Gunnery tips

[sturmkraehe]

In old IL2 I fared pretty well with a convergence set to 150m. My impression is this is no longer a good value for this one.

 

What are your preferred settings in multiplayer and do you have some further advice to improve my gunnery in this game? I have some notions on deflection shootung and need more practice but would be happy to take any advice on how to improve my gunnery further.

 

Did anything change btw between old IL2 and this one with respect to deflection shooting? Do I need more lead or less or is it identical?

[RedKestrel]

32 minutes ago, sturmkraehe said:

In old IL2 I fared pretty well with a convergence set to 150m. My impression is this is no longer a good value for this one.

 

What are your preferred settings in multiplayer and do you have some further advice to improve my gunnery in this game? I have some notions on deflection shootung and need more practice but would be happy to take any advice on how to improve my gunnery further.

 

Did anything change btw between old IL2 and this one with respect to deflection shooting? Do I need more lead or less or is it identical?

As far as what changed, the flight models are all quite a bit more detailed and generally speaking the forces acting on the planes during maneuvers are IMO modeled more strongly, so there is more to compensate for when firing. The ballistics are probably a bit more sophisticated but moving from old to new Il-2 I didn't notice a big difference when flying the same planes in terms of getting hits. I think old Il-2 was pretty good at producing realistic deflection angles and ballistics, all things considered.

Preferred settings for convergence are 250-300 m for myself, but I do a lot of ground strafing and I like to open up at longer ranges especially on AA guns. 

[Eisenfaustus]

You can use the aiming assist in the difficulty options to train deflection shooting as long as you concentrate on the relative position of the angled target and your sight.

 

Historical shooting manuals also help: Bag the hun, Horrido - des Jägers Schießfibel or the American manual I forgot the name of. 
 

Concergence - if my main killing power is in the centre I go for 400. If it is in the wings 200. If it’s evenly divided (Fw 190 A) 300. 

[JG1_Vonrd]

Take a look at Requiem's tutorials... he has several on gunnery. Here's the REVI one:

 

[Dragon1-1]

I set convergence to 400m if I have centerline armament, otherwise it's 180m (200yd). For ground attack planes, 300m. As for deflection shooting, the only way to figure that out is to practice. The video is nice, but it's no replacement for just flying against AI till you can land deflection shots reasonably often. Instant action is particularly good for this because AI absolutely loves to turn.

Edited May 12, 2021 by Dragon1-1

[sturmkraehe]

Online I am usually flying only spitties although a lot on allied side seem to prefer the tempest for dogfighting.

 

So what always happens to me is that while I need to pump half my ammo into a 109 or a 190 to bring it down while taking care to be in convergence they very often manage to one shot kill me irrespective of distance. I've been one shotted at distances of up to 1.5 km (icons on). I hear a bang - and boom!

 

How come that they can still be so lethal at such distances? How come that they seem to need only one hit to instant kill me while I need to waste so much ammo? Are allied guns so crap?

 

Is it possible for spits to obtain similar results (provided sufficient skill available)? How can I get this skill best? Any advice?

Edited May 14, 2021 by sturmkraehe

[Dragon1-1]

Well, you can't put 30mm cannons on the Spit, which is what I suspect is happening. Germans can carry a centerline Mk108, which does kill fighters in a single shot, and it's rather easy to aim with. While 1.5km seems dubious (make sure it's nor flak or something else killing you) unless from head-on, the 30mm round flies fast, hits hard and is easy to aim from a centerline mount. The Allies don't really have anything like this except the P-39 (which is currently underperforming quite badly).

 

Also, "half your ammo" in the Spit isn't very much.  Make sure you're hitting the important parts and not just punching holes in the wings. The Spit's armament is best used exactly at convergence. Firing the 20mm and .50s separately also helps. Also, try changing your convergence to something like 180m, which will allow you to set the sight to 200yd. This makes landing hits a bit easier for me.