Exorcet

Chaff overperforms in DCS. I also think the AI's CM effectiveness is better than players, they only ever sprinkle a couple of CM's every few seconds yet this is enough to break missile lock a lot of the time. If you are making your own missions or editing other missions you can remove chaff from aircraft or tell them not to use it.

Along with the need to have interceptors maintain speed and altitudes, we probably also need a low altitude attack option, especially for less capable aircraft. They could use a setting where they attempt to sneak up on other planes by flying low in ground clutter. They should probably reduce radar usage as well or try to rely on external radars like AWACS and EWR.

One has to be careful with this. It's a total assumption if you don't actually know. In any case I don't want to make it seem like all your points are being ignored. The general consensus is that the Phoenix is wrong, but I don't think the answer is to fixing it is trying to fake it to make it fit "eye witness accounts". Just for one thing, you were using the performance of the missile vs the MiG-21 as an indicator that something is wrong, but then this obviously implies than there is no fault with the MiG-21. There is, the AI flight models are off to varying degrees and the AI itself can be a bit all knowing depending on difficult settings. AI that is more realistic would surely help with some of the AIM-54 issues and I think those changes would be more welcome in DCS than a fantasy missile. Sometimes estimates might have to be made, but I think that should be a last resort.

Checklists remain relevant until we have 100% fool proof switches. We don't use the lists because we expect a problem, but to reduce the chance of a problem going undetected. Technically checklists serve their purpose even now in DCS with (mostly) consistent switchology. Has your HOTAS ever been set incorrectly, affecting your virtual cockpit? Have you ever accidentally bumped a switch a pressed a button? Really every modules should come with a set of checklists in the kneeboard from everything from start up to shut down.

Being seen can be a good thing. Even back in the days when all there was online was FC3 I'd use ECM to cover friendlies. I'd turn it on when I was leaving the battlefield. Unsurprisingly I'd get lock warnings on the RWR occasionally despite being 100's of miles from the front lines. I can't be sure if that actually helped anyone in combat, but it may have. Noise jamming still denies range information, so it can be useful. It prevents TWS lofting of active missiles, which lowers their range. Also, it's not the only jamming in DCS. The F-16 specifically has mode 1/2 deception jamming to break lock. You can even see it in the video TEOMOOSE posted. ECM is better now than it has ever been. It still might not be perfect but I think it's actually in a usable state, barring ECM immune planes like the F-14.

As long as it's optional. I avoid the Jester wheel as much as possible.

Damage modeling is absolutely in the scope of DCS. It's a simulator. The plane you fly is supposed to represent the actual plane it's modeled after in reality. That means if you use it incorrectly things break. And believe it or not that's part of the fun, not a detraction from it. Hardcode mode is already in DCS. It's the default mode, not an option that you turn on, and given what DCS is intended to be, this makes sense. I don't mind giving people options to make things easier for them though. I guess if you don't care to be cautious on takeoff you can just toggle immortal on yourself until you retract gears. Or just air start.

You can only successfully contradict the simulation if you're doing an apples to apples test. If missiles in Vietnam were used one way, and the missiles in the sim were used in a different way, you wouldn't have much of a comparison. Essentially it still comes back to numbers. Missile Pk can't be coded into a simulator because it's a dynamic value that depends heavily on circumstance. It's completely sensible to try to compare simulator Pk to real world Pk, but if there is a discrepancy found the only way to fix it is tweaking the numbers in the sim and you certainly don't want to move away from known, correct information. Pk, eyewitness accounts, etc should be used to inform the numbers. In the current case of the AIM-54 we have a code problem. We can't simulate it properly. Perhaps worse than that though is the fact that this code seems to change occasionally. Even if HB tried to fudge numbers to account for the code issue, there is no guarantee that things would work properly in the next patch. If we could be assured of some consistency then things wouldn't be so bad. The AIM-54 for a couple of patches ago seemed to do reasonably well. In my own experience it comes down to missile glide time, loft trajectory, and ECCM. The Phoenix doesn't like to turn since it bleeds speed rather quickly so you don't want to have it glide for too long. Loft trajectory needs to be such that the missile is not constantly turning, this goes back to the bleed speed issue. ECCM is basically the chaff reject value of the seeker, not much for the pilot to do here. Hitting a maneuvering fighter is absolutely possible with the current missile, it's just that the criteria for a successful hit force a pretty narrow optimal launch window.

I can't watch your tacviews, but if missiles are shot under poor parameters, numbers won't matter. If 12 missiles are launched at once and the first has a low chance of impact, most likely so do the other 11. Whether there is or isn't, I'm not sure such data would be particularly helpful. DCS isn't a statistical simulator and it's certainly not trying to hardcode situations. Whether the missile hits the MiG depends on the modeling of the missile and the plane. That is the relevant data that we need.

ECM wise yes, but weight and drag differs. The 184 Short is the best pod. ECM vs players has always had some value. You just don't want to leave it on indefinitely.

I don't get that from the line you quoted. Without information related to Bentley vehicles in particular, the simulation would probably not be very good. Car is a really broad category, knowing that category in general doesn't mean you know much about Bentley's. I'd expect a pilot with no FBW experience might say that about a FBW aircraft when everything is perfectly fine. You can't expect general knowledge to cover specific knowledge in all cases. I'm sure that happens, but keep in mind some of them turn out to be false alarms don't they? I've also seen the opposite. I had a serious brake issue on my car once and when I took it to an experience mechanic he did not find a problem the first time he looked over the car. His feeling was totally wrong.

How do you build experience in simulations? Through numbers. Numbers really are all that there is. Code doesn't work with feelings. Even in this case (AIM-54), we can see that numbers are the problem. The missile is currently stuck on old missile code that isn't very flexible, is inaccurate in a number of situations, and seemingly isn't very consistent from patch to patch. HB is doing their job by making a more accurate missile, though they have their hands tied by some unfortunately circumstances. Eventually things will get better. We don't know when this will happen, but eventually the Phoenix will move to the new API and we will actually have it properly modeled. Until then, we just have to make do and wait.

The entire paint/skin system needs to be looked over. It's inconsistent and half finished. Some liveries even change depending on the order you look at them.

They can also be really flaky with supporting their missiles. I was just flying F-14 vs MiG-25, and the MiG would fire first with AA-6's which are much faster than AIM-7's. Yet immediately upon firing back with AIM-7's the AI would turn and break lock despite having the advantage. I'd suggest adding AI comments to existing threads so they're all in one place and can be referenced easily.

Thanks, so it's actually similar to my Phoenix (totally expected if we're on the same patch). 45ish degrees is about the most aggressive angle I'd want to see in the climb but I know it can go above that depending on launch angle.

Not a hard cap. Maybe "squish" is a better term. Basically the higher you go, the flatter the missile flies. Previously the altitude didn't shape the loft as much, at least as I recall. Whatever the case, the loft has some odd behavior and it's definitely not optimal at this point in time.

I think it might be slightly more accurate to say it capped loft altitude. The missile can still climb at pretty aggressive angles. Are you hitting at 50 nmi? I find that 40 is just about max range against Ace AI that I'm testing against. I tried a few shots at 60 just now. 40k no loft, 40k 30 deg loft, and 50k no loft. Nothing hit, but the latter two were 1.5 nmi from target at 1000 knots while the first shot was 3.6. Previous testing at 40 nmi isn't a 100% hit rate but that where the AI starts getting killed and I have had the most success getting as high as possible and firing level.

Just looking at the images those lofts seem a bit shallower than mine, but if you have the max pitch angle of the missile that would give us a number to compare.

A P-61C would probably fit better with all the late model German aircraft, but we have two Fw-190's so why not multiple versions of this.

For me, the AIM-54 pretty consistently adds 20-30 degrees to whatever its initial launch angle is. Even when firing at far off targets it will pitch up to 50+ degrees if I try to assist it. Are you seeing similar values? Unfortunately I don't have tacview. I just launch and watch the missile in F6.

What intentional is my lowering the loft angle, not the loft logic currently implemented. The current logic is pretty bad in my opinion, which is why I don't try to assist. We may not be talking about the same thing. I'm saying that an assisted loft, despite getting to higher altitude, throws away the advantages it should have because the current loft logic climbs way too steeply and pulls way to hard on the way down. This isn't about comparing Phoenix versions, but maximizing performance of what we have currently. Without loft assist I'm seeing similar impact velocity. I just did a couple of test flights to confirm and 30 degree nose up actually ended up with the AIM-54 flying over the target and chasing it from behind in one case. I tried to increase launch range to give the missile more room to maneuver, but then it just ran out of energy for me.

I realize not assisting limits the altitude, although that's intentional. While giving it an upward angle gets it higher, it bleeds the extra energy by climbing too aggressively and then turning tighter to come out of the loft. I tested a few altitudes and angles and found that level launch at 40k+ gave me the best result. It some cases the missile even had the energy to chase down a fighter than turn and ran (when it went active, turn and run on launch is a guaranteed escape). The AIM-54 will under perform until it's moved to the new API. Remember the AMRAAM before it was able to properly loft, you could barely fight BVR with it. Until the missile gets the latest code, I'm considering it firmly WIP. As far as the Tomcat's strengths and weaknesses go, I think that's always solvable through mission design. Aircraft availability can be tweaked on each side, and you can always try to cooperate with other planes that can cover your weaknesses. Until we get a F-15 or something, all the more modern fighters have much weaker radars than the Tomcat. If I'm in a F-16 I'd love to have a F-14 looking over my shoulder.

Yeah the flaps are correct, the tanks aren't.

What happened to realism above all else? This again just like someone being arbitrarily selective. OK, but if it's not affecting you, why does what you think matter? Opinions are fine, but not having something just because you don't like it is silly. You're right, we can just have an assist added to the game.