What is the point of air-to-air missiles and why do we need them?

A2A missles can be outrun by any ESF with a Speed racer frame, They explode in the air trailing behind the Enemy. Not only that but you cant catch up to lock onto them again (even with Afterburners). So you are better of using your Main gun anyway.

Also you said G2A and A2A have the same damage. I dont think they do. A2A drop me to half health, 2 put me Deep in the red.
G2A missles do about 1/4 to 1/3 damage. The 4th always destroys you outright.

I imagine G2A missles would have no chance of ever hitting an Aircraft with the Speed frame.

ESF's are meant to be anti-air, that should be their purpose, the problem is air to grounds pods, not air to air. Libs should be the ground destroyers, ESF's should not be able to destroy everything on the ground. There is something wrong with this game when people are complaining that they are getting killed by air when in the ***** air, I'm glad you are getting air to air podded while hunting the map for me, so you can air to ground pod me and probably one shot me to death.

I use A2A because I can't hit the broad side of a barn with the main gun...

ESFs kill other ESFs with their cannons, without needing A2AM, fine. They're still the best anti-air without A2AM. That's the whole point of them not needing to exist.

All A2AM do is make it so a group of people without skill can kill someone better than them, which is extremely lame.

"Revenge for rocket-pods being OP for a few weeks" isn't a good excuse for there being A2AM.

A2A is more likely to hit the enemy plane than G2A simply because you're much closer to the plane. You can't remove it!!!11oneone (

Yes it is, you kill me, then a Scythe kills you, maybe take your A2A next time as well. Yes A2A pods probably are pretty BS atm but no more so than A2G, and I don't want ESF's having an easier time of it when they can already be made into the best one man killing machine in the game. Air to ground pods farm me, A2A pods farm them, until SOE do something about the farmyard weapons, everything needs to be able to be farmed so we don't get a situation where 50% of the pop is playing in one vehicle type, hunting the other 50% who didn't get the right unlocks when they had the chance, never had the chance or just don't want to.

Personally i use the A2A missiles as a Long Range weapon against AirCav and use the cannon for when i get close or on the tail of an opponent. If i'm impatient, they're also useful during a reload of your nosegun to get a lock and fire, so you arent doing nothing for a good 3-5 seconds.

I also dont see what the big deal with the A2A missiles is, i run a strictly AntiAir mossie. Rotery, Tomcats, Stealth and Hover. (No flares yet.) And i've died waaay more to enemy ESF noseguns than A2A missiles. I don't find them horribly difficult to dodge or outmanuver.

If you get someone Locking you, and you have flares/stealth, you have a good 4 seconds during the lock to find your target, and another solid 5-7 seconds after you dump your flare after he fires. If you cant shake a AirCav that is on your tail for a good 10 or so seconds and get on his tail in return, then he was likely just a better pilot than you are.

Because if he was hovering above you, you should be able to flare, locate and attack him since he is just hovering.

Simple answer to your question is this:

SOE believes that the 'answer' to SF's is to use another SF.

That is why G2A in all its current forms is all but completely useless.

They dont want the ground-pounders to have the ability to take down a SF, unless of course as you said.. they stack 10+ people on 1 single SF and 'mass fire' at it. What they want is for people to go get their OWN SF, then fight that SF in the air.

THAT is what they believe AA 'is'.

If this were true the skilled player would live and still manage to kill the group of waterhead COD bahbies, as they're called.

Well for one they let crappy Reavers compete. If anything they should remove A2G and have ESF fulfill their stated role as a counter to air rather than infantry farming machines.

L2P and cry more. Got me motivated to strap on my A2A and go kill some lolpodders...

Pssh ill give you A2A missles if you give me Radar locking skygaurds....

Remove the annoying A2A and A2G rockets and add Radar and Stealth and maybe some Empbombs

Give the ones that have one of the deleted weapons a ticket for another weapon of choice



Good lib flyers are deadly with their main weapon they deserve the kills but the 2 min flyer that kills a sunder by rocket-spam needs to go and lock on air missiles just shorten the few good air-fights we have


I have both systems a2a and a2g and cant wait to see them go they are just too op i feel like cheesing if i use em

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read your post on this, and the fact of the matter is that none of these tactics work if you have a half decent A2AM pilot coming behind you
use flares? ok every pilot does this
break line of sight? easier said then done, you slow down, the enemy esf slows down, and locks on you faster while you hover there like a sitting duck
use flares on the initial lock? what flares do you have? 12 second coold down, you just staed to use flares immediately realising tou have an A2A esf on you, which is usally after you have a missile lock on.

this tactic will lead to the following:
see enemy esf lock, use flares, get hit by 2nd A2A lock directly after even while seeking cover
slow down, esf A2AM has a field day locking on you
cry as you realise your flares havent cooled down and youev been shot dead

Your tactics are simply invalid, you can not challenge an A2AM pilot like this

"The most sickening thing of all is that I can beat 99% of these A2AM users in a duel"

then St fu. or do you just wanna pat in your back to enforce your e- p e e n

The number of totally awesome ace pilots that can just murder everyone if only they didn't have to worry about A2A missiles makes me laugh. If you're not a good enough pilot to shake off missiles, you're certainly not a good enough pilot to consistently win air duels against experienced dogfighters.

I promise you, what ruined dogfights is not air to air missiles, it's the dev's terrible joystick support and refusal to listen to the community and fix it. Any self respecting flight simulation player refuses to use a mouse and keyboard to fly, and therefore the cannon is just not viable for them. Air to air combat is a joke, designed for cod fanboys.

Don't really mind them, mostly only work against unaware, unskilled, or unsupported pilots. Depending on the distance of the enemy ESF you can dodge them or simply brake and fly around the enemy ESF to cause them to lose the lock-on before they even fire. From a distance you just fly low, go over a hill, and descend again and it will always hit the hill. Otherwise you can use the terrain to your advantage, which is especially easy on Indar/Amerish because you can fly under all the trees, if the missile was fired from anywhere above the treeline then the missile will nearly always hit the trees as you fly under them. Other than that... assuming you're at full health then it takes 4 missiles to kill you. One is lost to flares, two to bring the ESF to critical health, then one more to finish it off. You have plenty of time to get out of there or for your allies to shoot down the ESF that's chasing you, failing that you just have to evade one or two and the enemies plans are forfeit, at which point they've either run out of ammo or you have flares up again.

Just going to post this here...


Think of A2A missiles as a "Noobtube" for the newer PS2 Pilots...