• A-4B — Control of the mouse during roll maneuvers has been improved. The probability of experiencing damage or destruction when performing a quick barrel roll while using mouse aim control has been reduced.
  
• BI — Control at high speeds in AB mode has been improved. Landing characteristics and control at low speeds have also been improved.
  
• F3H-2— The thermodynamics and throttle characteristics of the engine have been corrected. The time limit for the continuous operation of the engine while using WEP has been increased.
  
• A bug where the locking circle of the Sidewinder homing missile would shift to the side has been fixed.
  
• A bug where AGM-114 rounds would not strike the center of the target, but would instead strike the front part of the hull or just before the target, has been fixed (report 1, report 2).

The current provided changelog reflects the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates, additions and fixes may not be listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving and specific fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.

Today we would like to celebrate The US Navy’s birthday, recognized on the anniversary of the historic formation of the Continental Navy during the American Revolution, comes 2 weeks prior to Navy Day.

Navy Day was the original date for celebration of the U.S. Navy after research in the 1970’s revealed the ‘true’ birthday of the US Navy to be October 13th, and though this celebration officially was replaced by Armed Forces Day (Third Saturday in May for the U.S.) in 1949 and the Navy Day moved to the 27th of October. The celebrations for Navy Day continued, especially within the Navy itself and the date was officially changed back despite Navy day still being widely celebrated later in the month.

Until 11:00 GMT on the 19th of October
The premium USS Cowel (DD-547) destroyer is available for purchase in the game for Golden Eagles.

• Research, purchase, crew training costs and other related parameters for vehicles have been changed. View the tablesheet with the main parameters in a new tab. All economy indicators for vehicles will be changed according to rank.
• Repair costs and award multipliers have been changed (view in a new tab).
• Ammunition costs for naval vessels and aircraft have been changed (view in a new tab).
• In tank SB additional respawns in the same vehicle have been removed due to the respawn system being outdated when multiple vehicle respawn for respawn points was introduced.
• The reward for destroying and damaging aircraft without suspended weaponry has been reduced by 60% in ground AB battles and for aircraft with suspended weaponry by 20%. 

• For free decals that belong to specific nations’ tasks for receiving them have been added. Decals from the category “Digits” and some decals from the category “Special” will remain free. 
• Requirements for the “vehicle of a nation” for receiving decals from the Allied and Axis section have been corrected.
• Values to obtain some decals from the category “Special” have been adjusted.
• Some decals from the category “Roundels and Insignias” have had their availability returned. 
• Achievements from the category “Decals” have been distributed in the same groups as decals. The names of the achievement groups and decals now coincide.

• All aircraft torpedoes now have info shown about the explosive type and weight. These parameters are used to calculate the damage that they inflict (similar to other types of aviation armament and naval torpedoes) rather than the previously used simplified damage value.

The current provided changelog reflects the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates, additions and fixes may not be listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving and specific fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.

On October 3rd, 1990, West and East Germanies were united, and the fall of the Berlin wall was finished. Germans celebrate this day as a national holiday, Tag der Deutschen Einheit, or German Unity Day.




Track your progress by clicking your nickname and opening the ‘Achievements’ tab > German Unity Day

Sound

• A bug has been fixed that caused an absence of sound events with gun fire on ground and naval vehicles under certain conditions.
  
• A bug has been fixed where sound events for engines on ground vehicles and aircraft were missing.
  
• The engine sound for incoming allied/enemy aircraft has been made clearer.
  
• The sound notification connected to the destruction of enemy vehicles in aircraft SB has been disabled.
  
• The sound of ‘scraping’ on the hulls of ground vehicles in contact with each other has been added.
  
• Sounds for the ‘scraping’ of a ship’s hull with obstacles and the hulls of other ships, as well as sounds of scraping on an aircraft’s fuselage on the ground, will now be more natural in fade out after losing contact with the affected surface, or after stopping.

The current provided changelog reflects the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates, additions and fixes may not be listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving and specific fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.

• Churchill III, Churchill VII, M4A3E2, T14, T26E1-1 - the number of spawns has been changed (reduced to 1, similar to other heavy tanks).
  
• T26E1-1 - has been removed from setup 8.5.

The current provided changelog reflects the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates, additions and fixes may not be listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving and specific fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.

In the Raining Fire update, War Thunder saw the addition of a brand-new high-tech armament type – guided air-to-air missiles with a semi-active radar homing (SARH) warhead. Today we’ll be discussing the hardware aspect of the new armament specially designed for seasoned War Thunder veterans.


The new semi-active radar homing missiles operate with a signal that is continuously emitted by the radar of the player’s aircraft and reflected back from the target. Such tech grants the armament a series of advantages over heat-seeking infrared guided seekers Firstly, SARH missiles boast almost all-aspect capabilities, allowing the player to engage their enemy from practically any direction, and that includes blowing up right in their face – at this stage, heat-seeking guidance has zero purpose. For the very same reason, the launch range has been greatly boosted, meaning that the launch range is solely restricted by an aircraft’s radar coverage and the level of missile seeker sensitivity. And on many occasions, the launch range even exceeds the range of a visual contact with the target! Moreover, SARH missiles are not affected by the sun and can be launched even in heavily overcast conditions.

Sounds cool? Well, keep in mind this is no ultimate armament. On the first hand, you need to Continuously track the target with your radar until the missile hits, which throws all sharp manoeuvring out of the window. On the second hand, semi-active homing warheads can be confused by ground clutter (a signal reflected from the Earth surface) – something you have to account for when launching and guiding the missile towards the target. Furthermore, if your opponent is sporting an RWR, they might catch on that there’s a missile since they can detect radar emissions.




Since SARH missiles are capable of locking onto targets that are out of the pilot’s visual range, it might be tricky for the said pilot to estimate the distance to the target. This type of armament has a specific operational range, or the launch envelope, which can be defined as the distance between minimum and maximum ranges of the missile given the present movement parameters of the player’s aircraft and the target. This zone is strictly individual for every missile model and varies with technical characteristics.

The minimum launch range is affected by parameters such as:

• The commit time when the missile begins homing in on the target. For instance, for the R-3R model, this is equal to 0.5 seconds, while for the AIM-7D/E – approximately 2 seconds.
  
• The post-launch time required to arm the fuse.
  
• The turn rate of each particular model of missile. For example, if an opponent is flying directly towards or away from the player’s aircraft, the manoeuvring time window of the missile will be minimal, while if the movement trajectory of the opponent’s aircraft is perpendicular to the player’s, the time window will be maximal.

In a similar vein, each missile has a maximum launch range, which depends on:
The aerodynamics, motor thrust, and firing duration of the missile.

• The flight altitude of the player’s aircraft – the higher its value, the greater the missile’s flight range.
  
• The flight altitude of the opponent’s aircraft – correspondingly, the higher up in the sky they are, the shorter the flight range of your missiles.
  
• The speed of the player’s and the opponent’s aircraft, as well as the angle at which the opponent’s aircraft is moving with respect to the player – if they are flying away from you, the maximum launch range is severely reduced.

The armament control system calculates all the aforementioned parameters and helps the player identify the potential launch envelope – the minimum and maximum launch ranges will appear as small marks by the right-hand side of the indicator if the B-Scope (rectangular coordinate system) is used, and as arcs if the radar uses the polar system.



Moreover, the pilot has the indicator of the target’s velocity vector at their disposal. You will find it right under the square marking the locked-on target. If the target’s velocity vector changes laterally, the side component will reveal their speed, and the vertical component – the direction in which they are moving with respect to the player (down and up are towards and away correspondingly).

Don’t expect an “intelligent” armament to do all the hard work for you – if your target changes speed or direction after you have fired the missile, it may not hit the target. Besides, when tracking the target, the missile may be confused by ground clutter. Such a scenario is possible if you are radiating a signal down on the target (in this case, the opponent is situated below the horizon line). This causes the radio waves to bounce off the ground, that might prevent the seeker from tracking down the target. Additionally, there’s even a higher risk of this phenomenon when firing a missile at a low altitude, because the side lobes of your aircraft radar and the missile seeker receive all-ways signals reflected off the Earth surface, which may result in the missile losing its target. To ensure you don’t run into these problems, lock onto the target and launch your SARH missiles when you are positioned below them.




Unlike IR guided missiles, missiles with a semi-active radio seeker lock onto and track their target and maintain range or speed tracking. Thus, the missile will never become distracted by other targets within the reflected radio-signal acquisition zone while simultaneously ignoring some of the emissions reflected back from ground and water surfaces. The seeker is equally operable whether pulse or continuous wave signal is used. However, different missiles have different subtle aspects depending on targeting mode, and it’s crucial to study them in advance if you wish to make the best use of your SARH missiles.

When bombarding an opponent with pulsed emissions, the guided warhead will home in on the target according to distance – the R-3Rs, Matra R.530 and some others employ this approach. This mode allows the pilot to mark the desired target and fire a missile at it while ignoring other possible targets and parasitic signal reflections off the Earth surface that are reflected at ranges different from the range to the target the missile is locked on. In addition to this, you can lock onto the target of choice before launching the missile. When deploying SARH warheads in pulsed mode, it’s important to remember that locking onto a target positioned below the horizon line or at low altitudes may cause issues. For a perfect lock-on, target opponents at medium and high altitudes – and only if they are level with you or above you. If the distance between you and the target is less than the flight altitude of your aircraft, you can totally neglect the emission bouncing off the ground – under these conditions, the missile is guaranteed to lock onto and track the target.



Specific missiles, like the American AIM-7D/E, track the target based on its radial speed by using the Doppler effect as they are guided by a continuous or pulse-doppler radar signal. In this particular instance, the seeker ignores any targets and signals reflected off the ground surface in the set direction with different speed values. The cons of such technology include the impossibility for the seeker to lock onto a target before launch, issues locking onto a target travelling perpendicular to the movement trajectory of your aircraft, and the reduction of the lock-on range when pursuing fleeing targets. In order to lock onto a target, the missile must travel at least 1–2 kilometres away from the carrier, which renders them useless in a dogfight. These missiles are most effective against opponents moving towards you, as well as against fleeing targets travelling at medium or high altitudes – in this case, the seeker will never misidentify any signal reflected off the Earth surface as objects travelling at the target’s speed.

Be sure to carefully study your armament, test it in different combat scenarios and become a true modern war expert – after all, “intelligent” weaponry is nothing without an intelligent pilot!

The War Thunder Team

• Keys for custom camo trophies have been removed from the store on PlayStation 4® and Xbox One. To open these trophies, you only have to click the “Open” button, GE will be spent automatically in a sum equivalent to the previous version (599 GE). Previously purchased keys will be spent automatically on purchase or achieving the appropriate trophy.
  
• PlayStation 4® users from the Japanese region are now again able to purchase custom camo trophies, or recieve them in battles.

Aircraft characteristics, damage model, and weaponry changes

• Turret aiming angles have been brought into compliance with documentation for the following aircraft:
  • Me 410 (all modifications)
• Dead zones have been adjusted for turrets to avoid hitting the tail for the following aircraft:
  • M.B.175T
    
  • SB 2М-103
    
  • SB 2M-103U

The current provided changelog reflects the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates, additions and fixes may not be listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving and specific fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.

The paper battlefield has been rolled out and the rules are in front of you! Prepare the figures and get exclusive vehicles from the enemy: the Merkava Mk.3D main battle tank, a BI fighter interceptor, the Lübeck frigate and the Sd.Kfz.251/10 armoured vehicle.

From 11:00 GMT on the 24th of September until 12:00 GMT on the 5th of October

Get components from battles, assemble plastic models and capture classified documents with them that can be exchanged for prizes!

Merkava Mk.3D (USA) — event vehicle, coupon, rank VII
The Israeli “Merkava” with a new smoothbore 120mm cannon and enhanced turret protection.
Exchangeable for 3 classified documents


BI (USSR) — event vehicle, coupon, rank V
An experimental Soviet interceptor and the first “rocket engine” aircraft in the soviet research tree in War Thunder!
Exchangeable for a Merkava Mk.3D coupon


Lübeck F224 (Germany) — premium, coupon, rank II
An excellent frigate of the Köln class - A premium version with additional torpedo launchers.
Exchangeable for 2 classified documents


Sd.Kfz.251/10 (Germany) — premium, coupon, rank I
A semi-tracked vehicle with a 37mm cannon. A perfect vehicle for early battles in War Thunder.
Exchangeable for 1 classified document

https://youtu.be/EOKvXDwwn1U
Fight in Arcade, Realistic or Simulator battles! After each battle, the necessary components for assembling the models can be found in “Workshop → Strategist”.

In the “Strategist” event you need to collect figures from components that you have obtained in battles and then use them in the offensive on the playing battlefield. Each completed offensive brings you classified documents which can be exchanged for exclusive versions of the game vehicles.

Check out the full article here!

Sound:

• The sound indication for destroyed enemy in air battle mode now differs from naval battles.
  
• The sound event of fly-by shells near the player’s vehicle features a whistle again, along with a ‘cracking’ sound. The ‘cracking’ sound is more natural for passing-by ultrasonic rounds, but the whistling sound is more familiar to listeners.
  
• A bug has been fixed where a destroyed then repaired engine might operate without sound.

Other:

• A bug has been fixed where the landing gear mechanical indicators did not operate in the cockpit view.

The current provided changelog reflects the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates, additions and fixes may not be listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving and specific fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.