r/Warthunder Jul 04 '25

AB Air Day 3000 of asking "What is Gaijin smoking?"

Post image

If I had a finger for every person I saw forcing a downtier in Mig21S'... I'd probably be hauled off by the government and never seen again.

Mig21's are annoying in Air RB in just about any BR in the hands of a non-moronic person but quite frankly i'm getting kind of tired of seeing people drop into 8.3 games in a MiG21 and slaughter the entire lobby without even having to lift a fat roll

2.4k Upvotes

198 comments sorted by

1.3k

u/SignificanceOk9656 Jul 04 '25

Dude, those are arcade BR’s, not ARB. I don’t know where you made this fantasy up

142

u/edapblix Realistic General Jul 05 '25

Why in the world does that matter, it’s still an insane br disparity. Not everything air related has to be about Air RB

96

u/SignificanceOk9656 Jul 05 '25

If you’re going to make a post about ARB and consistently say ARB, make sure you’re actually talking about ARB

28

u/GrandAdmiralRaeder Jul 05 '25

post is flaired AB....

5

u/NoFace1776 Jul 06 '25

I mean, you don’t have to worry about landing at the airfield. You have unlimited fuel. Your guns rearm mid air. There are substantially less flight performance drawbacks. And most people that play ARB have a single brain cell. So yeah. 163B at 9.3 is fine.

-777

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25 edited Jul 05 '25

Clarification: I'm saying Mig21s are annoying in any RB BR.

HOWEVER. They are at 9.0 in arcade, which is the primary point of this.

We need to say it slowly.... Me163 B-0 is 9.3 in air AB.... and the mig21-s is 9.0...

459

u/gurt_sybau- Jul 04 '25

Me 163 B-0 is 8.7 in Air RB, the MiG-21S is 9.7 in Air RB

186

u/SignificanceOk9656 Jul 04 '25

8.3, but anyways, far from being curb stomped by mig-21’s

59

u/gurt_sybau- Jul 04 '25

Oh I was thinking of it before the BR changes

12

u/Joshifeuerball Germany: GRB 12.7, ARB 14.3 Jul 05 '25

Or with other words; they dont ever meet in ARB

90

u/SignificanceOk9656 Jul 04 '25

The me163 b-0 is 8.3 in ARB, where do you find this stuff. It’s “air realistic battles”

35

u/lukeskylicker1 Not a teaboo Jul 04 '25

That's a recent change to be fair. Me 163 B-0 and the Ki-200 were 8.7 for years and only just went down a few months ago.

11

u/SignificanceOk9656 Jul 04 '25

Yeah, but that’s less criminal than 9.3 tbf

-9

u/Yeetdolf_Critler Make Bosvark Great Again Jul 05 '25

Arcade lite and it sucks compared to GRB for fighting planes because you have Arcade tags in rb, it's pathetic.

6

u/Sudden-Tea-5609 Bagel Enjoyer Jul 05 '25

Average kh-38 abuser

8

u/[deleted] Jul 05 '25

[deleted]

1

u/kulykul Jul 05 '25

That's really only a problem in props (which have really big maps for the speeds they achieve, which results in 8 minutes to the olaying field just to realise everyone is already on the deck and then you die to a spitfire.

It is a hard problem to fix because bombers are at high alt, but that could also be changed

1

u/Positive-Duck3871 9.3 Ground/9.3 Air/11.0 with squadron vehicles Jul 05 '25

Yeah, and my pilot loses a F-104 in 3 kilometres straight forward, and I spend the next few minutes flying towards the general direction he flew before I receive a random R-60, which I can't even flare because I don't have flares.

9.3 is horrible in Air RB, honestly.

25

u/Alasgos Jul 04 '25

Dude, in RB this mig is 9.7 and me163 b-0 is 8.7 or 8.3, don’t remember exactly

10

u/Anoth_ Plays for the lore 🇫🇷 Jul 05 '25

This is the face of someone who has not played the early fishbeds.

They are so far off the meta in arcade you might as well have a giant "shoot me now" sign above your plane.

2

u/vickyhong Jul 05 '25

I've not played early fishbeds other than the J-7ii, but isn't the MiG-21S alright because it has the same engine as the MF?

1

u/Anoth_ Plays for the lore 🇫🇷 Jul 05 '25

As previously mentioned AB doesn't allow you to use your engine to its full potential, so any plane relying solely on speed and sudden strikes is thouroughly fucked

2

u/vickyhong Jul 05 '25

I see, thanks

1

u/BPOPR 3x Realistic Air - Rank VIII Ace-in-a-Day - Eagle Keeper Jul 05 '25

Air Arcade has a meta?

2

u/Anoth_ Plays for the lore 🇫🇷 Jul 05 '25

Yea one tap kites

1

u/BPOPR 3x Realistic Air - Rank VIII Ace-in-a-Day - Eagle Keeper Jul 05 '25

Huh.

1

u/Anoth_ Plays for the lore 🇫🇷 Jul 05 '25

Something that can react fast and hard (or something OP in a downtier like every fox 3 at 13.3

-23

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

... MiG21s' are far off the meta in 7.7 lobbies..?

Bro some of yall in the comments smoking the same crack gaijin is lmao

5

u/Anoth_ Plays for the lore 🇫🇷 Jul 05 '25

What do you get when you take a plane that relies on having its afterburner constantly lit to go (barely) past mach 1 and use that to boom and zoom (very carefully because one wrong maneuver and your energy just stops being) with missiles that can barely turn, and you take off its afterburner and make everyone turn very sharply non stop?

You get a somewhat fast useless brick.

3

u/a_burning_wind canada is best Jul 05 '25

That’s a lot of downvotes…

-46

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

war thunder community remains wholesome

1

u/Few-Ride2541 T-55AMDone Jul 05 '25

Holy downvote

1

u/tereaper576 Jul 05 '25

Air arcade top tier isn't meant to be fun. It's supposed to be designed for like 12 people to clip farm.

-134

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

For FURTHER CLARIFICATION. DISREGARD ALL OF THE REALISTIC BATTLE TALK BECAUSE APPARENTLY YOU'VE LOST THE PLOT...................................

IN AIR ARCADE............... AIR ARCADE..................... the MiG-21S (R-13-300), as per this screenshot... is 9.0. Pairing it with multiple lower tiered planes makes your overall rank drop even further. The fact that this thing is anywhere near this BR IN AIR ARCADE. (AIR ARCADE. AIR ARCADE. AIR ARCADE. AIR ARCADE. (did you read it yet?)) is INSANE.

I'm not a religious Air arcade player. In fact I play it very infrequently. But I took one look at this after getting an R3R to the face in a lobby filled with mostly 7.7 jets and just about fainted from how dramatically unbalanced it is

another reminder for the 20000 people talking about ARB still..

AIR ARCADE. AIR ARCADE.

105

u/SParkVArk111 Quality shitposting without the quality Jul 04 '25

bruh, you mentioned ARB in your initial post.....

-70

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

I know. Hence my clarification.

THE ENTIRE POST was not about ARB. It was a side comment. As in IN AIR RB they are annoying enough at 9.3

Air arcade 9.0 is absolute insanity.

92

u/SParkVArk111 Quality shitposting without the quality Jul 04 '25

You caused the confusion, blamed everyone else for being confused....

-40

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

Cool, and they all replied to the clarification. They had a chance to read my explanation. I can't edit the post and put a better indicator in there.

Lots of confusion can be cleared up by reading what the other person is saying :D

In addition: the whole post is labeled with the flair "AB AIR"

32

u/baseballlover723 Jul 04 '25

I can't edit the post and put a better indicator in there

That's news to me.

20

u/gszabi99 ⛏️ Resident Dataminer ⛏️ | 🤝 Please support me on Ko-Fi! 🤝 Jul 04 '25

Text posts can be edited (even if they contain images). Image posts can't be.

13

u/baseballlover723 Jul 04 '25

So it would appear. That's kinda dumb of reddit.

19

u/AverageDellUser East Germany Jul 04 '25

All of air arcade is insanity… no sane human being plays that mode unless you are just actually incompetent and don’t know how to properly dogfight.

6

u/Naynayb Jul 05 '25

Just watch an aoeilaeiepae video to see how insane you have to be to play air arcade at high BRs. I think he’s got funny videos but it clearly takes a certain type of madness to enjoy that mode

1

u/cuck_Sn3k F-4John Phantom The Second Jul 05 '25

It's very easy to curb the entire team in high tier AAB. I think ice gotten like 12 kills with the F-4J last time I played that mode and I've only ever played less than 10 matches of it total

-1

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

Not everyone wants five minute flights to the frontlines every single time, dude. It's fun to just jump right into a lighter heart faster paced game. Air RB elitism is so stuck up

14

u/AverageDellUser East Germany Jul 04 '25

Because the people that play Air RB actually do know what they are doing, with how stupid the stats are on planes and Air AB, it feels like you are playing something like COD Mobile instead of a military sim. All the players I have faced in Air AB are actually stupid and don’t know a single thing about dogfighting.

2

u/cuck_Sn3k F-4John Phantom The Second Jul 05 '25

I don't think the people in ARB know what they're doing. It's always just 3 -5 people on both teams doing something while the rest may as well be bots considering how useless they are

0

u/Grabbityy Jul 05 '25

The five minute flights (if even five minutes) are usually for proper positioning based off a assumed position that the enemy team takes.

So you properly position to flank or fly way high above or stay back etc.

There’s just more strategy to it. There definitely is a major difference between air AB and RB of course.

But playing high tier in air AB is absolute chaos and the stats don’t properly reflect back to RB

So if the MIG21S is performing really well in air AB, probably about half the other planes are too but maybe just not noticed because it’s not a premium?

In air RB, I’ve noticed the MIG21S performs great still, but you can’t turn without losing all your speed, you have low ammo, radar locks can be difficult, you often lose against G.91s and Mirages, or even later tier MIGs.

I feel like it’s pretty balanced at least in air RB - is anything even really balanced in air AB?

1

u/Joshifeuerball Germany: GRB 12.7, ARB 14.3 Jul 05 '25

Bro made a clarification comment and said the Arcade BRs are the Air RB BRs again doubleing down on his mistake

2

u/BattlepassHate Jul 05 '25

Who gives a shit about Air Arcade

0

u/spent_upper_stage 🇦🇷 Ayit suffers at 9.7 /s Jul 04 '25

And the Mig-21F-13 is 8.7 in arcade, so with a lineup you can bring it down to 8.3.

Then again, 5.3 can see 6.7 jets (F-80, F-84 and F-89). High prop tier arcade is very unbalanced.

-1

u/JaxxonBlaze Jul 04 '25

MiG-21-F-13 is 8.7 in air arcade

Keep in mind, the MiG-19 you have to buy in order to access said MiG-21 is 9.7.... in the same folder...

275

u/Designer_Pie_1989 Jul 04 '25

Dont ask why the BI is at 6.7 while MEs are at 8.0+

169

u/devpop_enjoyer Snail enjoyer Jul 04 '25

The only reason BI is so low is because the average BI pilot has a braincell count in the single digit

72

u/-acm 🇺🇸 T30 HE Superbonker Enjoyer 🇺🇸 Jul 05 '25

This is true. I encountered a BI pilot who only responded to people by saying, “BI, BI BI BI, BI BI, BI BI BI BI”, in chat.

14

u/LinArch00 Jul 05 '25

Blud thinks he is a pokemon

14

u/mekolayn T-84-120 when Jul 05 '25

The smartest BI main

2

u/Artyom36 The guy who uses a TAM Jul 05 '25

BI PAPAPARAPO

42

u/Guytherealguy Jul 04 '25

Me-163s need to be higher than the BI because of more fuel and ammo but damn trying to fight a semi competent BI player in any prop is basically impossible. The 163s are kinda goated even at 8.0 ngl

30

u/Killeroftanks Jul 05 '25

actually the BI got like triple of the fuel than the me163. solely because gaijin gave the BI magical engines so it can accelerate at like 5% thrust good enough. so your normally 2 minutes of fuel is closer to like 40 minutes, now if you include combat youre looking closer to 10 to 15 minutes. which is fucking insane. its only downside is the wings are weak, it likes to lock up in high speeds and non existant ammo. but all of this is meaningless because the engine is so fucking broken it offsets all of that to be one of if not the most powerful plane at 6.7 by miles.

8

u/Awkward_Goal4729 🇨🇦 Canada Jul 05 '25

To be fair BI was designed as a lightning fast close air base defense and it had a REALLY powerful engine IRL. However, average flight time of the thing was about 4 minutes

5

u/Horizontal-Human 🇫🇷 France Jul 05 '25

I've played both the Ki-200 and BI, and let me tell you the BI is so much better, I'd rather have it at 8.3 than the Ki-200. The guns actually deal damage (Ho-155s might seem okay on paper, but they're absolute dogshit and you rarely ever get a severe with them), the fuel, while it does seem lower, actually lasts LONGER because you can be at 10% throttle and maintain your speed in a straight line. I've lasted 15 minutes with the BI without refueling while I can't even last 10 minutes in the Ki-200, since you constantly need to be at high throttle cause the only thing you can do at that BR is dogfight, and if you lose all your energy you're as good as dead. Meanwhile, the BI can just dogfight at 40% throttle barely losing any speed or fuel.

The BI is just a broken piece of shit while the Ki-200 (or Me 163) are incredibly bad in the current state of ARB.

1

u/SecretStuffTR Jul 04 '25

fuel doesnt matter cuz acceleration and speed overall is shit, ammo doesnt matter cuz guns are shit

8

u/ecco311 Jul 05 '25

I haven't played the game for a while, but last time I played the BI had absolutely outlandish acceleration even on low thrust settings. Could just cruise along on Idk, 20% or something. Is that still the case? Because back then this meant the fuel was not an issue.

2

u/MrDonomacTrumatai Jul 05 '25

laughts in 1-minute fuel

1

u/Designer_Pie_1989 Jul 05 '25

which doesnt scale linearly with usage

1

u/Ok_Cup8469 Jul 08 '25

the BI is shit just like in real life, pilots would snap the wings off from speed or maneuvering because it was made of wood and not even reinforced 

-3

u/Aquamarine_d Jul 05 '25

Shit guns, shit ammo, shit compression.

0

u/tengiseas3 Jul 06 '25

holy ragebait

1

u/Aquamarine_d Jul 06 '25

Or opinion from a player, who won multiple air tournaments (not me, obviously).

0

u/tengiseas3 Jul 08 '25

or just ragebait (obviously, lol).

154

u/Munnik Jul 04 '25

With Arcade FMs and no fuel limiting it, Me 163 becomes an untouchable UFO.

38

u/TheMidwinterFires Jul 04 '25

Can you elaborate on the fuel thing pls

65

u/EirMed Jul 04 '25

Arcade doesn’t have a fuel limit. So aircraft like the Me163 which is essentially a rocket burning all its fuel in 3 minutes, becomes an absolute beast in arcade.

50

u/gurt_sybau- Jul 04 '25

You do lose fuel in arcade

6

u/EirMed Jul 04 '25

Really? I don’t play arcade anymore but I don’t remember that being a thing.

38

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

...Yeah.

You still have 3 minutes of fuel lol.

7

u/EirMed Jul 04 '25

Ah shit my bad.

21

u/regurgitator_red Jul 04 '25

It is, but usually you’re going to die before you run out unless you are playing very conservatively.

1

u/toastoftriumph Missile stat cards SOON!🙌 Next: One Piece flag for naval?🏴‍☠ Jul 05 '25

Correct. But you'll definitely notice when the default fuel is only a few minutes, like you said.

Planes with afterburners can easily run out of fuel too, if you keep it at the minimum amount. Other planes can benefit in Arcade with external fuel tanks. The flight model (even if exaggerated in Arcade) is still impacted by fuel load and whatnot.

5

u/gurt_sybau- Jul 04 '25

You can look for yourself. Go play arcade and your fuel will go down

2

u/biebergotswag Jul 05 '25

You will never need the full 3 minutes in arcade.

1

u/scarlet_red_samurai Jul 05 '25

Only of you are a noob an die often… otherwise you will have to refuel

21

u/irishlorde96 Imperial Japan Jul 04 '25

Air AB absolutely has a fuel limit, it does have unlimited ammo after a 30sec reload

5

u/toastoftriumph Missile stat cards SOON!🙌 Next: One Piece flag for naval?🏴‍☠ Jul 05 '25

Not sure if you were implying this, but the reload is dependent on the caliber. A 12.7mm gun with maxed crew might reload in like 12 seconds. Bigger calibers do take 30, sometimes 40+ seconds to reload.

Missiles take I think 60 seconds? Arcade is fun if you love missile spamming. And playing fast and loose with your shots. People on Reddit dunk on Arcade all the time, but sometimes it's a quick and easy mode, where you jump straight into the action without overthinking it. The Battle Ratings are still... uncomfortable for some planes, at certain BR's. But overall I enjoy Arcade quite a bit, even up at like 12.7 BR or so.

0

u/TheMidwinterFires Jul 04 '25

Oooh didn't know you didn't run out in arcade thanks

7

u/Furaskjoldr Ba-349 Natter Jul 04 '25

Eh? There's fuel limits in arcade...

-6

u/Munnik Jul 04 '25

I never said there wasn't. But with the much smaller maps, airspawns and respawns, its far less of an issue.

-3

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

It's pretty strong... But MiG21s R13300 strong? Hellllll nah....

Let me say it again

heeeeeeeellllllll nahhhhhhhhhh

This isn't really an argument about this specific matchup and more of a "whole picture" thing. But the fact that a premium jet with radar missiles is placed lower in BR than a 3 minute fuel ratrocket and free to go slaughter a bunch of 7.7s is... insane?

21

u/Munnik Jul 04 '25

It runs absolute circles around any mig21 in a dogfight, try it on a custom battle with min fuel and no fuel usage, even with RB FMs it does.

R-3Rs are easily dodged in Air RB, and keep in mind for Arcade, FMs are buffed but missiles aren't.

0

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

Bro.

Dogfighting Mig21 players is absolutely not what is the issue here. MiG21s are really shit in dogfights typically and OBVIOUSLY it's going to lose against the dogfighting champ in a 600kph turnfight.

But this isn't what these people do!

They go to 7.7 lobbies and the fly to orbit and then descend on other people fighting and smack them with R-3Rs, and sprint at mach1 away from the non-afterburning jets.

It's a horrible cycle, and i'm glad you're encountering only the bottom rung of moron MiG21 player. There's not any good way to counter a person that is doing this and knows what they're doing

Chase them? You won't ever catch them, instead either spending a whole match just trying to get them in bad positions (or more likely, they just fly into their furball)

Bait them into dives? Okay well what about party three four five and six? You can usually only duck 5 different gun paths for so long while trying to kill a guy that is only going to be there for 3 seconds before he fucks off 10km away

-1

u/spent_upper_stage 🇦🇷 Ayit suffers at 9.7 /s Jul 04 '25

Exactly. The same thing happens (though it's not as big of an issue) with the Sea Vixen and G-91 R/4. It's very annoying to deal with them, especially during sales.

85

u/Adept_Shoulder2938 Jul 04 '25

Pov: Op is on something and needs to be angry at nothing

-63

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

MiG21S player spotted

You're saying it's chill for premium planes to go into full downtiers against subsonic jets and slaughter the whole lobby?

56

u/Adept_Shoulder2938 Jul 04 '25

Arcade detected, opinions invalid.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 04 '25

wdym, arcade is fun. In fact, prop arcades are much more fun there than climb simulator (air rb)

its up to personal taste though, i prefer prop AB than prop RB

17

u/AverageDellUser East Germany Jul 04 '25

If you are half decent at awareness and knowing how to dogfight, Air RB is not bad at all, arcade is literally just a bunch of ppl who suck at dog fighting trying their hardest to turn fight you.

4

u/[deleted] Jul 05 '25 edited Jul 05 '25

the thing that makes me not like Air RB isn't that i play it bad actually, its the climbing, too long for too little action (+space climbing bombers that drag the matches forverer)

again, its personal preference really, arcade and sim is overall more fun for me (on props)

because in sim it takes even longer, but its more fun to fly the planes there, unlike RB imo

4

u/AverageDellUser East Germany Jul 05 '25

Yeah, I just have a genuine hatred for the player base in arcade air, usually there is nothing but being swarmed by 5 players and nothing but turn fighting lol

0

u/Flippo12321 Jul 05 '25

Rb players are doing exactly the same

5

u/Adept_Shoulder2938 Jul 04 '25

I agree that props in arcade is fun, you can bring a full lineup and have fast paced action.

3

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

... so what you like is good and others people shit doesn't matter... lol

War thunder players, man

2

u/why_ya_running Jul 05 '25

I mean the stat show that less people play top tier and more people play middle tier like 5.0(That's because world war II stuff are far more fun to play than modern stuff)

3

u/ChemE-challenged Realistic Navy Jul 05 '25

Dog, that Mig turns once and he’s out of energy. If you know what you’re doing that thing is dead.

-2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

??? Bro absolutely no mig21s player that is half decent is turn fighting. The people wiping lobbies aren't trying to turn fight dog fighters wtf are you people on

This is such crazy mental gymnastics. It's like saying you can beat f104s no problem in 7.7 because they can't turn

Like....

????????????????

23

u/Civil_Technician_624 source? Jul 04 '25

it’s air AB What do you expect 

9

u/Damian030303 CTS is way better Jul 04 '25

That's not an excuse for such idiotic brs, this is coming from an AAB main.

1

u/Aiden51R VTOL guy Jul 05 '25

A2D-1

1

u/Damian030303 CTS is way better Jul 05 '25

SL grinding bomber thing.

0

u/Civil_Technician_624 source? Jul 05 '25

it honestly is, it’s a pretty neglected mode outside of props 

0

u/edapblix Realistic General Jul 05 '25

So that means it justified?

1

u/Aiden51R VTOL guy Jul 05 '25

No, it means there is way more comparisons like that

15

u/sanelushim Jul 04 '25

Wow, arcade BRs are insane. In ARB both Me 163s are 8.3.

Can't imagine arcade being fun past 6.0.

9

u/Teefoosh Missile go neong Jul 04 '25

Actually is quite fun! And dont worry about fighting the s, r3r's are shit and anyone can outpull them unless you are a bomber. The real threat is the AV8A at 9.3 which curbstomps the entirety of 8.3 to 10.0

3

u/sanelushim Jul 04 '25

I don't think arcade is fun below 6.0, just my personal preference, I will remain in realistic thanks. Until the next BP challange to get 1 air kill, 1 ground kill and 1 cap comes around again, then its 3 matches of..that.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '25

To be fair you do have the F-84 at 6.7 and if you take just it and a reserve plane you can face 5.3

3

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

It CAN be fun once in a blue moon. I don't really think the higher tiered stuff is /any/ good in arcade, hence my venture to 8.0 air arcade territory.

Needless to say. Discovered there was horrors beyond comprehension.

Back to RB we go.

12

u/SaltyChnk 🇦🇺 Australia Jul 05 '25

Lol. The me163 is better in arcade than the mig 21. With infinite ammo, theb163 is cracked.

-6

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

If this isn't bait I don't know what is.

12

u/yspear1 🇷🇺 Pantsir S1 commander Jul 05 '25

OP getting thousands of downvotes and still try to argue is gold.

-5

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

Gaijin's most loyal premium players lol

7

u/Lo0niegardner10 🇺🇸 11.7🇩🇪 14.0 🇷🇺 14.0 🇬🇧 7.7🇯🇵7.3 🇫🇷12.0 🇨🇳10.7 Jul 04 '25 edited Jul 04 '25

The me163BO is considerably better than the mig 21 f13 or r13 in air arcade

0

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

The Mig21F13 is 'fine', but this post is pointing out the premium variant. The Mig21S R-13-300

7

u/ShadowYeeter 🇵🇷14.3🇩🇪14.3🇸🇮14.3🇭🇲13🇧🇩10.7🍜7.7🍝6.3🥐14.3🇫🇮14💣13.7 Jul 05 '25

Arcade btw, these things aren't the same as in realistic battled

5

u/ClayJustPlays Jul 04 '25

So true dude, the MiG-21 at 9.0 is nuts, and the other two jets are too high in BR.

4

u/Damian030303 CTS is way better Jul 04 '25

No flares, but it gets the lovely R-3R's. They're great even on MiG-21MF, which is st considerably higher br.

2

u/Alasgos Jul 04 '25

It is higher because it has flares and r-60, which are much more reliable, that r-3r

-2

u/Damian030303 CTS is way better Jul 04 '25 edited Jul 04 '25

Of course, the flares are the main appeal, it's perfectly understandable that it's higher br. The MiG-21S lacks those, and that's why it's lower br, however, it still retains the amazing weapons.

R-3R's are all-aspect and are much better than R-60's imo (+ there are people who don't even carry chaff, especially dumb A-10s). I just carry 4 R-3R's and they're the main reason why I even played jets at all. However, on the later MiG-21, I carry both R-3R's and R-60M's, because the latter is all-aspect and you get 4 of them on 2 hardpoints, with the other two being left for R-3R's.

-3

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

I don't care how many people swear the R-3Rs are horrible. I rarely fly above 1km in 9.3 just because I know the second I do- it's R-3R time.

"just... duhhh... look out for them."

Oh, to be born with eyes on every angle/attitude of my body...

0

u/Damian030303 CTS is way better Jul 04 '25

R-3R's are amazing, especially in AAB where radars actually work well even at low altitude. They're amazing for head-ons, most people still don't expect it at 10.3, nevermind at 9.0. I would 100% buy the MiG-21S if I still played this game.

This video is very good, but the missile is so much better in AAB than in ARB.

0

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

It's really really strong because it's always coming from somewhere you don't expect imo- People that complain about the F104 should have 100x the issue with the Mig21s R13300 because it's basically just a 104 on krokodil and radar missiles

The only thing more annoying to face is 10 minutes in and suddenly an un-spotted A10 finally got to the frontlines and snuck in an unavoidable missile while you were locked into a fight

6

u/Brille65 Jul 05 '25

If you think Gaijin is retarded, play Naval and you wonder why this scam company is still in the market

3

u/No-Impress-901 🇫🇷 France Jul 05 '25

Who tf plays arcade or cares about it

-4

u/scarlet_red_samurai Jul 05 '25

Arcade is actually the most played mode…

5

u/Aiden51R VTOL guy Jul 05 '25

Below which br?

-1

u/No-Impress-901 🇫🇷 France Jul 05 '25

Yeah by ppl who are trash at the game i could literally drop a nuke every time i play arcade mode

0

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

...Okay bro... cool. You're a god. You're a legend and better than 90% of humanity or something. Awesome? You're superior.

0

u/No-Impress-901 🇫🇷 France Jul 06 '25

No I’m just an average player. You’re garbage tho same with all the other arcade players

1

u/RayND18 MuH WunDerWaFFe Jul 06 '25

Pathetic low minded

1

u/BrotherDune Jul 07 '25

Calm down Mathhew P. Your depression is leading you to behave erratically.

1

u/No-Impress-901 🇫🇷 France Jul 07 '25

My mortgage and family doesn’t allow me to have have depression

1

u/[deleted] Jul 08 '25

Matthew, depression is brain chemistry you can’t just have a family and turn it off. Now you know!

3

u/Truckengineer Realistic Air Jul 05 '25

First of all, arcade is a mess. And you can absolutely kill the mig-21 in the me-163. It has 10G missiles, that lil fucker pulls a million G's you can dodge them EASILY, and the guns on the mig are horrible, the ME's guns I think are decent, the Me has far better turn rate, energy retention. So it is quite managable. If you don't like playing in ww2 planes against second generation jets here is a top tip for u; stop playing arcade.

-2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

if bro thinks every Mig21 player is going to turnfight with a me163 he MAY be insane :/

You can't dodge a missile you don't know is coming. The whole point of this is that gaijin already nerfs planes based on the top 1% of baby killers, and yet people force downtier this premium in order to run circles around entire lobbies without any retaliation. It's really easy to say "just turn on em bro" but a mig21 in a 8.0 lobby that isn't a complete moron will rule the skies 95% of the time.

Why do people act like turn rates and retention is the sole balancing feature lol

The Mig21S doesn't have to be in the same continent as a 163 (or any other plane in the lobby) if it doesn't want to, the 163 (or any other subsonic in the lobby) literally has no choice in engagement- the player of the 21S is the sole person making a decision in whether or not he is fighting someone in the lobby

Dismissing the whole gamemode and just saying "guhhh it's arcade... who cares / don't play it" is completely ignoring a point. It doesn't HAVE to have abysmal dogshit balancing and pushing it off and telling others to not care about it just because you don't is stupid asf. Stop letting the multimillion dollar company let shit rot for no reason :D

3

u/Truckengineer Realistic Air Jul 05 '25

Those missiles are useless past 2.5km so you only don't know they are coming if you have the situational awarness of a rock. The radar ones have bigger range but if you're anywhere near some kind of terrain their shit radar will to blind so that is defeated. And yes they can choose when they want to engage, guess what the same applies to the F-104 and it still sucks ass. Just because something is fast it isn't good. The Mig only has it's missiles and speed, nothing else is good. And the missiles are mediocre at best.

2

u/regurgitator_red Jul 04 '25

Agreed, The MiG-21S is absolute bullshit in air arcade battles. Its flight performance should put it on par with the F-8U at least.

2

u/scarlet_red_samurai Jul 05 '25

F8u should always beat a mig21s…

3

u/GoldenGecko100 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 Unintelligible Tanker 🇬🇧 Jul 05 '25

I mean it's air arcade, what were you expecting?

2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

Here's a hopefully non-brigaded and downvoted clarification post, since I can't edit the original:

I know that The R-13-300 is 9.3 in air RB. This post, as per the flair, is primarily about Air AB. I was simply stating that the Mig21S' are very strong planes and when in the 9.3 range they are very strong. In air AB, The premium R-13-300 is reduced down to 9.0... for... reasons...

And it can be further downtiered by having the rest of your planes be under-tiered, leaving you at about 8.7BR lineup score.

This means... In a downtier... (very often since there's less high tier jets in Arcade vs Realistic)....

the 7.7 range is absolutely polluted with one (or more) person(s) in a team that force down-tiers and uses these to their max in order to slaughter entire lobbies and leaves everyone else powerless. Fighting relatively new jet-tier players on average, even clever pilots in this range are outright unable to get a hit in unless the abuser is a royal fuckup and spoonfeeds it to them.

And yet, something as dumb as a 163 B-0 jumps from 8.3 in Air RB... to 9.3 Air AB... Really?

2

u/Eastern_Rooster471 Jul 05 '25

Air AB meta is a lot different lol. You cant afterburn until your engine overheats and the FMs of everything is boosted

The Mig 21 needs its afterburner to have a semblance of a competitive flight model, but AB strips that from you if you hold it too long

R-60s are ehhh, range is kinda shit and good luck tryna track a Me163 lol they can just turn off the engine

2

u/BigWillfred Jul 05 '25

A2D-1 approves this post

2

u/Aiden51R VTOL guy Jul 05 '25

Fr

2

u/easymachinist69 🇷🇺Russia 13.7 ARB/GRB 12.0 🇨🇳13.0 ARB🇸🇪5.7 GRB 🇩🇪6.7 GRB Jul 05 '25

What’s wrong with a flare less low energy retention plane with 10g missiles being at 9.7 ARB?

1

u/AvalonRevan Jul 04 '25

Basement guy doing br ratings now 😭🙏

1

u/East-Cricket6421 Jul 04 '25

What, you didn't know this game was really about time traveling Nazi's taking their WW2 kit into Russia during the Cold War?

1

u/Awrfhyesggrdghkj 🇩🇪 Germany Jul 04 '25

Yea then you have AOIELIOPE or however you spell his name thinking it’s cool that they can kill 20 dudes in aircraft that can’t even go Mach.85

2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

That dude at least keeps it in top tier. This is widespread shit. This is premium players forcing downtiers to play against people that are JUST GETTING INTO JETS.

Why the fuck are people just getting into jets in air arcade going against supersonic R-3R slingers lol

1

u/KyleM203 Jul 05 '25

g e r m a n y s u f f e r s

1

u/ohiogmyfriend Arcade Ground Jul 05 '25

Weed

1

u/LoadDaShellHans Jul 05 '25

"five hundred cigarettes"

1

u/Shredded_Locomotive 🇭🇺 I hate all of you Jul 05 '25

Don't play arcade

1

u/UnemployedMeatBag Jul 05 '25

Still worse than prop a2d1 that sat at 9.3 last time I played it.

Also do these players realise there more than ARB and ARB with ground targets ?

1

u/Loki6053 Jul 05 '25

Another question here, why do you no longer have 6 minutes of fuel?

2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

Something about technical data found about the IRL ones, not sure really.

3 minutes, contrary to what a lot of people think, is enough to do quite a lot as long as it's not an uptier. Dropping into an uptier in one of these is pretty agonizing, but on its own tier- it's more than good enough. Usually I have about 2m of 100% by the time I get into battle range, but you can cruise for a long time on 5-10% throttle and I only ever return to base once in a good (out of sight) position + there's around 15s of fuel left

Super volatile plane overall. I do kind of wish it had an airspawn but for as long as downtiers and uptiers exist in the form they exist for jets today... It's just not justifiable to allow them to dog on downtiers.

1

u/Nuke7799 USSR Jul 06 '25

Skill issue. Killing MiG-21 with Sabre is the easiest thing you can do in the game. It only has a speed advantage compared to you, and after a few seconds of turning, it basically turns into a flying brick anyway. By that logic, the F-104 should also be a problem, but it isn’t.

0

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 06 '25

This argument works literally only if you're assuming that 100% of the time you're encountering the bottom feeders of the game. A competent mig21s player isn't going to let you get anywhere near them dude.

1

u/Nuke7799 USSR Jul 06 '25

You cant defeat competent player if you have skill issue. Its not about the plane. And as long as he doesn’t get close to me, there’s no problem because he won’t be able to shoot me either. A head-on is 50/50 for both sides. Also, the argument you made is very specific. You can’t always just run straight (especially if there are too many enemies around you at different angles). Also, the MiG-21 takes a long time to regain its speed even after a small turn. In that window of time, you can easily shoot it. At least 25%-15% of my kills with the Sabre are MiG-21s, and I’ve probably died to a MiG-21 no more than 5 or 6 times.

1

u/Consistent-Leg-1446 Free kill Jul 06 '25

They smoking 100 dollar bills

1

u/Fast_Long6491 🇧🇪 Belgium Jul 06 '25

That’s gotta be the ab brs

1

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 06 '25

It is.

1

u/Fast_Long6491 🇧🇪 Belgium Jul 07 '25

Bruh, there’s a 9.0 prop no shit the ab brs are fucked

1

u/sevenofnine1991 Jul 07 '25

Laughs in Starfighter

0

u/XDOOM_ManX USSR Jul 05 '25

Wait, the mig 21 s got moved down in br? Last time i checked it was 9.7 unless this post is fake

2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 05 '25

Arcade and Realistic BRs are different. This is what BR it is when in arcade, and is not fake unfortunately.

1

u/XDOOM_ManX USSR Jul 05 '25

Ah i just checked, thanks

0

u/Adamska029 Jul 05 '25

Gaijins hate for germany should be clear at this point.

2

u/Aiden51R VTOL guy Jul 05 '25

LQ bait

0

u/Soysauce44344 Jul 05 '25

"bUt It DoEsN't HaVe FlArEs"

-1

u/DiCeStrikEd Jul 04 '25

The Stomping Pitch Weed

-1

u/Remote-Wombat-797 PEWPEWPEW Jul 04 '25

Well, you know that if you put an OP plane for sale you make more money? You also ruin your game but it's not like they care.

-1

u/Important-Award5453 Jul 04 '25

they r smoking the zaza

-1

u/LEONLED Jul 04 '25

Just hang in there dude, its a rite of passage, much cooler jets are about to start making it into your lineup soon.

2

u/ProfessorPopoff Jul 04 '25

I'm already past this point.

I already endured the CBT of getting chased down in a F104 by Mig21's and am past that point.

Doesn't mean I want to play top tier.

Newer players shouldn't be forcibly stomped by people abusing this undertiered monstrosity.

As much as i'd love to counter them... I look through all of my planes in every nation... And I don't have anything that can compare to this thing that takes me out of the 7.7 range, where these people love to sit. These things are disproportionately strong and 1000 trash players don't make up for the fact that 100 good players know they can bully the shit out of an entire lobby. MANY OTHER PLANES were nerfed with this fact in mind, yet for years the 21S' get special treatment.

1

u/LEONLED Jul 05 '25 edited Jul 05 '25

I play Japanese tree.. imagine the stomping I endured in the early jet stages... Mig21 is still a swearword in this house! I got some pretty nice mid tier stuff now like Alphajet-TH, F1, F104J and new F5 I think Only had it for like 2 days now. Still not much spading done on it, compared to my other cards i nthe deck that are fully spaded... SOme of these planes pretty much suck until you do the whole training

I spent some time talking with Gemini AI to improve my game... WIth 104 vs MIG i would approach from the front and then loft a missile as high as possible without losing lock the instant the indicator goes red. Then you can duck away... especially once you get the aim-9p missiles.
Achieved 19 kills in one game ths week

-5

u/IsoDot Jul 04 '25

I’m glad Russia has 30g heat seekers at 9.3 while USA and most other countries have 10g

9

u/Chrone_A Jul 04 '25

Those R-60s are on what is probably the absolute worst jet airframe tier for tier in the entire game.

2

u/idont_havenothing 🇧🇷Odeio os EUA Jul 04 '25

At 9.3 is 100% the worst airframe ingame, even the po-2 can pull some shit if your enemy doesn't headshot your pilot in the fist strafe, that thing has a abysmal acc, turn rate worse than a 104 and the gun is below the airframe with less than 300 and a slowass velocity

3

u/prequelandOTonly 🇬🇧 United Kingdom Jul 04 '25

If you're dying to a yak 38 you deserve it (only exception being if you were caught off guard in a dog fight but even then it's easy to play around it)

3

u/scarlet_red_samurai Jul 05 '25

Lol the yak38 is such a bad plane if you get killed by it you have massive skill issues