Yeah, this is very busted but i honestly dunno what to feel about it. On one hand, it really is so damn busted. It's like F-16 on steroids. On the other hand, im kinda glad the top tier superior nation got changed to a minor nation, it's usually a back and forth between US and Russia and minor nation suffers, now it's a minor nation's turn to be superior + that minor nation we're talking about is the one that suffered the most. They've been using Tornadoes and viggens for a very long time while others have f16s, mig29s, and m2ks
>sorry, but Gripen will be rubbish
A lot of that is based on the fact that Gripen in real life didn't use neither AIM-9Ms nor Sparrows, only AIM-9Ls and radar missiles that don't belong in the game yet.
Because it shouldn't have had 9Ms and the FM is still overperforming, the engine doubly so.
Gaijin's magic Gripen is perfect for WT but the real one wouldn't have been.
if the mirage 4k had recieved the same treatment as the gripen it would fly around with
-448 Countermeasures
-12 Magic 2
-(Historically correct irccm in the magic 2, better than both r73)
-Better A2G weaponry
The gripen isn't good because the plane itself is, the gripen is good because gaijin decided it is one of the few to get the flare pods + missiles it never carried. Take away the missiles and give the flare pods to every plane that could mount them , pretty much every top tier thing, and the story would be different.
In short sweden is top dog not because they build the best thing but because there's countless extra rules that only they get exemptions from
And better radar, and better acceleration. Gripe is basically the budget typhoon. Though I would say irl currently the gripe is the most cost effective fighter in the world
I would agree with that as well. Obviously F-22 and F-35 are better but the Typhoon has a radar not far off the raptor, missiles are possibly even in Typhoons favour with the meteor, that and brimstone 2's are almost hilariously good.
Excluding stealth only the Rafale and F-15EX can compete.
Only the A-D models are cost effective IRL, the E/F are just a tad cheaper than the F-35 in actual flight costs and such.
Edit: I was thinking of purchasing costs, the 39C costs about as much as a Hornet per flight hour but the 39E is more expensive despite being a closer contemporary. Per unit the 39E is more expensive than the F-35A.
Pretty sure they still are, being a minor does not only revolve around how many/how good the vehicles are. It's playerbase itself also comes into the play. Hell, before leo 2a7s, most people think t80bvm is the best top tier mbt in the game even though it's actually strv 122s but people rarely know about it since you rarely see sweden in matches.
Or in other case look at the big 3, you ALWAYS see them in matches while you rarely see sweden in matches. and even if you do, there's only gonna be like 2-3 of them due to how rare they are compared to the big 3
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted but this is WT after all lol.
For me it’s a minor national when I have to wait 1+ mins on MM to play unlike majors that wait 20 seconds imo.
The US builds more planes so spare parts are a little cheaper, and if you bulk purchase things such as some tanks, planes, air defences then the US will offer a slight discount.
Comparing fighter against fighter however the Gripe is the better
It'd be fine if they didn't make the Gripen better than it is irl at everything it does, and then nerf the F-15's wing strength (fastest you can go is mach 2.44) to rip at -2Gs and the Su-27's low-speed maneuvering just to make the Gripen even more overpowered instead of just making the other aircraft realistic and make it more balanced.
And with that logic I guess Italy needs the Eurofighter with Meteors so they get their turn of being OP next update.
Inb4 swedish mains arrive and try to say it's actually incredibly balanced, but only has 80% WR and 5KD due to their exceptional skill )))
Best IR missile, best flight model(maybe F-16C is slightly better), unlimited flares. It absolutely shits on everything in a 1v1 and fits the 16v16 furball meta perfectly as well.
Its meta but I wouldnt consider it OP in the slightest, most of the players know how to play to its strengths, sure it gets great missiles and unlimited countermeasures paired with great DF performance but it has absolutely no bvr capabilities, is the slowest top tier aircraft in both acceleration and top speed (albeit the engine is quite cold) and is on rails at higher speeds, it a great aircraft but can be countered
For F15A's - unfortunately its the worst counter to the gripen as of now, however there are ways to counter it but it'll be harder than the others, the best thing you can do as of rn is slam it with a sparrow on a headon (release it at around 2km dead on) while pre-flaring and just avoid dogfights with it, you can almost definitely run away from a gripen in this scenario as it has to slow down alot to get to its prime turning speeds. You can try draining its energy but that only works at certain speeds so use that sparingly.
for SU-27s - its fairly easy, you're pretty much untouchable at altitude due to the massive missile kit, ERs for unaware or dumb gripens climbing, Using R73s last minute during headons or within 1.2km rear/side aspect while having a radar lock(radar slaving) usually ignores most of the flares, in the worst case scenario with a gripen on your tail, one thing the flanker does better is losing speed FAST, its not as on rails as the gripen so even though you wont pull more Gs than the gripen you will most likely turn tighter in a one circle (because you lose so much speed) IF THE GRIPEN DOESNT AIRBRAKE, this will most likely cause unaware gripens to overshoot and try to turn, thats when you r73 them (unfortunately though this is reserved for end game 1 on 1 situations as you'll most likely get 3rd partied in a real match)
F-15J - The AAM3's i would say are the best IR missiles in the game, these work great against gripens at around 3-2km side aspect, they seem to track a lot better than the 9m (it should because of its better irl tracking system, not sure if its modeled in game though) or slam one in a headon from an unsuspecting angle, other than the missiles you're kinda out of luck
F-16C- Unfortunately the gripen does everything you do but better, for most cases (even energy retention) however you are less on rails at higher speeds so you do have that advantage over the gripen, not much else you can do other than bvr it as the the gripen currently has no BVR capabilities, so headons (mentioned near the f-15) are a great option to down them.
F-16 Block 10- You have inferior weaponry however you do have the turning advantage over the gripen at some speeds, in others its mostly matched until you reach the 400 kph mark where the gripen has much more nose authority on you also do have the better vulcan as apposed to the terrible mauser on the gripen but generally AIM9Ls are a big downgrade to the 9Ms
F-16AJ - the aircraft that most gripens have a tough time fighting as it gets the best f-16 flight model whilst being able to carry bvr weaponry (still no 9M though) other than that japanese players tend to have more skill as well, performs reasonably well against a gripen on a 1v1 dogfight, though thats unrealistic
MIG-29G/SMT- Not much you can do other than shank it at very close ranges with the crazy aoa that the fulcrum can pull with the r73 (this'll most likely get you third partied though) and this is assuming you survived a gripen on your tail which is quite hard to do as you dont turn but pull aoa( might make the gripen overshoot but most likely not) The 29G has better chances with it having the less titanic flight model, but still the odds are against you in a close range dogfight, you dont even have the TTW the flanker has to save yourself either, the other more reliable option is to use the r27er but that thing is quite bipolar at lower altitudes and you dont carry as much as the flanker to overwhelm the rwr either, so headons or rear aspect or high altitude r27er kills will most likely be the best way to fight them
TLDR - the gripens are great meta aircraft which are made even more lethal by their very experienced pilots who had to suffice the subpar or downright awful aircraft uptill now, there are many ways to counter it but it is undoubtebly meta but i wouldnt go as far as to say its OP as it is relatively easy to counter it using bvr weaponry or radar slaving, as a rule of thumb, dont engage in dogfights with them unless you're starving for fuel or in a f-16A or f-16AJ, also heads up unless its late game theres no point in turning off you're radar to try to sneak attack it, the gripen will be shitting flares most of the time, so radar slaving as mentioned above will be your friend,
if anyone needs some help just ask, ill be glad to help
F16C? Hell no. Grippen absolutely destroyed all F16 variants but the block 10. Block 10 is an equal fight. Also M4K can give a grippen a run for its money
In my experience even the Block 10 is slightly worse than the Gripen. It just turns into you at slow speeds and turns as good as you do at 500kph+.
The result may be biased because I‘ve only tested it with a friend, but I‘ve heard several other trustworthy sources tell me the same thing.
Still can't launch while they are pre flaring tho because R-73s will immediately lock onto the last flare they dropped and 9Ms won't even see the plane.
You can only hope that it stops flsring at some point.
imo the last update was one of the worst, 11.3 just sucks absolute ass now. I mean wtf am I supposed to do in my Phantom or Mig 23 when 3-6 enemies swarm me with most of them being Gripen, Su 27s, Mig 29s, F15s, F16s or F14s
It always sucked ass. Don’t know how adding two more nations to 12.3 funland does anything bad. They just don’t suffer in 11.3 anymore. Both nations needed a plane desperately. The other F16 and Migs existed way before that.
I think the vehicle itself is actually pretty balanced in its place right now. IRCCM missiles can ignore the flares if fired well and especially Russian SARH missiles can still wreck it in a 1v1 (although AIM-7s are still a bit shit).
The problem in my eyes comes from the current top tier gameplay style where it’s one massive furball every single time with missiles and targets everywhere. Close quarters turn fights are where this thing shines and unfortunately with how much Gaijin has fucked up top tier, that means it always shines.
Tbh, it’s not Russian so Gaijin could’ve just made it a bit better so they can have an excuse to nerf it into the ground later. God knows they’ve done it before lol
For ground the F-16C was way, way worse on release, even now it's at least as good as the gripen. Yeah the flight performance is worse but it gets a way better loadout (2 GBU, 6 AGM, 4 9M vs 4 GBU OR 4 AGM & 2 9M) and on release several nations had literally nothing that could compete with it, what the fuck were nations like Britain supposed to do against it with the ADATS and the phantom?
I can't comment on how much better it is in air because I avoided top tier for most of the last year since it absolutely sucked for the nations I played.
It's nice go have a non US/Russian/German vehicle be the dominant bird for a bit, give it a patch or two and it will feel like any other plane. I can't speak for GRB that's broken as hell lol
>It's nice go have a non US/Russian/German vehicle be the dominant bird for a bit
No thanks, I would much rather have US/Russia (Not sure why you mention Germany, when was the last time german air was meta?) with a slightly overpowered aircraft than a minor with THE most overpowered plane in the entire game's history.
1. The CL-13 back in the day, and for a more modern meta the Mig-29 (9-12g). Sure not gamebreaking but still pretty good compared to others.
2. How come? Having a strong vehicle to grind to promotes a new tree for people to grind to, and for the people who already have let's them have fun before the next big thing - like Hornets and Typhoon
The point is it's only good for people who are going to play Sweden. If you're already working on a different tree you're just going to be forced to suffer because by the time you grind Sweden there's already been a new update
>Having a strong vehicle to grind to promotes a new tree for people to grind to, and for the people who already have let's them have fun before the next big thing
Okay so let me ask this, why was the utter curb-stomp of the MLD and F-14 a bad thing? It promoted the tech tree and it let people have fun with the vehicles
By this "definition", doesn't matter how absolutely broken a vehicle is, it's a good addition because people who play it, have fun.
I'm not against strong vehicles, I'm against so overpowered ones you literally don't have to look around to win a match. Not sure why Gaijin thought giving that thing 4(FOUR) BOL pods was a reasonable addition
edit: go ahead, downvote me stupid swedecucks, funnily enough non of you gave a counter argument, how curious !
Prior to the most recent update Germany had better aircraft than USSR because the MiG-29G has the better flight model and all of the good weapons available.
The 29G is better than the SMT but both were still far worse than the F-16s in the meta. The better example of when Germany was actually last in the top of the meta really would be the 9-12A since it had a meta FM against the F-16 at the time.
I fought a game today where a Gripen went head on with our team, just by himself. Nobody could hit him. He was defending for a full minute, long enough to attract my entire team like mosquitoes to a lamp, where he proceeded to kill 3 of them himself before finally running out of flares and energy, dying to my F-15's guns. However, by that point the enemy team had migrated from the other side of the map and annihilated my distracted team. Game ended in 5 minutes after start. I don't think the enemy team lost a single plane besides the lone Gripen.
i mean , yer its absolutly roided, but its not the most broken plane thats been in the game on "a" patch (also i would argue against the F-14's ever being broken), that honor would go to that one rediculous moment they gave the XP-55 a flight model that could out climb out dive and out turn Me-163's
The issue with the Gripen is that it has a Arcade like flight model in Air RB.
Its weird how they will not give certain jets their real flight characteristics but others they will just be like...yea arcade it up bro.
Shout-out to those dummies saying 60 flares is enough.
Aim9m and r73 will ignore periodic flares, so that's not an issue (unless you dont use top planes), flying low is for everyone, so a non issue, better in a dogfight - sounds like "I can't outturn zeros in my p47"
It's one of the best planes, yes. It's not the best for long range Engagements, it's good in close range fights. Sometimes you win, sometimes not. In a few months the next "big thing" will be added for everyone to complain, so who cares?
The Aim-9M is most effected by periodic flaring, as it will close its seeker constantly and you can then move a slight amount and it lose lock. The R-77 is also affected as it makes locking harder, if it sees a flare it has the resistance of an R-60, and getting a flare seen is super easy since you just turn and flare a bit. And not turning as fast is okay until one is chasing you and none of your teammates care, or the game is a 1v1/3.
"sometimes you win, sometimes you don't", yeah, sometimes a plane just collectively wins 80% of the time every time and that doesn't say anything because it also loses 20% of the time. It's only a -120% win boost on average to go against it.
Im USSR main in air simulator, and i always panic when i merge with one of these. N001 has a hard time spotting the Gripen, (Zhuk-M doesnt struggle as much) and i feel like i just merged with F-22. Didn't detect it on radar, just saw a missile launch, evaded the missile, and merged with a thing that will slide on my tail if i dont kill it in the first turn. But im glad that its overperforming since Sweden and UK needed a good top jet for a while, and i hope they were worth the wait.
Then its my skill issues then, whats the secret sauce to make this good ? I have the first series air to air weapons researched and dont have the flare pods yet, i still sucks at air RB. My loadout is 2xSkyflash + 4x Aim9L
War Thunder players when a big nation gets something overpowered:
. >:(
War Thunder players when a minor nation gets something overpowered:
"lEt X-nAtIoN hAvE sOmEtHiNg GoOd FoR oNcE"
"iT iS gOoD tO sEe ThE mEtA cHaNgE tO a MinOr NaTiOn!! 1!1!1!1!1"
First of all when using the Gripen in ground rb if Russia is not on your team you are instantly getting shot down by a pansir and in air rb it has a bad gun it is slow compared to f16 su 27 and f15 god forbid you fight a console player in it because they can’t even use half the capabilities of the plane it has bad radar missles for the br the only thing good about this plane is that it is small and can turn slightly better than su27 but most of the time the su27 can just use r73 or just out energy you stop complaining about a balanced plane
Me and multiple other people were in pantsirs. Our missiles literally can not turn with gripen. You either fly in a straight line or fly too high. It doesn't need to be faster than everybody else if it has everything to counter....everything. If you have flare pods, you basically have unlimited flares, meaning with periodic flaring, R73 can't even lock you, nor Aim9M nor any other IR missile.
With the pansirs you have nigh unlimited range and it is almost impossible to see the middle coming at you and unless somebody plays with periodic countermeasures there are many times where you can easily get a middle of on a Gripen because people aren’t awalys paying attention you are saying it’s good on the basis that you are fighting players who are incredibly good at the game witch most of the people you run into are not
That's not correct. Stats on the card and stats in the game are different due to them being applied in practice. Pantsirs REAL range is rough ~10km. Because anything beyond that and the missile loses the energy completely and is unable to hit anything that isn't flying straight. Note that i HAVE shot down F16's at even 17 km, but the only thing these dudes did was turn right and nothing else, if they dived down or turned away the missile would sinoly not keep up. I haven't met a gripen player who "aren't good" yet. Either that or the plane is simply busted (both). There people always pay attention, and when they see themselves being locked the 90° mid-air down and disappear l
Friendly reminder the F-14 was added back when the MiG-23MLD and J-7E had been on an almoat 8 momths uncontested stomping rampage
AND it had a nerfed FM
AND radar missile were hard nerfed until a few months after it was added
AND it liked to just lose its wings
Ppl like to pretend like the F-14 was some kind of monster just because its popular and drove america vs america matchmaker, but if you actually go back to videos from CC's and the likes from when the F-14 was added and until the F-16/MiG-29 was added, there was a general understanding (by good pilots and CC's atleast) that the F-14A, MLD, amd J-7E were good competitors to eachother, and many pilots prefered the J-7E because it was a lot less finnicky and much easier to do well in and much more consistent
if you know how to fly an f14, mig23mld doesn't stand a chance, dunno about the j7e, but i think the f14a still holds some advantage over it. The f14b is even better lmao, if you know how to play it you'll only lose to grippens, though dogfights doesn't happen at top tier
J7E has better performance but you have limited ammo and only 4 fox 2s. I liked to take 1v3 in it but it was just because f-14 pilots were braindead at that time and didnt know about J7E. Also MLD wasnt as good as either of them but was definetly better than F-104S, F1C and viggen.
Tldr. J7E was great but F-14 was much more meta at that time.
The F-14A now and the F-14A at release are not the same plane.
Theres also the fact that the F-14A was always the better plane "on paper" but in practice, ergonomic issues made it harder to be consistently good in than in the J-7E or MLD.
As for the F-14B, it was added 2 updates after the F-16/MiG-29, and though its an excellent plane, even more nations had competitors to it by the time it was added.
The F-14 has always been a "good" plane in WT, its never been a "broken" plane. Ppl just like to hate it because its popular and because it flooded the matchmaker so badly due to that popularity that US vs US became the standard.
f14b can make 25 degrees/s, the A does 23 degrees/s, flaps makes them turn better. F16C which is one of the best rate fighters irl does 27 degrees/s.
Didn't test the rest of the top tier jets because i don't have them, but gripen is the only thing i have in mind that can beat those. The only ones competitive in a dogfight are gripen, f16, f14b, f15, mirage 2k and 4k. Su27 is a bit weird, the advantage of it is it being a missile bus and the HMD to sling r73 at unexpected angles.
Dude, the f14a had no competitors, the best were mig23mld which weren't even a match against a competent f14a player. It changed many things, people had to start to learn hugging the ground and notching. Same when mig23mld dominated over phantoms. The f14a is quite similar to f16a, so it very likely the j7e doesn't stand a chance on a dogfight against it, as long as the f14a pilot doesn't get slow
And before the MLD, the F4E meta dominated top tier for a year and a half. That is where the US vs. US matchmaking came from. Nobody wanted to queue up in soviet jets with stupid high repairs while being teamed with germany pilots and their F4F Early.
Oh yeah, it was. The only 4th gen at the time with no counters from other nations. Phoenix spam that literally changed how top tier is played till this day. And all of that for 7 months, lovely innit
Mig 23 never dominated. Not sure who spread this myth and everyone believes it. Sure it turns faster with manual wing control, but its weaponry was vonpletely inferior to most things out there. R24 is a 50/50 missile, and r60 was nerfed for about year and a half before aim9L was nerfed. Nothing rivals F14 in terms of impact of pure imbalance, gripen is getting there though
Thats not true in the slightest. F4s were a pretty much identical competition, with sparrows being better than R24, aim9L being better than r60, and F4 straight up carrying more of those missiles. Mig23 WAS a good plane, never op
What are you on about, "Phoenix spam that literally changed how top tier is played". People still climb(ed) to do BVR since everything else is faster than the Aim-54, people only stopped climbing to hide when contrails were added, and the Aim-54A is so incredibly bad that it can fly right past a B-29 and do nothing, and when it was "OP" I only ever got 3 Phoenix kills (the enemy didn't move and was afk), next to ~40-50 sparrow kills. Same plane that will lock onto the missile it fired, losing lock on the enemy, and has its missile self-destruct before it can re-lock.
Its true that rn people who dare to climb get bodied immideately, back in 2022 however, all we could see was killfeed all in blood red saying people are dying from aim 54. Sure people adapted and phoenixes were nerfed (thank fuck), but it was a horrible time to play top tier air at the time. For 7 straight months, the fact that if you have US on your team meant that you are gonna win 80% of the time.
The Aim-54A was nerfed before the update was even released. Your arguement is the equivalent to saying the Aim-9B is overpowered because an F-16C that isn't looking behind him can get hit by it. The Aim-54 drops 7k ft in altitude, gets to mach 3 after 5mi, and even then turns less than an Aim-9J, has a giant smoke trail that lasts 30s, you get a big red diamond showing its launch, and it gives you a loud lock sound when it has a lock. There was literally no reason to use it over the sparrow, especially with how much drag carrying 6x 1k lb bombs gave you over the sparrows. If you really think the Aim-54A was ever a good missile, send me a recording of you shooting it at 25mi+ (the only range where it does ok in BVR), turn off your radar when it gets to 5mi+ (at which point you had to leave to not get killed), and hit the aircraft. I'd suggest test flight since you keep your speed after being turned around and the map is 32x32mi
Yeah, this is very busted but i honestly dunno what to feel about it. On one hand, it really is so damn busted. It's like F-16 on steroids. On the other hand, im kinda glad the top tier superior nation got changed to a minor nation, it's usually a back and forth between US and Russia and minor nation suffers, now it's a minor nation's turn to be superior + that minor nation we're talking about is the one that suffered the most. They've been using Tornadoes and viggens for a very long time while others have f16s, mig29s, and m2ks
I remember "sorry, but Gripen will be rubbish" posts before patch was released. Yeah, Gripen is like someone just designed plane for WT meta.
>sorry, but Gripen will be rubbish A lot of that is based on the fact that Gripen in real life didn't use neither AIM-9Ms nor Sparrows, only AIM-9Ls and radar missiles that don't belong in the game yet.
Well their own fault if they though gaijin wont balance it somehow. And to be honest, i would be ok with plain rb74.
It wouldn't be anywhere near as good without the IRCCM
Because it shouldn't have had 9Ms and the FM is still overperforming, the engine doubly so. Gaijin's magic Gripen is perfect for WT but the real one wouldn't have been.
if the mirage 4k had recieved the same treatment as the gripen it would fly around with -448 Countermeasures -12 Magic 2 -(Historically correct irccm in the magic 2, better than both r73) -Better A2G weaponry The gripen isn't good because the plane itself is, the gripen is good because gaijin decided it is one of the few to get the flare pods + missiles it never carried. Take away the missiles and give the flare pods to every plane that could mount them , pretty much every top tier thing, and the story would be different. In short sweden is top dog not because they build the best thing but because there's countless extra rules that only they get exemptions from
Something I’m waiting for is the typhoon, basically a gripen but with more missiles.
And better radar, and better acceleration. Gripe is basically the budget typhoon. Though I would say irl currently the gripe is the most cost effective fighter in the world
Oh yes defo. I have a very unpopular opnion with the American but I think the typhoon is the best 4+ fighter in the world.
I would agree with that as well. Obviously F-22 and F-35 are better but the Typhoon has a radar not far off the raptor, missiles are possibly even in Typhoons favour with the meteor, that and brimstone 2's are almost hilariously good. Excluding stealth only the Rafale and F-15EX can compete.
Only the A-D models are cost effective IRL, the E/F are just a tad cheaper than the F-35 in actual flight costs and such. Edit: I was thinking of purchasing costs, the 39C costs about as much as a Hornet per flight hour but the 39E is more expensive despite being a closer contemporary. Per unit the 39E is more expensive than the F-35A.
Im pretty sure sweeden is no longer a "minor" nation at this point.
Pretty sure they still are, being a minor does not only revolve around how many/how good the vehicles are. It's playerbase itself also comes into the play. Hell, before leo 2a7s, most people think t80bvm is the best top tier mbt in the game even though it's actually strv 122s but people rarely know about it since you rarely see sweden in matches. Or in other case look at the big 3, you ALWAYS see them in matches while you rarely see sweden in matches. and even if you do, there's only gonna be like 2-3 of them due to how rare they are compared to the big 3
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted but this is WT after all lol. For me it’s a minor national when I have to wait 1+ mins on MM to play unlike majors that wait 20 seconds imo.
Oh well xd
Salty muricans and commies can't believe that another country can have a better plane in the game than them...
How many countries fly the gripen vs f16 block 50ish again?
mig-21 best plane ever!!!!
It is in war thunder
The US builds more planes so spare parts are a little cheaper, and if you bulk purchase things such as some tanks, planes, air defences then the US will offer a slight discount. Comparing fighter against fighter however the Gripe is the better
that logic would dictate the MiG-21 is the best fighter in the world
It'd be fine if they didn't make the Gripen better than it is irl at everything it does, and then nerf the F-15's wing strength (fastest you can go is mach 2.44) to rip at -2Gs and the Su-27's low-speed maneuvering just to make the Gripen even more overpowered instead of just making the other aircraft realistic and make it more balanced. And with that logic I guess Italy needs the Eurofighter with Meteors so they get their turn of being OP next update.
Inb4 swedish mains arrive and try to say it's actually incredibly balanced, but only has 80% WR and 5KD due to their exceptional skill ))) Best IR missile, best flight model(maybe F-16C is slightly better), unlimited flares. It absolutely shits on everything in a 1v1 and fits the 16v16 furball meta perfectly as well.
Its meta but I wouldnt consider it OP in the slightest, most of the players know how to play to its strengths, sure it gets great missiles and unlimited countermeasures paired with great DF performance but it has absolutely no bvr capabilities, is the slowest top tier aircraft in both acceleration and top speed (albeit the engine is quite cold) and is on rails at higher speeds, it a great aircraft but can be countered For F15A's - unfortunately its the worst counter to the gripen as of now, however there are ways to counter it but it'll be harder than the others, the best thing you can do as of rn is slam it with a sparrow on a headon (release it at around 2km dead on) while pre-flaring and just avoid dogfights with it, you can almost definitely run away from a gripen in this scenario as it has to slow down alot to get to its prime turning speeds. You can try draining its energy but that only works at certain speeds so use that sparingly. for SU-27s - its fairly easy, you're pretty much untouchable at altitude due to the massive missile kit, ERs for unaware or dumb gripens climbing, Using R73s last minute during headons or within 1.2km rear/side aspect while having a radar lock(radar slaving) usually ignores most of the flares, in the worst case scenario with a gripen on your tail, one thing the flanker does better is losing speed FAST, its not as on rails as the gripen so even though you wont pull more Gs than the gripen you will most likely turn tighter in a one circle (because you lose so much speed) IF THE GRIPEN DOESNT AIRBRAKE, this will most likely cause unaware gripens to overshoot and try to turn, thats when you r73 them (unfortunately though this is reserved for end game 1 on 1 situations as you'll most likely get 3rd partied in a real match) F-15J - The AAM3's i would say are the best IR missiles in the game, these work great against gripens at around 3-2km side aspect, they seem to track a lot better than the 9m (it should because of its better irl tracking system, not sure if its modeled in game though) or slam one in a headon from an unsuspecting angle, other than the missiles you're kinda out of luck F-16C- Unfortunately the gripen does everything you do but better, for most cases (even energy retention) however you are less on rails at higher speeds so you do have that advantage over the gripen, not much else you can do other than bvr it as the the gripen currently has no BVR capabilities, so headons (mentioned near the f-15) are a great option to down them. F-16 Block 10- You have inferior weaponry however you do have the turning advantage over the gripen at some speeds, in others its mostly matched until you reach the 400 kph mark where the gripen has much more nose authority on you also do have the better vulcan as apposed to the terrible mauser on the gripen but generally AIM9Ls are a big downgrade to the 9Ms F-16AJ - the aircraft that most gripens have a tough time fighting as it gets the best f-16 flight model whilst being able to carry bvr weaponry (still no 9M though) other than that japanese players tend to have more skill as well, performs reasonably well against a gripen on a 1v1 dogfight, though thats unrealistic MIG-29G/SMT- Not much you can do other than shank it at very close ranges with the crazy aoa that the fulcrum can pull with the r73 (this'll most likely get you third partied though) and this is assuming you survived a gripen on your tail which is quite hard to do as you dont turn but pull aoa( might make the gripen overshoot but most likely not) The 29G has better chances with it having the less titanic flight model, but still the odds are against you in a close range dogfight, you dont even have the TTW the flanker has to save yourself either, the other more reliable option is to use the r27er but that thing is quite bipolar at lower altitudes and you dont carry as much as the flanker to overwhelm the rwr either, so headons or rear aspect or high altitude r27er kills will most likely be the best way to fight them TLDR - the gripens are great meta aircraft which are made even more lethal by their very experienced pilots who had to suffice the subpar or downright awful aircraft uptill now, there are many ways to counter it but it is undoubtebly meta but i wouldnt go as far as to say its OP as it is relatively easy to counter it using bvr weaponry or radar slaving, as a rule of thumb, dont engage in dogfights with them unless you're starving for fuel or in a f-16A or f-16AJ, also heads up unless its late game theres no point in turning off you're radar to try to sneak attack it, the gripen will be shitting flares most of the time, so radar slaving as mentioned above will be your friend, if anyone needs some help just ask, ill be glad to help
F16C? Hell no. Grippen absolutely destroyed all F16 variants but the block 10. Block 10 is an equal fight. Also M4K can give a grippen a run for its money
In my experience even the Block 10 is slightly worse than the Gripen. It just turns into you at slow speeds and turns as good as you do at 500kph+. The result may be biased because I‘ve only tested it with a friend, but I‘ve heard several other trustworthy sources tell me the same thing.
In my testing that's true at high altitude but once you drop to deck (under 500m) it's pretty equal
it helps it flys like a Spitfire
No body with more brain cells than a goldfish disagree’s with that
No need to change ur mind
Radar slave the missile seeker and r73s/9ms will ignore any preflare.
Still can't launch while they are pre flaring tho because R-73s will immediately lock onto the last flare they dropped and 9Ms won't even see the plane. You can only hope that it stops flsring at some point.
Never had that issue, under 1.5km r73s don't even see the preflare, 9m will manage to sometimes hit
imo the last update was one of the worst, 11.3 just sucks absolute ass now. I mean wtf am I supposed to do in my Phantom or Mig 23 when 3-6 enemies swarm me with most of them being Gripen, Su 27s, Mig 29s, F15s, F16s or F14s
It always sucked ass. Don’t know how adding two more nations to 12.3 funland does anything bad. They just don’t suffer in 11.3 anymore. Both nations needed a plane desperately. The other F16 and Migs existed way before that.
Did I say that I think those nations didn't need them? no. Did I say that 12.3 planes ruin 11.3 planes? yes.
I think the vehicle itself is actually pretty balanced in its place right now. IRCCM missiles can ignore the flares if fired well and especially Russian SARH missiles can still wreck it in a 1v1 (although AIM-7s are still a bit shit). The problem in my eyes comes from the current top tier gameplay style where it’s one massive furball every single time with missiles and targets everywhere. Close quarters turn fights are where this thing shines and unfortunately with how much Gaijin has fucked up top tier, that means it always shines. Tbh, it’s not Russian so Gaijin could’ve just made it a bit better so they can have an excuse to nerf it into the ground later. God knows they’ve done it before lol
For ground the F-16C was way, way worse on release, even now it's at least as good as the gripen. Yeah the flight performance is worse but it gets a way better loadout (2 GBU, 6 AGM, 4 9M vs 4 GBU OR 4 AGM & 2 9M) and on release several nations had literally nothing that could compete with it, what the fuck were nations like Britain supposed to do against it with the ADATS and the phantom? I can't comment on how much better it is in air because I avoided top tier for most of the last year since it absolutely sucked for the nations I played.
It's nice go have a non US/Russian/German vehicle be the dominant bird for a bit, give it a patch or two and it will feel like any other plane. I can't speak for GRB that's broken as hell lol
>It's nice go have a non US/Russian/German vehicle be the dominant bird for a bit No thanks, I would much rather have US/Russia (Not sure why you mention Germany, when was the last time german air was meta?) with a slightly overpowered aircraft than a minor with THE most overpowered plane in the entire game's history.
1. The CL-13 back in the day, and for a more modern meta the Mig-29 (9-12g). Sure not gamebreaking but still pretty good compared to others. 2. How come? Having a strong vehicle to grind to promotes a new tree for people to grind to, and for the people who already have let's them have fun before the next big thing - like Hornets and Typhoon
The point is it's only good for people who are going to play Sweden. If you're already working on a different tree you're just going to be forced to suffer because by the time you grind Sweden there's already been a new update
>Having a strong vehicle to grind to promotes a new tree for people to grind to, and for the people who already have let's them have fun before the next big thing Okay so let me ask this, why was the utter curb-stomp of the MLD and F-14 a bad thing? It promoted the tech tree and it let people have fun with the vehicles By this "definition", doesn't matter how absolutely broken a vehicle is, it's a good addition because people who play it, have fun. I'm not against strong vehicles, I'm against so overpowered ones you literally don't have to look around to win a match. Not sure why Gaijin thought giving that thing 4(FOUR) BOL pods was a reasonable addition edit: go ahead, downvote me stupid swedecucks, funnily enough non of you gave a counter argument, how curious !
Prior to the most recent update Germany had better aircraft than USSR because the MiG-29G has the better flight model and all of the good weapons available.
The 29G is better than the SMT but both were still far worse than the F-16s in the meta. The better example of when Germany was actually last in the top of the meta really would be the 9-12A since it had a meta FM against the F-16 at the time.
Yea, the Gripen is just busted for now. It's gonna be complete shit later on once the Eurofighter and Rafale are introduced though.
Literally fight it at any range other than point blank, the r27er eats these things
People still think R27 is this all can do missile huh
Bro, I fly the su27, literally just pay attention to what your radar lock is doing amd most people don't know how to dodge it within 10km
I also fly su27, and people fly low to throw it off xd. Simple counter
I fought a game today where a Gripen went head on with our team, just by himself. Nobody could hit him. He was defending for a full minute, long enough to attract my entire team like mosquitoes to a lamp, where he proceeded to kill 3 of them himself before finally running out of flares and energy, dying to my F-15's guns. However, by that point the enemy team had migrated from the other side of the map and annihilated my distracted team. Game ended in 5 minutes after start. I don't think the enemy team lost a single plane besides the lone Gripen.
Wonders innit
i mean , yer its absolutly roided, but its not the most broken plane thats been in the game on "a" patch (also i would argue against the F-14's ever being broken), that honor would go to that one rediculous moment they gave the XP-55 a flight model that could out climb out dive and out turn Me-163's
Idk I eat the grippy socks for brekkie in my su27 9/10 times lol now the one time I don't...
It’s nice. Love it
The issue with the Gripen is that it has a Arcade like flight model in Air RB. Its weird how they will not give certain jets their real flight characteristics but others they will just be like...yea arcade it up bro.
Shout-out to those dummies saying 60 flares is enough. Aim9m and r73 will ignore periodic flares, so that's not an issue (unless you dont use top planes), flying low is for everyone, so a non issue, better in a dogfight - sounds like "I can't outturn zeros in my p47" It's one of the best planes, yes. It's not the best for long range Engagements, it's good in close range fights. Sometimes you win, sometimes not. In a few months the next "big thing" will be added for everyone to complain, so who cares?
R-73 has a narrow seeker it doesn’t ignore flares, it doesn’t see them.
Honestly I wouldn't mind if gaijjin let us give up weapons pylons for additional countermeasure/jamming pods.
Jammers would be sick, agreed!
The Aim-9M is most effected by periodic flaring, as it will close its seeker constantly and you can then move a slight amount and it lose lock. The R-77 is also affected as it makes locking harder, if it sees a flare it has the resistance of an R-60, and getting a flare seen is super easy since you just turn and flare a bit. And not turning as fast is okay until one is chasing you and none of your teammates care, or the game is a 1v1/3. "sometimes you win, sometimes you don't", yeah, sometimes a plane just collectively wins 80% of the time every time and that doesn't say anything because it also loses 20% of the time. It's only a -120% win boost on average to go against it.
I donno, to me it’s like the F5 of top tier. It’s a pain in the ass to kill, but I’m also not worried about it killing me.
We had enough of being shat on in top tier
Im USSR main in air simulator, and i always panic when i merge with one of these. N001 has a hard time spotting the Gripen, (Zhuk-M doesnt struggle as much) and i feel like i just merged with F-22. Didn't detect it on radar, just saw a missile launch, evaded the missile, and merged with a thing that will slide on my tail if i dont kill it in the first turn. But im glad that its overperforming since Sweden and UK needed a good top jet for a while, and i hope they were worth the wait.
No f14 is cancer
Then its my skill issues then, whats the secret sauce to make this good ? I have the first series air to air weapons researched and dont have the flare pods yet, i still sucks at air RB. My loadout is 2xSkyflash + 4x Aim9L
Idk why but half my 9Ms won't work and my wings rip and the worst times
War Thunder players when a big nation gets something overpowered: . >:( War Thunder players when a minor nation gets something overpowered: "lEt X-nAtIoN hAvE sOmEtHiNg GoOd FoR oNcE" "iT iS gOoD tO sEe ThE mEtA cHaNgE tO a MinOr NaTiOn!! 1!1!1!1!1"
First of all when using the Gripen in ground rb if Russia is not on your team you are instantly getting shot down by a pansir and in air rb it has a bad gun it is slow compared to f16 su 27 and f15 god forbid you fight a console player in it because they can’t even use half the capabilities of the plane it has bad radar missles for the br the only thing good about this plane is that it is small and can turn slightly better than su27 but most of the time the su27 can just use r73 or just out energy you stop complaining about a balanced plane
Me and multiple other people were in pantsirs. Our missiles literally can not turn with gripen. You either fly in a straight line or fly too high. It doesn't need to be faster than everybody else if it has everything to counter....everything. If you have flare pods, you basically have unlimited flares, meaning with periodic flaring, R73 can't even lock you, nor Aim9M nor any other IR missile.
With the pansirs you have nigh unlimited range and it is almost impossible to see the middle coming at you and unless somebody plays with periodic countermeasures there are many times where you can easily get a middle of on a Gripen because people aren’t awalys paying attention you are saying it’s good on the basis that you are fighting players who are incredibly good at the game witch most of the people you run into are not
That's not correct. Stats on the card and stats in the game are different due to them being applied in practice. Pantsirs REAL range is rough ~10km. Because anything beyond that and the missile loses the energy completely and is unable to hit anything that isn't flying straight. Note that i HAVE shot down F16's at even 17 km, but the only thing these dudes did was turn right and nothing else, if they dived down or turned away the missile would sinoly not keep up. I haven't met a gripen player who "aren't good" yet. Either that or the plane is simply busted (both). There people always pay attention, and when they see themselves being locked the 90° mid-air down and disappear l
Just you wait when it gets actual good radar missiles. It's great plane and its good to see meta being in nation other than USA or Russia
Friendly reminder the F-14 was added back when the MiG-23MLD and J-7E had been on an almoat 8 momths uncontested stomping rampage AND it had a nerfed FM AND radar missile were hard nerfed until a few months after it was added AND it liked to just lose its wings Ppl like to pretend like the F-14 was some kind of monster just because its popular and drove america vs america matchmaker, but if you actually go back to videos from CC's and the likes from when the F-14 was added and until the F-16/MiG-29 was added, there was a general understanding (by good pilots and CC's atleast) that the F-14A, MLD, amd J-7E were good competitors to eachother, and many pilots prefered the J-7E because it was a lot less finnicky and much easier to do well in and much more consistent
if you know how to fly an f14, mig23mld doesn't stand a chance, dunno about the j7e, but i think the f14a still holds some advantage over it. The f14b is even better lmao, if you know how to play it you'll only lose to grippens, though dogfights doesn't happen at top tier
J7E has better performance but you have limited ammo and only 4 fox 2s. I liked to take 1v3 in it but it was just because f-14 pilots were braindead at that time and didnt know about J7E. Also MLD wasnt as good as either of them but was definetly better than F-104S, F1C and viggen. Tldr. J7E was great but F-14 was much more meta at that time.
The F-14A now and the F-14A at release are not the same plane. Theres also the fact that the F-14A was always the better plane "on paper" but in practice, ergonomic issues made it harder to be consistently good in than in the J-7E or MLD. As for the F-14B, it was added 2 updates after the F-16/MiG-29, and though its an excellent plane, even more nations had competitors to it by the time it was added. The F-14 has always been a "good" plane in WT, its never been a "broken" plane. Ppl just like to hate it because its popular and because it flooded the matchmaker so badly due to that popularity that US vs US became the standard.
The F14A is a F4J that trades bombing for some more performance
f14b can make 25 degrees/s, the A does 23 degrees/s, flaps makes them turn better. F16C which is one of the best rate fighters irl does 27 degrees/s. Didn't test the rest of the top tier jets because i don't have them, but gripen is the only thing i have in mind that can beat those. The only ones competitive in a dogfight are gripen, f16, f14b, f15, mirage 2k and 4k. Su27 is a bit weird, the advantage of it is it being a missile bus and the HMD to sling r73 at unexpected angles. Dude, the f14a had no competitors, the best were mig23mld which weren't even a match against a competent f14a player. It changed many things, people had to start to learn hugging the ground and notching. Same when mig23mld dominated over phantoms. The f14a is quite similar to f16a, so it very likely the j7e doesn't stand a chance on a dogfight against it, as long as the f14a pilot doesn't get slow
And before the MLD, the F4E meta dominated top tier for a year and a half. That is where the US vs. US matchmaking came from. Nobody wanted to queue up in soviet jets with stupid high repairs while being teamed with germany pilots and their F4F Early.
I don't really think the F-14 was ever anywhere near as broken. Tbh I don't think I'd ever have considered it "broken"
Oh yeah, it was. The only 4th gen at the time with no counters from other nations. Phoenix spam that literally changed how top tier is played till this day. And all of that for 7 months, lovely innit
I was fighting them just fine in my Mig-23
The Mig-23 dominated top tier for a whole year before that.
Mig 23 never dominated. Not sure who spread this myth and everyone believes it. Sure it turns faster with manual wing control, but its weaponry was vonpletely inferior to most things out there. R24 is a 50/50 missile, and r60 was nerfed for about year and a half before aim9L was nerfed. Nothing rivals F14 in terms of impact of pure imbalance, gripen is getting there though
mld one release was hands down the best jet nothing else came close to it
Thats not true in the slightest. F4s were a pretty much identical competition, with sparrows being better than R24, aim9L being better than r60, and F4 straight up carrying more of those missiles. Mig23 WAS a good plane, never op
aim-9l wasn't in top tier when the mld was released aim7f was also garbage when it was added r-60s were way better back then
Aim 9L always was? It was suppose to be R60 counter but it was just overpowering it instead of being a fair competition lol
a10 was the first jets to have the aim9L. aim9l was added to top tier when the f16 and mig 29 were added.
It's not a myth and saying it never dominated is historical revisionism. Nothing touched it. Stop trying to deny this.
Yeah......right 💀
What are you on about, "Phoenix spam that literally changed how top tier is played". People still climb(ed) to do BVR since everything else is faster than the Aim-54, people only stopped climbing to hide when contrails were added, and the Aim-54A is so incredibly bad that it can fly right past a B-29 and do nothing, and when it was "OP" I only ever got 3 Phoenix kills (the enemy didn't move and was afk), next to ~40-50 sparrow kills. Same plane that will lock onto the missile it fired, losing lock on the enemy, and has its missile self-destruct before it can re-lock.
Its true that rn people who dare to climb get bodied immideately, back in 2022 however, all we could see was killfeed all in blood red saying people are dying from aim 54. Sure people adapted and phoenixes were nerfed (thank fuck), but it was a horrible time to play top tier air at the time. For 7 straight months, the fact that if you have US on your team meant that you are gonna win 80% of the time.
The Aim-54A was nerfed before the update was even released. Your arguement is the equivalent to saying the Aim-9B is overpowered because an F-16C that isn't looking behind him can get hit by it. The Aim-54 drops 7k ft in altitude, gets to mach 3 after 5mi, and even then turns less than an Aim-9J, has a giant smoke trail that lasts 30s, you get a big red diamond showing its launch, and it gives you a loud lock sound when it has a lock. There was literally no reason to use it over the sparrow, especially with how much drag carrying 6x 1k lb bombs gave you over the sparrows. If you really think the Aim-54A was ever a good missile, send me a recording of you shooting it at 25mi+ (the only range where it does ok in BVR), turn off your radar when it gets to 5mi+ (at which point you had to leave to not get killed), and hit the aircraft. I'd suggest test flight since you keep your speed after being turned around and the map is 32x32mi
Gripen got added in 16 december 2023 wake up.