Imo some bombers are too strong right now, and some are too weak. there needs to be balancing done on a per vehicle basis. Blanket buffing a single vehicle type will hurt more than it will help. For example, something like the stirling could go down in br because it is slow and has poor defensive armament. something like the Ki-67s or 288C could go up because they are fast and can pretty much outrun everything and can never die
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Yeah I would agree, and of course BR balancing is something that is needed in all of the trees (Air, Armor & Naval). But there also seems to be a consensus that some buffing, be it gunner accuracy, airframe durability or both is past due. If I had my way, for example, all of the rank 3 B17’s would be moved to rank 2 with the same cardinal BR number as the B25. e.g. move the B25 from 3.7 to 3.2 & B17 from 4.7 to 3.7 and the B29 moved to rank 3 with a BR of 6.0, but that is me.
Fighters can climb so quickly that the only way bombers can avoid combat is to be lucky and have enemies that just could not be bothered to fly above 2000m. That happens once in a blue moon.
They need to change the ticket scoring for ground unit kills. It accounts for too much, so fighters just fly low strafing, dog fighting and scoring. The odd bomber that tries to fly high for base bombing does so without escort and stands out like a sore thumb - like a ripe cherry to be plucked. It’s never long before an XP-50 (a ridiculously OP plane for its BR) climbs up and shoots down the lonely bomber.
Lower the ground unit ticket values and we’ll probably see fighters (from both sides) actually fly above 2000m. With more company in the sky, bombers will not be the only target up there.
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From my perspective you are in both cases on the wrong path and just argue from a pure fighter perspective without having actual empathy for bombers, your Stirling example looks not convincing - more like to justify uptiers for the other 2 bombers.
From my pov no prop bomber is currently too strong (if used as a bomber, so excluding T-18Bs). To your points:
- Ki-67 and Ju 288s were designed to be fast as main part of their defense. If they are flown by experienced pilots those planes require actual skill to kill them - seeing every few hundred matches a Ki-67 with 5 kills or every few dozen matches a Ju. 288 with 2+ kills is just a sign off noob fighters tailchasing them. Arguing with their speed - if the same logic would apply to fighters/attackers you need to increase the BRs of many planes significantly.
- Your example Stirling is also wrong. What do you expect from flying a designated and very slow night bomber in broad daylight? You get shot down like various day raids of the RAF BC proved. In addition i wrote earlier that the main factor of BR setting for bombers is the potential and actual TNT output, as gaijin is unable to balance bombers properly.
From my perspective prop bomber game play was intentionally ruined by gaijin as they found no way to balance them correctly - the list of the 2nd post is almost complete, he just forgot loadout nerfs (recently B18/T18) or even more subtile nerfs like TNT reductions (recently with some Tu-2s) just by switching the bomb types.
So in case the bomber has still too high TNT output and all nerfs were not successful they raise the BRs like the B-29s or lower them for the Stirlings if too many get shot down. But the problem of the Stirling is still the very high potential TNT damage in case they made it somehow through the fighter screen.
Despite i support your overall pov you are actually inconsistent.
One on hand you open this thread with WW2 references - so you refer to realism - and on the other hand you want to increase the fantasy BR setting policy by lowering the BRs of B-17s??
I mean E and F models were active until 1944 - just by looking at the BRs of German fighters you might realize that the 109Gs and 190A-5s were active from mid-late (109s) or very late (190s) in 1942, you see the realism gap.
I fully support a downtier of B-29s as it was always a challenge to kill them at 10 km alt - and the Ta 152 H designed to kill them up there have currently a much lower BR.
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The balancing of bombers should be from a rp/sl gained to time spent/repair cost perspective. the balance should be that you cannot just farm sl and rp over a short period of time. The use of the JU-288C as a scripted rp/sl farmer shows that right now the balance for that vehicle is off. argueing that irl it had x statistic or was designed for x thing is pointless, realistic matchmaking is a terrible idea for war thunder, things should be balanced off of their effectiveness in game. if for example the stirling is constantly getting intercepted before it can get to bases, then either it needs to go down in br or its predators go up in br. the stirling has poor defensive gunners and is very slow. Saying yes it had a very high loss rate in real life is fine, but that doesnt matter, it doesnt mean that should be reflected in war thunder. Here is another example. The G5N1, i have literally never died in it. you can go and bomb 2 bases then rtb and never see a fighter. this is not balanced. if i wanted to farm rp for the japanese air tree i could sit in it all day and touch my mouse maybe every 10 minutes. playing a bomber takes little to no effort and you can get decent rewards from it. However, it is a viable set of vehicles to play and should be fairly balanced.Imo it should not be easy for fighters to intercept the bombers like it is for the stirling right now, and fighters should have a fair chance to catch the bombers, preferable after they have dropped bombs on at least one base, the bombers should not be completely uncatchable like the 288
Although i agree much more to this post as it shows them main problem of missing combat effectiveness in the BR setting, your examples come from a veteran pov - so arguing like this reflect your experiences, but are like mine highly subjective.
Your argument regarding the usage of the G5N1 has the same quality than my experience whilst flying 130 JU 88 A-1 missions with 80% win rate and losing just 2 planes (1 to midmap AAA) - they are exceptions from the rules and are far away from being representative. You might agree that both bombers are free kills if they got attacked by the right pilot.
I still see no problem with killing Ju 288s - they are almost untouchable on their first run, fine. And then? They are either doing their script things, wait for reload in arcade or rtb in air rb. In all cases you have time to outclimb them in order to perform a high speed dive attack whilst avoiding return fire due to the right angle or extremely limiting potential return fire.
So even in case the Ju 288 would be flown by an experienced pilot who decides to go into a low earth orbit - either he is no threat and will be ignored or he is the last guy alive after 8 minutes and has to survive a bunch of greedy fighters climbing up to him. Even the P-51 D-30 is able to catch and outclimb him.
Uncatchable - same valid for a P-47 D-28/30 above 9 km, you won’t discuss a BR increase for them just for being uncatchable - so why for a catchable bomber?
good ol days.
Remember super squadding with your clan so you could have 8 bombers in formation? ahhh
They are too fragile, way to fragile - well apart from a certain few - i am sure you know what i mean.
But additionally - If bomber pilots didnt just fly directly at their target every single time like turnips then they would have a higher survival rate.
Triangulate your approach to target guys.
Gamers problem these days is they want everything right there and then, be aggressive, push, get reward.
That is not what makes a good bomber, or pilot imo.
I ramble - but to conclude, i totally agree, they should not be so fragile and tail section simply falling off like a quick release mechanism.
Feel free to check out an old recording i made, this is about 4 years ago i think, not quite 2013/14 but still. - note i have full payload and not even had chance to drop yet. apologies for quality and mouse movements. - - - fyi - 6x1000lbs for 4 base map - 3x1000lbs for 3 base map. there are a few map exceptions.
If you genuinely want to see the best bomber pilot ingame since ever - check out a player called fmt3 - engage at your own peril.
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the bombs are dogshit though. makes the aircraft pointless. they are meant for ships, either that or the designation is wrong since ever.
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Nice vid - i loved the old ruhr map - 10 guaranted ground kills on the first run when coming from the other side, 6 to 8 tanks with 300 points for each, ~ 2.000 points when attacking the tank gathering at grid D4/D5.
Epic 1 hour fights there, only map with respawning bases those days…
Btw - fmt3 gets older (68?) - you see him either in B-26 or B-18B/T-18B. No 4-engine bombers since a very long time.
I have never had the opportunity of speaking to him, he is not very vocal.
He likes the swedish bombers recently. :)
I wont engage him until i have to.
My biggest gripe with bombers - is the bloody 4 base respawning. i wanna hit the goddamn airfield goddamnit.
here is something - they changed the map rotations - yesterday i got new guinea and various others.
5.3 naval allied or japanese will give you good maps for bombing carriers or ships or landing craft, ya know maps with proper objectives and shifting battlefield.
Malta, new guinea, midway, pelielue, etc.
When the B-29 was playable, and early into when it became unplayable, I’d see him everywhere. His commitment to bombers is just amazing.
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This was definetly true, but now you have Contrails, does it matter any more? You can’t really be sneaky, so instead I think your best bet is just to run the gauntlet and hope you can get through. I genuinely dont know though, I rarely touch ARB, and even rarer touch anything below Br9 ish these days
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You have the same effect when u fly the Jap B7A2 at BR 3.7 in RB - i enjoy since months from time to time flying on some old pacific maps - accompanied by 1 or 2 revised /new looking maps.
Of course you fly a pure JP team and you meer the usual US/GB XP-50/ Wyvern mix, but the majority are small 8vs8 matches in the 3.0-4.0 range.
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the contrails can be a problem but a good flight path can negate that.
The shackleton for example or pb4y are low alt bombers.
adjust flight path, adjust altitude, wait for opportunity to come in for bases.
The method has always worked.
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One has to learn to fly bomber tactics. They don’t need a buff Obeewan.
Use the force.
Are the challenging and difficult? Sure, but can be done.
Do they win games,? Yes.
The tag on this discussion is Arcade but mant talk about RB
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actually yes, i would agree with a br increase of those P-47s, i really enjoyed playing them and had at leat a 4 k/d in the D-30, and when i play to spade i go for max kills and dont really care about dieing so thats not reflective of a player playing carefully
I believe that vehicles should be balanced off their potential in the hands of a good player, if you dont do that you get things like the Panther D being 5.3
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stay on topic lol
Same here, but wt thinks otherwise. And to be fair - as long as mostly tankers fly bombers - they are good at tanks, but can rarely use the full potential of a bomber - i still see the main problem in the comparably low entry level and the total absence of valuable in-game tutorials (attached to the UI) regarding how to use them with some success and to survive.
Anyway, this absolutely stupid simple average approach for BRs by gaijin ruins this game. Just look at those masses of Wyvern abusers - absolutely disgusting gameplay with k/ds of 15:1 or more just by running across the maps. And killing the bases foreseen for Halifaxes or Sterlings so that these poor guys die (un case they made it that far) most of the time without the chance for a drop.
Some of those Wyvern jockeys even try very high alt fights - i critted recently one at 9.800 meters and he outdove me in seconds - despite having a rip speed of 870-880 TAS at high alt im my beloved SM 92, i had no chance to catch him.
Off topic P-47
Like the 5.0 D-30 too, i like the extremely good dive speed and high speed handling - and the airbrake is extremely helpful to park yourself behind F4U-4bs trying to do a high speed reversal (“classic roll from side to side”) - with the right timing for the airbake you just spray them down as you never overshoot.
But gaijin decided to put the chinese version at rank III with around 3k SL repair cost and the Italian at rank IV with 9k repair cost. Classic nonsense just aimed to discourage IT players.