[DCS BUG] AIM-54

Nuff said. Bug reported. Bring these things back to reality please. no missile tracks through mountains and thats just for starters. Dumbest missile in the game so far.

That is still an ED issue.

R-33 is pretty much the same. Nearly impossible to evade, even on mountains.

No responses from HB. Guess this aim 120 wannabe missile will continue to be friggin ridiculous. They weren't built to fight against highly maneuverable fighters. But hey , I guess when your plane is OP like this people will want to keep buying it. Good marketing scheme

R-33 is pretty much the same. Nearly impossible to evade, even on mountains.

The phoenix is quite easy to defeat if you know what you are doing: at low level kinetically, at higher altitude by notching+CM. The seeker is not brilliant, even the AIM-54C Mk47 follows the rabbit quite often. Also, do not play following the F-14's rules. Use the strenghts of your aircraft (I cannot give you any tips without going into the details of specific scenarios).

End of the day, who has better knowledge of his frame and superior SA, wins.

ATM the guidance is controlled by HB until the missile goes active, later is ED's job. In that process the AIM-54 wastes also a lot of energy, it would be a better missile otherwise.

AFAIK the difference between the current implementation and the real life is that WCS commands the '54's activation whereas at the moment it does it by itself. It sounds like a big deal but it's not: any decent RIO can pick you up STT (unless we are talking about extreme scenarios) so, again AFAIK, the WCS can resume its control. This is a problem only in multiple TWS salvo.

About the mountains, never noticed that. Although we greater the range, the more arcuite the loft trajectory is, to the point that it comes down almost vertically so the mountains won't help you. Do you have any tacview track, mate?

No responses from HB. Guess this aim 120 wannabe missile will continue to be friggin ridiculous. They weren't built to fight against highly maneuverable fighters. But hey , I guess when your plane is OP like this people will want to keep buying it. Good marketing scheme

Ability to read suddenly left you has it?

Suggest you actually do some research and see where this behaviour has already been acknowledged by Heatblur however they are singularly unable to do anything about it as - and let me repeat in big easy words for your comprehension - all missile behaviours are controlled by Eagle Dynamics and therefore beyond Heatblur's control.

So, since your apparently fragile ego is so easily hurt by getting shot down by AIM-54s online, I suggest in the interim you massage your sense of self worth by playing single player only against AI or avoid servers with Tomcat's on the opposing team.

No responses from HB. Guess this aim 120 wannabe missile will continue to be friggin ridiculous. They weren't built to fight against highly maneuverable fighters. But hey , I guess when your plane is OP like this people will want to keep buying it. Good marketing scheme

I mean... Turn perpendicular, pop 4-5 chaff bundles. It can't be that hard. I've had enough of my phoenix shots ruined by both players and AI doing exactly that to know the missile isn't OP.

Nuff said. Bug reported. Bring these things back to reality please. no missile tracks through mountains and thats just for starters. Dumbest missile in the game so far.

Until ED gives them access to missile guidance code, Heatblur is not able to do anything about this

They weren't built to fight against highly maneuverable fighters.

Iranian AIM-54s were used against highly maneuverable fighters a large number of times (dozens) and hit. In one case the RIO targeted the center ship of a three-ship flight of MiG-23s in close formation and shot all three down with a single missile. Some of the stuff Iran did with the F-14 put US Navy use to shame.

Yes, the AIM-54 was perfectly capable of hitting fighters and real life shows this is true.

Iranian AIM-54s were used against highly maneuverable fighters a large number of times (dozens) and hit. In one case the RIO targeted the center ship of a three-ship flight of MiG-23s in close formation and shot all three down with a single missile. Some of the stuff Iran did with the F-14 put US Navy use to shame.

 

Yes, the AIM-54 was perfectly capable of hitting fighters and real life shows this is true.

Against highly maneuverable targets that weren't maneuvering. Three jets in close formation aren't maneuvering. They can't maneuver under those circumstances. During the Iran-Iraq War most Phoenix kills were against poorly trained pilots under the control of GCI, who didn't even know there was a missile inbound until it hit them.

I'm not saying the Phoenix can't hit small maneuverable targets, I'm just saying that using the Iran-Iraq War as evidence is not sound because those small maneuverable targets weren't even maneuvering in most cases, and worse, were flown by untrained pilots.

No responses from HB. Guess this aim 120 wannabe missile will continue to be friggin ridiculous. They weren't built to fight against highly maneuverable fighters. But hey , I guess when your plane is OP like this people will want to keep buying it. Good marketing scheme

Well, Phoenix isn't an AMRAAM to be sure, but it is surprisingly maneuverable for its size and was the first missile we had that could reliably achieve a kill against a defensively maneuvering target. Against a QF-86 in 1973, one did a combined-plane 18g pull to achieve an intercept against the drone, which had just rolled vertical into a 6g defensive pull, ramming itself through and achieving a kinetic kill (it had a ballast in place of a warhead). I've seen at least two open-source publications that give a 25g envelope for the AIM-54C. Of course, the missile can't do this willy-nilly anywhere in its envelope; it doesn't have enough smack in a super-long-range intercept to achieve that kind of turn, and if its inside a certain range, won't have built up enough either, but the thing actually can pull hard enough to hit a maneuvering fighter-sized target and you absolutely can expect that it will knock you out of the sky if you're in the heart of the envelope.

Against highly maneuverable targets that weren't maneuvering. Three jets in close formation aren't maneuvering. They can't maneuver under those circumstances. During the Iran-Iraq War most Phoenix kills were against poorly trained pilots under the control of GCI, who didn't even know there was a missile inbound until it hit them.

 

I'm not saying the Phoenix can't hit small maneuverable targets, I'm just saying that using the Iran-Iraq War as evidence is not sound because those small maneuverable targets weren't even maneuvering in most cases, and worse, were flown by untrained pilots.

Do you have proof that the Phoenix can't hit a small maneuvering target?

Do you have proof that the Phoenix can't hit a small maneuvering target?

Do you have proof that I even claimed a Phoenix can't hit a small maneuvering target? Because I was extremely clear and deliberate in my words, if anyone bothered to read them in full without cherry-picking.

Do you have proof that I even claimed a Phoenix can't hit a small maneuvering target? Because I was extremely clear and deliberate in my words, if anyone bothered to read them in full without cherry-picking.

No need to get snarky, I was genuinely curious if there is something out there stating things should be functioning differently than they are. So you are saying they can hit small maneuvering target or can't? I am having difficulty trying to find what your point is, perhaps that there is no confirmed kill against a skilled pilot trying to evade it?

No responses from HB. Guess this aim 120 wannabe missile will continue to be friggin ridiculous. They weren't built to fight against highly maneuverable fighters. But hey , I guess when your plane is OP like this people will want to keep buying it. Good marketing scheme

Oh lord the sheer amount of salt within this has completely ruined my dinner and will probably make breakfast unbearable without an even amount of pepper to go with it.

Just curious, how many years did you spend within the USN flying the Tomcat? Great to see another Tomcat pilot in the community, well I mean you must be an ex-driver aren't you?

Since you clearly must have such intricate knowledge of the Phoenix's classified performance? You wouldn't have been so rude and arrogant with your initial bug claim otherwise would have you?

No need to get snarky, I was genuinely curious if there is something out there stating things should be functioning differently than they are. So you are saying they can hit small maneuvering target or can't? I am having difficulty trying to find what your point is, perhaps that there is no confirmed kill against a skilled pilot trying to evade it?

I'm snarky because my point was very clearly stated, only to be confronted with a straw man. And because I write research papers as part of my profession I'm pretty damn sure it's not my writing that's at fault. I don't know where the miscommunication appeared, so I'll highlight my point in bold.

Against highly maneuverable targets that weren't maneuvering. Three jets in close formation aren't maneuvering. They can't maneuver under those circumstances. During the Iran-Iraq War most Phoenix kills were against poorly trained pilots under the control of GCI, who didn't even know there was a missile inbound until it hit them.

 

I'm not saying the Phoenix can't hit small maneuverable targets, I'm just saying that using the Iran-Iraq War as evidence is not sound because those small maneuverable targets weren't even maneuvering in most cases, and worse, were flown by untrained pilots.

The argument that the missile "sucks" because it failed the three times the US fired it in anger is just as unsound due to the small sample size and the fact that missiles always had and always will have failure rates. Neither side of the Phoenix argument holds any rational weight due to skewed data (forgot to mention possible propaganda numbers out of Iran).

I`m in Su-27, and I can tell its not that easy to get away from the Phoenix missile. The contrary, its a damn hard task, maybe for me as a rookie. Its just too fast and too maneuverable to avoid it by only cranking, no matter what (as can easily be done with many, if not all, other missiles).

Since there is no radar warning when missile is launched... Only way is to turn on 3 or 9 o`clock of the missile. Can I ask here one thing, how to tell, that I am notching the AIM-54 (going perpendicular to it)? Only by my HDD display and location of aircraft that the missile has been launched from and my self pointing at it? After turning 3 or 9, aircraft DISAPPEARS from my radar. So how can I tell I am nothing it??

ps: to me it seems that AIM-54 is from a completely different planet, compared to any other usa`s or russian`s.

Thx in advance.

To suggest that in a module that is dedicated to realism beyond anything that existed so far, we would make a missile unrealistic on purpose, just to sell more copies, is quite frankly ridiculous. That said, please stay civil guys, anger is most often an expression of passion, a passion we all share and we understand it.

The rest has been mentioned time and time again: missile guidance is out of our hands.

@Mitja: you never notch by looking at your radar, but at your RWR or in this case berlioza. The berlioza makes it particularly easy to dodge active missiles, as it also shows you their range. Put it on your 9 or 3 oclock, wait till the last bar, release chaff and perform a high G maneuver. This does the trick 9/10.

The phoenix is actually very very easy to dodge/notch/beam with a lilttle training.

But now that I said that, I guess we will be selling less copies. :D (sorry, I had to make the joke)

I'm snarky because my point was very clearly stated, only to be confronted with a straw man. And because I write research papers as part of my profession I'm pretty damn sure it's not my writing that's at fault. I don't know where the miscommunication appeared, so I'll highlight my point in bold.

 

 

 

The argument that the missile "sucks" because it failed the three times the US fired it in anger is just as unsound due to the small sample size and the fact that missiles always had and always will have failure rates. Neither side of the Phoenix argument holds any rational weight due to skewed data (forgot to mention possible propaganda numbers out of Iran).

It wasn't a straw man because I wasn't arguing or trying to make any point, I was curious if there was some proof or event for what you were stating. I totally agree with you that neither side has a large enough sample size to say it's amazing vs terrible.

You may have made your point clearly but I read it quickly while at work so the fault may very well have been mine. I must say though, you really need to chill.

Against highly maneuverable targets that weren't maneuvering. Three jets in close formation aren't maneuvering. They can't maneuver under those circumstances. During the Iran-Iraq War most Phoenix kills were against poorly trained pilots under the control of GCI, who didn't even know there was a missile inbound until it hit them.

 

I'm not saying the Phoenix can't hit small maneuverable targets, I'm just saying that using the Iran-Iraq War as evidence is not sound because those small maneuverable targets weren't even maneuvering in most cases, and worse, were flown by untrained pilots.

So in other words you moved the goalposts?

The issue that always comes up regarding the Phoenix with people, that have problem with it, is its size. For some reason, too many people think their aircraft, a 1000 times more massive than the missile should be able to out maneuver the missile. It's a simple equation in the end. If the missile has more EM in the bank than you do, you will not out maneuver it.

Do you think you can out turn a missile from an SA-6, SA-11 or SA-10? Of course you can't. Why do you think you'll have a chance against the AIM-54, R-33, R-27 or AIM-120? You don't out maneuver modern missiles. (By modern I mean missiles with solid state electronics.) You have to defeat the guidance or get your EM state greater than the missile's EM state. This translates simply to either you notch it, or you drive it into the ground or bleed it dry.

If you want to get a better understanding in the parity between EM states of missiles and their targets, get Tacview setup, and enable EM metrics, then start testing.

mine will not work at bvr anymore, they track perfectly till a hundred yards or so from the target then snap to pull huge lead and die, this is happening consistently to me vs ai and i dont understand why. they used to work 70-80% of the time but now i have to close and use acm mode to get any hits at all

mine will not work at bvr anymore, they track perfectly till a hundred yards or so from the target then snap to pull huge lead and die, this is happening consistently to me vs ai and i dont understand why. they used to work 70-80% of the time but now i have to close and use acm mode to get any hits at all

Nothing has changed on them.

eatthis what's happening (and this happens with amraams too) is that it looses track for just the tiniest of moments and for some stupid reason instead of the missile extrapolating where the target should be and attempting to reacquire; based off of its last known position, orientation, and speed it will cause the missile to pull has hard as it can in some random direction.

Honestly, it seems that the guidance code is in need of a rewrite... not a rework but a complete deletion and rebuild in my humble opinion.

But that is an ED issue, not a HB issue.