i swear people say the f104 belongs at 9.3 and that is wrong, at 9.3 you still have subsonic aircraft such as the hunters / mig17s and more.
i decided to play the f104A myself to see how overpowered is it.
result: i spaded it before i ran out of free repairs.
the f104A and C do not belong at 9.3 at all
When things get decompressed, it’ll increase with the decompression.
But boy are they hard to use at 9.3.
Either you get an uptier & die, or you get a downtier & pray people don’t see you.
Cause if they do see you they just do a minor maneuver & you’re forced to overshoot & disengage.
Everyone knows it, but you have to deal with people who lately decided that the Re2005 is 6.0, SeaFury is 5.7, and the Yak38 should have 4 R60s and move to 9.3.
You cant really do much to the F104A/C. If you increase it’s BR then would be quite useless because it doesn’t have any flares and it cant even turn.Speed is the only thing F104 got. That speed isn’t enough to be a advantage at higher BRs. As RazerVon has already said things will get normal with BR decompression.
Plenty of planes sitting at 10.0-10.3 without flares and only have speed. So that argument is kind of moot
And Aim-9Js.
Not all, and it really doesn’t matter what you have when every missile bar a few will kill you 100% of the time when launched properly. F104A/C is a better plane than most 9.7s, yet here we are handholding the US players again.
And yes it’s a boring 1 dimensional plane and people die because lack of patience and overcommitting even in partial or full downtiers. That doesn’t make it any less broken at 9.3.
That do not see downtiers at 9.3 as that is a BR black hole.
That being said, they still perform extremely well, the only thing stopping them from being better is having to face US jets.
Here’s a list of aircraft at 9.7 that out-do an F-104A/C missiles and/or airframe performance: T-2, Harriers, Jag, Hunter F58.
The Harriers I especially know cause I hunted F-104s with them.
It’s not about hand-holding, it’s about an interceptor airframe that is just terrible being forced into a BR because most things above it are superior to it in every way.
Most people don’t know to properly fly it.
The Yak-38 is literally flying bus, even the F-104’s turn better than thing. If you manage to die to it then you deserve that death.
How flying straight is easy af in the game smh
Most people mindset’s is that turning is easier.
you forgot about A-5C. Real players in A-5Cs are definitely a threat to f104
That too, but I was mostly aiming for Aim-9Gs and Aim-9Es, which F-104s can’t dodge after launch at 9.7, not 10.0.
I fly against 104A’s at 9.0 (that is I’m at about 9.0 +/- a bit), and have just started using it as well, in AB.
While they are a bit of a pain, I think you overstate the case - as with most things they are good when downtiered, but even so they are unforgiving of any mistakes.
A lot of subsonics have AIM-9B’s and equivalents at that level, and those make short work of them, plus if you lose speed you are just easy pickings for pretty much anything with a gun.
Sure if you get your boom and zoom going you can do well, even in AB, but good play is good play and doesn’t make it a good plane IMO.
He probably never touched that plane after his free repair ended.10 matches arent enough to determine a jet’s strength
I don’t disagree that it has strengths - well 1 anyway - speed!
But so does the first Mig-21 that sits even lower… and it is similar - you have to pay attention to it, but it is not unbeatable at all.
AAB has completely different physics so, come back here when you played this thing in ARB.
I’m spading ROCAF F-104A in ARB but, I would say it is most skill less plane in 8.3 to 9.3BR ranges rn.
i agree