Dassault Rafale - Variants, Characteristics, Armament and Performance

Machinery of War Discussion Aircraft
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3504

As it stands, anything carrying 6 or more amraams does not need to leave high altitude, and nothing short of another amraam slinger can contest them, as the current meta is all about range, pull means little when every missile can outpull someone snapping their wings off.+

The MICA has the WORST long range performance, making BVR with it a joke. For the MICA to even be a concern, you have to have a complete skill issue; for you not only need leave the safety of orbit, but you have to enter an aspect where YOU can’t counter launch a ARH while they can (an angle that simply goes from 100 Degrees in front of them, to 180. The MICA excels at one thing only, off bore launches, all other missles are quicker off the rail at close range in a head on.

This means one thing, the MICA is a major skill issue detector, in that combined with an HMD, it makes it trivial to punish players doing dumb and risky plays up close and personal, its downright perfect for ruining a players overconfidence. And we all know the average top tier player.

I hate to envoke the argument of skill issue but seriously it is. You haven’t flown anything with a MICA, so your only knowledge of how they work is from them punishing a bad play you make, without the opportunity to learn why. Top tier is very difficult to learn from one side, you need to play your opponents plane to learn how it works from its side of the aisle. Assuming Im not replying to bait.

16 Likes
3505

And for the sake of shutting down the idea I’m calling skill issue without substance. And that I may be unhelpful. Let’s look at exactly the scenario that is what the MICA has an an advantage.

Typically Coming on perpendicular to anyone at 90 degrees means that you can close the gap while firing, meaning they either have to notch, multipath, or: either if theyre far away, they can hmd lock and fire back with enough room for the missle to pull in, or if they’re close, they must risk pulling in temporarily to get a shot off. This already isn’t a safe position for either plane to be in. Make the one in the notch a MICA carrier, and all that changes is that instead of needing to pull in around 50 degrees to fire then pull out, you need only pull in 10 degrees, not enough to notch but you are in an easier position to pull back into one.

Being the aggressor in that scenario may seem advantageous especially at close range, but even without a MICA your enemy is already in a good defensive position, the only change is that with a MICA, they can fire back at your already poor position. Of course a MICA wont work if your also multipathing or notching, same as every other missile, but in this position thats harder for you then them. You don’t want to jump someone like this.

There is also the fact it pulls slightly harder instantly off the rail for close up shots, but this is nothing most don’t know, such as comparing 9m/r73. The defenses are the same, merely a slightly larger margin.

Ultimately your tactics aren’t changed by a thrust vectored ARH compared to a regular ARH. The thrust vectoring just exposes any risk already there and exacerbates it. It not that r73 is harder to flare than most missles stalled out, its that it has a larger margin to make use of that position.

EDIT: And to drive this point into the ground. Anyone familiar with R73 will find the MICA to be so familiar as to think of it as simply a radar guided R73. With all caveats that comes with, such as instantaneous G pull that severely limits range; trading weak side aspect and strong rear aspect for strong headon aspect and weak rear aspect tracking. And the rhetoric should be eerily similar, people saying the R73 is op having not used it, as their experience is one flaring everything in an f5c with ice cold engines to a missle that requires putting thought into defeating it. In no uncertain terms it is a mirror of the r73, including any misplaced ideas either were/are OP.

6 Likes
3506

That book is referring to the PESA variant, the book was made sometime in the 90’s iirc, well before the AESA variant came out so could only be referencing the PESA. But yes, the AESA RBE2 is also 70± and several sources confirm it anyway.

6 Likes
3507

Thats just patently not true. The MICA is the fastest off the rail of all Fox-3’s on current top tier aircrafts, atleast according to these (admittedly dated) graphs (tho I dont think theres been any changes since iirc?).

Spoiler

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In both impact velocity, the MICA wins out sub ~11/18/25km, and in time to impact, it wins out sub ~19/30/39km at 1000/6000/9000m and the associated launch speeds seen in the graphs.

The impact velocity dropping off a cliff at longer ranges does significantly harm the pK%, but to say it only excels in off-bore shots is downright false.

I probs wouldnt wanna shoot it any further than ~13/23/36km tho at said alts ans launch conditions tho. Probably less depending on what the radar is giving me for the MAR in-game, but every player has their own preferences on missile launch params and the likes.

The graphs are also a simplified version of what would actually happen in a match, and its unclear how harshly the MICA might be affected if the target was defending when compared to other missiles.

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3508

Neat, learned something new from you 3 :)

2 Likes
3509

Im considering the fact that in match, the MICA bleeds much of its speed instantly pulling with thrust vectoring, its the same issue with the R73, there’s a significant discrepancy in off rail speed depending on how off bore your shot is. I don’t doubt and know well a straight shot is typically faster than others.

3510

Not exactly relevant when the MICA is one of the only ones even capable of off-bore shots…

3511

Every missle with an uncaged seeker is at some level capable of shooting off bore, its simply that TVC missles are significantly more capability doing so, and more practically. TVC missles lose significantly and noticeably more speed firing off bore than fin guided ones in game, its related to the wobble and spin out bug. Its rather rare to shoot a missle straight lined up with the nose at top tier.

EDIT: I do believe you misunderstood, Im sick and might not be writing the most concise. But was refering to how a off bore mica shot will be much slower than someone firing a non-TVC missle coming in perpendicular.

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3512

Functionally, yes, but to be practical while doing so, not exactly. Many of the top tier fox 3’s simply dont pull as much as the MICA or R-77 for off bore shots to matter at close range.

Case in point:

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These were some test shots posted in the Fox 3 forum thread back during the last time (I know of atleast) that maneuvrability for top tier missiles was modified. Not only is the MICA one of the rare few to hit this shot, its actually one of the fastest missiles at impact, and its time to target is the lowest. The AMRAAM btw, which the french love to compare against so much, basicly doesnt even pull into the target, and is slower than the MICA.

3513

He lives

9 Likes
3514

Ignoring the fact any shot off the bore, or the direct path off the nose of the plane is, by definition an off bore shot.

You ignore that is a test drive where it has consistently shown that test drives does not suffer from TVC bugs and refresh rate wobble, as well that it is showing a parallel shot ignoring again what I am referring to (A perpendicular shot).

This issues of the MICA regarding this have long been a topic and you can even note the people noticing in the DEV server, as to how people thought the missile had been buffed significantly, precisely because the DEV server did not suffer from these issues AS MUCH, let alone lacking it. We have confirmation of this being the case.

This issue doesn’t just effect the MICA, or even just TVC missles, all ordnance across the board loses range due to the servers lag and tick rate interactions, and it is known this noticeably causes TVC missles to waste much energy wobbling.

10 Likes
3515

And were this bug to be fixed, were I to concede this isnt true, and the test drive performance to be 100% to live matches, what does this prove?

The crux of my original argument is that margins of speed and G’s pulled are mostly irrelevant, it is detached from the meta and what it does effect is well within the levels even a slight skill gap covers easily. We saw this during the awful IRCCM IR slinging furball meta, r73 having TVC and cracked off bore capability meant little, what mattered was how many you had to spam and how many flares you had to stop said spam. Just because it was great during a stall fight meant nothing, because it was a furball hell where a 1v1 was impossible. TVC is equally irrelevant in the meta now. And what matters right now is how many you get, and how far they can go - extended beyond the missles - to the airframes radar and nose authority.

If something is OP it necessarily breaks the meta and will become said meta. And as it stands, the meta of sitting at altitude with 8 amraams is practically immune to MICAs. You must go out of ones way to expose yourself to a missile’s niche area it was designed to excel at to develop a disadvantage.

If the MICA-EM and 120-A/B were both IRL performance, the meta would be the same, the only difference is that the MICA would reinforce said meta because of its better dominance of short range. Theres a reason we don’t have MICA-IR with datalink, MICA-NG, f18 with 18 120s. They would threaten the meta.

TLDR; the meta is 8 120s in orbit, the MICA does not pose any threat to someone actually meta-slaving. No one even has access to 8 MICAs with LESS range. The MICA having its short-range low alt niche is incredibly healthy for gameplay in comparison to the current and past dominating outliers.

7 Likes
3516

Back from the dead, I see.

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3517

I think this is exactly the point. You guys are arguing about a situation that is so niche it’s not relevant. Today the meta is having 8 amraams flying at 12km, mach 1.7. I am a SIM player, when I play an amraam equipped jet, I literally just have to climb at 12km, reach mach 1.5, fire at 30/35km and get cold. Nothing will be able to kill me.

4 Likes
3518

Its the same in air rb now. Other 14.0s can still get to mach 1.5 at 7-10km even on small map like city an then spam off the missiles.

3520

So we have historical loadout but we can’t have historical performance lmao

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3521

TVC is no longer active at those longer ranges.

Even today after less than 20km there is no more TVC, and of course no more 50G at that point(only 35g at first pull alike Magic-2)
TVC is functionnal only while the engine is on, which is not at longer ranges

Therefore as the missile is reduced in ability and stands on it’s kinetic inertia to reach the Target, the missile have IOG systems to conserve energy.

The range of MICA-EM is currently 37.5% less than IRL advertized ranges

5 Likes
3522

probably marketing lies =D

1 Like
3523

Its crazy the amount of ETF player here that never touched a single french plane trying to make the Rafale worse

2 Likes
3524

80km is not marketing lies,… there is some tsets results proving those ranges.