I’ve been trying to get into sim lately as I want to play something a bit more challenging, but the que times have been horrendous, anywhere from 5-20 minutes depending on the time of day, and even queuing in multiple regions seems to barely help.
Do the devs have any intention of adding ground EC or something similar? Like something that is constantly running and you just join into rather than sitting into a que like with air sim?
And what about increasing awareness that sim exists or trying to help people get into it? When I first played Warthunder my intention was to just play sim, as I was coming from an arma/squad background with thousands of hours in armor with friends, but I quickly found that none of that experience mattered at all because you need an encyclopedic knowledge of every vehicle to not have a bad time. Why on earth the friend/foe request takes 5 seconds to go through instead of being instant, or the fact that you have less information on the map than more hardcore sim games, and lastly no voice comms really makes it hard for new players and creates a gigantic barrier of entry. I have probably 2k hours in warthunder now and it wasn’t until then that I felt comfortable playing sim at all.
Would sim really suffer that much from having friendly ground units displayed on the minimap? Or the addition of voice comms so I dont use goofy voice prompt system the community kinda created like im playing a game designed for 10 year olds who cant handle speaking to each other. I understand voice comms in RB/Arcade would be a disaster but certainly the sim community should be able to handle it, considering how small the community is you would be smart not to shit where you eat.
IDK gamers, I really want to get into sim and like it, but it feels like a completely abandoned game mode. Also the top tier ground sim that includes KA 50 and pantsir is the most egregiously unbalanced shit I’ve ever seen in this game, I had literally circus music playing in my head during the few matches I even bothered with.
I played sim with friends in discord back then. that way you can help each other out.
I recommend to make contacts and play with people as a clan. but make sure that the people are sympathetic and not just compete with each other who is the best.
I think a voice function for all players would not be a good idea in war thunder. you would then have over 50% only russian chatter or children who insult you.
the problem is that the mode is unfinished. the vehicle mix of the tech trees is getting bigger and bigger. it lacks one last big polishing to make the mode good.
I don’t think children will be playing sim lol, and as for “Foreigners” most know enough English at least to make simple callouts. There is already voice chat in the game, just no one uses it because it’s Squadron only and Discord exists for that.
Playing with friends or some kind of sim community seems nice, even if it was custom battles I could see it being fun but I feel so many people are mazed by the grind in this game the thought of playing and not getting any RP/SL probably sends shivers down their spine lol. I do have friends that play WT but convincing them to sit in a que for 10 minutes isn’t going to happen.
the waiting time in the WW2 battles is always shorter than in the cold war scenario.
if you spend the time with some small talk then it doesn’t feel long at all.
Problem is that SIM mode is neglected if not even abandoned. Not by the players but by the developers.
Last big thing they tried with sim was testing the RB matchmaker for SIM, which I personally did not like.
There are many proposed changes which requires almost zero testing and effort to implement, and which would improve ground SIM considerably (like helicopters starting with engines off). but no luck.
I was actually quite surprised they are adding SIM to Battlepass. So there is still hope.
Some other SIM problems like large number of duplicate vehicles would require some effort but there are plenty of solutions as well like:
Crew helping with ID and shouts warnings “That is a Friendly!” prior a shot
removing duplicate vehicles by spitting the tech trees for SIM MM (example East Germany vehicles would fight with WP and west ones with NATO) etc.
also a hatch open, hatch closed function would please me. trucks and halftracks excluded, of course.
with the hatch closed we are in the tank and see less through our periscopes. open we see more like currently but the commander is vulnerable to machine gun fire. - that would be real tank sim feeling.
but as you rightly say. the developers work so little on sim. so unfortunately it remains only unfulfilled wishes.
I like the sim rotation better than BR MM as well. However I wish they would do something to incentivize playing the lower BR vehicles inside the sim bracket/rotation somehow. For instance, why would I spawn in a Pv IV if the bracket has Tiger I and Panthers to spawn?
Would be cool if you got RP/SL % boost for kills made in the lesser vehicles of the bracket. Or a more complex ticket/SP system that necessitated the use of those lower BR vehicles in certain cases or made it mandatory to start in those lower vehicles and build SP to spawn in the better stuff.
Lastly I wish sim matches were designed to last longer than RB/Arcade matches. At least 2-3 times as long as they are now, though you would have to punish people who leave the match before spawning 3 times, which I don’t think would be too abrasive since it would be kept to sim only which the player base there should be able to handle.