Despite i really like your posts regarding cannons, shells and ballistics i am not sure if you have realized that there is a difference between reality and wt.
I described the differences between the Me 262 A-1a Schwalbe and the Me 262 A-2a Sturmvogel at BR 6.7. Have in mind that a large part of Me 262s that saw actual combat (estimated as ~ 300 in total) were A-2 bombers assigned to KG 54 (J) and were flown by bomber pilots.
Your description of 1 or 2 fighter variants which were converted to have 2 MK 103s, 2 MK 108s and 2 MG 151s (aka as “Jabo”) were no actual production models.
I disagree that the 262 was specifically designed as interceptor (excluding the C models with rocket boosters) as the main goal of the design was to overcome the conceptual disadvantages of props - especially regarding critical and tactical Mach numbers. The conversion into a fast bomber of a plane that was actually designed as a fighter was not really a smart idea.
As US bombers were seen as the main threat it is logical that the armament of almost all fighters was optimized to kill bombers - hence the 4 MK 108 in fighter variants.
There was a thread (2023) regarding Interceptor spawns of 262s - it boils down that gaijin spreads IC/air superiority fighter spawns mainly as balancing factor and not based on their intended role. I described this here more detailed.
Feel free to create a suggestion if you want to add an IC spawn to the 7.0 variant - a bug report for an actual interceptor (US XF5F) was denied by gaijin and the creator was asked to create a suggestion.
And I’m talking about the A-1a and the A-1a/Jabo. Not that it makes difference.
There’s already a regular A-1a with air spawn, which makes playing the one without completely pointless.
That might be true, but it doesn’t change the fact that the main focus of the Me 262 was to attack bomber formation and not to get air superiority.
All the armament, 4 low velocity 30mm cannons and R4M unguided air-to-air rockets are meant to inflict heavy damage on bombers.
How do you explain the Fw 190 A-8 being classified as Interceptor when it’s just another Fw 190 F model? There is nothing special about the A-8 that would make it more of an interceptor than the other Fw 190s or Bf 109s.
That’s the job of an interceptor. Fighters are armed to deal with fighters and fighter intended to attack bombers were often up-armored and up-gunned for the job.
Just how fighters were modified to carry bombs and carry out ground attack missions while using the airframe of a fighter.
Of course there’s also the high altitude performance that comes into play.
That’s the thing. Gaijin just makes planes interceptors when they feel like it.
The Ki-44 was as far as I know a purpose built interceptor, hence it featured insane climb rate.
But in the game even the one with the 40mm cannons isn’t classed as interceptor, when attacking bombers is the only point of carrying the Ho-301 cannons.
Aside from the side tangents occurring in this thread, is it safe to say that the general consensus here is that the Me 262 is not currently able to fulfil a role as Germany’s main fighter selection in its current BR bracket and needs to be moved down to 6.3-6.7 (pending potential changes to rocket boosters and airspawns)?
I confess that I do not have many specifics to speak on, having skipped past the Me 262s as quickly as possible, but if anyone can compare the likely performance of the 262 against props to the current performance of the He 162 in that same role, that would be a good metric to judge a BR change by.
Yeah, I don’t think 6.3 would work. I mentioned it because I can imagine it working, but I think 6.7 would be the place for them.
I don’t think an interceptor spawn would fix the problem, because it doesn’t solve the underlying performance issue, and there’s a fair number of aircraft the 262s fight that would still outperform them in all metrics while also having airspawns. If airspawns could fix the 262, then the Jabo would be a lot better than it is.
Flying bricks. feels like you are flying a Maus , you can feel the heaviness on these jets even when taking off, the C1A needs a rocket afterburner just to take off and once you ran out you wont catch or escape from anything (it only has 175s)
this will sound very polemic maybe but with the view and actual meta maybe me262 should have air spawn, they will get outrunned anyways
C2B absolutely should not be 7.3… it shits on anything when the boosters are on at that BR and nothing at that BR can do anything about it. It’s really easy to manage booster fuel…
Honestly, my main complaint (as someone who’s played the US for air) is that moving the Me-262 down should result in all of the prop aircraft moving down as well - especially the bombers. I mean in what world does it make sense that the B-29 is within 0.7 BR of the Me-262, let alone being at the exact same or a higher BR?
Not in this game apparently. Just checked & it seems that the A-1a/Jabo incorrectly has four cannon occupying all four gun ports instead of two cannon occupying the lower gun ports with the upper ports remaining empty…
These are planes that are good in the hands of good players, and bad in the hands of bad players. It does not matter at which BR you place them, the result will be the same. Putting them lower will make intermediate players suffer less in max uptiers, but good players will wipe out entire teams on their own.
Sorry, but thats nonsense.
Even good players suffer in the 262 at it´s BR vs way worse enemy players. The Plane makes a hughe difference. IIt´s not just the player.
O would you say all XP55 players are better than all players arround? No. most of them are really bad players. And they just dominate…
But hey. so like you saied… It´s not the plane. Why not putting the 262 in BR 6.0 to be the fiirst jet to fly, like it was?
That shouldnt be a problem. Coz it´s the player, not the plane…
Planes make a huge difference only if both players are competent. The P51H is god of all props, but I can kill the average P51H in a Ki-27. If the usual player’s entire strategy is to put their gun reticle at the enemy name tag, it just does not matter what planes are involved. The way the average player flying a 262 will die to a Su-11 will be the same way he dies to a Spit Mk V.
The player skill distribution is heavily skewed to the right (from the looks of it), so the average WT player is significantly bad.
Don’t know what you’re saying about the XP55. I haven’t met any XP55 that dominated so far.
The Me-262, in its most famous A1a version, is only a heavy ambush fighter that climbs poorly on these small maps…
All other versions are just prototypes or blueprints…
A1a, was primarily intended as a destroyer of allied heavy bombers… When the pilot made a mistake and got into a dogfight with the Mustangs, that was his last mistake… (aka Rudolf “Nowi” Nowotny) … Luftwaffe pilots themselves who survived the war , wrote that the tactics of using Schwalbe were formed directly with the units and for many pilots of piston fighters, it was a problem to switch to a jet aircraft.
Hartmann refused to switch to the Me-262 to the unit led by Galland, because he knew that it was a machine that was new and a lot of pilots were not used to this new technology…
In the game - climb high, maintain high speed and use Boom and Run tactics…
Actual combat losses whilst attacking fighters or their escorts were rather low (see Galland & Schuck biographies / memoirs) - allied (including the few USSR claims) kills of Me 262s happened mainly by camping their airfields.
The term dogfight is actually misleading - if you study 262 air kills you might realize that the leading jet pilots killed actually more escort fighters than bombers, there is no need for ACM if you are able to attack and disengage at will.
No, developing (fighter) tactics was the Job of Kommando Nowotny and subsequently of EJG 2.
This is not what he wrote in his memoirs. You might share the source to your claim?
See previous exchanges - this is an opinion based on the LW doctrine that enemy bombers were the main targets and fighters were not seen as a threat. The aircraft in itself was a fighter. That it was optimized to take down the main treat (=bombers) was logical.
Have in mind that there were no USAAF bombers present whilst the aircraft saw it’s maiden flights in 1941 and 1942; the 8th AF arrived later…
What most people forget in some discussions (like interceptor or not) was the rather limited flight time of a 262 of roughly 30 minutes (with reserves) - a 109 with a drop tank had roughly 100-110 minutes. It is therefore logical that 262s were used in a defensive role. That’s why the night fighter variants carried drop tanks to increase the limited flight time…
