At the moment both the F8U-2 and the F-8E(FN) share a BR of 10.0. Due to the recent debacle with the battle rating changes they both got an indirect buff, no longer having to fight some enemies and see others less often. While playing that battle rating it is clear the F8U-2 is very oppressive, many YouTubers have been making videos on it because it is very meta now. The plane is certainly on track for a BR boost to 10.3. I am here to say if Gaijin doesn’t decompress 8.0-11.0 the F-8E(FN) needs to stay at 10.0. The F8U-2 has:
4 decent IR missiles
Can carry 4 missiles
No radar missiles
Flares
RWR
Can carry ATG weaponry
While the F-8E(FN) has:
2 good IR missiles
2 bad radar missiles
Can carry 2 missiles maximum
No flares
No RWR
Cannot carry ATG weaponry
The F-8E(FN) is also less popular, meaning it is less oppressive to those around it. All together I hope there is decompression, but if there isn’t it deserves to be .3 BR below the F8U-2. Thank you for your time
The American F-8E is 10.3. The French one also gets Magics, which are the best or second-best rear-aspect missiles, with approximately double the overload of the AIM-9D as well as radar slaving. The F-8Es also have superior flight performance to the F8U. Just some things to consider.
Both the F-8E and F8U have a wing overload of 10g. The J-57P-16 of the F8U generates 78.51kN stationary and 87.52kN at optimal speed. The J-57P-20 and P-20A of the American and French F-8Es respectively both generate 83.58kN stationary and 93.62kN optimally.
While they can be useful occasionally and the burn time is very long you have to sacrifice a magic to take one. 15 G overload is definitely dodgeable if you see it far enough away or have chaff.
I will never understand why the F-4C is ABOVE the F8U. This makes 0 sense. Better missiles, built in gun, better dogfight performance, countermeasures, rwr, but the F-4C is higher??
That’s why things like these are very hard to balance and we need decompression. If the max battle rating was 15.0 and 9.0 to 11.0 was decompressed I would be all for it moving higher. But as of now the flares and RWR on the F8U-2 are what’s making it so oppressive. The F-8E(FN) was a fleet defense interceptor and that’s why the French didn’t give it those things. Interceptors are very hard to balance in a dogfighting game and that’s why we haven’t seen the MiG-25 or F-106 yet.
You really only use them when grinding for the magics and usually you might get a kill with them if you use it at altitude, the problem is anyone else up there usually also has radar missiles so you gotta hope you can out range them with the absurdly long burn time.
And it’s the lack of flares that is why the French F-8 is lower BR than the American despite having better missiles. The strengths of the Crusader family are in their maneuverability, excellent cannons, great climb rate, and superb missiles. Not something so trivial as countermeasures. The fact that none went up in the BR decompression is ridiculous - the F-4C is .7 above the F-8E (FR)! This is also the same BR as the A-5C, itself a broken fighter thanks to the same Magics that equip the F-8E. And sure, that’s got 18 countermeasures, it also doesn’t have the flight performance of an F-8.
So yes, the F8U-2 should be 10.3. But so should the F-8E(FR), while the F-8E (US) should be 10.7.
Also neither the F-8E nor the F8U were interceptors but rathers, even if used in an interceptor role, they are still highly agile and capable of dogfighting. Same is true of the F-106, though that was designed as an interceptor. The only difficult (realistically nearly impossible) to balance “interceptor” of those listed would be the MiG-25, because unlike the other three it wasn’t designed to engage fighters.
These are all very valid points, I do wish Gaijin decompressed 8.0-11.0 as they needed it the most. Many changes are egregious. Really topics like this boil down to personal opinion and bias, I like the F-8E(FN), so of course I want it as low as possible, but that’s not fair to everyone else so it won’t happen. As of right now 10.0 up it is certainly necessary to have some form of countermeasures, you can’t always be all watching and can’t always dodge missiles kinematically. If decompression happens to 15.0 and the matchmaker is changed to +|- 0.7 I would support the F-8E being 11.3, the F8U-2 being 10.7 and the F-8E(FN) being 10.3 OR 10.7 depending on how well it does at either BR.
There’s also the F-8P with SHERLOC RWR (though 530 capabilities removed) that could be a nice foldered sidegrade. Or upgrade if given Magic IIs but those of course would mean at probably 11.0 even without flares.
Was waiting for someone to mention my favorite French plane :) IRCCM on a 2nd gen airframe is near impossible to balance, 11.7 is the lowest it could go with today’s BRs. It could technically mount flares if you gave it the F-5C treatment, unfortunately I don’t think it will come to War Thunder until the devs don’t have anything to add anymore.
well the Jaguar IS is 11.3 with a pair of Magic IIs and countermeasures, though not the flight performance of the F-8. So 11.3 max probably unless countermeasures are just added (did the Aeronavale have a suspended countermeasure pod available?). I’d guess 11.0 but no flares+IRCCM is not fun for either party.
The flares make all the difference, at 11.3 with no flares it would be the destroyer of worlds in a downtier, I mean you want to fight 35G all aspect IRCCM in a F-105? Definitely not. And without flares it would be decimated in an uptier, no flares against an R-73 on the Bison would be horrible. It needs the flares for balance. Also I think the Aeronavale could have mounted them but didn’t for flight performance and weight concerns as its main job was to intercept and destroy targets as fast as possible and every single drop of speed was needed for that.
At least other french 10.0s can use SNEB rocket pods as makeshift flares. F8E FN just cant do much unless you fly into the sun. The recent G loading changes and br changes buffed F8U-2 too much so yeah it should go up.
FN can probably stay and be fine its not very spammed plane. only 2missles too instead of nice loadouts of american one. Stock grind with aim 9Bs probably doesn’t help it. Obviously everyone agrees F-4C also should ve stayed.
0 CMs is so bad for picking fight and limits playstyle unless you want to die fast with like 1 kill.
Mirage 5F and 3C can engage way more freely with makeshift flares despite being worse at flying.
F8E FN is 130 kgs heavier than US one and tiny bit more drag but gets bit better flaps.
F8U-2 on the other hand features best flight model about 740kg lighter than FN and better fuel loads with only downside being the constant wing ripping that just got removed. So its pretty nuts at the moment for br.
this is what F8U can do after G loading update. you still can rip it if you try but high speed pull is rather good. obviously its not the biggest strength or what you need to win in most cases but helps a lot. Also you don’t need to be careful with elevator really at all. FN pulls 1-2 Gs less to what is shown here due to weight and fm difference. Probably a plane that benefited the most from G loading change update by far.
Gone are the days where it was held up by wings ripping off during random matches.