I am trying to play the US bomber, the B-17E, and it is kind of painful to play it sometimes. The fighter will easily catch you up no matter how high you are. And how many bombs do I drop on a full uptier, as I am getting uptier a lot? The defence is not very bad, but it’s not going to be useful when the entire enemy team starts chasing you. You’re also very slow you fly about at the sped around 330km/h, climbrate is awful. So how do I exactly even play any heavy slow bombers?
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The anwser is you don’t
Heavy bombers have pretty much always been kinda usless because gajin can’t be bothered to balance thier own game in a way thats fair for something else other than fighters
Simply put until gajin fixes them (wich they said they would do but don’t know wheter they will actually follow up or not) I would recommend you avoid heavy bombers alltogheter
If you want any advice I would say just get good with the planes guns
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My brother, if you want to play as a bomber, try learning to play SIM because in RB it’s practically impossible
Trust me, it’ll be even more fun
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You can also take them to arcade, where they work OK, if you play them right. After all, you have in air reload, so you can cause quite some damage.
Just be warned, B-17 aren’t the sugar side of bombers.
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1 plane – I can definitely handle it. But definitely not 3 or 4 coming…
I need more tips from old players.
Why is no one complaining in the “january 2026 BR changes”!!!
Let find a way them.
Got any tutorials to set it up? I have the joystick and twin throttle and an MCDU.
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I tired before with other slow bombers, I defintely survived longer but that 1 match with bunch of base bombed the rewards are so little… It only great for SL grinding.
WingalingDragon has some great ones.
https://www.youtube.com/@WingalingDragon
https://old.reddit.com/r/WarthunderSim/comments/vn5n75/new_pilots_video_guide_library/
We also got a tutorial library on the subreddit.
I’ll shill my own control setup:
This is optimized for fighters so bomber view and bomb doors would need rebinding, but it has good rudder control and excellent camera controls (imo. I can dogfight pretty OK with this as my camera controls).
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Works for the joystick, right?
If you want more serious tips i can’t tell you to much as i don’t have that much expirence with bombers and tbh I don’t think there are any tips i can give.
You just have to play a more agile bomber or play sim
As for the changes, gajin did say thay want to improve bomber gameplay although they didn’t specify how and when will it happen
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Ah joystick will be way easier. Wingaling has you there.
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Check Legions Loadouts for optimal bombloads before you play: LEGION's Loadouts 2.18 – Line of Contact – War Thunder Bomb Chart - Google Spreadsheets
Remember AB bases have more HP so for that mode you need to increase what’s recommended per base by about x2.
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Find someone who has the most experience with bombers and bring them here.
Do you have any links for “wingaling” joysticks control set ups?
@ron_23 Any ideas? You look very average in ground but your great in the skys so you got any tips for both RB and Sim?
Done it in a test drive and how do I even know where is the base? they don’t even show it other then in the map so how do I found the location of the base?
How much fuel do I even bring for Sim? the map is huge.
You have to use the map to set a course for the base as best you can. I remember when I first started playing sim, finding the base was a nightmare. For starters, the base always look the same on the ground; just memorize what they look like. Its hard when you are stuck in a bomber sight though, so maybe try using the cockpit view to line up as best you can.
I mostly play jets, but I think that about 1hr should be more than enough for a complete sortie. Try and find a lobby that is running one of the smaller maps too. Off the top of my head, I think that Maginot Line, Tunisia, and Bulge are smaller maps that you can actually cross in a bomber.
I started play sim a couple months ago in the A-4E. Only ever used a mouse+keyboard too. Its a lot of fun and a great mode to play a lot of planes that don’t do too well in ARB. Just be ready to set aside a good chunk of time. Also, figure out the useful action mechanic; that is kinda important.
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I fly with 30 minute fuel in a fighter. 45 minutes should cover you in a bomber even with side climbing I think.
The way the economy works is that you have a capped reward amount you can earn. This resets every 15 minutes (or when you die - but if you die you get less than the maximum potential). The cap is hit when you earn 1050 score (at 92%. Even at 3000 score it barely goes to 92.5 or so).
As such, the best routine is to fly out, drop bombs on a base or airfield modules or a “push” (tanks fighting tanks - best done with dive bombers or big bombs) then return to base by the time 15 minutes expire. Alternatively, you can plan it so you drop bombs to say, 600 score, loiter until the first 15 minute cycle then drop bombs for 600 score again and RTB.
Landing gives you 20% of your reward. Before you land, you only get 80%.
For Xbox he has this:
For flight sticks I can’t find anything specific but Enigma and Tea Rex got tutorials:
Wingaling has a specific tutorial for how to do bombing:
I also recommend joining WingalingDragon’s LFG discord (it’s in his video descriptions). There’s regular LFG pings and even “New pilot sessions” organized (although that’s more KRABB’s discord. Krabb’s discord also has a bunch of custom bomber missions to be flown in groups (B17s are his big thing lately.)
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Got a picture how it look like? and is there a reason why the B-17 keep turning left?