WWII gunnery tips?

[Lufberyjaa]

I picked up Battle of Bodenplatte a couple of days ago and am having a great time flying the P-38J and P-51D. My piloting is good, but my gunnery is terrible. I seem to shoot ahead or behind. I usually end up leading too much. How far away can/should I shoot? Thanks.

[MajorMagee]

100m improves your chances but it will feel very close. The chances of getting a good shot go way down beyond 300m.

[Jaegermeister]

In the P38, all the guns are in the nose so you can get very close like 100 meters and open fire. A short burst at that distance will be devastating. 

In the P-51, your .50 cal guns will need to be set to the convergence distance you hope to shoot from. I like 250 meters. At longer or shorter distances, you have to be aware that your bullets will go off to the sides, so you may have to aim off a little to one side or the other. If I get very close with wing guns, I just wait until the EAC cockpit is right in front of my wing and open fire. That works pretty well.

I always repeat to myself when I am trying to make a long distance shot... Match wing angle with the enemy, outfly them first, then open fire in range.

Spoiler

 

 

[Aapje]

To add to that, centerline guns have little dispersion, so bullet drop is the main consideration. You can fire close in or very far away, if you compensate for the bullet drop.

Wing guns are more sensitive to distance. Depending on the plane I tend to set it to 200-300 meters for wing guns. Center line guns can also be set to longer distances. But typically you want to fire fairly close to the enemy.

[GiftGruen]

That‘s an interesting question - convergence.

I ended up with quite short 150m - but I am a 109/190 pilot and both planes are rather nose gun fighters ( not completely, but mostly )

That‘ also a question of fighting style, correct? Personally I tend to ‚late firing‘ since leading correct on large distances is something I am not managing really good. It‘s more ‚spray and pray‘ then.

[Lufberyjaa]

1 hour ago, GiftGruen said:

Personally I tend to ‚late firing‘ since leading correct on large distances is something I am not managing really good. It‘s more ‚spray and pray‘ then.

Oh dear, that's exactly what's happening to me right now!

I've been flying WWI Flying Circus combat exclusively since FC volume I came out. Just last week, I started with WWII planes. I'm doing a good job of getting on my opponent's tail, but I'm having trouble with shooting too far away and with too much lead.

The tips above are very hepful!

Are the gunsights in the planes gyro sights that can help calculate lead and bullet drop?

[Aapje]

3 hours ago, GiftGruen said:

I ended up with quite short 150m - but I am a 109/190 pilot and both planes are rather nose gun fighters ( not completely, but mostly )

If you set the convergence of the 109 to 400 meters, the cannon rounds will intersect the gunsight line at 125 meters, and then again at 400. In between you'll shoot a bit high. That can be a good setting for both sniping and upclose.

[MaxPower]

If you're chasing your opponent and pull them into your gunsights, it's likely that you're going to cause a high aspect situation with highly offset turning circles.  If you have the opportunity- the opportunity here could be some combination of starting with an energy advantage, having a performance advantage, having time before you're in danger of being third partied, etc- you can adopt a lag pursuit and try to turn in on the opponent's past flight path.  If you're chasing the other plane in a turn, you can keep him somewhere above your gunsight, like maybe 3 gunsights high.  At some point, you'll see his exhaust pass from below you to above you.  If you're able to close with this geometry, the resulting gun solution should be low aspect.  Low aspect shots allow you to see the aircraft you're shooting at, observe impacts, correct fire, and require less lead.

[GiftGruen]

400m convergence. Interesting - I'll give it a try !   Makes absolute sense - requiring less lead when turning in.

Generally in both planes, but more so in a 190, I tried to train myself to avoid turning more then 90 degrees, means: trained myself to use some 'hit and run and never slowdown' type of fighting - which overall greatly bettered my survival rate.  So using a lot of lead in turn cycles is something I rather rarely need.

What I'm actually trying to optimize - that's finding the correct firing solution in high angle attacks e.g. in vertical dives. Still waste a lot of ammo here cause my brain does not calculate fast enough distance/flight path/speed. Optimizing this would fit perfectly my ( now somewhat trained ) 'never-ever-circle' fighting style.

 

Edited May 4 by GiftGruen

[brickcommander]

Try to fly a plane with a steady gunsight. I am flying the p40 in moscow, and despite the plane's flaws, it is an amazingly acxurate gunnery platform! It has actually heen an eye opener.

[AndreiTomescu]

my SP experience:

- i try to keep the convergence as historical as possible: guns centered in the front, 400-600m. Guns on the wings, 260m. Ground attach setup with guns on the wings, 350-400m. 

- i found out that in planes with less devastating firepower, 109 standard guns included (E,F, early G) the best shot , also conserving ammo, is to jump the foe as it turns and manage a snapshot at an angle towards 90 degrees.  this way you hit cockpit, pilot and engine. Rear hits, especially for a tough opponent like Il-2, are very often useless. happened to empty guns into a Sturmovik, saw it riddled with holes, and still flying happly ever after.

- another useful approach if you shoot from the enemy's 6 o'clock would be to dip the nose a bit and shoot slightly from below, aming ahead abit. this way you have good chance to hit radiator and engine. Also you get a better visibility, since snaphots usually require shooting with the target well under your nose.

 - the gyroscopic gunsight i found usefull, but as to help calculate deflecting shots. just help. for its accuracy, too many variables are to be taken into account, and that's hard to do during a fast dogfight.

[AndreiTomescu]

6 hours ago, GiftGruen said:

firing solution in high angle attacks e.g. in vertical dives

In such situations, that i specifically build, Lady Luck also has a large amount of share. 

With a 109 one can fire just a short burst with the MGs only, as to test the solution, and after a bit of correction a shot burst with all the guns. But usually there ain't time for the second corrected round.

Other variant i use is to set the shot, intentionally over lead a bit, and as I fire (longer burst, like 2 secs) reduce lead as to walk the bullets over the target. 

But, from my "adventures", usually I miss because i don't lead enough.

[Dash,Polder]

Most important tip, upon opening fire don't miss, or you won't live long to regret it. 

[Catch]

Dang it. Light bulb moment! That's what I've been doing wrong.

[Qcumber]

Check out this channel for everything combat related for IL-2

https://youtube.com/@requiemsactl?si=winCNOzCXFF0H1sH

 

[Boaty__McBoatFace]

Practice with the 30mm MK108 lobbing hand grenades at maneuvering airframes and you are bound to improve on some marksmanship! 

[Pyro]

Fight, fight and after that fight again. Just build a quick mission and start fighting.

 

At some point you will just feel when to shoot as your brain has seen the correct image (where the pipper is related to the current EAC position in your sights) countless times. That happens on a rather sub conscious level but in the end you work on recreating the circumstances where you've hit before.

 

And that level of experience can only be build by constant fighting.

Attacking from many different angles and positions. Tracers are nice to learn this but the real fun starts, when you can disable them. Cliffs of Dover allowed for that. In that game you could (for the early 109s) remove the tracers (save for the 20mm's) and the enemy would only notice your shots when the damage was already severe.

Good old times 🙂