I started flying again after a long hiatus (they bricked my beloved Lancaster). I joined in a realistic battle on the Norway map and took my Tempest up. I started off trying to escort a couple of B-17s but we got bounced by 2 Bf-109s and an FW-190 and both bombers got smoked by the 109s after I latched onto the 190. The 190 pilot was very good and we ended up in a low alt, near stall speed e-fight. I had a bit more alt than he did so I was able to pull up into a stall then roll over and smoke him as he tried to turn and climb to get a shot at where he thought I'd drop into.

By this time I'd lost all my teammates but one guy in an F-82 and there were 4 more Germans left. We were both at low alt but fairly close so we linked up and started to climb. A 109 dropped down from the clouds and went for the F-82 but missed. He must have been totally target fixated because he didn't even try to evade when I rolled in on his six and he went down with a short burst.

We continued to climb again and got bounced from the clouds again but by a 190 this time. He dove in on my seven high but had too much E and couldn't pull into my turn. He proceeded to piss all his E away by pulling hard to try for a high angle shot at the F-82. I went up and over, cut the angle and dove down onto where I thought his flight path would take him. He didn't disappoint and I got a pilot kill from a burst I fired through the top of his cockpit.

We were both getting low on fuel and ammo and so decided to head back to base only to find it getting shot up by an Me 410. It did enough damage to let the AI ground forces take the base but it left him open for an easy shot. He was busy strafing some AAA so I simply went into a shallow dive and fired into his path from his 10 o'clock.

Then the AI flak from the newly flipped base opened up. The F-82 lost one of his engines and I took a bad hit in the wing and had a smoking engine.

We'd both assumed we'd lost and were going to go out by trying to take out as many AAA guns as we could when the final German pilot offered up a nice little gift and came in on the deck in a Do-217. He blew up a destroyer and then turned for home. Even with my engine burning out, there was no way he was going to outrun me. I was kind of stupid in that I went after him from level alt at 6 o'clock but I got lucky and his rear gunner didn't do much. I had a little trouble actually hitting him but I was finally able to saw a wing off. Ace in a day!

I don't think I've done that well at Tier IV in quite a long time.



S = k ln W