The AIM-54 was never broken. Its a pure skill check missile in-game, and always has been. What made it “seem” stronger back then was that the general playerbases understanding of BVR mechanics was significantly lower back in the day. Its always been relatively easy to outpull or to notch.
I absolutely disagree. When the aim54 was introduced, the game still used extremely rudimentary RWR, and the missile was an absolute menace that you could not evade if you dared to fly more than 1000m high. I would go as far to say that the introduction of the AIM54 was even more game breaking than the R27ER which has dominated for almost 2 years the top tier meta.
When RWR mechanics got refined then it was more manageable tho, but it’s still a very strong missile. It’s time to hit is very bad, but it’s kill potency even against multipathing targets thanks to its large warhead make it a better fix 3 than even some other fix 3s in game (like derby) in my opinion
You’re either misremembering or significantly overstating the capabilities of the AIM-54, particularly if you’re referring to the AIM-54 on release.
First off, regarding your comment on the RWR’s at the time, every nation had a jet with an RWR accurate enough for easy notching either before the F-14A was added, or within a patch of it being added barring Italy and sweden iirc, secondly, this point is largely rendered moot seeing as you could physically see the smoke trail for the missile for a solid 30 seconds post-launch. You could either notch off the visual cue, or you were simply an idiot for flying at a missile you knew was coming but did nothing about.
Secondly, the AIM-54 was pretty substantially inferior on launch compared to now. It had worse maneuverability, and significantly worse seeker seeing as it was released during the roughly ~12 month period in which all radar missiles were brutally nerfed with massive notch widths. It was incredibly easy to decoy, to the point where quite a few ppl did it entirely by accident every game.
Thirdly, as I pointed out, it was very easy to outpull the missile. Case in point..
The missile has never been that good in-game, people who had a good understanding of BVR back when it was added flew to altitude just fine. The fact the average player doesn’t know what they are doing, and were even worse on that front 3 years ago doesn’t mean a missile is broken.
Also, your comment about it “being more game breaking than the R-27ER” is laughable. The R-27ER crushes the AIM-54 in every respect in-game barring warhead weight and the fact one is a fox 3, but even then, the R-27ER also has a datalink which allowed for it to be shot, guidance to be lost, then to be reacquired for terminal homing. There was literally nothing in-game that came anywhere close to the R-27ER until a year and a half later when the “modern” fox 3’s were added. For comparison, the AIM-54 was added in June 2022, radar missiles were unnerfed sometime in sept-oct 2022, and the R-27ER was added in december 2022.
Fact of the matter is, the AIM-54 was such a non-issue in fact, that some people back then didn’t even consider it useable or a valid strategy to be used until it was buffed, as seen here (referred to as “actually useable now” by Seek following the buff) and here (referred to as “not that potent” by Defyn following the update going live, well before it was buffed), and the largely accepted upon “best” weapon load for the F-14A AFTER the AIM-54 was buffed was to carry 2/4/2 9H/7F/54A’s. 4x AIM-54 was also considered viable, though not as common, and 6x AIM-54 was considered a “meme” loadout (and still is).
Off topic enough at this point, if you’d wanna continue this discussion, we should do it in the AIM-54 or F-14 thread.
Calling the AIM54 non usable when it litterally forced every people to change their gameplay to play down to the ground
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- Unusable was likely a hyperbole, thats pretty basic reading comprehension
- He was referring to pre-buff, pre-radar missile fix AIM-54
- Vast majority of the playerbase has been mowing the lawn well before the AIM-54 was added, and the AIM-54 was added well before the larger community even figured out multipath was a thing in-game. It was generally done cuz 90% of players had no idea how radar missiles worked and didnt wanna bother learning, and back in the day before PD radars were added, being close to the ground made it hard for radar locks to even be acquired. The habit just continued afterwards because very few ppl had the forethought to actually look into radar mechanics.
The issue you’ll have is that sure, on paper, MICA might hit that range. But as you’ve not used it, I’m sure you are only misinformed on the capacities in which it will reach that range, instead of dishonest because that just wouldn’t be like you at all. Namely, on a straight flying target at incredible altitude. At anything other than space? It will bleed itself of energy by 10km, or 15 if you’re incredibly fortunate and the target decides that maneuvering is merely a suggestion.
Compare this to the Su 30 which is quite comfortable launching at ranges of 30km and hitting targets, even in substandard launch positions against the maneuvering foe, the 77-1 does demonstrate MICA’s range is incredibly lacking compared to the competition. But you wouldn’t know that, because you haven’t used either. But carry on, because you will.
After all, “You just got buffs” and that surely resolves the limited range capacity.
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I have used it lol?
Its really not that far off other missiles in terms of TTI and velocity at impact, even going all the way back to Dark_Claws original tests way back when they were first added. Couple that with it being fired by one of the top 3 fastest jets in-game now in terms of climb rate and acceleration, and you REALLY shouldn’t be struggling when using it with the Rafale, nor have I ever heard much complaints about it back when it was only on the M2K, aside from a few of you ppl in the french thread lamenting how “unusable” it is.
You are correct in saying I dont have the R-77-1 yet, I’m not terminally online and seeing as there was an event going on recently for a BB I liked, I was playing naval when I was playing WT. Still not sure where you got the mistaken idea I dont have/use the MICA tho, thats blatantly wrong.
Once again, you’re just massively overstating how “bad” it is at range, its obviously not the longest ranged missile, but its more than fine, particularly when fired from the Rafale.
I love how in this thread, the immediate reaction to anything which doesnt match the general narrative of this massive echo chamber is “you just hate france cuz you dont play them!!!” which, first of all, wild claim, very low effort, and second of all, nobody even bothers to actually check if me “not playing france” is a fact or not, when its pretty easy to do. For example, I know DirectSupport doesnt have a single top tier jet other than french ones, which is why it was hilarious when he accused me of being a single nation main that didnt know what using the MICA was like, seeing as for top tier aircrafts, hes a single nation main that only knows what the MICA is like.
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Tell yourself whatever you need to, that seems your goal in this thread every time you rock up anyway.
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Tell myself I play France?
If anyones trying to convince themselves of something that isnt true, its pretty obviously you in this case lmao.
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Croatian Rafale C F.3R has some nice livery
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Theres a very small chance that Canada might end up going for Rafales following the threats from the US. Our PM was allegedly discussing with both Britain and France the possibility of building EFT or Rafale in Canada, not sure what the answer was regarding that though, but seeing as the Rafale has the least US components, its arguably our best bet if the French allow us to produce them under license. Could get some gorgeous liveries if Canada went that way :3 The Canada 150th legacy hornet livery is to this day probs my fav one out there for example, but we’ve also got some really nice low vis ones imo. Would love to see what they could do with the Rafale
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Mythic nationality reveal
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That got me thinking
If Canada buys EFT or Rafale or both … And then loses the war and gets annexed by the US … We could have those aircrafts in the US tech tree …
why would the USAF ever operate them realistically. theyd probably just end up as musuem pieces, like MiG-25 and Mi-24
there is no parts for either
If US annexes Canada, it could become a sub tree for the US tree …
maybe they could also finally unlock the canadian decals for france 💔
I talking for sim, but i don’t see how you get defeated with a Eurofighter. You just have to play high alt, you will be able to launch the AIM-120 at least 8 to 15km before the Rafale and since the Rafale has to notch and the distance is way too far, it can’t launch back.
That’s the problem with the Rafale is that there’s no point at the moment to play high alt.
You can also play extremely offensive on sea level with the Rafale, but top speed will be limited and won’t able to follow other planes
The Rafale is incredible in sim, much better than the EFT. Between the radar being vastly superior, having more fox 3’s, and having permanent HMD IFF without emissions, its ISR capabilities are in a league of their own. Its countermeasures are also vastly superior (being mostly large CM’s instead of the horridly nerfed BOL ones the Typhoon relies on) tho it has less of them. The radar on the Typhoon is an outright liability in sim, which is not an issue the Rafale has to contend with, seeing as it has the single best radar in-game, and by a wide margin to boot.
The Rafales also been buffed significantly in flight performance, its time to alt and time to speeds match, and sometimes even exceed the Typhoons now, and the MICA can be used off-bore comfortably, unlike the AMRAAM, which means its also much more comfortable to use in a defensive manner.
Typhoon is great if the target makes it easy to find them, like flying in the cons or with their radar on well before the engagement starts so the Typhoon can set itself up for an ideal intercept, but anytime the Typhoon has to rely on its radar and its reliability as an aircraft falls drastically.
One thing the Typhoon does have ovsr the Rafale tho is the ability to bring some spare ground attack ordinance to help its team without impacting its air to air weapons load, something the Rafale cant do, but the Rafale tends to win sim matches by just outright bullying everything else into just quitting the match and finding one with less Rafales (or Rafales on your own team) since its just a better jet in air to air 99% of tho.
Also, you can def play the Rafale at high alt, its probably the single most maneuvrable jet at high speed high alt now since they nerfed the Typhoon and buffed the Rafale. You can sling MICA’s very far with very high pK% from high alt, and the disadvantage of sitting in the cons is mitigated by having a radar that will almost never miss a threat due to its massive scan area an superb scan speed. This is an even bigger deal on very cloudy sim matches, where cons are less of an issue and your radar becomes even more valuable, which are pretty common matches. If you do end up defensive in a BVR situation, you can also pretty comfortably sit in the notch and bait targets in for an off-bore MICA shot they themselves will lilely be unable to do much about unless they coninue shooting missiles at you until they merge.
Ive seen many more EFT’s hugging the deck waiting to ambush ppl than Rafales, simply because the radar is so awful it can pretty easily get you killed.
In RB I could agree the EFT competes (tho id still personally say the Rafale is likely better), seeing as its handheld by the spotting mechanics. Not in sim.
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Typhoon is still faster to get to alt.
Yes you can launch offbore but that’s even less range, those never hit.
You guys surestimate the current state of the radar, yes it has a wide scope, yes it can get lot of target, and able to pretty much look up and down, but it is very slow to get first acquisitions, which means in a 1v1 you will get locked first.
Barely, if at all at this point. Id have to redo the test with higher fuel loads (as seen in sim), but atleast at 20min fuel with air to air loads, the difference is a few seconds, and I tested this with a Rafale missing most of its performance mods…
You’re clearly VASTLY underestimating the radar. In its narrowest scan pattern, it scan similar or larger volumes of sky than most/all other radars in-game barring the other ESA’s, and its doing the entire 30x15.75° scan in 1.7 seconds. In terms of scan rate, its top 3 fastest in-game, with its only competition being the other ESA’s.
Numbers are all here comparing the RBE2-AA to the CAPTOR-M for example.
You can use 70x31.5 (or the new 140x31.5) for raw search function early in flight to build a battlefield picture that is literally unmatched by any other jets ingame, ID which target you plan to engage, and you can use the 30x15.75 “narrow” scan to rapidly find and engage any target as long as you get the azimuth right within ±15°.
You can also choose to fly radar off to deprelive the enemy of your radar emissions for finding you, instead using a mix of the IRST and OSF (or TGP) to find targets without them knowing you are there, and then use the HMD IFF to IFF them without them even knowing you are there. There are only 4(?) other aircrafts with a similar capability atm, (British/Italian EFT’s, Su-30SM, J-11B) none of which have the HMD IFF you have, which means they need to either visually ID the target, or turn on their radar and wait for the trackfile to determine IFF.
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