Have you actually touched that thing?? Because I don’t know how you could have come to that conclusion. it is a 12.0 aircraft with:
a middle of the road / slightly below average missile load
a RWR worse than the F-5E that has trouble picking up and identifying locks at ranges.
45 countermeasures
no Drop Tanks (It is capable of carrying them IRL)
The upgrades to the airframe are very nice, but do not make up for the issues it is forced to face at its br.
oh okay, lemme go make a list of oh I don’t know, pretty much any plane above 9.0. I Gotchu
They should add a tech tree one with AIM-9P-4 or P-5 and at a lower BR than the premium one so we can have a plane that fills the F-5E ↔ F-16 gap
That’s exactly what I’ve been saying haha.
Just a lower F-5G with 6 Aim-9Js or 9P-4s, perfect 11.3 to bridge the gap.
Yes, I have. Hell, I pre-ordered it cause I’ve been waiting for it to be added for 6 years now.
A lot of the reasoning behind it having worse things than some TT vehicles is oftentimes on Gaijin (such as deciding to mishmash the US F-5E even further by giving it the most modern RWR it had). Theoretically, Gaijin could give the F-20A the ALR-67, since Paul Metz’s book did state it (however bug reporting that isn’t likely to work due to lack of primary sources).
As for the drop tanks, that’s a Gaijin thing. Oftentimes, they’ll add drop tanks when they’re ready/available, so I imagine it’ll happen sometime by next update or the update after (and the F-5Es are likely to get the same tanks), as I imagine they haven’t been modelled yet (or else they would’ve been datamined).
As for the Countermeasures: This is probably gonna be the most disappointing part for you, but the F-20 would’ve used the exact same dispenser as the F-5E, which could only hold 30 flares and I believe up to 45-ish Chaff (will need to double-check sources on chaff again). Gaijin has actually gone a bit ahistorical with the flare count here, as historically the ALE-40 could only hold 30 flares.
The only way for this to get more CMs would be implementation of the ALE-37 CM pod (same one as found on the AV-8A and A-6E TRAM), which was supposedly compatible with just about any NATO-standard pylon. However, resources are limited, and it’s not likely you’ll be able to find any evidence the F-20 could support such a system.
Finally, missile load: Once again, we’re getting a better set up (with the 9Ls) than the F-20 likely would’ve gotten IRL, though there were a few issues on the dev server (such as lack of AIM-9Js as “stock”, and no ability to carry a single sidewinder on each underwing hardpoint rather than 2x on the dual-rail system).
I believe a lot of folks here kind of fell into the expectation that the F-20 would be comparable to the F-16 in all regards. While it is in a few, this thing was always meant to just be a medium-sized step up from the F-5E, for those who couldn’t afford or were barred from purchasing the F-16. It is worse by Northrop’s design, not Gaijin’s.
What? It has its accurate AIM-9Ls.
@BasherBenDawg
Nah, rank 9 for gen 5. Especially since they changed the rules for premiums this year.
We can get rank 8 premiums without rank 9 existing indefinitely.
I’m actually getting a sinking feeling that they’ll put the ARH planes at rank 9 so they can do a new round of rank 8 premium planes. Look how many rank 7 premiums they sold, theres an accountant in Gaijin’s office super excited to repeat that.
At least based on dev server performance there is literally no reason to fly the F-20 over a 12.0 F-16 except for premium rewards. Same weapons and worse performance across the board.
Gaijin likes having 5 vehicles to unlock the next rank.
As much as they made Japan only have one, they do like at least 5.
Now that Gaijin is doing rank 8s without rank 9, I don’t see rank 9 coming anytime soon.
In-fact, I see more rank 8 premiums across this year.
Welcome to high tier premiums: they have their upsides (unique vehicle, premium benefits), and their downsides (oftentimes worse than TT contemporaries)
That’s just the thing: it never tested those IRL. It’s less accurate for it to have 9Ls than it is for it to have 9Js/9Ps, so we’re very lucky in this case
I think i might have originally misunderstood you, and I apologize for that.
When you were mentioning overperforming, I assumed you meant at the 12.0 matchmaker, but it seems like you meant in comparison to what the jet was actually capable of.
For the point on the RWR, yes i’m aware that it is technically accurate to the prototype, but I feel that having it a grade below the 5E’s (F-5 has the V3 variant of the F-20’s RWR) when having to face things like 27ER’s and ET’s is going to be a serious issue.
For the rest of the points you made, more or less yeah. They did give the F-20 the benefit of the doubt in most situations, its just a shame that they put it at such a high br in comparison.
Yeah, it wouldn’t surprise me if they lower the BR sometime in the future, but I expect that won’t be for a fairly long time.
Apologies for how hostile I got during earlier rants in here, btw (The F-20 is one of the few planes I am very passionate about to this degree, it it kinda stung also seeing photos I had taken myself of the Paul Metz book being passed around without my permission, but that’s another story lol)
The F-20 LITERALLY can’t even achieve its top speed. Its energy retention also feels awful.