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03May 2005
"It was a smorgasbord of
achievement"
Field of Departure:
21
Targets:
A21, A74, A80
Pilots in Attendance:
Fuzeman
Lees2
Luft
Joker66
Plus Seal
RBS
RTS
Skeksis
SKu
Greetings! Once again I am happy
to report a fun and successful
squad night.
The night started early with
myself as the only Specialist in
the MA at first flying out of a
base who number I do not recall up
to A21 simply because there was a
low dar-bar and as usual I wanted
to warm up a bit. For some reason
I chose to fly the P40-E, probably
because we were training with it
last week and I wanted to see if I
could put it to any use. Once I
had climbed up to around 14,000,
A21 is a 10,000 alt field and I
wanted some additional alt, I
spotted a lone Spit on take off
ant tried to bounce him. My shots
were off and I went on by and
while trying to turn applied too
much rudder. If you read last
week's report you know that this
can cause a lot of problems and it
did and very quickly it turned
into a proxy kill for the guy I
tried to bounce. Ah well.
Very shortly after this Plus
arrived and took off from a
different field, grabbing alt.
Since I was having problems with
the new version of the TrackIR
software I logged off for a few
moments to turn off one of the
axis’s that was being overly
sensitive and went back on line.
Since I didn't want a repeat of
the last flight I turned to the FW
190D as I have been having more
success with it. Based on advice
from a different AH page I took a
drop tank and less fuel so that if
I needed to maneuver I could drop
the excess and fight in a lighter
aircraft. We meet up at A21 and
head in. What took place after
that was not a pretty sight. In
short we became re-acquainted with
buildings, and trees.
The first time we went in I made a
pass at a Spit with no effect so
Luft engages it, also to no
effect. This Spit is not alone
though as it has a 190 for company
but it seems to not be much of a
threat, it is the Spit that is a
problem. As I am starting to come
back to the fight Luft makes
another pass that doesn't go right
and he hits the ground while
making a snapshot. As I am trying
to maneuver and pick up the Spit
the 190 makes a pass but
fortunately did not hit. Because
of our relative speeds he heads
back out of the fight AND I start
to go for the Spit again only to
have the 190 blunder back into the
area and since the 190 was closer
I went after him instead. This
was a tactical error as the Spit
got on my six and in a good shot
at 600 he clips off my right
elevator. Of course I was trying
hard to hit the 190 at 600 and
scoring nothing and figure it is
time to bug out, especially since
there is now a 109 and a 51 in the
air. I made my break for it low
over the trees but wasn't
outrunning the Spit as I had
forgotten to drop the tank and
just as I think I might start to
open the distance I ran into a
tree.
We came back in to A21 and this
time I spot a Spit that must have
just taken off, it is climbing
straight ahead at 2.5k and I put
on full power and close as fast as
I can. I guess the guy had set
for auto takeoff and was afk as I
was able to open fire at 600 and
started scoring hits and he
doesn't react until just before
the Spit breaks up. This was a
satisfying kill as it was the
pilot who nailed me on the first
run. While this was happening
Luft makes this daring run on the
field where there is a lot of aaa
banging away. Shortly after RTS
scores a kill by vulching some
poor schmuck in a Spit and just
misses a building on his climb
out. Very quickly we have 3 LA 7s
in the air, one for each of us.
One is chasing Plus but I am
trying to intercept him unaware
that I have one after me and that
RTS is after that one. I don't
know where the third one went.
Suddenly Plus and the first LA
reverse right in front of me and
Plus is trying to take a shot at
the one that was chasing me while
the one that was chasing him has
opened fire and takes him out.
Now I am trying to drag one of the
LA7's for RTS who is in hot
pursuit when a Spit shows up. The
Spit tries a snap shot at RTS and
I am outrunning the LA. RTS is
still chasing the one LA when
another pulls up behind him and
starts banging away. This train
is running at treetop level when
an enemy 51 gets into it but
overshoots RTS and flies on by.
RTS gets away from all of this and
heads back to the field. The LA
and 51 find me and start to try
and put me down. Meanwhile RTS is
passing over the field and it
looks like he gets another LA 7
kill while I am still leading
these two enemies on a race. At
first the fire had no effect but
then I lost a flap but I am still
going. Next goes and elevator and
things are getting serious but at
the rate this is going I might
outlast their ammo supply except
for a poorly executed barrel roll
that cost me both wingtips to the
damn trees.
I am not sure when the following
happened during this part of the
night but the stand out in my
memory very clearly. First, I am
lining up a plane and as I passed
through the fire from a bombed out
building clipped my prop on
something. Okay so we start again
and after spending time to climb
we met up north of A21 Plus was
flying a P38L with ordinance. The
plan was for him to turn them and
me to burn them. I went on in to
recon the situation and found a
couple of craft in the air. Plus
cleaned up and followed in. Once
again I am trying to line a guy up
and this time I lose my prop to a
tree. Although I am now a glider
with a short flight duration ahead
of me the guy I was chasing heads
off, possibly someone came along
and attacked or perhaps he thought
I was going to crash and ignored
me. I was able to glide for a
while, just far enough to run out
of open ground. I got my wheels
down and landed but wasn't able to
stop before the trees took off the
wings. I *was* able to stop before
I hit the farmhouse I was heading
for.
Click to enlarge
Okay, it is getting close to time
for Squad Night and the question
is are we going to keep at it? The
problem is that attackers (us)
have to spend a lot of time
climbing so they don't get to A21
at the base altitude. Plus and I
both came to the conclusion at
about the same time that if we can
take it we have a serious
advantage in staging bomber
raids. Other Knights must have
come to the same conclusion as
they started stepping up the
attack as well. Maybe it was
because the three of us had been
working on A21 for so long.
Whatever, doesn't matter why it
happened, but suddenly we had a
lots of help and before Squad
Night got started A21 had been
captured. At this time I was
flying around in a P51B and RTS
was flying a 190 while Seal was
sticking to the P38. I did get an
assist in on a 109 but I honestly
do not recall ever hitting it.
From this point on we didn't do
much but CAP the area until it was
taken.
Moving on to squad night, Seal had
an idea, we would take B24s with
50% fuel and 8 1000 ponders and go
work over A74. More Specialists
came on line and the plan was set
in motion. About 6 or 7 of us
assembled on the runway, waited a
couple of moments, and then staged
a near-faultless take off. I say
near faultless as during the take
off (I do not use auto-take off) I
throttled back and raised my flaps
to let the drones catch up a
little too soon and smushed into
the ground. Thankfully the next
take off went much better and it
seems that there has been some
tweaking to the drone code as they
link up with a lot less effort
now. Parenthetically speaking as
a purist I get somewhat concerned
when parts of AH are made easier
but when I am doing stupid things
I can't complain.
;-)
The rest of the group arrived at
A74 first and started their drop
on the fighter hangers and the
town, as our plan was to make the
capture. If I recall correctly
some of the fighter hangers were
taken out and damage inflicted to
the city when I got there. Since
I was on a line with the city I
elected to make my drop there,
hoping a great deal to luck as
with the new damage graphics it is
tougher to figure out which
buildings are still standing from
anything higher than 500 feet. I
made a respectable if not great
drop and took out about 10
buildings and since I only dropped
half of the load I decided to come
back around and use the rest.
While I demolished another 10
buildings, the down side was that
this gave the enemy time to give
me some grief. Thankfully Joker
was acting as escort and was able
to force them away while I still
had a bomber remaining, which I
brought back to A21 for a pretty
darn good landing. If I had the
drones there was a pretty good
chance they would have landed with
me for a change.
I am not all that clear as to what
happened after this as we started
going out with a variety of
aircraft and for a while it looked
like we weren't going to be able
to take A74. We had lost the edge
and the enemy was starting to
mobilize but we stuck with it.
Just like the fight for A21 other
Knights got involved and were a
big help in the struggle.
Eventually Lees was able to sneak
a goon in and thanks to some last
minute attacks on the town we were
successful in capturing it. At
some point in the fight for A74
the remaining fighter hangers were
knocked out as I found out after I
landed and headed to the tower, so
we planned another bomber raid.
As we left A74 two large groups of
Knights also headed out, half
heading for A80 and half for A72
and Lees and I decided to head for
A80 as it was closer. Since there
was less distance between A74 and
A80 than there had been between
A21 and A74 we only climbed to
around 1,200 feet or so before
leveling off for our drops. I am
not sure how it ended up like this
but Lees and I made a X shaped
pattern, he was heading west
southwest and I was heading pretty
much due south by the time we got
there and I didn't want to throw
off what looked like it would be
good drop by changing course this
late in the proceedings. Lees
made a spectacular drop scoring
around 25 buildings while I took
out an additional 17 and a town
AAA on my run but I wouldn't be
landing these.
Since I was on my own I was
unprotected and the defenders
started after me with a 190 and a
LA 7, and who knows what else. To
make things worse their pursuit
kept pushing me further south,
towards enemy held sectors. Oh, I
was trying to turn back and I am
amazed that the drones stuck with
me as well as they did, but each
time I started to turn I had to
jump to a gun turret and well, you
know the rest. The LA 7 did the
most damage taking out both of the
drones but I was able to hold my
own long enough to cut off a wing
of the LA 7 with the tail gun
which gave me a few moments
respite and I started turning back
North again. At this point I was
easy to spot thanks to the flame
effects and Fuze offered to gun
but since I was down to one bomber
and that had fuel tank leaks, and
engine on fire and rudder missing
and who knows what else, I
declined as I knew I wasn't
getting home. Joker tried to get
to the 190 but the 190 got me
first but what the heck, it was a
fun run while it lasted.
:-)
Since the fight was still going on
and I wanted something with some
firepower to it I decided to take
out a Mossie. Heck it worked for
SK last week... The only problem
is that I have very little
experience with the Mosquito but
since it has guns, cannons, and
bombs I figured what the heck, it
can't be too much different than
flying a 38, right? Wrong... On
the *first* attempt to take off I
wound up sideways on the runway,
probably used too much rudder or
something. The second attempt
went far better and I made my way
to A80 and rolled into try and
take out a fighter hanger. All I
am going to say is that the bombs
went somewhere....
Now we have on our hands a nice
fight that is sort of like being
in the middle of a maelstrom and
everyone is flying around and
somehow in the process I take hits
to both inner fuel tanks so there
I am streaming fuel like a big
'shoot here' sign and decide to
get out of Dodge. Problem is I am
pointed the wrong way and I still
have my rockets. No problem,
there is a simple solution, just
go out and turn around and take a
shot at the same hangars I tried
to bomb on the way back.
Everything goes just fine, the
turn is fine, I am lined up just
fine, the enemy is waiting (wait
that is not fine) and I get to
fire the rockets. The rockets
went somewhere....
I do not know how I did it but I
got past the enemy aircraft even
though one gave chase for a few
moments. Someone must have
pounced on that guy as I certainly
wasn't going that fast or flying
that well as to shake him off but
I would take what I can get. Of
course there were about 5 new
Knights flying in, including a
member of the MAWs that commented
on the film I made for the Track
IR, and that might have caused my
pursuer to change his mind. With
no one to bother me I started to
climb up so I would have some alt
to trade for speed when I became a
glider and headed back to A74.
About halfway there my
inexperience with the Mossie came
into play as I was unaware that
there were four tanks on it and
only found this out when I came to
my senses and switched to the
tanks that had been punctured to
try and use what gas I could
before it drained away. Yes, I
had pulled up a damage report
earlier but I did so quickly, just
long enough to see what was in
red. I really did not want to try
to fly an already damaged plane so
I continued back to 74 where the
landing was uneventful.
It was at this point I got another
one of my 'bright' ideas. I would
try to sneak a goon in and see if
we could take the base out from
under the enemy's noses. Troops
were disabled at A74 so I left
from A21 but only on the second
try. For some reason the first
C47 would not pick up any speed
and at the halfway point on the
runway I rolling at the dizzying
speed of 10 mph. What the heck is
going on here? As far as I
know AH doesn't model random
malfunctions and wouldn't it make
the game...interesting if it did
(notice I am not saying make the
game better). On Fuze's
recommendation I benched this one
and tried another and was able to
get it airborne although trying to
use the E6B information showed the
C47 to be performing under factory
specs. This may be attributable
to the high altitude as the
performance came back up to where
it should be as I descended.
The good news was that I had no
company on the way in and was able
to get to the right altitude to
drop and got the door open but
that was where the luck ran out.
There was still a grand furball
going over the base and if I had
another 20 seconds I would have
been able to drop but not all of
the defenders were involved and
one of them spotted my 47 and
voiced his objections with lead.
Ah well, it was still fun to try.
This was my last flight for the
evening as I had been online for
almost three hours and had been
going since 05:30 that morning.
When I logged there were still
some of the Specialists on line,
still waging the good fight. This
was a great night that was a lot
of fun.
:-)
As always I report the kills I am
aware of:
Fuze - 1x VH, 1x town AA, 3x town
buildings, 1x LA7, 1x 190 A5, 1x
Zero, 1x 51, 1x109
Joker66 - 1x LA7
Lees - 24x town buildings, 1x town
aaa, captured A74
Luft - 3x FH, 1x town aaa, 1x 109,
1x Spit
Seal - 3x FH, 10x town buildings
RBS - 1x 109
RTS - 2x ammo bunkers, 2x LA7, 1x
unknown assist, 1x bomber assist
Skunk - plenty of combat
Skeksis
P.S. Plus had an idea for next
week, carrier ops using Japanese
planes. Sounds like fun to me.
:-)
P.P.S. Did I mention that it was
a lot of fun this week?
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