naturally good shots, but many were not - they just got so close that they couldn't miss.

It was very difficult to teach deflection shooting and most pilots were very poor at it. The USAAF in WW2 discovered that their good shots nearly all came from the countryside and were naturally skilled at deflection shooting - with shotguns against birds. 

The RAF in the late 1930s did some exercises using camera guns attached to fighters who were sent to 'attack' bombers, and were horrified to find that they nearly all missed by a large margin. This led to the development of the gyro gunsight which eventually solved the problem."
(source Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum)

 

"*MvR mentioned distance in 16 of the combat reports that pertained to his victories. *Translating into feet, he said that he fired from about 600 ft. once, about 150 ft. 9 times, about 60 ft. *once, *and 30 ft. 5 times."
(source theaerodrome.com)

Edited July 23, 2018 by yaan98

[unreasonable]

@yaan98 good post, a few points, since I still think you have drawn the wrong conclusions.

 

I do not think it is either practical or desirable for the program to try to handicap human players through artificial shooting impediments. The only practical approach IMHO is to try to model the real physical factors that lead to inaccuracy. These might include more turbulence and propwash behind aircraft, and more turbulence generally.  I handicap myself because I do not have a snap to gunsight view: I have to use TiR to line up and it is hard to keep it so if you are manoeuvring. One effect is that I am better at deflection shooting than I am from behind in a dogfight! But I cannot see how you can impose that or other kinds of restriction on all players.

 

One restriction that could and  should be in the game IMHO is proper weapon jams. RB3D had them. What they do is discourage low probability shooting because apart from probably wasting ammo you also run the risk of losing a gun altogether.  

 

Deflection shooting is tricky and tends to be instinctive: as someone who was taught to use a shotgun in my early teens I find it fairly intuitive, but you also have to be able to do a little very basic maths to apply it to aircraft. It is very hard to train pilots to do it, as there is no real opportunity for live fire practice (and most RL military pilots are not exactly rocket scientists in my experience ) .  Of course we get thousands of opportunities, but there are still some people who are really bad at it and other who are not.  It is not justifiable to take away the advantages of a genuine skill from those that have it. Some of the top scoring WW1 aces were aces precisely because they could deflection shoot.

 

Most of the complaints about "sniping" in CFS do not involve deflection shooting at all: they usually involve a plane trying to extend away or dive away in a straight line that is hit at long range. The target then complains that this is unrealistic since "most pilots had to shoot at 50m".  In RoF this was made worse by the hyper dispersed bullet spread, but the fault here is the idiocy of the targets not the simulation.

 

Currently I am in the process of compiling a spreadsheet of MvR's victories using Norman Frank's book, originally to look at the incidence of fires and wing collapse damage, but I will include ranges where they are mentioned plus the context. Some of the combat reports mentioning close ranges say that he either approached apparently unobserved to close range, or that he opened fire and continued his attack to close range, for instance of 2-seaters where he had already killed the gunner.  So the range information has to be read in context to be meaningful.

 

One thing to note about this, however, is that MvR was by no means average in his approach, and he (and some of his unit when he was there) tended to get much closer than the majority of German pilots, at least before he got a bullet in the head for doing exactly that. His approach is no more representative of the WW1 practice of an average pilot than is Fonck's. One of the principles of history is that if you find lots of laws forbidding the practice of X, there is a high probability that X was frequently practiced. I feel the same way about long range shooting in aviation. 

Edited July 23, 2018 by unreasonable

[ZachariasX]

4 hours ago, unreasonable said:

One of the principles of history is that if you find lots of laws forbidding the practice of X, there is a high probability that X was frequently practiced.

If there is indication that only one person could ever walk on water, then there is a high probability that walking on water was common practise?

[unreasonable]

44 minutes ago, ZachariasX said:

If there is indication that only one person could ever walk on water, then there is a high probability that walking on water was common practise?

 

Just so.

 

And then:

1) All the other occasions when MvR did not record the distance at which he fired. Should we assume that he fired at the average distance when he made a specific measurement,  or not?

 

2)Perhaps we should note that in one report he shoots down a BE2 at 600m! because it made the mistake of flying straight?  But if this happens in the game the whining is deafening, because, 50m.

 

3) Then there is the kill steal report in which he is pissed off at another pilot trying to claim his kill while firing at 300m and 1,000m which "a child knows" is impossible. So other pilots clearly fired at long range - just as he did if the target was not manoeuvring.

 

MvR's reports are interesting in that they record what happens when a WW1 plane is attacked, with a pretty useful sample size, including both scouts and 2-seaters,  not because the way in which MvR attacked is typical. It was not, at least not always. He was a (perhaps borderline) psychopath,  as his collecting of victim souvenirs indicates, and should not be taken as typical of how WW1 scout pilots behaved. Even at the time, his behaviour was noted as being exceptional.  Whenever he was not around to imitate, the scoring rate of his units collapsed. He used a high risk, high return strategy and got lucky - for a while.

 

Anyway I am about half way through the spreadsheet now, in a couple of days I will finish and post a new thread on MvR's victories and what they do or do not mean and we can all argue about it again. 

 

 

Edited July 23, 2018 by unreasonable

[HagarTheHorrible]

53 minutes ago, unreasonable said:

 

 

2)Perhaps we should note that in one report he shoots down a BE2 at 600m! because it made the mistake of flying straight?  But if this happens in the game the whining is deafening, because, 50m.

 

 

 

 

 

Are BE2's capable of doing anything, other than flying straight ? 

 

Circumstance and chance also play a role, as MvR was to find to his cost.  Most combat took place on the German side of the lines with prevailing winds in the Germans favour.  Less than favorable shooting opportunities were less of an issue for German airmen (?) as retreating from the fray was not such a problem , so ammunition could be expended at less promising targets without having to worry about getting home.  I think we all, at some time or another, have fired more in hope than expectation, but then, like the German pilots, we have to worry far less about getting home. MvR was also a crack shot and if you reduce all the other potential possibilities for errors, like manouver, speed, stability, flight direction etc then chances are higher but still open to luck and chance.

 

MvR was a practical pragmatist.  I think if he had reasoned that the odds were good, at long range sniping, he would have not only recommended it to his fellow performers, but practiced it more frequently.

 

......but then you know all this anyway 

 

(I have no idea why it decided to go bold on me and it won't turn off)

[ZachariasX]

2 hours ago, unreasonable said:

And then:

I shall be most interested to see your compilations of MvR‘s hunting. I would think that he, and people like him are very off the norm what general „hunting practise“ back then was. If that was anything other than what 1GCAP refer to as „spray & pray“ (& run/disengage), I‘d be very much surprised. 

 

But taking your comment out of context gives it a lot of color.