F-15 Radar bugs?

[capttrob]

Hi everyone,

 

It seems the F-15 radar drops targets as they get closer even when locked. I asked someone else online who has more experience than me regarding if the target is able to go into a sort of "stealth mode", and he felt it was a bug.

 

If im flying in RWS or TWS BVR, as the target gets closer, i adjust range to get better SA. I "trim" my radar so the target altitude and bearing are centered on elevation and azimuth (directly ahead and centered in between radar elevation limits). So i know he is definitely being scanned. As i get to about 20 miles, the target dissapears. Adjusting elevation for radar scan as needed to constantly have a good few thousand feet above and below the targets' altitude, but he goes "POOF". Sometimes this happens if the target gets shot down by someone else, but this isnt the case with what im experiencing. The target will dissapear, and before i know it, reappears at like 3 miles firing an IR missle. Is there some sort of "stealth mode" in this game? I know targets are harder to detect if they dont have their radar on, but not within 20 miles...? Sometimes if i hit bore mode and fly the circle to him visually, it also fails to detect within 10 miles, although rare.

 

Any input appreciated...

 

edit: Also, it takes 3 Aim-120's to get a hit at 15-20 miles. I'll deliberately climb to FL250 or above and wait for the target to come well within the slider on the VSD before firing (steering dot centered). Still takes 3 missles. 30% kill rate doesnt seem very promising for such a widely touted missle.

 

One guy actually got angry with me cause i fired 3 missles at him and shot him down. Saying i "shot my wad" and that pilots should fire 2 and then come in with guns. Is this an unwritten rule somewhere? If my sticks miss you, you can be sure there are more coming until my rails are empty or you are a fireball.. whichever comes first....lol. I'll switch to guns when im too close for missles. :-)

[Weta43]

Tell him if he promises not to beam or use more than 2 flares/chaff you'll only use 2 missiles.

[LaRata]

Hello :)

 

1. The AIM-120 will fail his target has other Air-To-Air missiles .

2. In Kosovo Air War NONE of the Mig-29 will be shoot down using only one AIM-120.

3. In Iraq about 1996 ; 4 x AIM-120 and ; 2 x AIM-54 fail to destroy 5 x Iraqui Mig-25 in the No-Fly Zone...

 

The AIM-120 is not invincible ;)

 

Not sure that situation in the game is a bug but it will be very bad to be shot down in this situation

 

 

LaRata

[Pilotasso]

Hello :)

 

1. The AIM-120 will fail his target has other Air-To-Air missiles .

2. In Kosovo Air War NONE of the Mig-29 will be shoot down using only one AIM-120.

3. In Iraq about 1996 ; 4 x AIM-120 and ; 2 x AIM-54 fail to destroy 5 x Iraqui Mig-25 in the No-Fly Zone...

 

The AIM-120 is not invincible ;)

 

Not sure that situation in the game is a bug but it will be very bad to be shot down in this situation

 

 

LaRata

 

You should be carefull with those statements. You should also say in wich conditions they hapened. The yuguslav mig-29 kill by a dutch F-16, was not 1 but 2 aircraft wich fired 4 AIM-120B's. All missiles were launched "on the edge of the envelope" as it was stated.

 

As for the Iraqui failed intercepts it is relevant to mention that is extremely difficult to intercept any aircraft that turns tail and runs at mach 2.5 as soon as it knows its being painted.

 

Its still different from what we get ingame. Out of 10 AMRAAM's I only get kill and then sometimes I spend whole sessions without a single slammer kill. And this is like 10 miles to target here.

[BeetleJuice]

IIRC the 120 has problems tracking a target that flies lower than you, I think this is called ground clutter. Also, the way radar works has a weakness if the target puts you on his 9 or 3 o'clock, called "beaming". Combine these two factors with some chaff and you'll loose lock. In LockOn its better to look-up and shoot-up.

 

The more experienced players will have better explanations :)

[capttrob]

Thanks for the replys guys.

 

Im losing lock and getting the disappearing act with head on engagements mostly. I'll pay more attention next time to beaming. But i believe beaming is more of an evasive maneuver to run down the energy of the missle chasing you. Beaming will and should make it difficult for doppler radars to detect speed and motion, but it shouldnt fail to detect a primary reflection. Metal is metal. I'll definitely keep a closer eye on it and see if its more of a beaming issue than a possible bug.

 

From what i have been reading, ground clutter can be a problem for Nap of the earth detection if the target is flying over a congested city, but my targets were well above terrain mostly. Climbing will definitely put you at an advantage for longer missle range. At least in theory.... ;)

[BeetleJuice]

Climbing will definitely put you at an advantage for longer missle range. At least in theory.... ;)

 

In real life, yes. LockOn is different :)

[GGTharos]

Hello :)

 

1. The AIM-120 will fail his target has other Air-To-Air missiles .

 

Huh?

 

2. In Kosovo Air War NONE of the Mig-29 will be shoot down using only one AIM-120.

 

How about the only two-shot-two-kill TWS shot taken by an F-15?

 

3. In Iraq about 1996 ; 4 x AIM-120 and ; 2 x AIM-54 fail to destroy 5 x Iraqui Mig-25 in the No-Fly Zone...

 

No, yet most of the 120's kills are single-shot kills. And?

 

 

The AIM-120 is not invincible ;)

 

Not sure that situation in the game is a bug but it will be very bad to be shot down in this situation

 

 

LaRata

 

It isn't invincible, but it's much, much deadlier than it is in the game ;)

[nscode]

How about the only two-shot-two-kill TWS shot taken by an F-15?

 

How about shots against pilots who DID see a long range missile at work and don't head towords it?

[GGTharos]

They did see it coming, their RWR said 'eeek!' ...but it was a little too late by then.

 

And in your scenario, that's 'winning without firing a shot'.

[Ironhand]

...Beaming will and should make it difficult for doppler radars to detect speed and motion, but it shouldnt fail to detect a primary reflection...

You are correct. The radar doesn't fail to detect a primary reflection. It just doesn't display the return on the screen in a look down situation, if that reflection's Doppler falls below the gate. (You may already be aware of the following...) This is the famous (infamous?) Doppler notch. In order to filter out ground returns, objects approaching below a certain speed are filtered out and not displayed. So, if he beams you in a manner that allows the closure speed to fall below that cutoff point, he will disappear on you. Your radar may be seeing him but it's no longer telling you about him. This isn't an issue in a look-up situation because there's no reason to filter the returns. The gate is removed and he is displayed as a beaming target.

 

Rich

[Pilotasso]

You are correct. The radar doesn't fail to detect a primary reflection. It just doesn't display the return on the screen in a look down situation, if that reflection's Doppler falls below the gate. [...] objects approaching below a certain speed are filtered out and not displayed. [...]This isn't an issue in a look-up situation because there's no reason to filter the returns.

Rich

 

F-15A's used to pick cars in high ways. They filtered it out by computer algoritms.

 

If I designed my own aircraft to take it myself for war I would have writen an algo wich allowed the radar to target a fighter that slowed or notched from a higher speed untill the radar's physical limits.

[Kenan]

It isn't invincible, but it's much, much deadlier than it is in the game ;)

 

"Much, much deadlier"?

 

Amraam in LOCKON is pretty much deadly.

 

You forgot to mention that in this sim (as in most of them), we are given unlimited hours of online practise against other human pilots so, amraam "not being that deadly as it is in the real life" doesn't mean it's undermodelled in the game, just that the real life pilots, like those serbian ones, didn't have opportunity to load up a track file and practise for hole day barell-roll, f-pole and shit-pole manouvers against NATO fighters. So there you go: they heard "eeek" and got shot down with a lot, lot less chance to figure out what's going on. Not a consequence of a ueber missile, but rather lack of knowledge (and practise) about one.

 

Maybe the info we have in Lockon is completely false, BUT we still use it, combined with marathon multiplayer sessions to beat the Amraam.

 

You can make it super-duper-omg deadly in Lockon, players will eventually figure out (after dropping from high school, lossing job, wife etc.) how to beat it, or at least evade it.

 

I remmeber when the patch got out, all those guys who were flying ruskie planes (me included) were smacked off the sky with those TWS shots, while not having their ECM on. Once we learned about it, most of us started always using ECM when in a firing range, to at least get a missile warning when being fire upon.

 

So, IRL you dont have opportunity to get shot down 73 times and learn all about your threat. You have a lot less flying hours, a lot lerss resources and you can't respawn/recover (at least not back in this world).

 

So yes, it IS much deadlier IRL but not because I or you can 'easily' evade it in the game.

[GGTharos]

Actually you're wrong. The real AMRAAM performs better in terms of seeker capability, -and- maneuverability.

 

If you think a barrel roll will beat a missile head-on you'd definitely get shot down a lot RL ;) There's a kalman loop filter that takes care of this as is, and besides, real missiles have better guidance constant qualities than LO's missiles.

 

 

I'm sorry Kenan, but I'm acutely aware that you don't know much about dodging in-game missiles ;) I know too much about them and I have tracks of your flying ... I can tell.

 

Having ECM on all the time is the worst thing you can do, since it's a completely silent shot and the warning comes at half the distance it normally would.

 

Your assessment is a nice theory, but in the end, incorrect. The real AMRAAM would give you less warning than you get in LOMAC right now, and it wouldn't slow down quite as fast. At the same time, your own defensive maneuvers against it would be more limited in a real fighter than in LO.

[nscode]

They did see it coming, their RWR said 'eeek!' ...but it was a little too late by then.

 

They saw it's trail much earlier than their twd sayed eek.

[GGTharos]

That part I missed. Thanks.

[nscode]

Btw, that also contributes to what you're saying about late detection...

[GGTharos]

Are you saying they were detected early and still not dodged?

 

Just trying to get on the same page ...

[Pilotasso]

They saw it's trail much earlier than their twd sayed eek.

 

HA-HA!

It beats ED to add a trail for AMRAAM. I always hated to see it float away. Both in LO and F4. ;)

[Kenan]

Actually you're wrong. The real AMRAAM performs better in terms of seeker capability, -and- maneuverability.

 

And? If you had it 100% simulated in LOMAC, you think people wouldn't find a way to dodge it ie. fight against it? What's the point?

 

It would just make it a bigger challenge for them, but after hours and hours of sitting in front their PC's they'd find its weaknesses and exploit them big time.

 

Untill, that is, a well known resident know-how forum GGuru jumps in and says "Well, you know, IRL it's lot more deadly, because it just can't be right for you guys evading it so easy in the sim. So it must be something wrong with the LOCKON Amraam. I'll just tell ED they cranck it up a little."

Oh, and the smiley >> ;)

 

 

I'm sorry Kenan, but I'm acutely aware that you don't know much about dodging in-game missiles I know too much about them and I have tracks of your flying ... I can tell.

 

Well, I must say I'm pretty honoured, getting recorded and studied by an expert online pilot of your calibre (who is also testing the game for ages before it gets out to public ROFL)..I mean...the only right way for me to repay you, would be to, well, start recording my own tracks of you flying..but, since I'm sadly, no longer in 504th it wouldn't make much sence to do that, and I think picking my nose or watching paint dry would be a lot more productive way to spend an hour of my life.

 

BUT, since you did record those tracks, it's pretty strange you say I suck at dodging missiles as, if I remmeber correctly, you 44th guys used to fire so many Amraams at me (and miss) that you had to go RTB, refuel and rearm, while I was orbiting around nearby hill twidling my toes out of boredom.

 

Oh well, I must be getting old so it may be possible I have no idea what I'm mumbling about.

 

Having ECM on all the time is the worst thing you can do, since it's a completely silent shot and the warning comes at half the distance it normally would.

 

Yes, but it gives you pretty much enough warning and time, not only to turn away but even to fire your missile (ER/ET or R77).

 

Your assessment is a nice theory, but in the end, incorrect. The real AMRAAM would give you less warning than you get in LOMAC right now, and it wouldn't slow down quite as fast. At the same time, your own defensive maneuvers against it would be more limited in a real fighter than in LO.

 

And how does that makes my theory incorrect?

Are you saying if all those things were implemented in Lockon, online ruskie plane pilots would never evolve and find a way of dealing against it?

 

Or are you saying it would make their efforts a lot more difficult? In that case, it's still possible and my theory holds and you don't know what you're talking about.

 

V55

[nscode]

Are you saying they were detected early and still not dodged?

 

Just trying to get on the same page ...

They SAW their trails early, but thought they were targets, airplanes, so they headed towords them. Only after some time did they get beeping and realised those were missiles, but at that time it was late.

 

Leader had complete radar failure. Num 2's radar was suposed to be working (failure was not indicated), but at no time did he have a target detection. It seemes that leader's TWD was also failed or partialy failed from this dialog:

2: target left

1: great, have you got them locked?

2: no, SPO!

 

So 2 had an SPO painted detection when 1 did not.

 

At least this is what I remamber from reading it a few months ago. I don't know if there is a translated version of the aricle and I can't find the serbian one right now.. it was a picture of a scaned news paper page so it's harder to find. I'll try to translate it fully when I find it and get some free time..

[GGTharos]

IIRC I read one of those fighters actually launched a missile after getting the warning.

[nscode]

No.. when their commander phones the surviving pilot (he was still in Bosnia) and asks him "Did you at least do something 'smart'?" he responds "no.. haven't fired one rocket"

[GGTharos]

Hmm ... there was an interview with one of the pilots somewhere, where he said he launched a missile ... I will try to find it.

[nscode]

Think that was the one near Titel, in Serbia. Got blown right after.