I know it’s for the balancing purpose. But I think the minimal fuel operational time is excessive for specific aircraft. Either the fuel amount preset could be “time-in-the-air” based, or the fuel slider recently added should be able to go below 30% of the maximum fuel load. I think most twin fighters suffer from the excess fuel weight. It’s the same story for long range fighters. I want to have the fuel in the amount I just need for the sortie, for attackers, bombers, twin fighters with a long operational range. Twin fighters in this game is not favored by many for its characteristics. They usually get a better payload for bombing and ground attacks. But I think they are still quite heavy to contest other single engine fighters. If I could fly them with maybe 200kg less, I would be able to fight better. This is just my desire to have fun in the game. But it won’t hurt the game. Bombers will get a better climb rate. Usually the weight doesn’t affect the maximum speed that much, as long as the drag stays consistent.
I get the point that bombers need the fuel in the tanks to make them easier to get caught in the fire. It adds more immersion. I understand it. If it’s the case, I accept the adjustment. The phenomenon happens for any planes, so it could be said for any types of planes. As most aircraft store fuel secondary to the main tank located in the fuselage, whether wings being flammable or not is very important in the gameplay.
B-25 as an example, at 30% I’m assuming the plane is carrying around 790kg of fuel. It’s accountable for 45 minutes worth of flight time. I only need around 1 third of it, If I use 40% of it, I only carry like 316kg of fuel. So basically, it doesn’t matter for bombers. Because the player is likely carrying the maximum bomb load. In which adds 1600kg weight.
Beaufighter MkVIc as an example, to be specific. It has the minimal fuel at 55mins worthy. The weight added by the fuel is 530kg. Meaning it’s possible to reduce the weight by 350kg. Because the aircraft’s empty weight is around 7100kg, it has the windloading of around 150kg/m2 at the lowest. But if you add 530kg, it’s at 163kg/m2. It’s a whopping 13kg/m2 increase, and the difference is very noticeable in the game. If I could select the 180kg fuel weight option at 18mins worth of fuel, the wing loading would be around 155kg/m2. You might be thinking, why would someone care about a wingloading in a heavy fighter. Usually, heavy fighters pack a quite a punch. But that’s not gonna change the fact that heavy fighters aren’t good for B&Z either. Its playstyle is heavily centered around hit&run. But heavy fighters aren’t really suited for a vertical maneuver. They have thick wings with large control surfaces, resulting in a sluggish control at higher speed. Hitting someone and escape is harder, thus requiring the players to take the enemy in just one run. Twin fighters in overall is less forgiving of missing a shot. Meaning it’s very important to have the extra bit of the maneuverability, it’s also noted that some twin fighters are surprisingly maneuverable, like Ki-45. Ki-45’s minimal fuel is at 48mins. If it could carry 16 mins fuel, it would save around 200kg. Ki-45 tei has an option to carry two 250kg bombs so, dropping one bomb would make a similar performance difference between the weight, though other factors are involved.
Even for a single engine aircraft, B7A2 has a minimal fuel setting of 1 hour 28 mins. At 480kg fuel. I just searched online for the info and all the weight listed here are estimate. I don’t need that much fuel. Can I have like 1/5 fuel so that the fuel mass is at 96kg, again it saves 384kg weight. B7A2’s empty weight is 3800kg. Meaning it’s very significant in a comparison.
- Yes
- No