The 5th round of the Joint Warrior battle series is over and what a great action-packed event it turned out to be!
Here is what in my opinion stood out from the two prelims and the final battle:
Who were the top MVPs this time around?
Sweeper from the Fighting 99th Air Wing made a strong impression in the final battle after missing the preliminary match; the American Eagle driver has pulled off an amazing performance after downing 4 enemy fighters , thus leading team Red to victory in their final clash against the 104th-led coalition.
Air-to-ground-wise and after missing the latest events, the Su-25 guru Wizard from Death Wings (UVAF squadron) has made a resounding return into the spotlight; the Ukrainian striker was a nightmare to his opponents, pulverizing nothing less than 27 ground targets, which is worth a total of 240 points!
Other noteworthy performances
The 51st Regiment must be very happy to have recently recruited Holimoli as the man is proving himself a force to be reckoned with: right after a solid performance in Top Gun 2, Holimoli has come back again to score the second best air-to-air performance in JW5 with 3 kills on Aleman, Tunther and Jamison.
The 104th continued to impress and prove they have multiple talented pilots in their ranks: Knight has been the revelation this time around as he downed 4 enemy fighters including some big names such as Frostie and Soviet; although he got shot down towards the very end, this first big performance from Knight has earned him a spot in the top 20.
The ground pounding area was also action-packed as another pilot has also risen from the ranks: Dackster, a Reservoirs Elite pilot riding an Su-25 made quick work of 19 enemy ground units; needless to say that this is worth a lot of point; Dackster has also had to deal with an encounter with an enemy F-15C! not only he survived the duel but has also won it by downing his enemy although damage taken from this encounter had forced him to eject on his way back. It’s great to see the legendary RvE squad revived and back in the PvP spotlight again after many years of absence.
There has also been some solid flying shown by several pilots such as Rage, Jester, Stuge, Plaiskool, Nighmare, Frostie, Honos, Omny and Scooter; These guys have all shown great skills and rightfully earned their spots on JW5’s MVP list.
Battle For Top Spot
Stuge and Ocelot were battling this out in Joint Warrior 5. These two men have been going toe-to-toe since Stuge had been crowned after his Top Gun double title back in December. Red Flag 4 had seen Ocelot snatching that top spot and it’s finally Stuge who reclaimed it back this time around after a stumbling performance from his rival. Stuge also moves to third place in the air-to-air hall of fame with two months now spent as the undisputed air-to-air champion.
Air-to-ground-wise, Honos had accumulated enough lead in the previous events to stay comfortably seated at the very top of the rankings; Honos has been the top bomber pilot in DCS for 5 months so far and only needs two more to become the all time best.
The squadron rankings have not changed a lot with 104th and the 71st still reigning respectively in the air-to-air and air-to-ground categories.
Country-wise, Sweeper’s performance has allowed the US to close in the gap on Finland while Rage gave the UK enough boost to move past the Republic of Ireland.