Dogfight strategy?

Hi,

I've been struggling at dogfighting, especially with the F-5E. So my first question would be, is there something special that you need to consider in the F-5? Is there something special about this plane versus the others?

My guess is that it's got not a lot of thrust and also, it has small wings.... so if you pull too many Gs, you just get a ton of drag and lose all speed. And then, due to the lack of thrust, that speed is very hard to recover. Am I wrong?

I only play against AI, often I am in my F-5 against Mig21s. The AI seems to only do 2 things : turning around in circle in a horizontal plane. Turning in circle in a vertical plane.

When he stays on a horizontal plane (same altitude), I can manage, however we just keep turning and turning and turning. What do you guys do? I tried just to stop trying to get behind him and just go in a straight line, and then come back in some way, but he always finds me super easily and therefore, I haven't had much success, since when doing that, he's the one that has no problem getting behind me.

In a vertical plane (doing vertical loops, changing altitude), well there is nothing I can do... I lose all my speed and nearly stall. So when I put the nose down I can't pull any Gs, else I don't get my speed back... so I just need to dive... and then he gets behind me yet again.

So that's it. Honestly, I have less issues when I am in the Mirage, but I could still use tips, but I don't think I'm that good either. So any general tips is welcomed.

And in the F-5 I just suck... so any F-5 oriented is very welcomed.

Might not be too helpful but I recommend you to not fly against the AI. Once you are behind them and slower than the AI, they will always do a loop until they run out of fuel or they are behind you.

But you could try following:

Before flying: Lower skill (which will make them more than stupid but this way you shouldn't get into too many loop maneuvers)

In a merge: If you are bored by the constant loops, you can do two (or more) things.

1) Go low. The AI can't follow you below a certain altitude and thus they can never gun you. Still better than constant loops IMO.

2) break off and reset yourself and maybe with a lucky shot you can get him....

Simply apply the right Basic Fighting Maneuvers to solve any angle problem in order to place your self in a firing position. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_combat_manoeuvring

Simply apply the right Basic Fighting Maneuvers to solve any angle problem in order to place your self in a firing position. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_combat_manoeuvring

Though I can appreciate your attempt at helping, this isn't super helpful.

Just 1 minute into this article you read that "85% of kills are done with the attacker not being seen".

Not useful since my post referred to the AI and as I recall, the way it is coded in DCS the AI always knows where you are.

You could argue "then don't play against AI", but this is not the purpose of this post.

Lol yeah simple 'do some of that pilot sh!t man!'

Thats the most helpful advice ever. That wiki link is good tho. Click through on it, find this; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_fighter_maneuvers and learn about yo-yo maneouvers and how they can be used to cut a corner. Also be careful with stick deflection. You pull too hard you lose all of your energy for a short burst of turn rate. Far better to watch that AoA meter in the left corner of your dash so that it doesn't get pulled into the red. You get better sustained turn rate. Now couple that with slight out of plane (above or below the horizon) rolls and you should do better.

Actuall you can sneak up on the DCS AI. Try turning your radar off and keeping it in the weeds until you pass below the intended victim, then plug in the burners and pull up behind him. He will not start dumping flares until your missile is under way!

1) In my experience the most important thing is to know your relative performance, where it favors you and where it favors the other guy. Stick to the envelope where you're stronger.

For instance a while back I was dueling a Mirage in my 15 and I didn't realize that the baguette is significantly better at scissors (especially flat). The other guy on the hand knew that this is his forte and kept forcing my hand into scissors at the second merge. At the beginning I was completely fine going there but it pretty much always resulted in a loss for me. After a couple fights I realized that this was the main problem and tried to stick to my guns and force 2 circle fights no matter what. One of the most difficult things I found was to stay calm and avoid accepting the scissors even if my gut feeling was that it would be the right move. In that scenario albeit the 2 circle flow is slow but if you do it right the 15 wins it most of the time.

2) The other thing I'd mention is that you should use lead / lag appropriately. This is not an easy thing to do and as far as I understand the principle is that you're using lead to collapse range / closure while increasing AoT to get a snapshot or kill. On the other hand using lag you can preserve your position, this is particularly important when you get to the point where you cannot effectively push any further without throwing away too much energy.

In case of offensive BFM what I noticed lately is that in many cases you can push in until you can't anymore, sit back to lag and keep your spot until the other guy makes a mistake or the flow of the fight favors you and you can push in further.

3) Know how far you can push at different scenarios, especially in the offense. This mostly comes by experience and is very important to preserve energy instead of wildly throwing it away hoping to get a lucky snapshot only to find your nose 2 feet behind the other guy stalled out.

4) Be conscious about your merge speed / altitude / plan and the same for your enemy. I.e. if you're pushing your usual corner speed and you run into a guy who's doing 320 knots chances are he's either looking for a nose low or 1 circle plan. If you manage to force him into a 2 circle or nose high you have pretty good chances. This can be further preplanned with relative aircraft strengths in mind etc.

5) AI has SFM so the loops they can do is.. a bit questionable at times.

Unfortunately having some ideas, like I do and understanding it is two completely different things. Applying it in combat is another. It's a very delicate art :)

1) In my experience the most important thing is to know your relative performance, where it favors you and where it favors the other guy. Stick to the envelope where ....

 

 

Unfortunately having some ideas, like I do and understanding it is two completely different things. Applying it in combat is another. It's a very delicate art :)

That's a lot of good info thanks. Indeed, I obviously still need to understand some basics stuff and even though just copying a wikipedia hyperlink isn't super helpful, there is a lot of good information in there.

And then there is being able to apply it.

But, of all you said, the one easy thing to grasp for me is your last comment about SFM. I didn't even know the AI was coded using a simplified flight model... :S

It's a small consolation... I mean, it helps knowing I am not all that horrible.

Which brings another question: I've only seen relatively negative comments about the AI and the way it behaves (always knowing your position, now that SFM thing, etc.) Is there any chance DCS will review its algorithm for the AI? Not all of us want to engage into PvP on multiplayer servers.

Yes, they are working on the AI I believe.

The main problem with AI in a guns fight that

a) they do 2-3 different things but that's all

b) they almost never pull the trigger unless you're flying straight level for an extended time

c) they don't max perform their jet

d) they don't really react to what you're doing

Basically there are 2 ways of losing against an AI in high aspect BFM,

1) you get hit head on before the merge because you didn't maneuver

2) you run out of fuel

Because of these things it's not very beneficial to practice BFM against AI. It can be useful as a challenge to see what's the fastest way to defeat it, or how to defeat it handicapped (bags) etc. but most of the things that work against the current AI will immediately fail against another player. So I'd recommend to try training in PvP (there are some guns only servers around) and only use AI to drill what you already know works against good opponents. Otherwise an empirical approach will teach you relationships and tactics that are wrong in a normal environment.

Though I can appreciate your attempt at helping, this isn't super helpful.

 

Just 1 minute into this article you read that "85% of kills are done with the attacker not being seen".

 

Not useful since my post referred to the AI and as I recall, the way it is coded in DCS the AI always knows where you are.

 

You could argue "then don't play against AI", but this is not the purpose of this post.

Don't bother whether you fly against an AI or Human. You always have to assess angle off - aspect angle and distance - enemy's energy - your energy and then you apply the right offensive or defensive maneuver.

What else you say IMO is on the wrong direction. You should focus on the BFM, specifically what's the right maneuver to perform :-)

This one incredible maneuver will defeat any AI in DCS!!

DCS AI's tend to have better than realistic sustained turn performance and power to weight ratio so employing 2-circle flow against them usually doesn't work that well. On the other hand like Blaze said, AI newer tries to turn as hard as the plane can so you can easily force him to overshoot in a scissors. If you don't bleed too much speed yourself you can still pull your nose up behind him (maybe need to accelerate for a few seconds before pulling up) and shoot him down. This trick works pretty much against any AI plane in DCS and often is the only trick that works. It also tends to be a suicide against players.

Remember that almost always the winner is proactive, and the loser is reactive. You can never tell what the opponent's exact plan is but there are many ways you can reduce their choices to a point where they become predictable.

For example, if you see a MiG coming into your tail, make a turn to one side and reverse after a while to invite them to play scissors. Their options here are either to blow through or accept the challenge. If they do the former, you end up far apart but with the enemy in your frontal hemisphere which allows you to meet any attack with an attack. If they enter scissors, you'll both be at low speed which is a Tiger pilot's paradise. Force an overshoot and take them to the cleaners! At high AoA during scissors keep the ailerons level and use small rudder inputs to turn the F-5 around.

+1

Fight online with friends. Against ai you can't apply all the real tactics. I guess the 80 % not seeing the enemy applies, but with mig21 vs F5 you often end up in a bfm fight. In my experience the key is (besides keeping a tally all the time) to be able to see if you are in a 2C or 1C situation. Should you fly max sustained turn rate or minimum turn radius?

1) Go low. The AI can't follow you below a certain altitude and thus they can never gun you. Still better than constant loops IMO.

Oh the AI will come low and gun you.

Did some config adjustments for new HOTAS for Su-25A and F/A-18C AI constantly flew perfectly 700m rear at 10m altitude and gunned constantly as we had infinity weapons and fuel and invulnerability.

The real way to deal the AI was actually just make it crash on ground by pulling from 700km/h speed at 10m altitude high G pull to vertical, climb to 500m, roll around and dive 30 degree down and AI just went to higher dive straight to the ground.

2) break off and reset yourself and maybe with a lucky shot you can get him....

That is as well more difficult when AI has simple flight modeling and they can do far more than player can. Someday we should get a more realistic AI that has the limited reflexes etc without requiring to nerf their other skills.

Blind lead turns will work against AI everytime. They never seem to get it. :)

If you have some spare time and don't mind the slightly cringe-worthiness of the first one;

then;

https://youtu.be/HvDz4MrYXNc

and maybe;

https://youtu.be/pQvF7V-VEYI