“Moreover, these Belgian and Dutch F-16’s are not straight duplicates, although they play very similar to other F-16’s.”
As several other people have pointed out, a slightly different radar and a LITENING pod does not make a vehicle unique. It’s still the same aircraft, it’s just a (hardly) different armament. If the standard for “unique” additions is that the targeting pod is different, the standard needs to be raised as that’s frankly absurd to be charging upwards of $50 for such a frankly insignificant change.
“Benelux has many unique vehicles to offer, that gaijin first chose for mostly variants that have an almost identical playstyle to other ones in other tech trees does not invalidate the Benelux.”
Let’s be real here, this isn’t the Benelux tree it’s the Benelux subtree. The main tree is FRANCE. There’s zero reason why the French subtree should be closer to the American Air Force than the literal American tech tree. I’m not “just looking at the bare bones ground additions”, I’m looking at a suggestion manager (someone who literally works with gaijin and signs off on questionable vehicle additions like these) try and tell me that these additions fill gaps in the French tree while also admitting that there are too many F-16s in the tree even for your own preference. Which do you honestly believe, that these are necessary and that they fill gaps or that they weren’t needed? These statements are contradictory. Benelux is a subtree, not a main tree and it’s absurd that a subtree has more of an airframe than the main tree that produced the aircraft. National identity is fine, but not when it begins to compromise the integrity and identity of other tech trees. I’m not even touching on the fact that you think France should have gotten at least one premium F-16 when no such thing exists in the tech tree that literally designed and built the airframe, as that’s it’s own comically absurd can of worms.
I’m of the belief that nations should have gaps and lack of capabilities, as that’s what gives you a reason to grind the other tech trees beyond wanting a new shiny toy. With the current grind I just don’t find that feasible. It takes hundreds if not thousands of hours to grind through a tree, and with the current state of the grind I can understand the aversion to having large gaps in capabilities. That being said, it’s purely because the grind is so absurdly long not because it’s a good idea.
To be fair sometimes the differences in game are less than they should be. In these cases the vehicles themselves aren’t at fault. There’s also very significant differences that won’t be noticed in game, for example anything to do with crew comfort, electronics or license production / replacement domestic parts, or ammunition/loadout selection that in game are changed for balance (like excluding AIM-9P-4 on the L-39ZA/ART) or even just mistakes like getting capabilities wrong, forgetting weapons or adding features that aren’t there in reality. All of this can result in a vehicle less unique in game than reality.
Not saying that is happening here though, I have no idea about Dutch F-16s, but it did happen to other F-16s like the Thai F-16A OCU that is less unique than it could’ve been if it was added right.
China does not, in fact, operate the M1. Taiwan does. Taiwan will never be a part of China, not willingly. China should not have gotten it, but gaijin is lazy and has to keep giving China the first variant of new American/Russian stuff. The F-5A, the TOR, now the sepv3.
All of this can result in a vehicle less unique in game than reality.
So if a vehicle has unique stuff in real life, but they don’t have any meaningful impact on the game, that doesn’t mean anything. This is a discussion about the game, it’s gameplay and it’s balancing. Real life specs for these vehicles have zero impact on why I should be spending my money on them if those real life specs are essentially non-existent in game. On top of that, there are plenty of ways that these vehicles could be made unique by giving them more specific and unique weaponry and yet gaijin doesn’t do this. I don’t care of the F-16 block 69420 in the random subtree has a window unit AC for the pilot, if it’s not modeled or represented in game don’t try and charge me $50 and call it a “unique” vehicle as it’s not in game. IRL =/= in game, and people need to stop conflating IRL performance and specs with in game implementation.
Yes, the REPUBLIC OF CHINA and CHINA are TWO DIFFERENT COUNTRIES. Taiwan is NOT China. Taiwanese vehicles SHOULD NOT be going to the Chinese tree, and it’s absurd that the Taiwanese subtree went to China to begin with. These are two entirely separate adversarial nations, one should not be relegated to the other’s tech tree when the main tree has been threatening to invade the other in real life for decades. Taiwan is Taiwan, China is China. It’s like you only read the first sentence of my post and then your brain shut off.
It was a joint project, but not Swiss. Instead it was jointly developed by Thomson-CSF (France) and General Motors Canada (Canada, unsurprisingly) to be used by the Canadian military. The hull would’ve been produced under license by General Motors Canada, not imported.
There is literally nothing political about stating the FACT that China does not operate the M1, Taiwan does. These are two separate nations. If you think that’s a political statement and want to argue politics over it that’s on you for your own misunderstanding, and says more about you and your own beliefs than anything else. You’re the only one who brought politics into this.
Real life is a big part of why people want vehicles in game, so it does have an impact. But even then my focus was around things like not giving the Leopard 1A5BE the Belgian ammunition, which is Gaijins fault for not making it as unique as it could, not an issue with the vehicle itself.
