Allow Bushes to be Turned Off in Graphics

I never paid a dime for bush decos, but still got enough to cover my tranks well. Do 3 special tasks / month and level up the warbond shop. Easy.

Pretty funny to read threads like this. I also want an option to turn off T-80BVMs or KA-52 helis^^

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Nah, they’re fine… If they can be turned off, then maybe the tank needs to be derendered to counter your want to have them taken off.

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Yes, you know, there are lots of players in this game who have been around for several years.

You know… I own 4 bushes, and don’t use them on nearly all my tanks.
Cause the way I use them, on the very few tanks I do, is to convince people to shoot toward visible spots.
And that’s not needed on nearly all tanks.
I also like having my tanks sim-able at all times.

Before anything else, I would like to emphasize that bushes, in my opinion, are merely “cosmetic elements” in-game that provide as much advantage as they offer, so long as you do not fire your main cannon from your vehicle and remain absolutely stationary. The extent of “how much” advantage they offer is completely subjective and entirely up to your own discretion. However, keep in mind that vehicle size, map environments, BR ranges you play, and the types of bushes you use all play a role in influencing the overall effectiveness of these bushes; sometimes they make you harder to spot, sometimes they do not affect anything, and sometimes they make you even easier to spot.

Nonetheless, 1) the bushes have been in the game for years, 2) they are not strictly behind a paywall, and 3) they are relatively easy to obtain by completing special tasks in the Warbond shop. From a personal standpoint, I am not sure how “bushes” are related to the term “wallet warrior” (which was mentioned in this post), given that even free-to-play players can readily obtain them through active playing. I believed that labeling players who use bushes as “wallet warriors” was unfair, biased, and stereotyped.

If you believe that players that use bushes have an advantage over you, you can always earn them through Warbonds.

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I have a 2.7K/D apparently am I a good boi?

I my opinion it is hard enough for new players to get into the game without having to deal with sweaty Jumbo and Panther players with bushed up tanks and max aced crews. What kind of impression does it give new players when they get killed by this?

There needs to be an option to hide decorations just like fictional skins can be hidden. If people want to customise their tanks they can do that, and If people don’t want these customisations to impact their gameplay there is an option for it.

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No.

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That’s a 9.7 vehicle.
New players if facing that bought a premium.

I understand where you’re coming from but can’t support this suggestion of removing other players shrubbery.

Ideally new players will have the same impression it gave me when I first started playing WT. Learn, improve, adapt and overcome. Been playing for over a year and still learning things in this game. Mostly GF AB but will be jumping into GF RB now that I’ve learned a few things. Not expecting RB to be easy but that is part of the process and I’m up for the challenges and experiences a new mode brings. Eventually I try my hand at flying aircraft which will bring a completely different experience. Again, not expecting it to be easy.

This mentality of some people that “it should be easy for me so who cares how it impacts other players” displays a weakness and a sense of entitlement in those individuals. Unfortunately this fragile mentality seems to be prevalent in not all but a part of the younger generation. Participation trophies for all!

If new players aren’t willing to face the challenges and difficulties this game has then maybe WT isn’t the game for them.

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200% agree.

Hard agree. Ground RB is a skill based competitive game, for the most part. Some of the most important skills are spotting tanks, identifying tanks, and then using that knowledge to place your shot well to counter your enemies armor advantage. Aside from positioning, this is probably the most important skillset you can have. It’s what allows a skilled player to outplay their opponent in a straight 1v1. You can know what they can do, and play accordingly.

Unless one player is bushed. In which case, odds are every single one of those skills becomes entirely meaningless. You cannot spot a target in a forest if they’re just a collection of bushes. You cannot ID a target if they’re just a collection of bushes. And even if you do manage to spot and ID them, you cannot aim for weakspots if you don’t know where they are.

Effectively, they dumb gameplay down. Relevant skills, which have been cultivated through learning and careful play, become secondary to whoever is bushed up more effectively.

Imagine an analogue in Air RB, where players could grind or outright buy an item that would render them practically immune to spotting, and completely concealed what plane they were in. How do you counter a plane if you don’t know what it is, and therefore don’t know what advantages you have over it? You’d end up trying to unwittingly outturn Zeros and outclimb BF 109s. This would be completely unacceptible. Why do we accept in in Ground RB, even if theoretically every player can use it?

I don’t want it gone because it’s pay to win (As it isn’t, technically), I want it gone because it dumbs down the gameplay and makes skill irrelevant.

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IRL, tank crew try to camouflages there tanks…, Deal with it …

image
image
image

Spot that before they firing x)

Make a good camouflage on your tank in game is also a skill, specialy if you play with gunner optic view.

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In these images the tanks are stationary, either to act in ambush or to hide from aerial reconnaissance. As soon as they move and begin to perform manoeuvres the branches will fall off, something which does not happen in game.

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Here he move:

And here he move too:
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And here:
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And again here…
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Yeah, you are right, massive bushes camouflage it is only when they stopped…

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Not sure you’re making a strong point here. Yes, IRL tanks could be bushed up to the eyeballs. But they could also do hundreds of other things to give themselves an advantage, not implemented in game because doing so would make gameplay worse.

You don’t have to deal with infantry support, artillery fire anywhere near the scale or effect of IRL, being outnumbered, or being jumped while your tanks are not combat ready. You don’t have to worry about your tank breaking down, or running out of fuel due to limited fuel supplies. You don’t have to worry about only the Allies having any air support for their late WW2 lineups. You don’t have to worry about the enemies starting on highly advantageous terrain that you have to somehow assault.

All of these things make War Thunder unrealistic, but they also make it fun. Gameplay should alway trump realism when the two are in conflict. Bushes may be (somewhat) realistic, but they make gameplay worse. And so there should be an option to not render them.

By the way, note that in every photo you posted, the tank that’s bushed up is clearly identifiable (And in the M48’s case, has it’s weakspot showing). Compare that to the magic floating bush nonsense you can pull off in game which turns a tank into an indistinct wall of bushes.

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I completely agree with you. Personally, I find ground realistic mode to be a tough and challenging game mode that most players have mastered through trial and error. While it may appear logical to provide the ability to hide bushes from view as a fair and newbie-friendly option, keep in mind that many other factors affect and offer those “little advantages” as well.

  1. What about crew levels? They are very important, especially when it comes to repair and reloading time.
  2. What about the free, but kill-based, unlocked camouflage skins? Certain camouflage skins, when used right, blend in well with the match’s environment.
  3. What about the modules? There is a substantial difference in performance between stock and spade vehicles.
  4. What about BR? Nobody wants to fight against a vehicle a full BR higher (do you want to take on the Tiger II H in your T-34-85?).

As many can see, the list of elements that provide a minor edge over one another is endless. While I agree that some of these factors can provide “small advantages” at times, I also believe that it is precisely these elements that make this game so dynamic.

So, the question is, how far are players ready to go in terms of “presumed balance” to ensure fairness amongst participants in ground realistic mode? Turn off crew levels? Turn off camouflage skins? Turn off vehicle modules? Or just turn off everything, to the point where every single player has identical crew skills, vehicle skins, vehicle modules, and the exact same tank? In that instance, that player has completely missed the essence of playing in a ground realistic mode.

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  1. Crew skills give an edge, but it’s not an insurmountable one. Give a less skilled player a higher level crew, and a more skilled player a stock one, odds are still good the better player wins. A slight buff to reloads, a saving grace against bad shots, and the ability to recrew and repair faster will not outmatch a better placed shot, a better positioned tank, or a better application of game knowledge. It lessens the skill gap, but player skills will overcome crew skills 9/10 times.

  2. It may help them blend in slightly, but it doesn’t break up the silohette. A tank still looks like a tank. Just a beige tank on a beige background. An experienced player will still spot one, especially if positioned predictably, or poorly.

  3. The game would be better if stock tanks weren’t a thing (especially certain elements, like stock APCR/HEAT, inability to repair, etc, but it being the cornerstone of the game’s economic model, it’s not going anywhere, and it’s foolish to think it might. It’s a bit of a false comparison to adding an option that merely disables the rendering of bushes. That’s not depriving Gaijin of anything but a few bushs sales.

  4. The game would improve from a tighter MM spread if feasible (I don’t have the queue numbers, so I can’t say for sure), but at the end of the day, you can play around it. It requires skill to overcome a Tiger II in a Hellcat, and that’s a good thing. It’s rewarding the player who positioned better, who knew the map well enough to get a flank shot, who knew to hold their fire until the Tiger II gave them a good angle. Conversely, bushes reward the player who has bushes, and prevents a more experienced player from utilizing the skills they have learned to win the engagement.

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This is a very hypothetical scenario, but in matches, experienced players often have a higher-level crew than less experienced players, thus widening the skill gap. In my opinion, this plays a bigger role in winning engagements overall than covering the tank with bushes.

The bushes are never behind a strict paywall. They break as much silhouette as the bush size allows. In higher BR, where tanks are increased in size, bushes do not play much of a role in breaking tank silhouette but rather in the coverage of weak spots to make it harder to hit. With the current bushes options, in order to break the tank silhouette effectively to the point where it is unrecognizable, you have to apply multiple “different color/type bushes” at the front. This in fact allowed me, or just any experienced player, to have an easier time recognizing the tank (imagine looking at a tank covered in multi-colored palm/fir/weed leaves from a distance on a winter map; you can hardly miss that one).

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My argument isn’t nessesarily that bushes are the single most unbalanced thing in the game. That’s an impossible argument. I’m arguing simply that bushes, rather than adding skillful gameplay, or at minimum allowing a way to play around them, simply remove gameplay. They dumb the game down and make player skill less important in a fight. It doesn’t matter if I know the weakspot of the T26E5 are the hull hatches if I can’t see them. It doesn’t matter if I can identify every single tank within a BR range when I’m staring at a bush.

And for the record, much like with stock grinding, the game would probably be improved via the removal or the drastic speeding up of crew training, but in Gaijin’s grindcentric economic model, it’s impossible.

You’re conveniently forgetting the infamous 6 pack of bushes, which are pay to win and can completely cover a tank with completely innocuous looking bushes. But that’s not nessesarily relevant to my argument.

Bushes can make you more conspicuous on certain maps, but A) you have to manually set up bushes on a winter camo for that to happen and B) they do still allow you to conceal the type of tank and/or the weakspots. Which is often just as impactful or moreso.

Doesn’t matter if I can see a KV-1B thanks to his bushes on a snow map, if I cannot then take aim for the bottom half of his driver’s port or the tiny gaps in his armor. It doesn’t matter if I guess that a tank is probably an Abrams if I can’t get a clean shot into his turret ring. And if my shot lands wrong, because I had to take a blind guess at a tank or a weakspot, my penalty is usually death. For failing to have psychic powers. Replay that engagement where I can actually see what I’m engaging and therefore what I’m aiming at, it comes down to my skill in picking out a weakspot and hitting it accurately. Tell me that bushes improved my gameplay experience.

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