It’s to my terror that I find it to be that America isnt being hand held through the nuclear thunder event
As someone who has both America and Russian top tier, I am not biased against the aircraft, so don’t take this as you will.
But America needs a buff in this game mode. It’s airframes and missiles are simply just not enough.
I’ll give major examples
F-15; alright airframe, alright missiles (carried by the 9M)
Now… the Russian ''counterpart"
MiG-29; great airframe, perfect missiles, however could use the extra two missiles sometimes
Not satisfied? Another example.
F-4E; clunky, alright speed, terrible energy retention and radar, alright missiles, however can carry both kinds of nukes
MiG-23; can turn when told do (sometimes), alright radar, meh missiles, fucking rocketship, however can only carry lighter nukes, leaving the big ones to the Su-24… (horrible aircraft)
Russia also gets the yak-141, which is a fucking god by itself except for missile count, but I won’t go too much into it
I don’t have much to say about the bombers, I’d believe if they were reskins of eachother.
I just wish this game mode were balanced. (I have 3 marks for the B-52 and Tu-95, I’m not biased or uneducated)
I think the main issue is that the best USA planes are pay walled Also the Mig-21bis might have been a better counterpart to the F-4E in the lower bracket then the F-4J with the Mig-23MLD at the higher BR.
Other than that the SAM systems force low altitude close rang engagements that favor the Russian planes/missiles a little more.
unfortunately there is no exact 1 to 1 counterpart between the 2 trees, the F-4E and the bis would at least both have 4 all aspect IR missiles (as the are in the nuke mode currentl) and no lookdown radar, the F-4 has 2 extra radar missiles, but without the lookdown that’s not a massive issue and the bis can trade it’s radar missiles for 2 more R-60Ms.
But the F-4E is a higher BR than the bis, so they could start it with it’s normal loadout and add the AIM-9Ls back later if it struggles.
The F-4E is better than the MiG-23 in pretty much every way except for the once in a blue moon the MTI works, and top speed I guess. It gets 9Ls for God’s sake. On top of that the F-4E gets a full air-to-air kit when carrying a nuke while the MLD is restricted to R-60s only…
Like the A-10 and A-7 are pretty buns but the F-4 is by far the best free aircraft.
IMO the F-4E shouldn’t have nukes and instead something like the AGM-45 (as the US ARM carrier are pretty restricted by their subsonic top speed) and the F-111F should have been the US nuke carrier (plus its ordinary conventional ordinance ofc)
But, it’s unlikely that the event will be changed in any significant way
MTI works quite well in look down mode it functions the same in game as a PD radar the only reason it doesnt work all the time is people multipathing but it can still hit them low the F4E cant it doesnt even have a ground clutter filter unlike the MIG 23 MLD you cant hit multipathing targets from above due to this the MIG 23 MLD can
the R60M and AIM-9L feel pretty even in this mode since they changed seekers for this mode
the MIG 23 MLD literally outperforms the F4E in every FM aspect other than instantaneous
even looking at statshark and flying the MLD in game it can be seen to perform better than the F4E
it’s just quirky, you have to be under 1500m and have your nose pointed down for it to engage MTI mode, which is a pain when SAMS are forcing you into a permanent multipath as you cant keep your nose down for long when you are at 50m alt to begin with.
If you’re dying to R-60Ms or R-24s of either flavor, that’s a much larger skill issue. The truth is quite simply that the guns are the best option for either aircraft- and the M61 mogs the GSh-23L.