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Does anyone else feel that the "Aircraft Damage" feature, when activated, is too forgiving on jets hit by missiles?

I understand that a large bomber may not go down necessarily with 1 shot, but seeing often fighters taking two (and sometime three) shots before splashing comes as a surprise. I understand that occasionally one jet may be able to return to base crippled but to see it keep turning and fighting after being shot (yest this has happened) seems fiction. I am not sure how how to reproduced these instances, but I would guess they are not uncommon.

While there's always room for improvement, I'm sure the devs have modeled this feature based off of real data and input from subject matter experts. Hopefully they can shed some light for the edification of users based on your query.

F-15 only needs one wing after all.

Do some air-to-air missiles have proximity detonators? A near miss from a missile might then cause limited damage rather than destroy the aircraft. Just a quick thought.

Knightpawn wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 1:46 pm Does anyone else feel that the "Aircraft Damage" feature, when activated, is too forgiving on jets hit by missiles?

I understand that a large bomber may not go down necessarily with 1 shot, but seeing often fighters taking two (and sometime three) shots before splashing comes as a surprise. I understand that occasionally one jet may be able to return to base crippled but to see it keep turning and fighting after being shot (yest this has happened) seems fiction. I am not sure how how to reproduced these instances, but I would guess they are not uncommon.

In my opinion, no. In my experience, I almost never see a fighter actually take more then one hit. Decoyed missiles don't count.

As is always the case, OP can post some example scenario/save so everyone can see.

Mark352 wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 4:15 pm Do some air-to-air missiles have proximity detonators? A near miss from a missile might then cause limited damage rather than destroy the aircraft. Just a quick thought.

I think a majority would have them right? The VT fuse was very much available by the time the first proper AAMs were made.

Some could be assumed to have faulty fuses that detonate somewhat prematurely, or the countermeasures (flares and/or chaff) could be assumed to detonate the warhead too early but close enough for some damage.

Also some aircraft can be tougher than others with respect to damage. An example within CMO's timeframe would be the Korean War. The US air-to-air kill ratio was unintentionally inflated because alot of assumed "kills" against MiG-15s were actually MiGs that post-war records show made it back to base. The actual kill ratio against the MiG-15 was closer to 1 to 1 or 2-1

The problem for the US pilots was two-fold:
1) The MiG-15 as a Soviet design, was built tough and could resist some damage and make it home.
2) The .50 Cal machine guns on the primary US A2A aircraft, the F-86 Sabre, didn't have enough punch to reliably inflict the required damage on a MiG-15 to firmly bring it down, rather than just driving it home.

While that example does not involve AAMs, the same principle could apply in theory, where some AAMs might not have a large enough warhead for a clean one shot kill, and the target aircraft could be somewhat more damage resistant in it's inherent structural design.

KLAB wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 2:47 pm F-15 only needs one wing after all.

And that was from a mid-air collision with an A-4 Skyhawk! I love that story so much. The F-15 pilot had no idea he was missing a wing until after he landed, as his view was obscured by the stream of leaking fuel & fluids. He said that if he knew, he absolutely would have ejected.

"but seeing often fighters taking two (and sometime three) shots before splashing comes as a surprise"

How about an example at least. I rarely see modern fighters take more than one hit from a modern AAM.

lumiere wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 5:24 pm As is always the case, OP can post some example scenario/save so everyone can see.

Easier for them to chum the waters without it.

I haven't seen any weird damage cycles lately and the escalation seems ok. Probably an edge case somewhere but who cares.

M

thewood1 wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 6:46 pm "but seeing often fighters taking two (and sometime three) shots before splashing comes as a surprise"

This was the trigger for the post; for sure an outlier that happened while playing a game toda. I think it happens mostly with Fox-2 shots whilst Fox-3 tend to be lethal from the first shot

Knightpawn wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 8:09 pm

thewood1 wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 6:46 pm "but seeing often fighters taking two (and sometime three) shots before splashing comes as a surprise"

This was the trigger for the post; for sure an outlier that happened while playing a game toda. I think it happens mostly with Fox-2 shots whilst Fox-3 tend to be lethal from the first shot

So do you mean its not often?

Knightpawn wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 8:09 pm

thewood1 wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 6:46 pm "but seeing often fighters taking two (and sometime three) shots before splashing comes as a surprise"

This was the trigger for the post; for sure an outlier that happened while playing a game toda. I think it happens mostly with Fox-2 shots whilst Fox-3 tend to be lethal from the first shot

Fox-2 is a heat seeker, and those tend to be smaller missiles than Fox-3s which are active-radar missiles (Fox-1 is Semi-Active Radar missile).

This could mean that the comparatively smaller missiles could have smaller warheads, leading to a less certain chance of 1-shot kills.

thewood1 wrote: Thu Oct 30, 2025 8:24 pm So do you mean its not often?

I am not sure what each one of us means by "often". For sure it does not happen in the majority of cases. But it happens in a noticeable frequency (mainly with Fox-2 shots) that made me wonder and write the original post. This is not a report of a technical issue; it is a genuine question about the damage model and whether other people have the same impression

I had a similar complaint here

https://forums.matrixgames.com/viewtopi ... 1#p5229521

This part of the doctrine is often overlooked by designers; it allows units to be forced to return to base when they are damaged or low on ammunition.
In addition to damaged aircraft, in scenarios like 'Canary's Cage', you can see missile boats that, after launching their missiles, continue to charge at 35 knots with only their 76mm cannon against a combat group equipped with 127mm guns. Logic would dictate that they fire and then return to base to rearm.

TyphoonFr wrote: Fri Oct 31, 2025 3:26 pm This part of the doctrine is often overlooked by designers; it allows units to be forced to return to base when they are damaged or low on ammunition.

scc.png
In addition to damaged aircraft, in scenarios like 'Canary's Cage', you can see missile boats that, after launching their missiles, continue to charge at 35 knots with only their 76mm cannon against a combat group equipped with 127mm guns. Logic would dictate that they fire and then return to base to rearm.

While off-topic, but concerning withdraw doctrine one of my complaints for this is that, units will take direct path to their base (enemy sub can just wait over this course) and you cannot override it with F3 key course plot.

I've never seen such behavior. In my experience, usually if an aircraft does survive getting hit by a missile, it has been set on fire and then burns up a minute or so later.

I found Tcao's report about gunfire damage interesting though. I would imagine the oddities exhibited in his examples (MiG-23 taking a 400 round burst of 20mm fire and only having its radar damaged) comes from CMO's modeling of gunfire in bursts rather than individual rounds. So when a plane is hit with "100 rounds" of 20mm, that actually may be intended to represent one or two rounds hitting it and the other 99 to 98 missing. The only reason it is described as 100 rounds is because firing 100 individual shells in game would be infeasible due to it slowing down immensely. Also, perhaps in real life situations, the majority of rounds fired at a target are often going to miss, so there is no point in modeling them individually anyways.

TyphoonFr wrote: Fri Oct 31, 2025 3:26 pm This part of the doctrine is often overlooked by designers; it allows units to be forced to return to base when they are damaged or low on ammunition.

scc.png

In addition to damaged aircraft, in scenarios like 'Canary's Cage', you can see missile boats that, after launching their missiles, continue to charge at 35 knots with only their 76mm cannon against a combat group equipped with 127mm guns. Logic would dictate that they fire and then return to base to rearm.

That setting only applies to ships and submarines (and apparently ground units, but at the moment they don't have any bases they can be assigned to, apart from loading amphibious tanks on LPDs etc.). Aircraft will automatically return to base after they suffer a critical level of damage, and the threshold can't be adjusted. I've had this result in a B-29 raid being "defeated" because all of them returned to base despite still being flyable. None were actually shot down, and many did not lose any critical systems. The overall structural damage was just too high.

Just to stay in practice a little, I built a test scenario. One F-16 with 2 AIM-120s and 2 AIM-9s against a blind and non-maneuvering Mig-29A. In fact, I lined up four blind Mig-29s 100 nm apart in column, except the last two were only 20 nm apart. This allowed me to use up the AIM-120s and then see how the AIM-9s did. Ran it 12 times with WRA set to one AIM-120 and one AIM-9.

24 AIM-120 launches with 23 hits. Every hit was almost an immediate kill. A few listed as damaged and then within 1-2 second became kills.

24 AIM-9 launches with 23 hits. 16 immediate kills and the rest caused severe damage that led to kills in 2-30 seconds.

Not a single hit that didn't end up a kill.

Also want to point out that in The Falklands several Argentinian aircraft were damaged by sidewinders vs outright destroyed immediately. At least one of those crashed before landing and another was downed through friendly AAA on RTB. There is a Helion book that has some confirmed specifics.

One thing to ponder is if aspect of missile to target makes a difference.

edit: Just checked Shields's Airpower in the Falklands and appendix J shows detailed AIM-9L usage in combat by Harriers. My counting shows 18 A2A kills using AIM-9Ls with 3 damaging hits. Those Limas had the relatively new expanding rod warhead that was considered much more effective than the one on older Sidewinders. Is 3 out of 18 often?

thewood1 wrote: Fri Oct 31, 2025 11:05 pm One thing to ponder is if aspect of missile to target makes a difference.

Indeed it does. IIRC frontal impacts have a higher chance of hitting the cockpit and incapacitating the crew (leading to immediate loss of the aircraft), while rear impacts have a higher probability of affecting the engines. Side-impacts are more likely to cause damage to the fuselage.