Some Suggestions/Requests for Devs: Problems with Missiles

[GGTharos]

There are some serious but small problems with missiles right now which allow some people to 'game the game'. This is my opinion only, but here is what I have observed:

 

Currently all Russian missiles track to an altitude LOWER than what the US missiles do. This causes the following problem (we already discussed the missiles not tracking below a certain altitude and this is similar)

 

You can find an Su-27 or Su-33 or MiG-29 coming head-on at you, he's flying low, you fire an AMRAAM, and the opponent can just 'bounce' the nose down and force the 120 into the ground. You can do the same to R-77 more or less, but it has been very difficult, in my experience, to cause this to happen to any of the R-27 series, and here is why I think this is happening:

 

Because the Amraam loses track when the target is at 20m or less, it fails to 'pull up' with the target as it comes back up to trackable altitude. It slams into the ground. This is VERY easy to accomplish and it's very frustrating and a big problem, as again, we have people just going low and getting rid of missiles effortlessly while theirs don't suffer the same problem.

 

Here are my suggestions to fix this:

While you try to simulate some missiles (particularely R-27EM) having low altitude intercept capability that is supposedly on average better than other R-27's, there's nothing saying that the AIM-120 can't do low-level intercepts (it is after all supposed to go after cruise missiles as well) .

Anyway, my suggestion is, that the way this 'lower tracking altitude' is currently simulated is -so- artificial and allows some level of abuse, that I think the best solution is to just make all missiles equal in terms of tracking altitude -or- make SARH much more vulnerable to chaff (right now they seem almost impossible to decoy with chaff. It happens, but iit works very rarely for me anyway)

 

As I understand it, today fighters are built to get high and fast -quickly- so they get the first shot. LOMAC fails to encourage this currently - even with lofting missiles an enemy can just fly low and 'dump the nose' when the missile goes active and trash it and he never has to go defensive.

 

I'm sorry for making this so long but these things are really frustrating in-game. Russian planes already have EOS and R-27ET's which already theoretically gives them a low altitude advantage, but no fighter/interceptor should be encouraged to do battle at 20m off the ground, IMHO.

 

There are some additional problems demonstrated by ICE in this thread:

http://forum.lockon.ru/viewtopic.php?t=2742

 

I think the alttiude tracking/guidance course problem is a little bigger right now though.

 

I think that missiles should take lead-collifion course when using Mid-Course updates, then proportional when they acquire with their seeker (proportional to the GIMBAL limits which aren't implemented very well for ARH missiles I think) . I think most of this is being done in 1.1, but please, /please/ looking into things that allow people to 'game the game' and essentially gain invulnerability.

[Kula66]

Agreed GGT, I came across a Mig-29 very low yesterday and my 2 remaining AMRAAMs missed from a couple of miles ... then I get a 77 up the chuff as I overshot!

 

It is very frustrating!!!

 

Does the problem affect IR missiles? If not, time to carry 2 'winders for those low flying ... targets, or even got to guns!

 

James

[GGTharos]

It doesn't, but what's that 'winder gonan do against a MiG packing 77's?

 

Or R-27T/ET's?

 

The devs did listen and agreed to make heat seekrs track down to 3m in 1.1, but the problem unfortunately still remains - one solution would be to make all missiles behave the same and cut-off at the same altitude, as well as follow the same type of course, so then they woudl all go intot he ground. IMHO, that would be silly. It may be better to make them trakck very low for now and at the same time degrade radar performance for low-flying aircraft radar (say 750-1000m you get 85% of your normal range, 500-750 you get 75%, 250-500 50% and less than that under 250m) Maybe this is too severe, but there's zero reason for fighters currently to not fly low and just dump missiles into the ground. Still, this won't work with active missiles which can jsut be launched straight up and they'll acquire on their own, but this cuts both ways -and- if say, a MiG suddenly realizes that it won't detect an F-15 until it's within 20km, let alone get a lock, while the F-15 is staring at it from 80km away from an altitude of 30000 feet and luanching a lofted missile from 40-50km it could potentially make lpeople who like to go low less likely to do so. Don't get me wrong, fi you got valleys, hide in the valleys and hunt visually, it's cool.

 

But just running on the deck so that missiles don't hit you at all due to a small motion of the stick is not okay - on flat terrain I believe it is commonly accepted that the low-altitude fighter in a BVR game will be at a disadvantage. Of course, it'd be nice if a real fighter pilot could confirm that, too.

[Chizh]

I agreed too. It's a problem.

We shall try to ask confirm pilots. But in 1.1 it it will not be solved. We had time to do only low interception for IR missiles.

[GGTharos]

I understand. We will live with it for now, thanks for looking into it :)

[Skywall23]

GGTharos this may be a stupid question but....do you have 1.1? :P :o

[Skarp]

Re: Some Suggestions/Requests for Devs: Problems with Missil

 

There are some serious but small problems with missiles right now which allow some people to 'game the game'. This is my opinion only, but here is what I have observed:

 

Currently all Russian missiles track to an altitude LOWER than what the US missiles do. This causes the following problem (we already discussed the missiles not tracking below a certain altitude and this is similar)

 

You can find an Su-27 or Su-33 or MiG-29 coming head-on at you, he's flying low, you fire an AMRAAM, and the opponent can just 'bounce' the nose down and force the 120 into the ground. You can do the same to R-77 more or less, but it has been very difficult, in my experience, to cause this to happen to any of the R-27 series, and here is why I think this is happening:

 

Because the Amraam loses track when the target is at 20m or less, it fails to 'pull up' with the target as it comes back up to trackable altitude. It slams into the ground. This is VERY easy to accomplish and it's very frustrating and a big problem, as again, we have people just going low and getting rid of missiles effortlessly while theirs don't suffer the same problem.

 

Here are my suggestions to fix this:

While you try to simulate some missiles (particularely R-27EM) having low altitude intercept capability that is supposedly on average better than other R-27's, there's nothing saying that the AIM-120 can't do low-level intercepts (it is after all supposed to go after cruise missiles as well) .

Anyway, my suggestion is, that the way this 'lower tracking altitude' is currently simulated is -so- artificial and allows some level of abuse, that I think the best solution is to just make all missiles equal in terms of tracking altitude -or- make SARH much more vulnerable to chaff (right now they seem almost impossible to decoy with chaff. It happens, but iit works very rarely for me anyway)

 

As I understand it, today fighters are built to get high and fast -quickly- so they get the first shot. LOMAC fails to encourage this currently - even with lofting missiles an enemy can just fly low and 'dump the nose' when the missile goes active and trash it and he never has to go defensive.

 

I'm sorry for making this so long but these things are really frustrating in-game. Russian planes already have EOS and R-27ET's which already theoretically gives them a low altitude advantage, but no fighter/interceptor should be encouraged to do battle at 20m off the ground, IMHO.

 

There are some additional problems demonstrated by ICE in this thread:

http://forum.lockon.ru/viewtopic.php?t=2742

 

I think the alttiude tracking/guidance course problem is a little bigger right now though.

 

I think that missiles should take lead-collifion course when using Mid-Course updates, then proportional when they acquire with their seeker (proportional to the GIMBAL limits which aren't implemented very well for ARH missiles I think) . I think most of this is being done in 1.1, but please, /please/ looking into things that allow people to 'game the game' and essentially gain invulnerability.

 

what alt are you shooting from? I really never encountered that problem when i fly around 26,000ft. only time I will have a problem with it is when someone in a su-27 is flying over water at a very low alt and you cant shoot them but they can shoot you.

[Kula66]

I had the problem yesterday over land .... F-15 coming up behind a 29, showing 0 height on the radar, locked, red lights on, count to 5, fire ... then again when first missed ... second also missed :( I should have gone to guns, but I over shot and got a 77 up the tail pipe ... ouch! I don't remember my alte exactly, but I'd just come down from 45k' and was probably at about 3-5k'

 

James

[GGTharos]

Re: Some Suggestions/Requests for Devs: Problems with Missil

 

 

what alt are you shooting from? I really never encountered that problem when i fly around 26,000ft. only time I will have a problem with it is when someone in a su-27 is flying over water at a very low alt and you cant shoot them but they can shoot you.

 

Any altitude, any terrain. While shooting from higher altitudes makes it a -little- riskier for the low-flyer, the technique is still fairly effective.

[Guest Cali]

I came across someone doing this as well. When I told him about this he said it is not a cheat, hmmm whatever. I guess we will start seeing people fly under 20m now. WEEEEEE sounds like fun, SAMS wont hit you if you fly under 10m. enjoy all!!!

[Chisha]

Server admins should add some low level turbulence on missions. Would make it at least little harder for low-flyers. 8)

 

How about some random small-arms fire when flying over enemy territory? This of course would require devs involvement. Some strategically placed MANPADS and AA-guns could do the trick for now. :)

[GGTharos]

Server admins should add some low level turbulence on missions. Would make it at least little harder for low-flyers. 8)

 

How about some random small-arms fire when flying over enemy territory? This of course would require devs involvement. Some strategically placed MANPADS and AA-guns could do the trick for now. :)

 

I do both. Unfortunately the low-alt tracking works on gun sand MANPADS as well, and addtionally 'low level' turbulence seems to start at 100m :(

[Drakkhen]

Server admins should add some low level turbulence on missions. Would make it at least little harder for low-flyers. 8)

 

How about some random small-arms fire when flying over enemy territory? This of course would require devs involvement. Some strategically placed MANPADS and AA-guns could do the trick for now. :)

Two good ideas. In fact, there should also be some ground-effect for very-very-low flying ones... didn't feel it neither while landing nor while dogfighting with exhaust burning grass.

Beside, I'm not for equality between missiles, they are not. Correcting some weapon behaviours is just fine as long as it brings the game closer to real situation feeling, IMHO.

[GGTharos]

THe problem ehre is that it may not be possible to model the environment that forces certain modes of flights realistically.

In that case weapon envelopes or other artifical means of forcing this should be used.

 

What I mean is: Low level turbulence is useless in preventing this - ground bounce interference fo rth elauncher's radar isn't modelled, it's jsut modelled for him as a TARGET (so that missiles suffer) but not for his own radar. This is what's causing problems right now. Lack of ground bounce and clutter problems for the radar.

 

Together with the lofting trajectories and mid course update modelling in 1.1, these things would make people think once or twice before flying 'lowlow' to attack a high-flying interceptor.

[Drakkhen]

Could it be possible to simply simulate radar contact loss with a probability proportionnal to ground altitude when under 30m?

[GGTharos]

It'll be done for 1.2 probably from what I understand. Essentially once under 3000m you start having radar degradation. I think.

[kyjko]

This is by no means an attempt to highjack this thread, but I think there is also some other problems with missiles and people cheating. Last week I was flying online on S77th server and was engaging an F-15 while flying a Flanker we were both under 1000m at a range over 128km. All of a sudden he fires AMRAMM at me at this range and I was way still way out of range of using R27ER. I could not figure out why he shoot at me at this range as no way he could hit. I still turn away at over 100km range to put missile on my 9 position and he also turn away. All of a sudden I see my RWR strength indicator radpidly increase and I dead from missile fired at over 100km away in a matter of seconds. At first I think he cheat and load AIM54 on his plane, but when I check log it said AIM-120. I mention on chat how this could happen and he log off. I wonder if there way to load other missiles on plane like AIM54 and have it appear as AIM-120 or some other name in log. I really think this person cheat, because he also park infront of my plane on tarmac when I spawn in and shoot me with gun when I spawn in. I do understand the missile thing could be LAG problem or something, but I suspicious from player previous action of parking on my AF and kill me with gun when I spawn in. When ask player how he kill me at such far range with AIM-120 he log off. I do want to say, no intention to make this a russian vs american plane flame war. People gaming the game on both sides. Just wonder if this possible to do and if someone know how I get hit from this guy when no way he could have hit me from that far??? I agree with GGtharos, people cheating and gaming the game gotta stop it ruining the fun for all of us that like to play fair. sorry for bad english

[GGTharos]

Yes, it was -probably- some sort of Lag issue but yes, it -may- and I say -may- be possible to use some sort of mod (eg by screwing up pylon numbers) to load an AIM-54 on YOUR computer and make it appear liek a 120 on everyone else's.

 

Asshats will always haunt us everywhere.

[Drakkhen]

In this cheating case, could it be possible for clients to quickly receive some kind of "weapon map (some kind of binary signature)" from server and if client's available weapons doesn't fit to this "map" it is reported or just warned and kicked? ...I mean, a way to have everyone with the same game (thus allowing a modded client to connect on a modded server if they both made the same modifications). :wink: