Intro
The CAS issue. Is there anything as contentious as that? I don’t think there is. While this is an issue that will continue being debated until the ends of time, as Gaijin continues to ignore discourse regarding it; doing as they wish — we players are left to make what we can of the situation. At least Gaijin is kind enough to provide us with AA, the effectiveness of which is questionable at times. (May god save Japan still not having a radar based AA at top tier…)
Not to mention the other weird choices they decided to take when modeling radar based AA, instead of missiles functioning like they do in air RB, where they work based on a lock; missiles function more like ATGMs. While sure, this leads to the strangely beneficial scenario where missiles fired by SPAA can practically ignore something the multi-pathing effect. especially when firing at helicopters hiding behind trees and such. But this is a discussion for another day.
But this leads us to our next point. The gameplay loop of top radar SPAA seems rather simple, and boring. Simply staring at your radar screen, and firing missiles. Is this all there is to it? The answer is: no! There’s a lot more to it. Which leads us to my main point!
Genuine skill issue on part of players
]You see, as a ground player first; and air player second there is something I have noticed now that I have tipped my toe into the power of 4th gen aircraft. People do not know how to play top-tier AA. I mean it.
The amount of times I’ve gotten easy kills on SPAA who for some reason decide that their best course of action is to stay idle in spawn, simply staring at their radar screen for contacts; instead of, I dunno, positioning themselves in say, a forest? Or behind solid cover, such as a building? I tell you, next time you play a strike aircraft with a good targeting pod, simply observe what the enemy AA does. I guarantee with 90% certainty that what most AA will do is simply sit in spawn.
In my opinion, this compounds the issue where CAS is extremely powerful and I do not think it is unreasonable to assume that players playing poorly somehow contributes to this. So, what can we do? I am glad you asked.
Countering planes properly utilizing radar based SPAA
It is my opinion that one needs to make do with the cards they are dealt, and this is one of these examples. So what can you really do against planes? How do you play radar based SPAA properly? In my opinion the “correct” way to play SPAA can be summarized through this helpful acronym.
Positioning, Radar, Deployment, Firing (PRDF)
So what does this encompass? Refer to below!
1. Positioning
It goes without saying that positioning is important no matter what mode one plays in War Thunder. It is incredibly important in SPAA, as simply sitting still presents you as way too easy of a target. So, simply find positions that provide you with an advantage. Be it concealment, solid cover, unexpected angles of attack; the list goes on and only your imagination is practically the limit. Which sends us to our next issue.
2. Radar
So you’ve positioned yourself in a wooded area with nice concealment, what now? You have your radar, which you can use to see where enemies may be. But you may soon realize that the enemy knows where you are, because you have your radar on constantly. So, how about we ration our use of radar? Turn it on every 30 seconds to see if you see people, and if you don’t; turn it off. You have optics too after all. But oh no! You left your radar on for too long, and now there’s a plane hunting you. What now!?
3. Deployment
But you suddenly remember you are a self-propelled anti-air system! You can move under your own propulsion! You can simply redeploy yourself to another position. And if you’re lucky, you might have smoke grenades to confuse the plane hunting you. So you move to a new position, what now?
4. Firing
So you’re now at a new position, you turn on your radar and see that the plane which was hunting you is heading for your previous position and is only 10km away! Bingo, that’s a firing solution that anyone can dream of. You lock on, and fire… It’s a hit! The poor sod who was after you didn’t even realize you redeployed, and you get the easiest plane kill of your life while he was struggling to figure out just where you had gone. This is a heavily wooded area after all! Good work!
Now, while this example is highly idealistic and doesn’t account for things such as enemy tanks coming over, it gives a general idea as to what you should be doing. I won’t lie, when SPAA is played properly, it can be extremely fun. If principles of PRDF are followed, it becomes like a game of cat-and-mouse between the SPAAG and CAS plane in question.
A game of wits, where the one who outsmarts the other wins. Because I assure you, the skill issue isn’t one sided. It’s just that playing planes wrong is a lot harder with guided ordnance currently. I myself have around 344 air kills racked up on my OTOMATIC (a notoriously, and by all regards, crap SPAAG compared to others) by simply following principles of PRDF when playing it.
How this compounds the CAS issue
If you recall to the past few matches you did at top tier where air was involved, how many players do you recall spawning in radar SPAA only to die almost instantly to a guided weapon because they didn’t move an inch from spawn? For me this happens quite often. And I now present you all with a question now, in the form of a poll.
- Yes.
- No.
- Unsure. (Other factors affected the performance of friendly SPAA)
(Edit) Feel free to write as to why you voted which option.
The part Gaijin plays in this
As stated before, the modeling of SPAA is a topic for another time. But Gaijin really does not try to teach players much in the ways of advanced topics such as this. I am not even sure if they tell you in-game if radar makes you visible to RWR. Though feel free to correct me on this if this is wrong. Gaijin should in general teach people positioning, or at the least give them the tools to easily figure these things on their own. Making custom battles is rather cumbersome, so exploring maps is rather hard.
A simple tutorial on basic radar SPAA tactics when players unlock it would help a lot. Something as simple as the examples I gave in PRDF would give players a very good idea of what they should do to avoid becoming easy food for CAS.
And this is the one thing where I myself am willing to be firebrand about. I absolutely believe it is Gaijin’s responsibility to teach players how to play their game, it should not fall on us.
Conclusion
With this, I conclude the main part of this thread. I do not believe my arguments are unreasonable, and I hope that some people find help in playing SPAA using the info in this thread. That is all. I would also like to say before closing, that I do not think CAS should be removed, but I do think it is very strong at the moment. So keep that in mind before you write a comment fueled by nothing but vitriol towards my arguments. As I said at the start; let’s keep this civil! Thank you.