She's Beautiful! - F-117 Nighthawk - SEA POWER

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[BrotherMunro]

The F-117 is *technically* retired but they are still kept in near flying condition just in case they are needed for something. There are also a handful still flying, the USAF uses them to simulate enemy stealth aircraft in exercises

[polygonvvitch]

The F-117, the aircraft that was designed to be rendered in 1990s low poly 3D engines.

[yungyork]

A good idea for the F117 would be to set up multiple radar sites along a path with "shorad" and a target of interest deep in enemy lines (something like a bunker or a headquarters building), & have an airbase offset near the the target of interest, try to avoid detection as best as possible using different routes towards the target, and then attemt to evade any interceptors that are sent up to stop you,

By the looks of things, although the krivak could see you, it couldnt hold a good lock on you due to the rcs of the nighthawk, so the missiles went dumb. Might be cool to do a night scenario and show detection rings for the radar sites and do your best to stay out of them :)

[monty]

I believe they were still testing other technologies, after “retirement”. A couple of them are in air museums, now.

[niteman]

One of the reasons for the F-117 being retired is that, before the production of the F-22 was terminated, it was expected that modern stealth aircraft capable of multi-role missions would obsolete the older stealth tech. Recall that its famous engagements were decisively in the era of 4th generation air frames where stealth was less common.

[jamison]

It is a very good model and legendary airframe. It was disclosed somehwat recently that the USAF and perhaps even the CIA had/have been using the F-117 still over recent years or even till with a set of airframes that remainder fully operational despite the official retired status.

What we're seeing is all a bit of Sea Power modder limitations. JDAM's are GPS guided of course, rather than unguided, so at first I thought that's why they categorized the bomb as a missile, plus the fact it can easily gluide 13 miles per release at altitude and then make corrections via the JDAM kit for accurate hits, but that's only on stationary targets.

The laser should enables hittng moving targets, but in the real word you need a clear line of sight per weather/haze/other atmospheric conditions to remain lazed onto moving targets and I believe the target can move quite fast, so nearly anything on the gtound is fair game and even a slow moving Russian helicopter has been hit by a laser guided bomb.

In the future, I'm hopging Sea Power adds greater options/paramters for radar cross section, infrared, gliding parameters, and other settings to cover technical or physical aspects of SP. For example, converting these vague and limited number of "tiny, small, semi-small" radar cross sections over to a more technical and scalable system that sets it be an RCS in sqaure meters, For example, an RCS of tiny being assigned to a hypothetical one-manned launched launcher recon drone the size of a large bug, the RCS of F-22, and he RCS of the future B-21/Boing F0--47 NGAD are not accurately protrayed as all just using a "tiny" RCS section. There's also the issue of RCS settings from the parrticular angle/aspect presented towards each enemy on the groud or in the air at varying altitudes and bearing.

Another limitation would be the bomb bays that you noted, as that RCS should change, but Sea Power is having those doors open very early and for an extended period, rather than the actual method of opening just prior to release and only being open for a brief moment. That should surely increase the RCS for specific angles and bearings, but only for the specific enemy units at specific vantage points. Not impacting the RCS at all right now is the best overall comrpromise.

I could basically go on and on (talking about approximately 100 pages of text) evaluating future changes that could enhance the accuracy of Sea Power as a combat sim (and the possibilities of endless fun), all regarding emulation of the physicas, weapon systems, guidance/propulasion, RCS, infrared (and overall emissions of various energy/RCS)m, implementing an inherent probability of error for various weapons and subsystems of various units, and it just goes on and on. In the meantime we just have to wait and see where the dev take it, and hopefully that includes a true interest in supporting the mod community to provide them with the variables required to mod mod all the things. :)

[MrEhole]

I worked on that project many years ago. It's a multi-role btw. Great vid sir.

[Witzkatz-vdpt]

It's cool to see the Nighthawk in Sea Power! I think it was never really meant to be used against moving targets at sea, but like the bombs' nicknames imply, as a bunker-buster. The laser designator of course works against moving targets as well, but I think this will be mainly used to attack a fortified coastline without drawing SAM fire from every Tom Dick and Harry down there so that later on the ships can move in unharmed.

[williamdahl]

Presently stealth ac operate with at least one jamming ac. Such as the F35 and F18G “growler”. The new AN/ ALQ-99 multi frequency jammers in concert with AGM-88 HARM’s provide the modern SEAD and the stealth units provide JDAM or BlU99 or GBU series munitions to be delivered. So everyone can enjoy a Sam free evening.

[astro]

I would say the F-117 is more close to the F-15 in size. I believe the RA-5 was the largest carrier capable aircraft to enter standard service.

[madrabbit]

During Panama, Gulf War I, and Bosnia, they were used for high value targets with real tight AAA conditions. As long as they stayed outside a certain range of radar, they couldn't be detected. I suspect that all radars will find them hard to lock onto, thus the reasons those SAMs missed.

[kineuhansen]

planes like the f117 and b2 would be cool to see in game

[malditaseaintensifies-kdec]

I want to see modders working with the devs. Imaginge the possibilities! Imagine a DotMod or an NWP mod for this game!

[andrewcoulthard-clark]

I want them to make a mod for the 'Tic Tac' Incident of 2004...

[rustybulletstmm]

The F-117 was originally intended to be a Fighter to focus on Air to Air hence the F designation. However it fell out of that role and settled into the Attack role of carrying heavy bomb payloads deep into enemy radar and anti air range something it excelled at. They retired it in favor of new stealth technologies that worked into the F-22 and F-35.

[screechowl]

I did a lot of testing with this one and found that you can hit ships, including Krivak II if you stay at 20, 000'. For some reason, any other height it was seen much quicker. At 20k it was able to successfully drop and cause the SAMs to miss most of the time. You could just about ensure successful hits by doing a 2 ship and having the lead do sparkle and the #2 drop. Lead will stay 10 miles away. I tried is several times and that worked. Low altitude bombing was the worst outcome.

[KnightShadowsong]

F117 is an outstanding aircraft. it's honestly a fav of mine though the Tomcat will forever be the best fighter jet made by man IMHO. honestly from US Doctrine, the best use of the F117 would be sneak attacks using a coordinated strike with EW Support aircraft, EA-6B prowlers and Hawkeye early warning birds, probably a few tomcats as well just in case something got close. though I find it amusing that the Bombay doors being open doesn't effect RCS, considering the one shoot down from a Russian system that I know about was a fluke because the plane had just opened it's Bombay doors and it's RCS went from size of a bird to SU-57 (I don't know the Su-57's RCS but considering it's Russian it's probably garbage.) from a tactical perspective if you needed to penetrate an extremely well defended area, this would be the aircraft to do it, think the trench run from Top Gun Mavrick or Star Wars. cant wait to see some missions with it.

[eypandabear]

Hey Stealth, when you’re lasing a target you can order “cease fire”, then change course, then manually reengage the target with the laser. It’s a bit clunky but it works. I don’t know what the angle limit is on the designator, I just try to keep it vaguely realistic.

[TheGeocacheHunter]

11:45 you can see the bombs whizzing by the missiles.

[kegman]

Officially no longer in service, though you still can see them flying around Edwards AFB for "reasons".