Air Sim neglected again

[FlyingWarlord]

Like for the love of all that is, you’re a Game Master and even you are just being ignored 😭

[Schindibee]

Well it would be a bad sign for the game if a mere volunteer chat moderator could dictate development…

[Code_649]

I don’t know what you mean, Gaijin released the new radar zoom feature to make it easier to specifically target enemy missiles /s

Anyways, back on topic: I think there are a number of things that would be implemented over time and not, you know… all at once. I’d be overjoyed if that were the case but it’s not because people struggle to get into Sim (some think it’s like DCS where it’s super complicated when in reality it’s not, think they absolutely need HOTAS/joystick or TrackIR/VR, etc.) and thus leaves us with a relatively smaller player base and consequently, a lower queue position on Gaijin’s priority list.

I mean, imagine if we had a consistent 500+ players/day playing Air Sim across all BRs (or at least, the ‘popular’ ones) and peaking to ~1000 on update release day or on event grind days. Would there finally be a variety of available games with maps that’s not Denmark? Probably not, but it fills me with angst of the alternate reality: scrolling for 10 seconds hoping to see anything but Denmark.

…Anyway, rant over. To be specific, I’d want to see the 2D NCTR at least implemented as that’s the only one that is a monumental QoL change for all aircraft without NCTR modelled inside the cockpit. There are other things I’d like changed/implemented, but for now, this will do (for me, at least).

[Kingskofi]

what is 2D nctr?

[Code_649]

This.

[Kingskofi]

oh, i came across this suggestion when i was making mine.

Hopefully gaijin can accept my suggestion and add nctr to the other toptier planes

[kizvy]

Why would they care about sim, grb is their cash cow next to its sister, arb

[RunaDacino]

One can hope with ARB content creators trying sim, we get some newfound attention.

[kizvy]

Tbh I don’t see them trying sim, all of them from what I’ve seen are trying out aces of thunder

[LostF0X]

some few CC play sim too, but overall players are mostly interested in ARB, not sim. I saw a lot of players during the years quitting sim for other games and that’s a shame, this has a wasted potential.
But don’t think ARB is in a better state, the standardization of maps made that mode kinda boring too

[MotorolaCRO]

@FlyingWarlord

Maybe it has the same amount as pve players (false) because it’s been left in the dust for so long?

There has been a thread/post about popularity of all modes using Statshark’s data and it turned out PvE modes are neck and neck with Simulator.

Simulators in general are a niche market.

@FlyingWarlord

Look at how many people play DCS, or MSFS, the market for a more expansive sim game is massive.

No it really isn’t.
Those are dedicated simulator games and are, as expected, niche.

[LostF0X]

@MotorolaCRO

Simulators in general are a niche market.

True, but when I started playing sim here, over a 10 years ago, the player base was quite bigger

[RunaDacino]

@MotorolaCRO

No it really isn’t.
Those are dedicated simulator games and are, as expected, niche.

Most of it I blame on people making things seem much harder to get into than they really are.

This scares people who’d be interested away.

This is part of my obsession with sharing my MnK control scheme whenever a forum post even marginally demonstrates interest in sim - minimize barrier of entry and encourage them to give it a try.

Even in the dedicated sim subreddit I found many people have significant misconceptions about the capabilities of cheaper control schemes due to terrible default controls giving false impressions.

And then add to that that certain people like using sim as a badge of elite superiority and will make operations and handling much, much harder than it really is. Il2:GB I found to be extra bad about it (we had a guy saying taking off with 109s in Il2 is incomparably difficult vs that of Warthunder’s and well…
109 F-4 in sim: Press engine button. Wait. Throttle forward gently. Apply brakes and rudder. Take off.
109 F-4 in Il2:GB (Wings of liberty/Combat Box): Press engine button. Wait. Maybe taxi. Throttle forward gently. Apply brakes and rudder. Take off.)

(looks like the exact same thing to me! Except for taxiing).

[FlyingWarlord]

@RunaDacino

Most of it I blame on people making things seem much harder to get into than they really are.

Definitely this. I played sim warthunder on mouse and keyboard for a long time. I just got a hotas setup last week and yes it’s easier, but truthfully mouse and keyboard still netted me a positive KD and was no problem.

[Schindibee]

@RunaDacino

Most of it I blame on people making things seem much harder to get into than they really are.

This scares people who’d be interested away.

Yes. They’d rather complain endlessly how bad attackers and bombers have it in AB and RB, how fighters should be forbidden to attack bases, instead of just trying out sim.

Most of the time it’s those three things that are pulled up to defend their resistance to try sim:

1. Rewards (which is admittedly a often discussed point also in the sim community, IMO however an overrated one)

2. Large maps and long time (which I think is not really valid: Turnaround time for a long distance base attack is maybe 10-15 minutes in a jet, not 30-45 minutes as probably many believe).

3. Wrong belief that with controllers/keyboard and no HOTAS you can’t play sim (@RunaDacino’s efforts to dispel that are highly appreciated!)

[The_EnforceR]

I’m tired of hearing this man…

Rewards are a huge issue if you’re not a good player and want to fly in a packed lobby.

Even with a K/D that would have you go positive or even in air RB, in sim you can be losing hundreds of thousands per match in anything above tier IV.

And even if you perform great in one sortie and survive, you can’t really recover from 2-3 bad ones, cause useful action limits.

Ive talked to at least 20 people the last few months who dont touch anything over tier IV because it’s just really punishing to play without premium time, even though they enjoy late war props and jets.

Anyway, sim mode has been abandoned for a decade now, with minor stuff done every few years, probably by a dev or two who have to write some extra hours in. Hopefully we get a similar game someday with a dev team that is actually interested in making a game, cause sim these days feels like it only exists as a marketing stunt for Gaijin to fake being a realistic combat flight simulator.

[RunaDacino]

@Schindibee

Yes. They’d rather complain endlessly how bad attackers and bombers have it in AB and RB, how fighters should be forbidden to attack bases, instead of just trying out sim.

Looking at Aces of Thunder reviews, it also seems to be a knowledge thing. I saw so many reviews for AoT saying “finally I can fly without people using mouse aim against me” as if they didn’t know air sim existed that solves that exact issue.

I imagine the “To Battle” vs “Tournaments/Events” joining gap contributes significantly. You use to battle: it seems like nobody plays. You use the lobby browser and you can see plenty of options.

Rewards ARE an issue though for ranks IV-V where you get stuff like Ho 229 with 17.3k spawn cost and 19.8K max income.

[Ninjato70x7-psn]

@Smin1080p_WT The sim community has been engaging in ideas and thoughts for years. YEARS. Why are we getting ignored? These posts for Air Simulator Battles (ASB) get thousands of views, with a handful that engage and depending on the topics, maybe more. There’s been 1 update involving ASB every two years, if that. Why don’t we get ASB announcements seperate from Air Realistic Battles (ARB?) Why isn’t there a dedicated ASB team? And if there is, why aren’t we getting updates or announcements? Announcements on ASB and where it’s going to be taken would be appreciated.

ASB wants and needs more maps, Pyrenees, Pradesh, Kamchatka, ect. Mostly for higher tier.

Fix the bugged AI, some AI ground forces get stuck in the map. Aircraft AI crash or behave like idiots, etc.

Multi-pathing needs re-evaluated. Lower it again.

Shooting down radar missles with other missles needs evaluated.

At this point, it’s very frustrating Gaijin has done nothing with sim. It’s no wonder it’s been slowly dying the past year. Ever since Fox 3’s have been added, there’s been no real care with map fixes, new maps, mechanics, BR’s (took awhile with BR changes), fixing bugs in ASB, etc.

Here is a handful of important topics. There’s more.

Gaijin. Update Sim EC

Gaijin. To the development team for Air Simulator battles, I hope you guys see this. I was going to make a video on this and link it to this thread, but at this point. Why bother wasting my time with “update sim” content when it’s been neglected. The least you can do is update a few things for sim players at the respected BR rotations that we have been discussing on the simulator mode section of the forums for awhile now. When are you going to re-work sim EC? You haven’t re-worked objectives, A…

Bigger maps in SB

Making the maps bigger. More specifically for the higher modern BR’s. Currently the map size for Spain, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Smolensk, Sinai and Denmark are 128k by 128k, which is a bit small. At that BR there are aircraft that if done right can essentially engage eachother from runway to runway with BVR and most simulator players only choose those maps at that BR because all the other maps are way too small. Of course. Suggestion talks about bigger maps at top tier mostly. For props to early…

The Iron dome meta

That isn’t exactly like that, ATGMs, bombs etc all have relatively huge RCS meanwhile something like AMRAAM has maximum 0.178^2/4*Pi=0,0249m^2 front aspect in case if every single wave was reflected perfectly back to emitter (which isn’t the case irl so practical RCS is even lower) so the detection range of a radar that can detect a 3m^2 target from 100km (current WT cap) such radar will detect that missile from max 100/((3/0.0249)^(1/4))=30.1km meanwhile in WT radars can easily pick up such mis…

Is Top Tier Sim Finally Dead?

No… it’s Air realistic where the match doesn’t end in 10 minutes, it’s not just 32 planes mashing into each other, ground targets and objectives actually matter, nobody gets names over their heads, and you get the depth of a sim battle with Air realistic controls (the controls that turn most people off air sim).

Simulator maps

The maps available in aerial simulator mode have not been changed for a long time and are for the most part poorly suited to modern aircraft combat (too small, no relief…), I am thinking in particular of Dover Strait, Sicily, Stalingrad and the majority of maps from the Second War. The question I ask (before making a suggestion) is to see if players would be interested in seeing new maps arrive in this mode. In the maps already present in game that can arrive in simulator mode there are Pyrenee…

Air SB Players Have Been Patient – What's Next?

Hi all — hope this finds you well. I don’t often post (unless it’s one of my many suggestion posts haha 😅), but I wanted to open a respectful and constructive discussion around the current state — and future — of Air Simulator Battles. While I haven’t been flying Sim for years, I’ve spent enough time in the mode to see both its strengths and the areas where it desperately needs love. In recent years, we’ve seen the addition of some phenomenal aircraft: the F-15E, F-16C Block 52, Su-30SM, Eurof…

Adding helicopter's to SB for better helicopter immersion and a better helicopter grind

After adding the original post some time ago. I’ve decided to add this to the suggestions section so it can maybe get some well needed attention. For those that are reading and voting on this. Especially the developers and moderators that come across this. I want to make this ABSOLUTELY clear. If helicopter’s do get added to simulator these changes NEED to happen otherwise it will become hard to play with helicopter’s in simulator. We are not only voting on helicopter’s getting added to simulato…

[Schindibee]

@RunaDacino

seems to be a knowledge thing

In German we have a saying “what the farmer doesn’t know, he doesn’t eat”, so yes, I think that plays a big role.

I can even speak for myself because I admittedly also took a long time to join the Sim community, also mostly because I assumed it to be different that it actually is: My first tries where when one was still forced to play a random low power aircraft to be able to earn enough points to fly a better plane. hating that I shied away from Sim for a looong time…

That’s why I always try to motivate people to try it out.

[swoomers-psn]

Its player drop is due to no new maps no unique features… there are dozens of maps that could be made for simulator but they choose not to add them, they could actually make the objectives matter other than points, sim has potential they just choose to ignore it