I’d like to raise the issue of the hole in the Soviet tree at 9.3-9.7 on air RB. At these BRs we have no aircraft that can compete with what our opponents are getting.
At 9.3-9.7, USSR players fly aircraft with no flares and no decent air-to-air missiles. In the same range, other nations have flares and missiles that can actually hit a target (the R-3S is a total joke, while the German MiG-21 SPS-K at the same BR already has the R-60).
Attackers are another failure. Once again, the German tree has a MiG-23BN that is better in every respect. Why does the German tree, at the same BR, have better Soviet aircraft than the Soviet tree itself?
It’s nice that the MiG-19, MiG-21 and SU-7 have good performance and great engines, but what’s the point if every opponent can shoot them down with air-to-air missiles? There’s no chance of evading missiles at all, because these aircraft don’t turn at higher speeds.
Playing the USSR at these BRs is simply terrible, even without uptiers. Every nation has better aircraft with at least flares and proper air-to-air missiles, while the “German” tree is made up of Soviet machines that sit at higher BRs in the Soviet tree.
This isn’t entirely true, but soviet aircraft at that BR to take a bit more skill to effectively use compared to things like the F-100, Av-8s, or T-2
The Mig-19PT is a very good aircraft, but it’s not perfect for the meta due to it needing more skill+it’s fighting style leaves it open to being 3rd partied/not getting a kill before someone else does. The R-3S missiles it carries also greatly help it in certain situations.
The Su-7s are solid aircraft, but are still worse than the Mig-19 in every way but speed.
The Yak-38 is an excellent (or even overpowered) plane until someone gets behind you, which is a guaranteed death sentence 95% of the time. It still is subsonic too, albeit one of the fastest. It’s also extremely susceptible to uptiers and is weaker than many other 9.3s in uptiers.
I can’t speak about the Mig-21F-13, but it just doesn’t look as good as the F-100s and other 9.3 aircraft.
The Mig-21S is easily the best soviet 9.3/9.7, but it still lacks flares/higher G missiles. With decompression it 100% deserves to move up to 10.0 alongside many other 9.7 planes.
The Mig-23BN is a 9.3 at 9.7 and it’s barely better than the Su-7 IMO.
Russians get su17m2 which carries 4 r60s and is really good
Regardless the issue that makes 9.3 jets not really good to play is that the upgrade to 20g missiles should be +0.7 rating, not +0.3, but who knows how many years it’ll take for this to happen
Just play mig 21 smt its easy mode once you get it mostly