cheers!
I give it until the first BR change. Then 12.0 (or maybe 12.3) with AIM-9L, F-14B to 12.7 or 13.0 with 9M
(Which is going to be hilarious when the MiG-23s move down a BR at the same time, since the F-14A in-game predates the MLD by ~10 years already, its RWR already can’t pick up anything its fighting, now its going to be well within F-16 brackets)
@MythicPi @MysteriousHonza Thank you both, Ive been getting kills very consistently since yesterday following your advice!
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o7
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All good tips that I commonly use.
I’d like to add one of my own. What I like to do is going slightly to the RIGHT after taking off, so at direction of the enemy team since most players turn left. That way I can get better firing solutions once they correct their flying path vector - My phoenix will be going straight at them.
Otherwise if you don’t do this, depending on the map, you’ll get 80% of the enemy players flying at a ~45° angle from you which means 2 things:
- They are in a much better position to notch your phoenix
- There’s a good chance that by the time your phoenix gets close enough to go pitbull your target has turned direction before the merge and will trash your phoenix if it’s on IOG only.
I’ve been using this for a while and managed a 61% wr so far using mainly phoenix with a 3.9 k/d. Before the indirect phoenix buff of course. You just have to be careful to not overextend (when going right) and suddenly find yourself surrounded by enemies.
I’m still trying to figure out what’s the best strategy to go against aim-120 users though as they can outrange my aim-54A just fine it seems…Probably just to ignore them sadly. Like you said I rarely get kills when going after high altitude targets. Phoenix is just too slow and clumsy against good players.
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All of this works. I also go on intercept course at the start of the match. What also appears to be working for me is to stay pitched up 10-15 degrees when firing and then waiting for at least 5 seconds since the last missile is out before I move at all. Then I make a gradual turn while keeping the targets on radar and the moment I see that Im about to lose some, I shut it down and go cold.
The combination of all these things suggested here has been working so well actually now that Ive been having lots of games with too many kills… Ive even gone for full phoenix loadout because of how good well its working rn… I plan to enjoy it to the fullest before gaijin nerfs or breaks something again.
Here is a pic from yesterday’s adventure… 4 phoenix hit, the rest was with guns and L’s… But still, 4/6…
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F-14D can’t use AMRAAM surely the only ever times it was used was some dumbfire AMRAAM body.
AMRAAM would have been on the F-14, but it was retired sooner.
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The F-14D required only the pylons be mounted and software be updated to fire the AMRAAM. All other necessary items were present. The move not to go ahead with it was political more than anything else.
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software matters though, otherwise harrier gr.7 would have 6 mav’s
This sounds like the same reason people denied AMRAAMs for K2K.
We have the Mirage 200 with 8 missiles and thats more then a software issue
It isn’t a concern for Gaijin unless they want to use it as a reason excuse for balancing decisions.
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It is just asking but, when did the F-14A start receiving TCS?
The F-14A in the first Top Gun movie already has a TCS, so it should be before 1985, but I doubt they received it before the Sidra Bay incident.
The TCS specifically was used on F-14A-140’s and newer since 1985.
The IRST chin pod and ALQ-100 antenna were sometimes mounted as early as the F-14A-70 mod.
That being said, one of the aircraft in the movie (BuNo 160694) was an F-14A-100. You’ll see that it has the IR / TCS pod but it is removed and has an aerodynamic cap in case they wanted to install it at a later date.
According to the TAMIYA kit, the TCS pods were still highly sought after and not every aircraft had yet gotten them by the time they started filming, which is why you’d see the aircraft with the aerodynamic cover.
Some early models of the Tomcat did not have the TCS, but did have the fairing. This, or the IR seeker was there but temporarily removed and had an aerodynamic cover as mentioned.
Here we see VF-111’s F-14A from 1983 with just the original ALQ-100 antenna and light. No IR or TCS.
Long story short, F-14’s after block F-14A-140 standard would have been fitted with the TCS & ALQ-100 antenna. Earlier modifications were retroactively also upgraded over time with these modifications. By the time the film was rolling - most of the fleet had the modification to use the TCS but not all of them actually had it installed. Hence the aerodynamic covers on some.
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Speaking of the TCS, are the devs aware that the TCS still interfeers with missile being launched? Often what happens is that you have a TWS contact and the TCS changes target on its own. If you try to launch when that happens, you notic that the missile appears to be locking where the TCS is pointing and not the radar… I feel like the TCS has also something to do with TWS contacts jumping around, as in you have target A selected and then it magically switches to target B that can be even outside the current scan zone… I cant say for sure if it does or does not trash the missiles but it certainly isnt right… I wish we could simply turn the TCS off or on at will, it would be at least be a crude solution. I remember there were problems when the F14B was introduced in regards to TCS and radar interaction. They fixed that but maybe not entitely.
The TCS sadly does not come with the features it should have, so it’s just the F-14’s radar that’s all over the place for no reason
I miss the time where it could spot targets for your team. Now it’s rather useless.
The best utility I’ve found is to identify player vs AI aircrafts and to lock targets going cold as a crutch for the lack of All-aspect PD. Even if the AWG-9 can’t track them, the TCS will and so I can follow them.
The issue is…it’s too damn hard to get a lock!! You have to be aiming almost exactly dead center at the aircraft for the TCS to lock. So if it’s doing any kind of maneuvering it’s near impossible.
It needs to be less sensitive. I mean there’s a dedicated guy at the back that should be doing this, not me the pilot. In-game I should just be able to point the camera in the general vicinity of the bandit to get a lock. Same thing in a dogfight situation to get a ballistic lead indicator with the tcs.
Frankly I think they should bring back spotting for two-seaters that have a FLIR pod or something similar to the F-14 tcs to simulate the rio/wso visually identifying threats which in the case of the F-14 was part of the RIO workload. Gaijin currently makes no distinction between 1-2 seaters aircrafts gameplay wise. The rio/wso is always just dead weight.
Anyway this is another topic, at least just let me actually lock stuff with the TCS without it being so painful for god’sake.
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Gaijin had the TGP’s ingame autotracking to the radar target, but it fucked ppl trying to do mixed combat, so they disabled it instead of just giving us a keybind to slave it to the radar…
Unrelated sidenote, but I’d love this skin in-game:
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Oh damn I thought this was real for a sec.
Love the Habs and Nordiques logos on the pilot/rio helmet.
In an alternate reality if Canada went through with the purchase of Iranian F-14s… Gaijooble plz.
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