Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-29 Fulcrum - History, Design, Performance & Dissection (Part 1)

Destroys everything BVR-wise, even the F-14B with its (hot garbage as currently implemented) AIM-54C’s cant really do anything against a MiG-29 in BVR. PARTICULARLY atm with the proxy fuse issue making AIM-54C’s even worse than usual (seeing as an issue with proxy fusing affects missiles with low maneuverability, low speed and and large proxy fuse zones more than highly maneuverable high speed missiles)

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Yeah, I’d imagine the L-150 and Zhuk-M largely resolved these issues.

They completely removed it’s superior dogfight capabilities but gave it BVR which is something the mig29 isnt really known for… Funny

yes, R-27ER…

Also take into account the 29G’s had R-27R in these tests. I don’t believe R-27ER1 is at all historically correct for the 29G. Really the SMT should be the only 27ER carrier.

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I mean, its not exactly terrible in the dogfight either, it holds its own or beats almost anything ingame barring the F-16’s, and afaik that more due to the F-16 overperforming than anything.

Afaik, irl the maneuverability advantage between the MiG-29 and F-16 wasn’t that great, the primary advantage being the HMCS and R-73, which could be accounted for via tactics but was a major issue at first.

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Well but what I’ve seen in most graphs posted here the mig29 seems to underpeform in high alpha and the f16 overperforming in every aspect. It’s not a shitbrick like the tornados thats for sure

Yeah I get that, its just an odd balancing decision imo, particularly in the case of the F-14B, which should by all accounts be crushing the MiG-29’s in BVR, but instead gets absolutely crushed because the devs have deemed the AIM-54C to be a terrible and near completely useless missile despite all sources stating otherwise.

Hell, through arguments with one of the devs, it was shown they still believe the old “the AIM-54 was only made for hitting strategic bombers at long ranges” myth, despite the majority of the AIM-54A’s kills being fighters, and the 54C getting an all new digital seeker, a directional warhead, and new system for proximity detection for ultra low altitude intercepts ( a must when dealing with AShM’s)

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IRL wvr-wise the mig29 and the f16 are pretty close to each other, the Viper is better at sustained rate and the fulcrum is better at insta turns and 1C fights. Ingame the f16 does everything that the other planes do but better but imo that’s due to the fact that they Gave the mig the R27Er, as long as western aircraft can’t compete with the russians bvr-wise they’ll keep the f-16 overperforming when talking about maneuverability.

Planes have >1 multipliers in game compared to real life. This in general makes missiles less effective which are modeled as close to 1-1. And everyone hugs the ground at that. I doubt even if fixed aim-54s will be as effective as they were irl

Hugging the ground would be largely rendered irrelevant, or atleast its effectiveness would largely be reduced if gaijin finally decided to remove the crutch that is their excessive modelling of multipath error.

This wouldnt be unique to the AIM-54C, but the 54C (and AIM-7M) having directional warheads and “smart” fuses for ultra low altitude intercepts would make them the best radar missiles against deck hugging. For example, 7M’s minimum intercept alt is 5m, which although in ideal conditions still goes to show how different it is from the in-game 95m vs a completely non-maneuvering target.

As for the >1 multiplier, yes this will always be an issue for missile modelling in general, but the issue is shared equally among missiles so its not really a balance issue imo. What IS an issue is that the AIM-54C is modelled as a 17G missile when there are primary and secondary sources stating up to 25G, and congress transcripts describing the missile as having “High maneuvrability”, and “Formidable kill capability in most dogfights”, and it specifically being stated that the allegation that the missile was “not useable for close-in combat” was false.

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Never mind the fact its seeker is effectively a copy paste of the AIM-54A’s in-game, that its warhead has a lower kill potential than the AIM-54A because the lower HE filler used in a directional warhead was modelled, but NOT the advantages of a directional warhead, that the low smoke motor has not been modelled despite being a thing in-game for 2 updates now, etc…

Granted this is mostly off topic at this point, but is to say, fixing the AIM-54C would actually make it a genuine threat in BVR to MiG-29’s, which it just outright isn’t rn. Quite frankly, if you arent AFK, it should be impossible for you to die to an AIM-54C as is in-game atm.

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Hopefully it gets fixed when more fox 3s get added and not ignored

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Same, rn radar missiles (with the R27Er as an exception) are kinda mediocre

I unlocked the f14b yesterday but sadly currently there’s no purpose to play with that vehicle.

I mean, its fun, and its not terrible, but its not meta either.

Its strong, if not dominant in radar missile combat, but;

  1. radar missiles are terribad atm, worse than the legacy AIM-7E was back when the F-4E was top dog imo
  2. As previously mentionned, the 54C’s are awful atm, worse than theyve ever been, and they were already a shell of what they were irl
  3. Its TCS literally doesnt do what its supposed to do, so its AWG-9 is not being utilized to its full potential vs notching/chaffing opponents
  4. Its IR missiles are sub-par in the age of 9M, P3, R-73
  5. The RIO isn’t actually doing anything in-game, which makes the radar a bit of a hassle to use to its full potential

Its kind of pointless to be “the best” at something thats genuinely bad in-game as currently implemented, and its made worse by not even being “the best” at said niche because of gaijins modelling errors/decisions.

I still think its a lot more fun than flying the F-16 or MiG-29 though

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I’m sure they will fix it, right as the add DECM mechanics which then no-sell SARH / ARMs at longer ranges.

29 pilot.
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When switching the RLPK on radiation, using the information of the SPO-15 indicator is not possible due to fallacy, and in some cases, chaotic.

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Well, AIM-54C is supposed to be rather strong in heavy ECM environments, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they casually forget to model that when they add ECM, or try to gaslight the community saying it wasnt good in high EW environments lmao

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Maybe I should make a bug report…

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But “reliability” isn’t modeled?