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[TheBronzePickle]

The thing about the Russians is that, no matter what tier they're at, they do have some horribly powerful weapons. The damage they can do with even a split second of fire can usually damage your plane enough that your advantages are nullified. They can also be a pain in the ass for US planes, since the US's HMGs used in boom and zoom combined with the sheer hardiness of most of the Russian aircraft can sometimes result in the Russian plane surviving a pass without being drastically reduced in flying ability.

[mud074]

The thing about the Russians is that, no matter what tier they're at, they do have some horribly powerful weapons. The damage they can do with even a split second of fire can usually damage your plane enough that your advantages are nullified. They can also be a pain in the ass for US planes, since the US's HMGs used in boom and zoom combined with the sheer hardiness of most of the Russian aircraft can sometimes result in the Russian plane surviving a pass without being drastically reduced in flying ability.

But the firepower is not really that great no matter what tier they are at. Starting at around tier 6, every country but the americans have cannons on most planes. From rank 5 up to rank 13 the yaks have single cannons in the nose and the la line get double cannons at rank 7 and single cannons at rank 3. If you compare that with similarly tiered planes from other countries, the arnament on them is really normal. As for the two "big cannon" planes, the 9T and the 9K, they are really just not that good. The K is pretty useless for anything but luck shots and hitting bombers because of the low firing speed and bad accuracy. The 37mm on the T is still really not that good. Most of the complaining comes from people getting unlucky and letting the T get a hit on them. Really, if I could have two equally performing planes with the only difference being that one has the 37mm and one has a 20mm, I would chose the latter. The firerate and ammo count on the 37mm is just not enough to be effective against a opponent who knows what they are doing.

As for the .50s, I don't see any reason for complaint after the recent MG buff. A single accurate burst from the P-47 at convergence is normally more than enough to heavily damage or set on fire an enemy, especially with the belts made up of API. Against the russians though, I see the problem. Their bad habit of putting out fires can make fires nearly useless against them. Do you play HB or AB? All it takes is a slightly red wing and any plane will have major trouble turning in HB. Damage has much less of an effect in AB and you really need a crit to take anything out. FRB isn't even worth talking about since a red wing is normally enough to send a plane spiraling to their death.

[Flying Dice]

I get the feeling that most of the "OMG Russians OP" complaining comes from AB, precisely because a second or two of fire from anything in HB can easily cripple your plane. I actually prefer MG-only fighters in HB because they do plenty of damage, have good ammo, and don't have to worry about overheating because of a finicky cannon.

On the arcade side of the coin, I don't see how people can justify complaining about Russian cannon fighters but not the Airacobras and Kingcobras. I have far more success with those than with any Russian fighters, not least because they encourage you to play in a way much more oriented around careful aiming; a La-5 will let you spray ammo all over the sky, but if you try that with a Kingcobra your guns will overheat.



One place where I do think Russian fighters are explicitly better is in the ammo loadout. They all get special AA belt loads heavy on the AP-I and best cannon shells which are only present (outside of the Russian tree) on a handful of Japanese fighters.

[Sonlirain]

The thing about russians is that they get the superfast fireing machineguns ALONG with devastating cannons.
I had my tail and wings ripped off constantly by LAGGs and other russian aircraft.

Also who plays HB anyway? Last time i checked i had to wait 10 minutes to get in and whne i finally got in noone could hit anyone in the air (i was flying in a HE-112 around dozens spitfires) none of them could hit me and i couldn't hit any of them.
After spending all of my ammo i returned to the airfield and got killed while stationary.

It's pretty dull if you ask me.

[ukulele]

I only play HB basically, and while i agree there are not many people playing it you just have to be a little flexible with what you chose to fly to get into games in less than 30 seconds or so. Also, no one could hit anything? Im farm from a pro or anything but i can get (on my best days and with some luck) 4-5 kills with 120 20mm rounds, most people in AB have to reload multiple times to get a kill, in historical no one empties their plane for a kill. Also while you find historical boring, i dont understand the apeal of a game so simplified it barely even keeps making sense, every skill needed on air combat its made almost non-important by arcade, its just a huge ball of people following that magic targeting reticule.

EDIT: Acording to the website stats i have around a 5:1 K/D ratio in historical, wich must be broken, also a 3/1 in arcade, its perfectly demonstrates that skill or tactics are of lesser value.

[mud074]

The thing about russians is that they get the superfast fireing machineguns ALONG with devastating cannons.
I had my tail and wings ripped off constantly by LAGGs and other russian aircraft.

Also who plays HB anyway? Last time i checked i had to wait 10 minutes to get in and whne i finally got in noone could hit anyone in the air (i was flying in a HE-112 around dozens spitfires) none of them could hit me and i couldn't hit any of them.
After spending all of my ammo i returned to the airfield and got killed while stationary.

It's pretty dull if you ask me.

HB is actually played quite a bit. Most high ranking people I know nearly exclusivly play HB because it is far less like a twitch shooter and rewards thoughtful gameplay rather than reflexes. It is like playing a flightsim with mouse control and many people like that. The reddit warthunder squads which I am a part of almost exclusively play HB because it also awards teamwork more. AB, on the other hand, is pretty much chaotic clusterfucks of dogfighting where all you do is point the nose of the plane towards the nearest enemy and click, sometimes bombing or capping.

Also, in regards to your bit about russian planes, did you even read my post? Although I agree that the MGs on the low tier planes are too much, somebody playing with any amount of strategy will easily be able to beat any of the russian planes with massive cannons. Beyond the two med rank yak 9s, all of their cannons are 20mm with the IL-2 ground attackers getting 23mms. AKA the same cannons that other nations get. The 20mm mg 151 that the germans get is actually better than the cannon the russians get because it can load mine rounds, which are HE rounds specially made to hold significantly more explosive matierial and do a lot more damage. If you compare the ShVAK the russians get to other nations cannons, it is really in the middle in quality. Also, the laggs don't even get the fast firing machine guns that the low tier russians get. In fact, the only time the fast firing MGs appear past tier 2 is on bombers and the IL-2. I don't want to write about how the russians planes are really not that good any more, so just go back and actually read my posts and come back when you have a reason they are OP.

[Sonlirain]

I only play HB basically, and while i agree there are not many people playing it you just have to be a little flexible with what you chose to fly to get into games in less than 30 seconds or so. Also, no one could hit anything? Im farm from a pro or anything but i can get (on my best days and with some luck) 4-5 kills with 120 20mm rounds, most people in AB have to reload multiple times to get a kill, in historical no one empties their plane for a kill. Also while you find historical boring, i dont understand the apeal of a game so simplified it barely even keeps making sense, every skill needed on air combat its made almost non-important by arcade, its just a huge ball of people following that magic targeting reticule.

EDIT: Acording to the website stats i have around a 5:1 K/D ratio in historical, wich must be broken, also a 3/1 in arcade, its perfectly demonstrates that skill or tactics are of lesser value.

Tried HB a couple of times just to refresh my memory why i dislike it.
So here it goes.

Game one:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm flying a Stuka with 37 mm cannons being chased by 2 fighters.
The gunner manages to noncritically hit one of the enemy fighters.
I finally manage to get behind a tank formation and unload the cannon shells into their rears (i assume you have to hit the rear to damage those with cannons) and managed to kill 2 before running out of ammo (with 2 fighters trying to shoot me down mind you).
Also my aircraft lost control at this point since the enemy fighters chasing me finally critically damaged my tail.

Result?

Only 1000 eagles lost (2k earned 3k repairs).
I assume that if i wanted to earn some i'd have to fly 10 minutes to the nearest airfield rearm and fly back in order to earn 1000 lions (assuming i get destroyed)

Game 2

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Flying a HE.111H-6 on my way to bomb some tanks. After around 5 minutes of watching an impenetrable wall of clouds/fog i finally made it to my target.
Since there is quite a bit of AA in the area i decide to try level bombing and miss all of my 32 firecracrackers and managing to only damage some of the vehicles i turn back to the airfield for another adrenaline filled 15 minutes of flight and reloading but was interrupted by one destroyer 4 thousand meters below me that finally managed to land a perfect shot ripping both of my wings and tail finally releasing me from this nightmare

The 20mm mg 151 that the germans get is actually better than the cannon the russians get because it can load mine rounds, which are HE rounds specially made to hold significantly more explosive matierial and do a lot more damage. If you compare the ShVAK the russians get to other nations cannons, it is really in the middle in quality.

The stats can state they come armed with 20 mm riceball cannons launching overcooked rice at enemies but if that rice can rip wings and tails in one shot just like a 50 mm HE cannon shell then i will treat it as such.

My personal experience with the LAGG-3 comes mostly from being shot down by it in the most amusing of ways rivaled only by troll cannon germans (that usually turn like busses because those are only fit on a jury rigged stuka and a heavy fighter) and Air/KingCobras.

And amusing = Instantly losing one or both of your wings, entire tail at least one gunner AND your pilot in the timeframe of less than 2 seconds.
And the fact they are "only" 20 mm does not make a difference if they seem to be infused with demonic warp energies.

[Flying Dice]

The thing about russians is that they get the superfast fireing machineguns ALONG with devastating cannons.

Which is in no small part balanced by this:

Yak 7B: 1x 20mm, 2x 12.7mm
Yak 1B: 1x 20mm, 1x 12.7mm
Yak 9T: 1x 37mm, 1x 12.7mm
Yak 3: 1x 20mm, 2x 12.7mm
LaGG-3-66: 1x 20mm, 1x 12.7mm
La-5, La-5F, La-5FN, La-7: 2x 20mm

etc. etc.

Seriously, they're all amazingly undergunned, with very low ammo. The only Russian fighter I have with something approaching a respectable armament is my I-16 type 28. Pretty much every US/British/Japanese fighter above T2ish has something like 2xmg, 2x cannon/x4mg/6xmg/8xmg/4x cannon/4x mg, 1x cannon/6xmg, 2x cannon/etc., all with deep ammo pools.

And amusing = Instantly losing one or both of your wings, entire tail at least one gunner AND your pilot in the timeframe of less than 2 seconds.
And the fact they are "only" 20 mm does not make a difference if they seem to be infused with demonic warp energies.

News flash: Any plane with a cannon can do that. Even in arcade, landing a couple cannon shells in the right places will completely trash a plane. It also depends on which sort of shell hit you; a HEF-I will usually hurt a lot worse than AP-I.

On a related note, that's part of the reason why a lot of us like HB: Less bullshit. If you hit someone with a cannon shell, 80% of the time they're dead, period. 20% of the time you'll need a second shell or burst of MG fire to finish them. You can hit someone with 10+ cannon shells in AB and if the RNG isn't feeling kind, they'll limp away to base.

It's as was said earlier, though, the Russian fighters aren't particularly good at anything, they're just also not terrible at anything, so assuming poor pilots in a Russian fighter and in something else, the Russian will usually win because the other player doesn't exploit their advantages (e.g. a US pilot trying to turnfight in a Kittyhawk instead of doing the closest you can get to a boom-and-zoom in arcade/a Japanese pilot trying to outrun them)

[Sonlirain]

I wouldn't call any plane armed with a 37 mm cannon "undermarmed".
In fact most of those armanents seem similar or better than the ones on german aircraft of the same tier.

Yak9T for example has a 37 mm cannon and a decent 12.7 mm MG as backup while the (same tier) Bf 109 F-4 has a 20 mm cannon and two dinky 7.92 MG that won't kill anything unless they hit the pilot.

Also most of their drawbacks like being unstable when shooting bad weight to power ratio ETC become nonexistant or seriously diminished in Arcade.

[ukulele]

We basically will never think the same becouse of the diference between arcade and HB, also regarding your experience in historical, in the first case you flew the worst plane aviable basically in the second you missed 32 times, so basically both of your tests where sabotaged by you. Also in most cases in historical bombers are a waste of slots.

[Sonlirain]

It might have something to do with the fact that bombers in HB shake when dropping bombs as if they were crewed by a band of rampaging gorrilas.

[Flying Dice]

Curious how you only talk about the German fighters as being inferior to Russians. No shit, they're terrible. I get more kills trolling in a Stuka than with a 109. Practically every non-German non-Russian fighter at those tiers either has a 37mm backed by 2-4 mgs or a pair of 20mms backed by 2-6 mgs. The only advantage Russians have is the fire rate on their cannons, which is not actually that great, because it means you burn more rounds every time you miss.

[Ultimuh]

Ramming other players seem to be a valid way of dispatching an enemy (should you be heavily damaged have run out of ammo.)
And yet there seem to be people who hate this tactic.
I myself don't mind being target of a kamikaze, beats having the pilot knocked out.

[Flying Dice]

I think most of the rage is oriented around the AB types that fly straight at each other, don't even flinch (much less turn aside), and then whine about the other guy being a ramming noob for not turning away.  I'm perfectly willing to fly a crippled fighter into an enemy, though. What's really funny is, if you've got a bulky bomber with a bunch of fighters riding right on your tail, is this: Diving steeply, leveling out, suddenly killing your throttle, dropping your flaps, and letting them slam into you and each other.

[Ultimuh]

What's really funny is, if you've got a bulky bomber with a bunch of fighters riding right on your tail, is this: Diving steeply, leveling out, suddenly killing your throttle, dropping your flaps, and letting them slam into you and each other.

That DOES sound like fun. :p