naval acadamy - flak artillery test?

[NiclDoe]

Originally Posted by Brag

I remember it being a bitch to shoot down the airplanes. But don't remember the airplanes doing any shooting or bombing.

................ I forgot to tell Bernard abou the RAF shooting down Balz!

[GoldenRivet]

the planes will not attack you in stock SH3.

in GWX this is another matter, the planes are fully armed and ready to kill you even in the training mission.

the main problem with the mission is probably not that it is more difficult than the previous version of GWX, but i think the vulnerability of the gun crews have been increased.

FACT: if you are one little flesh and blood man holding onto a rocking and pitching AA gun on a u-boat aiming at a speeding aircraft some of which have 4 to 6 machine guns ranging from 30 to 50 caliber as well as at least one or two 20 mm cannons all shooting at you at once.... you are facing a firing squad that will win 99.9% of the time.

a ww2 fighter aircraft is little more than a machine gun platform, and most types are increadibly resistant to damage. unless you got lucky and hit a fuel line, or oil line, or a pat of the cooling system (assuming its a liquid cooled engine) most of these planes will soak up a great deal of lead and keep going.

to put it simply... your average u-boat had one or two men who are made of soft and spongy flesh, firing a couple of machine guns at at a large armored aircraft which is firing several machine guns and cannons.

AA guns were placed on U-boats for little more purpose than to bolster the securities and the feeling of well being and invincibility they lended (falsely) to impressionable 17, 18, and 19 year old boys.

Just for example... The P-47 (which is not modeled in the game) could place 13 lbs of lead on a target for every second the pilot held down the trigger. im confident that the numbers are similar most any fighter aircraft. if you happen to be standing in the crosshairs of such an aircraft - forget it - for you, the war... and everything else for that matter... is over, i have complete confidence that a straffing aircraft would be firing at you for up to 5-7 seconds during his straffing run, that equates to anywhere from 65 - 91 lbs of lead landing all around (and on) your little man at a rate of about 3,000 feet per second.

small bleeding holes like the ones seen in Das Boot are of the least of your worries, more likley you would have various bodily matter (including urine and feces) all over the deck. if the crew bothered to bring the man below, he would probably be missing limbs, or be completely disemboweled by such a lethal hail of gunfire (assuming it was focused on the conning tower)

[U-104]

OW!

[TomcatMVD]

I have the stock version and they don't attack

[GoldenRivet]

to make a long story short...

i think in the stock version it was determined that some aircraft were not attacking even in the campaing.

GWX dev team modified some files that resulted in all aircraft attacking, even in the training mission.

can a GWX dev confirm?

[sasquatch]

I didn't even try to shoot down the planes myself. I gave orders and the crew obeyed... Time compression helped the mission go by quicker...

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by TomcatMVD

I have the stock version and they don't attack

Lucky you

The aircraft are now rougher to kill, but not overly so.

Many many hours of development and testing went into the aircraft....what you almost have in effect are completely new aircraft when compared to thaose that were in stock. Look iin the library for starters.

IIRC, aircraft have to have ekite status before they will attack....this was not the status they were afforded in stock

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by GoldenRivet

... The P-47 (which is not modeled in the game) could place 13 lbs of lead on a target for every second the pilot held down the trigger.

I have to quibble here.

1) the cyclic rate of fire for the Browning M2 is 550 rounds per minute, or 9.16666667 rounds per second. Times the eight guns of a P-47 equals 73 rounds per second coming out of the gun.

2) M2 ball ammunition weighs 45.8 grams, or 0.100971 pounds. Times 73 rounds that's 7.37 pounds of ammunition per second. I think you were using the total weight of the ammo, not just the actual round.

3) My real nit-pick is the use of the words "on a target". At the usual firing range of 400-500 yards the likelyhood is that only 10% or so of all the rounds fired are actually going to hit the sub, and most likely any given crewman is going to be hit once or twice. Still devastating, but he's not going to be a shredded mess. Look at any gun camera footage of ships being strafed and you'll see the target disappearing in a shower of water thrown up by the missed rounds.

i have complete confidence that a straffing aircraft would be firing at you for up to 5-7 seconds during his straffing run

Pilots were trained to conserve ammunition and protect the guns from overheating by firing one-second bursts. The P-47 held enough ammunition for 32 seconds of fire, which if the trigger is held down for 5 seconds only gives six firing sessions total.
http://www.inetres.com/gp/military/i...g/50_ammo.html
http://www.geocities.com/capecanaver...n/fgun-fi.html

What happened in Das Boot is actually fairly accurate.