Chaff and R27(E)R

[FLANKERATOR]

ED recently announced some tweaking regarding heat seeking missiles but what really caught my eye is the probability stuff they mentioned. Not sure but there could be no accurate formula used to decide whether an A2A missile would hit or not. I mean it could be based on plain probability only, which could be calculated based on the presence or absence of factors like target lock, aspect, countermeasures, look up /look down, G number.... Etc

 

It would make sense as it seems to me a quite difficult task to come up with an accurate way of modeling this given the amount of things coming into play.

 

That being said, there is obviously something wrong with current implementation of SARH missiles and in the main scheme of things, the Flanker is the first to be affected as the ER is its main BVR option.

 

My opinion is that ED must give this some priority and tackle it once for all. Let's remember that this software is first and foremost about combat and there is quite of an issue now at the top of the chain that is crippling air superiority fighters and particularly the Su-27.

 

Also from a PvP perspective, results from anything involving those missiles will be questionable.

[Cik]

ED recently announced some tweaking regarding heat seeking missiles but what really caught my eye is the probability stuff they mentioned. Not sure but there could be no accurate formula used to decide whether an A2A missile would hit or not. I mean it could be based on plain probability only, which could be calculated based on the presence or absence of factors like target lock, aspect, countermeasures, look up /look down, G number.... Etc

 

It would make sense as it seems to me a quite difficult task to come up with an accurate way of modeling this given the amount of things coming into play.

 

That being said, there is obviously something wrong with current implementation of SARH missiles and in the main scheme of things, the Flanker is the first to be affected as the ER is its main BVR option.

 

My opinion is that ED must give this some priority and tackle it once for all. Let's remember that this software is first and foremost about combat and there is quite of an issue now at the top of the chain that is crippling air superiority fighters and particularly the Su-27.

 

Also from a PvP perspective, results from anything involving those missiles will be questionable.

 

hear hear. it gets very east vs west in here but really it effects everyone. eagles just don't feel it as bad because the AMRAAM is more resilient to CM.

 

unfortunately there isn't a huge drive from their quarter because the sparrow isn't their core BVR option.

 

anyway, a rising tide lifts all boats, so here's hoping.

[Sweep]

^We could limit F-15s to 120Bs...

 

Those like CMs, if I'm remembering right.

 

Need more -7 vs -27R, so we can all get our inner chaff spammer on.

[Cik]

^We could limit F-15s to 120Bs...

 

Those like CMs, if I'm remembering right.

 

Need more -7 vs -27R, so we can all get our inner chaff spammer on.

 

well, i'd like to play 80s~ era scenarios with R-27R and T vs AIM-7 sparrow

 

unfortunately i feel it would probably be pointless as you'd play for a few hours with no kills recorded :^)

[GGTharos]

those missiles have missed in a way that's physically impossible. here's my question, because what scorch says is reasonable in many ways:

 

Those missiles have already missed when they go after HOB chaff. If looks silly but it's irrelevant. It is NOT the problem.

[Cik]

the problem is that the way it works out makes no sense; the radar can maintain a lock against something but not guide missiles to it.

 

either the chaff needs to actually cause a dropped lock (and thus, kill the inflight missiles ability to track entirely) or the missile needs to actually track the target.

 

missiles tracking chaff even though the radar clearly has a hard lock on the target makes no sense at all.

 

is that what you are getting at? i am so confused.

 

i hesitate to offer critique but you should stop being so damnably cryptic all the time and just say what you think is actually wrong about the missile modeling.

[SDsc0rch]

going to my list......

 

chaff *should* affect radar (yeah, the radar in the nose of your aircraft)

 

this isn't modeled

 

chaff effectiveness is modeled ("modeled" - see above) to a degree - but not for the aircraft-mounted radar ----- that's why you see the disconnect, cik

 

and its understandable why you would raise that objection

 

you don't see the radar target designator box being pulled off the target that you can see in the HUD with your eyes

 

i for one would think that would be a cool effect

 

just like the AIM-9 seeker head is pulled off the target when there are flares or missiles within the seeker FOV

[GGTharos]

What you're not getting is that you're making an issue of a minor nuance that amounts to a visually silly result but an effectively valid one (the missile had missed already at which point it fund finds summer chaff bundles somewhere to go after). No I can't really say everything right now, and it's what I know, not what I believe.

 

i hesitate to offer critique but you should stop being so damnably cryptic all the time and just say what you think is actually wrong about the missile modeling.

[Cik]

so you're saying that the missile modeling is correct and that it does model CW/M-link communication, the real position of the radar beam and such, but then it deliberately is programmed to look like it does not?

 

a very bizarre thing to assert, considering the job they did on faking a poor implementation of chaff looks very convincing.

[GGTharos]

There's no CW (neither radar set uses it, not that this is particularly relevant to anything) and mlink is ignored after the seeker comes on line. Mlink being used for discrimination is only valid for 120 and later, but it isn't modeled anyway.

 

None of this matters :-)

 

There's no deliberate programming of missiles pretending to do something different than what's happening in the simulation. Is a simple fact that a missile that goes way out of its way for some distant bundle of chaff is a missile that has already lost track, and while this looks silly, is completely irrelevant and not the real issue. It is effectively cosmetic.

 

Get off it, it's not helping anyone.

Edited January 3, 2016 by GGTharos

[Nerd1000]

What you're not getting is that you're making an issue of a minor nuance that amounts to a visually silly result but an effectively valid one (the missile had missed already at which point it fund finds summer chaff bundles somewhere to go after). No I can't really say everything right now, and it's what I know, not what I believe.

 

Are you implying that the game uses the RNG to decide whether the missile is spoofed at the moment of chaff launching from the target, and then if the spoof roll is successful commands the missile to fly towards a randomly selected chaff cloud?

[GGTharos]

The RNG operates for that missile when the chaff bundle enters the missile seeker's iFOV.

Not quite what you said.

[Cik]

so it just rolls for every chaff in the FOV

 

how does that even make sense, none of them are even being illuminated by anything

 

why are they decoying things if there is no way for the missile to even know they exist?

 

what?

 

so if them being hit is entirely cosmetic, them DECOYING things isn't cosmetic. how is this not a huge problem?

 

HUH?

[GGTharos]

so if them being hit is entirely cosmetic, them DECOYING things isn't cosmetic. how is this not a huge problem?

 

HUH?

 

The very obvious fact here is that the missile is no longer looking at the target, and what happens with it at this point isn't terribly important. This is effectively cosmetic. Wrong, but cosmetic.

[Cik]

if i'm actually wrong about this i'd appreciate you helping me understand

 

i'm a su-27 with 6x R-27ER

 

in front of me at co-altitude is a F-15.

 

i begin illuminating him

 

i launch a missile

 

my radar keeps a continuous track of his airplane the whole time

 

the missile misses, decoyed onto a piece of chaff my radar is not and has never been tracking.

 

so, keeping in mind that since it's a SARH missile and the only thing it does is follow the 'paint' that it's host aircraft is providing, how can it be decoyed by a chaff it's host aircraft's radar has not been decoyed by?

 

is the entire function of a SARH missile just handwaved? is the R-27ER secretly a AMRAAM such that it has it's own missile radar it can turn on and actually seek independently?

 

how is this not entirely incorrect?

[GGTharos]

SARH has its own radar by definition, is just not capable of emitting. It doesn't care what your aircraft radar is tracking with the obvious caveat that said target should be inside or fairly close to the radar beam of the emitting aircraft, or at least a signal like it (eg jammer). In game there only one signal that missile will ever follow, aside from the jammer of its hoj capable.

[pr1malr8ge]

if i'm actually wrong about this i'd appreciate you helping me understand

 

i'm a su-27 with 6x R-27ER

 

in front of me at co-altitude is a F-15.

 

i begin illuminating him

 

i launch a missile

 

my radar keeps a continuous track of his airplane the whole time

 

the missile misses, decoyed onto a piece of chaff my radar is not and has never been tracking.

 

so, keeping in mind that since it's a SARH missile and the only thing it does is follow the 'paint' that it's host aircraft is providing, how can it be decoyed by a chaff it's host aircraft's radar has not been decoyed by?

 

is the entire function of a SARH missile just handwaved? is the R-27ER secretly a AMRAAM such that it has it's own missile radar it can turn on and actually seek independently?

 

how is this not entirely incorrect?

 

 

Just because your radar is rejecting the return from the chaff does not mean your missile is able to do so either

 

The image below is sort of what a radar return looks like when chaff is also being illuminated. Imagine that this ball in the image below is the size of a KC130 or bigger your missile could easily miss if following any point but the one leading to the target. Unlike the Jet that has much bigger/better computing power to filter out all the false returns. Keep in mind, that a Radar illumination IS not a pin point beam it is a cone and spreads with distance. Chaff is designed to REFLECT as much energy as possible. So it will look much larger with less energy then that of the targeted aircraft.

 

 

Edited January 3, 2016 by pr1malr8ge

[Weta43]

the missile misses, decoyed onto a piece of chaff my radar is not and has never been tracking.

It doesn't matter whether your aircraft's radar was tracking it, if the missiles seeker's radar couldn't differentiate between the return from the target, the return from the chaff, and tracks the return from the chaff inside the radar 'cone' around your target illuminated by your radar for just long enough that when the chaff stops being a valid target (either because it's no longer illuminated, or has 'stopped') the seeker can't find the original return from the target inside it's FOV, then it was 'distracted' by chaff & it's a miss - doesn't matter at that point to the game whether it just goes ballistic, or keeps tracking the chaff that should IRL now be invisible to the seeker.

[Boberro]

Did you lead the missile? I've seen this problem with AMRAAM exactly because it lofts (poorly) in DCS. The lack of loft from ER is a good thing in comparison. The ER also has great kinematics as of the last time I tested it.

 

Yes and no.

I guided it, stopped, reacquired.

I kept radar on the target, no problem. But when I watched missile on F6 I've seen how it went stupid to the left for 1-2 seconds, then suddenly returned to guide on target. Twice happened during its flight.

I guess enemy chaff worked and made ER to fly this weird path.

 

I do not it was supposed to be like that. Green line is theoretical path to the target, black line is real path chosen by missile. Arrows shows missile position, how it turned left\right like. Difference in paths between green and black line is market as orange degree symbol.

 

Edited January 3, 2016 by Boberro

[TAW_Blaze]

@Sweeper

 

If ED got it right and this is how (E)Rs work in real life than I should stop lobbying ED and start lobbying Moscow and all their export customers about how entirely useless their missiles are. Their tax payers need to know. Snowden, are you reading this?

 

 

And an excert from one you may recognise;) When not flying straight and level 30 degree offset is all it takes baby!

 

 

Honestly. Look me in the proverbial eye after youve watched all three videos and tell me you would be happy with that.

 

I think we already established the fact that testing any kind of missile performance against the AI is useless a very long time ago. Remember when Falcon made a thread where he spawned a gazillion flankers around himself and all of them missed their ERs?

 

The AI doesn't even know how to operate the radar for ****s sake. How do you expect their missiles to hit then?

 

The last video shows 2 misses out of 3 medium range scenarios. It could be warping but on the first 2 it seems to be doing the exact same bullshit, pulling too much lead. Maybe this is some kind of pattern. Need far more experiments to make sure though. If we figure out what seems to be happening most of the time, maybe that would help the devs find the problem, no?

[Nerd1000]

The RNG operates for that missile when the chaff bundle enters the missile seeker's iFOV.

Not quite what you said.

 

If the seeker is pointing at the target aircraft those two events happen at the same time, or very close to it (can an aircraft occlude a chaff bundle? It seems doubtful that the devs would bother modelling that sort of thing).

[*Rage*]

Homing missiles generally guide themselves though.

 

 

 

Those missiles have already missed. It's irrelevant. It merely looks bad.

 

 

 

It isn't hidden, it's just inconsequential.

 

 

 

You're looking at the wrong part of the model. This isn't the problem. Those missiles have already missed.

 

Those missiles have already missed when they go after HOB chaff. If looks silly but it's irrelevant. It is NOT the problem.

 

There's no CW (neither radar set uses it, not that this is particularly relevant to anything) and mlink is ignored after the seeker comes on line. Mlink being used for discrimination is only valid for 120 and later, but it isn't modeled anyway.

 

None of this matters :-)

 

There's no deliberate programming of missiles pretending to do something different than what's happening in the simulation. Is a simple fact that a missile that goes way out of its way for some distant bundle of chaff is a missile that has already lost track, and while this looks silly, is completely irrelevant and not the real issue. It is effectively cosmetic.

 

Get off it, it's not helping anyone.

 

The RNG operates for that missile when the chaff bundle enters the missile seeker's iFOV.

Not quite what you said.

 

No no no.

 

The missile hasnt already missed because quite clearly if there is no chaff it wont miss. What youre saying is that these missiles are so poor that we shoud expect 50-75% of missiles to miss regardless. and that in some probabilistic model ED has against an AI which isnt as creative as a real player the odds work out right. Well it doesnt online because players exploit the fact that in almost any circumstance enough chaff will do the job.

 

Its no longer just a cosmetic thing. It might be if we tested the AI only but against a real player it doesnt cut the mustard.

 

This is no different to when you could evade 3-4 120s in a row by barrel roliing each at the last second. Its a player exploit that rendered an otherwise perfectly acceptable model (at the time) of a missile useless. This is no different.

 

Again ill post the youtube videos in case you missed them, Watch all three and tell me you sign off on them.

 

 

ED (even as a civilian and commercial company) can do better than that. Infact all it takes is one line of code to change. But it needs to come from them.

 

ED by their own admission claim the FC franchise is their most commercially successful. Ive supported them up to the hilt so far. But they and their testers and moderators need to understand that the complaining about the Chaff'-CM-Clutter issue has been going on for years and is NEVER going to stop until it is satisfactorily fixed or at least patched. It is just too important.

Edited January 3, 2016 by ///Rage

[karambiatos]

Not to forget even AA systems are affected by the chaff/clutter a lot, since 1.5.

[il_corleone]

@Sweeper

 

If ED got it right and this is how (E)Rs work in real life than I should stop lobbying ED and start lobbying Moscow and all their export customers about how entirely useless their missiles are. Their tax payers need to know. Snowden, are you reading this?

 

 

And an excert from one you may recognise;) When not flying straight and level 30 degree offset is all it takes baby!

 

 

Honestly. Look me in the proverbial eye after youve watched all three videos and tell me you would be happy with that.

 

OMG, the Aim9B of my F86 is better than those ER :lol::lol::lol:

[*Rage*]

OMG, the Aim9B of my F86 is better than those ER :lol::lol::lol:

 

The R3-R of the Mig21 is much better (Yes its overmodeled - blah blah)