I doubt a long time ago would be F-4E from Block 49 or Block 53 in 1970 or 1979
In my opinion, F-4E in USA tech tree from 70’s before GBU-15(V)1/B bomb service 4 years
Ah, I think F-4E from USA tech tree lack TISEO and DMAS (Digital Modual Avionics Suit), so remodel F-4E for third major update or fourth major update this year
Recently, I’ve been thinking about F-16 models for both the US and foreign operators that could potentially be added in the future.
For the US, I had two ideas, but unfortunately both could be seen as either TT bloat, or copy + paste. For the foreign-operated ones, a majority would just fit within sub trees as copy + paste as well (aka all of the Thai F-16As).
The two I want to see for the US: Early F-16C Block 30 (mentioned way too many times before), and the F-16A Block 15 OCU (though a standard Block 15 would be kind of cool to see, as well)
Something i havent seen mentioned, western jets are falling further and further behind on targetting pod tech ingame with each updates it seems. All western jets besides france seem to be limited to at best the LITENING II TGP (gen 3 FLIR irl, gen 2 in-game (again) after gaijin “fixed” it), it notably has atrocious zoom as well.
There exists better TGP’s irl for western jets that are period appropriate to the TGP’s fielded by France and China for example.
LITENING ER (2001)
LITENING AT (2003)
LITENING G4 (2008)
SNIPER ATP (2001)
This would match the DAMOCLES (2009) pod from the french (by FAR the best fast jet TGP in-game) and the chinese pod on the JH-7A/upcoming J-10A (not sure exactly when their pod went into service, but it was in the 2000’s), as well as the zoom capability seen on some of the russian jets, such as the Su-25’s, and the upcoming Su-24, along with the optics on some russian missiles, namely the Kh-29’s (granted some dont have thermals)
And for those that think the current western pods are fine and the change wouldnt be a big deal, here is the LITENING II vs the DAMOCLES in-game: LITENING II:
They come up with new excuses regularly now for why they don’t want to adjust the flight performance. Internally they simply stated they didn’t feel like adjusting old FM’s in regards to the F-5 series but that wasn’t a good enough excuse. So instead - they simply stated they believe the tertiary Russian sources over the NATOPS. Crazy.
It is just an arcade game, people need to understand that and take it to heart.
It seems so. Could probably try one more time at a bit lower AoA and a bit higher speed (like 20degree AoA or something) but I’ve other projects that I’d like to spend time on right now that don’t require bug reporting. One of them is looking into engine fuel consumption, because one of the many reasons some planes feel shit is because we are taking too much fuel with them.
Both are relatively major missing features that already exist in-game on other planes…
Sidenote to SADL, I wonder what other NATO aircrafts have it or something similar to it. Id be surprised if only the F-16C and A-10C had such a beneficial feature.
As far as air to air is concerned, Link 16 should provide similar functionality (and more).
As far as air to ground is concerned, it’s a bit complicated.
SADL supposedly works with US army’s EPLRS radios (which BTW seems the US army has phased out in favor of the newer apparently satellite-based BFT system, though it’s not clear if SADL can work directly with the latter as well or not … @MiG_23M might be able to chime in here, though he might get someone knocking on his door tomorrow morning if he does).
Theoretically Link 16 should provide similar functionality, but it probably needs some airborne or ground based relays.
The issue here is while the capability would be realistic, IRL you could target and destroy/disable/jam those (airborne/ground-based/space-based) relays, which obviously isn’t the case in the game. So it’s a bit complicated in terms of realism.