F15A in 12.7 BR

Game Discussion Realistic Battle
490

I geniuely thinks no AIM-9M in 4th gen supersonic fuselage should be allowed in 12.7BR as we argued before.

Even subsonic GR.7 were fine at 12.7 back in the day until F-14A IRIAF suddenly showed from nowhere.

Having IRCCM missiles on a supersonic fuselage, which is manoeuvrable in 12.7BR, seems criminal.
Not only F-15 but also with others.

Honestly, I don’t want R-73 MiG-29 on 12.7BR
but ‘in this goddamn new-normal’
I think Gaijin’s next step is obviously buffing MiG-29 with R-73
Of course, they don’t give a damn about 3rd gens.

So, in worst case scenario if F-15 and F-16 remains 12.7BR with IRCCM missiles
MiG-29 might gonna need R-73

And my Tonka and phantom will be doomed between both.
Sluggish attacker fuselage with 12.3BR …

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491

Maybe because you have a skill issue in reading capability?

In case I crushed F3H-2(9.0) while flying in Vampire FB.5 (8.0)
It doesn’t mean that F3H needs 8.7BR.

Of course, in case I frag some F-15A while flying with Harrier GR.7 or F-4K
It doesn’t mean that F-15A goes down further 12.3 while GR.7 goes up to 13.0

Personal skills cannot justfies statstics which Gaijin uses.
F-15A staying 12.7BR with 4x IRCCM cannot be justified.

2 Likes
492

I’d like to invite to stop with the exaggerations.

It’ll be good with 9Ms? Very likely.
It’ll be broken or game dictating? Nope. Most of peers or even vehicles below its BR has tools (the amount of tools they have is something to be nuanced, but they clearly have them) to counter most of the F-15As terms, it’s not the MiG-19 vs F-104 situation where those planes had free reign over the rest.

This fearmongering over a plane that has been arbitrarily given a reputation of gamebreaker while most of good players with it haven’t even achieved over 2.5KD with it shows how of a gaslight this whole “Duh F-15A is better than almost any 13.0” narrative ends up being.

And excuse me, but I’ve seen enough good players in this place bragging >2.5KDs in vehicles allegedly worse than the F-15A at the same previous 13.0 BR.

493

At least other irccm slingers like the french f-16a didn’t have radar missiles at 12.7. So you didn’t have to worry about headons.
F-15 though? GL man lmao

494

Well, F-15A might not be ‘that level’ of insanity. I admit it.

But still, I am quite curious why it needs to be the current 12.7 by Gaijin’s makeshift solution.

If we consider those 3rd gens don’t have many countermeasures (need to cross-check, but regularly 60~90 maybe)

Keeping more and more and more 4th-gen fighter jets down to 12.7BR seems a bad move.

It might not be as good as Su-27, or suffer more against Su-30MK

And well, even though F-15’s radar acts iffy, AIM-7M is AIM-7M. (I told you before in another topic, I also hope it gets radar fixed)
Having the SARH missile itself is better than never.

Well, I am quite unsure about whether F-15A is better than almost any 13.0
But still, it may be better than almost any 12.7.

Man, I hate Gaijin’s makeshift fixes and their ‘new normal’.
If this decompressing were aimed not at 14.7 but at 16.0 instead.
There would be some place, such as 12.85-ish BR.

I admit that F-15A struggles against enemies in the uptier when she was 13.0
But Gaijin just shift the problem onto others.

Tonka GR.4, Harrier GR.7(just mentioning those two because those are my fav)
Or Phantoms will struggle against F-15A, along with those damn F-16s with IRCCM.

Then, if Gaijin thinks a single care about those third gens, the next step would be to directly buff them down. Compression creates further compression.
(Or just let them rot.)

Tired of this. really.

Seems what I really felt fearmongered was Gaijin, not F-15. :|

1 Like
495

The F-15 was lowered to 12.7 despite it’s strengths because those very same strengths do not influence the game in the current 13.0-14.0 meta.

To vastly oversimplify, it’s strengths are 4 very good IR missiles, and competitive flight performance. Not exceptional flight performance, you’ll still handily lose to F-16s or Gripens, and some of the more nimble fighters can cause problems if you misplay. Also boat loads of countermeasures, but this is a passive advantage.

Meanwhile, it’s disadvantages are a crippling weakness in BVR/head on engagements due to it’s poor RADAR and unreilable AIM-7Ms.

On the whole, this might sound like a fairly balanced list. But due to how most 13.0+ games play out, it really isn’t. The outcome of the game is almost always decided by that initial ARH salvo of missiles. It really shouldn’t be, even Fakours aren’t difficult to dodge by just pulling into a notch, but I’ve consistently watched half of a team eat easily dodged missiles and die, leaving the other half to be easily cleaned up by the other team in a series of dogpiles.

To be fair, the F-15s are far from unique when it comes to struggling with this. All other ~13.0 aircraft are in a broadly similar boat. But at least they have advantages that help mitigate this lack of impact early in the game.

They either have ARHs themselves, ERs which are credibly dangerous SARHs even against ARHs (Depending on the circumstances of launch), an AESA RADAR to make the AIM-7Ms a bit more credible at range (alongside one of the best dogfighting flight models in the game), or, at worst, are more agile and with a greater number of IRCCM missiles so they can do more if they do manage to close the distance (M4K, Gripen).

Basically, what it comes down to is that if the F-15 can get into a dominant position, it can be very strong. But it completely lacks the ability to influence the early game to ensure it does

If/when the ARH meta gets rightly shoved upwards at least a couple of BR ticks, then the F-15s can go back up. But right now, it seems there are far larger fish to fry. The only planes that should have ARHs at this tier should be bricks that sacrifice everything for carrying a couple of ARHs. The fact that there’s only 0.3 BR between stuff like the ICE and Tornado F3 Late and the premium SU-30s is hysterical.

2 Likes
496

cool, so now F-15A is at 12.7.
gonna make a topic where i cry about how Gaijin should move MiG-23MLD to 11.3 so it doesn’t need to face F-15A, and another person will probably make a topic where it cries about how Gaijin should move a specific 10.3 aircraft to 10.0 so it doesn’t need to face MiG-23MLD, etc.

even if i need to admit F-15A sucks at 13.0, it’s OBVIOUSLY not 12.7 content, not even near of being fair at 12.7. AIM-7Ms suck, but they’re way better than anything at 11.7, and AIM-9Ms have IRCCM, even if they’re the worst IRCCM missiles ingame, they have IRCCM and that’s enough to make it lose them if it stays at 12.7.

i already had enough with Mirage F1C using Magic 2s, and now there’s this Mach 2 american cheeseburger fat plane flying around 11.7 skies? huh…

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497

There’s no argument that I can do about this point, those planes does not hold a single advantage over the F-15A in a one on one and will certainly struggle in the event of such situation. However, it still part of the equation that the F-15A holds merely tactical advantages over some of its former 13.0 peers, or passive advantages if you want to call them in a way.

That is definitely some way to put it.

And again, it only comes to a point when the F-15A has never been properly a harm to the higher ranks health such as (and I hate to repeat myself again, but) the Gripen or the Su-27 to a lesser extent back in the day.

It may be a plane with really strong points here and there, but I believe @Aegis270 wrapped it up quite well on his own reply:

It remains to be seen over this next months, but I genuinely believe that in its current state, compressing the F-15A/J/Baz isn’t the end of the world, and if anything could be done to appease the angry masses, they can remove its IRCCMs to fit in 12.7 in proper terms.

And in conclusion: I’d like to add that it has barely ever been the best plane in its respective BR history, the only instance I remember it being truly good was when it stayed at 12.3 back when 12.7 was added, and it lasted a couple months. Decompressing the F-15A back to 13.0 without giving it another side solution won’t cover its issues either. Issues that, apparently, are a taboo to speak of to many people because its the plane-version of satan.

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498

This is the important part to remember, IMO. The F-15s being moved down is a symptom of a problem, rather than the entire problem itself. Ask yourself why something so clearly superior to various 12.7s was doing so poorly at 13.0 that Gaijin felt compelled to move it down.

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499

I know the type of answers you’ll get: “But it’s the american mains who play the plane wrong”, “It doesn’t change the fact the plane has a good FM with a good kit”, “But they’re compressing it through stats”, yada yada, etc.

I’ve already played the F-15A, the F-15J and I’m relatively close to get the Baz, and I know exactly what I’m getting into once I get to spade it.

They all three (except for the different indigenous missiles on the Japanese and Israeli variant) share the same core flaws: being HMS-less, having a mediocre radar compared to even current peers like the Hornets and the most unforgivable flaw of all: pairing a mediocre radar with a SARH missile like the AIM-7Ms which turns really hard to connect with a weak illumination.

500

Well-
Their take is also partially right, sadly.
Of course, it isn’t the full draw of the problem.
Perhaps a dark side to Gaijin’s balancing?

F-15A really seems like a strange plane
It shouldn’t be current 12.7 without removing 9M, it might be better than the current MiG-29 with R-60M…

But also, it seems it doesn’t fits current 13.0 meta.

Too good for 12.7, but quite bad at 13.0

Quite strange. Feels a bit like F-14A syndrome 2.0.

If radar becomes fully repaired after a few months have passed.
Can it go back to 13.0 (of course, further decomp would be a prerequisite. No ARH Sukhoi at 13.3)…?

Anyway,
Even if I dislike F-15A coming down to 12.7, and worry about the slippery slope of buffing some 12.7BR jets
(Example: MiG-29 might really need R-73 badly if this situation has become stagnated just like how F-86 and MiG-15 nailed the coffin of early jets…)

Still, it seems all I can do is get used to it.

Naah… how could F-15 be the plane version of satan.

F-15C_Cipher_off_border
F-15C_Cipher_off_border1280×720 57.5 KB

She sounds more like “The Demon Lord of the Round Table” than satan.
:P

3 Likes
501

If Gaijin offers a Hornet-like radar illumination which doesn’t fall apart on a target moving diagonally, sure. Bump it to 13.0, no questions asked, even without touching the compression above.

In my humble opinion, the biggest current drawback the F-15A has is its radar being paired with the AIM-7M, first when it was at 13.0, and still kind of is at 12.7. If it had for instance a similar radar performance of the Hornet’s radar at 13.0, it would definitely be no argument here and this compression would’ve been totally unfair by any metric.

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502

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Honestly, I think the skill level of the pilots flying the American F-15As has at least some impact on the results.
The F-15A’s K/D being worse than the F-15J’s… well, that’s probably not too surprising given the performance gap between the AAM-3 and AIM-9M.
But what’s up with this K/D difference between the F-15A and Baz?
Sure, the number of matches is overwhelmingly lower compared to others. (There just aren’t that many users on the Israeli tree to begin with.) But even so, I think there’s a difference that can’t be ignored.

1 Like
503

That said, my current assessment of the F-15A is that it’s an aircraft with performance between 12.7 and 13.0.
If asked if it’s 12.7, I’d deny it, but if asked if it’s 13.0, that’s also a tough call. Its current BR range is simply too narrow.
Admittedly, since there are few 11.7-rated aircraft facing off against the 12.7 F-15A, it probably isn’t worth worrying about.
Besides, the MiG-29 and F/A-18 can still hold their own. They at least have features that are superior in certain areas.
But even if they were originally within the matching range, how are Netz or F-16A supposed to shoot down F-15As flying at 6,000-7,000 meters when the probability of matching against F-16AJs, EJ-mods, or Kurunass 2000s has increased?
Nevertheless, I firmly believe the BR for the F/A-18A, F/A-18C (Early), Su-33, and Su-30Mk2/MKK – which hold overwhelming superiority against peers or inferior opponents – should definitely be raised. I also believe these are the root cause of this controversy.

504

I honestly think the performance difference is overstated. It’s maybe a kilometer more range, and a little bit more pull. Most shots you take with an AAM-3, you could just as easily get with an AIM-9M by just… waiting a few more seconds, getting a little closer, pulling a bit more lead.

This is also the weapon that impacts matches the least. This isn’t the old, pre-ARH days, where you could just take an F-15 up to 7km and rain AIM-9Ms down on the enemy furball.

I’d take the borderline identical KD stats between the F-15J and the Baz as proof of this.

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505

You saying this does not disprove a fact

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506

Imo the F-15A should get AIM-7P to have something Merely “good” to fight 13.0 aircrafts.
It’s a Sparrow, but at least a better one.

The main thing we need is decompression (and no, 14.7 is not enough, should be 15.3/16.7 as minimum). Now i’m not a programmer nerd, but i think it’s not THAT HARD to increase a number in the matchmaker and chance some planes’ BRs.

2 Likes
507

Ace combat mentioned, where is muh round table map gaijin?

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508

Sorry, I’ve been translating and speaking at the same time. What I meant to say wasn’t “That’s probably not too surprising given the performance gap between the AAM-3 and AIM-9M.” but rather “The performance gap between the AAM-3 and AIM-9M might be one reason.”
I should have double-checked. My apologies.

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509

All good. It’s just a talking point I’ve seen a lot recently, people freaking out at AAM-3s as though they’re some super weapon when they’re a pretty marginal upgrade over AIM-9Ms. I’ve even see people saying that it’s a reason to put the F-15J 0.3 BR over the F-15A.