ACM Training:  Basic ACM Concepts

MPGames RT
Category 35,  Topic 3
Message 5, Tue Dec 13, 1994
D.PIEROT [RAPIER] at 00:06 EST
Sub: ACM-Angles and E-Fighting

Hi Gents!

Super long post!  I apologize but its impossible to do it right with less :)

Basic art of ACM...or...How to keep your tail from being blown off :)

"The heavens were the grandstands and only the gods were spectators.
The stake was the world, the forfeit was the player's place at the table,
and the game had no recess.  It was the most dangerous of all sports and the
most fascinating.  It got in the blood like wine...No words can describe the
thrill of hiding in the clouds, waiting for human prey.  The game is
sighted, then a dive of 5,000 feet, 30 seconds of diabolic evolutions, the
pressure of triggers and the adversary hurtling downward in a living hell."

Elliott White Springs, 13 kills, W.W.I

Several things to keep in mind first.  AW is not like any stand alone computer flight simulator where you adversary is a computer.   Your adversary is a living, breathing, THINKING human being.  There are NO TRICKS!!  NO MAGIC MOVES!!!  No maneuver that the computer hasn't thought of. One of the most common questions by neophytes since time immemorial is, "What do I do if the guy gets on my six?".  Initially, they are disappointed in the answer..."Most likely you die."  :)  ACM takes place BEFORE the guy is on your 6.  Once he is there you are going thru the motions until he pulls that trigger one final time.  There are a few desperation moves for this portion, but they are just that, desperation moves.

Second point is, that you can't just follow the guy around hoping for a tracking shot:

"Fly with the head and not with the muscles.   That is the way to long life for a fighter pilot.  The fighter pilot who is all muscle and no head will never live long enough for a pension"

Colonel Willie Batz, Luftwaffe, 237 victories, W.W.II

You must think in 3 dimensions, and project a point in space where your opponent will be in N seconds, then maneuver your plane to be in position to fire on that point in space at N moment.  If you think about it, once you know a plane's present position, the area that it can be in in 3seconds looks like an egg.   The point of the egg is where he is now.  He cannot go backwards, he must travel in some flight path forward.  He can pull up, dive, turn left or right or some combination of this.  How hard he can maneuver is limited by his speed and type of plane.  You must figure out where he IS going and place yourself THERE!

ACM-GENERAL DISCUSSION

As we said in class, there are two main styles of fighting Angles/Stall fighting and Energy fighting.  A successful engagement will probably use something from each style and will not be purely one or the other.  Your choice of which tactics to use depends on the RELATIVE performance of your plane against the opponent, and the parameters of the initial engagement.  For purposes of discussion, we will talk about the pure styles so that you can see how they compare to each other.

You must also understand lead, pure, and lag pursuit.   Lead pursuit is where you are aimed at a point ahead of the opponent's present position. It is characterized by having your nose or in the case of a turn, your lift vector (we could go into a long discussion of what lift vector is, but suffice to say it is represented by the point on the mid point of your
canopy, directly over the pilot's head) placed ahead of the enemy's present position.   Pure pursuit is having those things aimed directly at the opponent's present position, and lag is having them aimed behind the opponent's position.  Lead pursuit tends to bleed more energy, pure less, and lag even less.

ANGLES FIGHTING

Angles fighting is based on the relative, sustained turning ability of the planes.  It is characterized by high gee turns and maneuvers, right on the edge of stalling or blacking out.  To quote Robert Shaw, top gun instructor,"...the angles tactician has essentially two choices:  He can turn harder or he can turn smarter.  Although the primary objective for the angles fighter is to achieve a position advantage, energy considerations cannot be ignored with impunity.   An angles fighter that races around the sky with its pilot pulling on the pole as hard as he can, normally will lose energy in the process." 

Since potential energy (altitude) is limited, this energy loss eventually will mean loss of speed.  If the angles fighter becomes too slow, its maneuverability suffers, so that eventually it reaches a point where it has insufficient performance remaining to gain further position advantage, or even to maintain previous gains.  The prudent angles tactician must, therefore, achieve his angular gains as efficiently as possible, so that he can defeat his opponent before his own a/c reaches the point of critical maneuverability loss."  It is usually characterized by flat turns that place a premium on turning ability.  As Shaw stated, continued energy loss results in planes that are hanging on the edge of a slow speed stall, trying to improve position, hence the name stall fighting. The angles fighter attempts to gain angles (put his nose closer to or on the opponent's position.  He is usually in lead pursuit, i.e. having the opponent in a position forward of the midline of the canopy.

Angles tactics are usually aggressive and if your plane has superior turning performance, results in quicker kills.  The drawbacks are if you don't have superior turn performance you are dead.  Also it tends to leave you at the conclusion of a victorious engagement, low and slow, which is meat on the table if someone else shows up.

ENERGY TACTICS

Energy (E) tactics are almost the diametric opposite of angles tactics. Energy can either be potential=altitude or kinetic=speed. Energy tactics are characterized by low gee maneuvers and most of them happen in the vertical (i.e. anything but the horizontal) plane.  The E tactician attempts to generate sufficient separation between himself and his opponent, ideally the separation is from a position of altitude that allows him to pull down on the enemy's 6 without being threatened himself. It tends to be less aggressive (i.e. more patient) and generally is the result of whittling down the opponent's advantages until you can overwhelm him with a 6 shot or a series of snapshot opportunities.  It usually requires that you have either a superior climb performance, initial altitude advantage, or initial energy advantage.  It helps too if the plane you're flying has great guns, as this style does not usually initiate long tracking shots, but rather, short snap shot opportunities.

Speed and gee control is essential, E fighting is characterized by low gee turns and speeds above 200+, though again what is important is the RELATIVE E advantage.  The E fighter tries to maintain vertical maneuvering speed, (i.e. sufficient speed to pull up into the vertical) to beyond guns range without stalling.

The most useful maneuvers for the E tactician are the loops, especially low gee, high speed loops, the hi yo yo (this is the bread and butter of E fighting as it will allow a plane with poorer turn performance to cut inside a better maneuvering plane's turn), Immelmans either single or double, vertical climbs or dives, climbing spirals, & horizontal turns of less than 90 degrees in duration.  The E tactician takes advantage of the fact that as a plane slows in a climb, its turning radius tightens (all other things being equal, slower planes turn tighter).  This is how the hi yo yo or loop cuts inside the opponent's turn.  The flight path is egg-shaped, tighter at the top, broader at the bottom where your flight path intersects the flat turning opponent.

The E fighter comes in with hopefully gobs of E, but really even a slight E advantage can work, and then whittles away on the opponent, using the maneuvers mentioned above, working on a series of snap shots, NEVER turning horizontally more than 90 degrees at a time.  You can turn more than 90 degrees only in a climbing spiral where you have a superior climbing fighter and are out of gun range.   If he loses the E advantage, he bugs out, as the opponent will eat him up.   When safe, he climbs out, regains the E advantage and then can choose to reengage or look for a less sharp opponent :).  Advantages are you maintain enough speed throughout the engagement to bug out safely if unwanted enemy buddies show up.  It is generally safer for you, you take less risk of being hit.  Disadvantages are engaging better turning plane co-E, you will generally lose, so don't engage!  This also means that E tactics are difficult to initiate while on the deck so it is a good idea to try and maintain some air space below you :).

Make sure to try some of these things out before class and then be ready to talk about it on Friday.  Looking forward to seeing you folks!

@=={--RAPIER----

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