Gotha. If I manage to get the damned thing airborne it frequently does not stay that way. The difference between max speed when loaded and stall is not all that much. Once control is lost it's game over. Forget landing it.

Thanks for this video link. I'll check it out today. I don't have rudder pedals but I do have a twist rudder on my stick.

For what it's worth I'm left-handed.

I know the term "boom and zoom" is rather silly to apply to any WWI aircraft but that's the way I fly the Spad XIII. It's definitely not a turn fighter and if you are slow and low in the Spad XIII, that usually means death.

The SPAD really did use B&Z tactics, they just didn't call it that. Somewhere I saw a WWI "how to fight in a SPAD" manual - it was really just a page or two of diagrams - and it put heavy emphasis on vertical maneuvers.

B&Z is a relative term. It just means using speed over agility. You can B&Z with any plane, but obviously it will be less successful in say a Dr.I than an SE5a! For each conflict from WWI to Vietnam, the planes that were fastest and less agile were natural B&Z'ers vs the slower more agile planes of the time. Post-Vietnam that became less important, with the Syrian slaughter over Bekaa 30 years back probably being the last time anyone tried it.



The Jedi Master

SPAD13 is a fantastic plane that is also very forgiving and does not have as much uncontrollable osculations caused by rudder input as SPAD7.
Dogfighting all Alabtroses, DVII (not "F"), Pfalzes is a dodle. Not jump in and run away, but sustained dogfighting - when you understand that SPAD not only has great top speed, but also has climbing rate that is up to 40% better than any of its competitors above. And just cut their trajectory in climbing turns - Albatroses will not stand a chance. Now, if Dr1 or DVIIF appear - now it is a boom and run away time:)

DR1, N17 and Camel are all very hard and much harder to learn than SPAD.

Any aircraft is easy if you only choose the softest matchups. The real test of the DH2 is against another human in an Albatros D.II.

Hardest Scout: Camel

Hardest aircraft overall: Gotha at full load. Keeping the darn thing airborne without autopilot is a lesson in frustration...it just refuses to fly by the rules.

All of them.