The BR of the Swedish SPAA Elde 98 Seems Too High

Machinery of War Discussion Ground Vehicle
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Quick radar/spec summary

ADATS (11.7) — Band I | Search range: 25 km | Search sector: 360 × 18 | Features: Look-down, IFF

CLAWS (12.3) — Band J | Search range: 20 km | Search sector: 360 × 65 | Features: Look-down, IFF, TWS: 40

FlaRakRad (11.7)

Track radar: Band J | Track range: 16 km | Features: Look-down, BVR, ACM

Search radar: Band D | Search range: 16 km | Sector: 360 × 18 | Features: Look-down, IFF

Pantsir-S1 (12.0)

Track radar: Band K | Track range: 36 km | Sector: 90 × 60 | Features: TWS (ESA), BVR, ACM, NCTR, DL:4

Search radar: Band F | Search range: 45 km | Sector: 360 × 80 | Features: Look-down, IFF

Tan-SAM Kai (TADS, 12.0) — Band J | Search range: 30 km | Sector: 360 × 70 | Features: Look-down, IFF, TWS: 40

CS/SA5 (12.0)

Track radar: Band K | Track range: 21 km | Sector: 90 × 60 | Features: TWS (ESA), BVR, ACM, DL:8

Search radar: Band J | Search range: 40 km | Sector: 360 × 60 | Features: Look-down, IFF

HQ17 (11.7)

Track radar: Band J | Track range: 21 km | Sector: 15 × 15 | Features: TWS (ESA), BVR, ACM, DL:2

Search radar: Band F | Search range: 38 km | Sector: 360 × 60 | Features: Look-down, IFF

Ito-90M (12.0)

Track radar: Band J | Track range: 16 km | Features: Look-down, BVR, ACM

Search radar: Band E | Search range: 18.5 km | Sector: 360 × 27 | Features: Look-down, IFF

Elde 98 (12.0) — Band I | Search range: 20 km | Sector: 360 × 70 | Features: Look-down, IFF, TWS: 40

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I acknowledge that the Elde 98 has a good radar. It offers a wide vertical search sector, a respectable 20 km search range, and fast update capability with TWS:40. In practical terms, it is not a

However, radar strength alone does not compensate for the veh

Several SPAA at the same BR field radar systems with equal or superior performance — particularly in raw search and tracking range (e.g., Pantsir-S1, CS/SA5, Tan-SAM Kai). When compared directly, Elde’s radar is competitive, but not uniquely superior within the 12.0 bracket.

More importantly, radar capability cannot offset the Elde’s structural drawbacks:

  • Very limited ammunition capacity (4 ready / 8 total), severely reducing sustained engagement capability
  • Slower missile kinematics compared to many peers at the same BR
  • Currently missing mobility mechanics, which prevent it from performing as intended

Even with good detection performance, these limitations directly affect practical combat effectiveness over the course of a match. Detection alone does not equal engagement dominance, especially at top tier where missile speed, engagement envelope, and salvo capacity matter heavily.

For these reasons, while I agree that the Elde 98’s radar is solid, I do not believe it sufficiently compensates for its overall disadvantages relative to other 12.0 SPAA.

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Start card numbers can often be misleading, take speed for example:
The listed number is the max obtainable speed, it says nothing of what the average speed you as a player can expect the missile to have in a majority of normal engagements while the missile is maneuvering, it also doesn’t tell you what you can expect the missile to have as a speed at range or how fast it can achieve that top speed.

Same things with maneuvering, it doesn’t really tell you how much the missile can pull at any given speed or situation.

I was describing general terms and not only for skilled players.

I still think the vehicle actually performs better than some might think it does. How many matches have you played with it so far?

2 Likes
8

You’re again relying to much on stat card numbers. Many of those ranges and coverages are just the standards the radars are set at without changes. I think all of those vehicles can change not only the range but also the search scope of their radars to be both bigger and smaller than the listed numbers.

May i also ask; Are you using AI for this? You’re answering surprisingly fast with long pages of structured text that contains factual errors and sometimes gets cut off mid sentence (as if you didn’t select everything to copy paste) which is why i’m asking.

1 Like
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One quick clarification: I play on the Soviet side, so I haven’t used the Elde 98 myself.

As I mentioned in another reply, if we don’t have reliable data for average missile speed or more detailed flight profiles, the stat card is the most objective and reproducible source we have to estimate missile performance. If you think there’s a better, higher-accuracy source for comparing missile performance than the stat card, I’d like to know what that is.

Also, 710 m/s as a listed max speed does look quite slow compared to other top-tier SPAA.

The same applies to maneuverability: the listed G value doesn’t tell us how much pull the missile can sustain at different speeds or in different engagement situations, and that uncertainty applies to every missile. Because of that, stat cards provide the most consistent baseline for comparison.

So, based on the stat card values, my view remains that the Elde 98 performs somewhat worse than many other 12.0 SPAA.

And sorry if I misunderstood your point about skilled players — my English isn’t perfect, so I may have missed some nuance. Thanks for your reply.

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To be honest, I am using AI. However, I personally recorded and organized all of the numerical data myself. Since I am not very confident in my English, I am using AI primarily for translation and wording support.

In addition to AI, I also use online translators to review and cross-check the text as much as possible. Even so, there may still be mistakes that I haven’t fully corrected during that process.

The overall data, logic, and structure of the argument are entirely my own. I’m simply using AI to help express it in more natural English.

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The easiest is to play the vehicles yourself and see how they feel when used, and honestly i personally have a hard time accepting statements about vehicles from someone that hasn’t played the vehicle themselves. Its very easy to miss details that can make a vehicle a lot better or worse than it looks on paper, things that you would likely only notice if you play the vehicle yourself. (For example the EldE 98 Mobility, it’s horrendous in some situations. Or the Pantsirs missiles being ridiculously hard to aim past 13km to the point of being almost impossible to hit something with if the target just turns sightly even if they can fly for far longer distances than that)

As a secondary option i recommend looking at server replays where the vehicles are used and then using the sensor view to look at the speeds and g-forces for the missiles during their use in matches. It at least gives some idea on how the missiles perform in actual use.

I’ve seen some player made lists of in-game missile stats but i don’t know how reliable those numbers are and some of the numbers can also look bad if you don’t take others into account at the same time that might more than make up for the deficit.

So lets say as a hypothetical scenario there are two missiles with the same max speed and max overload in the game; one of them reaches it’s top speed in 2 seconds and keeps that top speed for 15 seconds even while fully turning, while the other missile accelerates so slowly that it only reaches the max speed after 10 seconds and only if it flies in a straight line and if it turns it never reaches that top speed.

If then both missiles has a max overload of say 40G (which they can only achieve at max speed) then one of the missiles will be at 40G for almost all of it’s flight while the other missile will only be at 40G for maybe 5-10% of it’s flight and be at maybe 25-30G for the rest of the flight.

So even if two missiles have the same numbers on the stat card they can behave wildly differently when used in game.

Thanks for your honesty, using AI for translations is perfectly fine :) I just don’t like it when people use them for factfinding as the AI is very often wrong and often uses odd sources for it’s claims. There are national community sections here on the forum that you can look at to see if your language has one, if you want to create topics in your own language that is. You can find them here: ( National Communities - War Thunder — official forum )

Sidenote:
The Community Managers did talk about there being some new things in the works to better show a lot of the more advanced data for ammunition and vehicles in the game. I think it was in one of the Community updates about what is coming to the game in the future, i’ll see if i can find it.

Edit: Found it, you can read more here: ( Community Update No.8: Responses and What’s Coming! )

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First of all, I agree that actually playing a vehicle provides a more accurate understanding of its performance. I also agree that missile behavior can vary significantly depending on the situation.

However, once we start building arguments around very specific hypothetical scenarios, the assumptions can become endless. Even vehicles widely considered overpowered, such as the Pantsir, can struggle to secure hits at long range under certain conditions. Every SPAA in the game has situations where it performs poorly.

That is why I am trying to approach this from an average-performance perspective. The question I am raising is whether the Elde 98 can consistently perform at the level expected of a ±0.3 BR bracket around 12.0 in typical, repeated match conditions.

If you had to choose, purely based on performance and objectivity — setting aside personal preference — from the following vehicles:

US ADATS, CLAWS, FlaRakRad, Pantsir, UK ADATS, Tan-SAM Kai, Type 81(C) (11.7), CS/SA5, HQ17, and Ito-90M,

in what order would you rank them for achieving the strongest overall results?

Realistically, would the Elde 98 place near the top of that list?

You mentioned that other factors can compensate for certain weaknesses. In the case of the Elde 98, however, it appears that its disadvantages tend to outweigh its strengths.

Even if we acknowledge that its radar performance is respectable, and even if we accept your argument that the missile performance is better in practice than it appears on paper, there are structural limitations that remain regardless of scenario:

  1. Mobility that is currently not fully implemented due to game mechanics. While this may not be critical for anti-air performance, it is still a disadvantage.
  2. Extremely limited ammunition capacity. As mentioned earlier, there is a two- to four-fold difference in total missile count compared to many peers. This severely reduces sustained air-defense capability.
    2-2. The low missile count also makes intercepting incoming missiles more difficult, since each shot carries a much higher opportunity cost.

To summarize honestly, the two main concerns I see with the Elde 98 are:

  1. Missile performance that feels slightly lacking compared to its BR peers.
  2. Structural, fundamental limitations — especially ammunition capacity — that cannot be compensated for by situational advantages.

That is the core of my argument.

I truly appreciate you taking the time to find the national community link for me, and thank you as well for being understanding about my use of AI for translation.

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One small thing that I’m pretty sure got overlooked(?). We’re comparing the Elde with IR missiles to almost only Beam-Riding missile carriers. So while the Elde can fire all 4 missiles in one go at 4 different targets most others can only engage one at a time. And in the case of something like the CS/SA5 its missiles are worse.

So basically the Elde either benefits by having a better missile or a better missile and the ability to engage multiple targets.

2 Likes
14

Way under BR’d should be 12.7 it’s OP unlike Spyder, too small and unfair to fight against.

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First time ive ever heard anyone call the spyder OP since that thing came out.

Its extremely easy to fight against compared to something like a pantsir.

Its missiles are extremely prone to preflaring while rolling. Its also limited to 4 missiles at a time, so you can easily overwhelm it with missiles since it will have 3 missiles available for interception after firing at you.
Not to mention its platform’s mobility is terrible so it wont be getting to any pesky spots.
12.7 is overkill for that shitbox

A competent pantsir player will completely negate your existence by intercepting all munitions you launch at it and its team with its 12 ready to fire missiles

1 Like
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Tbf it was sarcasm based on prior cope I’ve heard from other players, also I said Elde was OO unlike Spyder lol.

Gotta remember to add the /s cause I forget how many actual terrible takes exists here and they don’t mean it sarcastically lmao

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well now i look dumb, fell for the least ragebait post of all time, there have been too many bad takes lately that i cant tell sarcasm from a genuine post.

From KH38 spammers complaining about equally no skill spaa gameplay to US mains wanting 7M’s and 9Ls on the F4s.

mb gng

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18

I think its fine-ish for 12.0, the compression does make it a bit messy but the buff they really should give it is more than 1 ammo box

(along with the obvious things like buffing the IRIS-T, fixing the mobility, etc etc)

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Nah you’re all good man, it’s just casual rage bait lol
IMG_0868
Enjoy the cat image

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Fixing mobility isn’t possible as the devs stated on my report the Elde simply can’t get it’s articulated mobility modeled in game.

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Fairly typical then. Gotta wait for a soviet articulated vehicle to be added

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That will be fine, the Elde still won’t get fixed lol

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23

Yeah… that is true

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It’s not only the articulated linkage, it’s also the dual engine, IRL the EldE 98 has one engine in the front half and one in the back half but in game it only has one in the front. Dual engines is not modeled in the game yet. (the strv103 should technically also have two independently functioning engines).

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I mean they also closed my clipping issue where the vehicle will try to become a mole rat but whatever it’s swedish the devs don’t care.