The Virtual Red Flag event series organized in association with the 104th Phoenix Squadron continues to gain popularity; five rounds have already been run so far with the participation of hundreds of virtual pilots and thousands of viewers and followers from all over the globe.
Just like its real counterpart, the purpose of Virtual Red Flag is to train pilots from the various online squadrons and wings in a virtual air combat environnement using DCS’s high-fidelity NTTR map to simulate real world’s Nevada Test and Training Range used in the actual Red Flag.
Participating pilots are then split up into two teams: Blue Forces (pilots undergoing training) and Red Forces (Adversary or Aggressor squadron).
The “Aggressor squadron” is made up of the top fighter pilots in the SA Rankings and are meant to be outnumbered at least 2 to 1 in order to keep the aerial battle competitive.
That did not prevent Red Forces from prevailing by scoring an impressive 900 points and proving once again that experience and tactics are more important than numbers.
Plaiskool from France greatly contributed to Red victory as he downed 5 enemy fighters, which has awarded him RF5’s prestigious MVP title and propelled him right up to the top position in the 2016 Race and to number four overall.
Reigning champion and three-time hall of famer Stuge from the 104th Squadron achieved the second best air-to-air performance with 3 aerial kills, deepening the gap with immediate pursuer Ocelot as well as reinforcing the domination of the 104th Phoenix in the Squadron Rankings.
SF squadron leader Bushmanni continues his run of good form and his victim this time around was Juju from the 159th. Bushmanni is still number 3 in both 2016 and the overall rankings.
51st Regiment’s Frostie was also among the top performers in this Red Flag with one confirmed kill over Presing from 104th; this result has awarded Frostie the 7th place overall and the top spot in the Su-27 category.
Another player who has been doing consistently well over the last events is redcoreSix from TAW squadron; The German pilot continues to gather momentum as he achieves a rather huge jump in the rankings, going from 58th to 19th with a total score of 1158 points.
The biggest jump in the rankings though came from 104th’s Octuplefire who devoured 44 spots on his way up to 24th place, his highest ranking so far. Last Top Gun champion Razer was the first to bite the dust against Octuplefire then an encounter with Holimoli ended up on both pilots mutually shooting each other down.
Air-to-ground wise, there wasn’t too much action involved as Blue Forces failed to provide the necessary air superiority that would of allowed their strikers to inflict significant losses to Red ground forces, therefore only a few kills were registered by Chico from RvE, Toast and Archer from the 159th.