Air to air missiles currently are extremely unreliable at taking out enemy aircraft, especially flankers (su30sm, su30sm2, su27sm, etc), in top tier air battles. A direct hit from an AAM would VERY often result in only a black fuselage that minimally impacts the flight performance and control of the target. Refer to the image below for a typical scenario. Changes to the damage model introduced in recent updates are not able to address this issue.
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