I’m going insane with this. I have like 0 kills with this missile and I get killed a lot by it.
I started the F-14 with Phoenix and got a kill here and there, but soon I got none as everyone avoids them now, so I switched to this R-27 missile. I’m going low, multipathing along hill and mountain ranges to avoid the Phoenix and Farkour, keep the radar on SRC PD HDN 37 or 19km, hit lock and often lock some nothing some bullshit some player that gets hit just that instant, enemy comes right for me 7km, I hit lock looking straight at him, lock lock lock lock LOCK doesnt lock, he shoots missile I’m dead.
Everysingle game it’s the same stupid story. Give some tips cause at this pace I;m throwing the laptop out the window.
Just FYI, dont try to use normal lock-on while on search for close range targets, it, as you noticed, is unreliable. Switch radar to within visual range combat, it makes radar search cone/patter more narrow and removes the 5km dead zone while itself autolocking on anything within 10km
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that autolocks on friendly if any nearby
Then dont point your nose on friendly (more so considering WVR mode is also sees well only head-on), position yourself (especially in such heavy plane like Tomcat)
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Radar management in some aircraft can be very difficult and can consume a lot of time, energy and effort (which is why many aircraft were 2 seaters). So dont get disheartened when it takes time to get the hang of. Using the right radar mode, at the right time and rapidly and constantly switching to the correct mode in an ever changing dogfight is a very difficult skill to master.
Now then:
Just to avoid confusion, im going to translate some of what you said a bit, so if I get anything wrong, just say. You are using the Event F-14 and are new to using radars , SARH and ARH Missiles?
If this is the case, im not surprised you are struggling, the F-14 is a complicated aircraft to use effectively and you are up against many other highly capable aircraft. learning how to use radars is a skill you’d learn in steps as you leveled up the tree
You attempted to use the ARH (Active-Radar Homing) Aim-54As or Fakour-90s but were met with limited success so you swapped to using the R-27R1s an (SARH or Semi-Active Radar Homing missile) but are having issues with getting your radar to acquire and or maintain the lock?
First things first. In the top left of the Hanger, go to Battle > Tutorial and complete teh guides for “AAM with SARH Seeker” and “Active Radar homing AAM”. Just to ensure you have the basics covered and have some practical experience so-to-speak.
Radar basics for the F-14:
You have 4 main search modes
SRC
SRC PD HDN
TWS
SRC PDV HDN
On the F-14A both the SRC PD HDN and TWS have a minimum range of 5km, if the target is within that range, these modes wont work.
SRC is good when at altitude looking for targets generally, but struggles at low alt with ground clutter
SRC PDV HDN is best used when the target is coming directly at you
SRC PD HDN is best used when the target is coming at you or moving away from
But Id personally recommend using TWS most of the time and is generally my go to (at least in aircraft im often playing like the Tornado F3 and Sea Harrier FA2) This mode does a good job at tracking/locating targets and you dont need to think too much about which mode you are in. (additionally this mode is the mode you should be using to fire and guide the ARH missiiles onto the target with, but the missile will take over at a certain, but I dont recall what that is for either missile on the F-14.)
In addition to the radar search modes you also have the ACM modes. This narrows the view of your radar to a tiny point directly in line with the nose of your aircraft. Use this to lock anything that you need to immediately lock onto without fretting about radar modes (but this mode only has a 9km range in the F-14, in some aircraft it can be much higher up to 19km)
ACM also has a few different modes besides directly in line with the nose. One is a vertical bar in front of the aircraft and another is a bar above the aircraft. This second mode is great in a dogfight when you want to lock onto a target you are turning with
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I was using TWS HDN when I was going with Phoenix missiles (thanks to some guides from the likes of Tim’s variety or Defyn or whatever). Nonetheless I was getting annoyed by it when using the R-27 since I had to use yet another control to cycle to its auto-targets. Picking like dead enemy, push cycle picks missile, push cycle picks whatever else than the enemy I’m looking dead on at. Granted I used it on 37 or 19km for the R-27. Is there any way to disable auto-tracking on the TWS HDN?
I’ll try it again with 10km range and shoot at the first enemy I lock, but if this gives me same trouble, I’ll take the other advice and continue just using the ACM.
Having to toggle between targets is a bit annoying. I use tgfh as the keys for plane controls T and G for the throttle while F and H for rolls and the toggling the radar targets keybind is T+alt and use R for lock/unlock radar. I don’t know where I can put the toggling radar targets better. The wheel mouse button is change radar mode while W key is change from BWR to short range. I have 2 mouse buttons for the thumb and the furthest one is for both spooling and fire missiles while the other is for airbrake which I used a lot in dogfights for planes that have them. Now I did consider replacing that button with toggling radar targets, but I don’t think it would improve anything. Using T+alt just cuts the afterburner for that fraction of the second I push it…
One more question somehow unrelated: How do I manual control the wings to keep them always folded in?
I dont think there is a setting like you would like (I know id use it in ARB as well)
But you can get go into the settings a change an option so that instead of cyclic selection you instead get a cursor that you can manually place onto targets and stuff. It is what I use in Air Sim, but I have a small joystick on my HOTAS I use to control that setting and I’ve yet to find a good way to do so when using M+K on PC.
My controls for when on PC are:
W S for throttle
A D for roll
Q E for YAW
1, 2, 3 and 4 for radar controls
Alt+Q for cycle radar targets
R for CMs
Alt+F for Flaps
Alt+G for Gears
Space for fire selected weapon
F for cycle weapon
left click guns
Right click zoom
Mouse wheel throttle
Mouse wheel click radar lock
With of course mouse for most of the control input.
Thats the core of them. But use whatever settings work for you, there is no right answer (and mine are from the best as I mostly use a HOTAS in Sim)
You need to set a keybind for “Switch wing sweep control mode” to toggle auto wing sweep on/off. and set up an axis for “Wing Sweep”
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Just bind whatever key you use to lock people with the aircraft + control to “ACM/BVR mode” and use that mode to lock on to use the R27 (If your radar lock key is 1, ACM mode should be control + 1)
If your radar is off completely and you hit the standard “lock” button it should default to turning on/off ACM mode. i have bound that button to scroll wheel press so that i can quickly turn off tracking if it targets friendly by mistake and then just as quick turn ACM mode on again to try to lock the enemy (bonus here is that you can do the same with chaff, turn off → turn on, and you hopefully have the enemy locked again instead of their chaff).
i never use any normal radar modes if the enemy is within visual range. at BVR i try to use TWS as much as possible as its often more reliable at finding low flying enemies and then lock them as needed.
Lmao