[FIGHTS-ON]

Hopefully not as dumb a question as the title suggests. I am assuming that the AI assesses you aircraft speed & direction and then shoots a round (or rounds) towards a predicted point of impact. (i.e the same way that radar directed AAA works for real). I understand that with 4.09 (?) that the more passes you make at a target the more accurate the AAA becomes ("one pass, haul ass etc") which adds realism. I assume that constantly weaving & adjusting height therefore makes a predicted AI "hit" muuch more difficult. Is this correct? Does the AAA always aim at the nearest or first a/c it targets?

So as to provoke some helpful discussion, what would you recommend to fly a Flak supression profile (in IL2!!!!) :

1) Speed (obvious, but constrains your flight profile to straighter lines)
2) rockets? (so as to give you more chances - but repeated attacks (dueling with a gun is always going to be risky))
3) Plan to attack simultaneously with other aircraft. Is there a way to get the AI driven planes to do this? Even if i adjust their ToT in the planning AI aircraft always seem to attack in sequence AND from the same direction. perhaps creating 4 seperate a/c to attack at the same time from 4 points of the compass?

[8FS_Bulau]

They shoot like live gunners do, with a bit of a "spray" pattern, but otherwise, what you've noted matches my own experience with it.
Re: your points

1. Relative motion is more effective than simple speed, IMO. Relative motion from the gunner's perspective is what you want to achieve. Generally, the more you fly in a path that moves across the gunner's view, (perpendicular to their bullets) the better your chances of not getting hit, i.e. don't fly directly towards or away from the gun. To hit them, you need to rake your fire through the AA location, not fixing on it for any time. Flying low to the ground also seems to help.

2. Rockets can compensate for bad aim, since a close by hit will often kill the AA. But really...man up, and use your guns! It's more satisfying!

3. This works well, especially with multiple AA, so the are not all "gunning for you", but split their attention.

[Roblex]

I am at work at the moment so cant give details but I have a great video that someone made to show how to take down AA. The smug b*stard (just kidding, I am jealous) calmly demonstrates by taking out each of about 8 guns round an airfield in succession in single passes with just a 1 second burst of guns. There was a whole selection of different types including a wurblewind.

What he seems to be saying though is that as long as you don't point your wing at the gun it is unlikely to hit you. He then shows that when he points his wing at the gun suddenly the shots get dangerously close. What he recommends is that you fly a loop(about 90-120 degrees) round the gun keeping your wing tip about 5 degrees below it then wing over and dive in pointing at a spot about 5-10 metres in front of the gun then just as you get in range raise the nose and walk the cannon fire on to the gun.

Basically, leaving aside lucky hits, as long as you don't point your wing or nose directly at the gun it is unlikely to hit you. This does not apply to overflying, or nearly overflying, guns though as any person who has tried bombing a heavily defended town belwo 4000m can attest. If you fly straight & level over a concentration of guns one of them will get you. You need to be flying in a curving path a few hundred meters horizontally from the gun before attacking then you need to prescribe a vertically & horizontally curving path as you dive in.