I would say im pretty good at ground, but in the beginning i was terrible, just horrible. But over time i got better, and that makes me wonder if it’s a mistake buying the fa18c premium for the US air tree? (Mind u i have not played much air battels)
I would really like to have the f15e as a cas option, and f22 in the future, so that’s the main reason i want to grind air.
I have seen online that the us air tree is very long and miserable. So my question is, is it a mistake buying the fa18c premium with little to know experience of air top tier in wt?
if you want to get the experience and get the jets, but a prop premium, there is not a lot to learn from prop, then you can enjoy first jets and build experience from there, the us tree has some good early jet compare to the other tree
to be fair I havent played it since the premium Su30 dropped and for a good reason.
you would be better off with F-4S as grinder. Missile bus, but one of the better ones. Much better BR matchmaker wise. Should allow you to learn ropes of long range missile combat pretty comfortably.
well then, better to save your money. F/A-18C early is fun plane dont get me wrong, 7Ps are awesome, but you wont be getting any grinding done as you are well within the 1.0 BR spread of 13.3.
or, use F/A-18C early as your CAS option. tad bit on the weaker side, especially since it uses the desert storm config with Tpod in missile slot, so with full mav loadout you only get 1x 7P (not that you will use it in ground mind you) and 2x 9Ls. against ground you will pretty much perform just as good as say, F/A-18C late (I run swiss one in my top tier ger loadout, and you can just hope to avoid dogfights lol.
While im slightly biased to the usa myself, It’s definitely a hit & miss nation at certain br’s.
The f-18 as the others have said is pretty decent, But it’s in a br where your facing moderately good ARH missiles. So it will get stomped a fair amount in uptiers.
If you do stick with the usa. Try to use the props if you can. The p51’s especially sense they kinda relate to the stand off play style of top tier jets later. (The match maker also stacks the cards against usa aircraft a bit as well due to short matches and airfield starts, so a good trial by fire nation.)
I cannot speak much for props, since I have not played them seriously, but I can speak for jet planes.
USA has very competitive (if not meta) planes in every tier since the start of jets. From a purely air-to-air perspective the grind is probably the best in the game if you actually like playing planes. It is of course longer than other trees purely due to the amount of planes, but many of them are simply a lot of fun to play.
If you want to get good in air, enjoy playing it and have the time for it I would unironically recommend getting a premium account and just grinding from the bottom. Alternatively, starting from some good premium props can also be a good option.
Lower tiers contain a lot of new players and is excellent for learning. As you grind you will naturally get better, unlock more advanced airplane features and also face better players.
If you buy a top tier airplane you will very likely simply hit a wall. Instead of a gradual skill curve you will face a steep skill mountain. There are simply so many things you need to know to play remotely efficiently at top tier. This has lead a lot of players to simply start bombing in their great fighter jets, because that’s the only thing you can do somewhat efficiently as a new air player. Bombing in top tier is neither fun nor will increase your skill, and just doing boring grinding for the eventual reward in the end is not worth it.
The F-18 premium is admittedly a very good plane, but I would unfortunately not recommend it for beginners.