Winging in the MA

More by accident than plan, a bunch of Dogs spent the night working the team thing in LW Blue tonite. It was a blast -- the only things missing were enough enemies to go around!

Started shortly after I logged in. Maddog was already up to 10k in a group bombing mission when Hack9 (my brother and the pusher who got me hooked on AH -- now getting back to the game) happened to log in at almost the same time, so we upped together to wing up and to cover Maddog. We joined up with him and a widely spread group of buffs about a sector out from the enemy base. We took a high cover for Maddog, at his 3 and 9 about 3 K above him. One unfortunate buffer to Maddog's 8 o'clock was left to fend for himself -- no targets of opportunity until the Dawgs are home safe! A 109 climbed up towards Maddog's 24s near the drop point, and since he was on my side I made the first pass, plastering him with gull-winged 50s and getting him smoking. He broke off, and I let him go -- again, the goal is to keep the Dogs safe - but the guy just couldn't take a hint. He tried again from the opposite side, but before he could get in range both Hack and I came at him from opposite sides. I couldn't land hits -- I hadnt positioned well enough and was a bit far back -- but hack made a very nice 600 yard shot to ping the wing and send him to earth. (Gotta give credit where it's due...those Fw190 20mm's do come in handy at times.)

By then, things were a bit more confused, and the defenders were broken up. Hack and I chased a pony, that gave up the climb and dove back to its ack, but then we rejoined Maddog for his second pass. No one else got involved, so we let Maddog head for home alone. He was a little disappointed, because he usually gets a couple kills...and his fighter cover didn't let anything scratch his paint.

Dicho showed up around then, working over some buffs. I scurried over to join in the fun, while Hack decided to finsih the escort and ride home covering Maddog after all. Dicho got in some nice hits on a slashing pass from above and ahead, and while he climbed up for another pass, I demonstrated one of the finer points of killing bombers -- by waiting until a some poor sap tried to attack from the bombers' 6, and timing it so the bomber was shooting at the sap so I could sweep in untouched. I had fun making all sorts of pretty lights on the bomber's wings, but he got back at me when the sap blew up. I headed home with a smoking but functioning engine.

Knights had a big advantage in Blue, which made finding the next fight a bit of a challenge. But, we found a rook base with more red over it than green. Dicho, Dogma, and I upped F4U-1As and climbed to about 10K and headed for the Rooks. Half way to the base, we passed over a wave of friendlies engaging the lower defenders. Rather than join in the gang, we proceeded to right over the base -- where uppers were still coming, but where the ack was nicely down.

And here's where we got organized. Rather than all diving in and making our own way, we moved as a rough triangle about 1k apart while we dropped down to 5K. Then we could see the cons, and could line them up at our convenience. We took turns making attacks on them, so the guy with the best angle could dive in fairly straight while the other 2 orbited higher and watched for enemies above and below. There were friendlies arriving below us, and chasing the bad guys all over, so we got to play "cut them off" and "guess the break direction". I thnk we got a kill and some assists between us.

With that kind of work, it wasn't long before it was vulch...I mean base suppression..... time. I kinda accidentally stole a non-squaddies kill when a P-51 moving slow over the base turned out to be missing a tail. Oh, well.. the bullets were on the way already...so I sent a few more too. I think we got several other kills before the supply of "new guys who havent learned yet" dried up.

By that time the ENY was getting uncomfortable, and several guys went to other arenas to scope out the balance penalties elsewhere. In the end, the other arenas were either no better, or we capped, so I came back to blue. Dicho had had to log, and I think Dogma gave up when he couldn't get into Orange. Hack and I were left, so we winged up for another sortie.

He took his favorite 190A8, and I upped my F4U-1 (couldn't take the -1A). We climbed on the far side of the base, away from a group of 10K enemies. Working together, and calling out positions, we managed to keep the bad guys off each other until they had lost E and we had gained it. When a 51 made the mistake of diving too hard after a Knight, we were able to dive in after him and run him down. The other 3 cons either died to other Knights, or ran away...and another base attack was foiled.

So we upped again, and flew toward a rook base. There we got involved in an extended positional battle that amounted to a 4v4. We called out warnings to each other, and to other knights, saving at least one pick. A Tiffy came from outside the area, and when he made a mistake I was able to land some hits one him while he tried (and failed) to HO. Unfortunately, I collided with him and began losing oil.

Now I was trailing smoke, and new bad guys arrived with picking on their mind. Hack and I headed back towards home, carefully watching a Spit XVI that wanted to cash in from his 5-7K alt advantage. On his first pass, I broke hard left and Hack broke right -- he would have been sandwiched if he followed through, so he went vertical and pretended to fly away. We completed our circles and moved a little closer to home. Then a P-51 came screaming in, hoping to finsih me off. (See, mom always said smoking was bad for your health!) He had too much speed, and when I broke he couldn't stay with me. He made the mistake of crossing in front of me, but even though he was only 400 away I couldn't get the hits. Uh oh, its the spit again -- and this time we decided to do the Thatch weave, so if he targeted me I would drag him in front of Hack's guns. The spit didn't like that idea, and went vertical again...but now he'd lost enough e that as he came back down hack had a shot.

Unfortunately, the Spit HO'd hack before Hack had his chance. Now we were both smoking, and a hi La7 decided to join in. We were close to base, but Hack succeeded in moving to the far side of the ack and was left alone. The spit and the pony made passes again on me, but had too much speed an misjudged the angle of my break. By that time, I was close enough to base to make them nervous, and they left for home. Hack and I were able to land, with a kill in the bag but with both of us alive. (The tiffy had died elsewhere while we headed home.)

While we had a lot of fun being organized, I think the best part of all was that NO MONGREL DIED all night!

Looking forward to more of this in the future. It occurs to me that if we all got a handle on HOW wingmen work together, and practiced it lots in MA, when we go back to the FSO we will just OWN the bad guys!

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