F86 A-5 vs MiG15bis

[FuriousMeow]

The F86 is Ricky Bobby's WonderBread car and the MiG15bis the cars lapping

 

[Whittle]

My recent online battles (flying the MiG without G-suit, vs F86 pilots who have it) have all followed this path (assuming the F86 pilot wasn't caught unaware and didn't make obvious mistakes):

1. Make a pass on the F86, either miss, or more likely don't shoot, because the F86 pilot has manoeuvred in a way which would require too much G to be pulled.

2. Climb away (easily).

3. Repeat until fuel is low, the F86 walks away on the deck, or someone else turns up.

 

Whilst it's correct for MiG pilots to not have the G-suit, the fact that black outs come on at 3-4G after a few reasonable manoeuvres, with no significant recovery of the "G health bar" for a significant period, really limits what MiG pilots can do. I'd prefer to see the aircraft's performance differentiated in a more realistic way (even modelling of physical exhaustion due to control forces) than an artificially low black out tolerance.

[MJones]

I think both of you are right.  It's still early, though.  

The Mig 15 vastly out climbs the A-5 (wait until the F shows up) and the Mig pilot needs to be looked at (w/o G suits.)  I'm more than pleased and Korea has brought me back into sims full time years after Il2 1946.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

On 9/8/2026 at 5:49 AM, Whittle said:

an artificially low black out tolerance.

I'd like to see that statement backed up.

It seems to me that the pilot physiology model is the same (or similar) as the one of IL2 GB. As you can read in Dev Blog 263, an awful lot of research has went into it, drawing from several peer-reviewed scientific journal papers.

Unless you have hard evidence that the in-game G effects are not in agreement with the cited sources (or of course that the cited sources are wrong, but in that case you should get your own results peer-reviewed and published), I am very much inclined to believe that the blackout tolerance is perfectly realistic.

[MJones]

3 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

I'd like to see that statement backed up.

It seems to me that the pilot physiology model is the same (or similar) as the one of IL2 GB. As you can read in Dev Blog 263, an awful lot of research has went into it, drawing from several peer-reviewed scientific journal papers.

Unless you have hard evidence that the in-game G effects are not in agreement with the cited sources (or of course that the cited sources are wrong, but in that case you should get your own results peer-reviewed and published), I am very much inclined to believe that the blackout tolerance is perfectly realistic.

I took it as the time needed to recover from pulling G's w/o a suit.  Not necessarily blacking out because of a hard pull.  That is going to happen much faster unless you have a G suit.  I realize that these types of maneuvers are a major strain on the body (with or without suit), but these are also younger men in their prime.  The DPRK and PRC pilots were chosen from 'better than average' regiments in their respective armies.  I could see looking into this.

It's cool that this aspect of flying is modeled (suit vs non suit).  There have been a couple situations where I'm positive the G suit saved me.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

31 minutes ago, MJones said:

I took it as the time needed to recover from pulling G's w/o a suit.  Not necessarily blacking out because of a hard pull.

That's how I took it as well, but this too is something that's already modelled. Quoting from Dev Blog 263: "Therefore, the endurance of our pilot to long-term G-loads, as well as to cyclic G-loads in the new model is adjusted both taking into account reliably known data from various publications, and based on the impressions of real pilots with aerobatic experience." Also, various non-instantaneous effects such as the Push-Pull Effect and Warming Up Effect have been modelled.

38 minutes ago, MJones said:

The DPRK and PRC pilots were chosen from 'better than average' regiments in their respective armies.

Better at what? AFAIK, high-G tolerance wasn't a pilot selection criterion until centrifuges became more generally available after the Space Age.

 

Since forever, there have been IL2 players that are under the impression that "the other side" has an unfair advantage of one kind of another. Quite often directly contradicting each other. Fact is that human impression is notoriously biased and unreliable, and any such accounts are usually wrong. It's certainly possible that the Devs have made mistakes in the F-86 flight model or the MiG's pilot physiology, but without proper testing in a controlled environment and a comparison with real-life sources, any statements that the current implementation is wrong based on anecdotal evidence only, are laughable at best.

[kev2go]

On 9/7/2026 at 11:49 PM, Whittle said:

 

Whilst it's correct for MiG pilots to not have the G-suit, the fact that black outs come on at 3-4G after a few reasonable manoeuvres, with no significant recovery of the "G health bar" for a significant period, really limits what MiG pilots can do. I'd prefer to see the aircraft's performance differentiated in a more realistic way (even modelling of physical exhaustion due to control forces) than an artificially low black out tolerance.

 

yes i agree. there were some forum posts to this from 2021. Looks like nothing has changed since.

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/72621-the-g-fatigue-model-is-incorrect-and-needs-revision/

Edited Wednesday at 03:58 PM by kev2go

[LukeFF]

7 hours ago, kev2go said:

 

yes i agree. there were some forum posts to this from 2021. Looks like nothing has changed since.

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/72621-the-g-fatigue-model-is-incorrect-and-needs-revision/

There were changes made to the model after player feedback.

[FuriousMeow]

Yeah, there were quite a few changes to the physio model. Its fairly different from the one that was rolled out. At higher Gs/speeds requires angle maneuvering far more than direct pursuit maneuvering.

I don't think its that bad for the non-gsuit MiG-15 but the earlier 23mms are like pushing potatoes out of a tube - so slow and drop immediately. The later 23mms, though,  they are useful. The 37mm can actually be used for lead shots, its not the greatest but doable and it's not a shallow angle to target weapon either.

I just found it funny how easy it is to zoom around the F-86 A-5 with the MiG-15bis

 

Edited yesterday at 01:09 AM by FuriousMeow

[Xtremist]

20 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

I'd like to see that statement backed up.

It seems to me that the pilot physiology model is the same (or similar) as the one of IL2 GB. As you can read in Dev Blog 263, an awful lot of research has went into it, drawing from several peer-reviewed scientific journal papers.

Unless you have hard evidence that the in-game G effects are not in agreement with the cited sources (or of course that the cited sources are wrong, but in that case you should get your own results peer-reviewed and published), I am very much inclined to believe that the blackout tolerance is perfectly realistic.

Very easy to prove, just try to dogfight against the same type of aircraft with ace level Ai, in chase you can't sustain the same turn as ai, you black out long before they do. 

[Panzerlang]

16 minutes ago, Xtremist said:

Very easy to prove, just try to dogfight against the same type of aircraft with ace level Ai, in chase you can't sustain the same turn as ai, you black out long before they do. 

Maybe ace-setting AI are modelled to have superior fitness to the human-modelled player.

[Xtremist]

26 minutes ago, Panzerlang said:

Maybe ace-setting AI are modelled to have superior fitness to the human-modelled player.

It is true for lower level AI too, i wrote the ace level only because it is easier to try it with them, they are less likely to just bumble around with extended airbrakes.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

1 hour ago, Xtremist said:

Very easy to prove, just try to dogfight against the same type of aircraft with ace level Ai, in chase you can't sustain the same turn as ai, you black out long before they do. 

No-one here is talking about the AI pysiology. The discussion is about the player physiology model.

Still, the same standards apply. This is a simulator. Your opinion is worthless if it's not backed up with controlled tests and real-life sources.

[Xtremist]

1 hour ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

No-one here is talking about the AI pysiology. The discussion is about the player physiology model.

Still, the same standards apply. This is a simulator. Your opinion is worthless if it's not backed up with controlled tests and real-life sources.

I don't know what "real life source" is necessary to prove that AI and player model should have the same G-tolerance...

And if they are not the same, from that point it is irrelevant if the player or AI G-tolerance  is closer to reality.

Also, a simple user doesn't have the necessary tools to scientifically prove this in gameplay environment, other than trying to fly the exact  same path as the AI, but that is not exact and reproducable.

The repeated reports of many users about this observation should warrant a closer look at this from developer side, i don't think that it is my burden or responsibility to "prove" the existence of a bug considering the current state of the game, i.e. very far from being finished.

Edited 22 hours ago by Xtremist

[AEthelraedUnraed]

2 hours ago, Xtremist said:

I don't know what "real life source" is necessary to prove that AI and player model should have the same G-tolerance...

The post that you replied to isn't at all about whether or not AI and player G-tolerance are the same. I haven't said a word about that, so your whole point is completely irrelevant. My post was about whether or not the player physiology model is realistic or not, because someone claimed that it wasn't.

2 hours ago, Xtremist said:

i don't think that it is my burden or responsibility to "prove" the existence of a bug considering the current state of the game, i.e. very far from being finished.

If someone claims that the current model is unrealistic, then it is most certainly their responsibility to bring up evidence. Especially considering the large amount of scientific sources the Devs have cited in their work on the physiology model.

[Jaegermeister]

2 hours ago, Xtremist said:

The repeated reports of many users about this observation should warrant a closer look at this from developer side, i don't think that it is my burden or responsibility to "prove" the existence of a bug considering the current state of the game, i.e. very far from being finished.

Regardless of what the developers decide to work on, if you want to make statements that the flight model or pilot model is incorrect, then it does become your responsibility to prove it.

From the forum rules…

19. Claiming that the flight model is incorrect without the required proof and starting a flame thread based on such a claim is prohibited.

The form for a flight model claim consists of:

• short but consistent description of the claim;
• link to a reference and to a specific part of such reference that describes the correct behavior of a disputed element/situation;
• game track record and the list of conditions used to recreate disputed element/situation.

Every “simple user” does have the tools to make a bug report and test for facts before they make statements about what issues exist. “Reports of many users” is highly subjective and not very reliable for making decisions.

i would say that your last statement regarding the state of the game is also subjective, inflammatory and unproven.

[Joch]

Well IMHO focusing on whether non-G suit behavior is properly modelled is a red herring, both the F86 and MIG15s are "Boom and Zoom" fighters made for quick hit-and-runs, not turn fighters. 

I have not tried MP yet, but have done a lot of 1v1 and 2v2 F86 vs MIG15 dogfights at 8000 meters+ and the relative performance of the fighters matches the historical accounts I have read.

The MIG15 has superior speed and climb rate and can dictate the fight, but it feels a bit like riding a rocket with limited maneuverability, hard to finesse turns and get onto a F86s tail. OTOH once you get properly lined up on a F86, the firepower from the cannon is impressive.

The F86 feels a lot easier to fly, seems more stable when close to a stall, has superior views with its large bubble canopy and even though on paper the MIG15 has an edge, it seems easier to outturn a MIG15 in an F86 and maneuver into its rear quarter. The two gunsights also seem more accurate and are great for quick snapshots.

In the fall of 1953, the US got its hand on a MIG15 and setup mock dogfights with a F86. Chuck Yeager piloted one against another top USAF pilot. Whether Yeager piloted the F86 or the MIG15, the result was the same, he quickly got on the other plane's tail and was impossible to shake off. Afterwards, he commented that both plane's relative performance was close enough that pilot skill was the deciding factor.

just my two cents opinion...

[Xtremist]

41 minutes ago, Jaegermeister said:

Regardless of what the developers decide to work on, if you want to make statements that the flight model or pilot model is incorrect, then it does become your responsibility to prove it.

From the forum rules…

19. Claiming that the flight model is incorrect without the required proof and starting a flame thread based on such a claim is prohibited.

The form for a flight model claim consists of:

• short but consistent description of the claim;
• link to a reference and to a specific part of such reference that describes the correct behavior of a disputed element/situation;
• game track record and the list of conditions used to recreate disputed element/situation.

Every “simple user” does have the tools to make a bug report and test for facts before they make statements about what issues exist. “Reports of many users” is highly subjective and not very reliable for making decisions.

i would say that your last statement regarding the state of the game is also subjective, inflammatory and unproven.

1,

The "simple user's test for facts" is to try to pursuit the ai pilot with the same aircraft with the exact same configuration. It will show the nature of the problem, but it is very far from any scientific methodology, so you can't expect it to"prove" anything, but it can shine light on a serious problem.

I don't see any other viable method available for the common folks 

 

2,

While the “reports of many users” might be based on subjective experience, they are there for a reason, and the developers do have responsibility to adress them.

3,

If you think that my statement about the games readiness is "subjective, inflammatory and unproven" just take a look at the bug reports list, especially regarding the serious, -sometimes game braking - bugs.

[Jaegermeister]

5 minutes ago, Xtremist said:

The "simple user's test for facts" is to try to pursuit the ai pilot with the same aircraft with the exact same configuration. It will show the nature of the problem, but it is very far from any scientific methodology, so you can't expect it to"prove" anything, but it can shine light on a serious problem.

I don't see any other viable method available for the common folks 

 

You keep going back to “simple users” and “common folks” as though it’s an excuse for not having facts to back up your statements. We all have the same tools and information to work with here.

Just off the top of my head, there is a g meter available in the HUD instrument selection. You could fly each plane in pursuit of the other in a similar configuration and note the gray or black out severity and duration on a chart and compare the results for each plane. You can put the planes on autopilot while you are in the cockpit and the AI flys it while you read the instruments. This could be compared to historical information regarding g limits for the planes and pilots, which of course varies by individual. These observations could then be put in a bug report if you find any discrepancy with real world data.

I have read that many of the top scoring Russian MiG aces in the early part of the Korean War were the most experienced aces from WWII in prop planes. The best of these pilots never had a g-suit to rely on and were very resistant to g forces due to long practice, natural ability, physical fitness and knowing their own limits. You can’t really model that accurately, but I am sure the Devs are aware of it.

If you just want to argue, I’m not your guy….

[Xtremist]

37 minutes ago, Jaegermeister said:

You keep going back to “simple users” and “common folks” as though it’s an excuse for not having facts to back up your statements. We all have the same tools and information to work with here.

Just off the top of my head, there is a g meter available in the HUD instrument selection. You could fly each plane in pursuit of the other in a similar configuration and note the gray or black out severity and duration on a chart and compare the results for each plane. You can put the planes on autopilot while you are in the cockpit and the AI flys it while you read the instruments. This could be compared to historical information regarding g limits for the planes and pilots, which of course varies by individual. These observations could then be put in a bug report if you find any discrepancy with real world data.

I have read that many of the top scoring Russian MiG aces in the early part of the Korean War were the most experienced aces from WWII in prop planes. The best of these pilots never had a g-suit to rely on and were very resistant to g forces due to long practice, natural ability, physical fitness and knowing their own limits. You can’t really model that accurately, but I am sure the Devs are aware of it.

If you just want to argue, I’m not your guy….

"You could fly each plane in pursuit of the other in a similar configuration and note the gray or black out severity and duration on a chart and compare the results for each plane."

This can produce absolutely no data concerning the difference between player and ai G tolerance. Especially since after partually blacking out, you can't continue the pursuit. Yet, you want to get useful data from this.

Yes, we all have the same tools to work with, and they are absolutely useless for this task on a serious level of debugging. That's why i'm telling that it is not my/our job to investigate the problem, but with a ~2000 hours of Il2, and as the owner of this product, i feel myself entitled to say that this needs to be looked at by the developers, and i am not alone with this.

You can easily chase an AI opponent with the same aircraft into G-loc in Il2gb, with Korea it is nearly impossible.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

59 minutes ago, Xtremist said:

The "simple user's test for facts" is to try to pursuit the ai pilot with the same aircraft with the exact same configuration. It will show the nature of the problem, but it is very far from any scientific methodology [...]

Quite the contrary. Setting up a controlled test where everything's equal except for the variable you're testing for (in this case two of the same aircraft that fly the same path, one piloted by AI and the other by a player), is exactly what scientific methodology is all about. Science is not something vague that only scientists with white lab coats can do; everyone can do it, including "the common folks".

1 minute ago, Xtremist said:

This can produce absolutely no data concerning the difference between player and ai G tolerance. Especially since after partually blacking out, you can't continue the pursuit. Yet, you want to get useful data from this.

It's a mystery to me how you arrived at that conclusion. If you want to test if there's a difference in G tolerance between player and AI, the moment they black out is a very valuable datapoint. The experimental setup described by Jaegermeister is a viable way to obtain this data.

3 minutes ago, Xtremist said:

i'm telling that it is not my/our job to investigate the problem, but with a ~2000 hours of Il2, and as the owner of this product, i feel myself entitled to say that this needs to be looked at by the developers, and i am not alone with this.

Actually, the forum rules quite clearly state that it in fact is your job.

What is most definitely not your job, is deciding what the developers should focus on. You are in no way entitled to decide any of that, and you are in no way entitled to pretend to speak for the community. That you're not the only one with a certain opinion, doesn't mean in any way that it's widely perceived as an issue. It might be just 1% of all players, with the other 99% satisfied with the status quo.

[Xtremist]

30 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

Quite the contrary. Setting up a controlled test where everything's equal except for the variable you're testing for (in this case two of the same aircraft that fly the same path, one piloted by AI and the other by a player), is exactly what scientific methodology is all about. Science is not something vague that only scientists with white lab coats can do; everyone can do it, including "the common folks".

It's a mystery to me how you arrived at that conclusion. If you want to test if there's a difference in G tolerance between player and AI, the moment they black out is a very valuable datapoint. The experimental setup described by Jaegermeister is a viable way to obtain this data.

Actually, the forum rules quite clearly state that it in fact is your job.

What is most definitely not your job, is deciding what the developers should focus on. You are in no way entitled to decide any of that, and you are in no way entitled to pretend to speak for the community. That you're not the only one with a certain opinion, doesn't mean in any way that it's widely perceived as an issue. It might be just 1% of all players, with the other 99% satisfied with the status quo.

"Setting up a controlled test where everything's equal except for the variable you're testing for"

This fails at the moment you try to fly exactly the same path same speed same micro adjustments as the Ai with a player controlled plane, because it is very difficult to do with enough accuracy that it can produce scientifically useful data. And if you managed to do that, you have no way to be sure you did. There goes your controlled test environment. And without it, the best you can get is an assumption that something is off. This is where the developers can continue with more sophisticated tools.

"What is most definitely not your job, is deciding what the developers should focus on."

Nobody asked them to FOCUS on anything, i wrote that there is a problem they should look at, there is a big difference, as a customer and user i have all the right to tell if something is not quite right with the product.

Edited 16 hours ago by Xtremist

[Dash,Polder]

Just my personal opinion based on life experience, recovery should be quicker and more fully after the pully, unless you actually G-locked, than you should be lucky to still be breathing and you really need to get out of Dodge because you are done for the day.   Flyers who skillfully and carefully manage their g loads should reap the rewards, just as it is in real life.  A professional fighter pilot shouldn't be accumulating, storing, and banking fatigue and exhaustion by simply pulling 4 G maneuvers over the course of a single sortie.  That only happens doing three or four sorties a day non-stop for weeks in an actual war surge, or no one could actually do or sustain a war time tempo.  You'd need three or four times the pilots per squadron to man the sorties the way it seemingly works now, the men are just too weak.

[MiGCap]

We have the topic "G-Forces", first as part of the Yak-9P thread and now as extra thread:

 

[AEthelraedUnraed]

5 hours ago, Xtremist said:

This fails at the moment you try to fly exactly the same path same speed same micro adjustments as the Ai with a player controlled plane, because it is very difficult to do with enough accuracy that it can produce scientifically useful data.

I'm sorry, but it seems you have a shallow understanding of how science works. What you quote, is the exact reason that you don't use a single test (AKA anecdotal "evidence") but several and then apply statistics (e.g. averaging).

5 hours ago, Xtremist said:

Nobody asked them to FOCUS on anything, i wrote that there is a problem they should look at, there is a big difference, as a customer and user i have all the right to tell if something is not quite right with the product.

Oh you have the right to have an opinion. You may even share it, no problems whatsoever. But what you may explicitly not do, as described in the forum rules but IMO is also common etiquette, is present your opinion as fact without providing evidence. By doing so, you're effectively elevating your own opinion above all disagreeing ones, and that is IMHO a very egocentrical and entitled thing to do.