Project Reality Forums

Ive done some research on the most commen AA missile in PR the AIM - 9 or commenly known as the sidewinder. The AIM -9 is a short range AA missile (1km to 18km or 0.7miles to 11.7 miles) that is most commenly found on aircraft. Anyway... to my suggestion.

Problem

Currently Air to Air missile are overpowerd due to their lack of realistic mechanics...
That being said this is all in my opinion...

Countless times i've been flying and been shot down by a sneaky little bugger with a hand eld AA mearly 100 meters bollow me or... a fixed AA position. Veiwing AA missiles being fired and operating AA in PR I have observed three aspects which IMO opinion need to be tweaked/changed.

Observations

1: Acceleration: When fired it looks like the AA missiles reach full speed instaneously and seem to have a speed equivelent to light speed... lol a little bit drastic. But to mirror the AA's range which I think is linked with the maximum view distance on the map being played... I think the acceleration / top speed needs to be reduced. (BTW the top speed of the AIM9 in RL is 2.5mach or 2.5 times the speed of sound) Also i dont think the acceleration can be tweaked at all with the engine being used? (Maybe mosquill can find a way )

2: Turning circle / change of direction of missiles: I find that since the current speed of AA missiles are well mirrored to that in RL their turning cirlces are F&#$&%$&%!!! ridicoulous!!!! Since when could a AA missile make a near 270 degree turn in 0.5 seconds at top speed? (all inaccurate info all just assumptions made from observations) I think that turning circles need to mirror more like of missile in PR like ATGM's or Heavy Anti tank but obviously better for AA.

3: Flares: The current flare system seems to not work the way it was designed to. Flares are used to Alter a missiles flight path away from the aircraft correct? But with the system now it gives the pilot A TERRIBLE amount of time to re-act to incoming AA especially if its only a few 100 meters away.

Ways to fix issues

All im suggesting is one or two of these not all... but its all up to the devs ^_^

Ive read that the AIM9 has to surpass 200 meters per second to be armed... Maybe that can be introduced? Simply by adding a timer to the missle before being armed... and the time at which the missile is armed mimics the time of which it takes the missle to reach that speed. This will stop AA being so effective at rangers at like 100 meters...

Reduce top speed of the missiles

Reduce the turning circle of the missile... Then this way it will actually bring in "skill" when using AA. Therefore if a target is moving away in a straight line from a AA its more likely to bring on a kill, where as if a target is moving along side a AA the operator would have to fire infront of the target to compensate from the AA's newely increased turning circle.

Intoduce two tones of Alarm for pilot... "When targeted by a AA and when missile is fired" but NOT when the aircraft is being locked on.

Because of this reason... Flares in PR disrupt what the AA is locking on to, So this way the pilot can make a decision when to deploy his flares to successfully counter either the locking on process or the missiles flight.

Introduce a timer between flare sets (only in choppers)... This way a pilot can only deploy a set of flares lets say every 2 or 3 seconds because all what choppers now do is deploy their numerous flares in a constant stream to avoid ever being locked on.



Please PR community feel free to tell me Im crazy or add on to my suggestion! All im aiming for is to make PR more enjoyable and more realistic at the same time!

Thanks all for reading...
Diabolos

For starters, I was instantly impressed that you had laid out your suggestion so well and put some thought and research into it. Before I even started reading it I could see that this was worth reading just as it has been laid out well, I wish more people would do this

Now to your suggestion, with Acceleration ye the missile dose instantly reach top speed when fired. This is more a problem with BF2 although I do believe with a bit of coding it might be possible to fix but would have to look into that. Also to Surface to Air missiles are Stinger missiles and no AIM-9 missiles so basing your research off them isn't strictly correct since AIM-9s are Air to Air missiles, where when they are launched they are already travelling the same speed as the jet that fired them.

Turning circle is a good point there, might have someone look into that.

Flares are kinda a crappy thin in BF2 all together, we may look at doing something along the lines of the CA flare system at some point but not certain yet.

Not sure I quite understand your idea behind the lock tone alarms, your suggesting there should be a gap between when the aircraft is first being tried to get a lock on, and when the missile is fired? Reason why it is as it is now is because it was so easy to stop locking on before the AA could get a lock by just dumping flares which isn't that realistic in r/l, same still applies ingame other than the pilot doesn't know the bit between when he's being tracked or not which isn't that realistic but helps gameplay a bit since the flares aren't realistic.


Anyways I'll let the coders look at this and see what they think

haha thanks, its good to see that all my effort into proof reading and research has payed off.

With the alarm system that I suggested, I gues that AA would be more like a deterrent instead of a method of taking down aircraft...

With a more elaborate description of it you may understand me better...

When a Surface to air missile has acheived lock onto a target, Intoduce a alarm for the pilots when this happens (which is all ready in place)... And also introduce a different toned alarm when the missile is fired.

Reason Why im suggesting this although it seems to be giving the aircraft too much of a chance is the pilot can make a choice wether he wants to break the lock or take his chances in letting the missile fire and then hope the flares will be enough to altar the missiles flight path...

oh and *face palm* I worded it wrong in my initial suggestion...

I'm pretty sure its not possible to have two sound tones for being fully locked and for the missile to be "fired and locked on", the BF2 engine classes them as the same thing.

[R-DEV]Rhino wrote:I'm pretty sure its not possible to have two sound tones for being fully locked and for the missile to be "fired and locked on", the BF2 engine classes them as the same thing.

Hopes and dream out the window...

Haha.

Thanks for responding

Diabolos.

I was talking with a retired fighter pilot who confirmed that an avoidance tactic for AA missiles is to travel perpendicular to them so they run out of gas before they can turn onto the aircraft.

This supports the 'enlarge turning circle' argument.

this is indeed an excellent suggestion one for Sniperdog I think

PLODDITHANLEY wrote:I was talking with a retired fighter pilot who confirmed that an avoidance tactic for AA missiles is to travel perpendicular to them so they run out of gas before they can turn onto the aircraft.

This supports the 'enlarge turning circle' argument.

Missiles bleed off a lot of energy when turning, so the turning circle isn't enlarged, but the missile is slowed a lot by the maneuver.

A lowered acceleration would be nice, and realistic(?), but I think the speed of the missiles is pretty much fine. Wikipedia states 700m/s for a stinger missile which is about the speed they appear to move in-game

I think a more prominent smoke/flash effect when they're fired would help pilots a lot, I don't approve of earlier warnings though, the idea of flares is that they are a decoy to be dropped when in hot zones, not as a counter-measure when you are already locked. A more visual effect would mean pilots could maneuver into a better positions relative to the launch site, and therefore an element of skill would improve survival chances.

I like the CAS way of doing flares, but PR aircraft don't seem to have enough flares to be effective decoys, so pilots often run out if they try and use a careful cover tactic.

[R-DEV]Rhino wrote:I'm pretty sure its not possible to have two sound tones for being fully locked and for the missile to be "fired and locked on", the BF2 engine classes them as the same thing.

isn't that already implemented in vanilla? I mean, you get a lock-on warning, and then you get a different sound when the missile is fired.

masterceo wrote:isn't that already implemented in vanilla? I mean, you get a lock-on warning, and then you get a different sound when the missile is fired.

No thous are two different things. The "lock on warning" is when your trying to get a lock via the HUD, ie, tracking the target but not locked on, in the jet you then get anouther tone in vBF2, in PR like I said, we removed it.

What DIaboLoS is on about is having different lock tones for when the HUD is locked onto the aircraft and when the missile is fired. BF2 class them both as the same thing.

Trying to get a Lock = Tracking Tone
Locked on the HUD before fire = Locked Tone
Missile Fired after Locked on with the HUD = Locked Tone.

just as a note the hand held AA's are stingers not AIM-9's

[R-DEV]Rhino wrote:No thous are two different things. The "lock on warning" is when your trying to get a lock via the HUD, ie, tracking the target but not locked on, in the jet you then get anouther tone in vBF2, in PR like I said, we removed it.

What DIaboLoS is on about is having different lock tones for when the HUD is locked onto the aircraft and when the missile is fired. BF2 class them both as the same thing.

Trying to get a Lock = Tracking Tone
Locked on the HUD before fire = Locked Tone
Missile Fired after Locked on with the HUD = Locked Tone.

oh, right. It's been a long time since I played vBF2, so I got a bit confused there.

Are you talking about all AA missiles or the MANPADS versions specifically?

dtacs wrote:Are you talking about all AA missiles or the MANPADS versions specifically?

Im talking about all AA missiles in PR. From what I can tell from observations is AIM9's or Stingers use the same mechanics...

It was inaccurate of me to base my suggestion purely on AIM9 research that i done but none the less im sure everyone here is smart enough to understand my point of view...


Diabolos

First off, excellent post Diabolos, well thought out and grammatically normal

xI DIaboLoS Ix wrote: 1: Acceleration: When fired it looks like the AA missiles reach full speed instaneously and seem to have a speed equivelent to light speed... lol a little bit drastic. But to mirror the AA's range which I think is linked with the maximum view distance on the map being played... I think the acceleration / top speed needs to be reduced. (BTW the top speed of the AIM9 in RL is 2.5mach or 2.5 times the speed of sound) Also i dont think the acceleration can be tweaked at all with the engine being used? (Maybe mosquill can find a way )

It is actually very possible to put realistic acceleration values in game as has already been done for certain missiles and is being worked on for others, all you need is a targeting system on the projectile.

xI DIaboLoS Ix wrote: 2: Turning circle / change of direction of missiles: I find that since the current speed of AA missiles are well mirrored to that in RL their turning cirlces are F&#$&%$&%!!! ridicoulous!!!! Since when could a AA missile make a near 270 degree turn in 0.5 seconds at top speed? (all inaccurate info all just assumptions made from observations) I think that turning circles need to mirror more like of missile in PR like ATGM's or Heavy Anti tank but obviously better for AA.

Modern missiles, especially the new aim-9 x's, are extremely effective at what they do, and have some pretty ridiculous turning radii from what I understand:
But even so the turning values in game may be fairly high atm, and can be changed if we see the need to reflect realistic capabilities or address gameplay concerns.

Also bear in mind, as hitperson pointed out, the AIM-9 isn't the only missile out there and turning radii and capabilites can very heavily from missile to missile, depending on what they were engineered to do.

xI DIaboLoS Ix wrote: 3: Flares: The current flare system seems to not work the way it was designed to. Flares are used to Alter a missiles flight path away from the aircraft correct? But with the system now it gives the pilot A TERRIBLE amount of time to re-act to incoming AA especially if its only a few 100 meters away.

This may also change as we modify acceleration values, but it is also worth pointing out, as Rhino did, that there are multiple ways of working the flare system.

As far as your suggestions go they are all valid points and all possible, it just depends on what we want to change and how those changes will affect balance, gameplay, and realism.

But I can assure you it is being worked on.

If you look at the AIM-9's ingame, they are high-off boresight, modeled after the AIM-9M, which means they can track and lock a aircraft high off the boresight of the aircraft carrying it, something it is not capable of in real life.

Using a modified client, I've done some changes to the Air assets, all missiles can now be avoided by maneuvering (something not previously capable), through reduction in reaction time and agility

For example, if we have a aircraft on the tail of another aircraft, and launches a SRM, like a Sidewinder, it has little to no chance of out-maneuvering it, thus having to rely on sometimes, useless countermeasures. But if we have a head-on engagement, or a engagement where the other aircraft is more than 45 degrees of the engaging aircraft's nose, the missile will most likely miss its mark, or overshoot.
To add to the reduction is missile ability, aircraft must lock on to their target in a tighter "lock angle", closer the middle of the screen, actual maneuvering will happen, something I have not seen in PR before.


Hopefully I can get a video up with a friend as trying to make one playing with bots in MiG's hasn't worked.

'[R-CON wrote:Sniperdog;1400857']Modern missiles, especially the new aim-9 x's, are extremely effective at what they do, and have some pretty ridiculous turning radii from what I understand:

I searched youtube for a video like that for about 30 minutes and came up with nothing that was worth useing lol... I guess I was just useing the wrong words -.-

But agreed that was some awesome maneuverability. It's good to hear that it was all ready being worked on !!! I'm looking forward to see what you guys come up with

Thanks for the response.

Diabolos.

xI DIaboLoS Ix wrote:I searched youtube for a video like that for about 30 minutes and came up with nothing that was worth useing lol... I guess I was just useing the wrong words -.-

But agreed that was some awesome maneuverability. It's good to hear that it was all ready being worked on !!! I'm looking forward to see what you guys come up with

Thanks for the response.

Diabolos.

Funnily enough, the Russian's and Israeli's had had a super-maneuverable missile for quite a while now. R-73+Rafael Python 4

A well needed suggestion and possitive feedback from the developers so I will attempt to contribute

Decreasing the available time to fire one missile after another would elimate the current system of snap shooting all 4 missiles without even locking onto a target.

Not being able to fire an Air to Air missile without having a lock.

I know that its not realistic, but gameplay > realism by making dogfighting less arcade. It took me months to figure out a system to dodge missiles and it takes too much practise to pull out: