Missile - brief guide

[MadTommy]

Hi guys, I just want to make a quick post on missiles and different types of missiles in Lock-on.

After reading a post in the ED forums I finally figured out what the different missiles do.

There are effectively three types of missiles:

You have infrared, semi-active radar and active radar.

IR: Infrared is obvious. It follows heat sources. This missile does not require you to maintain lock, as soon as you fired a missile you can break lock and start tracking a new target. All planes carry at least one type of IR missile.
However, the SU 27 and 33 have two long range IR weapons, the R27T and the R27ET. The 27ET as a far longer range with a max range of 70 km at high altitude, so there is little reason to choose the R27T.

SARH: Semi active radar homing: - in order to make it kill with these missiles you must maintain lock until the missile reaches its target. All planes carry a variety of semi-active radar homing missiles. The Russians have the R27 and the US at the Sparrow7. For the Russian jets, the only missile worth carrying is the R27EM, which has the longest range. One important note to these missiles is, once the shooter has been killed the missile becomes ineffective.

AR - Active Radar: these missiles have a built-in radar tracking system in the missile and can therefore track the target themselves. Therefore, once the missile is tracking its target you can break lock and acquiring a new target. It appears that you must maintain lock for least the first few seconds of flight, I'm not I'm not sure of the exact parameters of this. AR missiles will continue tracking the target even if you have been shot down.
There are only two types of AR missile. The F-15s AMRAAM 120 and the mig29 with it's R77.

This gives a big disadvantage to the SU33 and the SU27 as they have no active radar missiles and must maintain lock in order to make the kill. This is why it is very important to always carry two R27ET missiles (the long-range infrared version) when flying Flanker. The Mig may only carry six missiles however all six can be fired without maintaining lock, making it far easier to avoid your enemy's missiles and effectively make the kill yourself.

Hope this helps.

ps essential reading for epoch.. sorry next time i'll include a pie chart.

[MadTommy]

And a must read from:

AirTito
ED Testers Team

Here is his review of the differences in the different jets.

Regarding BVR-

Su-27/33- Advantage of the Su-27/33 is the big number of missiles onboard. Detection range and look-down capabilites are also good. That gives to the Flanker room for more option than the MiG for example- you detect him further he can. Also- the 27/33 is a flying fuel tank- great range and you don't have to worry about flying burners that much, again compared to the mig. Also it has the missiles with biggest range in the game (human controlled a/c). Disadvantage- no active missiles, no TWS shots, you need to go STT and always compromise your launch, so in multiple target engagement it's more dificult than the F-15. It's deadliest weapon in LO is the 27ET because it gives no warning. The Su-33 has an advantage of having two extra long range missiles.

F-15- powerful radar, great detection and lock range, great look down abilities. With fuel tanks it's range is even bigger than Flanker's and carrying fuel tanks doesn't block any weapon hard point like the wingtanks of the MiG. It can carry up to 8 active missiles which could be launched in TWS mode thus giving warning only after the missile goes active (pitbull). IFF is partically modeled and for that the F-15 is "famous" with the plane with most teamkills. You can IFF but you must be careful. Disadvatage- lack of passive sensors (EOS) and small chance of surprise. So when engaging you always have yourself compromised.

MiG-29S- deadliest plane in LO- small size, harder to detect, hard to spot visualy. It carries the deadliest missiles in LO- 27ET and 77. Weapon system is the same as of Su-27/33's with less powerful radar but fire-and-forget ability because of the R-77. Great acceleration rate and seems to be the only plane in LO with relatively exact drag at supersonic speed. With all other planes you can't go faster than Mach 1.2-1.3 with payload. The missiles are like airbrakes. Biggest disadvantage- short range, even with 1 tank. But because of the great acceleration you may stay out of burner and still engage or break. If you take wingtanks too then you can't take 27ER/ET missiles. This is other weak point of the MiG- 6 missiles in total with only 4 medium range. So two things are cruicial for that plane- fuel and missile management.

Another important moment IMO is that flying all planes will greatly improve the skills. By knowing the advantages of one plane you can predict what to expect when you face it. I was flying russian planes only in BVR but from about 1-2 months I started trying the F-15 and I liked it. It made me better understand the BVR when I looked from the other side.

For dogfight-

Flanker or Eagle- no doubt about that. The MiG is so castrated in that area that it's not even funny. You can do it but you must go out of the standarts. There are people in my squad that can write Ph.D. thesis on that so I'll let them speak. The F-15 has better TWR than Su-27 and sustained turn rate too at higher speed. But watch out your pull- Eagle's pilot blacks out sooner than Flanker's.

P.S
The F-15 has the advantage of carrying more countermeasures. So in the russian planes you have to be more careful while using them.

With AWACS or EWR avaialble in the mission the russian planes have the advantage of the datalink picture which they can use for sneak attacks.