Idk if it’s coincidental but I quite literally just did a report on improving the AIM-7Ms guidance which sparked this discussion. Previously it was thought it followed similar guidance laws to the AIM-7F and just swapped for a monopulse seeker.
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I don’t know… Let me know when they improve the missile to historical performance. Its already 6 months overdue and competitively DOA.
They had the perfect competitor to the R27ER. the M offered similar capability without the need of a passive IRST lock.
Previously thought? A 5 min google search can literally tell you what you need to know about it and the other western missiles GJ has neglected. Thats an excuse
No, at this point this is nothing more but an apparent disregard to any weapon system that will undermine the Union/Federation.
Genuinely asking (anyone), Why does every western missile need 20 active bug reports and half a year and counting for GJ to actually model their missiles? At the same time, the second a soviet platform suffers in the slightest they add a brand-new missile in the middle of a patch and let it slaughter it’s competition?
GJ spent over 3 months carefully crafting the R73. Lol these dudes had a meeting on implementing it on the Su25 for the summer event that would serve as the catalyst of the SMTs release. A specially crafted platform (1st Federation fighter in WT history) that will receive the best IR missiles for WVR and BVR, the best radar missile along with an (already modelled) improved radar to further its lethality.
But the F16C is going to receive a copy paste Aim7F, a copy paste Aim9L AND a copy paste MLU radar? What is the point of doing a report if platforms like the ADF still have not received the capability that is due to them? Or the F14?
Why wouldn’t the AMRAAM be completely gutted of historical performance? GJ has undeniable history of leaving every top tier missile of American decent unfinished. Are they going to tell you “it was previously thought.” too? After all your hard work, research & countless technical debates? It appears so, yes.
Its GJ’s standard operating procedure to date.
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Do you have any examples of how American equipment has come to the game in an intentionally nerfed state? iirc the AIM-9L, AIM-7F/M came to the game overperforming and in the case of the AIM-7F… yes it’s a copy paste of the AIM-7M in the sense that it’s severely overperforming. All SARH missiles that are not monopulse of some sort overperform and to a degree some monopulse seekers underperform so in that regard it’s unilaterally affecting all missiles. It was a design decision on Gaijins part to simplify the radar missile seekers. This isn’t some intentional nerf to American or Western stuff.
In the case of Russian stuff, they have far more access to documentation and it’s more legible to them. It’s really simply just that, and even then we have to put in several reports to fix Russian equipment. The SMT is coming to the game with the wrong radar if you’re gonna pretend the dev server is the be all - end all final iteration of how something might show up on live. The F-16C could be fixed by then. If it’s not, were there reports on the particular issue?
If I recall, it seems to me that Russian stuff has remained handicapped as far as aircraft go on implementation with some exceptions and on the other side of the fence, NATO ground vehicles come nerfed in some way for balance. This has been the only discernible trend I’ve been able to identify and in this case Gaijin admits it is a balancing decision at least.
I’d love to do a Aim-7F/M range test at 12,000 meters if anyone’s willing.
Also did you claim something came into War Thunder intentionally nerfed or did @MiG_23M misremember a statement from elsewhere possibly by another user?
Sir, you’re smarter than to believe such fictions.
Also AIM-9Ms are potentially the best missile.
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What are you using to compare the range against? What kind of launch parameters?
I don’t understand your following question.
I don’t believe the AIM-9M to be the best missile.
Is it all worth pointing out what has happened with the AGM-65 Maverick? Where practically every respect has been properly reported and rebuffed for a number of reasons, including;
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They implemented contrast seekers properly, then for Balance reasons replaced them wholesale with correlation seekers wholesale.
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They reduced the penetration of the HEAT warhead to 830mm from 1300mm on the dev server when it should be somewhere on the order of 1200mm~1500mm and it used the same source that got 120mm NATO HEAT penetration reduced and is still outstanding.
Among many issues.
They still get outdone by the R-73 in close, and otherwise there are the R-27(E)T & -R where they will struggle.
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Perhaps a thread can be made addressing the “many issues”. When this was done for the Mirage 2000 they started to get fixed at a much more rapid pace. This stuff does actually come to the attention of devs a bit faster than reports that are sometimes not being forwarded as soon as they should be… tech mods dragging their feet… Though I have had no such issues (personally) with tech mods in the past year.
Also getting tired of being told I’m super pro-russian only and want all American stuff to suffer all the time.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/955829235493273680/1151000082850779146/image.png
1000kph TAS total air speed, as close as possible.
I’d tail, and record the launch to get a time from launch to impact.
That time would be equated with the speed for an estimated range traveled as well as the average missile speed.
I’d add that to the distance launched at for a very accurate total distance traveled by the missile.
Not perfect, but it’s how I found out the range of Magic 2s are 14km at 10,000 meters.
AIM-9Ls are 18km at 10,000 meters.
I have been doing my own testing with custom missions. I have the recording for all tests done on this sheet as well if you want to see the actual video. If you want a very specific test done, let me know.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/955829235493273680/1151000437634367528/image.png
I need to re-test for any changes done to these missiles on the latest dev server. WT Version tested in is on the top of the page though.
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You are far more methodical than my previous impressions had thought of.
Didn’t expect ER & 7F/M to be that close.
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Did I not just point to a crucial capability that would put the Aim7M on par with the R27ER that was not in game upon release and still is?
Aim7F was overpowered on release? Wrong.
It was completely a Mach slower than it was in game and had zero turn capability at close and medium ranges. It was killing nothing upon release. Go look pull up the forums when the F4J came out. They hot fixed it mid patch it was so bad.
Tell GJ to nerf it down to when it came out then. Still irrelevant. The Aim7M is not modelled and missing capability.
Another example? the Aim54. Proven much better even the A than it is in game. You confirmed GJ acknowledged this. The C is still a copy paste and the A still performs worse than it ever did IRL.
Aim-9Js and Ps.
The USAF says the AIM-9P is an improved version of the J model with a greater engagement boundary enabling it to be launched farther from the target. it also incorporated improved solid-state electronics that increased reliability and maintainability.
Aim9L? It’s nerfed upon release and still nerfed. All aspect range is nerfed. The M is a copy paste with no reduction to visual signature nor will it have any background discrimination capability.
Want to talk what’s overperforming? R27ER. There is no way in hell a 700lb R27ER can go Mach 4 at low altitude and immediately pull up 90 degrees and fly after any target you decide to relock without losing stability and or energy. It’s not physically possible. Lol but the R73 being much lighter and not nearly carrying the same velocity requires thrust vectoring to pull the same maneuvers?
But in your own words you can throw a Aim7M off if you just do a little roll miles away while maintaining a lock right? The aim7M does not need CW. illumination necessary only for mid-course and terminal guidance
Additionally, it does not need any CW period in the F16C… But guess what? It will upon release and carry all the disadvantages along with it.
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You also forgot to mention that the AIM-7F along with all radar missiles had their speedgates nerfed into the ground for about 10-11 months following the release of the F-4J, which made the missile incredibly unreliable and very commonly a teamkilling threat for no good reason at all. This massive nerf to all radar missiles particularly impacted western jets which relied on them to try to even the playing field against the outright oppressive MiG-23 MLD, possibly the most oppressive jet in the last 3-4 years of WT at release.
Speaking of the R-27ER, I have an ever growing suspicion the missile is massively overperforming in some aspect (I suspect its drag?). The R-27ER has a lower CkX (1.75) than than the R-27R (2.0) (7M has a CkX of 2.3 btw), and its actually the lowest CkX I could find in-game, granted I only really looked at other radar missiles it would commonly face. Despite the fact it has lower specific thrust for both its booster and sustainer(234.45/233.96) than the 7M(328.23/301.49), which is a measure of how efficiently the engine uses the fuel to create thrust, the ER ECLIPSES every other air to air missile in effectively every metric worth anything, to the point of it being honestly rather absurd, surpassing the total dV of the R-27R(721.84m/s) for example by roughly 66%, and its closest competitor, the AIM-7M(955.94m/s), by ~21%. I’m starting to think its abnormally low CkX is the reason it so vastly outperforms everything else. Not only in acceleration and speed, but also seemingly in speed retention, particularly in maneuvers, which it should DEFINITLY not be doing seeing as its a MASSIVE missile (260mm diameter, 4.7m long) with a shorter burn than something like the 7M.
iirc the 27ER also has a better seeker than any other missile in-game, cuz yanno, reasons. Hence why it seems to be the least affected radar missile when it comes to gaijins current horrendous modelling of things such as multipath. This is despite 2 acknowledged bug reports on separate missiles (the ER and the 7M) indicating the ER has a minimum alt of 20m, while the 7M has a minimum altitude of 5m irl, along with the fact that allegedly, the ER cant even be launched against a target below 3km altitude if there is ground clutter behind them (though this last claim, I haven’t been able to confirm immediately, and will be looking into it some more as it could help everyone deal with the 27ER and end its stupid reign of terror).
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9L all aspect range is 11km on afterburning targets in War Thunder [10km locked for launch, likely a general game limitation].
All missiles have same visual signature, and IDK if that’ll change. That or the diamond will just be based on motor burning instead of smoke.
A capability that was not known until I referenced many different documents and scoured the internet for months before finally submitting a report? Nowhere else is this mentioned with a source worth its’ salt.
AIM-7F was not overpowered on release, sure… but it was certainly overperforming for the vast majority of time it’s been in the game… which has been well documented thanks to my report. This was fixed. And it’s not unique to the AIM-7F either, the R-23R was busted as well and was never a decent missile despite all these fixes. It took the R-24R coming to the game (still inferior to the AIM-7F) for Russia to have a competitive radar missile.
AIM-54C is not even remotely copy paste of the AIM-54A in the same sense the AIM-7E-2 is not a copy paste of the AIM-7E… Idk what this argument was supposed to prove. None of this data for fixing the AIM-54 was available on release. It was discovered via FOIA later.
AIM-9J/P copy paste was well explained and continues to make no serious difference. If they were to model the minute differences it would have net zero impact on the actual performance of both. USAF continued to upgrade the AIM-9P over the years, so if you have proof the AIM-9P-1 and AIM-9J are not identical or whatever, feel free to report it.
Where are you finding the all aspect range of the AIM-9L is nerfed? In fact, I’ve found documents that suggest it’s nearly double the 0 degree head-on lock range that it really should have. We can go ahead and report that and all other IR missiles in-game to have all-aspect lock range significantly reduced in 0 degree head-on scenarios if you’d like… except for the Russian missiles which are well documented and performing accurately already with the exception of the R-27T/ET… they are significantly underperforming in all aspect lock range right now.
Why are you highlighting the “illumination necessary only for mid-course and terminal guidance”? That’s literally the entire flight… what?
Without CW it cannot lock and track in normal SRC mode. It would only be able to lock and track in a HPRF (head-on) lock. This would be a significant nerf.
… disadvantages of being able to switch to SRC and track through a notch?
British documents suggest the all-aspect lock range of AIM-9L against non-afterburning targets should be approximately 1-1.5km iirc. Within 30 degree frontal arc this picks up to about 2-3km or something like that. I’d need to go back and reference them.
@Ziggy1989 Whatever reply you have for me is gonna have to wait to be seen until the morning. Seen you typing up a storm, perhaps its a better conversation to have in DM’s anyway. I’m not seeing anything productive coming from the discussion at this point.
Wait… you think High PRF above 30 kHz can only lock targets in a head on? No… Lol
OMG you are so wrong.
Almost every single radar missile that is Air to air & Surface to air that was EVER MADE is configured as a high PRF, pulsed doppler radar frequency. Essentially as a Doppler tracker apart from being a basic monopulse angle tracker.
A radar missile, even the most advanced must be configured High PRF (better known as interrupted continuous-wave or ICW) to successfully guide to target. That is why they go “Pitbull” in terminal phase.
A “weapons grade lock” is only achieved in HPRF.
In older aircraft such as the F4 you needed a second transmitter called a CW illuminator to generate a weapons grade lock. Which was the main problem holding the sparrow back in terms of guidance.
High PRF radars do not need an additional illuminator. Their Radars are too powerful and have the field strength to correctly guide sparrows to target with no issue whatsoever.
The F14, F15, F18 and the F16C does not either. But all the same issues that previous generation of fighters had with guiding sparrows is still prevalent.
WT does not know what they are talking about when it comes to radars. Unfortunately, you do not either.
It is pure War Thunder belief that HPRF can only lock targets in head on. What a contradicting belief because you can still kill targets in a chase while in HDN right now in game.
Note: I did not see your additional comment for message until after. But it does not matter. GJ will not move to make the game more realistic if people continue to defend poor modelling and neglect for western weapon systems. Something I do not believe you are capable of ceasing.
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As far as I can tell you are responding to this bit:
There are a number of examples I can think of where Gaijin has nerfed western missiles, or done a very poor job of modelling them, with a massive pile of bug reports needing to fix them. I’m sure there are plenty of examples for Russian missiles too, but you asked for examples of western missiles, so here are some off the top of my head.
Intentional nerfs:
- Stinger and Mistral being limited to 10g overload, when there are multiple primary source documents showing both to have more than double that. Nerfed to that level because Gaijin found out the Igla was 10g and didn’t think the Stinger / Mistral could really be that much better than it.
- AIM-9D / G being limited to 16g despite Gaijin being provided with multiple weapons manuals explicitly stating the max g load was 18+g. Kept nerfed at 16g for ages because Gaijin had a secondary source document stating that the MIM-72A was 16g (they never explained why a secondary source about a different missile overruled two primary sources)
- Red Top being modelled without any front aspect capability. Sure you could argue that no front aspect IR missiles were in the game then. But even once all aspect IR missiles were in the game Red Top hasn’t been given a front aspect capability (and yes it does actually have a front aspect capability against sub-sonic non-afterburning targets, you just need to be a little bit off the nose).
- Firestreak was modelled as a 5g missile instead of a 15g missile. After being provided with two different primary source documents Gaijin increased it, but only to 13g. Then after further complaining by the community they increased it to 15g, but removed proportional navigation guidance from it, making it pretty terrible. After even more complaining from the community Gaijin eventually stated they removed proportional navigation from the Firestreak because one of the documents said it was a “pursuit course missile”. After we pointed out that the document they were referring to explicitly stated Firestreak used proportional navigation guidance, and “pursuit course” referred to the type of intercept the interceptor was meant to follow they finally modelled Firestreak correctly. A year and a half after it was added.
- After British players constantly asking for the AIM-9G it was introduced as a copy-paste AIM-9D without radar slaving, or the 40° uncage capability (the only two things to differentiate it from AIM-9D).
- AIM-9L was modelled as a 20 g missile for ages (back when it was only on the AH-1Z).
Bad modelling:
- Pretty much everything else about Red Top when it was added. Seriously everything about Red Top apart from the visual model and missile mass has had to be bug report. There is a bug report on it missing 1/3 of its aerodynamic range, that is still open 3 years on. Along with a whole bunch of other reports.
- AIM-9D was a copy paste AIM-9E (even down to using the AIM-9E visual model when it was added). Gaijin then buffed it way to far in the opposite direction; which while hilarious for British Phantom players kind of destroyed game balance for a while (there is a video of someone getting an 18 km rear aspect kill).
- Gaijin just deleted SRAAM’s guidance for over a month (if you fired it then all it would do is fly in a straight line for 3 seconds then explode)
- After fixing SRAAM Gaijin then broke it again and left it basically useless (spinning out and unable to hit even a slightly maneuvering target) for something like 6 months, only fixing it just before the Harrier GR.1 was revealed (coincidence?)
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Oh they know, they just ignored and muuuhh later.
https://community.gaijin.net/issues/p/warthunder/i/qKeCG0nvUksM
Range gated HPRF
They say it has more drawbacks than advantages which is why no modeling has been done. BS, range gate allows tracking through MLC.