[DCS BUG] AIM-54

[Loki_]

Yep. It is time to add some real life behavior to this missile never was successful IRL. This missile is ruining DCS game play in that way implemented by developers. This thing is unrealistic.

 

Agreed. Its currently the "i win" button in mp.

[MurderOne]

When I was in, the USN simulated about a 50% kill rate with them in DACT.

[pepin1234]

When I was in, the USN simulated about a 50% kill rate with them in DACT.

 

which kind of targets?

 

because every time we ask why USN didn't show often Aim-54 in real combat actions, then a fanboy come to tell because it was too expensive missile. Such justification have not any real life logic. We see the price of every weapon extensively used by USN, USAF and allied, when you compared the threat value and weapons price, that is not like the real main reason to not carry often Aim-54 was the kind of targets in real combat and what the people don't want mention... the bad performance of the missile against real air threat. Real: ECM environment, fighters that change aspect all the time, etc ect. The current Aim-54 performance in DCS is more compatible with Acecombat 7. Not that DCS is a simulator...?

[MurderOne]

which kind of targets?

 

 

F/A-18C and D under dissimilar air combat training during predeployment workups.

[nighthawk2174]

which kind of targets?

 

because every time we ask why USN didn't show often Aim-54 in real combat actions, then a fanboy come to tell because it was too expensive missile. Such justification have not any real life logic. We see the price of every weapon extensively used by USN, USAF and allied, when you compared the threat value and weapons price, that is not like the real main reason to not carry often Aim-54 was the kind of targets in real combat and what the people don't want mention... the bad performance of the missile against real air threat. Real: ECM environment, fighters that change aspect all the time, etc ect. The current Aim-54 performance in DCS is more compatible with Acecombat 7. Not that DCS is a simulator...?

 

What exactly is wrong with it then?

Edited September 8, 2019 by nighthawk2174

[GGTharos]

Yep. It is time to add some real life behavior to this missile never was successful IRL. This missile is ruining DCS game play in that way implemented by developers. This thing is unrealistic.

You're right. R-27 missile family also had 0.05pk in real combat, which means right now it is too good in game and should be changed.

 

AIM-7 had 0.34pk and AIM-120B 0.59. so these missiles should be changed to be even better in game.

 

The sources for all this are public.

 

Do you still want to do this?

 

AIM-54 problems are common to all missiles, but the 54s flight time exposes them. Those 'issues' would be fixed for all missiles, not just 54s.

[falcon_120]

Regarding effectivity in MP, I have witnessed during the last months in DCS how its become the most effective weapon in BVR. The thing is insane, almost inmune to chaff and requires perfect notching to evade. So I really cant say it is in a bad spot right now.

 

 

 

Enviado desde mi SM-G950F mediante Tapatalk

[MoGas]

Yep. It is time to add some real life behavior to this missile never was successful IRL. This missile is ruining DCS game play in that way implemented by developers. This thing is unrealistic.

 

:megalol::helpsmilie:

[pepin1234]

You're right. R-27 missile family also had 0.05pk in real combat, which means right now it is too good in game and should be changed.

 

AIM-7 had 0.34pk and AIM-120B 0.59. so these missiles should be changed to be even better in game.

 

The sources for all this are public.

 

Do you still want to do this?

 

AIM-54 problems are common to all missiles, but the 54s flight time exposes them. Those 'issues' would be fixed for all missiles, not just 54s.

 

Go and convince VVS that they should not use those missiles because you are too fan of everything is not Russian. Also try and convince the rest of the west you GGtharos have proof they never will be hit by R-27. Maybe you are not so lucky in this task. If you show what do Aim-54 in DCS they will laugh in your face.

[AeriaGloria]

Pepin please stop with the combative attitude about missiles. Yes there are some issues, but it seems like every time someone mentions that they aren’t completely bad, like say the kinematics on the Phoenix(backed up by the white paper which I recommend), that you take them to town saying they are a western fanboy who wants to see all Russian hardware implode.

[lunaticfringe]

You're right. R-27 missile family also had 0.05pk in real combat, which means right now it is too good in game and should be changed.

 

*snip*

 

AIM-54 problems are common to all missiles, but the 54s flight time exposes them. Those 'issues' would be fixed for all missiles, not just 54s.

 

How dare you let little things like "facts" or "data" get in the way of his tantrum.

[Karon]

Oh boy this forum.. I used to post a lot, then I gave up. This thread though.. damn..

DCS, as LOMAC before it, has always had some issues when it comes to missiles. I am amazed every time someone comes up comparing RL and DCS on this matter, especially if the user is a long time follower of this forum.

 

 

Anyway, let's debunk a couple of the most odd comments.

In primis no, the missile is not magic (desync and DCS bugs aside), energy-wise is very inefficient because it pulls random Gs in at least three steps of its envelope (departure, end of the loft, pitbull). It would perform better otherwise. Nevertheless, its rocket motor is massive and if you are silly enough to fly head-on buster towards a F-14, you can be hit even at 80nm and more. Fly flanking or beaming, and you cut that range in half at least (AKA build your SA Part I). Actually, if you notch a 30nm+ range shot and the RIO doens't know his job, the missile will simply fall from the sky harmless.

 

In secundis it's not immune to chaffs, on the contrary! It chases the rabbit happily enough and very often. 90% of the complaints come from people that try to notch the missile by notching.. the AWG-9! The angle between the pitbull AIM-54 and you and the AWG-9 and you is different, sometimes both on the horizontal and the vertical plane! There's no way you are notching both when the missile goes active, you are simply doing it wrong (AKA build your SA Part II)! Morever, the AWG-9 can be fooled very easily, increasing drastically the workload of the RIO. Learn how to do it.

 

In tertiis, again, stop comparing real life and a videogame. DCS is a good sim but real performance numbers are not always available, math models have their limits as the coders and the game environment. Not to mention the fact that missiles are not always fired to score a kill but to reach a tactical objective. In a MP scenario, you also have packet loss, LAG and so on. I agree that the current missile representation can be improved (can't wait for ED to give access to the missiles code to HB) but learn to take what comes. DCS is not meant to be fair or balanced (we'd have a MiG31 and its Rusky Phoenix at least -I would love it!-, if that were the case).

If you want balance out of the box, probably you are playing the wrong game.

 

Finally, PK does mean absolutely nothing. It's a marketing number with no sense if you don't know the parameters of the launches. It's like saying that the F/A-18 is rubbish because one has been killed during one of the Gulf Wars (I don't remember which one) and no F-15s have been lost. It doesn't make any sense.

 

 

 

Since I believe only in facts and numbers, I spent weeks testing the AIM-54 in a controlled environment. Eventually I fired more than 3000 of those and I have a pretty good idea of how they work. I posted my consideration, why and how the AIM-54 is unrealistic and what can be changed in the last part of my AIM-54 PK model.

Speaking on Discord, reddit and other places, the most common errors of people that complains is the lack of understanding of how a FOX3 work, hence they notch the wrong source and, even worse, they have zero SA, so they don't even pretend to change the geometry of the engagement to turn it to their advantage. Not to mention that none of them has spent time learning how to defeat the F-14 and the AIM-54.

 

For instance, I recently did a BVR practice test with F/A-18s from my Virtual Wing. They got hit from 80nm at the very first launch, not expecting such a massive range, then immediately adapted, improved and eventually defeated the next AIM-54s (stream, debriefing, tacview and analysis are on my youtube channel). So stop complaining, study, learn, adapt and play according to your strengths. You will succeed eventually.

[GGTharos]

You're right about the in-game situation - I wasn't aware that people were trying to notch the fighter rather than the missile. Interesting data point.

[MoGas]

You're right about the in-game situation - I wasn't aware that people were trying to notch the fighter rather than the missile. Interesting data point.

 

yep, I was always suprised when I watched the tacviews from the online flights, when people complained and asked for restrictions...I thought the will figure it out one day, but as you can see, most of the time always the the same People who are complain…. :joystick:

Edited September 10, 2019 by MoGas

[chief]

ED, gonna fix this yet? And yes, I'll pester until it's fixed

[umkhunto]

ED, gonna fix this yet? And yes, I'll pester until it's fixed

You're never going to outmaneuver the Phoenix in your little flanker, fixed or not. Go practice some missile evasion.

[MobiSev]

ED, gonna fix this yet? And yes, I'll pester until it's fixed

 

Did you read the development update post?

 

https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4062564&postcount=1

Edited October 14, 2019 by MobiSev

[chief]

You're never going to outmaneuver the Phoenix in your little flanker, fixed or not. Go practice some missile evasion.

 

Where you getting that info from?

[104th_Maverick]

I'm gob smacked at all the drama!

 

If you cannot evade a Phoenix YOU are the problem, not the missile guidance.

 

Its so easy to evade the missile its comical, if it was this super weapon that some of you claim then everytime we flew we'd get smacked down by a Tomcat which is far from the case!

 

The cold hard truth that some of you will struggle to accept is that you are doing it wrong.

If you are one of the people on this thread consistently spouting that the Phoenix is OP and 'something needs to be done' you have to realise that YOU are the problem here, what ever you are trying to do you are NOT doing it properly.

 

There are lots of very good reasons why NONE of the top teams in PvP get kills with the Phoenix while flying in SATAL any more, because it really is easy to evade.

If you keep getting killed with it over and over again in MP, the problem is at your end, I dodge upwards of 7/10 Phoenix's fired at me, get with the programme!

 

 

The problem is there are to many people with low SA flying around pointing their noses straight at Tomcats thinking they will be safe. If a Tomcat is painting you, you better be doing something about that or you will get a Phoenix in the face.

I've seen it 100 times, some low SA bro flying straight towards the inbound Phoenix then calls total BS when he doesn't evade after it goes active.

 

 

Here's a pro tip champ.... how about not fly straight towards that F14 that is painting you???

[Airhunter]

Oh please save us notch-Jesus almighty!

[M0ltar]

;4105625']I'm gob smacked at all the drama!

 

If you cannot evade a Phoenix YOU are the problem, not the missile guidance.

 

Its so easy to evade the missile its comical, if it was this super weapon that some of you claim then everytime we flew we'd get smacked down by a Tomcat which is far from the case!

 

The cold hard truth that some of you will struggle to accept is that you are doing it wrong.

If you are one of the people on this thread consistently spouting that the Phoenix is OP and 'something needs to be done' you have to realise that YOU are the problem here, what ever you are trying to do you are NOT doing it properly.

 

There are lots of very good reasons why NONE of the top teams in PvP get kills with the Phoenix while flying in SATAL any more, because it really is easy to evade.

If you keep getting killed with it over and over again in MP, the problem is at your end, I dodge upwards of 7/10 Phoenix's fired at me, get with the programme!

 

 

The problem is there are to many people with low SA flying around pointing their noses straight at Tomcats thinking they will be safe. If a Tomcat is painting you, you better be doing something about that or you will get a Phoenix in the face.

I've seen it 100 times, some low SA bro flying straight towards the inbound Phoenix then calls total BS when he doesn't evade after it goes active.

 

 

Here's a pro tip champ.... how about not fly straight towards that F14 that is painting you???

 

 

I recognize that the missile is easy to notch and it really is, but the foundation of the problem is that the missile will continue to track you through a notch a lot of times and will even track you when you lose line of site. There have been several several times where I have no 14 nails, missile warning or anything showing on rwr and Im line of sighting a phoenix and then it comes bulldozing through a mountain or just picks me up out of no where and flies through my canopy seconds after the missile warning. I have watched tacview. I have watched F10 on GS. I have seen it out of my own cockpit.

 

Whether this is a ghost or not doesn't matter in my eyes and telling people they don't know how to notch doesnt fix the problem; it just side steps it. There are far too many good pilots and F14 testers saying the same thing. The phoenix is bugged. It should not have magic INS. It should not be going pitbull as soon as the search aircraft loses lock allowing the tomcat pilot to turn cold and the missile to lock you from 30 miles. It should not be flying through terrain. It should not be in one location for the shooter and a different location for the defender. It should not lock you after it’s passed your aircraft. It should not have the seeming broken seeker gimbal limits thst it has.

 

The meat of the issue is the phoenix is not behaving as it should. There is a reason why the patch is coming tomorrow and Heatblur have acknowledged that there are issues with it whether it is their doing or ED's. I have had far too many personal instances where I notch a phoenix and it flies straight through my canopy and does not detonate. I have also had too many encounters where I’ve notched the missile for a long long time and when the missile is let’s say 200 yards from me I get a missile warning and it either kills me or flies through my canopy. I’ve gone back and looked at tacviews when this happens and plain as day the Phoenix is tracking me through my notch the whole time. Is it easy to notch when it works correctly? Absolutely! However, seeing the missile and having to continue to defend regardless of it actually being trashed, having it fly through terrain, having it go pitbull from way too far away allowing the shooting aircraft to turn around, and having it guide to you magically without nails or radar indications are major factors and are why it needs fixing and why it’s still limited to 2 in SATAL.

 

By the way since you brought up SATAL, a big reason for it not getting many kills in SATAL is because people launch the MK47 from way to far away. Far enough away that its out of energy when it reaches its target. I have very very rarely seen people notch the Phoenix in SATAL. It is almost always out of energy when it reaches the target and actually, if you go back and watch my streams, you’ll see that more often than not the Phoenix flies straight through the defending aircraft and does not detonate. Ghost missile? Probably. However, even entertaining the idea that missiles are showing for defenders or spectators in a competitive environment in a false location or a different state than the shooter is a big issue and has brought the Phoenix very close to being banned outright. However if I did ban it it would make the tomcat harmless is most senses so I opted to leave it at 2 to make it at least somewhat viable.

Edited November 20, 2019 by M0ltar

[webweaver40]

Thank you Moltar for explaining what has been frustrating for myself and many others

 

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

[IronMike]

Guys, this has become an emotion driven thread, I hope everyone realizes that.

 

We've acknowledged these bugs ages ago and we are working on them from our side as much as we have access to them.

 

Unfortunately I have some bad news, too: the aim54 changes will not be in the next patch. We've implemented changes for the new API, but it seems that the changes take effect only partially. We're currently talking to ED about that and have since decided to not release it as is.

 

The question, gentlemen, whether or not it makes or breaks Multiplayer for you, has onyl indirectly to do with the missile though, and mostly with ourselves. Missiles in DCS are as they are, have been like that for years, and you can either deal with it or not, or limit it to two, or restricted them altogether - but the constant lamenting - on either side - will not bring us anywhere. Sorry, but that, too, needs to be said. Everytime I see this thread has a new reply, I need to take a deep breath, honestly, before I click on it. And some of you fail to see the bigger picture sometimes, where the missile is one bug out of many that affects a rather small portion of players, out of which an even smaller portion is vocal about it, out of which yet again an even smaller portion complains about it. That does not mean that we take it less serious, you all know how much we care about Multiplayer. But it means that there are other pressing issues as well and not everything evolves around Multiplayer or around missiles in multiplayer for that matter. We try to give these things the highest priority we can, but just because it matters highly to all of us PvP folks, it does not mean that it is the only thing that matters in DCS. Please be so kind and don't forget that.

 

The one thing that does matter to us most, is data and facts that help us fix what we can on our side. And in my opinion we have everything we need in this regard, so now we are going through the process of implementing it. Since our access to missile guidance is extremely limited (and will continue to be even after the new API works), this takes time, as we have to do it together with ED.

 

Thank you for your kind patience in the meantime, and our apologies that the changes will not come with the next patch as previously expected.

 

PS: As for SATAL, Moltar, it is not up to me to comment on your rules, but the data that is coming from an environment that has been restricted to the weakest version of the missile and only two of them, is not representative either. In a sense that experiment has already been tweaked for results. How it would really affect such an environment (6vs6 Pvp) in its entirety and through all versions, we would only know if it would have been used entirely unrestricted. And yes, obviously the INS bug would remain and the assumptions are probably fairly close, but they still remain assumptions beyond what we see happens to the 2 remaining missiles per plane.

[Airhunter]

Thank you for saying this.

[GGTharos]

To back up IM, nothing about the Phoenix itself is 'OP' in-game.

 

The situation is created by the behavior of missiles in DCS, and it is a core DCS issue. There's nothing for HB to fix right now.

 

BUT

 

realize you're likely getting MORE realism WRT this thing in some ways than you do with most of this game when it comes to missiles: RWRs are not perfect things, you might not get the best information for running a constant notch, your RWR might react late or not at all.

 

Adjust tactics accordingly - you can certainly notch the aircraft itself, you can employ chaff (sadly not detectable by radars in DCS which COULD mess up a TWS track, even an STT one though STT would be more resilient) ... if you aren't sure you're notching the missile, turn through the notch while employing chaff, then do it again.

 

I'm not suggesting this will be some sure-fire defense, maybe it won't even really work ... but really, start trying something other than just sitting in the notch or 'split S and extend'.

 

On my end I'll ask if there is some desire to implement a couple of things aside from the fixes that obviously should be made in order to help out here.