The other thing that occurs to me is that once you hit a certain tree level–say equivalent to when the SA-6 and HAWK were first employed ('73 Arab-Israeli War and the SA-6 shock to the IAF) makes flight above 500 feet (LOS dependent, of course) an emotional experience.
Warthunder doesn’t replicate more than SHORAD systems and you lose the MRAD/HIMAD air defense coverage. Perhaps that should be a "bot type thing at the higher-tech tree levels when integrated air defense systems are the norm.
Frankly, some 'bot driven SPAAGs wouldn’t bother me as long as they stay back and don’t engage in the ground-ground fight.
Been flying CAP recently when playing germany and the airfield AA as it is, is painful enough.
Maybe I’m just not used to flying in such tight places, but the fact that chasing an enemy plane for barely a minute means I’m already getting shot at by magical flak I can’t dodge is not fun.
I’m talkin’ ground battles. Agree that the airfield flak is plenty bad. But, as I responded to Puffin, that’s a coding fix and downgrading the hit percentage of the AI could fix the issue.
The M163/Hovet isn’t the best SPAA but seeing that a lot of prop planes are still used in 7.3 than in 7.7, this should be easier for SPAA players to use now. Still depends on the players aiming skills and knowing how to use’em. Even with Radar, a lot of players still miss x.x
Imp isn’t a great SAM system either, but glad these vehicles will be lowered by .3 Br. I advice players to stick with the M247 than using the Imp.
I’d rather have an AI AT-gun kill me when leaving the map than just randomly blowing up when going outside the borders.
Seriously though what kind of retort is that? AI AAA would add a new aspect, AI AT-guns is just an animation.
If it’s anything like the AI AA we have on convoys in sim. It would be “fly within 5km of the map, you die” it would basically render any CAS without long range stand off weapons, pointless. It would not be fun.
It would be like having AT guns around both team spawn and the millisecond you got too close. You died. No warning, no defence, nothing. 1 mil too close, you are dead.
You’re now openly praising anti-aircraft bias…I’m not surprised.
Let me enlighten you: RB GFs players come to play against other players, not AI.
In every RB mode it’s been used, AI AAA has proven terrible due to the inherent issues with AI:
RB AFs (2015-): The meta became camping at your own base…“let the AI AAA kill the enemy team!”
RB GFs (early): Beyond the issues of AI targeting and having no realistic limits on reaction/traverse/etc, AI AAA limited or outright deprived player SPAAs from their primary prey (aircraft) with which to get earnings…which starved those units of their job and helped start the “SPAAs are bad” myth
RB NFs (continuously): Putting aside the many other flaws of Naval, its allowance of putting AI in charge of handling the entire aerial flank is a pathetic handout and yet another example of how silly “CAS OP!” talk is
Naval aviator: pay 650 SP then carefully position for a bomb/rocket/(especially) torpedo run
Sailor: press one key to assign AI gunners to aerial flank (often autonomously firing accurately to 5km+!)
RB AFs suffered terribly because of AI AAA (that base camping meta stunted players’ skill development in the mode for years) and it still hasn’t recovered. The Naval modes’ embarrassingly rigged setup is no better…that is one reason why NFs struggles to attract a crowd.
Players don’t need AI interference to compensate for the skill issues some people have when coping with being outplayed and defeated by aircraft. Your involvement in advocating for this is notable…
It’s simple actually: certain people hate WT and its basic premise as a multi-player battle.
They blast the concept of balancing, cannot stand competition and despise even the potential of their defeat…they are so entitled that they’d rather rig everything in their favor than simply win by doing well.
For these people, winning 100% of the time isn’t a goal–it’s a demand. Remember: they’re entitled to success…but you don’t deserve even the chance to win.
Unsurprisingly, the same people you see supporting such stances as this are the ones you see celebrating cheesy settings manipulation and other things too. Sad as it is to say, their entire mentality is indicative of the skill issues that persist in the WT player base and have made it overall less talented over the years…so reliant on crutches and handouts, smh.
Widened maps are a good idea…but AI involvement in player modes is (at best) a terrible curveball for reasons mentioned above.
AI AAA is terrible to aircraft in all modes…rather than winning by skill, players just get killed by RNG nonsense and it sucks. I explained this previously:
The same fundamental issues with AI measures exist…the underlying problem is the AI control itself.
Spoiler
WWM was different from RB GFs, is dead in 2024 and now utterly irrelevant as a result.
I don’t think the Battle ratings can effectively be managed with the current format of the game. Instead I propose the following.
Give SPAA in realistic battles the option to select an enemy aircraft. Similar to how enemy aircraft can be selected in Air Realistic. No information, no lead indication no range is given. Instead if functions similarly to the scouting mechanic in game.
In addition to being able to select the target aircraft, have the crew provide verbal prompts to correct the AA fire similar to how crews verbally call out the range and vehicle type when using the range finder.
I assuming that because war thunder can generate a lead indicator for radar in Rb and for all targets in Arcade. I’m assuming that the game client can track the players crosshair/point of aim relative to the lead indicator display and the crew can call high or low, more lead or less lead.
If anything like this gets implemented at the very least have the crew callout the type of Aircraft. Example, BF109! (Doesn’t need to specify a model, could be a Bf109 E3, could be a Bf109K) or Yak! etc. This kind of information will give SPAA players a better chance of preparing at least.
Also, nothing needs an Air Spawn in RB. Make the runways big enough that anything can take off with any possible payload. I
No runway AAA, aircraft don’t need air defense in RB. Make it that attackers can’t retreat and safely rearm unless they have fighter cover or fend off enemy air themselves.
I don’t know if the game engine can support it but allow players to crater enemy runways to prevent take-off. Imagine paying the typical aircraft Spawn cost only to spawn in on a damaged runway, you’d think twice before taking a plane out. At the very least it would give spiteful bomber pilots something to do.
I’m fine with AAA. However, the airfields are way too bloody close.
I can fly ~1 minute even in a 2.0 aircraft and land, rearm and be back incredibly quickly. Conversely, you can barely leave the ground map to chase/engage another fighter without getting shot out of the sky by gunfire you cannot evade, as prop tier AAA guns seem to work purely on “increased damage for spending time within flak range” rather than anything else. If at least there was a proper flak box with all the cool black clouds, I’d feel less annoyed at “you take damage randomly at increasing levels.”
Even with the tiny maps of ARB, RTBing from the objective area takes about 3 minutes with props.
GRB airfields should be at least a 3 minute flight to RTB, adding up to likely 7 to RTB, rearm and return to offend.
It might also rein in fighter-bombers for proper strike craft that can carry multiple bombs, or encourage using multiple smaller bombs that need more skill to kill.
Maybe we can retain air spawns for first spawn, but it should be done behind the airfields, with airfield being moved back for 3 minute flight time.
Only drawback I can see is gaijin would need to find a way to have dynamic airfield spawns/assignment based on BR brackets ( planes under 4.0 with their barely 300 km/h speed vs 6+ props with 600 km/h speeds vs jets)
Its definitely dogshit for the Aircraft in RB battles, but does it negatively impact the actual ground battle? Besides the person camping the enemy airfield is still gambling on a plane spawning before they get bored. Or add multiple unprotected runways.
