I’m playing the JAS39C, and getting absolutely wrecked. I know, I’m not good at the game, you don’t need to bombard me with “just learn how to play”. That’s what I am here for. I try watching youtube videos, and people seem to only post Steel Guru “Hehe, here’s 2 second clips of all the kills and deaths it took me to get spaded” videos or old videos. Those don’t help at all.
Watching Defyn’s video from 11 months ago I have no clue how his RB 99s do what they do, but mine definitely don’t pull Gs like his do. On top of that, I don’t have the situational awareness to fight 4 people at once to take advantage of the biggest strengths of the Gripen. (Side note: How does he see the missiles when he turns and looks for them? I only get an indicator if I am looking at them when they are launched, not afterwards. I have my crew maxed.)
The most recent video I see is a video by sTix43_ who says “stop flying low and climb” but I have tried that and I get 10 AIM-120C launched at me before I can even think about locking something with my RB 99s.
Literally nobody else shows the beginning of their matches other than sTix43_, and I have no clue how he doesn’t die, every time I can notch like 4 missiles then get hit by 3 more in a row and another couple hit my burning corpse plummeting to the earth. I can’t even get a lock before I take an AIM-120C to the face. So I’ve just been sticking to dragging my nuts on the ground hoping to pick up scraps while my team keeps the enemy busy, but that has been going REALLY bad, I don’t know if I’ve been insanely unlucky or what, but in the 31 games, I have 9 wins while getting a little over 1 kill per game.
I feel so overwhelmed, I was doing ‘‘great’’ in the JAS39A once I got the hang of it, averaging about 2 kills per game in the last ~40 games I played, and now I feel like I’m a gull flying among eagles.
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Spoiler
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6s8DVihHS9I
Videos that actually go into depth don’t do as well, I’m not even a big fan of defyns videos in terms of using them to learn, hes entertaining for sure though. You’ll have to dig around smaller channels and look for stuff like above. Even then its a massive amount of things to learn, not something you can just watch a couple videos and become good at, gonna take a lot of work.
Game is a huge knowledge check, and in order to improve you have to actually be conscious of your mistakes, but you have to actually know what you are doing wrong in the first place and that can be hard to intuit without knowing a lot first. I pretty much learn something new every day digging around videos and playing and I’ve been playing a long time. It wasn’t even until recently I started using manual radar controls and its embarrassing to think I even bothered playing without them.
And again the knowledge check thing, you can watch this video, but unless you have the necessary background knowledge a lot of what he is going to talk about is not going to register. If you really want to get the most out this type of stuff you’ll have to stop whenever they say something you don’t get and research that and do it over and over which might turn this 17 minute video into many hours worth of digging around to understand most of it.
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This video actually helps a ton. He explains why he’s doing what he’s doing and how the mechanics work instead of just insulting the other player like Defyn. Also notice that he has more videos explaining other mechanics, gonna dive in. Thank you very much!
For me personally i think the biggest strength in gripen lies in picking of stragglers instead of being first (or among the players in the first wave) to target.
I usually purposefully wait little with taking off, then only use afterburner to get to height and then just cruise to se how the match evolves, more often than not the first wave of enemies and friendlies fire a lot of (if not all) their ARH missiles at each other and seldom at the planes that are lagging behind a bit.
This gives me a bit of freedom to then fire off one or two RB 99 at those enemies that survived the first engagement and/or those that are lagging behind on the enemy team. Then i usually start doing VERY slow evasive maneuvers long before i even get any RWR warnings to potentially bleed energy from any enemy missiles that are on their way to me while not losing to much energy myself, then there are two options:
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If i get no RWR for little while i push forward to engage whatever there might be still left at altitude or slowly dive down to hopefully catch unaware enemies at the deck by surprise with the RB 74(M).
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if i get RWR warnings i turn back towards base while alternating notching left and right bleeding as much energy from the missile as possible while descending just enough to not lose to much energy while changing direction of the notch. After like 3-4 times of switching direction i can usually tell if the missile is struggling to keep up by how much it changes direction on the RWR hud. Once the missile is starting to lag behind the 90deg angle i then just keep that same direction notch and slowly adjust to keep it at 90 deg, that usually means i can turn back into the fight and have the missile lose so much energy that it’s going to have to do a 180 to still fly towards me, at that point it’s practically defeated and i ignore the RWR from that specific missile.
Then after that it’s highly situational and there are no real good tips other than what goes for any air match in any plane.
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Ya NP, been digging around a lot recently here’s some others ones that might help too. Really liked the defensive explanation in this one the best i’ve seen.
Spoiler
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYfNbDZw5J8](YouTube?
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I think I’m just going to give up on the Gripen C for now. I feel like its just not for new players to top tier. There is no way to learn how to notch the bullshit. I can’t see missiles coming at me, so I there isn’t even a way to know if what I’m doing is working in the slightest or what I need to change. Like I watch my RWR and turn my camera 90 degrees looking for it, and just suddenly I just die while my periodic countermeasures are trying their hardest.
When you first get into matches with missiles you can watch behind you and learn how to dodge because you can actually see the missile and how it reacts to your movements and learn from it. I’ve watched and rewatched these notching videos over and over and over again and just cant seem to get it. I turn 90 degrees from the launch, I’ve tried changing altitude to bleed energy, I’m literally 35-40km away from the enemy when they start launching at my and I cant do anything about it.
I can try and play it safe, climb to the side, but the matches go one of two ways: my team steamrolls and its over before I even get in range to hit someone with a R99, or my team gets steamrolled and I’m being hunted by 7 guys with ordinance that outreaches mine. Or I try to fight on the ground and am constantly in fear of getting rained down on from above while fighting.
I suck at this, and I am just trying to have fun. These missiles are just sucking every bit of enjoyment out of the game from me. It feels like everyone in the match has been playing the game for 10+ years and I’m just some shitter trying to learn how to play and I’m being seal clubbed with no chance to learn. I wish the answer was “just go play lower BR and get the hang of it”.
I think I’ll just stick to the Gripen A and have fun like I was actually fighting on the ground with my AIM-9Ms until I unlock the F/A 18C MLU 2. At least then I can fight back before getting railed.
I’d say it is pretty much impossible to see the actual missiles in many cases, there is no missile diamond when the motor stops burning. You need to fully rely on your RWR to align the MSL warning to your notch. I really suggest you check your settings to see if your RWR sensitivity is at 100%, I did not have it at 100% and struggled greatly at top tier until I turned it to 100%.
The Grippen is a support aircraft. Don’t go in there expecting to fly high and spam twenty AIM-120s like the F-15E. Flank around the map (I usually go from the left), and then once I get on the same line as the ground troops/bases, I turn towards the bases and start firing my missiles at anyone within 6-9km (3-6 miles).
Another good thing is to fly with your wings vertical (up and down) and kinda zig zag. If a missile is going towards you, the constant movement kinda messes them up.
Also, when you enter the furball, turn on periodic countermeasures (you have to set a keybind). I should specify that you should do that when you get BOL Pods.
Oh, and do not be afraid to grind off AI. If your teammates are greedy and constantly taking your eliminations, just take out ground troops and A-4s for some exp. It’s better than going a match with no exp. made.