Simulator 12.7 - 13.0 Br bracket and 13.3 - 14.0+ br rating

Game Discussion Simulator Battle
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I’ve always told you that the AIM-7 is a good missile, and that you’re overestimating how important missile speed actually is.

Agreed on that—but they’re also very popular, so they have to be taken into account, if nothing else just because of how many of them you run into.

Once again, you’re oversimplifying. By that logic, missiles like the Matra should be completely unusable because they have the lowest range—but that’s clearly not the case.

It all depends on who sees who first, positioning, distance, energy, and so on. What you’re saying is only true in a 1v1 where both players are perfectly aware of each other’s position, distance, and energy state. And even then it’s not necessarily true.

If I notch, I waste his missile and mine at the same time—so I get another chance to fire once I exit the notch. Remember: the opponent can’t fire another Fox-1 until I leave the notch. And once I do, it becomes a matter of who acquires who first—and that depends on radar performance, situational awareness, weather (you or the opponent can lose sight in the clouds) and terrain configuration

You’re really oversimplifying something that’s way more situational.

And yet, it often happens that I win those engagements—because once again, position, speed, and awareness are way more important than missile speed.

Usually, the one who fires first gets the kill. The kind of missile fired is secondary, unless we’re talking really short-range stuff like the basic R-27 or the Skyflash.

If I’m flying a Mirage, spot you first and shoot first—by the time you turn around, lock me, and fire back—my missile already has such a head start that it’s going to hit you first anyway, even if you shoot an R-27ER.

Kfir has four Fox-3s.

About the F-14: I agree with you regarding the IRIAF variant. But the standard F-14? I don’t agree. With Fox-3s, you can just fire and run—and it works extremely well. I’ve shown you with the Harrier and the J-8.

Worst-case scenario? You don’t get a kill, but you also don’t die. Best case? You get kills without being touched. That’s a win in my book

I’ve got over a 3 K/D with the regular F-18—and I haven’t even spaded the plane yet. Just imagine what I can do with the premium one…

Those results—not just mine—are just the appetizer of how much I’m going to exploit it. I wouldn’t have spent €80 on it if I weren’t 100% sure it was worth it.

The Gripen A is another broken plane. In fact, it’s the best plane on maps where you can multipath everything—like Denmark, and it’s still the best dogfighter in every other map, even if it lacks any kind of BVR capability.

But on every other map (excluding Fox-3 carriers), the F-18 gives you everything you could want. I was flying it with 4 datalink Fox-1s and 6 AIM-9Ls. Alternatively, you can go 6 Fox-1 DL and 2 AIM-9Ls.

The radar is amazing—much better than on the F-16 or F-15 (which don’t have TWS). In a dogfight, the F-18 is a beast, and in BVR it performs great thanks to its radar and datalink, even if it’s not the fastest.

Once I have more time to play (and they fix the game), I’ll show you how much I can abuse it—but that 12/1 should already give you an idea.

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You’re underestimating it.

Literally no u.

Energy, not range.

  1. Who sees who first
    If you see the enemy first and catch him off guard… it’s not a BVR fight. You just sneaked up on him.

    If you go to 8000 meters, you generally see the entire map, so I really don’t know why are you so fixated on awareness, it’s really not a problem for BVR.

    90% of the time players see each other from 60 kilometers on radar and go head on towards each other until they are in range, while climbing and/or accelerating, to give their missiles better launch parameters. That’s what BVR is, not your seeing the enemy first nonsense.

  2. Positioning
    It has nothing to do with the plane’s performance, it’s just skill.

    Unless you mean climbing performance.

  3. Energy
    Su-27 is much faster and better suited for BVR than F-18, it can give its missiles much better launch parameters on top of the missile being just better.

    F-15 is a better airframe for BVR than Su-27, but not by enough to offset R-27ER’s performance. F-15 going 300kph or even 500kph faster won’t make the AIM-7M better than R-27ER.

Except you are sideways, while the enemy already has his radar pointed at you…

On top of that Su-27 has 20km range HMD, while F-16s, F-15s and F-14s at 13.0 don’t. HMD is a huge advantage.

Just because I killed a Rafale in a dogfight with a MiG-29SMT, doesn’t mean that Rafale isn’t disgustingly OP…

You are arguing that R-27ER wouldn’t dominate, because it wouldn’t be physically impossible to outplay someone with ERs…

All of the things you listed are important, but again they are mostly about skill. Someone with ERs can position worse and get away with it.

You can launch your Super 530D first, but he can launch his R-27ER 3 seconds later and it will still hit you 3 seconds earlier than your 530D him…

This is what a missile being better means. The ER user has it easier…

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That’s without considering evasive maneuvers, which make differences in kinematic performance even larger. Look how much more speed, so energy for maneuvers, does R-27ER hold compared to Super 530D, and how much faster it is on impact. Keep in mind that a missile going less than mach 1 is considered to be defeated.

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The difference is even bigger, when you consider that because Su-27 is better, there will be more of them, you will be outnumbered and forced to stay low and terrain mask, while he launches his missiles from 8000 meters.

No, the worst case scenario isn’t that you just don’t get a kill. The worst case scenario is that you waste all your missiles, you have to rtb to rearm, while enemy gains map control, can do CAS freely, bomb bases, spawn camp you and win the game.

You fail to understand the bigger picture. Getting a kill is not a nice bonus, it’s your responsibility. If you don’t kill the enemy or force him out of your airspace, you will lose the game.

By playing like this you give away map control and allow the enemy to spawn camp you until you leave. That’s exactly what’s happening to the red side at 12.7 and 13.0 right now, that’s what’s happening to the blue side at 14.0.

You have 3 KD mainly because of the snowball effect, not because the plane is that OP.

Like I said, the team that can’t get any map control gets spawn camped until they leave. A lot of people may join throughout the battle, but they will leave before another person joins, leaving one side always outnumbered.

Oh ok, so it’s better.

F-18C Late has a worse radar than F-16C and F-15C/E, so I assumed the earlier F-18s have the same radar, but without TWS. Didn’t bother to check that.

But again, you’re talking about the premium one, which is locked behind a paywall.

Once again to remind you, I still think Su-27 should be 13.0 (Su-33 should stay at 13.3). It’s just that you don’t understand how drastic of a change it is.

With Su-27 at 13.0 the red side would be better about as much as Su-30SM is better than F-15E or F-18C Late.

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Panter with the current state of the game the spo 15 cant discern multiple launches. Nor can it give you a different launch warning between fully active and semi active. In ths multiple hostile environment it doesn’t give the pilot enough information to really fight bvr.

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Let me try to sum up the whole BVR discussion.

To me, it seems there’s a fundamental misunderstanding between what you mean by “good at BVR” and what I mean. You tend to look at stats on paper—missile speed, range, pure performance—while I look at which plane gives you the best chance to win a 1v1, considering all the resources available to the player.

And yes, I 100% agree with you: if we isolate just the missile in a pure BVR context, the guy with the R-27ER has an advantage. No argument there. But I don’t find that particularly relevant, because in the actual game, long-range kills are pretty rare, and there are a lot of tactics people use to avoid them: notching, multipathing, hiding behind terrain features.

You see the 27ER as super strong because you say, “If both shoot at 40 km, the 27ER wins.” I see it as: “If I fire at 40 km, I’m probably just wasting a missile because the guy will hide in a valley.”

So in my opinion, what really wins fights isn’t missile speed—it’s awareness. Awareness of the pilot (skill), and awareness tools of the plane (radar and RWR quality). Then there’s positioning—which is entirely about pilot skill—and energy management, both current and general: how well your plane generates and holds energy, how it turns, and so on.

A faster missile is obviously a nice plus, but being the first to re-acquire after a notch or terrain break is way more important. The guy who gets to the merge first and has better awareness of his opponent’s position will usually be the one to shoot first—and that decides the fight. That’s also why having a strong dogfighting airframe is crucial, since most kills happen up close anyway.

If you look at things from this angle, something like the F-18—with a great radar, solid RWR (same tech on both premium and TT version, just different loadouts), decent long-range missiles (which are mostly fired just to apply pressure), and excellent dogfight capability—comes out as a better all-around plane than something that only wins in terms of missile speed.

Honestly, I’d agree with you 100% if notching weren’t so easy and if managing missile energy mattered more in WT. But since that’s not the case, missile performance matters, sure—but not as much as other factors.

So when I compare the F-18 and Su-27/33, I see two very balanced planes:

  • Long-range pressure: Su-27/33 has the edge (faster missiles).
  • Situational awareness: F-18 wins (radar + RWR).
  • Dogfighting: It’s a tie—the Su has better missiles, but the F-18 has the better flight model.

I’ll say it again: in my experience, the merge isn’t an if, it’s a when. Long-range kills are rare. I barely ever get any. So in the War Thunder context—not just on paper—the F-18 and Su-27/33 are very much equivalent.

You’re also not considering that the enemy you “scared off” will have to RTB and rearm after dumping tanks, burning through fuel, and maybe even wasting a missile trying to shoot back.

Also, in WT, from my experience, “airfield camping” mostly happens when a team simply has more players left alive. There’s no real concept of “map control” because players don’t move together or try to control areas—most people just roam around looking for targets. There’s no real strategy, no team coordination, and communication is basically non-existent.

People can’t even ping themselves or check if someone is friendly before shooting them down. Seeing a team that actually works together to gain map control is pure sci-fi—and also my wettest dream.

Nah nah, I couldn’t do the same thing with an F-16A, for example—and in fact, I don’t—because that plane simply isn’t as good as the F-18.

If both wasnt possible, I would still love this.

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I’m not saying that Su-27s will launch R-27ERs from 40 kms and get kills that way.

I’m saying that they will win the BVR part of the engagement, which is the beginning of EVERY engagement, unless the enemy is terrain masking or you’re both at low altitude. Once Su-27 wins the BVR part, you then “merge” or rather he gets your six for free.

That is if you survive that long and manage to notch all the ERs, which are the hardest missiles to notch in the game, and flare the R-73s or an ET he might launch together with an ER.

Playing like a rat is meta, I agree. But the true awareness while ratting isn’t coming from sensors, it’s just you looking around with your eyeballs mk1. When you play like a rat, you actually want to turn off your radar, to not give your position away.

Remember that Su-27 has IRST. You can lock the enemy with IRST to not lose sight of him and slave IR missiles, without giving away your position. IRST has much better flare resistance than missiles.

Also R-27ETs are just overall great missiles for sneak attacks.

Bad RWR doesn’t matter for 1v1s, but it’s a quite big disadvantage when in a 2v2 or furballs. It’s hard to keep track of who is where and slow radar with 1 wide scan pattern doesn’t help with IFF. That’s why I’m in favor of Su-27 being a 13.0. It’s one of the few weaknesses it would have and wouldn’t be completely busted. Su-33 doesn’t have that weakness and has 2 more ERs, so it should stay at 13.3.

You should avoid furballs anyway though, so it’s not a crippling weakness.

The spo-15 is simply good enough. You can notch missiles, you know where the enemy is, you know when he is locking you, and when he has launched a missile at you. F-14A and F-4J don’t have a launch warning on their RWRs for example. Funnily enough spo-15 is actually better in some ways than all the other RWRs, since it doesn’t have blind spots and tells you if the enemy is low or high.

The biggest advantage you can have while ratting is having an HMS to lock the enemy quickly. Su-27 has HMS, while F-16, F-15, F-14 and F-18 don’t.

That’s not what happens. What happens is this: the enemy notches your AIM-54, doesn’t panic for no reason, and keeps loitering around the area looking for targets i.e. maintaining map control.

Just because he had to defeat 1 missile doesn’t mean he has to rtb now lmao

When the enemy has map control, it doesn’t mean that the enemy team is coordinated. It means that the map is saturated with enemy players and you can’t fly for long without some enemy starting a fight with you.

If the enemy has complete map control, it means you can’t even take off without immediately being engaged by someone/spawn camped.

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That would be only partially true. Like, it would be true against an F-18, for example, but not against an F-14, Kfir, or Harrier. Also, many times—even when I have the ER—I still go into the notch if I don’t know exactly where my opponent is or how close his missile is. So it really comes down more to “who sees who first” than missile speed.

What you said is true in situations where both players are aware of each other—in that case, the one with the R-27 does have the advantage. I usually stay in the notch anyway if I’m not 100% confident I can win the BVR part, and I try to get into the merge from there, preflaring, of course. I usually have periodic flare deployment on until I’m sure I’m in a safe position.

I don’t agree with the part where you say the R-27 is hard to notch, considering that what you actually need to notch is the Su-27’s radar—not the missile itself—and the radar isn’t great; it’s not that hard to defeat. On the other hand, now that I’ve flown the F-18 a good bit, I can tell you the missiles are slower, but the radar is leagues better than the Su-27’s.

Anyway, what you should do after notching the radar is stay in the notch for a while to make sure he can’t fire another missile. That goes for any BVR situation where you don’t have a clear advantage—and for me, it’s standard procedure no matter what plane I’m flying.

Yes and no. I periodically turn the radar on to get a scan or two, because it’s very easy to miss a target just by looking. Also, shutting down the radar is only really important when you’re very close to your enemy. Otherwise, using your sensors is still super important, especially since you need them to fire Fox-1s.

I usually only turn my radar off if I’ve completely lost the enemy and have no clue where he is. If I have any idea of his position, I keep it on.

Sort of. IRST loses track pretty easily when a plane drops flares—but you definitely need to stay alert and remember that a Su-27 might be using it. I always drop a few flares at a distance just in case, to avoid getting hit by a sneaky ET.

Yes. Most of my kills with the Su-27—even at top tier—come from the ET. They can be flared easily at range, but people tend to forget about them. A lot of red team players don’t even use them for some reason, but they’re actually great.

It matters a lot in 1v1s—and in general. You need to know what plane is challenging you so you can react accordingly. On the Su-27, you don’t have that information. In my opinion, a good RWR is even more important than a good radar. It’s probably the most important sensor onboard.

For example, I react very differently if I’m challenged by a Kfir versus an F-16.

You’re scared of the ER, but not of the AIM-120, Derby, or Fakour? I don’t get why the ER worries you so much. It’s a very good missile, the best fox1, sure—but even at 13.3, it wouldn’t crack the top 3 best missiles, considering what else is out there.

True, but they can still set ACM to a vertical scan mode. That’s not as good as HMD, but personally, I don’t notice much of a difference in most situations. Of course HMD is better—but I don’t feel its absence that much, especially at 13.0.

To be honest, in my personal experience I’ve never really felt that “map control” plays a major role in War Thunder matches—at least not in the way it does in other games. Most of the time, players tend to move around the map individually rather than coordinating to control specific areas.

The only moments where positioning becomes a real issue, in my view, are when one team ends up with significantly more players than the other. In those cases, any kind of strategic movement becomes difficult regardless of the map. But overall, I’ve just never approached War Thunder with the idea of map control as a core mechanic, and I ve never heard anyone bringing that concep up before.

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Except Kfir C10 and F-14 IRIAF shouldn’t be at 13.0 in the first place. You can’t make more bad balancing decisions to cover up the previous ones. They are also event vehicles, so at least you don’t meet them that often.

Harrier also shouldn’t be at 13.0, but at least it’s a terrible plane. It has AIM-120s and nothing else.

If you lose to F-14As and Bs in an Su-27 because of AIM-54s, it’s a genuine skill issue.

So you don’t even do BVR, you just wait for the guy to merge with you. No wonder you don’t attribute any value to BVR performance, unless it’s spamming Fox 3s and RTB.

You can notch either the radar or the missile. It’s just that you only see the enemy’s radar on RWR. Notching the missile is easier, if you can see it, and has more instantaneous effect. The R-27 itself is hard to notch.

The main reason R-27 is very hard to notch though is data link. The enemy can always relock you if you leave the notch. The only plane on blue side that gets fox 1s with data link is a premium F-18, and even then AIM-7Ps are still much worse.

Visual identification exists.

At longer ranges it doesn’t matter who you’re fighting when you have ERs, because what you do will be the same for every opponent. Your missile will always reach him first.

Launch the missile, crank and maneuver, notch if the enemy starts notching and you still have a launch warning on RWR. It’s a simple procedure.

Once again, SPO-15 is good enough to not overshadow Su-27’s many strengths.

Because Su-27 not only carries 6 of the best fox 1 missiles in the game, it’s also in general just a good plane. It has a much better flight model than the MiG-29, much better IR missiles and much more missiles in general.

The moment Su-27 becomes a 13.0, it will flood the lobbies, because it’s just overall a very good plane with few weaknesses.

…

You didn’t even bother to read what you quoted.

You must live under a rock.

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I think we replied more or less the same things like 3 times now. I guess there s nothing else we can add to this, we’re both repeating. We’ll have to wait and see what happens with the next br changes, if sim is actually taken into account this time, considering that they skipped it completely last time for no reason.

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LOL what??? Are we playing the same game?

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harrier 1 is underperforming in sustained by around .5g. not a lot but its a decent amount
@MatrixRupture would be able to tell u morez

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Why would you say this?

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All Harriers have a number of issues:

  • Sooty Exhaust (most relevant in SB on all the lower BR harriers where VID is most common. I was IDing a friendly AV-8A a couple of months back cross map because he was the only thing in the sky with a sooty exahust and unlike aircraft themselves, the exhaust doesnt seem to have any render limit)

  • Extreme temp issues which make flaring any IR missile very hard (it is literally impossible to flare an R-60 fired from 3km away if you are at low air speeds in a harrier). This is a result of how Gaijin models IR signatures to be based on thrust not exhaust temps and the Harriers gain thrust at lower airspeeds. Based upon IRL data, the Harrier should be one of the colder airframes and has the potential to mitigate most IR threats with greater ease than most aircraft (the advantage of being able to turn a rear-aspect shot into a side aspect shot near instantly with a VIFF and the unique exhaust arrangement). A short-term solution could be provided by re-using the F-117s IR reducing code to bring Harriers more in-line with other non-AB aircraft, like the Hunter or Buc

  • FM is almost certainly underperforming. especially the VIFF (which for example, when put to 100% should slow the aircraft down 6-7x quicker than it does currently, based upon matrix’s math, should go from 400kts to 300kts in 3.3 seconds, in game it takes 22.8 seconds and putting them to 30° should near instantly raise the nose by around 20° according to Sharkey Ward but in-game, does nothing) But STR is also looking like its underperforming quite a bit.

And then a number of them have specific issues as well. Such as:

  • Sea Harriers havent really got a usable HUD for SB (they replaced the GR3 placeholder HUD update before last but only half finished its native HUD, which turns out to be largely wrong in its implementaion, but despite that, we are missing a load of mission critical symbology, like a gunsight)
  • Sea Harrier FRS1/FRS1e missing EEGS
  • Sea Harrier FRS1 is missing its correct RWR
  • Gr7, T-10, FA2 are all dependent on BOL which doesnt really work at the moment
  • Harrier Gr3 is missing Phimat
  • Harrier Gr1, the SRAAMs are bugged to hell and almost unusable

(Im sure the AV-8Bs have their own list as well, but im not really following them much at the moment)

(and this is just stuff really relevant to ASB, throw in GRB and there are even more issues with a few of them)

Even small things, like the 30mm ADENs being some of the hardest to use guns in game, just adds to the overall challenge for the aircraft, and whilst some dont have the 30mm ADEN (like for example the T10 and Gr7 have the awesome 25mm ADEN) those that do have the 30mm also have a number of other issues

The Harriers are in need of a complete overhaul which would be no small buff for them. With many over BRed. For example the FRS1 is 11.3 in SB the same BR as the Mig-23MLD. There is no way the Mig-23MLD is equal to the FRS1, also the FA2 is near impossible to justify being 13.0 at the moment in any gamemode. Etc etc.

You also have the annoying problem in the Harrier Gr7 of having no 12.3 bracket in SB, so you are permamently forced to play at 12.7 or 13.0 where you are often on the defensive as a sub-sonic aircraft with no BVR.

I think the ONLY harriers doing “well” at the moment is the AV-8S and AV-8A at 9.7 with 240 CMs. The Harrier Gr3 and AV-8C are fine and probably correctly BRed with their 60 CMs, But the other 10. Really could do with some love.

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Hes unfortunately been perma-banned because he accidentally shared 1 page of a classified AV-8B+ manual.

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About the harriers, I only play the av8a at 9.7 and I’m fine with it, I dont feel it needs changes, and if it did receive them it would probably have its br changed too, so maybe it’s better how it is at the moment. The other harrier I play is the av8b italian at 13.0, and that one is very abusable because aim120. I havent tried any of the other harriers, but to me harriers performance is not top of the list problem. I’m sure that as @Morvran say they can be improved, but…at those br there are more urgent problems. Harriers tho can surely be addressed in the future, why not!

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AV-8A is fairly solid because it has 240 CMs at a BR where not all have CMs. So it can quite comfortably pre-flare all day long which mitigates one of the Harriers major issues at the moment. Also the Harrier 1 airframe is fairly solid for 9.7 in terms of relative performance.

Though at the same BR as the AV-8A is the Harrier Gr1 with no CMs at all. So there is also quite a major compression as well at the moment.

AV-8B+ is fairly solid, with the ability to run 2x Aim-9M + 4x AMRAAM + Gun. But again, at the same BR is the Sea Harrier FA2 with 4x AMRAAM and no Gun and No IR. So… Its rather hard to justfiy it being the same BR and really could do with buffs. The first needs to be BOL.

With full buffs, I would expect to see BR changes (though I would argue a few are over BRed already and so would be correctly BRed with the buffs) but I dont think any would suffer as a result as the net outcome would still be a decent buff. But some of the initial ones, like fixing IR sigs for example, wont change a thing in that regard

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I have a friend who runs the harrier gr1 at 9.7 and he simply bring some rockets to use as flares. i do the same with the japanese f1 at 10.3. Not the best solution, but a solution nonetheless XD

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Yeah, It can work, but does also mean either having to mess about with control setups sepcifically for one aircraft or rapidly swap between SRAAMs and Rockets in a fight constantly just too “flare”. Also means you cant then run bombs on those pylons either.

But that BR is just a mess. There is no way the Harrier Gr1 should be the same BR as the GR3/AV-8C and there is no way those 2 should be the same BR as the AV-8A/AV-8S.

Also the Hunters are just as insane at the moment. With things like the Hunter F6 [France] being a lower BR than the J34 and the Hunter F58 [SQV] being 9.7. Suffice to say. That entire BR bracket needs to be redone from scratch, ideally with a decompression

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I would say that everything past early jet should be rewatched and remade. For example, at 9.7 you can use harriers, israeli a4, american a7 and chinese q5: all of these are all extremely different in capabilities and some are much better than others, just taking these few planes into account it’s easy to see how something like the q5 sits at the bottom while stuff like the israeli a4 sit at the top.
Gaijin should also decide how to balance cas planes, if taking into account their cas capabilities first or their combat capabilities first. At the moment it’s a mess.