The plane, love it or hate it, is like a Seahawk on steroids. It's ideally suited to the 'finger' gun arrangement, and my experience with it chewed up lighthouses even before the nerf. A big howie on the swivel and BOOM, big targets disintegrated.

What it needs, and what tier nine needs, is something akin to a blimp. Make those two really hard to hit with rear arcs on the Shiki turrets. The guns will be more useful, the plane will be like a very fast blimp, (less armour more maneuvers) and it will feel like those two large mounts chewing through ammo and hitting nothing are put to good use.

Seconded!

All in favor?

Sounds like you need this mod:

I don't object to the plane in the Barashiki's slot having this change.

(I still object to the Barashiki occupying the top-tier zep slot, but that's a separate issue.)

I object. The Barashiki is not a blimp, it's a solid-hull craft that fits visually between the Spectre and KingFisher, and it should be statted as such. The Shiki has a great many problems, I agree, but they're caused by its placement as the T9 blimp. And T9 hardly needs a blimp, when T8 already has such a good one.

If players want a bulky plane with maneuvers, turrets, and large guns, then they should reconsider a modded KingFisher. It seems to serve those purposes quite well.

The shiki sprite is tiny

The Barashiki is the single craft in most need of a reworking. It now has a tiny sprite belying its status as the biggest and slowest of the planes in the game. Combat in it is still less than exciting, though at least it's no longer excruciating. But it really belongs in t10 above the Kingfisher if anywhere. Its arcs are oddly and awkwardly placed to boot. It feels like it was shoehorned into whatever spot was available rather than being either given an appropriate spot or being adjusted to fit in its given home.

Signs point to yes.