I havn't been around here much for the last couple days because of my addiction.. This addiction I speak of is Aces High, a WW2 combat flight sim. It has over 50 different types of aircraft ranging form the early war Spitfire, Hurricane, P-40's and the D3A VAL Japanese dive-bomber used in the attack on Pearl Harbor. To the late war American P-51 Mustang, British Typhoon and Tempest right up to the German ME 262 jet and the ME 163 rocket popelled interceptor. There is also a good selection of Bombers like the B-17 and B24 and a few ground vehicles such as the German Panzer and Tiger tanks, Russian T-34 and British Sherman VC Firefly, you can even run around in a Jeep if you so desire

Some people play just for the fights, some good old fur balling as it's called or a good tank battle but I'm one of those that like to look at the bigger picture in the game and attempt to win the war there by resseting the map to a new one where the war starts over. To win the war your country (Bishop, Knights or Rooks) has to own all of your bases and 40% of each of the other countries bases.

Each base has tactical targets on them such as troop barracks,radar tower, ordinance bunkers as well as fighter, bomber and Vehicle hangers. destroying all of any of these objects on a field will disable the corresponding service at that base for a set amount of time or sooner if it is resupplied by the players. Each base also has a town close by.

To capture the base your country or team if you prefer must destroy all buildings and guns in the town then get 10 troops into the map room in the center of the town either in a C-47 unarmed transport plane, an M3 Half track or if you have several players driving, jeeps can teransport 3 grunts. The only exceptions to this are Vehicle fields that don't have towns. The map room is located on the base so you just have to kill the guns on the base and get the troops in. That might sound easy but can be quite the operation when the other team reialises that your trying to take this base and come rolling out in an array of armor and anti aircraft vehicles.

Now that I have bored you with the basic of the game play I am going to share one of my flights with you that I recorded in game and am going to attempt to retell here in text.

My brother (thndrEGG), his squad and I were contemplating taking a rook vehicle fild but decided we should despose of the troop barracks at the Vehicle base to the North East of it so they couldn't just run troops right back into the base as easily after we captured it.

We dicussed what plane to take for this job and were thinking of using F4U1-D's or the more common name D Hogs but decided against them because of their high fuel consumption and we didn't want to end up in a fight and run out of gas (that always sucks). So we decided to take Japanese KI-61 Hien (Swallow) or as American pilots knew them "Tony". These are good flying fighters that carry 2, 250kg bombs and where easy on the gas. They are not the fastest or best plane in the game but it's always fun to shoot someone's high end ride down with your not so good one.

We picked our paint jobs and got onto the runway. Wind em up guys I said over the "radio" (AH is nice in the fact that it has in game voice communication.)

Our 5 engines roared to life and we started rolling down the runway and took to the air soon after.

 We flew NE for a while taking care not to enter the radar ring of the nearby enemy base so we wouldn't alert them to our presence, the raidio alive with our friendly chatter as we climbed to 15,000ft and leveled off now on a direct line to our target.

"I'll take the quanset huts and you three each hit 1 set of tents. Sound good"? I asked. Rgr tents. Was the reply as we got nearer to the base. Looking down we could see 2 friendlies and 2 red contacts in a battle on the deck skimming the trees...

"Low 190, low pony, no factor. Falcon23, pony closing on you" Thnder said.

"Copy" was the quick reply as he tried to evade.

"Switching to bombs and in on my target" I said.

"Roger here we go" said Thndr.

We dove in from our 15,000ft perch, dropping our bombs and pulling out at the last second. Climbing back up to some distance to get some altitude for the fight to come.

"Bombs dropped, tents down" reported Thndr.

"Huts down" I said. "Wanna go play with that 190?" I asked.

"Yeah lets play." came the reply.

As we turned to chase the 190 Thndr spotted the P-51 that we had seen erlier and said "I'm going to go play with the pony" leaving Blutalon, Craig666 and Shadycat to chase the 190. I decided to stay high in case someone needed help.

 "Second 190 coming in." I said as another red icon appeared on the horizon. The second 190 turned to help out the first 190, I turned over and gave chase.

 "Craig, Shady check 190" I warned as I attempted to get a bead on him. A few seconds later and I saw the first 190 explode as Craig and Shady filled him full of holes.

  I continued chasing the second 190 in an attempt to make him break off of craig as I heard Thndr telling me to watch for the P-51 who was now attempting to get on my 6. The 190 finally broke off as I sent some rounds past his plane just nicking his wing.

  As I continued to chase the 190 the P-51 broke off of me and went after Blutalon with Thndr, Craig and Shady all in tow.  The P-51 let out a burst of gun fire missing Blutalon then shady put some rounds into the P-51 knocking off his rudder and starting an oil leak. The chase went on after the P-51 started smoking and he was franticly twisting and turning trying to evade Shadys' gun fire but in doing so smacked into the ground followed by everyone congratulating Shady on the kill.

  I broke off from the 190 due to his greater speed and the fact that he was trying to lead me back to his base. I started climbing again gaining altitude for the next group of planes I knew would be coming. As i did a lone B-25 came flying in low looking like a tasty snack for us. Craig whipped his plane around and went in for a risky HO (head on) shot smoking the B-25's right engine and giving him a fuel leak on the left side.  The B-25 pilot pulled up hard trying to get a shot at Shady who was passing across his high 12 but as he let off a quick shot his damaged engine shut down forcing him to level off due to lack of power. Craig came in again from the B-25's 6 and they had another exchange of gunfire before Craig had to break off.

  "Did ya get him?" Thndr asked.

  "No I'm out of ammo" replied craig.

  "Head back to base, we'll cover you" said thndr.

 Craig made his escape as the B-25 attempted to lead Shady over the anti aircraft tanks (Ostwinds) that had made their way onto the field. After several passes shady finally knocked a wing off of the 25 where apon it hit the ground sliding to a stop. Everyone began climbing again as a P-38 showed up high in the sky.

  "There's another con inbound. We're going to be screwed if we stick around much longer" I said as another 190 entered the area atempting to mearge with me while keeping his altitude advantage. The P-38 came in to engage me as the 190 ran off, he pulled off to the right as I fired a short burst at him.

 "Spitfire here too" I said as I turned around to get another shot at the 38 this time landing some good hits on him. I pulled up and to the right while he went down and to the left coming back up in front of me. He attempted to pull up over the top but I stuck with him landing more good hits. I could see debris fly off of him as my rounds hit then his left engine started belching smoke. I started to follow the 38 down through his loop but looking back i saw a 190 500m off of my tail so I pulled up and hard right, the 190 was faster than I was but I had mauverability on my side as I managed to pull a tighter turn than the 190 and he swung low underneath me. The 38 came back around but I managed to reverse on him and was once again on his 6 attempting to finish the job while the 190 was on my 6 attempting to shoot me but again had to much speed and lucky for me overshot. I put a few more rounds into the 38 and knocked off his right wing and he went spiraling into the ground. The 190 then turned on Thndr and I gave chase warning Thndr about him.

 I tapped off quick burst clipping the 190 in the wing. Thndr managed to avoid him but then I saw the Spit coming down at him. "Thndr Spit!" I warned.

 "I don't see him. Oh now I do" Thndr responded. The spit missed him and I attempted to get a shot on the spit, missing. The spit and I both came back around and ended up in the HO shot position, he got a good shot on me smoking my oil but I got a better shot and sawed off his wing. With oil all over my canopy and leaking out of my engine (lucky it was a slow leak) I managed to get back to my base and land my kills.

  And so ends a tale of combat in Aces High. I hope you liked the story.

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