Why use empty hardpoints?

[VirgoCompany]

There is an option to just not take any special weapons, whether in just one slot or even in all of them, but why would we want to do this?

I've seen one comment say that it increases standard missile count, but if that's the case why can we mount additional standard missiles in hardpoints? Do more weapons mounted on more hardpoints mean more shots available, not only for special weapons but also standard missiles?

Could we get a guide set up for weapons and tactics for weapons?

[TDATL]

Some of the weapons work differently when doubled for no real reason. MLAG, MLAA and Unguided bombs benefit from doubling up in the form of letting you fire all the hardpoints they are assigned to and increased ammo. Meanwhile standard missiles and SAA only give increased ammo.

I hope they fix that because being able to only fire two at a time when you have four or more doesn't make much sense.

[Roust McGoust]

Thank you, I had this same question. Now I have to try putting gun pods on every hardpoint on the SU-25 LOL

[Compass]

The doubling up depends on weapon types. Most weapons can double up, so not doubling up like the CGP and the SAA might be balance issues, though I don't think either would be overpowered when double stacked.

[VirgoCompany]

Doubling up on SAA might actually make SPAMRAAM weapons obsolete in a way; turns out you can lock onto one target, fire one missile, then lock onto a second target and fire the second, and so long as both targets are in the target circle or at least re-aquired before the missile can overshoot, it'll hit. So, you load up on many SAAMs, suddenly you get so many missiles that as long as they're targeting planes within the circle, will pretty much hit 95% of the time baring extreme maneuvers. ...Or you can just fire them more often on single targets one at a time.

But yeah, it might just be down to balance issues.

[cyäegha]

Originally posted by VirgoCompany:

I've seen one comment say that it increases standard missile count, but if that's the case why can we mount additional standard missiles in hardpoints?

if you actively choose not to mount special A2A weapons and thus have free A2A mounts, the game populates them with STDMs, but all it does is increase ammo capacity, you can't fire more than two of them at once

it's either that or the game arbitrarily screws around with your max STDM capacity on a mission-by-mission basis and occam's razor suggests it's the former