The Art of the Kill (BFM)

[Emu]

It's interesting that you say they're similar, I would have thought the turns were longer and faster in BVR and more often that not engagements were head-on.

[Sceptre]

how do u guys know all this lol

[GGTharos]

It's still BFM. BFM is the basis of all air combat.

 

It's interesting that you say they're similar, I would have thought the turns were longer and faster in BVR and more often that not engagements were head-on.

[Kaktus29]

biggest problem to do real good BFM is obviously watching the enemy as you pass each other (merge) or as you hunt him as he is anywhere from 9-3 o'clock in front of you..

 

with this i mean, you have to see it really good, or as good as RL does it.. what is the reaction time, how good do you see, ..here its about having good monitor, graphic card, no lag, etc etc..many factors that are not the same with most players..so its not even playground from the beggining.

 

And you need to see the movement of the enemy very good in order to re-balance your BFM, do you increase throttle, do you put more G's, less G's.. one mistake if you are flying against ACE pilot and its over, you can't get back the energy you blundered with a unneeded move..

 

but all in all, BVR is i would say a different category.. its more hi-tech and less skill oriented.. i mean its more computer thingy than skill thingy.. a computer nerd if you teach him the procedures will do good BVR, but hard to teach a good BFM, you need a good "feel" of the air, space around you and around the enemy, like parking a car in a very tight space and you get to evaluate if space is worth your effort or not in a split second decision as your car drives through the parking lot.. while BVR is more like pressing the right buttons to get the damn GPS to shut up. its more technical oriented.

 

especially in our modern time, that is even more technical with all kind of jammers, frequencies, counter moves(you might still need to do BFM obviously but they will not be so demanding of you that you will end up dead cuz you pulled only 4.5G's instead of 4.8G's.)

[TAW_Blaze]

Most of those ace pilots are computer nerds if you wish. The guy who understands exactly how his stuff work will beat the crap out of anyone who doesn't.

 

BFM is just as technical as BVR. I know some people who would prove you that good BFM is more calculated than good BVR.

[GGTharos]

A person who can't do good BFM also by definition cannot do good BVR. The games we play don't represent this VERY well, but they do it to some extent. If you rely on the computer to do all your tactics work for you and you just fly the plane willy-nilly you'll get shot down the moment you run into someone who knows what they're doing.

 

Most people don't even know how to do the math on an intercept, and all of that comes from BFM as well. There is a lot of skill involved in BVR - it's just that sometimes, your targets make it simple/easy. This is no different than a bandit rolling out in front of you in BFM and reversing his turn, thus solving all your problems.

 

In other words, don't base your judgement on trivial applications of a skill.

 

but all in all, BVR is i would say a different category.. its more hi-tech and less skill oriented.. i mean its more computer thingy than skill thingy.. a computer nerd if you teach him the procedures will do good BVR, but hard to teach a good BFM,

[Kaktus29]

@blaze.. yes,but to do a good BFM you need to have a skill, you can't learn that, its like being natural basketball player, or natural soccer player.. some ppl have that "body intelligence" ..ability to move more elegantly and mostly have depth perception much better than others so they excel at sports when you anticipate a ball moving through the air and understanding how to move to intercept, control, manipulate the ball better than others.. this is not something you can LEARN, you can learn basics but never can you excel as someone who is natural at this..

 

while BVR is learning lots of frequencies, technical wizadry, and just hoping your side is more technologically advanced than the enemy and that is it pretty much.. Average pilots in hi-tech machine learning BVR non-stop with all the more-advanced radars,jammers,EWR,RWR will win against a super-natural-talented pilots who can pick up your speed and turn G-rate just by looking at your plane at 400 yards.. u get the point now?..

[Kaktus29]

@gg of course BFM is something to study and learn, but again, its like training basketball, its your phyisial aspect of fighting if you will..while BVR is your strategy/tactics behind basketball.. so even if you are great basketball player you will loose badly if your team has bad strategy(coach tactician-bad BVR,technology etc,bad radar etc, etc) while other team is with better management, better strategy and worse players 1 on 1..

 

For this reason BFM is not something to beat yourself up with..i would be more worried about the upper echelon of the game which is BVR one.. if you lack tools to do that(tools as technology on your side) your options run dry pretty fast..

[TAW_Blaze]

yes,but to do a good BFM you need to have a skill, you can't learn that, its like being natural basketball player

 

No. You can learn BFM. You can learn BFM based on theory and apply that theory in practice. You also learn a lot of stuff by practicing and experimenting. If you think you can't learn BFM you have absolutely NO idea what you're talking about.

 

A talented guy might do slightly better and someone who's not might need more hours to learn the same thing. It doesn't matter. Anyone can be good at anything, if he's truly dedicated.

[Kaktus29]

@blaze.. i disagree.. to do very good BFM you need to observe the enemy plane and make a move based on his move,not only that, you need to "see" his speed, banking, G-turns all on instinct .. you miscalculate this and boom you lost lot of energy or increased your radius simply because you are not good at it..

[TAW_Blaze]

OK. I guess all of the air force trainers that train BFM are retarded then, because it's clearly impossible to learn BFM. You're either born Hartmann or you're screwed. Whatever..

[GGTharos]

I don't know why you're mixing up BFM and overall tactics. That's not how it works.

 

Yes, you can learn BFM. No, not everyone can do it - some people just lack the spacial orientation, others lack the discipline or concentration to do it right, etc. You don't learn BFM just by doing BFM - not in an air force. They want you to learn quickly, or you're out. So they tell you exactly what to do, what the bandit will do, and what you are looking for. This way you learn all those cues - yes, like training basketball, but very focused. Later on, the bandit you train against won't be as cooperative, and eventually the bandit will be 'full up'.

 

The 'guys up above' are completely irrelevant to your individual BFM/BVR training.

 

BFM is the core skill of any fighter pilot. EVERYTHING that happens in the air is BFM. This is why good BVR requires good BFM. It doesn't matter that you have to deal with techno-wizardry - systems operation is also part of the procedure, by the most important part is that missiles fly to their target, and if it flies, it's BFM.

 

After all that, we get into weapon system specifics which can certainly alter the course of a fight - but your very basis for using all this stuff well, in the air, while flying, is BFM.

 

@gg of course BFM is something to study and learn, but again, its like training basketball, its your phyisial aspect of fighting if you will..while BVR is your strategy/tactics behind basketball.. so even if you are great basketball player you will loose badly if your team has bad strategy(coach tactician-bad BVR,technology etc,bad radar etc, etc) while other team is with better management, better strategy and worse players 1 on 1..

 

For this reason BFM is not something to beat yourself up with..i would be more worried about the upper echelon of the game which is BVR one.. if you lack tools to do that(tools as technology on your side) your options run dry pretty fast..

[Bushmanni]

@blaze.. i disagree.. to do very good BFM you need to observe the enemy plane and make a move based on his move,not only that, you need to "see" his speed, banking, G-turns all on instinct .. you miscalculate this and boom you lost lot of energy or increased your radius simply because you are not good at it..

 

One way to learn stuff is to just do it and with time you usually get better at it, even if you might not know why. This is a natural way for neural networks to learn statistically do the right thing. People say this kind of skill "instinctive" which it's not but intuitive. This kind of learning hinges on you happening to do the right thing randomly at some point. If someone in the know manages to coach or "manipulate" you doing the right thing you will have a dramatic shortcut.

 

As an example it took me few months to learn no-spin spike throw and understand how I acquired that skill. After that I was able to teach the basic skill to multiple people within 15 minutes (they could get most of the thrown spikes stick to a board). I used to think this was an impossible thing to do or at least you would have to be some kind of extraordinary person to be able to do it from random distance. Turns out it's relatively easy to learn when you know what things to pay attention to.

 

Other aspect is that in many technical skills like race driving or dogfighting the right thing to do isn't easy to stumble upon randomly but can be analytically figured out with relative ease. In these kind of circumstances it's crucial to know and understand the governing "rules" in order to be effective at your trade. There's no way to instinctively or intuitively learn them as precisely as learning the rules through technical analysis or someone telling/showing them to you.

 

For example judging bandit energy is not simply seen (except with radar or something similar). When you do certain maneuvers you can see how the bandit reacts to your moves and from that reaction you can make assessment of his energy. For example you are making a sustained level turn at corner speed and the bandit is tracking you inside the turn circle which is only possible if he has considerably less speed than you. Or you go for a one circle flow at head-on merge and at the other side of the circle the bandit flies half a mile in front of you which means he's going much faster than you. Knowing how turn radius, g and speed play together makes it pretty straightforward to get pretty good sense of the bandits speed with a simple observation. With more experience this assessment will get more accurate but there's nothing special that just anybody can do.

[WRAITH]

Just to add Typically.................. Sequence is as follows...............

 

B.V.R. > W.V.R. > A.C.M aka the Furball > B.F.M aka the Dogfight

Your aim should be not to tango in knife fights but B.V.R target acquisition and destroy notch and bump out of the threat zone.

 

The B.V.R situation may very into mutual support engagements in and out depending on circumstance. It may be a solo flight or squadron or even split.

 

Due to many determining factors on many possible situations like available ordinance, Fuel, Air Craft and AWACS Support, weather, enemy ground defense network, enemy Air Craft knowledge +/- ( maneuverability) sometime better to turn and burn.

 

But its fact most wars have been pulled into B.F.M aka dogfights via splitting squadrons tactically strategically breaking the fight and win the battle.

 

Once your in the B.F.M situation its vital to control the circumstance and keep your WEZ open exchanging for offensive and defensive maneuvering in your strategy to win the fight the aim is to pull in your lift vector on the bandit on his vulnerable Six O'Clock when in guns only option.

 

Although there are books and online pdf's on this that offer more detailed discussion over 100 pages or so.

 

But we really need a good air combat sim that really holds to true air combat fundamentals and offers this in A.i and Human play as this is just more long winded wishful thinking.

 

We need more Air Craft better battle space situations in combat sims.

 

Me Dreams maybe one day!

 

Maybe the DCS F-18 and a SU-27 development might offer better practice into Dogfighting... mmm me thinks!

 

Cheers

Edited July 9, 2014 by WRAITH

[ENO]

Gotta take a dude sporting a rhino baby seriously yo.

[Sceptre]

So after reading all the material in this thread and watching a few instructional videos, I decided to give air to air combat another try.

I set up a scenario in the editor; 2x Su-27 Flanker aircraft on "Excellent" skill level against me in the "F-15C" at a range of 50 miles.

I was able to kill one with an AMRAAM at about 10 miles after avoiding his shots by using that theory of making the missiles "lose energy."

The second one I got with my gun in a dogfight :)

 

Is this a good way to practice? Because I often have a hard time finding servers with people on them (with decent ping) and when I do, everyone's just doing aerobatics :D

 

I'm a total noob here, my many years as a sim pilot have been spent flying choppers or ground attack planes :P

[104th_Maverick]

The best way to practice is with another person, in an environment that can be easily reproduced quickly.

 

You want to find a buddy and get on TeamSpeak or, try and find someone willing to train / help you a little and get them on Teamspeak.

 

Then set up a server with only 3-4 aircraft (F-15) on Blue and 3-4 aircraft (F-15 or SU27) on Red.

 

Have them separated by 40nm, with the blue aircraft lined up next to the other blue aircraft and same with red.

 

This way you can run the scenario over and over... if you get shot down or shoot the bad guy you both just jump back to SPECTATORS then take another jet and go at it again.

 

It is VERY useful to have TacView recording these sorties, so both of you can sit down after 30 mins or so of fighting and watch the ACMI to learn some more key lessons...

 

Morale of the story.... find some online buddies to train with, training against the AI will lure you into a false sense of security regarding your ability... you need to be (ideally) training against people who know what they are doing, you will learn much faster!

 

Remember its not all about winning tho... you must be able to find success in failure and apply this to your learning, if you cannot, you'll be fish food for longer than your happy with ;)

 

S!

[Sceptre]

Thanks! I will try this, as the AI does seem fairly limited after a while :)

[Stuge]

;2112980']The best way to practice is with another person, in an environment that can be easily reproduced quickly.

 

You want to find a buddy and get on TeamSpeak or, try and find someone willing to train / help you a little and get them on Teamspeak.

 

Then set up a server with only 3-4 aircraft (F-15) on Blue and 3-4 aircraft (F-15 or SU27) on Red.

 

Have them separated by 40nm, with the blue aircraft lined up next to the other blue aircraft and same with red.

 

This way you can run the scenario over and over... if you get shot down or shoot the bad guy you both just jump back to SPECTATORS then take another jet and go at it again.

 

It is VERY useful to have TacView recording these sorties, so both of you can sit down after 30 mins or so of fighting and watch the ACMI to learn some more key lessons...

 

Morale of the story.... find some online buddies to train with, training against the AI will lure you into a false sense of security regarding your ability... you need to be (ideally) training against people who know what they are doing, you will learn much faster!

 

Remember its not all about winning tho... you must be able to find success in failure and apply this to your learning, if you cannot, you'll be fish food for longer than your happy with ;)

 

S!

 

Well said Maverick.

 

I have a couple of training missions of this kind ready. I can even send them if someone wants. Simple parameters like fuel, weapons etc can be changed with 5 minutes of editing...

 

Also I'm usually around at 10 pm UTC every day, if someone wants to do training.

 

The Art of the Kill PDF one of you guys linked.. appreciate it, might grab it for reading at work :D

 

S!

[Buckeye]

Well said Maverick.

 

I have a couple of training missions of this kind ready. I can even send them if someone wants. Simple parameters like fuel, weapons etc can be changed with 5 minutes of editing...

 

Also I'm usually around at 10 pm UTC every day, if someone wants to do training.

 

The Art of the Kill PDF one of you guys linked.. appreciate it, might grab it for reading at work :D

 

S!

 

Stuge, I know you and I discussed previously doing some BFM PvP practicing together but we were waiting for AT&T to get me set up with internet at my new place. Well, AT&T is coming tomorrow and I will finally be able to get online in DCS so I will be looking for practice whenever I can find a partner. Just a fair warning, I've never flown online and I'm not very good because the only training I have is from myself against the AI (plus I've only been simming for 6 or 7 weeks)...so I won't be able to teach you anything...but I will still be a good human target for you and I'm more than willing to be cannon fodder and go through ACMI's to analyze our fights. If we practice enough, I'm bound to get decent and then I can give you a good challenge :joystick:

 

If you still want do practice sometime, shoot me a PM and we will work out a good time for us both :pilotfly:

[Stuge]

Just a fair warning, I've never flown online

 

Don't worry, we can start with your F-15C against my A-10C and work our way up from there..

 

I like to teach. So I will just try to do that, trying to find the best way to do so :)

[Buckeye]

Don't worry, we can start with your F-15C against my A-10C and work our way up from there..

 

 

 

I like to teach. So I will just try to do that, trying to find the best way to do so :)

 

 

Damn that's gonna be embarrassing when I get shot down by the GAU-30 haha

 

Looking forward to it man! I love learning about this stuff so it should be a great time.

[TAW_Blaze]

I'm up to it aswell. I think you can find both me and Stuge on the 104th TS quite reliably.

[Stuge]

I'm up to it aswell. I think you can find both me and Stuge on the 104th TS quite reliably.

 

High five, colleague! :D

[Buckeye]

I'm up to it aswell. I think you can find both me and Stuge on the 104th TS quite reliably.

 

Already planned on stalking the 104th TS looking for you as soon as I was up and running online haha :music_whistling: Looking forward to flying with you finally, dude. I'm gonna need to learn to have a bruised ego...generally it's not my thing, but I think over the next few weeks I might be getting a little more used to it.

 

:helpsmilie: