These are two separate topics:
- Maps without bases / bombing points
- MM with wild team compositions on standard & legacy maps
Both show that the guys in charge for triggering lobbies, the guys in charge for map design and the guys in charge for aircraft mechanics don’t talk to each other - i would even claim that they don’t even play their game.
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Most of the Pacific maps are very old and were initially designed for 12 vs 12 matches in the classic JP vs US/UK (axis vs allies) setup .That means also that most of these maps have certain mission objectives which require simply more aircraft to fulfill own or deny the enemy team to fulfil their goals. This is borderline impossible as the MM creates as soon as both sides have 6 Aircraft in the BR range a lobby - no matter what kind of aircraft are in the queue.
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This creates often (depending on which side has bombers or not) ultra one-sided matches when average players meet each other as also the quality of bombers is decisive. So if you can convince your US team on certain maps to sideclimb they can outrun, outclimb and outspeed any JP/Thai Helldivers and it ends in a turkey shooting - or your US/UK bombers use their rather good working defensive turrets vs JP paper planes flying high and very fast.
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But the main problem is still the bombing part as the average bomber player has not the necessary experience to hit a stationary target from 5-6 km altitude - if he flies higher, the accuracy gets worse, if he flies lower he becomes a way too easy target.
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On top of that - bombers have also different time spans between dropping the release button and the actual bomb drop - so depending on speed and altitude it gets extremely difficult to hit a pillbox or cargo ship if you don’t have the necessary experience. And even if you have it - the artificial bomb spread denies even with an aced plane and a level 75 crew often a hit / ground ai kill.
Some map (like Saipan) have even severe design flaws allowing you to win (as US/UK bomber) with doing nothing - just to stay alive as your own ground ai captures A or B point (old) and friendly ai aircraft (F6Fs) murder JP tickets like there is no tomorrow granting you a ticket win after ~13-15 minutes. The map is so large that you can’t get caught if you reverse climb - and no enemy player was smart enough to anticipate this move.
That means when playing for JP u have to check the enemy team for very experienced players aware of this flaw and pre climb if you identify one of them and activate a blind hunt / avenger order at the right point in time - otherwise you will lose by tickets.
That the MM decides most matches is not limited to Pacific maps :-)
In my last match a JP/That SB2C killed a JP carrier (Shokaku, marked as US / enemy with 2 escorts) for a mission score of 312 (12 for the 2 x 1,000 lbs hit plus 300 for the delayed kill) points. Ticket reduction: 100 points, same as a plain arty / aaa target 😎 This is just another sign of imbalance…