Unlike the previously presented players, LastDingo isn't a specialized low level player exploiting the special conditions of era I only. LastDingo played eras I-IV, stopping short of the long grind for jets. A few hundred tank battles were included, but the obvious display of stupidity and cowardice in tank battles was a turn-off.
His obsession was the maximization of the victories/battles ratio, yielding a top 100 rating in this category after months of playing. LastDingo flew about half of the matches in squads, including hundreds with INIT2WINIT and hundreds with TFD players. The most extreme results were during the winter 2014/2015 with "last month" victories/battle at about 95%. His record was a 118 match victory streak with American BR 3.0 and 3.3 planes in late 2014.
LastDingo won 2,944 matches out of 3,675 (80.1%).
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| B-25J, a fantastic and versatile bomber |
Aircraft types favoured by LastDingo:
A-20G: A fantastic light bomber
B-25J-1/-20: Very good bombers all-round, albeit with unpleasantly small bombload
B7A2: Fantastic escort fighter, also killing pillboxes from high altitude. Best B7A2 tactic is to dive on climbing red fighters.
Beaufighter VIc: Most satisfying firepower.
Bf 109G-10: A bomber destroyer with 3 30 mm guns. Capable of stopping heavy bomber rushes almost on his own. Capable of chasing G8Ns at high altitude - two G8N kills above 8 km altitude were scored. The downside of the 109 is that apparently everyone attacks it, expecting an easy kill.
Boston/Havoc: Weaker than even an A-20G, but together with DB-7 and
maybe the TBF the only really worthwhile British propeller bombers.
Do 217E-2/-4: First really powerful bombers, a squad of which can
turn the base & airfield bombing tactic into a winning tactic.
F6F-3: Very good fighter-bomber, with good turnfighter qualities.
Fw190A-8: Most satisfying firepower.
Fw190D-9: No love for it until a domination match with 19 kills in it - bloodlust!
Il-4: A fantastic Russian bomber for high altitudes. Can kill
pillboxes and bases from above 7 km with near-immunity, then dive and
kill tanks with its three heavy bombs.
Ki-43-II: Ridiculously good low level fighter. Can kill many armoured cars with ease.
P-38G-1: First really good bomber destroyer in the American line, albeit with a tendency to die in flames.
P-47D-25/-28: Most powerful fighter-bombers, capable of destroying eight destroyers with a single load of bombs and rockets. Even the new AD-1 Skyraider isn't really better.
Pe-2 (early ones): Effective Russian light bombers, good tank/pillbox/destroyer killers.
Yak-9K: Almost the same as Yak-9T, but with 45 mm gun.
Yak-9T: Very good Soviet fighter with much-feared 37 mm. AP
ammunition enables this gun to kill medium tanks. The hate against all
Yak-9 (because of their one-shot-kill guns) is so strong that they appear to receive extra attention by red
fighters.
The best mix was a BR 3.0 setup with P-38, B-25, A-20G, both P-47 and the F6F. It was powerful in ground strike due to 2 good bombers and 3 best fighter-bombers and powerful in air combat with 4 good fighters and 2 tough bombers with many fixed machineguns. This mix yielded approx. 80% victory rate flying solo.
A summary of LastDingo's principles:
determination to win (many THINK they want to win, but actually they do what they feel like at the moment instead of what's needed for a win!)
avoid undue attention (climb high and to the sides, avoid field of view, keep distance, avoid initial or respawn fighter waves)
never trust the blue randoms
choose good plane lineup, including BR considerations (2 bombers or
1 bomber + 1-2 fighter bombers, preferably 1 bomber interceptor like
Bf109G-10/F4U-1c/ 4 cannon Brits/Yak-9, all else: fighters for
domination map air duels)
focus on objectives and keeping the others from accomplishing them (kill bombers, defeat airfield capture efforts)
choose ONE path to victory (in ground strike: airfield kill OR bases/tanks/pillboxes kill)
readiness to adapt to the situation (let off from airfield to kill tanks if need be)
keep an eye on ticket counts
prioritisation of important aircraft (bombers with more bomb load, ignoring fighters)
do not engage an aircraft that's already being chased unless it really needs to die ASAP
partially fly in squads with TS3
stay at key airfield and low during domination battles if ground forces are irrelevant on the map or at the moment
some skill at aiming guns
some skill at aiming bombs (one 500 lbs/250 kg per moving tank, 3-4 tank kills in one pass)
speed capture of airfields (instructor off)
surprise/dive capture of airfields (pretending to not land, then suddenly land)
knowing the own aircraft
knowing the hostile aircraft
knowing the maps
knowing typical random player behaviour
look at 'n' list to identify new red bombers and unusually successful red players
chat communication to motivate at least a few players to do the right thing
stealth ammunition for fixed guns except in tier I
basic evasive manoeuvres
basic offensive manoeuvres
look at 'm' map to plan ground forces destruction
assignment of vectors for bomber destroyers (left high or right
high), threats (individual bombers) and ground targets (left or right)
in teamspeak
engaging 'suitable' targets (big gun fighters prefer large target planes, agile bombers bomb troops flying low)
some high altitude bombing with first
climbing to altitude during sideways climb instead of impatiently flying
straight towards the reds
playing at eras I-IV to have fun in the full diversity
stop playing for hours after a defeat streak of four
share tactics, tricks and target info with squad mates
drop bomber's bombs for quicker climbing
announce incoming bombers to team to improve bomber interception
LastDingo was the founder of a quasi-secret quasi-invite-only chat channel into which the top 100 players of the leaderboard in victories/battles were invited. About 50 players joined it, and the channel was successful in getting top players to know each other. It's largely defunct now because it disappeared due to a bug (or feature?) of the seemingly still buggy WT chat system.
Statistics of LastDingo:
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| sorted by sorties |
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| sorted by air kills |
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| sorted by ground kills |
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| tank battles, sorted by sorties |
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