Jason Straight

Yeah, I don't expect complete realism, but I just feel that it's not right that AA is more real than the aircraft weapons. There's not even a fighting chance now. I do like the fact that low and under-cover is more of a thing, but just annoyed that there's no way to operate against AA, not matter how good you are.

Recent changes to targeting and locking with attack helicopters has taken the joy and effectiveness out of them, unrealistically. I primarily fly the AH-99, so I'll be talking about my experiences with weapons, radar, and targeting in respect to what I've experienced in that aircraft, which lists a maximum sky range of 3000 and ground range of 2000 for IR, although I seem to actually get 4000 and 3000 respectively. AA will lock on and fire at you at about 4km, you have virtually no chance of coming out on top of an engagement with armored AA, even if you employ bob-up tactics. They will saw you apart with their guns if the missiles don't get you a km before you would even be able to target them. Missiles are now controlled by the pilot, which is great, but they can no longer be laser guided by the gunner, which means you MUST have a valid radar or IR lock to hit. This also means that for IR only munitions that the target be hot (or moving). I understand that this was probably done for game "balance", but it's not balanced when AA can lock and fire at ~4km, and the attack helicopter only to 3km. It's also not at all realistic when you compare the actual effective ranges of laser markers and missiles like the IR DAGR or Hellfire.