I think the AASM is not nearly as bad as what you make it to be (although I’m biased as someone that uses them more than I am on the receiving end). It’s only better than the Maverick in its explosive mass, but its also much slower and easy to shot out of the sky with a huge smoke trail (unless you are British with no actual SAM to take it out, which is why I kinda get you, but it also applies to the Maverick). The main culprit here is the kh38, and in the end only the Russian have access to it. While I don’t play the eurofighter, I’ve seen some people doing some very impressive things which let me believe it’s still one of the better option out there, even in the current META (behind the SU30SM, F15E and Rafale, but better than the others).
I personally think that the issue is not « the KH38 and AASM are busted, we need to add Brimstone in a more correct way » which would make it probably busted and even worse for top tier, but that the issue really is « The AASM and KH38MT are busted, how can we make them less busted, and give counterparts to others ». In this case, giving new SAMs to everyone and making them more reliable at destroying weapons would be a good start to nerf them. As for adding equivalents, the AGM for the US and other planes that carry it is already a thing. For the EFT, its harder imo (since SPEAR is not the thing I expected), unless the Brimstone is modeled in a specific but still wrong way.
As to why I don’t think we need to add anything more busted than the KH38MT as it is now, is that I think we are reaching a limit to what ground vehicles can do with how the game currently works. I think more powerful weapons should be reserved to specific roles, such as HARM, and that current A2G weaponry is currently sufficient to destroy ground teams, so there’s no need to add more.
Realistically, I think limiting the Brimstone MMW to a pure FnF missile, with no see through smoke, and to 6-10 max for a plane (since its explosive mass is lower than AASM and KH38MT, more missiles could be fair), or have the SP cost change dynamically (and exponentially) as more A2G weapons are added, is what would be acceptable in my opinion without ruining ground more than it already is.
(Why everyone forgets about how good IOG on a missile is just confuses me)
Its easy. if no MMW. The bare minimum is just giving us historically accurate variant of the Brimstone. The Brimstone 2. The 200% increased range would actually make them far more forgiving to use. Couple with a number of outstanding Brimstone buffs, like massively reducing its IOG drift it would be fine.
Couple that with GPS or SAL+GPS Spear-3s to give us something like GBU-39s and we’d be fine without MMW for now. But Brimstone 1s (a variant of Brimstone never carried by the Typhoon), with no FnF and in an underperfroming state. Just sucks.
I really odnt get Gaijin stance on not just giving Brimstone an IIR seeker.
They invent a seeker for the AJ168
The IIR Seeker for the KH-38MT is a mockup nothing more
They artificially nerf BOL to the point of near uselessness
and yet refuse to add any form of FnF to an iconically FnF weapon
But yes. No one is expecting 18x FnF weapons. 6 at the same cost as everyone else is the minimum. Ideally with exponetial SP costs for more. (maybe 9 as a min on the GR4 because its a much weaker platform)
IOG is very good. Range is also better, but with the last major, it’s also not sufficiently better anymore that it actually matters. Previously, when locking at Pantsir with IR I was basically inside their firing range to get a got TRCK lock (12-14km). So only the Pantsir was a threat, but I could survive the encounter easily (although they often shot down 3 to even all 6 AASM before they reached them). With the update, there is several things that make the AASM IR much less compelling when SLM, SLAMRAAM and other long range SAM are in game :
I have noticed some issues at range to get a POINT lock, basically needing to smash the lock button 5 or 6 times to finally get a lock, which is a huge time waste (it tries to TRCK, fails, turns seeker off, and I need to try again)
The AASM is a very slow missile. When fired in POINT mode, even with great IOG, it takes a significant amount of time to reach the 15, 20 or even more km distance you have to fire them at if you dont want to die from the SLM. That means that one of the three things usually happen : The missile gets shot down very easily, the SAM has moved 20m and the AASM doesn’t pick it up in TRCK mode, or the SAM already died 2 minutes ago
All in all, in the past few months, I’ve only played the AASM IR in uncontested matches (so with Germany and US on my side), and have mostly used the AASM laser using the exact same technic used by Typhoons with Brimstones, flying low, popping up for a AASM in very close range to not give an easy shot to enemy SAM, and go back to the deck.
And in this case, the Brimstone is a much better missiles for 3 reasons :
You have more of them (although this is offset by the explosive mass against tanks)
They have better maneuvrability
They have time to target indication so you can fire them and only pop up with the laser designator seconds from impact (why the Rafale still doesn’t have this is beyond me)
Obviously the AASM IR has its moment with some stupid 6x kill streaks in one pass, and those can influence the game much more in 10s than an eurofighter having to do passes for 5 minutes to get 3 kills, but the time were people can climb at 10km altitude and drop down firing all their FnF weapons is ending as everyone is getting new SAM (starting mostly with the SLM). I think the fact that Britain doesn’t actually have a decent SAM to shot down AASM is the main factor as to why you are so adamant at putting them in the same bag as the KH38MT, while I personally think comparing them to Maverick in term of efficiency is a better approach
I am aware that the AIM9X does not have datalink until the 2018ish variant. I was under the impression that at least earlier ASRAAM also does not have it, but I would not be surprised to be wrong or that later variant did receive it
Yeah, but this is the same for everyone. Including AGM-65 users whos missiles are instantly defeated by smoke and Brimstone users which ahve to be within range of a Pantsir to even fire.
I havent played Typhoon once since the last major. I see 0 point ever spawning it. I just play 11.7 and pray for a downtier.
do they? I always fire direct at target, though they are massively underperforming in that regard.
Id still trade having 18x 15km SAL weapons for 6x 30km+ FnF weapons most of the time. Especially in ASB.
Its not just that. We also have no IFV and no MBTs for top tier either. All we had was CAS. Which we’ve spent the last few years barely being able to use because of the Pantsir. Let alone with its fair share of nerfs for no apparent reason (Gr7 and Gr1 still waiting for a number of buffs and bugs to be sorted)
Now, we are facing things far far stronger than the Pantsir with if anything, weaker weapons.
Its frustrating.
Typhoon, the pinnacle of our TT Denied:
FnF AGMs
Historically accurate SAL AGMs
Multiple GBU options
Stand-off weapons
Heck, our Tpod doesnt even cue to the GMTI lock like it does on (as far as I am aware) literally everything else.
So how does it engage at long range in front aspect shots? Is it just IOG and hopes and prayers?
And as a side note on the topic of brimstones: their main issue is being a SAL missile. This means your aircraft needs to be exposed to guide, giving two options: either be too far from air defense (and be prepared to wait 2-3 business days per missile) or be much, much too close and have to pass over the enemy point blank every pass. Popping up is also an option but overall risky as you’re somewhere in the middle and just get an IRIS-T on your tail each time you expose.
The reason this is worse than hammer, or particularly kh38 is the rate of kills. You can ripple off 6 fire and forget weapons and go rearm in the time a eurofighter has gotten 2-3 brimstone launches, if it survives that long (as these F&F weapons can be launched from a much longer range without the concern of maintaining guidance and you can just launch and leave, eliminating the risk of SLM.)
My personal opinion is the solution should be a F&F weapon. There is no reason why the implementation of MMW brimstones is impossible. We have a spawn point system. We have the ability to adjust smoke characteristics. Make smoke act as chaff and make MMW weapons cost a fortune and a half so you can’t just load up tons. No need to limit to 6 but you’ll probably never have more than 6 because of the cost, so that’d be alright.
Brimstone 2s would be a great compromise but still leave the EFs at a huge ground strike disadvantage. Range gets you far (pun intended) but what matters is that rate at which the aircraft can do damage, where any SAL weapon is unfortunately left behind. There is a reason I prefer to use the harrier GR.7 in CAS right now with its (rather hilarious) ability to ripple off smokeless AGM65D/Gs, turn around, and land at a helibase for 5+ strikes in one match (PR is 7)
Yep. Would be nice, though I fear that would make it a chore to play in ARB/ASB. I kinda already hate playing the Gr7 in ASB because of the Aim-9Ms and the BR increase from then.
But thats off-topic bar the Brimstones the GR9A would also get
I havent played them. From what I could see in different videos, they do seem much more maneuverable than AASM, and it does make the difference at say 3km where I see people firing Brimstone like whatever with pretty high HOBS, while the AASM still needs some pre aiming in the general direction, and then they glide pretty well.
As I said, the actual TRCK range for the AASM is 14km max against the largest targets such as Pantsir. Against tanks its more like sub 12km if not sub 10km. Any more than that and you are using the buggy POINT mode, and then again, I can count the amount of kills I’ve gotten at more than 15km (even pre patch), since they are slow, easy to shoot, and take 5 business days to arrive. Even KH38MT users now only fire from airfield with the GPS at max distance, which is like 15ish km. You barely see anyone firing their missiles from further (also did I mention the GPS deviation nerfed the AASM to being barely useful at 10m with its 250kg max ?)
The META now isn’t really IR missiles (at least with SLM in the enemy teams), and the one vehicle that didn’t get nerfed as much as the others is the EFT with its pop up strategy.
As for ASB, I do agree that in this case not having FnF weapons is a problem
The IFV issue is not specific to Britain. The MBT with the Challenger 3 as the best British tank is however a big issue (and I’m not going to try to argue with the Leclerc, even it is still better). But, tbf, if you are not playing a leo2a7 (or strv) or a t series, you’ll have an inferior vehicle in general.
Currently the META favors Russia and Germany quite a bit both in the tank and SAM department, with Russia also having extremely good CAS.
All in all, I just dont think top tier ground is an enjoyable experience for most tech trees
The seeker used by the ASRAAM is better than the IRIS-T, and worse only to the MICA (technologically speaking), with dual 1D arrays (IRIS-T is one band, MICA is 2 2D arrays). Considering that the AIM9M and other older normal IR seekers should already have 15+km of lock range, it would not be surprising that the ASRAAM should be able to lock near it’s max range of 40ish km without needing DL.
Aside from maybe the MICA, I dont think DL on modern missiles is used to increase lock range, but largely to give HOBS capabilities (such as over the shoulder firing), which the ASRAAM isn’t suited for, as its a very fast, non TVC missile, even with over 50G of pull. It was most likely not a huge consideration and might have been added only later on
Du you know when it was from ? This should only be achieve with Datalink, so this would give an idea as to when at the latest it got this capability (id it indeed did not have DL in the beginning)
The recent change allowing to fire the MICA outside of its boresight was significant enough that I think DL on those highly maneuverable missiles is actually worth it. If Gaijin adds earlier ASRAAM without DL (for some reason), this might be a significant nerf to its HOBS capability, which could be useful when notching for example (especially if EFT gets its swivel AESA)
Asraam is not a big missile, it’s like 88kg, roughly same weight as other short range ir missiles (9m, 9x). A big missile would be something like a r27et which has double the range and weights like 350kg. It’s actually smaller than most of its contemporaries like r74m2, mica ir etc
I suspect due to the ASRAAM’s design utilising tail fins and body lift (and an exceptionally high AoA, if you’ve seen any of those launches!) along with the 50G pull, IOG is probably enough for the fraction of a second before it finds the target in the front probably ±110 or 120. I just can’t imagine needing a launch beyond that angle.
and there are primary sources showing 360° engagement area. Whether that is just done via IOG or it has DL im not sure though, but this news article does elude to DL, though I wouldnt consider it a primary source for it