Disingenuous mode names can always be changed. This one and Naval should have had their names changed to be blatantly obvious they were not about just tanks/ships years ago.
No it is not - it is simple observation.
Some players chant how “OP” CAS supposedly is. A minority of those players go so far as to try demanding a separate mode without CAS, while clearly not thinking much, if at all, about the implications.
Snail says no.
That minority proceeds to throw a tissy fit and light community firestorms at every opportunity because they’re salty they don’t get their CAS-free mode.
Snail is of course forced to put out the firestorms, so they nerf CAS.
CAS users adapt eventually or migrate to using the weapons that do still work.
That player minority resumes screaming, completely unaware how their utter refusal to adapt is ruining the entire game for themselves and everyone else.
And this is the core of my suggestion.
- Switch to Sim-derived SP system so aircraft of all types are everpresent at game start. This does mean CAS can first-spawn, but so can the CAP to kill it with.
- Heavily re-buff the overkill-neutered SPAAGs and SAMs so that players have ground-based systems to kill CAS if they believe they lack the skillset to effectively fly.
- Copy the default plane system from Naval, and expand the default SPAAG/SAM system already seen in higher ranks to all BRs.
Then anyone who wants to counter the CAS they claim to hate now has multiple options to do it and always has them available with sufficient SP to use them.
If they steadfastly refuse to not use those counters, it is no longer a game problem, but a player one.
If they joined WT just for playing tanks, they joined under false pretenses.
Either you stay in the air to hunt more unaware tunnel-visioned CAS, or you go land at your runway, eject, spawn a new tank, and do what you will.
Playing CAP and/or SPAAG/SAMs is functionally-speaking as societally necessary as having police, firefighters, mailmen, and teachers - it’s not necessarily glamorous work, but someone has to do it. If nobody spawns CAP, SPAAG, or SAMs to counter CAS, every single player on the team is collectively to blame if their team gets obliterated, because now under my proposal, they had the tools and chose not to use them.
I personally enjoy using CAP, and sometimes also SPAAGs. And if SPAAGs are made more common-sense to use without dozens of games practicing hoping for dumb enough pilots to practice on, I would use them way more.
We know that this solves the problem. Not just the modern SAMs immediately after release, but as a much longer-running example, look at 7.7-9.0. Every single nation has Radar-equipped SPAAGs and/or SAMs to use.
A lot of the complaining about CAS stops as soon as people have the means to help themselves with their own problem.
Another not too distant example was when the Coelian got its correct guns - the APHE allowed it to confidently move into mid-map, exactly where the CAS loves to concentrate on, and the boosted HE belt velocity made hitting gutsy prop CAS considerably easier. Now imagine how much easier still it would be if every non-radar AA had a short-range lead indicator based on crew skill.
The game already has and knows exactly how to solve this problem. Whether they will take the leap to actually do it, however, is not known.
The point is not to stop the bitching, because it should be clear to any outside observer that some people will always bitch about anything and everything interrupting their power fantasy. The only solution that is palatable to the game environment is thus…
Make. Their. Whining. Their. Fault.
And then walk away, leaving them to their ranting.
- Y U NO TANK ONLY MODDDDEEEEE!!!