I’ve been particularly interested in dedicated Soviet Interceptors, here we can put together a tree of vehicles that could make up the research line.
Here is a tree I put together within a span of 10 minutes, if you have any ideas on what could be changed, please let me know. BR’s are junk so try not to pay attention to it that much. Thank you.
Mig-25P would be 9.7 - 10.0. No flares, R-60s only as its IR missiles, and useless R-40s no one would use.
On top of being slow, worse than a Mig-21SMT by far.
It’s not necessary cause we have yak + naval, mig, su, etc lines already.
Mig-31BM wouldn’t be above F-15C MSIP II, it’s… not that good.
Most of these are massively overtiered. I mean, the Yak-28 at 10.3?? The MiG-31 is comparable to the F-14A, not F-15A!
Also some more vehicles I believe would be more appropriate for this, as they are more significant in numbers and/or more conventional
MiG-21PF: 9.0
MiG-19PM: ~8.7
MiG-23P: ~11.7
I’d say it’s above pretty much purely on the R-37M, with triple the range and double the speed of an AIM-120B, while having superior maneuverability. But that’s pretty much all the BM really has, it’s in a weird spot and I wouldn’t expect it anytime soon, unlike the standard Foxhound, the B, and perhaps even the M.
No other country really has an equivalent to the 37M, it’s the longest-range and fastest AAM in the world by a large margin. I think the AIM-260 is probably the closest in terms of performance, but I’m not really en expert that.
BM’s most advanced weapons are R-73s which have been used by Mig-31 since Mig-31M, and R-77s.
R-37M wouldn’t be added cause that’s a stealth-era missile and Gaijin would likely avoid Mig-31 facing stealth aircraft.
400km, 200km is the standard R-37’s range, and the downgraded RVV-BD’s
In essence the RVV-BD is the R-37M without its booster, making it aerodynamically the same as the R-37 but with an improved seeker.
Not in terms or range, from what I understand the AIM-174 lacks the booster of the RIM-174 and is somewhere around 240km range. So the difference is comparable to the R-37 vs the 37M. But I’m also not very familiar with the missile so I could be wrong.
The PL-15 and Meteor are more like AIM-120D, lighter and shorter ranged. The PL-17 is comparable to the R-37M though. The problem really raises that the JATM and PL-17 are on more versatile capable vehicles than the MiG-31. Unless Gaijin pulls an F-14 and only gives a single country a weapon of this class, the MiG-31BM still won’t be added for a long time, and won’t be top tier by the time it is.
Plus that’s only 3 countries. While many NATO members are probably going to purchase JATMs and Japan has their own missile program, that still leaves several nations that probably won’t have a similar missile, possibly ever.
Not bad but we’d probably see a trimmed down version of this line in game, a lot of these aircraft are far too specialized to ever really be of much use in current gameplay.
One interceptor you didn’t list that could be of good use is the MiG-23P. An interceptor variant of the MiG-23, based on the MiG-23ML, modified with:
Removal of the IRST system
N006 Sapfir-23P LD/SD radar meant to detect fast, low-flying aircraft such as the F-111
ASP-23ML-P HUD and gunsight that works with the new radar
Wasn’t able to confirm if it had countermeasures or no (probably not as it was a specialized interceptor) - but it could easily be made to carry the same countermeasure as the ML
Most likely never carried any ground ordinance whatsoever
Same missile load as we’re used to in the MiG-23ML/A/D
Given all that, I can see a potential interceptor line in game being something like this:
