Not what I was expecting (but great)

[GregD]

This sim is *not* what I was expecting... But it's on me... I'd flown recent jet sims, and mostly lately WW2 stuff.. Never 50s early jets..  This is a different kettle of fish!

Take the F80 for instance, to me an achingly gorgeous jet. I could stare at it forever, as pretty as the F84 is fugly. ... Well the thing is a piece of #$$% to dogfight with 😉 It can barely take off when loaded, it's unstable as hell when loaded with bombs, a dropped rock could accelerate faster, it'll snap roll on you when pulling G after a bomb run, and as a gunnery platform it's moving around a lot.... But it's probably accurate and it's cool ! 

The dogfighting is also very different than I'm used to... In ww2 sims you could get on someone's tail and work from there.  Here?  There's a huge speed differential *at all times*... Jet vs bombers, best slow down (and get hit) or do a fast pass and aim well, if you wanna save energy the pass is like 2 seconds - boom gone...  Even jets v jets, these things accelerate slow and lose speed fast, so I've found it exceedingly rare (i.e never so far) that I would be doing a classic dogfight behind another jet. It's generally high speed pass, shoot from (seemingly) a different zip code forever away, spray and pray (gunsight!!), or big deflection...  In normal conditions, it's hard to catch a jet and stay behind at the same speed (maybe it's me).. 

All this to say, it's different. But I love it ! New skills, gorgeous planes and sceneries, fun damage model... I know the hardcore simmers knew this already (and spend more time complaining about enemy AI), more of a heads up for casual flyers. Also, it's *hard* initially. There are a million keys to map, little info on squad management, it took me 2 days to realize the F80 has take-off assist rockets to help get that thing off the ground, LOL.. The squadron management remains confusing, why could I not fly all missions even if my plane is ok and I'm selected, sometimes I still have no idea but I'm sure it's me, etc... Took a week to get the hang of it all, but man it is fun !  I still think this needs a good manual/tutorial to be successful with a larger crowd, and success would mean more planes... 

Edited August 15 by GregD

[Husar]

Good that you like it. BTW F80 also has a boost and heavy loaded take off by itself with 70% flaps and neutral trim without trying to pull up to much and stall.

[Uther]

2 minutes ago, Husar said:

Good that you like it. BTW F80 also has a boost and heavy loaded take off by itself with 70% flaps and neutral trim without trying to pull up to much and stall.

Took me over 20 career missions before I realised that and mapped the boost button. I can take off now, usually. 😁

[Hetstaine]

I've found the F80 to be very forgiving, rolls like a 190 on steroids, takeoff and landings are pretty sweet, once you have done a few that is, and as a bombing/rocket platform, very stable. I grabbed the F84 just to have more ordnance! Both great groundpounders. Jatos are awesome, live using them!

Dogfighting, haven't done much in MP, got one pass on a LA11, hit his wing and he turned and dove amongst the ground clutter and i lost him. Still, great fun after il2 props for so many years.

[Viking1]

9 hours ago, GregD said:

This sim is *not* what I was expecting... 

 it's *hard* initially. There are a million keys to map, little info on squad management, it took me 2 days to realize the F80 has take-off assist rockets to help get that thing off the ground, LOL.. The squadron management remains confusing, why could I not fly all missions even if my plane is ok and I'm selected, sometimes I still have no idea but I'm sure it's me, etc... Took a week to get the hang of it all, but man it is fun !  I still think this needs a good manual/tutorial to be successful with a larger crowd, and success would mean more planes... 

The kind of things the Devs need to hear. In order to reach a new crowd..