Wings of Glory V9.0 Changelog

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Hello! Here’s the changelog for Wings of Glory v9.0 update! This time, we chose to post the changelog on devforum as this is the biggest update in the game’s history and it cannot fit in a Discord message :pensive:. This update includes modern planes, a new map, and new features such as radar and radar missiles.

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New Planes

USA

  • F-16CM Block 50 ‘Fighting Falcon’/‘Viper’ (2007)
  • F-15C ‘Eagle’ (2010 Radar and JHMCS upgrade)
  • F-14B ‘Tomcat’
  • F/A-18C Lot 20 ‘Hornet’ (2005)
  • F/A-18C ‘Maverick’ (New Premium, same variant as the regular F/A-18)

USSR

  • MiG-23MLD
  • MiG-29S ‘Fulcrum’
  • Su-27P ‘Flanker’
  • MiG-31B ‘Foxhound’

Britain

  • Eurofighter Typhoon (Tranche II / Block 10)
  • Tornado F.3 / ADV

Germany

  • EF2000 (Tranche II / Block 10)

France

  • Mirage 2000-5F
  • Rafale C F4.2 (2023)

Japan

  • F-2A ‘Viper Zero’
  • F-15J ‘Eagle’

New Map: Svalbard

This is the whole island group of Svalbard, slightly scaled down.
Here’s the showcase of the map:

New features

Spotting
Implemented spotting, enemy planes that your pilot cannot see (beyond a certain range, or behind terrain) will no longer have a red tag telling they’re there

  • 8 km for tier 8, 32 km for tier 7 and below
  • Range affected by pilot upgrade

Radar
Implemented radar functionality and UI stuff. There is no radar scope, however lockable targets are represented with a UI tag (green square) on the plane.

  • Press X to lock when there is a green dashed square with a X outline on the target you want to lock
  • Double pressing X on planes that can “soft-lock” will initiate a hard-lock
  • On mobile, this is the regular plane lock button
  • Pressing X again will unlock the target
  • TWS (track-while-scan) or soft-locks are shown with a single square
  • STT (single-target-track) locks are shown with double square
  • Lock range is affected by the enemy plane RCS, their aspect, relative speed, and the power of your radar

To defeat radar you need to use your chaff, terrain, and maneuver relative to the emitter!

Missile range indicator
Implemented a missile range bar when a target is locked with radar (either TWS or STT lock)

  • Top bar shows the max range for the target when it’s heading the same direction the entire flight time
  • Bottom bar shows the max range for the missile before the target can just run away
  • Arrow shows the current distance relative to the above

If the target is outside of the vertical bar (above the max range bar), then the missile might not have enough speed to hit the target!
Missile range indicator

Radar warning receivers (RWRs)
Implemented Radar-Warning-Receiver (RWR) systems. This interacts with other radars (from planes/SAMs/missiles) and displays being scanned/locked or launched at by them.

  • Most planes have unique RWR designs and sounds, some unable to show as much information as others (yes, we know that not all of these are correct)
  • RWRs have different direction measurement errors!
  • STT lock with most planes will ping the plane you’re locking with a LOCK signal (except AESA/PESA radars)
  • Guiding SARH missiles will ping the plane you’re locking with a LAUNCH signal (except AESA/PESA radars)

Chaff countermeasures
Implemented chaff countermeasures. These are dropped by using the same key as for flares (C). Introduction of chaff has replaced (some) flares on some planes.
Chaff easily defeats pulse radar, and pulse missiles with a few bundles. Radars such as the one on F-4J and most tier 8 planes require correct maneuvers (appearing as close as 0 m/s in relative speed as possible) to defeat. In the case of most tier 8 planes and all ARH missiles, dropping chaff is required while doing this.
CW missiles are easily defeated by chaff bundles if your relative speed to the emitter is low enough.

TIP: Relative speed gets lower when you position the threat either 90 degrees to the left, or 90 degrees to the right on your RWR.

Countermeasure pods
Implemented countermeasure pods. Currently, these are only available for F-1 (AN/ALE-41K), and Tornado F.3 (Phimat).

Fighter to fighter datalink
Implemented fighter to fighter datalink. Targets that you cannot see but teammates on the same datalink see with their radar will now be displayed with a green octagon shape. However, these datalinks have some limitations, such as only being able to transmit to compatible datalinks:

  • Link 16 is compatible with: Link 16, Link 4, F-2 Link
  • Link 4 is compatible with: Link 16 and Link 4
  • F-2 Link is compatible with: F-2 Link, Link 16, and F-15J Link
  • F-15J Link is compatible with: F-15J Link and F-2 Link
  • Beryuza is only compatible with Beryuza

Radar missiles

Implemented semi-active radar homing (SARH) and active radar homing (ARH) missiles:

SARH missiles
These missiles require a continuous hard lock (STT lock) on the target to track.

  • Missiles that do not receive signal for one-two seconds, depending on the missile, will guide based on inertia of the target and self destruct
  • Missiles that are not datalinked (marked with DL signal in the stat card) require the target to be within a given tracking cone in front of the missile

New SARH missiles include AIM-9C, R-3R, R.530, R-24R, R-27R, R-27ER, R-33, AIM-7E-2, AIM-7F, AIM-7M, AIM-7MH, AIM-7P, Skyflash and Skyflash SuperTEMP.

ARH missiles
These are the “fire-and-forget” radar missiles, much more capable than SARH missiles in combat.

  • These missiles only require a TWS lock to launch as they track based on datalink
  • Can guide without the plane providing lock information before they go active. In this mode, they guide on inertia only, and turn their own seeker on when the target is expected to be within active range
  • If you provide guidance to a target, there is a small green dot to the top left of lock UI
  • Can be launched without a lock, and will pick the first target they see
  • Early ARH missiles like the AIM-54A need to be told to go active (cannot do it on their own) and cannot be launched without a lock

New ARH missiles include R-77, AIM-54A/C and Mk47/Mk60 thruster variants, AAM-4, MICA-EM, AIM-120B, AIM-120C-5 and AIM-120C-7.

Datalinked missiles
Datalinked missiles (some SARH and all ARH) have a green tag that appears after 4 seconds of flight. This shows distance to the target, and in the case of ARH missiles, shows the time to go active (example: A15 for 15 seconds to active), and time to impact (example: T15 for 15 seconds to impact).
Datalinked missile stuff

IR (infra-red) missile improvements

Existing missile systems also see improvement! Optimized the general behavior of IR missiles, and implemented new features such as:

  • Three types of IRCCM (infra-red counter-countermeasures):
    • FOV shrinking
    • Predicting plane movement when seeing flares (turning off the seeker and assuming the same movement until flares are not visible)
    • Imaging sensors
  • Thrust vectoring control for missiles that support it
  • Enhanced locking renamed to “Radar assisted”, these missiles now require a radar lock to automatically slew to your target

Physics changes

We have also put in a ton of work to make the physics feel smoother and more realistic. This includes changes to the core physics and controls of the aircraft:

  • Implemented same scaling to controllability of the aircraft as the control surface animations to make the planes feel less snappy
  • Adjusted mouse controller PIDs to account for the lack of instant response from controlling the plane
  • Implemented AOA based control surface efficiency which also limits controllability of a plane in a stall
  • Revamped pull down from stalling
  • Adjusted landing physics to be a little more consistent

Tier 7 changes

  • Adjusted prices of some planes to reflect Tier 7 capability
  • Added radars and RWRs to planes that had them in real life
    • This is indicated in the avionics tab in lobby stat card
  • Added new missiles to:
  • F-4E and F-4J receive AIM-7E-2 and AIM-7F
  • F-8E receives AIM-9C
  • MiG-21bis receives R-3R
  • F-5E-3 receives AIM-9P-5
  • Mirage IIIE receives R.530

The rest

  • Reworked mobile control layout and controlling the plane / using freecam. Can now control the plane by dragging your finger on the left side of the screen, and control the freecam by dragging your finger on the right side of the screen.
  • Implemented Augmented Proportional Navigation (APN) for modern missiles that support it
    • Implemented range dependent APN for missiles that make use of optimized guidance (AIM-120C-7 and MICA-EM)
  • Improved G-Limiter behavior and implemented dynamic G-Limiters for:
    • F/A-18C: G-Limiter scales based on extra weight put on the plane
    • F-16CM: G-Limiter has a set value based on whether you carry A2G ordnance (CAT I/III switch in the cockpit)
  • Implemented overriding G/AOA limiter for F/A-18C and Su-27 (by pressing N). Be careful as pulling too hard will rip your wings off!
  • Implemented leading edge condensation effects, currently only for tier 8 but will add more (for tier 7) later
  • Implemented wing sweeping mechanic for MiG-23, F-14 and Tornado
    • Implemented pylon swiwel mechanic for Tornado’s underwing pylons to keep them oriented forwards
  • Implemented LOFT mechanic for missiles that support it (mostly tier 8)
  • Added a mach indicator above speed indicator when going above mach 0.95
  • Fixed inconsistency between server missile and clientside missile, serverside missiles were usually way slower
  • Reworked missile drag
  • Reworked HMD slewing to IR missiles
  • Improved the look of plane information tags to remove a bit of the bloat (i.e rank of the player)
  • Improved smoothness of launching missiles
  • SAM launch warning sound replaced by RWR sounds for planes that have them
  • Implemented forward operating bases that offer reloading of air to air missiles and countermeasures. Destroying these bases disables reloading
  • Reworked missile networking to be entirely custom
  • Reworked mouse sensitivity when controlling the plane (it was unnecessarily slow)
  • Reworked coin to medal scaling for purchasing planes, removed medal to coin conversion
  • Added a text-based tutorial explaining new features when joining tier 6, 7 and 8 for the first time. Unfortunately, this is only available in English for now.

Also bug fixes and stuff :cook:

There’s probably a lot we have missed for the changelog but the update has been in development for so long we forgor :pensive:
We’ve been working on this update for over half a year (modeling work started more than a year ago!), and we’re excited to have you all try what we’ve been working on, so have fun trying out all the new stuff (and remember to cosplay with FOX-1, FOX-3 calls :speaking_head::fire::fire:).

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