Which is fair for anyone who plays Random battles more than someone who strictly plays Sim only. They are not going to know or be up-to-speed on changes to the EC mechanics, and economy.
The reward for winning an EC Sim game is only at +47% SL. If your side loose the EC match, then you only receive +20% SL. That’s only a 27% difference in SL earnings and no difference in RP at all. At this time, there’s no incentive for anyone to go full sweaty mode over bonus rewards. It’s pointless!
It used to have the +100% RP bonus before the change. But, they quietly removed it sometime early this year or last (I can’t remember). So that means another nerf to combat dishonest players abusing the mode for the rewards, while the honest players suffer for it. The same situation over in Heli EC PvE. The bonus RP was gutted there as well. Why? I have a feeling it was due to the heavy use of bot accounts that was going on in there.
I really don’t think most players are leaving the game is due to bonus rewards when their team loose, unless they are a new player that is unaware and have been living under a rock. There is also that group that leave no matter if they win or loose, and that has to do more with their RL situation. Not everyone will have the time to stick around for a 1 to 3 hour game. Other things in life may require their attention.
Right now, most players that do leave an EC match. It’s because their team is getting stomped, and more so when the opposition is clapping them constantly with meta aircraft. It’s no different with a similar scenario in Random games. Most players calling it quits and only a few stranglers are left behind.
if u play ru top tyer jets in sim. u wil often suffer cuz of amount of players in ur team vs enemy.mig 29 mig 29 smt they are usles. if u chase 1. there is 2 behind u. only way for me to play sim. its yak and spawn camping. and its kinda boring af+ wery toxik .lot of games im left 1 vs 6-8 f16-f14 . i have games whit 33 death… i think there should more air and groun objects for avoid those 8 hunting for 1 games
You’re preaching to the choir. I’m very much aware with the issues in EC9.
The reality is, no amount of additional targets will fix issues regarding team balance here. The problem is, players are always going to rush over to the nation with the strongest lineup. That will never change.
What can change is Gaijin not making adjustments to manipulate the upcoming meta when the major patch drops. There was no reason to give the F-16s the AIM-9M, while also nerfing the flight models for the MiG-29 & MiG-29SMT, that lead to them to feel like bricks.
This is a dirty marketing stunt that most game studios do to encourage players to purchase through the progression regarding stronger equipment. In this case, GE up the tech tree to get the new shiny F-16s to stay competitive. This has nothing to do with national favoritism. They are a business after all and very aware regarding certain iconic aircraft that the community desires. At the end of the day, they will take advantage of that in order to increase short-term profits.
What everyone can do is stop playing this “rat race” game in top-tier progression. It’s never going to end, and it will only make your experience miserable. Top-tier is never going to be balance and will often lead to certain things clapping everything else in every major patch cycle. Open your wallet or suffer. Frustration is part of the formula with how F2P are structured in order to encourage sales.
The quicker you come to understand this and stop trying to rush to compete in top-tier. The more relax you will become; minus the blood pressure.
If you’re into top tier, the game is in my opinion not F2P.
The absolute grind needed to keep up with each major patch cycle is ridiculous and not realistic. The way I look at it is that if you want a nation - you purchase a premium jet in that nation, a premium will always allow you to grind out anything in said nation in a very reasonable amount of time. That’s the price of the game if you want top tier. I’m not condoning it but it’s the way it is for anyone who values their time in the slightest.
In this discussion game balance is irrelevant. The problem stems from the fact that few people have russian planes, because the most played nation in the game is the US. So no matter what kind of side is theoretically favored, the problem is that there should be a system to keep a more or less similar number of players in the match. They cant force players to play Red team instead of Blue, but in my opinion somehting should be done. The easiest fix is Smaller Lobbies. The only solution i can come up with. If you cap lobbies at 6v6, which is already a large number for top tier, you can make it so that lobbies do not get too unbalanced. Also, this way it would be harder to find a match with US planes, encouraging people to start researching Red tech tree. And maybe gaijin would also sell more premiums at that point.
This is why we need to be able to choose all nations vs all nations - sure it’s lame to fight against the same plane’s you’re flying but it’s even more lame to not get a match started or to have lopsided teams.
Alternatively they could add AI Bots to make the teams even no matter how many actual players are in the game.
Either way something needs to change; and this doesn’t just apply to top tier - Air SIm can be a friggin’ ghost town at times.
How would that work where there are no tags telling you that the person you’re looking at is the enemy? You get visual and it’s the same one you’re flying and then they shoot you.
I don’t think anyone wants to be fighting bots. Would be a real bummer if you engaged a target, spent some missiles and it turned out to be some shitty AI, not fulfilling at all.
I think it’s way more important to figure out why people won’t stick around and fix that.
I can name a few reasons
Shitty default controls presets, making it very hard for new players fighting regular sim players, creating a massive skill gap - and only a few deaths in, the new player is in serious SL debt.
Boring objectives, give player actions more substance to the outcome of the game - more dynamic missions. (I have plenty of ideas if Gaijin will listen).
Economy. Pretty self explanatory. It’s not as bad as it used to when you’d actually have to save up SL during the week so you could afford to play some sim during the weekend lol. But you still need to do pretty well to start making SL profit.
It won’t work. All it would do is add more confusing to properly ID targets based on the visual airframe design. When you consider that both sides have the same aircraft. Like for example, playing EC3 in your P-47 and there’s a few on the German side flying the Premium P-47 “Hitlerbolt”. Don’t forget nations like France and Italy that also have American aircraft. China with Japanese aircraft, and Germany/Sweden that have certain Russian aircraft.
And don’t forget top-tier when you have inexperienced players that are trigger happy and will fire missiles without reading IFF properly. When a match is an all vs all nations lineup. It turns into one giant TK cluster f#*k.
Agree. All nations vs alla nations is a terrible idea. It would quickly become a TK fest, and it would also be not immersive. Odd match ups can alreayd happen, but many time with Blue planes you face Red planes. All v All would get boring quite quickly, teamkilling aside.
what nonsense. nobody wants to play games and simulations with AI enemies like 6 Days in Fallujah or many other titles? Nobody wanted to play GTA5 because of AI?? … such crazy statements can only be made in a war thunder forum.
a really decently programmed AI that interacts with the players would actually be very important for EC.
Flight sims like the old IL2 from 2001 and many others would never have been successful without AI planes. the problem is that the AI in WT is not properly programmed. the AI in European Air War from 1998 was better programmed.
pure PvP has its charm but a lack of flexibility. you are always dependent on other players at the same time. we see how hard it is to open battles. cleanly programmed AI planes would be an enhancement for EC. if everyone had an AI wingman like in DCS, it would have a high daynamic as PvPvE.
Camel, we have already had this discussion before.
First of all you’re comparing completely different first person shooters to a flight simulator game, it’s just ambiguous. Second of all, what you should be doing is advocate for vastly better AI in the game BEFORE you ask for it to be shoved down our throats into our beloved enduring confrontations mode. Do you seriously think the shitty AI is even slightly good enough to essentially turn EC into PVE? No? Then be careful what you wish for.
The problem is, You’re pitching it like it’s the solution to low player count when it’s just sweeping the problem under the rug. Let’s not replace our player base with bots. There are tons of super important improvements we need in EC sim, that will fix the player retention problem - such as improving the learning curve, better default keybinds, make objectives more dynamic, fixing the broken CAS targets for our bomber/fighter players. Once we’ve fixed those very important issues, we’ll have tons of players to fight which are infinitely more engaging than an AI ever could be.
And for the record I’m not entirely against AI, they can serve the role of larger objectives such as bombers, ground targets or surveillance/AWACS planes that can make for very engaging gameplay and objectives.
You’re asking for AI from other games, not war thunder. So again, I’ll reiterate. Advocate for VASTLY better AI in the game BEFORE you ask for it to be shoved down our throats.
I have already written x times years ago that Gaijin must please revise its AI aircraft. of course this cannot be done overnight. and of course it is not simply possible to transfer DCS AI or other AI into the Dagor Engine 6.5.
however in the user created battles AI placeholder have to be. like before 2021. no matter if crap AI or really balanced AI.
I don’t blame the two enemy pilots. maybe the dog had to go for a walk. I can’t force the enemies to stay in the game. I don’t need to mention that the round ended 50 seconds later.
the people who scream “AI gone” or “abuse” and the developers who listen to them cause such problems.
in conclusion. the current AI is bad but necessary for the mode to work in such situations. and this is not an isolated case
paul it is often a misunderstanding in this forum to think we can fix Sim problems with Arcade measures.
I always find it important to look at other simulations and look for possible ideas, impressions and improvements for Sim EC. Arcade “balance pls” measures will not save Sim.
I agree it should not happen, but here’s where I think you understand the situation completely wrong. I don’t think lobbies get like that because “maybe the dog had to go for a walk.”. Instead, lobbies get to that point because of what I spoke about earlier:
I think you with your 2500+ hours in sim aren’t able to see it through the perspective of the new player.
I engage with new players all the time through chat and by inviting them to discord and have probably personally helped 30-40+ people into the game mode for the past 6 months, by helping them with everything from IFF, dogfighting, radar to most importantly learning the controls.
The average new player experience in sim looks a bit like this, I’ll be quoting myself from a conversation yesterday:
“Right now they fly tunnel visioned, likely don’t know SAS mode is a thing at top tier and stall themselves out in the first turn, they probably don’t have a convenient key bind for looking around, let alone being able to keep eyes on a target in a dogfight and constantly get blown up from thing’s they never even knew were there. 5 deaths later and they are in serious SL debt, not even counting TK penalties for people who have not been taught IFF - not exactly something you’d want to stick around for.”
That, along with my point earlier is why a majority of lobbies have 10-20 people who left after a few deaths and zero progess. Not because they “had to walk the dog.” or because the nations lineups aren’t ‘perfectly historical’ to satisfy some roleplaying boomer.
we were all new back then. and I remember my first EC round when I couldn’t fly straight and level with a P-36 and I didn’t know how I was ever going to hit an airplane. (sometimes it doesn’t work today either :) )
if people in EC Sim start immediately with their Premium Phantom it is logical that there are such problems.
yes, I only play with people who have a lot of experience. more than me. as for beginners, I would advise even the biggest jet enthusiast to do a few 2.0 or 2.3 sessions in a propeller airplane that is as easy to fly as possible.
and test flights. take-off, landing, take-off, landing, first propeller airplane keystrokes step by step.
