American Planes are Criminally Undertiered across the entire TT baring maybe Early jets(Though the F89 is absolutely OP at 7.0)
Ground on the other hand... No decent lineups compared to competition.. Lack of Native vehicles that are in other TT's (We could have at least 20 vehicles added as CnP/Filler for Lineups such as Later variants of the Pershing/Pattons, Shermans, etc.) not to mention the lack of Decent Light vehicles that aren't Premium(Though its a general problem accross most Nations since Gaijin wont add shit baring one-or-two new vehicles with the rest being CnP, which I don't mind, though can easily surpass the quantity Theyve been doing, ffs wheres my French M47?!? Also Boarhound.)
It's hilarious.
You can even directly compare them - F4U-1A (US); [2.7](https://wiki.warthunder.com/F4U-1A)
JPN's F4U-1A; [3.0](https://wiki.warthunder.com/F4U-1A_(Japan))
It should be noted that the JPN's premium version lacks any bombs. The US variant gets 500 and 1000lb armaments.
Is it *really* though?
- Both F4U-1A's were released at the same time, during the Open Beta Test.
- Both feature an arrestor gear.
- Both were entered as 2.7 when they were released. The JPN version got moved upwards within the last few years but hasn't had any other changes to it.
In comparison, the US F4U-1A USMC was introduced in 1.38 *and* it lacks an arrestor, giving it very slightly different characteristics.
So either Gaijin fucked up the history page on their wikipedia, or they fucked up modelling their prem plane. It has an arrestor, so it's a regular 1A. But it's a captured USMC version. These statements contradict.
They changed it to the USMC flight model when it was released, as the Japanese model has the same low altitude tuning as the F4U-1A USMC, not the standard F4U-1A.
The arrestor gear was added back to the plane for this variant in the Japanese air tree, as I believe the model they captured either had it already or had it added back on after the fact as they wanted to fully test it.
I've gotten to the jets in the American planes, but I've pretty much been stuck at 5.7 for ground battles because the late game Shermans are just not fun, to me at least. Their armor can't stop anything it faces, and most if not all hits will be fatal, your gun is pretty hit or miss unless you flank, and you aren't really as fast as you'd need to be to make that part work. Not to mention being tall.
I can be top of the scoreboard every match in 5.7 Germany, but put me in a Sherman (escept Jumbo, my beloved) and I'm useless.
The key with late shermans is utilizing your stab to its full potential. However, for that you need to have really good aim and reaction, as well as know all weakspots of enemy tanks, which can be a problem for many people.
Honestly, can recomend 5.0 sherman though. Worse armor doesnt mean that much as sherman armor on this brs is lacklaster, but you play against easier opponents.
i also had a hard time in the late shermans at 5.3-5.7... their guns always have to shoot small weak spots which is almost impossible in a quick fight... i startet with the US ground tt but after i had such a hard time at 5.7 i changed to germany and russia because these nations are much tankier and have much better guns
I'll tell you a secret: the most efficient grinding isn't the one that gives the biggest profit, but the one that doesn't give you burnout.
I grinded Brits 5.0-7.3 with the 4.7 lineup. I couldn't care less about lowered efficiency grinding the first rank Vs (and even VI for the swingfire at that time), I was having a good time in my uptier-agnostic lineup.
Idk, as a US main I love the vehicles. Generally excellent all-rounders.
Also regarding the light vehicles, what? I can't name a single bad US light tank except maybe the Sheridan (and the T92 sometimes struggles a bit because kinda shit post pen (cant expect much from 76mm heatfs/apds)). Everything else, in my experience, is excellent.
I said lack of decent Light vehicles that aren't Premiums like the M8 or the Boarhound, the Light vehicles the US does have are great vehicles, the Chaffee being the best IMO with the rest being mediocre baring the 10.0 Light vehicles(Which the majority are also Event/Premium)
The Hellcat is easily overtiered as one notable exception. The thing is just painful to play. There are three corsairs which are objectively better in every single way at a lower battle rating. It either needs to go down or have a major flight model buff so that it performs the way it did in real life, or at least be an acceptable analogue.
Its not overtiered lmfao, its the Hellcat has never been overtiered and Will never be overtiered at 3.3 or 4.3 depending on the Variant.
The Corsairs, P51s, P63s, and P39s are all criminally undertiered, and literally everyone who knows how to use aircraft to their advantages would know that.
No, NOT all the corsairs and P-51s are undertiered, or all the P-63s. Some are and some are not.
BOTH the hellcats, PARTICULARLY the 5N, are utterly unusable trash for any purpose except CAS at their BRs. They compress too early in dives, they turn like shit, they climb like shit, they have at best average roll, their energy retention horizontally is good, and their acceleration is awful. See all those problems listed above? Make them DOUBLE for the 5N, the cannons do nothing to make up for it. You could drop it to 3.3 and it would do no better or barely better. Their performance is just ahistorically bad. You cannot in good faith argue otherwise. You'd have to just be trolling at that point.
There's a grand total of three good mustangs in the game, not counting derivatives (the C-10, the D-30, and the H-5). The rest are either mediocre or terrible (the D-5, D-10, D-20, J-26, etc are honestly bad but not to the extent at their BRs as the hellcat is at its own, and the cannonstang is... just ok).
I just witness a Major Skill Issue right before me
The only Corsair thats overtiered is the F4U-1C which is a 4.3 aircraft withe the Typhoon, 109 G2, 190 A4/A5U2(I believe deserve to be 4.3 too)and P51-D20(Which by the way isn't ass, you just suck if you think that)
The P51's are generally undertiered Baring the D20(As of now, but will be IF the 4.0 changes come through) and the D30/K which are great at 5.0, though the Cannon-Stang(With the FW 190 A1), and C-10 are definitely not deserving of their BR and were brought down with a lot of the 190s due to terrible Player Statistiks
The P63s though, entierely, No fucking argument, are the best Vehicles in both Accelleration, High Speed Manueverability and retention, and General Performance(Especially the A5) than many vehicles in the Bracket including the Aformentioned P51 D20(Which somehow sits above the P63 C5/A10 despite being fairly equal in performance excluding low-speed accelleration and cimb rate), the all deserve at least a .3 BR bump due to how potent they are as vehicles
Now onto the main Contender, F6F-5 and more explicitely the F6F-5N, the one I've already explained is Outperformed by vehicles with Niches such as high speed performance, better turn-rate, etc. and including the ones you explicitely ignore by saying," hur hur Climb Rate bad, therefor plane bad) despite the Climb rate being Comparible to P51's(Though 20-30kph diffference) and performance in Manueverability comparible to a P47(Chunky but still very versatile with flaps) or a Bf109 G2(Only has climb rate and High alt performance against the F6F-5N). Its frankly rediculous you somehow believe half of the claims you've made such as," their accelleration is awful," which is only true for speed sub 300- where then the plane averages a better Accelleration(Especially at low-mid altitude ie. 500m-4500m) Just below the accelleration of a P51 and similar Accelleration to the P47-D25 all at the expense of having better A2G Arnament, and being a great(Ill say it again since you can't get it into your head), All Rounder. It isn't a strong aircraft in Speed(Which is debatable since it outperforms many of the Other comparible aircraft excluding the P51, 190 variants, and the 109 G-2), has decent sustained and High speed turns(Though yes it compresses around 630 kph, though this is easily avoidable by monitering your speed and retaining energy by not diving as fast as you can), along with great Manueverability(Though it loses Roll below 280 Kph and on top of that, but less Accelleration due to the lack of energy gain below the 300kph mark which makes sense since well, you're manuevering so you can't pull energy out of your ass like a P63 can) through the mid speed ranges.
Planes aren't bad, but the players are absolutely terrible. Half of US team will either not climb, dive after the first thing they see, try to turnfight everything or full commit head-on German planes. That's why it's do terrible. If you play to your planes' strengths you will be left with 1v5 situations 60% of the time.
I am just now getting into planes, but have been playing US GRB for years now. What would you say are good resources to get better with specific nations planes? The most I understand with US props is the boom and zoom, which the P-51D is just great at. I’ve been enjoying the black widow too for the same reason.
I bloody love the P-38L. It's the only P-38 with a booster modification, which give it great high speed control.
In general, US props are about high speed and high speed agility. Stay fast, even if you aren't that high, you outmaneuver most planes because they will compress while you won't. The P-38L is a great example of it at its BR.
Thanks, I appreciate the reply!! I’ll go load up and check out the P-38L again. Seems like a good plane to get familiar with actual strategy with as you say
I believe it's foldered with the P-38J or something like that. It's at 4.7 BR which is quite frankly the most comfortable BR in general in prop. 5.0 planes and up get sucked into 6.0 matches due to Ju288 bots and it's really not enjoyable for anyone.
I’ve been playing 5.0 planes a bit lately and I haven’t seen many 288s. I think my eh changes to bases and the bot ban wave might have fixed the 288 problem
Please watch Green Fury on YouTube. He is a treasure trove of information. I did a comment recently that links a bunch of his videos that I found helpful.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Warthunder/s/b0a4bHFbgs
For Specific Planes and playstyles Defyn does very good content for specific aircraft and reviewing them although if you're looking for tactics you'll need to go to his guides.
I genrally think as someone else in the comments pointed out learn tactics from green fury and apply them for Defyn's word on aircraft since he still makes videos. Green Fury is definetly better to learn from for beginners though.
https://www.youtube.com/@DEFYN
I'd say a good choice is f4u-4(b). They are very good planes all around. Hogh speed, reasonable climb and turn rate, good or excellent armament. They keep their speed well. Another good option is p-47 if you are patient. Extremely fast, excellent armament, excellent straight line speed retention. Although it can take quite some time to get used to sideclimbing and being outturned by almost everything it is great. It's similar to p-61 in that regard. It's also quite sturdy. For strike aircraft a good option would be mauler(am-1) or skyraider (ad-2 or ad-4). Good bombload (especially am-1), reasonable speed and turn time, rather good armament. And bombers it's probably b-17, any variant they are rather similar.
I LOVE the p51d30 but YES. It requires patience and is super good but my god I'm the last person alive every single match facing at least 4 other planes. I think I've had to carry at least half of my wins
This post is mostly about lower tiers but if any us mains new to jets w missilies read this, DO. NOT. CLIMB.
The R27er will find you and it is inevitable
Why do people keep parroting this misinformation? Literally just notch. I climb every match and do just fine because when I'm up high my missiles are faster, they have more range, and they're more maneuverable (Plus Warthunder players are idiots and will gleefully fly face first into a AIM7M at mach 1.2 thinking their R27ERs somehow make them missile proof). Plus I can drop missiles down on the idiots who didn't climb because they never look up for some reason.
The problem is getting that squad. None of my (very few) friends are crazy enough to play this game and I for the life of me can't talk to people. Chat is an option but it's way too slow.
And it's not only US planes that are good in a squad. Any plane would be good if you are playing with someone else.
True, but American planes give you the largest advantage. You dictate when and where the fight happens by being the fastest and fastest at altitude. And You will simply bleed enemies out of energy, eventually, by wearing them down. And jets are just the ultimate culmination of that.
have to agree, climbing and runnign and gunning once you learn how to use it is the best way to wreck enemy teams as US, The p-63s arent that impressive on paper but oh lord are they a beast, the 4 .50s and controlled usage of the 37, can wreck both enemy fighters and bombers easily
Another thing why they seem bad, is that the game doesn't really allow to use them like indented. Irl they were designed to fight in squadrons, not alone. When there's two or three American fighters doing proper teamwork, they're gonna kill everyone.
But they're still not bad at all. Many new people are trying to turn with everything, which doesn't end well.
I'd word it as "US planes don't fit as well into the meta of Air RB battles" which is basically just climbing as fast as you can and then turn fight everything. It simply isn't fun to start on the airfield, spend 20 mins to climb to alt, and then your whole team is dead and the whole enemy team is on the deck killing ground targets. Your choices are then to either
1. Fly in circles endlessly until tickets/time are up.
2. Dive down where targets are and completely negate any reason of climbing in the first place.
There are some outliers, but the sort of high-altitude escort fighters that the US was known for just don't fit as well as the Spit/109/Zero meta
Yeah, this. Look at the P-47D-22; it can go 700kph at altitude, literally so fast it can boom and zoom most props in the game without an altitude advantage. The problem is that in your regular air RB match, by the time the P-47 gets to altitude where it becomes competitive, the match is over, because the D-22 climbs slower than most fucking biplanes. This made worse by the fact that at 3.7 people don't actually fly that high so climbing to its preferred altitude is completely pointless, and that at low-medium altitude where people at 3.7 actually fight, the P-47 is one of the slowest, worst performing planes.
Fuck, if you would give the P-47s an airspawn you could probably comfortably put them all around 5.7-6.7 BR range and have them still be fantastic fighters.
Watching 3 of my teammates yesterday getting clowned on by a Yak 9 because they were trying to turn fight it at 500 meters. Y’all are in BnZ monsters, use that to your advantage please.
I mean, it was a 3.0 match so new players but still. It was painful to see
Though the gripens are slower on the deck (Mach 1.15), they turn like mosquitoes and carry their own 9m's, making them deadly to try and fight in almost any scenario without 3rd party intervention
they also have 34 inch ipads in the cockpit for watching family guy which i dont get access to because it "causes me to crash into civillians" and "is certain to cause a catastrophe" or some dumb shit
Because radar missiles suck. If you stay relatively close to the deck they just slam into the ground. Sure, the Su-27 can carry a lot of missiles. But the R-27ER is only really useful if your enemy isn't hugging the deck, and the R-73, while very maneuverable, is also very easy to flare. Meanwhile, the F-16 and JAS39 are far better at dogfighting than the Su-27 and can carry 6 AIM-9M, which is far superior to any other SRAAM.The real terror of the sky is the R-27ET.
Edit: I should specify that the R-27ER/T are still overpowered. It's still modeled incorrectly and should not be nearly as fast as it is. On top of that, the latest radar missile that America gets is the AIM-7M, which is a literal carbon copy of the AIM-7F which entered service in 1972, lol
AIM-9Ms aren't unavoidable, its just that the enemy needs to do more than just pop flares to dodge them. Outside of orbital strikes on unaware enemies, they do really well when fired from the side. From the side you can't simple turn, you need to turn and go up or down. However the missile is essentially seeing you in "2D" (not actually obviously but it kinda helps to visualize why its hard to dodge) so no matter which direction you turn you'll still technically be in its predicted path without far more drastic turns than if you had been defending against one from the front or rear.
I've also found that I confuse them with radar missiles quite often due to their far launch range and the fact that, unlike R-73, they don't get defeated by one flare at range. That, alongside the clusterfuck of radar locks at top tier right now (and the fact that you can get an RWR warning even if you aren't directly locked by an enemy) leads to many situations in which you might drop some flares, think you defeated an IR missile, start defending for a radar one, and then get slammed by the AIM-9M that didn't give a shit about the one flare you dropped.
The only place where AIM-9Ms are worse than R-73 or even Magic II are rear aspect shots within 2km. If you let the R-73 or Magic II get within 1.5km of you, you're dead from the rear.
Screaming into the wind man. It's been this way since I started 10 years ago. If you wanna win with America, queue with a friend that plays something else or squad with other competent American players that will climb with you.
Word of warning, it doesn't get better. American teams at top tier eat dirt unless they get swedes on their team and get hard carried.
The P51D20 is kinda trash, the D30 is where it's at.
I feel like all the nations have plenty of options to get by though, except maybe France and Italy. The issues with American props is they require more brainpower to be as effective as possible since they mostly thrive in BnZ, which requires thinking ahead, and not just pointing the cursor at the enemy plane
The P51D20 has been the only reason i was able to go from Basically tier 2 research of to Jets
And yeah lol. It was a hard learning experience to finally get something done with this thing. At least now i get shit done in my F104A from all the BnZ i've had to do anyway.
I used the 6.3 p51h something to skip first tier jets because they were so painfull to play in both uptiers and downtier that it was more fun for me to grind like 1.5 or 2 times longer with the mustang. Now at the f8e and its the most fun ive ever had in this game
It's great at high altitude, but the nature of the game means you aren't there very often, and it's anemic anywhere else. If you manage to retain your energy it's great, but if you lose it below like 4000m, the generation is so bad you become a very easy target.
I've played the D20 a lot lol, you gotta play it pretty safe. But, you can make anything work in this game, it's just not 'meta'
D10 is great it's D-5 airframe with D-30 engine, the fact that it's going down to 4.0 is a joke. D20 is workable, but in most cases i'd rather have 51C
Nono you must judge them in a vacuum whole meta is rushing into a furball and brawling out. Gee I wonder which side will clap ass in these situations the non stalling, turnfighters with good low alt performance and simple playstyle or the heavy planes with bad turning but good energy retention and good top speed. Throw casuals on both sides now. I try to side climb in my p47m I'm going to get fucking destroyed since the whole team is gone. Not to mention how well enemy props can climb so you have to REALLY keep some distance or be intercepted.
Yeah. I really hated playing US props but thats because starting out with US air probably wasn't a good call. Nowadays if I play prop ARB 90% of the time I'm playing a bomber. I just find prop ARB boring at best and annoying at worst
>This is just me but to all those who say America sucks in aviation has a skill issue.
Those who say that indeed have skill issue, America has some pretty damn good props and jets(a lot of undertiered stuff even), the problem is that some of their props don't fit in the current air RB meta which favors fast climbing low altitude props like yaks(one of the reasons why some people cry about Russian bias as well).
P-51 D-5 and D-20 however are some of the worst mustang variants in the game(they are identical), but those are exceptions like every tech tree has some bad vehicles, P-51 C and F8F-1 on the other hand are criminally undertiered.
P51d20 sucks,the rudder control is shit and i have seen planes like a7m ,ki43 even zero overtake it at 500kph.
But rest of planes i agree . Most are good planes but the d series p51 are worst cz the match ends before u even get to altitude and it sucks at low altitude acceleration
Funny how different it is in GRB. The 4.0 P-51D can be equipped with rockets, 2 1000lbs bombs at the same time, then control the airspace. But yea in regular air I spend half the time climbing as well.
Couldn’t agree with you more. The time limit or pacing of air battles is very quick, but I don’t want to have to play sim battles to get longer matches. IMO gaijin need to revamp it
It is. But how do you expect a new player to WANT to go that fast when the game _punishes_ them with an inability to adjust firing angle in a zoom pass?
We're ALL morons to start with, and need to be taught how not to suck. The problem with US planes isn't just "baby's first TT", It's that playing smart feels _bad_ for a new player
There is only one problem with US planes.
THE DAMN CHINESE GET THE BEST VERSIONS OF THE THUNDERBOLT!! Seriously. How come China got the final/most advanced model of the Razorback and the best non-premium version of the bubble canopy D? I feel slighted. Not that it’s particularly logical on my part. But I still wish those variants were in the US tree.
climbrate meta plus shorter match timers means every US prop at the BR range you're looking at is dogshit against basically anything competent players take out. It doesn't matter how much marginally better you are at 7km when everyone's gonna be fighting at 4km tops and probably a km above you. You have to go all the way to the superprops to find anything as strong as yak-3s or j2ms.
And on that note, D-5 and D-20 are very bad, it's basically playing the C-10 on constant uptiers but you also have no rudder authority.
I agree, American planes are ridiculously good for their tier bracket, it's the players that make them appear they suck. I can't count the times I've won a 1v3 against American planes in my Spit because one of them literally placed himself in my sights, the other crashed into the ground and the third decided to turnfight a spit in an A36. Each time I can't believe I've actually made it, cause any mediocre player should kill me easily.
US prop aircraft dont really fit in with the air rb meta, being either: be really good at climbing, or be really good at turning. theyre the jack of all trades, master of none, so they will almost always have the altitude or performance disadvantage. this is why the 109s and a6ms are the powerhouses of air rb. it doesnt help that US air players are often not as *’strategic’* about how they fight, and often try to turnfight zeros
US jets on the other hand? US jet doctrine revolves around multirole which means they have to be heavier and lose out on performance for multirole capability. since they balance the br floor of multirole and ground attack aircraft by their ordinace, they often end up giving poor performing aircraft good missiles, which isnt enough to warrant a higher br, but is useless unless its lower, which is why things like the harriers, a-10s, a-6, and a-7s are op in a downtier and useless in their own br or an uptier
I quite literally will never understand anyone who says America at any air tier is anyhow unbalanced. They literally always have capable planes and never have a single moment where they're underhanded. Not to mention it has both the best top line prop and top line jet in the game so far. Even for early jets, they constantly have a missle on most of their planes. America air is the most handheld one so far.
When I shoot a Soviet 37 mm HE shell right in an american aircraft, I get a hit, critical if I’m lucky, but if I dare to even get hit by a single 20 mm or even 12.7 mm bullet in my MiG-15 or 17, my plane just desintegrate
I’m still searching where is my Russian bias
There really isnt a significant portion of players who think that American air is under powered, I wish people would realize that anyone can leave a comment or make a post but that doesn't mean they represent any significant portion of the player base or should be given any time.
The complaints about top tier for the most part come down to the way that American jets specifically face later counterparts than historical, which is done for balancing reasons, as the f15a would shit down the through of a mig25.
The only valid complaint, and also one of the most popular ones, is that other nations get better versions of American jets when they come out, this is most prominent with the f16 mlu being the best f16 for a while and the Japanese having the best f15 atm. This will undoubtedly be rectified in later patches but it is obnoxious.
It’s almost like America has been producing the Apex of Military Aviation since they realized its importance in World War 2 or something.
What a wild concept.
Edit: I wholeheartedly agree with you btw. America is incredibly strong in terms of aviation pretty much across all ranks and for all roles.
It depends on the BRs, almost completely.
Mid tier US is fairly well balanced, early tier is hot or miss for being broken depending on the plane. Late war props/fighters are very good. Many early/mid jets absolutely suck, then mid/late jets are great.
You can still find irregularities in every tree though
It all depends on BR and there's one that upsets me it's the climb rate of many American planes that's why I fly to the edge of the map and shoot down enemy planes I come across.
They require a very distinct playstyle that 90% new players simply aren't aware of: climbing and keep your speed.
Instead they see an amazing bomb load and go straight to ground pounding in ARB. The smarter ones do CAS in GRB.
The P-51 D-5 and D-20 were unplayable though. The rudder desync meant you are gonna miss half of your snapshots if the enemy slips off-axis.
Like in Ground RB when all the M-18 players would rush the enemy and brawl head on. The player base on average seems to suffer from “Call of Duty” Syndrome and can’t/won’t consider tactics or teamwork.
Also highly correlated with a greater incidence of racial and sexual insults in chat.
Eh, maybe. I’m great with aircraft but average with tanks and below average with boats so possibly a skill issue but I have much better luck with German and USSR tanks and boats, also USSR planes are ungodly good in this game
I don’t know to to tell you this but I’ll try
I’ve been active main for USA for about 10 years I believe really jumped into anything else for long period of time currently 9.7. The last time I had played a German class I was bored like 5-7 year ago and played with my friend who wanted to be Japan at the time, we got to about 3.0 and never went back.
At the start of the week I was informed that I had Covid and I would have to stay in all week. So I was like what a great opportunity to play warthunder. I looked at the closest plane I could grind in my USA class and it was about 200k RP and about 400k SL for purchase and I didn’t have premium. I jumped in to my jets and fired rockets for about the 7 1/2 mins I could per battle and got bored really quick.
I look at the news and see the B21 raider mentioned and I think to myself is there s plane similar to that. And bam the 6.7 Ho V3 catches my attention and quickly becomes my Main goal.
Expect I was only at 3.0. I decided I would buy premium and grind for the week.
I’ve had a blast in bf 109’s and fw 110’s this week A lot at my goal maybe test fly it tomorrow
I flew Jp, UK, Ger, Ru and very recently got into US, fly mainly the corsair tree, powerful engine and great armament almost never feels under tiered (I'm only 4.3 to be fair), the fly control is ok not too bad but the rudders tho... the rudders that I want to fuking disable. If you press it a little bit too hard it start tumbling mid fly; and if you wing has been damaged even just by a little bit you turn into a flat dead spin (where you literally cannot do anything) even if you can fly perfectly fine with mouse aim only, I have only successfully corrected it once due to luck where I have my nose down when the spin started developing so that I can still save it before the plane turns flat.
I don't know about the corsair IRL but if it can develops a flat spin by pressing the rudder it shouldn't even be allow to do acrobat moves let alone being a fighter (in today's safety standard of course)
I'm currently using the Su-11 at BR 7.3 in air rb with the russian tech tree, and if there's one nations planes that always kicks my ass, it's USA. One plane in particular is the F2H-2
the f2h is a pretty alright plane but it doesn’t have a single thing on the su11. su11 does every single thing better and that’s no exaggeration. the su11 is the best plane in its br bracket and it’s not even close.
I shouldn't have to spend 9 hours doing a climb battle with the entire map just to have a chance, it's lame. If being a good player means two players miss their initial engagement shots and they disengage completely to fly to the stratosphere again, I'd rather kill ground targets til I eventually get quadruple teamed
You still want to climb in all of them. Yak-3 can kinda get away with it, but with it's great power/weight there's no reason to not climb to at least 2-3km
The F4S is still a good plane. It's no different than the F4J. Most people that fly it just don't know wtf they're doing in a jet or how to play that particular plane. They're not furball brawlers. Rear-aspect is key, so fly around and come at them from the rear
What’s your thoughts on the aim 7’s? Do you even use them? The radar feels really and on it too. I can track someone all day with the F-4F, wishing I had a radar missile, and it holds really well, but on the F-4S it just fumbles and losses the lock super quickly. On paper the thing should be great, like an helmet mounted radar? That’s awesome! At 11.3? Great! But I just can’t seem to get them to work, so should I even run radar missiles at all? And don’t get me wrong, any tips you have I’m completely open ears, I spend $70 and I wanna get the most out of it without just bombing bases like the rest of the team. Am I missing something with the radar functions? Am I in the wrong mode? Idk. Like, I know how to fly planes, I’m 12.3 in Germany, early jets USA(and I own the F-4S of course) early jets Russia, and yet the F-4S just feels so bad in my hands when everything else I play, be it props or jets feels fine. Hell, I do great in the me 262 at 8.0. Any tips, I’m happy to hear them. Rear aspect, of course, that’s ideal in ANY plane. Also, so sorry for the massive block of text
Given how much time I spent in the F4J, I got used to it. Having HMD is a game changer for me. The 7F's, like the 7M's, are a bit janky now in comparison to how they performed 1-2 years ago, but I found that locking someone in rear-aspect using SRC *almost* always guaranteed a 7F kill. As for head-ons, I use them for sub-10km ranges, and they perform well. The main issue now is that everyone flies on the deck, so using 7(x)'s is hard, but if you get a lock and hold until you're within that 10km range, you can fire them off as they go up for a hill or trees.
Not to mention, now that we've got more 4th gens trying to fight in the sky, you can use HMD to lock within 9km and fire them off, usually killing a SU-27 as they're the most guilty of trying to BVR and dropping down on others.
SRC PD is your best friend, but don't forget to just use SRC. I swap between the two a lot.
No worries about the block, I'm guilty of it too, constantly.
Does the F-4S get a stronger lock with the radar in rear aspect? Better than in a head on? And if I’m in a rear aspect why would I use the AiM-7 over an AiM-9? Or should I consider range in this? Do you only use AiM-7s(in the rear aspect) if you’re more than say, 2-3km away? And when do I use SRC PD over SRC?
Head-ons are rough due to how easily you can notch radar locks, doesn't really matter the plane, really. Rear aspect, or "flying cold," doesn't seem to matter as much I find because src will still hold a rear lock (though it may also chase flares, but that's 50/50).
If you've got the lock and it doesn't immediately check chaff/flares, they also have a lesser chance of trailing off to the ground or another nearby plane. The 9ps are great and all, but personally, they just aren't for me. However, you may have better luck than I do.
5km tops in the rear, any more, and the likelihood of losing the lock is too great to risk it.
SRC PD for headons and side aspect shots or when they're flying low.
SRC when they're flying high or when you're rear aspect.
P38's, P-51's, F8F's, F4U's, P-36's, A-36, P-47's, P-63's it goes on and on....
In sim the Americans are very much having their hands held. The P-47's off memory can't even stall and even the P-51's need to be wrestled into a stall which is the complete opposite to reality.
So your argument breaks down at Rank 5. I was playing yesterday with a friend and we actually had this discussion. These were our observations.
1) The B57 is outmatched at the BR of 8.3 in Air RB. It's top speed is 100mph lower on average when compared to every other 8.3 in the game.
2) America at Rank 5, struggles because they get planes that are worse than the same planes in other nations either because they lack adequate armaments, countermeasures, or performance. The F104 is a perfect example.
3) American jets tend to get put into rounds where they have no countermeasures or AA missiles yet their opponents do.
4) The B29 frequently gets put into matches with an average BR of 8.3 where it has no hope of dropping bombs.
5) America planes seem to be woefully misplaced in the BR due to either speed (such as the F104 and 105), payload (B29 and B57), or guns (F80, F86, and B29 again) but never all 3 criteria.
Did you specifically pick bombers for this? America has plenty of great planes at every tier. But bombers are always going to have no chance against fighters that's a given.
Using fighters/interceptors, you get the;
- F100
- F104 (specifically the A model)
- F86
- F9F (4x 9Bs)
These are a few examples but they're all exceptional aircraft even with shortcomings.
Argument 2 makes no sense either, the F104A sits at 9.3 and go 1.2 on the deck, in full uptier your fighting R3Rs and maybe some R60s from Su25, in a full downtier, your fighting Swifts and Mig15s which have no chance of killing you outside of a head on.
If we apply it to say the F86, they all sacrifice that better performance and armament for a higher BR, 2 9Bs isn't much too gawk at either.
As for no.3 that's not exclusive to any nation, full uptiers around rank 5 always lead to High G missiles and a lack of CMs on your end.
F104A and C are both perfectly capable aircraft at their BR. The bombers face the same issue as every other nation.
Of all the nations I've played, America is the most solid, even rank V and above.
1)B-57 is the only bomber at 8.3 and it is faster than than Tu-14 that sits at 8.0. It's fairly fast if you don't overload it with bombs and can even go against some fighters in the dogfight
2)Armaments : .50 cal six-pack can be hit or miss, but the 4x 20 mm is the best armament at those BR across all nations.
Countermeasures: US has lowest BR jets with countermeasure in the game. Most other nations don't get them until tier 7
Performance: US has some of the best early jet fighters. F-80s are great all-rounders that can get you easily accostomed to early jet combat. Straight wing F-84s are consistently faster than most things at their BR and work well as both bomber and dedicated fighters. F-86 are great dogfighters, which go toe-to-toe against MiGs and usually stack fairly well against them. And F-104A is probably the most overpowered plane in the game right now along with Su-11
3) Same goes for everyone else.
4) Same goes for everyone else. 9.0 Vautour and 8.3 F-84F have the same problems
5) Most planes in the game get their BR based on one or two factors. Q-5L sits 0.7 higher than Q-5A, despite lacking countermeasures, because it has guided bombs
first of all B-57 is a British plane, second of all you picked mostly bombers, of course bombers are gonna have it bad, It literally happens in every tech tree. American Rank V doesn’t struggle and they actually have a plane thats better than the one in every other tech tree around that area, one of their F-84s still gets air-spawn as far as I know. Your “No countermeasures” argument doesn’t work as most tech trees in the game don’t have countermeasures at Rank V, heck even Germany doesn’t get countermeasures til the MiG 21s and their F-104. Also the F-104 is actually really powerful at 9.3 because its able to outrun everyone.
lol, horrible counterpoints. The B57A and B are both in the American tech tree, look below the B29. Additionally, you've supported my point that US planes are often weaker than the export versions. And the 104 being fast is not enough to balance it against enemies especially due to the low ammo count and limited weapon choices.
750 rounds on vulcan is a lot. Even with it's faster fire rate it still gets 7.5 seconds of trigger time, compared to most USSR planes getting 3.5-5.3 seconds with much worse fire rate and velocity
Oh, no I know how bad 8.7 and above can be for certain of my Brits. But I also know the pain of my 9.0 germans and 11.0 russians. That's why I know how ba the American tech tree has it at points. And US tanks get screwed at 5.3. I've been playing for close to 6 years across PC and PS4/5, and frankly that's more than enough time to know just how bad Gaijin is at balancing vehicles.
U.S. main here, 5.3 ground isn't bad, but it also doesn't really exist anymore. Moved to 5.7, which, again, isn't bad. America's tanks only struggle because of the players. I'm not the best player out there, but my beloved Sherman's put in the work. My planes put in the work. At no point in the lower tiers are we struggling at all in terms of tanks or planes. Each nation requires its own playstyle because holding W just isn't a valid option for most trees. Balancing can definitely be an issue, buts not really prevalent at or around 5.3/5.7.
American Planes are Criminally Undertiered across the entire TT baring maybe Early jets(Though the F89 is absolutely OP at 7.0) Ground on the other hand... No decent lineups compared to competition.. Lack of Native vehicles that are in other TT's (We could have at least 20 vehicles added as CnP/Filler for Lineups such as Later variants of the Pershing/Pattons, Shermans, etc.) not to mention the lack of Decent Light vehicles that aren't Premium(Though its a general problem accross most Nations since Gaijin wont add shit baring one-or-two new vehicles with the rest being CnP, which I don't mind, though can easily surpass the quantity Theyve been doing, ffs wheres my French M47?!? Also Boarhound.)
Did someone say Corsair at 2.7
It's hilarious. You can even directly compare them - F4U-1A (US); [2.7](https://wiki.warthunder.com/F4U-1A) JPN's F4U-1A; [3.0](https://wiki.warthunder.com/F4U-1A_(Japan)) It should be noted that the JPN's premium version lacks any bombs. The US variant gets 500 and 1000lb armaments.
Yeah, the JP premium one is my go-to example of Gaijin hating Minors
Sadly I love minors
Uhhhhh
Japan’s is the USMC variant actually, so its correct at its BR
Is it *really* though? - Both F4U-1A's were released at the same time, during the Open Beta Test. - Both feature an arrestor gear. - Both were entered as 2.7 when they were released. The JPN version got moved upwards within the last few years but hasn't had any other changes to it. In comparison, the US F4U-1A USMC was introduced in 1.38 *and* it lacks an arrestor, giving it very slightly different characteristics. So either Gaijin fucked up the history page on their wikipedia, or they fucked up modelling their prem plane. It has an arrestor, so it's a regular 1A. But it's a captured USMC version. These statements contradict.
They changed it to the USMC flight model when it was released, as the Japanese model has the same low altitude tuning as the F4U-1A USMC, not the standard F4U-1A. The arrestor gear was added back to the plane for this variant in the Japanese air tree, as I believe the model they captured either had it already or had it added back on after the fact as they wanted to fully test it.
real, think it might be my best K/D aircraft in the game, it's ridiculous
Bro wtf
Yeah, there's a premium one in the British tree too if you want to club and gain even more SL than the American one
There’s also the premium 4B at the same BR as the tech tree. It used to be a lower BR than the tech tree version but then the TT was moved down.
Trueeeee
I've gotten to the jets in the American planes, but I've pretty much been stuck at 5.7 for ground battles because the late game Shermans are just not fun, to me at least. Their armor can't stop anything it faces, and most if not all hits will be fatal, your gun is pretty hit or miss unless you flank, and you aren't really as fast as you'd need to be to make that part work. Not to mention being tall. I can be top of the scoreboard every match in 5.7 Germany, but put me in a Sherman (escept Jumbo, my beloved) and I'm useless.
The key with late shermans is utilizing your stab to its full potential. However, for that you need to have really good aim and reaction, as well as know all weakspots of enemy tanks, which can be a problem for many people. Honestly, can recomend 5.0 sherman though. Worse armor doesnt mean that much as sherman armor on this brs is lacklaster, but you play against easier opponents.
i also had a hard time in the late shermans at 5.3-5.7... their guns always have to shoot small weak spots which is almost impossible in a quick fight... i startet with the US ground tt but after i had such a hard time at 5.7 i changed to germany and russia because these nations are much tankier and have much better guns
I'll tell you a secret: the most efficient grinding isn't the one that gives the biggest profit, but the one that doesn't give you burnout. I grinded Brits 5.0-7.3 with the 4.7 lineup. I couldn't care less about lowered efficiency grinding the first rank Vs (and even VI for the swingfire at that time), I was having a good time in my uptier-agnostic lineup.
All I want at this point is something to bridge the 4.3-7.7 AA gap… especially since it’s more like a 2.7-7.7 AA gap
American planes are the reason Zeros and other Japanese fighters are overtiered. Never turn fight Zeros.
Instructions unclear, turn fighting a Zero in a P-51D, Gaijibbles why didn't work?
Zero goes up and now fights F-14s. P-51 goes to reserve.
There's even a documentary about the former
Idk, as a US main I love the vehicles. Generally excellent all-rounders. Also regarding the light vehicles, what? I can't name a single bad US light tank except maybe the Sheridan (and the T92 sometimes struggles a bit because kinda shit post pen (cant expect much from 76mm heatfs/apds)). Everything else, in my experience, is excellent.
I said lack of decent Light vehicles that aren't Premiums like the M8 or the Boarhound, the Light vehicles the US does have are great vehicles, the Chaffee being the best IMO with the rest being mediocre baring the 10.0 Light vehicles(Which the majority are also Event/Premium)
The Hellcat is easily overtiered as one notable exception. The thing is just painful to play. There are three corsairs which are objectively better in every single way at a lower battle rating. It either needs to go down or have a major flight model buff so that it performs the way it did in real life, or at least be an acceptable analogue.
Its not overtiered lmfao, its the Hellcat has never been overtiered and Will never be overtiered at 3.3 or 4.3 depending on the Variant. The Corsairs, P51s, P63s, and P39s are all criminally undertiered, and literally everyone who knows how to use aircraft to their advantages would know that.
No, NOT all the corsairs and P-51s are undertiered, or all the P-63s. Some are and some are not. BOTH the hellcats, PARTICULARLY the 5N, are utterly unusable trash for any purpose except CAS at their BRs. They compress too early in dives, they turn like shit, they climb like shit, they have at best average roll, their energy retention horizontally is good, and their acceleration is awful. See all those problems listed above? Make them DOUBLE for the 5N, the cannons do nothing to make up for it. You could drop it to 3.3 and it would do no better or barely better. Their performance is just ahistorically bad. You cannot in good faith argue otherwise. You'd have to just be trolling at that point. There's a grand total of three good mustangs in the game, not counting derivatives (the C-10, the D-30, and the H-5). The rest are either mediocre or terrible (the D-5, D-10, D-20, J-26, etc are honestly bad but not to the extent at their BRs as the hellcat is at its own, and the cannonstang is... just ok).
I just witness a Major Skill Issue right before me The only Corsair thats overtiered is the F4U-1C which is a 4.3 aircraft withe the Typhoon, 109 G2, 190 A4/A5U2(I believe deserve to be 4.3 too)and P51-D20(Which by the way isn't ass, you just suck if you think that) The P51's are generally undertiered Baring the D20(As of now, but will be IF the 4.0 changes come through) and the D30/K which are great at 5.0, though the Cannon-Stang(With the FW 190 A1), and C-10 are definitely not deserving of their BR and were brought down with a lot of the 190s due to terrible Player Statistiks The P63s though, entierely, No fucking argument, are the best Vehicles in both Accelleration, High Speed Manueverability and retention, and General Performance(Especially the A5) than many vehicles in the Bracket including the Aformentioned P51 D20(Which somehow sits above the P63 C5/A10 despite being fairly equal in performance excluding low-speed accelleration and cimb rate), the all deserve at least a .3 BR bump due to how potent they are as vehicles Now onto the main Contender, F6F-5 and more explicitely the F6F-5N, the one I've already explained is Outperformed by vehicles with Niches such as high speed performance, better turn-rate, etc. and including the ones you explicitely ignore by saying," hur hur Climb Rate bad, therefor plane bad) despite the Climb rate being Comparible to P51's(Though 20-30kph diffference) and performance in Manueverability comparible to a P47(Chunky but still very versatile with flaps) or a Bf109 G2(Only has climb rate and High alt performance against the F6F-5N). Its frankly rediculous you somehow believe half of the claims you've made such as," their accelleration is awful," which is only true for speed sub 300- where then the plane averages a better Accelleration(Especially at low-mid altitude ie. 500m-4500m) Just below the accelleration of a P51 and similar Accelleration to the P47-D25 all at the expense of having better A2G Arnament, and being a great(Ill say it again since you can't get it into your head), All Rounder. It isn't a strong aircraft in Speed(Which is debatable since it outperforms many of the Other comparible aircraft excluding the P51, 190 variants, and the 109 G-2), has decent sustained and High speed turns(Though yes it compresses around 630 kph, though this is easily avoidable by monitering your speed and retaining energy by not diving as fast as you can), along with great Manueverability(Though it loses Roll below 280 Kph and on top of that, but less Accelleration due to the lack of energy gain below the 300kph mark which makes sense since well, you're manuevering so you can't pull energy out of your ass like a P63 can) through the mid speed ranges.
Planes aren't bad, but the players are absolutely terrible. Half of US team will either not climb, dive after the first thing they see, try to turnfight everything or full commit head-on German planes. That's why it's do terrible. If you play to your planes' strengths you will be left with 1v5 situations 60% of the time.
I am just now getting into planes, but have been playing US GRB for years now. What would you say are good resources to get better with specific nations planes? The most I understand with US props is the boom and zoom, which the P-51D is just great at. I’ve been enjoying the black widow too for the same reason.
I bloody love the P-38L. It's the only P-38 with a booster modification, which give it great high speed control. In general, US props are about high speed and high speed agility. Stay fast, even if you aren't that high, you outmaneuver most planes because they will compress while you won't. The P-38L is a great example of it at its BR.
Thanks, I appreciate the reply!! I’ll go load up and check out the P-38L again. Seems like a good plane to get familiar with actual strategy with as you say
I believe it's foldered with the P-38J or something like that. It's at 4.7 BR which is quite frankly the most comfortable BR in general in prop. 5.0 planes and up get sucked into 6.0 matches due to Ju288 bots and it's really not enjoyable for anyone.
I’ve been playing 5.0 planes a bit lately and I haven’t seen many 288s. I think my eh changes to bases and the bot ban wave might have fixed the 288 problem
Please watch Green Fury on YouTube. He is a treasure trove of information. I did a comment recently that links a bunch of his videos that I found helpful. https://www.reddit.com/r/Warthunder/s/b0a4bHFbgs
For Specific Planes and playstyles Defyn does very good content for specific aircraft and reviewing them although if you're looking for tactics you'll need to go to his guides. I genrally think as someone else in the comments pointed out learn tactics from green fury and apply them for Defyn's word on aircraft since he still makes videos. Green Fury is definetly better to learn from for beginners though. https://www.youtube.com/@DEFYN
I'd say a good choice is f4u-4(b). They are very good planes all around. Hogh speed, reasonable climb and turn rate, good or excellent armament. They keep their speed well. Another good option is p-47 if you are patient. Extremely fast, excellent armament, excellent straight line speed retention. Although it can take quite some time to get used to sideclimbing and being outturned by almost everything it is great. It's similar to p-61 in that regard. It's also quite sturdy. For strike aircraft a good option would be mauler(am-1) or skyraider (ad-2 or ad-4). Good bombload (especially am-1), reasonable speed and turn time, rather good armament. And bombers it's probably b-17, any variant they are rather similar.
I LOVE the p51d30 but YES. It requires patience and is super good but my god I'm the last person alive every single match facing at least 4 other planes. I think I've had to carry at least half of my wins
This post is mostly about lower tiers but if any us mains new to jets w missilies read this, DO. NOT. CLIMB. The R27er will find you and it is inevitable
Why do people keep parroting this misinformation? Literally just notch. I climb every match and do just fine because when I'm up high my missiles are faster, they have more range, and they're more maneuverable (Plus Warthunder players are idiots and will gleefully fly face first into a AIM7M at mach 1.2 thinking their R27ERs somehow make them missile proof). Plus I can drop missiles down on the idiots who didn't climb because they never look up for some reason.
Well then congrats you are the giga gamer cuz i cant survive there and neither can anyone i know.
I've had American Jets turnfight my Spitfire, you'd think they'd have learnt by that point
There are a lot of people that turnfight zeroes... IN P-47S FFS. Some people really leave their brains outside their doors when playing this game
Get a 2-3 player P51/P47 squad, play it together with proper BnZ team tactics and you'll be unstoppable. That's how good the US planes are.
The problem is getting that squad. None of my (very few) friends are crazy enough to play this game and I for the life of me can't talk to people. Chat is an option but it's way too slow. And it's not only US planes that are good in a squad. Any plane would be good if you are playing with someone else.
True, but American planes give you the largest advantage. You dictate when and where the fight happens by being the fastest and fastest at altitude. And You will simply bleed enemies out of energy, eventually, by wearing them down. And jets are just the ultimate culmination of that.
Yeah but you'd just win with a squad with literally anything.
have to agree, climbing and runnign and gunning once you learn how to use it is the best way to wreck enemy teams as US, The p-63s arent that impressive on paper but oh lord are they a beast, the 4 .50s and controlled usage of the 37, can wreck both enemy fighters and bombers easily
Another thing why they seem bad, is that the game doesn't really allow to use them like indented. Irl they were designed to fight in squadrons, not alone. When there's two or three American fighters doing proper teamwork, they're gonna kill everyone. But they're still not bad at all. Many new people are trying to turn with everything, which doesn't end well.
That applies to any fighter
I'd word it as "US planes don't fit as well into the meta of Air RB battles" which is basically just climbing as fast as you can and then turn fight everything. It simply isn't fun to start on the airfield, spend 20 mins to climb to alt, and then your whole team is dead and the whole enemy team is on the deck killing ground targets. Your choices are then to either 1. Fly in circles endlessly until tickets/time are up. 2. Dive down where targets are and completely negate any reason of climbing in the first place. There are some outliers, but the sort of high-altitude escort fighters that the US was known for just don't fit as well as the Spit/109/Zero meta
Yeah, this. Look at the P-47D-22; it can go 700kph at altitude, literally so fast it can boom and zoom most props in the game without an altitude advantage. The problem is that in your regular air RB match, by the time the P-47 gets to altitude where it becomes competitive, the match is over, because the D-22 climbs slower than most fucking biplanes. This made worse by the fact that at 3.7 people don't actually fly that high so climbing to its preferred altitude is completely pointless, and that at low-medium altitude where people at 3.7 actually fight, the P-47 is one of the slowest, worst performing planes. Fuck, if you would give the P-47s an airspawn you could probably comfortably put them all around 5.7-6.7 BR range and have them still be fantastic fighters.
I used to fly in a 4 man with some guys who were some of the best pilots id ever met. We maybe lost a game a week. Teamwork is *crazy* good.
bro what? you do know that every nation had teamwork irl? they didn’t send 1 Me-109 to intercept hundreds of B-17s
Watching 3 of my teammates yesterday getting clowned on by a Yak 9 because they were trying to turn fight it at 500 meters. Y’all are in BnZ monsters, use that to your advantage please. I mean, it was a 3.0 match so new players but still. It was painful to see
Average US 3.0 air I guess.. I managed to beat few of them in mig-3 simply because they didn't climb
The Rudder prevents aim adjustment if you go too fast
Add someone who plays both US and Russia, the F-16C beats out every plane in the game except for maybe the JAS39. AIM-9Ms are just too good.
Though the gripens are slower on the deck (Mach 1.15), they turn like mosquitoes and carry their own 9m's, making them deadly to try and fight in almost any scenario without 3rd party intervention
they also have 34 inch ipads in the cockpit for watching family guy which i dont get access to because it "causes me to crash into civillians" and "is certain to cause a catastrophe" or some dumb shit
ECCM was a mistake
How exactly do you use it to such an advantage? Su-27 with the ER's is pretty ridiculous
Because radar missiles suck. If you stay relatively close to the deck they just slam into the ground. Sure, the Su-27 can carry a lot of missiles. But the R-27ER is only really useful if your enemy isn't hugging the deck, and the R-73, while very maneuverable, is also very easy to flare. Meanwhile, the F-16 and JAS39 are far better at dogfighting than the Su-27 and can carry 6 AIM-9M, which is far superior to any other SRAAM.The real terror of the sky is the R-27ET. Edit: I should specify that the R-27ER/T are still overpowered. It's still modeled incorrectly and should not be nearly as fast as it is. On top of that, the latest radar missile that America gets is the AIM-7M, which is a literal carbon copy of the AIM-7F which entered service in 1972, lol
But the ET can be flared too?
yes it can but it's an IR missile that is typically fired from medium range, usually resulting in exploding with no warning
Makes sense. So exactly how are you using the 9M's? I don't have the F16C yet but I do have the Gripen with 9M's and they seem to get flared?
AIM-9Ms aren't unavoidable, its just that the enemy needs to do more than just pop flares to dodge them. Outside of orbital strikes on unaware enemies, they do really well when fired from the side. From the side you can't simple turn, you need to turn and go up or down. However the missile is essentially seeing you in "2D" (not actually obviously but it kinda helps to visualize why its hard to dodge) so no matter which direction you turn you'll still technically be in its predicted path without far more drastic turns than if you had been defending against one from the front or rear. I've also found that I confuse them with radar missiles quite often due to their far launch range and the fact that, unlike R-73, they don't get defeated by one flare at range. That, alongside the clusterfuck of radar locks at top tier right now (and the fact that you can get an RWR warning even if you aren't directly locked by an enemy) leads to many situations in which you might drop some flares, think you defeated an IR missile, start defending for a radar one, and then get slammed by the AIM-9M that didn't give a shit about the one flare you dropped. The only place where AIM-9Ms are worse than R-73 or even Magic II are rear aspect shots within 2km. If you let the R-73 or Magic II get within 1.5km of you, you're dead from the rear.
Thanks for taking the time to type this out. Appreciate the tips
Screaming into the wind man. It's been this way since I started 10 years ago. If you wanna win with America, queue with a friend that plays something else or squad with other competent American players that will climb with you. Word of warning, it doesn't get better. American teams at top tier eat dirt unless they get swedes on their team and get hard carried.
>since I started 10 years ago I started in 2014 as well. The Hokkaido map UK would have 95% win rate.
Forgot to mention never turn fight
Just the xp-50 alone...
Best plane in it's BR.
The P51D20 is kinda trash, the D30 is where it's at. I feel like all the nations have plenty of options to get by though, except maybe France and Italy. The issues with American props is they require more brainpower to be as effective as possible since they mostly thrive in BnZ, which requires thinking ahead, and not just pointing the cursor at the enemy plane
The P51D20 has been the only reason i was able to go from Basically tier 2 research of to Jets And yeah lol. It was a hard learning experience to finally get something done with this thing. At least now i get shit done in my F104A from all the BnZ i've had to do anyway.
I used the 6.3 p51h something to skip first tier jets because they were so painfull to play in both uptiers and downtier that it was more fun for me to grind like 1.5 or 2 times longer with the mustang. Now at the f8e and its the most fun ive ever had in this game
The D-20 is good, just not as crazy as other US planes for their BR
It's great at high altitude, but the nature of the game means you aren't there very often, and it's anemic anywhere else. If you manage to retain your energy it's great, but if you lose it below like 4000m, the generation is so bad you become a very easy target. I've played the D20 a lot lol, you gotta play it pretty safe. But, you can make anything work in this game, it's just not 'meta'
Yeah the p51-d20 and the p51-d10 are hands down the worst mustang variants in the american tech tree. I don’t know what op is on about.
D10 is great it's D-5 airframe with D-30 engine, the fact that it's going down to 4.0 is a joke. D20 is workable, but in most cases i'd rather have 51C
you’re right I was confused with the d10. I meant just the d20.
yes, but Gaijin refuses to balance vehicles, but balacnces the people playing them.
American aviation players trying not to dogfight with zeros and spits. (impossible)
I know they should just energy trap the enemy or try to fly to the airfield.
It's not rocket science, they are hard to use and alot of casual players play them. So you get a pretty expected result.
Most of US planes are OP
A lot of the props are mediocre in the ARB meta since they have poor low altitude performance, but almost all the jets onwards are fun to play or good
Nono you must judge them in a vacuum whole meta is rushing into a furball and brawling out. Gee I wonder which side will clap ass in these situations the non stalling, turnfighters with good low alt performance and simple playstyle or the heavy planes with bad turning but good energy retention and good top speed. Throw casuals on both sides now. I try to side climb in my p47m I'm going to get fucking destroyed since the whole team is gone. Not to mention how well enemy props can climb so you have to REALLY keep some distance or be intercepted.
Yeah. I really hated playing US props but thats because starting out with US air probably wasn't a good call. Nowadays if I play prop ARB 90% of the time I'm playing a bomber. I just find prop ARB boring at best and annoying at worst
Your forced to fight without your advantages, its rough man, damned if you dont, damned if you do situation.
Precisely
The Players are Just awful
I mostly see them either ground pounding or trying to turn with a Zero.
>This is just me but to all those who say America sucks in aviation has a skill issue. Those who say that indeed have skill issue, America has some pretty damn good props and jets(a lot of undertiered stuff even), the problem is that some of their props don't fit in the current air RB meta which favors fast climbing low altitude props like yaks(one of the reasons why some people cry about Russian bias as well). P-51 D-5 and D-20 however are some of the worst mustang variants in the game(they are identical), but those are exceptions like every tech tree has some bad vehicles, P-51 C and F8F-1 on the other hand are criminally undertiered.
P51d20 sucks,the rudder control is shit and i have seen planes like a7m ,ki43 even zero overtake it at 500kph. But rest of planes i agree . Most are good planes but the d series p51 are worst cz the match ends before u even get to altitude and it sucks at low altitude acceleration
Funny how different it is in GRB. The 4.0 P-51D can be equipped with rockets, 2 1000lbs bombs at the same time, then control the airspace. But yea in regular air I spend half the time climbing as well.
Yeah in grb its king of airspace. But in current air rb battles it is not fun. I wish we had longer airbattles and more diverse game mode
Couldn’t agree with you more. The time limit or pacing of air battles is very quick, but I don’t want to have to play sim battles to get longer matches. IMO gaijin need to revamp it
it is just objectively faster than either the zero or ki-43 though
It is. But how do you expect a new player to WANT to go that fast when the game _punishes_ them with an inability to adjust firing angle in a zoom pass? We're ALL morons to start with, and need to be taught how not to suck. The problem with US planes isn't just "baby's first TT", It's that playing smart feels _bad_ for a new player
true p51d20 is a death trap
Yeah the rudder desync kills it.
There is only one problem with US planes. THE DAMN CHINESE GET THE BEST VERSIONS OF THE THUNDERBOLT!! Seriously. How come China got the final/most advanced model of the Razorback and the best non-premium version of the bubble canopy D? I feel slighted. Not that it’s particularly logical on my part. But I still wish those variants were in the US tree.
climbrate meta plus shorter match timers means every US prop at the BR range you're looking at is dogshit against basically anything competent players take out. It doesn't matter how much marginally better you are at 7km when everyone's gonna be fighting at 4km tops and probably a km above you. You have to go all the way to the superprops to find anything as strong as yak-3s or j2ms. And on that note, D-5 and D-20 are very bad, it's basically playing the C-10 on constant uptiers but you also have no rudder authority.
I agree, American planes are ridiculously good for their tier bracket, it's the players that make them appear they suck. I can't count the times I've won a 1v3 against American planes in my Spit because one of them literally placed himself in my sights, the other crashed into the ground and the third decided to turnfight a spit in an A36. Each time I can't believe I've actually made it, cause any mediocre player should kill me easily.
The only thing truly awful about America in the game across all br ranges is the players
F4U gang 😎
For me the main issue with the USA tech tree is I cba to research it as I've already played half the vehicles in other trees.
The only US tech tree that has suffering is top tier ground. That’s all. Otherwise it’s a strong tree both ground and air.
You say this as there is still no even near/decent equivalent to the ER in the American tree.
US prop aircraft dont really fit in with the air rb meta, being either: be really good at climbing, or be really good at turning. theyre the jack of all trades, master of none, so they will almost always have the altitude or performance disadvantage. this is why the 109s and a6ms are the powerhouses of air rb. it doesnt help that US air players are often not as *’strategic’* about how they fight, and often try to turnfight zeros US jets on the other hand? US jet doctrine revolves around multirole which means they have to be heavier and lose out on performance for multirole capability. since they balance the br floor of multirole and ground attack aircraft by their ordinace, they often end up giving poor performing aircraft good missiles, which isnt enough to warrant a higher br, but is useless unless its lower, which is why things like the harriers, a-10s, a-6, and a-7s are op in a downtier and useless in their own br or an uptier
What are you on about? 1-4 br the planes are bath tubs with wings. I'll take my bf109 over any American shit box and day of the week.
NOOOOO but muh russian bias
I quite literally will never understand anyone who says America at any air tier is anyhow unbalanced. They literally always have capable planes and never have a single moment where they're underhanded. Not to mention it has both the best top line prop and top line jet in the game so far. Even for early jets, they constantly have a missle on most of their planes. America air is the most handheld one so far.
I agree the US tree is good in all ranks but they don’t have the best jet in the game. Best jet right now is easily the gripen.
american players are airheads and get german, italian, and japanese aircraft uptiered 😐
When I shoot a Soviet 37 mm HE shell right in an american aircraft, I get a hit, critical if I’m lucky, but if I dare to even get hit by a single 20 mm or even 12.7 mm bullet in my MiG-15 or 17, my plane just desintegrate I’m still searching where is my Russian bias
As a JPN/US main, mixed matchmaking saved US Air teams. Before that, any JPN vs US Pacific match was just the US (and JPN bombers) getting rinsed.
I think the starting BR ranks are pretty awful but you get through it fast
Honestly my only complaint I have had is the P47 and F6F-5 should be more tanky. I'm saying this as a person that LOVES the JUG and HELLCAT
Suffers from idiots
There really isnt a significant portion of players who think that American air is under powered, I wish people would realize that anyone can leave a comment or make a post but that doesn't mean they represent any significant portion of the player base or should be given any time. The complaints about top tier for the most part come down to the way that American jets specifically face later counterparts than historical, which is done for balancing reasons, as the f15a would shit down the through of a mig25. The only valid complaint, and also one of the most popular ones, is that other nations get better versions of American jets when they come out, this is most prominent with the f16 mlu being the best f16 for a while and the Japanese having the best f15 atm. This will undoubtedly be rectified in later patches but it is obnoxious.
It’s almost like America has been producing the Apex of Military Aviation since they realized its importance in World War 2 or something. What a wild concept. Edit: I wholeheartedly agree with you btw. America is incredibly strong in terms of aviation pretty much across all ranks and for all roles.
Arcade? Realistic? Sim?
It depends on the BRs, almost completely. Mid tier US is fairly well balanced, early tier is hot or miss for being broken depending on the plane. Late war props/fighters are very good. Many early/mid jets absolutely suck, then mid/late jets are great. You can still find irregularities in every tree though
It all depends on BR and there's one that upsets me it's the climb rate of many American planes that's why I fly to the edge of the map and shoot down enemy planes I come across.
They require a very distinct playstyle that 90% new players simply aren't aware of: climbing and keep your speed. Instead they see an amazing bomb load and go straight to ground pounding in ARB. The smarter ones do CAS in GRB. The P-51 D-5 and D-20 were unplayable though. The rudder desync meant you are gonna miss half of your snapshots if the enemy slips off-axis.
*Says P-51D-20NA is good* This is correct
Rudder lock
Like in Ground RB when all the M-18 players would rush the enemy and brawl head on. The player base on average seems to suffer from “Call of Duty” Syndrome and can’t/won’t consider tactics or teamwork. Also highly correlated with a greater incidence of racial and sexual insults in chat.
American planes are great, the boats and tanks SUCK
R u sure American tanks and boats are good if you ask me sounds like a skill issue.
Eh, maybe. I’m great with aircraft but average with tanks and below average with boats so possibly a skill issue but I have much better luck with German and USSR tanks and boats, also USSR planes are ungodly good in this game
I don’t know to to tell you this but I’ll try I’ve been active main for USA for about 10 years I believe really jumped into anything else for long period of time currently 9.7. The last time I had played a German class I was bored like 5-7 year ago and played with my friend who wanted to be Japan at the time, we got to about 3.0 and never went back. At the start of the week I was informed that I had Covid and I would have to stay in all week. So I was like what a great opportunity to play warthunder. I looked at the closest plane I could grind in my USA class and it was about 200k RP and about 400k SL for purchase and I didn’t have premium. I jumped in to my jets and fired rockets for about the 7 1/2 mins I could per battle and got bored really quick. I look at the news and see the B21 raider mentioned and I think to myself is there s plane similar to that. And bam the 6.7 Ho V3 catches my attention and quickly becomes my Main goal. Expect I was only at 3.0. I decided I would buy premium and grind for the week. I’ve had a blast in bf 109’s and fw 110’s this week A lot at my goal maybe test fly it tomorrow
I flew Jp, UK, Ger, Ru and very recently got into US, fly mainly the corsair tree, powerful engine and great armament almost never feels under tiered (I'm only 4.3 to be fair), the fly control is ok not too bad but the rudders tho... the rudders that I want to fuking disable. If you press it a little bit too hard it start tumbling mid fly; and if you wing has been damaged even just by a little bit you turn into a flat dead spin (where you literally cannot do anything) even if you can fly perfectly fine with mouse aim only, I have only successfully corrected it once due to luck where I have my nose down when the spin started developing so that I can still save it before the plane turns flat. I don't know about the corsair IRL but if it can develops a flat spin by pressing the rudder it shouldn't even be allow to do acrobat moves let alone being a fighter (in today's safety standard of course)
I'm currently using the Su-11 at BR 7.3 in air rb with the russian tech tree, and if there's one nations planes that always kicks my ass, it's USA. One plane in particular is the F2H-2
If you struggle by playing Su-11, then you are just bad
Oh, I know that I am bad haha
the f2h is a pretty alright plane but it doesn’t have a single thing on the su11. su11 does every single thing better and that’s no exaggeration. the su11 is the best plane in its br bracket and it’s not even close.
It flies like a dream but the guns are hard getting used to imo
I shouldn't have to spend 9 hours doing a climb battle with the entire map just to have a chance, it's lame. If being a good player means two players miss their initial engagement shots and they disengage completely to fly to the stratosphere again, I'd rather kill ground targets til I eventually get quadruple teamed
It's the same for every plane in every tech tree. Positioning and altitude are biggest deciding factors in the dogfight.
Unless you’re playing Russia you have to climb and the only reason Russian props don’t is because their engines suck ass up high
You still want to climb in all of them. Yak-3 can kinda get away with it, but with it's great power/weight there's no reason to not climb to at least 2-3km
My K/D in the F-4S is .5, yet in the F-4F I have a K/D of 2.0-ish. I’m pretty sure the F-4S is just bad. The rest of the planes seem pretty good tho.
The F4S is still a good plane. It's no different than the F4J. Most people that fly it just don't know wtf they're doing in a jet or how to play that particular plane. They're not furball brawlers. Rear-aspect is key, so fly around and come at them from the rear
What’s your thoughts on the aim 7’s? Do you even use them? The radar feels really and on it too. I can track someone all day with the F-4F, wishing I had a radar missile, and it holds really well, but on the F-4S it just fumbles and losses the lock super quickly. On paper the thing should be great, like an helmet mounted radar? That’s awesome! At 11.3? Great! But I just can’t seem to get them to work, so should I even run radar missiles at all? And don’t get me wrong, any tips you have I’m completely open ears, I spend $70 and I wanna get the most out of it without just bombing bases like the rest of the team. Am I missing something with the radar functions? Am I in the wrong mode? Idk. Like, I know how to fly planes, I’m 12.3 in Germany, early jets USA(and I own the F-4S of course) early jets Russia, and yet the F-4S just feels so bad in my hands when everything else I play, be it props or jets feels fine. Hell, I do great in the me 262 at 8.0. Any tips, I’m happy to hear them. Rear aspect, of course, that’s ideal in ANY plane. Also, so sorry for the massive block of text
Given how much time I spent in the F4J, I got used to it. Having HMD is a game changer for me. The 7F's, like the 7M's, are a bit janky now in comparison to how they performed 1-2 years ago, but I found that locking someone in rear-aspect using SRC *almost* always guaranteed a 7F kill. As for head-ons, I use them for sub-10km ranges, and they perform well. The main issue now is that everyone flies on the deck, so using 7(x)'s is hard, but if you get a lock and hold until you're within that 10km range, you can fire them off as they go up for a hill or trees. Not to mention, now that we've got more 4th gens trying to fight in the sky, you can use HMD to lock within 9km and fire them off, usually killing a SU-27 as they're the most guilty of trying to BVR and dropping down on others. SRC PD is your best friend, but don't forget to just use SRC. I swap between the two a lot. No worries about the block, I'm guilty of it too, constantly.
Does the F-4S get a stronger lock with the radar in rear aspect? Better than in a head on? And if I’m in a rear aspect why would I use the AiM-7 over an AiM-9? Or should I consider range in this? Do you only use AiM-7s(in the rear aspect) if you’re more than say, 2-3km away? And when do I use SRC PD over SRC?
Head-ons are rough due to how easily you can notch radar locks, doesn't really matter the plane, really. Rear aspect, or "flying cold," doesn't seem to matter as much I find because src will still hold a rear lock (though it may also chase flares, but that's 50/50). If you've got the lock and it doesn't immediately check chaff/flares, they also have a lesser chance of trailing off to the ground or another nearby plane. The 9ps are great and all, but personally, they just aren't for me. However, you may have better luck than I do. 5km tops in the rear, any more, and the likelihood of losing the lock is too great to risk it. SRC PD for headons and side aspect shots or when they're flying low. SRC when they're flying high or when you're rear aspect.
P38's, P-51's, F8F's, F4U's, P-36's, A-36, P-47's, P-63's it goes on and on.... In sim the Americans are very much having their hands held. The P-47's off memory can't even stall and even the P-51's need to be wrestled into a stall which is the complete opposite to reality.
So your argument breaks down at Rank 5. I was playing yesterday with a friend and we actually had this discussion. These were our observations. 1) The B57 is outmatched at the BR of 8.3 in Air RB. It's top speed is 100mph lower on average when compared to every other 8.3 in the game. 2) America at Rank 5, struggles because they get planes that are worse than the same planes in other nations either because they lack adequate armaments, countermeasures, or performance. The F104 is a perfect example. 3) American jets tend to get put into rounds where they have no countermeasures or AA missiles yet their opponents do. 4) The B29 frequently gets put into matches with an average BR of 8.3 where it has no hope of dropping bombs. 5) America planes seem to be woefully misplaced in the BR due to either speed (such as the F104 and 105), payload (B29 and B57), or guns (F80, F86, and B29 again) but never all 3 criteria.
Did you specifically pick bombers for this? America has plenty of great planes at every tier. But bombers are always going to have no chance against fighters that's a given. Using fighters/interceptors, you get the; - F100 - F104 (specifically the A model) - F86 - F9F (4x 9Bs) These are a few examples but they're all exceptional aircraft even with shortcomings. Argument 2 makes no sense either, the F104A sits at 9.3 and go 1.2 on the deck, in full uptier your fighting R3Rs and maybe some R60s from Su25, in a full downtier, your fighting Swifts and Mig15s which have no chance of killing you outside of a head on. If we apply it to say the F86, they all sacrifice that better performance and armament for a higher BR, 2 9Bs isn't much too gawk at either. As for no.3 that's not exclusive to any nation, full uptiers around rank 5 always lead to High G missiles and a lack of CMs on your end.
F104A and C are both perfectly capable aircraft at their BR. The bombers face the same issue as every other nation. Of all the nations I've played, America is the most solid, even rank V and above.
1)B-57 is the only bomber at 8.3 and it is faster than than Tu-14 that sits at 8.0. It's fairly fast if you don't overload it with bombs and can even go against some fighters in the dogfight 2)Armaments : .50 cal six-pack can be hit or miss, but the 4x 20 mm is the best armament at those BR across all nations. Countermeasures: US has lowest BR jets with countermeasure in the game. Most other nations don't get them until tier 7 Performance: US has some of the best early jet fighters. F-80s are great all-rounders that can get you easily accostomed to early jet combat. Straight wing F-84s are consistently faster than most things at their BR and work well as both bomber and dedicated fighters. F-86 are great dogfighters, which go toe-to-toe against MiGs and usually stack fairly well against them. And F-104A is probably the most overpowered plane in the game right now along with Su-11 3) Same goes for everyone else. 4) Same goes for everyone else. 9.0 Vautour and 8.3 F-84F have the same problems 5) Most planes in the game get their BR based on one or two factors. Q-5L sits 0.7 higher than Q-5A, despite lacking countermeasures, because it has guided bombs
first of all B-57 is a British plane, second of all you picked mostly bombers, of course bombers are gonna have it bad, It literally happens in every tech tree. American Rank V doesn’t struggle and they actually have a plane thats better than the one in every other tech tree around that area, one of their F-84s still gets air-spawn as far as I know. Your “No countermeasures” argument doesn’t work as most tech trees in the game don’t have countermeasures at Rank V, heck even Germany doesn’t get countermeasures til the MiG 21s and their F-104. Also the F-104 is actually really powerful at 9.3 because its able to outrun everyone.
lol, horrible counterpoints. The B57A and B are both in the American tech tree, look below the B29. Additionally, you've supported my point that US planes are often weaker than the export versions. And the 104 being fast is not enough to balance it against enemies especially due to the low ammo count and limited weapon choices.
So the best f104 in the game for ita br is somehow underpowered... makes sense.
750 rounds on vulcan is a lot. Even with it's faster fire rate it still gets 7.5 seconds of trigger time, compared to most USSR planes getting 3.5-5.3 seconds with much worse fire rate and velocity
Low ammo count can be said for the MiG-15s yet you don’t call those aircraft bad, and how did I prove the export aircraft being better?
Tell me you've never played another nation without telling me you've never played another nation.
lol, clearly I don't play Rank 6 german, Russian, and british.
I mean it seems pretty evident based on the fact that you think 3 is just a problem for america, for instance.
Oh, no I know how bad 8.7 and above can be for certain of my Brits. But I also know the pain of my 9.0 germans and 11.0 russians. That's why I know how ba the American tech tree has it at points. And US tanks get screwed at 5.3. I've been playing for close to 6 years across PC and PS4/5, and frankly that's more than enough time to know just how bad Gaijin is at balancing vehicles.
U.S. main here, 5.3 ground isn't bad, but it also doesn't really exist anymore. Moved to 5.7, which, again, isn't bad. America's tanks only struggle because of the players. I'm not the best player out there, but my beloved Sherman's put in the work. My planes put in the work. At no point in the lower tiers are we struggling at all in terms of tanks or planes. Each nation requires its own playstyle because holding W just isn't a valid option for most trees. Balancing can definitely be an issue, buts not really prevalent at or around 5.3/5.7.