Proximity-Targeted Communication System for Ground Realistic Battles

Suggestions Gameplay
1

A Personal Note

I consider myself an active communicator in GRB. Years of playing real-time strategy games like Wargame: Red Dragon or WARNO gave me a working understanding of coordination, flanking coverage, and threat prioritisation that I genuinely try to apply in matches. On occasion it works: a handful of players acknowledge the callout, adjust their position, and the push holds. Those moments are what Ground Battles could or is supposed to feel like.

They are also the exception. And the tools available to make them happen are, frankly, inadequate for a game that positions itself as team-based.

The Problem

Radio commands

The T menu was useful once. It isn’t anymore. Years of players reflexively spamming “Attack the A point” and “Attack the D point” regardless of context have desensitised the entire playerbase to the point where most teammates filter these commands out entirely. I switched from “attack” to “defend” callouts years ago specifically because I noticed the former had stopped producing any reaction at all. The signal-to-noise ratio is so poor that even a genuinely urgent and accurate callout drowns in the noise of everyone else’s spam.

Text chat

War Thunder’s playerbase is international, and in any given GRB match the odds of your teammates reading, understanding, and acting on a typed message are low on multiple fronts. Language barriers aside, players engaged in active combat rarely have the attention to read text in real time. I have been killed multiple times in the act of trying to type a warning to help a teammate; exposed, stationary, and unable to defend myself while attempting to communicate something that went unread regardless.

Map pings

Pings exist, but share the same broadcast problem as radio commands. Beyond that, the audio feedback is so repetitive and so poorly varied that many players (myself included) have simply lowered the volume to avoid being driven out of focus by the sound. World in Conflict, for reference, shipped with thousands of distinct voice lines across three factions with genuinely excellent voice acting. Being “spammed” by those never felt like spam. War Thunder’s equivalent does not inspire the same confidence.

The result is that even when a player has accurate situational awareness (a flanking enemy, a vulnerable cluster of teammates, an inbound air threat) the tools to communicate it effectively to the right person at the right time do not exist. Players end up zoned out, scoped in, and killed by something three people on their team already knew was coming.

The Core Issue

Ground Battles is marketed as a team-based game mode. This suggestion is simply asking for the communication tools that would make genuine teamplay possible in practice — not just in name.

Proposed Solution

A proximity-targeted communication system: look directly at an allied vehicle, hold a designated key, and a contextual radial menu opens allowing you to send a specific message to that player and only that player.

Unlike broadcast radio commands, a targeted message arriving from a nearby ally is harder to dismiss as background noise. It is specific, it is direct, and it arrives without competing with the rest of the team’s callouts simultaneously. The game already displays compass bearings, making compass-based directional callouts a natural fit — “incoming from the North” is unambiguous regardless of which direction the recipient is facing.

Suggested Message Types

The following are proposed as a starting set — the community is encouraged to suggest additions below:

  • Incoming enemy from [compass direction]
  • Enemy flanking from [compass direction]
  • Incoming air threat — aircraft
  • Incoming air threat — helicopter
  • Bomb / Missile incoming
  • Please help me repair here
  • Friendly fire situation / blue on blue (useful in Simulation Battles)

On the Ideal Solution

The honest ideal would be in-game VOIP. Direct voice communication between nearby allies would render most of this discussion unnecessary. However, the moderation challenges this creates are real. Toxic behaviour over voice is harder to catch and punish than text. It is worth noting that at least one major title has recently implemented AI-based voice moderation to address exactly this problem, demonstrating it is a solvable challenge rather than an insurmountable one. Whether War Thunder ever goes that route is a separate question. In the meantime, a targeted text-based system is a practical and implementable step in the right direction.

Precedent

Proximity-targeted player communication of this kind has been implemented effectively in other titles in the genre with demonstrably positive results on in-match coordination. The mechanic is not new or experimental. It is simply absent here.

Community Input Welcome

This post covers a proposed starting set of message types, but the system’s value scales directly with the variety of callouts available. If you have additional suggestions for messages that would be genuinely useful in GRB, please share them below.

Should War Thunder implement a proximity-targeted player communication system?
  • Yes
  • No
  • Yes, but with a different implementation
0 voters
4 Likes
2

This is a good middle ground solution to the whole we need proxy chat group (I don’t want a COD server where people are screaming random slurs and this prevents it) This should also be expanded to air where you can select a friendly aircraft and tell them you have someone diving on them or on there tail. Some times you do get overloaded and a warning could help you dodge a attacker. This could include naval and the future of infantry with special radio call outs.

Though the ability to turn it off would be a must as people can use it to troll. A second thing being Gaijin could monetize this by having voice packs connecting it to events / packs that read out the message sort of like the fast message system we have. Third with EW systems in the pipeline if we believe this is using radios maybe they could be jammed (static) in situations if that would be viable or if your tanks radio / operator is out of action.

Though people may sometimes feel like there is cheating if WarThunder players gained slightly more situational awareness but that’s life.

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+1 for more situational awareness opportunities

If I where to add a message I would add a fight to the end good luck message for when you see someone who is completely cooked to show your respect on there coming defeat.

3

Gaijin should give us proximity voice chat. Clearly that would never go wrong in any shape or form right?

4

next thing we know:
N word
F word
some slur i didnt even know existed
N word
N word again
*repeat roughly 500 times

2 Likes
6

That’s already the WT chat lol, i would immediately disable any proxy voice chat they add to this game

1 Like
7

It has its merits, but might be difficult and finicky to implement. I think War Thunder comms can be fixed without directed messages, and also team messages would need updated with or without directed messages. Here’s how I’d change the radio commands and to cover all the communications
First and generally, the ability to enable/disable voicelines that friendlies will hear. It’s cool that there’s a variety of options but the difference between for example I wouldn’t want to send a “cover me” when I meant a “need backup”.
Anyways on to basic messages

For this the tactical map makes more sense than messages. Have clicking on the map open a radial menu to allow placing of specific markers- the current generic one, attack, defend, the different enemy vehicle type icons, bomb here, point of interest, etc. The types of map icons that can be seen in plenty of other games. Also have unique map icons for each quick message instead of all simply having the same (!) mark.

Honestly “air alert” does this pretty well. Though it is spammed a bit. Perhaps automatically include information such as heli or fixed-wing and number of engines, based on proximity and keen vision skill.

This wouldn’t make sense without directed message so I won’t say anything on it

This is largely covered by the “repairing” callout. It can certainly be improved by having that callout include a bearing and range (from each listener to you) in addition to the time left, so people can easy find the one in need of repair help. Also, add a different voiceline for when the sender has no parts rather than just saying “repairing!” so it’s more obvious they need help. Additionally, have a the repairing icon be visible briefly even to friendlies that would ordinarily be too far away.

For this I’d have a quick message that simply states your vehicle (see the list of vehicle names already in-game for ranging) as well as your grid square. It’s probably more useful to report to the whole team what you’re in and where you are than to tell one guy not to shoot you. Perhaps also have a small friendly marker be briefly visible above your tank.

1 Like
8

Yessss the war thunder community can DEFINITELY be trusted with that, just as much as they could be trusted for an official discord server.

Jokes aside, i wouldnt mind a cod lobby-like game, would be quite funny. Even better if the enemies can hear it too.

1 Like
9

Would be funny in infantry having RUST style prox chat with someone playing music trying to do stealth ops but forgot there microphone was on. Or playing flight of the valkyries in a Vietnam era helicopter though prox chat.

Though funny might be better to not have prox chat and have a basic communication system like this so you can tell someone direct information.

10

Exactly what i had in mind, that would be peak.

1 Like