Escort AI behavior

[amariani]

When I'm flying, say, SEAD mission the escort AI aircraft switch to ground attack the second the enemy flight shows up leaving the bombers to fend for themselves. Why is that?

[Righteous26]

Check their weapons loadouts with the external object viewer. If they are loaded with ARMs, rockets and bombs then they are on a SEAD mission as well. They are likely following their mission orders. You may not be the only flight tasked to provide SEAD escort. You could order your wingmen to attack enemy aircraft at which time they will likely jettison all their air to ground weapons. Regardless, escort missions are a dicey affair as you will be ordered to intercept enemy fighters or destroy enemy AA units, but not both and will fail the mission even if you are able to destroy several enemy units because the escorted aircraft must generally survive the mission until a specific waypoint, usually waypoint five, they are not under your control and they tend to act suicidal. I avoid escort missions wherever possible because they are so easy to fail despite your best efforts.

[amariani]

In this scenario I'm flying SEAD, another unit is flying strike and a third one is flying escort. Both strike and escort flights are AI. As soon as the enemy shows up the AI flying escort drop their tanks and leave the strike flight by itself and go on to attack ground targets.

[bazillius]

yes, it's just a discouraging bug in the game. When this happens during the game, it also makes me very angry. I didn't find the reason. I would also like to find a way to solve this terrifying and depressing AI bug.

And it always happens during some interesting mission. All SAMs have been cleared by you and your wingman. 5 minutes to the target! Bandits, bandits! missile launch! missile launch! And all your escort F-15s start suicidal firing cannons at Shilkas and all dies along with your bombers. And you are watching it with facepalm.

Edited March 20, 2022 by bazillius

[bazillius]

mmmmm... By the way. it hppens only in generated quick missions  starting "on air". If you do full flight with taking off, following turn points all is okay, escort fights with air targets. in companies and manually made missions, everything is always fine. If You dont Use ALT+N

Edited March 21, 2022 by bazillius

[Righteous26]

There is a way to mitigate this if you take a flight of four to eight aircraft. Arm half your aircraft for air to air and half for air to ground. Be sure to keep your two flights with you until the enemy planes show up and then order the flight armed for air to air to attack them while the other flight attacks SAMs and AAA units that you target.