this is why I dont get when people say FnF Brimstones would be OP because of LOAL in mode 3 where you just shut gun them onto the battlefield sure, but in mode 2 it works literally like that where you designate a target, the btimstone flies under IOG and then starts searching for a target when its with in range the same as point lock and IR just it would do it from a closer distance so it would probably miss more
there is a video out there of someone lobbing a GBU-8 from like 23km away near one of the spawns on vietnam and it begins tracking a tank leaving spawn at about 5km
yeah normally what i do with such guided weapons, it is absolutely possible specially with higher caliber agm’s like AGM 65 and KH 38 since they have much higher re lock time than stuff like PARS 3LR and Spike ER2, its honestly a pretty useful strat specially with some spaa’s like pantsirs or stuff that have really good radars altough i normally fire about 3 against pantsirs to use the first 2 as decoys
Again, nothing conclusive there, it might be exactly what you say, but no definitive proof that those aren’t just ground locks on a stationary target.
You are misunderstanding me, the fact that you see either of those two options in the hud (which i do know what they mean) means that the missile han’t been fired at the point of still seeing those in the hud.
LOAL means changing from point to track during mid flight of the missile.
I cannot see that in the videos as they are all on stationary targets so point and track locks will behave the same.
Yes, but to relock doesn’t there have to have been a lock to begin with to the RE-acquire?
Again, i want to be clear that i am fully prepared to be wrong about this, i just have not seen anything proving LOAL’s existence yet. (i would honestly love to be wrong because that would open so many new doors for CAS play for me :P )
Edit:
Going of topic now though, if continued discussion is to be had you can PM me if you want.
ive done this a number of times, if you want to try for yourself you can use agm65a which due to its very low tracking range you pretty much need to do this to hit targets
In the 7:49 launch you can see the moment the missiles locks. Untill then it is flying on point IOG
5:12
In this video it even changes the target, so POINT is out of the question
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Go ahead and provide video footage of getting a TRACK lock against a tank at more than ~13 km in a (custom) match.
I said “capped to a range of ~13 km […] in game”, not on paper. You can get longer range locks on the test map for some reason, but that never happens in actual matches. You can test it out in a custom match against bots pretty well. You can get an intermittent “TRACK” lock out to slightly longer ranges, but you lose it again almost immediately.
Examples:
Spoiler
AGM-65G:
KH-38MT:
And since it came up, here’s an AGM-65D switching to a TRACK lock on a moving target from a ~23 km POINT lock lauch:
Clips are from before the update that increased targeting pod render/lock range, but that didn’t affect TRACK lock range at all.
Excuse the potato resolution, had to get the clips below the filesize limit.
The FoV of TV/IIR guided weaponry a vehicle has to drive through is very, very narrow. It’s a lot of luck hitting a moving target with that. The Brimstone, even in mode 2, presumably scans a far larger area. Also, how do you even assign a target to it? Can it be done manually from a targeting pod, which might be fine since it still requires some player input, or just at a GMIT radar contact?
Fired 2 in POINT lock at a moving convoy. Tried to get them to track separate vehicles but they both locked onto the lead one, you can def see them track that lead vehicle though.
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Now this shows it WAY more clearly :) thx :)
alright, i misunderstood you, sorry about that. (although i would argue that semantically “capped” means max, 13km isn’t the theoretical max, it’s more of the average practical max expected to be achieved in matches if that makes sense)
I have personally gotten several 15-16km track locks and fired with continuous track till impact, they are admittedly rare, but it does happen in matches (anecdotal i know… ). (Edit: in snow/winter matches most often, don’t know if that matters or is just coincidence.)
Nice video, a lot clearer, thanks :)
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If they refined clouds and their impact on IR, IIR and IRST, I reckon youd get those ranges more consistently
All good, maybe that wasn’t the most clear way to put it in the first place. I can’t remember ever getting a lock at more than ~13 km, but I suppose it’s possible, it’s only a ~15% deviation to what you claim as your maximum lock range. Either way, it’s nowhere close to the datamined stats, and it’s pretty much the same range for all IIR AGMs.
Map temperature matters for heatseekers, so it may do so for IIR seekers too, no clue.
Target size matters a lot too. You won’t be getting a TRACK lock on a Wiesel at those ranges, and you can lock ships to much further out, for example. But I’ve never found how that is actually determined. Do vehicles have some sort of “size” stat? Does the game actually take silhouette size into account, which would vary by angle? It’s all a lot of mystery box black magic and it’s understandable that people look at datamined missile stats and lock ranges and expect that that’s what they’ll get. Especially so if they can’t compare them themselves because they haven’t ground them out.
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from what I know or how I would assume it would work in game is similar to IIR/TV guided weapons where you have to lock the ground for IOG (you can already do this with out a laser on the SAL brimstones so I assume it would work with the radar guided ones.) the down side would be that it doesnt start tracking until 5km from what ive heard and due to its speed it would be hard to hit moving targets from 15+KM but on the other end it would have at least a larger search area but probably not by much
u cant gaslight me into saying they have 13 km when i have the guided weaponry data btw its INGAME and then just double down
I think IRL will be entirely mute in this matter. The question is, how will Gaijin choose to model it?
But that is a topic for another thread entirely
the 20km is the theoretical max without any sort of outside factors, 13km is the most likely practically achievable max lock range in any given match due to weather, target heat, target size, temperature of ground (i assume), clouds, etc. a lot of factors bring that theoretical 20km max down quite a bit quite fast.
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A GMTI radar would be able to provide an estimated point of impact for a moving contact, that’s way harder to achieve with a purely visual signal. Considering the launch platform has that capability anyways designating the target for a mode 2 attack visually seems very counter intuitive. I haven’t seen any numbers as to the lock range of the missile itself, but 5 km for a mmW radar seems like a very high estimate.
They could probably take some leeway with it, sure.
Go provide footage of it then. I did, so did others. You aren’t getting a TRACK lock on tank sized targets in a (custom) match with any of these weapons, even in perfect weather conditions.
im just going off of how gaijin treats the SAL brimstone where you can launch it at the ground with out the laser turned on and its IOG will take it to about where you were aiming
Yes, but the entire point of mode 2 is that you can hit a moving target, right? Just IOG doesn’t do you much good there, since you need to program in where your target will be by the time the missile gets into a range where it can actively start looking for it with its mmW radar.
i have done 20 km on a few vehicles, its major issues are weather, vehicle thermal signature and apparently size too cuz the vehicles i can count that i have been able to lock at such ranges are the flarakrad and the pantsir, missile seems biased towards big trucks, ofc there is also varying for example i have tried to lock even at 6 km on bad weather and it really struggles, its very dependant on weather too, but most of the time it dosent affect it nearly as much unless the weather its really bad like very big clouds or fog or heavy rain, i have gotten on average 7 to 13 km on medium weather on bad weather 6-7 maybe even 8, and on clear weather i have gotten to abuse that 20 km lock range
I would love to see that, i don’t think i have ever seen an actual track lock past 16km range in any conditions in a live match.