Air RB and its possible rework

[Macekeeks]

the whole point is to get around low altitude missile spam and make the game more strategic as i said

[MyHugeDeck]

The ARH missile in question is a fatass phoenix. They are easy to avoid by design. It only pulls 18G
R77 and AMRAAMs have equivalent or higher range and can pull double or more Gs.
They have advanced seeker heads and are significantly more difficult to dodge. These Fox-3s are a completely different ball game and in every top tier game just about all jets will be able to carry them. There will be a lot more of these missiles and they will be a lot deadlier.

[MyHugeDeck]

One way to avoid ground-hugging imo is to add more terrain features on maps. Cant hug the ground very well if you are fighting over the Himalayas.

[girl_twink]

When it comes to the modern ARH missile combat coming next patch, I feel discussion about how they should be balanced should be held after they’re actually added and it’s seen how they actually fit into the Air RB meta.

[MyHugeDeck]

I wanna see you dodge 4 amraams coming at you from 4 different directions

[Macekeeks]

and sit on the deck wow we came full circle

[MyHugeDeck]

Thing about these missiles is that at close range they basically become radar guided fox-2 missiles. You enter a furball and they will come at you. I am assuming you didn’t play the beta test for fox-3s

[themadseventeen]

This might work in DCS because it’s not 16v16 madness. If you do that in war thunder you are just waiting your time.

[themadseventeen]

While those are kinda what we are suggesting, it doesn’t fix the problem of every match of ARB being the exact same. If you read our post you will notice that we have identified multiple problems with ARB, not just map size.

[MyHugeDeck]

Thats a valid point. Cant and wont argue with that.
Just one thing. Isn’t it incredibly boring and without active guidance from the aircraft radar, arent the chances of actually getting a kill quite low?

[Macekeeks]

I dont think you understand what we want air rb lacks variety and is the same thing over and over fly left, fly low, spam ir missiles if you could actually fly high and get rewarded for your missile being more effective you should. even in lower lobby counts flying on the deck would still be meta if not mandatory

[MrFisherman1812]

+1

[SanguineSerpent]

@themadseventeen

Right now, strike planes are not really useful in the top tier meta. Destroying bases and ground targets doesn’t really affect the outcome of the game. Games are very rarely ended due to ticket bleed, and even if they are teams that won because of strike aircraft would have most likely won earlier if they had fighters instead.
All planes should have a place in ARB.
Of course not to mention, strike planes are kind of free food for fighters since they are forced to fight in the same space with them.

Solution: Make strike aircraft and their objectives the main part of the game, instead of an afterthought. This would mean a few things. First, players are able to respawn now and can respawn as many times as they like. Each spawn (except the first) costs as much as full repair cost. Second, instead of player kills the objective now are bombing targets. This creates an interesting dynamic between fighters and strike aircraft. You need strike aircraft to win the game, but since they are almost defenseless against fighters, they need fighter support. Teams would have to fight for air superiority so that their strike groups can go and do their jobs. This way both players who like playing fighters get their fill, and people who like blowing stuff up get to do so.
To further increase the complexity and challenge of balancing your loadouts, we thought of having multiple types of targets. Some are light and wide area, so a lot of smaller yield bombs or rockets work better against them. Others are harder and smaller, requiring precision strikes to take out.
Managing the balance between A2G and A2A power becomes crucial to winning games.

Sounds interesting, but it removes the thrill of managing to get an ACE and surviving till the end of the match, and replaces it with ‘winning by tickets’, which, on its own, is fine, but I don’t think it’s a good trade-off. Sounds more like air arcade battles than what ARB is about.
And from what I can understand, fighters effectively have to baby-sit their strike teammates (which can be sometimes fun, but also very frustrating) so that they can win.

@themadseventeen

• Furballs and third partying

Due to linear map layouts (spawn, middle of the map with objectives, other spawn) every single player meets enemies in the middle of the map, which creates a giant furball. In these furballs it feels like all kills and deaths are based on luck, since no one can keep track of 6, 7 or more enemies around themselves. This leads to a lot of frustration upon death, and I would say that kills don’t feel as rewarding as in a proper dogfight.
Another problem with this is that it doesn’t allow for dogfights to exist. If someone tries to engage with someone for more than a turn or two, they are going to get third partied, leading to them dying, or their target dying to someone else while engaging. Again, more frustration.

Solution: There are a few remedies for this. First one is to reduce player density by placing multiple airfields per team, all along their edge of the map (like in sim). The only thing that matters is player density. If a map is large it can have more than 32 players. Another measure on top of this is limiting the number of players that can spawn on an airfield. This would ensure an even distribution of players across the map at the start of the match.
Game objectives are also spread across the map to accommodate this.

Mostly agree.

@themadseventeen

• Map sizes and modern weapons

Maps like small Spain, small Afghanistan and City are too small for modern planes to work on them. As soon as you reach Mach 1, you are in range of modern SARH (and ARH soon to come) missiles. This leads to everyone hugging the ground, which in turns makes these weapons almost useless. These maps are just too small and should be removed after 11.0 or so.

Multipathing made it so that everyone is flying tree top level, which we feel like goes against the nature of air combat. Right now these weapons are primarily used for head on attacks on players that made the mistake of ungluing themselves from the ground.

Solution: Maps that are played at top tier should only be of the largest variety War Thunder has to offer to allow these weapons to operate more naturally. In order to “unglue” players from the ground MANPADs are placed at some areas of the map. Their approximate position is marked on the map, but might be outdated, or it might not be there (bad intel). These MANPADs should be deadly enough that players would have to gamble if they want to fly low close to them. Objectives should also have capable AA defenses, some better, some worse.

My problem, like @girl_twink, is that MANPADs ruin 1v1s as you so happen to be on the deck, just like center-map Gepards do too. SAHR should be usable, but they should be situational, not an easy way to kill someone just because the enemy had to avoid MANPADs. They are already situational enough, although they are more situational than I think are useful (hence your solution). But again, I think the on-the-deck tactic that Air RB had evolved into is fair enough, and doesn’t let R-27ERs slingers completely stomp the enemy team.

@themadseventeen

• Repetitiveness of ARB

Every match plays the same in ARB. Take off, go to the middle of the map, dodge some R-27s and AIM-54, shoot some SARH missiles yourself, merge into the giant furball, and continue from there if you survive. If you die at any point, leave the match to do it all again. Alternatively climb up at the start of the match if you have R-27s or AIM-54s.

Solution: Changing the gamemode to a ground and air focused one already increases the amount of options players have, which leads to more different games as they progress. In addition to this objectives are randomly chosen at the beginning of each match. Random events also can occur during a match. Some examples of those would be:

1. Cruise missile strikes headed for objectives.
2. Supersonic bombers going to objectives.
3. Helicopters going for objectives.
4. Landing craft going to set up artillery to shell objectives

These events wouldn’t be a total surprise, a warning would be shown a few minutes in advance. This forces players to think in advance.

100% agree with adding random events. That seems interesting, but they shouldn’t be the main part of an air realistic match.

@themadseventeen

Potential removal of enemy markers

I think markers off other than friendlies would make it so that having radar would be much more useful (other than to detect aircraft from BVR, and to launch radar missiles). The only problem I feel like will be an issue is that it may become extremely easy to get behind the whole enemy team and launch IRCCM missiles without any detection, which is a smart but very frustrating tactic (for the enemy) that players could utilize.
If this seems too likely to be the case, I think being able to detect enemies, and have them marked, should be as it is.

[girl_twink]

But your idea involves increasing the number of playerers? In matches currently, whether they’re on City or one of the extra large “EC” maps, a furball seems to universally develop. No matter how big you make a map, as it stands most players will usually stick together.

[Ravanos]

Very well put together and there is very good suggestions for positive changes.

[SanguineSerpent]

Most players get to the center of the map (whether it be big or small), and then the furball begins.

[Macekeeks]

@SanguineSerpent

My problem, like @girl_twink, is that MANPADs ruin 1v1s as you so happen to be on the deck, just like center-map Gepards do too

putting them around POIs would help with bots and people flying straight doing nothing for the team rolands would atleast make them consider the angle they are flying at not to mention other players in the area.

[Macekeeks]

@girl_twink

No matter how big you make a map, as it stands most players will usually stick together.

exactly that’s the problem there needs to be reasons to spread out which is what we are suggesting doesn’t help everyone spawns on one airfield

[themadseventeen]

@SanguineSerpent

And from what I can understand, fighters effectively have to baby-sit their strike teammates (which can be sometimes fun, but also very frustrating) so that they can win.

I imagine it in a way that fighters clear the way for their strike aircraft. Once your fighters win and path is clear strike aircraft can proceed.

@SanguineSerpent

My problem, like @girl_twink, is that MANPADs ruin 1v1s as you so happen to be on the deck, just like center-map Gepards do too. SAHR should be usable, but they should be situational, not an easy way to kill someone just because the enemy had to avoid MANPADs. They are already situational enough, although they are more situational than I think are useful (hence your solution). But again, I think the on-the-deck tactic that Air RB had evolved into is fair enough, and doesn’t let R-27ERs slingers completely stomp the enemy team.

We proposed MANPADs as a solution to a problem, not just because we want MANPADs for no reason. If we can come up with a better solution I am fine with not having MANPADs. @MyHugeDeck suggested more varied terrain, for example.

As for R-27ERs, that’s more of question of balance. Meta planes and missiles come and go, but the gamemode stays

@SanguineSerpent

That seems interesting, but they shouldn’t be the main part of an air realistic match.

I thought we would have 1 or 2 per match, per side.

@SanguineSerpent

The only problem I feel like will be an issue is that it may become extremely easy to get behind the whole enemy team and launch IRCCM missiles without any detection, which is a smart but very frustrating tactic (for the enemy) that players could utilize.

We thought about including AWACS style aircraft as AI support, because we think that’s cool, but we couldn’t see what problem it would solve. With this we might have a reason to add them.

[themadseventeen]

Sure you can all stick together but that would probably lead to you losing since your enemies will just destroy your undefended objectives. At least how I imagine it