does this game have good dogfights?

[Rookie]

I played AC7 but I only was able to use the missiles in the game and not the machine gun, since the reticle is very jumpy. I've heard Project wingman has amazing machine gun but maybe not good missiles? So I was wondering about this game. Are both missiles and machine guns good?

I've heard it has sandbox where I can just spawn a bunch of enemy AI and fight them. Are they balance to fight, where they dodge but not too much dodging etc? Or will i be stuck in loop-de-loop battles?

[Hydro]

the game is significantly more realistic than ace combat 7, while there are dogfights they are rarer due to the existence of missiles (like irl), the dogfights are less like ace combat 7 and a bit more like DCS (tho not too much like it so its not hell)

this means you cant do a post stall and instantly win a dogfight, dogfights are battles of wit, attrition, and skill which personally i like alot. But generally if you are in gun range and dont have heatseeking missiles, something has gone very very wrong for you and the enemy

[IxianMace]

Personally, I find both the missiles and guns in Nuclear Option to be good and pretty easy, but I come from a (mostly) realistic flight-simulation background.

Most air combat begins beyond visual range, with the deadliest missile shots occurring at close to medium range. Dogfights are rather rare, but if you happen to get into one, I could summarise it with the following:

- If you're in the same aircraft as the AI, the AI will almost always outperform you in a turning fight (specifically a two-circle fight) due to flying its aircraft to the maximum limits of its performance and not being affected by G forces. Sure, you can turn your aircraft hard like the AI, but you're going to have to ease off at some point unless you want to lose consciousness.

- Dogfighting is viable in certain advantageous matchups, but you're still going to have to force an error from the AI using tactics if the AI gets behind you. Otherwise, you can expect your aircraft to be put out of commission if a few rounds hit the wrong places. The AI has pretty good aim and overall is not to be taken lightly.

As for dodging, if you survive the merge and can get behind an enemy aircraft and you have an IR missile, you're very likely to win, as the AI takes some time to respond to a missile launch. The key is knowing the minimum range of your missile versus how long it'll take for the AI to effectively respond to it. If you only have your guns, then it depends on your aim.

---

I've also played Project Wingman, so I'll chime in on that as well.

Project Wingman does have nice air combat with guns, but its flight model is very arcadey and energy management isn't as important as it is in Nuclear Option. You also have significantly more ammunition in Project Wingman than you do in Nuclear Option, and the hitbox for aircraft seems to be pretty lenient in Project Wingman. In Nuclear Option, your shots have to be right on target.

The missiles in Project Wingman are all IR missiles and will lose their lock the moment you release a flare. They're also really bad at turning and will miss you if you're flying roughly perpendicular to them. The IR missiles in Nuclear Option will often need multiple flares to lose their lock. Hard turns won't save you. The air-to-air radar missiles in Nuclear Option will need to be notched and jammed in order to lose their lock.

[Rookie]

Publicado originalmente por Hydro:

the game is significantly more realistic than ace combat 7, while there are dogfights they are rarer due to the existence of missiles (like irl), the dogfights are less like ace combat 7 and a bit more like DCS (tho not too much like it so its not hell)

this means you cant do a post stall and instantly win a dogfight, dogfights are battles of wit, attrition, and skill which personally i like alot. But generally if you are in gun range and dont have heatseeking missiles, something has gone very very wrong for you and the enemy

Pardon my ignorance, but what do you mean dogfights are rare? The game has a campaign which doesnt have much dogfights? If so, can i very quickly create a map and just spawn some enemies to fight against, or no? Can I also ban missiles from the map ?

[Rookie]

Publicado originalmente por IxianMace:

Personally, I find both the missiles and guns in Nuclear Option to be good and pretty easy, but I come from a (mostly) realistic flight-simulation background.

Most air combat begins beyond visual range, with the deadliest missile shots occurring at close to medium range. Dogfights are rather rare, but if you happen to get into one, I could summarise it with the following:

- If you're in the same aircraft as the AI, the AI will almost always outperform you in a turning fight (specifically a two-circle fight) due to flying its aircraft to the maximum limits of its performance and not being affected by G forces. Sure, you can turn your aircraft hard like the AI, but you're going to have to ease off at some point unless you want to lose consciousness.

- Dogfighting is viable in certain advantageous matchups, but you're still going to have to force an error from the AI using tactics if the AI gets behind you. Otherwise, you can expect your aircraft to be put out of commission if a few rounds hit the wrong places. The AI has pretty good aim and overall is not to be taken lightly.

As for dodging, if you survive the merge and can get behind an enemy aircraft and you have an IR missile, you're very likely to win, as the AI takes some time to respond to a missile launch. The key is knowing the minimum range of your missile versus how long it'll take for the AI to effectively respond to it. If you only have your guns, then it depends on your aim.

---

I've also played Project Wingman, so I'll chime in on that as well.

Project Wingman does have nice air combat with guns, but its flight model is very arcadey and energy management isn't as important as it is in Nuclear Option. You also have significantly more ammunition in Project Wingman than you do in Nuclear Option, and the hitbox for aircraft seems to be pretty lenient in Project Wingman. In Nuclear Option, your shots have to be right on target.

The missiles in Project Wingman are all IR missiles and will lose their lock the moment you release a flare. They're also really bad at turning and will miss you if you're flying roughly perpendicular to them. The IR missiles in Nuclear Option will often need multiple flares to lose their lock. Hard turns won't save you. The air-to-air radar missiles in Nuclear Option will need to be notched and jammed in order to lose their lock.

hmmm, I cant play a mission or easily make a mission to engage in some dogfights? Can I ban the AI from using missiles?

[IxianMace]

Publicado originalmente por Rookie:

hmmm, I cant play a mission or easily make a mission to engage in some dogfights? Can I ban the AI from using missiles?

You can easily make a mission to engage in dogfights as well as ban the AI from using missiles.

[HuskyDynamics]

Publicado originalmente por Rookie:

Publicado originalmente por Hydro:

the game is significantly more realistic than ace combat 7, while there are dogfights they are rarer due to the existence of missiles (like irl), the dogfights are less like ace combat 7 and a bit more like DCS (tho not too much like it so its not hell)

this means you cant do a post stall and instantly win a dogfight, dogfights are battles of wit, attrition, and skill which personally i like alot. But generally if you are in gun range and dont have heatseeking missiles, something has gone very very wrong for you and the enemy

Pardon my ignorance, but what do you mean dogfights are rare? The game has a campaign which doesnt have much dogfights? If so, can i very quickly create a map and just spawn some enemies to fight against, or no? Can I also ban missiles from the map ?

They're rarer in the sense that they don't tend to happen organically at a high rate among the AI (though they certainly can happen, and do). The Furball mission is explicitly set up as a close-quarters dogfight (I believe it's 5 on 7, player disadvantage), but in larger-scale missions like Domination or Escalation (which encompass the whole map and can run for over an hour before one side wins), generally one aircraft will hit the other with a missile before they get close enough for guns.

That being said, it's pretty easy to force a dogfight by just not firing missiles at the other guy and evading any he sends at you until you get close enough to use guns. There is also often at least one specifically dogfighting-oriented multiplayer session running at any given time, and you can set up custom missions to restrict the use of air-to-air missiles to make them happen much more frequently.

[HuskyDynamics]

As a side note, the "campaign" (if the game can be said to had one) is not story-based; there's no overt order to the missions and there's no narration cutscenes or anything. It's just a set of scenarios you can pick from and jump into, or make your own. There are shorter objective-based missions with specific "win" conditions (destroy an enemy depot using a Chicane, hold a bridge against enemy ground forces with a Cricket, destroy warships before they can reach your island airbase, etc.), and larger "open" missions. This second type scales all the way up to Escalation, which covers the entire map and the goal is to simply fight until you can destroy or capture all of the enemy airbases while simultaneously preventing them from doing the same to you.

The scenario missions are probably much closer to what you're expecting in terms of a "story" mission from an Ace Combat perspective: preset objective, more-or-less defined paths to follow, set number of prespawned enemies, that sort of thing. The open missions, on the other hand, leave it up to the player to decide what to do. If you want to dogfight, you can load up for air-to-air and intercept enemy planes. If you want to do CAS, take rockets and bombs and seek out a convoy. If you want to do EWAR, grab a Medusa and go hunt radar stations or find something to jam. All of the mechanics of the game are on full display in the open missions, and what to do is up to you.

[HuskyDynamics]

As far as the "balancing" of dogfights go, the AI has the exact same planes you do. They have the same capabilities (loadouts may vary, but they have the same weapon options to pick from as you do) and the same limitations. There's no magic shields or health bars; a bullet that hits your wing will do the exact same damage as if it had hit an AI and vice versa. Understanding real-world BFM and dogfighting principles (energy management, pursuit curves and turn circles, how to force or avoid an overshoot, etc.) isn't strictly necessary but will help a lot because it's all at least somewhat applicable (and a player can apply it a lot better than the AI can, at least for now).

[obsessedwithpineapples2223]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3162147297

[IxianMace]

Publicado originalmente por HuskyDynamics:

They have the same capabilities (loadouts may vary, but they have the same weapon options to pick from as you do) and the same limitations.

Does the AI experience G forces like human players do? Is it capable of blacking out due to high-G turns?

[Ghal Maraz]

Publicado originalmente por IxianMace:

Publicado originalmente por HuskyDynamics:

They have the same capabilities (loadouts may vary, but they have the same weapon options to pick from as you do) and the same limitations.

Does the AI black out from high-G turns?

Honestly never thought about that before. If I think about it, it seems like any time I'm pulling over G on an AI, I am the one closing the circle and gaining on the AI. But it could be that the AI do it in some situations and it's just hard to tell if they are

[IxianMace]

From my experiences fighting the AI and spectating it, I've often wondered things like "Shouldn't the AI be blacking out at this rate?" Then I watched a developer stream and someone asked about the AI and making it black out in dogfights, to which the developer responded along the lines of that that would make the AI more complex, confirming my suspicions that the AI isn't subject to G forces and can just keep turning without regard to how its pilot might be affected.

[Rookie]

Publicado originalmente por obsessedwithpineapples2223:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3162147297

ok...but can i force set cool dogfight Machine gun only scenarios and have a fair fight against the AI? Or like give them missiles but reduce the amount they have?

[Belligerent_Herald]

Publicado originalmente por Rookie:

Publicado originalmente por obsessedwithpineapples2223:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3162147297

ok...but can i force set cool dogfight Machine gun only scenarios and have a fair fight against the AI? Or like give them missiles but reduce the amount they have?

yeah you can create your own scenarios or alter existing scenarios in the editor. you can restrict airframes to certain weapons and remove missiles launching ground units. Several of them are currently in the workshop.

[Rookie]

Publicado originalmente por Belligerent_Herald:

Publicado originalmente por Rookie:

ok...but can i force set cool dogfight Machine gun only scenarios and have a fair fight against the AI? Or like give them missiles but reduce the amount they have?

yeah you can create your own scenarios or alter existing scenarios in the editor. you can restrict airframes to certain weapons and remove missiles launching ground units. Several of them are currently in the workshop.

Most importantly (albeit opinionated) is it fun to engage in dogfight? Is it thrilling etc?