rossmum

Ehh. I reckon I could smoke a Sparrow-loaded 14A but only if I got close enough to it. The B just has unholy thrust that makes it hard to catch with anything, the weaker performance of the TF-30 combined with comp stalls should make it less easy for them. Maybe very limited spawns for the more capable birds, and very limited supplies of their respective SARH missiles.

Suppose I might as well do the forums posting thing. Regarding current loadouts - I did mention this when I saw you on the server earlier, but the rear-aspect setup isn't really that fair on blue. Red players know they can't shoot us head-on at all, and the R-60 will frequently make insanely short turns to hit them in the merge. With that said I'm not entirely sure going back to the R-13 is necessarily the best idea either, and it kinda bums me out that the 21's signature weapon isn't available a lot of the time because it's technically all-aspect. If people want to fly at mid/high alt and ignore being locked up, they're kind of asking for an R-3R to the face, honestly. The 9P5 acts as a good equaliser and when everyone has some all-aspect capability (rather than just one team) it forces them to adapt and stop just flying straight and level into a merge in full reheat. As for the 23 - given the Phantom is looking like a bit of a pipe dream at the moment, what's the plan for that? The ML is going to be pretty insanely capable compared to what we currently have, and what we'll be getting soon (unless the F1 is closer than I thought). The Crusader won't really cut it as a counter. Will it be included with the R-23 or as a limited, pseudo-MS? In the latter case it'll still have a radar far beyond what anyone else does, though... I can't wait for it, but I don't want things to be too easy for us red players :D I'd fully support swapping out the 25T with the 25A, although it means a bit of a capability gap between red and blue maybe this could be compensated for some other way. The 25T is a bit of a weird duck since Russia barely even built any of the things.

Yeah, definitely don't cut throttle on landing. Your blown flaps system stops working below 80% RPM, so stay at or above that until you're just about to touch down - use the airbrake to regulate speed if you're too fast. I aim to be 'over the fence' at 380 and touch down between 280 and 320. Don't land over 1500L fuel unless you absolutely have to. Be prepared to lose a tyre if you're overweight. I frequently use T/O flaps because I chronically approach low and fast (a habit I can't seem to kick IRL as well as in sims), same rules as normal. Power on. Takeoff flaps are also a huge boon if you need to turn tightly, get your speed under 600, drop the flaps one stage, and slap the emergency burner on. This works best with a clean aircraft, missiles and racks will cause you to stall out much sooner but if you do this clean, you can turn with or inside most F-5 pilots' ability. Keep your speed up when engaging groups, but if you find a lone opponent, know that you can take things slow and he probably isn't even aware of that.

Just practice, and sometimes less is more when it comes to controls. Most of the time when people complain it's hard to fly, it's because they're over-controlling the aircraft when it doesn't need any input.

It should be totally independent of the engine, it's feeding off a fixed air tank rather than the bleed air off the compressor. I don't know how the tank would be full but the system not functional, I've never experienced it. You're absolutely sure the gauge read full for both normal and emergency pressure?

Glad to hear you've been enjoying it! I take it my salesman pitch worked, then? :lol:

NOT AN ENGINEER but from what I understand, there are ways to mitigate it through design and certain aircraft do retain usable roll authority even well into the stall. That said, I don't think the 21 has any of the usual design features that cause this, and it also lacks roll from the stabs (as correctly modelled visually, and as far as I can tell reflected in the FM - I think old problems of retaining roll auth without ailerons was a DM problem where it thought they were still there). Thankfully, whether it's accurate or still needs tweaking, it shouldn't really make too big an impact on gameplay as putting yourself into that state during a fight is 100% going to result in death, you're a standing target and will take forever to regain your speed. As for T/O and landing... landing doesn't feel much different to me other than the aircraft is slightly more prone to wandering. The bounce induced by the suspension stiffness is what's messing with me most, including for T/O. I fly by feel and not any manuals, so maybe doing a by-the-book landing is complicated now, but my usual standby of coming in at 380-400 and then dropping to 280-320 over the fence hasn't been causing any issues at all.

Don't pull. Trim until the neutral light goes out, then trim the same amount again. It should either rotate by itself or require only a feather-light touch to the stick to bring it off, be ready to counter with a gentle nose-down push if it bounces too hard and comes up too quickly.

At least some of the takeoff behaviour seems to be due to the stiffer suspension rather than the flight dynamics, by 250+ you're already bouncing quite hard and it doesn't take much to cause the nose to bounce right off the ground.

The 19 actually does have roll trim, but it's a separate 3-position sprung switch on the left console, near the radio channel selector panel. AFAIK roll trim didn't move to the stick until the 29 - all 23 sticks I've seen still have the old style pitch-only trim switch.

The MiG-15 also has a different control system and flies at much lower speeds.

That's why it's only viable either against lone enemies, or groups of enemies who are too busy worrying about their own tail to offer mutual protection. There's a big distinction between things that are risky for tactical reasons and ones which are risky because the aircraft will try and kill you. A lot of people mix these up and then scratch their heads when a plane they thought was incapable of turning cuts inside their circle and deletes them.

I have all the gear controls bound on my HOTAS for muscle memory purposes (same with weapons control panel). It's easier to reach for something IRL than swap hands on the stick, look at the relevant control, move the mouse to it and click it while my subtle head movements are making it hard to be precise, then swap hands again.

While a single pair of double racks isn't too bad for weight or drag, carrying one on every pylon is, and unless you religiously manually select the appropriate pylon after every shot, you'll end up with an imbalanced loadout and a very, very bad roll tendency in an aircraft without roll trim.

It doesn't, however, stop you carrying 4 R-60s and 4 R-60Ms (which I strongly advise against).

Eh, I'd disagree on the above. With emergency burner, some discipline, and especially a stage of flap out, you can hold 30 indicated pretty comfortably. You'll be slow and vulnerable to attack from another enemy, but your average F-5 driver starts panicking when the plane he thinks can only go fast is cutting inside his turns and happily staying airborne as he's approaching a stall himself.

My usual combat load is 2x R-3R and 4x (occasionally 2x, but rarely) R-60M. People talk a lot about the draggy double racks but it isn't that big of a tradeoff at all in my experience, and between the weak warhead of the R-60 and the generally chaotic furballs that develop on Cold War servers, I'd rather have the extra sticks. Punch off the racks when empty. The R-3Rs are useful for killing oblivious cosmonauts or forcing someone to chicken out of a head-on merge, and you can also use fixed beam's ghetto boresight ability to pop someone in a dogfight if you run out of heaters. R-13s are something I only carry when I'm deliberately trying to make a 'fair' setup for practice against an F-5, or when I'm forced to forsake the R-3R. The extra range and extra explosive power isn't worth the far worse turning ability of the missile, the R-60 is god when it comes to close range. Any other missile exists only for memes or specific historical setups IMO.