(L+CR) Toaru Hikuushi e no Koiuta (The Pilot's Love Song)

[Avrorrange]

Originally Posted by Panzerklein

This anime's plot armor is quite strong, there are pircture of a soldier with lost-a-half head after hit a 12.7mm anti-material rifle's shot. With 20mm, Ari will lost her arm and bleed to dead.

And I don't know what happen to Sky Clan's paratroopers, they look more train and better equipment, and they look like WW2 German trooper in real life. So maybe Sky Clan is actually a powerful country or a "Reich".

If cadet's rifles don't shot down fighters magically and all Isla's planes would be shot down like flies, even the Knights with Toperdo wings are no march for them, then Levamme come in massive force with even prototyped jet fighter and take down Sky Clan's fighters as ease. Thus Levamme will offer "friendly help" to Isla, Isla beyond the choice of accept or refuse the offer after saw the power of both Sky Clan and Levamme. The story will be better.

BTW, look like Karl know Silver Fox emblem, did this force appear in any other series of same author yet?

I think the fights would have been more realistic if only all the cadets fought with machine guns instead of having some shooting down fighter planes with one shot using bolt action rifles.It's ridiculous every shot the bolt action rifles fired managed to hit the enemy planes at any rate, considering how fast they are moving.At any rate, it was a miracle they even got some down considering how bad their equipment and tactics were.I mean seriously, you are outnumbered, outgunned and outmaneuvered with the first thing you do forming a static circle?

[Tenzen12]

Originally Posted by Darthtabby

Just because the pilot of that plane has a letter from Juana doesn't mean he has direct access to her. I think it's probably supposed to be Charles.

While this was a very good episode, I do have some criticisms of how the combat was portrayed. This series has a tendency to overdo it a bit with the number of craft involved in battles and the number of enemy craft that get shot down. Even considering that it was likely Charles at the controls of that Levamme fighter I still think the enemy planes it was fighting were taken out too easily, and the number of enemy fighters that went down to fire from cadets who were armed almost entirely with bolt action rifles was even more ridiculous (seriously, there's a reason why fighter aircraft carried machine guns).

That's fair point, considering how that Seagul kicked ass, you are very likely right (I assume Fanna and "Juana" are meant to be same person, doesn't they?)

In other hand most people here assume Hikuushi verse planes are EXACTLY same as their WW2 counterparts including armoring and gun caliber, which doesn't have to be that case. Is that hard imagine it using lesser armour (maybe to be more agile or some other issue own to hikuushi verse engeneering) and thus can be penetrated more easy?

[Avrorrange]

At any rate, I don't understand why there was a cadet school on Isla in the first place. I understand you want people to die, but at the same time want more soldiers on board to at least give them a good fight before they all go down, but why not give them more professional soldiers? Even if you expect the cadets to fight, why not give them real front-line single seat fighters instead of WWI styled planes?The setting's are completely screwed up.I guess this is one of the shows where you should just shut up and watch the action scenes.

[Wild Goose]

... did you miss how everyone on Isla is, as a practical matter, exiled from the Republic of Ballesteros?

They've been given enough to maintain appearances, but the Ballesteros government doesn't want anyone on Isla to return, and won't shed tears if all of them die.

[Tenzen12]

It's still real expedition

[Avrorrange]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

... did you miss how everyone on Isla is, as a practical matter, exiled from the Republic of Ballesteros?

They've been given enough to maintain appearances, but the Ballesteros government doesn't want anyone on Isla to return, and won't shed tears if all of them die.

I know the government doesn't want people to return, but the problem is why bother have cadets at all. The situation is like they are doing too much on some areas but too little in other aspects.Why bother send a group of cadets on board? You know they aren't going to help much with those antiquated planes.Why not just send these unwanted youngsters as laborers instead? At the very least you don't have to spend the money to educate them.

Besides that, what made the government think that the expedition won't return? By all means no one knew just how dangerous the expedition is and that the leader of the expedition Admiral Luis seemed really confident about the chances of success by all means. If it was HE who proposed the expedition and it was HE who decided to lead it the government should by all means not doubt that they would not survive.The government must be really stupid to believe he would be nutty enough to propose and personally lead an expedition he knows he won't survive. If they really didn't want anyone to return I think they shouldn't give them any military support at all.

[Tenzen12]

1. I don't remember anywhere mention their planes are antique.

2. Most students VOLUNTERED as cadets to Isla. They was not forced.

3. There is alson no reason think goverment send it to be wiped out.

You guys complain on own assumptions as if it was facts.

[Avrorrange]

Originally Posted by Tenzen12

1. I don't remember anywhere mention their planes are antique.

2. Most students VOLUNTERED as cadets to Isla. They was not forced.

3. There is alson no reason think goverment send it to be wiped out.

You guys complain on own assumptions as if it was facts.

Well, the people on Isla mentioned a lot that the expedition was a glorified attempt to dispose of the unwanted. Just why in the world did you think the government asked Karl La Hire to join the expedition even knowing his true identity?As far volunteering, I do not understand WHY the government actually established a cadet school. It costs A LOT of money to train people. Which that sum of money, they may as well send more trained soldiers on the expedition. Besides that, the planes ARE antiquated. It isn't the stuff the send out to the front lines and is purely used for training purposes. Just compare the planes the Sky Knights use compared to the ones they use. At the very least, the ones the Sky Knights use aren't as primitive as the ones the students used.The ones the students used looked awfully similar to the antiquated ones the Sky tribe originally used. They are by all means primitive because 1. there's no inbuilt autocannons/machine guns and 2.they weren't single seat fighters. The ones the students used were similar to the planes they use in WWI while the ones the sky knights and the Sky tribe later used looked more similar to WWII planes.

[Panzerklein]

Originally Posted by Tenzen12

1. I don't remember anywhere mention their planes are antique.

2. Most students VOLUNTERED as cadets to Isla. They was not forced.

3. There is alson no reason think goverment send it to be wiped out.

You guys complain on own assumptions as if it was facts.

Crusade also have a lot of voluntered poor people, but the truth that European lords want to get ripe of them thus make them go to "holy land" and die there.

On Isla, beisde exile noble families, most of cadet are poor people.

Originally Posted by Moe Connection

I know the government doesn't want people to return, but the problem is why bother have cadets at all. The situation is like they are doing too much on some areas but too little in other aspects.Why bother send a group of cadets on board? You know they aren't going to help much with those antiquated planes.Why not just send these unwanted youngsters as laborers instead? At the very least you don't have to spend the money to educate them.

Besides that, what made the government think that the expedition won't return? By all means no one knew just how dangerous the expedition is and that the leader of the expedition Admiral Luis seemed really confident about the chances of success by all means. If it was HE who proposed the expedition and it was HE who decided to lead it the government should by all means not doubt that they would not survive.The government must be really stupid to believe he would be nutty enough to propose and personally lead an expedition he knows he won't survive. If they really didn't want anyone to return I think they shouldn't give them any military support at all.

To make look like they going to fight, just like crusade can't just send unarmed people to there because these people will discover soon and revolt, take control the Isla or the worse support exiled noble families, then Republic's plan is failed. In Crusade, poor people have weapon, some has armor, but still ill-trained to compare to knight. To make sure people can't return, Republic just give them old planes. In anime they can shoot single-seat fighter with rifle, but in realistic logic, those Sky Clan fighter will take down all Isla's planes with ease with no to minimum lose. Even if they success, the Republic still can praise their glory and claiming the Holy Spring, at that time the Isla got heavy lose already they may be killed by Republic force far away from Republic's land and blame to Sky Clan or Levahme so the truth will be covered, one stone two birds.

[Tenzen12]

Well yeah, in a way Islas quest is crusade on it's own, but goal of crusades wasn't get rid of poor people itself. And volunters came cause they could improve their life if they succeed.

Not mentioned army was always most stable and perspective occupation for poor. So it's win win scenario.

But Cadets WASN'T sent to just die, but to be military asset.

[Panzerklein]

Crusade has many goals, but the goal to reclaim holy land is nosense, especially with most force of crusade armies are poor people, whiles the feudal lords, knights actually are few, most of them stay in Europe. When many poor people go to "holy land", the unrest because poor population is decrease, thus the true and hidden goal is get rip poor people with their unrest to outside Europe.

Crusade itself can't say: "Hey poor guys, go to holy land or somewhere and die there for our nobles's sake".

[Tenzen12]

The stated goal of the Crusades was to recapture the Holy Land from Muslim forces, but there were also many unstated goals which European lords and clergy strove to achieve.

Originally, the pope had called for a crusade to capture important Christian holy sites, such as Jerusalem, from the forces of Muslim rulers. These military operations were launched in response to calls for support from the Byzantine Empire who had been under attack by Muslim forces for many years.

The rulers of the Holy Roman Empire had their own agenda as well. Centuries of fighting between feudal lords had produced a surplus of warriors that rampaged across Western Europe. The Crusades provided rulers with a novel way of emptying their realms of their more violent element while increasing their own virtue, prestige and riches. The more pious rulers saw it as an opportunity to win forgiveness or absolution while the less pious saw the potential wealth that could be gleaned from controlling part of the holy land.

Later, the aims of crusades changed. Some targeted heretics such as the Cathars. Others targeted pagans or excommunicated Catholics.

Some of last crusades was lunched in my homeland, and reason for it was spreads of protestantism which would weaken influence of catholic church here. So there was many reasons for these and social unrest wasn't even most important ones. Well yours reasoning is also mentioned here as side show.

[Panzerklein]

That is second goal if the crusade success like I said.

[Avrorrange]

Originally Posted by Panzerklein

Crusade also have a lot of voluntered poor people, but the truth that European lords want to get ripe of them thus make them go to "holy land" and die there.

On Isla, beisde exile noble families, most of cadet are poor people.



To make look like they going to fight, just like crusade can't just send unarmed people to there because these people will discover soon and revolt, take control the Isla or the worse support exiled noble families, then Republic's plan is failed. In Crusade, poor people have weapon, some has armor, but still ill-trained to compare to knight. To make sure people can't return, Republic just give them old planes. In anime they can shoot single-seat fighter with rifle, but in realistic logic, those Sky Clan fighter will take down all Isla's planes with ease with no to minimum lose. Even if they success, the Republic still can praise their glory and claiming the Holy Spring, at that time the Isla got heavy lose already they may be killed by Republic force far away from Republic's land and blame to Sky Clan or Levahme so the truth will be covered, one stone two birds.

The regular troops actually had good planes. The cadets were the only ones with antiquated aircraft.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Machineguns were generally less and less useful as WW2 went on, to the point when towards the end of the war, you were seeing more and more fighters with lots of 20mm, as opposed to .303, .30 cal or .50 cal machineguns.

Unless you are American....then you just get loaded up with stupid amounts of 50 cals in the wings. Which are actually better for anti- fighter. More ammo and better ballistics

[Wild Goose]

Panzerklein has really answered what I'd want to answer, so no need to reinvent the wheel.

Originally Posted by Cosmic Eagle

Unless you are American....then you just get loaded up with stupid amounts of 50 cals in the wings. Which are actually better for anti- fighter. More ammo and better ballistics

Well, yes and no. There's an article that discusses this, and the USN very early on figured that 20mm gave better bang for it's buck - but the problem was that the US did not have reliable 20mm cannons.

But yeah, for anti fighter work, having eight M2s will definitely chew up enemy fighters, plus you have higher ROF and more ammo.

-=-

...and now the Spacebattler in me wants to reenact The Final Countdown and mate it to Isla. Sky Clan, say hello to American Righteous Freedom!

YouTube

https://youtu.be/NkOsXNF_ZoM

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

Yeah yeah, Vlad Tepes award. Couldn't happen to worse people though.

[cupumanager]

The Air Battle is Headdesk Material, but I don't wanna broke my Laptop...

Bolt Action Rifles that can One-shot kill a maneuvering plane? What is it? some kind of Gyrostabilized Pulse Railgun?

Originally Posted by Revolutionist

Anyways, that fight was all kinds of ridiculous. Bolt-action rifles vs machine guns, and they managed to shoot down a few planes before getting obliterated. The balistics were all backwards, the enemy planes were shooting .22 whereas the cadets were the ones shooting .50 cal.

^THAT^
At least Wolfgang brought a Lewis LMG...even though he died in the end...

I don't get it...Why the Anime portray the cadets still carrying Rifles? Just show them using Autocannons like Ignacio in the OP, that will be more believeable, albeit just a little. Is there in the Novels anything that says they died firing Bolt-Action Rifles?

Even if Fidel Melze Fausto shown that he can honor Commoners and his rival, that doesn't worth it - he still deserves to die for all of his Leroy Jenkins tactics he pulled off that killed most of the cadets...In fact, I can see how his family, both Father and Son, are Glory-Hounds who like to just Charge Home damn the consequences...
Make sense why they would volunteer into Isla Expedition...

Originally Posted by Darthtabby

The close up of the front end of Charles' fighter when he goes to overboost gives a different impression of the nose shape. Given that this series is by a different studio and director than the movie and the fact that blue plane looks like it was probably hand drawn I was inclined to think maybe they went with a slightly different design and drew the nose in a way that made it look off. The armament fit seems fairly similar, with wing guns outside the propeller arc and machine guns poking out of nose blisters. The Sky Tribe fighters have much more prominent nose blisters and wing guns within the propeller arc.

If we're bringing real planes into this I think it looks kind of like a Hawker Tempest. Note the chin intake.

The most important thing is that its blue. The Santa Cruz and all the Levamme Empire's fighters in The Princess and the Pilot had blue as the dominant colour in their paint schemes. By contrast every Sky Tribe fighter has had either yellow or grey as the dominant color.

Originally Posted by Darthtabby

Going by the "Flight Log" that came with my copy of The Princess and the Pilot the Levamme fighters in that movie were a cross between the Supermarine Spitfire and Bell P-39 Aircobra, with a "ground pose" based on the FW-190. The Levamme fighter that appeared in this episode looks rather similar but isn't exactly the same -it has a chin intake, a different canopy design, and some odd fins low down near the back.

You're absolutely spot on! And I was mistaken...The different Roundels and Markings compared to the Levamme Air Force as shown in Tsuioku threw me off...

It resembles either Hawker Tempest or Sea Fury - Nose like Tempest, however the chin intake is much smaller - instead, it have an upper intake too. The Cannon placement is different too - Two of the cannons are positioned between the upper nose intake.

Its not Aeris II as used in Tsuioku, so possibly its newest replacement in Levamme Air Force since they got outclassed by Contrarotating Prop variant of J7W Shinden used by Amatsukami.

...Heh, for now, looks like Supes kinda enjoyed being called Onii-chan by his not-blood-related sister...huddled together in a Hospital Bed...

I wonder, how many years after Tsuioku is Koiuta's Timeframe? Fana now married and become High Consul of Levamme Empire...It haven't been confirmed yet that The Seagull Ace is Charles, but very likely he is...

...Why, Levamme and Balesteros, two nation very far from each others, have the same Spanish-based culture and shared Legend of Santa Aldista?...there's must be a connection between them...

[Utsuro no Hako]

Originally Posted by Moe Connection

The regular troops actually had good planes. The cadets were the only ones with antiquated aircraft.

Yeah, the leaders were overconfident and committed their entire air force to battle, leaving the cadets as the only ones to fly CAP (because there's no way these barbarians could out maneuver the great Isla Air Force and attack the island). If they'd left a couple squadrons of real fighters behind, the battle woudl've gone very differently.

[hsmsful1]

I am amused that the leaders were such fools , I mean it's something like abc. If you leave your base undefended, it is over and yet they took the initiative and went on offense while leaving their base in the hands of few fighters and some trainees with old planes. And so are that white haired guy, ari, kal-el, that girl with Mitty (lol) and Claire the only trainees still alive?

[Utsuro no Hako]

Originally Posted by hsmsful1

And so are that white haired guy, ari, kal-el, that girl with Mitty (lol) and Claire the only trainees still alive?

No, only half the trainees were in the air. The ones on the ground were still alive when we last saw them.