Let’s not forget that there was no limit on the amount of bombers per team before 2016. The introduction of the Tu-4 made them “OP” and prompted the limit to be implemented, so your statement was inherently false.
And i disagree with your overall view on removing bombers from Air RB. My view is that they should stay, and I’d rather see their gameplay loop improved than remove them.
Love the bomber rework! Definitely makes them feasible for GRB too. Good job Gajin
and ruined basically all of prop arb
ty gaijin
Well they did overdo the rework in terms of overall durability and near immunity to certain types of damage (HE, fires and ramming mainly), but they also acknowledged that and are working to implement fixes.
And i wouldn’t say this temporary situation is “ruining” ARB at prop tiers, just unbalanced for the time being.
For now we’ll just have to wait and see what kind of effect the upcoming fixes and changes will have regarding game balance.
Sorry, I’m still struggling to find this kind of communication - could you remind where they did acknowledge it ?
I don’t see any way to improve their gameplay loop that doesn’t result in spaceclimbing to drag out matches
Thank you
just make it so if the only aircraft type left is bombers then the match ends, simple as that ngl. or people can learn to play for longer
Even before the 4 bomber limit, the odds of bringing the airfield down were next to nothing. I forgot about the Tu-4, so that makes it 3 instances where bombers had a realistic chance of taking down the airfield: The Yer-2 in 2013, the B-29 in 2014 and the Tu-4 in 2016. All of these were incredibly unpopular and very quickly patched, so my overall point still stands
How do you intend on improving their gameplay loop without completely changing what air RB is and has always been? You would need to rework it from the ground up to implement bombers in a meaningful way, this is equivalent to moving them to a separate gamemode and starting over.
Despite the many complaints, air RB is quite popular the way it is, dogfights are the most engaging part of flying after all. There is no need to change it, just give bombers a separate gamemode (with escorts and interceptors, etc) where they have a purpose, don’t ruin what works, like they did this update
This is a whole separate discussions from what this topic is about.
I still disagree. This is your opinion, mine is different. If you want them in a separate gamemode for bombers, make a post/suggestion discussing this option or contribute to an existing one. I won’t argue about it with you here.
It’s not separate, buffing bomber durability to absurd levels just made fundamental problems with bombers’ implementation more apparent than ever. It really doesn’t matter how durable they are when they have no purpose in the game, you have to fix the latter before attempting to address the former.
For the last few years, bombers were so easy to kill you could pretend they were not in the lobby, now we are back to the old meta where they make air RB insufferable to play… thanks gaijin
I don’t get this negative attitude towards Air Arcade regarding lack of tactical gameplay, when in this mode it’s always been possible (depending on the map type, of course) to achieve victory by any combination of bombing bases, destroying ground targets, decimating the enemy team and (if applicable) capturing airfields.
This variety of feasible approaches to a mission, the potential need to switch several times between them during a battle, and the viability of bombers and attackers in this mode should be something Air Arcade gets praised for in comparison to the glorified Team Deathmatch that Air RB seems to have become.
As an aside, changes regarding bomber gameplay over the years have not just been driven by the Air RB community, see the infamous “Yer-2 rush” tactic in Arcade and Gaijin’s reaction to it.
Even as this looks like largely off-topic: your reply showed me that i was not precise enough with my wording which led you to the assumption that i would have a dismissive attitude towards Air Arcade.
This might help:
From my pov tactical & strategic game play is centered around making informed decisions based on elements of surprise and diversion whilst working around similar attempts of the enemy team to do the same.
The setup of Air AB with permanent markers kills this approach entirely as everybody able to look around can immediately make informed decisions. Even as the Air RB markers (below radar equipped BRs) allow at close ranges a similar awareness, part of tactical / strategic game play the initial positioning centers around avoiding this awareness.
Whilst at least at prop BRs the game impact of non PvP designed or optimized aircraft in Air AB is widely recognized, the mode is still a classic shooter with more or less infinite spawns whilst the game play follows classic shooter logic - including a plain attrition approach like spawn camping.
Air RB still allows to use tactical and strategic game play - either by beheading the enemy team by killing their best player/aircraft combo or sneak attacks very late game with decisive PvP or PvE action even playing totally outnumbered - if you are are to play around orders or the red square.
That’s why i wrote partially displayed as mission goal / tickets. Whilst i do agree that Air AB seems like Air SB way more viable for strike aircraft or bombers - the main difference to Air RB is from my pov that the setup of Air AB being way more engagement optimized as a shooter.
Therefore my criticism:
Is based on gaijin’s successful attempt to align the Air RB game play objectives of an Arcade shooter (“kill em all”) with the main difference of being a single spawn mode with much better SL/RP rewards.
If you look at old and very old Air RB map layouts of Norway or Operation Iskra (see this post) Air RB had options for all plane classes to have a significant game impact even 1 vs 8 (see here, 2nd part of the post) - and Norway still offers these options but almost nobody is able or willing to use tactic or strategy.
The reference to low skill grinding tool is aimed at the rather low efforts to kill a respawning base (at least in the initial run) whilst granting 2-3 times of the RP compared to a player kill - whilst the base kill in itself has little to zero impact regarding the outcome of a match.
Therefore this remarks is basically correct:
…but fails to distinguish between fighting with full transparency allowing you a full risk assessment (who is where flying what with which treat level) with permanent markers like in Air AB - or assessing risks based on unknown variables like with limited marker ranges and severely reduced awareness.
That means that a bomber or strike aircraft being decisive in Air AB is a result of an informed decision by the enemy team allowing them to do this - whilst the same aircraft trying to perform the same became preferred targets in Air RB due to their inability to defend themselves.
Hope this clarifies my point of view - i see Air AB not as inferior mode.
Have a good one!
The issue with air ab is, that the objectives (NPC convoys) are quite often almost under the enemy airspawn. Its a bit meh. The frontline maps are ok. The advantage of air AB is the pace of the game. Maps are small…alot respawns mean target rich enviroment. Ammunition respawns as well. So you can rack up alot more kills than in RB. Means its number one choice for tasks and event missions. Its much quicker to do kill tasks in AB than RB.
Just had a fire spread from the inner engine nacelle of my b52… to the outer undamaged nacelle, but not the wing joining the two (???)
They are aware of the issues and working on fixing them.
Meanwhile wings remain ridiculously resistant to multiple R4M or 50mm HE impacts.
They are “tweaking” things, while there are problems in the very basic assumptions, like “bomber wings are semi-indestructible”, and the only reason bomber tails are destructible is because paper tail syndrome affects every plane in game and even boosting tail HP 80 times doesn’t help enough, lol.
This is the list of planes which received “bombers” DM (from update changelog):
What other aircraft can get it in the future? All twin-engine planes? Single engine bombers/attackers?
From russian forum, translated: