Every match of ARB I get into, the entire map is just covered in clouds or fog or both and I cant see anything. The game is almost unplayable as you literally cannot see anything. You cant spot enemy planes, you can’t see tall obstacles like buildings or mountains, you can’t even tell if you’re going up or down without checking your alt. In real life, you avoid clouds when flying. The weather ingame it quite literally the definition of unflyable.
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The rest of us don’t seem to have a problem adapting. Maybe RB isn’t the mode for you if clouds are really screwing you over.
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You mean you don’t like having to go to cockpit or virtual cockpit view so you have an artificial horizon to reference?
Where is that IFR tutorial Gaijin?!?! lol.
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The main issue is not being able to see other aircraft and wandering around blind in clouds for several minutes looking for them
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The rest of us…
Who are the rest of us?
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You mean like… realistic to real life? Until you have search radars, yeah that is the way it is. In fact WT kind of hand holds you because at a certain range it will pop up the icon and card for you. Try a custom battle set to sim to see how much harder it can be.
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Imho your statement is only correct if you specify the era of wartime (basically post WW2), the IFR equipment of used aircraft and the training level of the involved pilots.
WW2 & weather
So during WW2 low cloud ceilings, fog or 9/10 clouds prevented mostly single engine fighters to take off - and even if the cloud ceiling was high enough for a take-off, the conditions prevented safe landings as the pilot training was not good enough to return to base (or even find it)
The rather limited fuel load was not enough to perform a mission and to allow long searches for your airfield, leaving ground level variations aside.
In addition you can’t compare irl to wt due to various reasons.
The total absence of any squadron tactics in wt is just a little part of it - so as a single engine fighter you (almost) always flew as a part of formation in order to protect each other - so even if the squadron took off in “bad weather” their goal was also to break through clouds as a formations due to this.
Last but not least - the weather played a much more important role in the ETO during than most guys are aware off, so as the weather in Europe is mainly coming from the West there, the 8th AF could time their missions that way that they had good conditions to take off (imho there is no such thing as good weather in the UK) doing some BTO (Bombing Through Overcast)sorties and the LW boys could not take off due to fog and /or heavy clouds.
I do agree that an “all-weather” jet fighter (having radar,etc.) with a trained pilot should be able to deal with all weather conditions.
Although i agree with this in general, this “new weather” is just another episode of the gaijin series “looking for realism, too much, nobody asked for”.
Some years ago we had very often a solid a solid cloud/fog between 2 km and 8 km - and even some kind of night battles whilst flying in props.
So in order to survive you had to adopt and to use the right tactics.
Seeing the fights in prop BRs today, almost nobody has a clue how to fight in such conditions; you see a “top tier light” low alt furball somewhere on the map and all players are going there like moths seeing a light in the dark…
I admit that the weather above the clouds looks sometimes breathtaking.
But as an end user playing Air RB in a few selected non-meta props especially due to the convenient markers (as i don’t like dot spotting the whole time) this new weather creates severe issues.
On one hand the limited experience of a lot of players create the mentioned furballs - on the other hand a lot of people simply forget some basic rules and fight fighters optimized for low alt with fighters optimized for high alt with the usual outcome - just because there is a marker…
In addition the various cloud layers kill any sustainable success if your playstyle relies purely on gaining positional advantages and you prefer non-meta planes not able to extend from “surprises” / guys flying deliberately in clouds in order to score cheap 3rd party kills - and there are a lot of them…
Imho this is technically correct, but as the thread is tagged “realistic battles” a reference to SIM is not dealing with the core issue.
Hand holding by gaijin: Yes to a certain degree, but for playing SIM there are imho better simulators available. Alone the ability to fly a plane with mouse aim and the instructor in Air RB is the best example how far from reality Air RB is/was created…
I mean this is a video game and there are a lot of people (me included) flying with a real joystick, SFC and disabled instructor in Air RB just due to convenience reasons - and the set up of Air AB or Air Sims matches is not a desired goal for everybody.
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The clouds are just shit for gameplay in any kind of PvP game mode.
We play a game with PvP 16v16 battles, and a spotting system to allow us to keep awareness in that situation. Clouds not only completely grief the spotting system, they also hinder your actual ability to see, and the actual rendering of enemies.
Clouds just don’t belong anywhere near any even remotely competetive mode (which ARB is since it’s TDM and the better you do the more rewards you get at the end of battle).
The clouds make gameplay extremely inconsistent, and engagements immediately become more luck based (like the enemy plane rendering in the first place/ derendering literally in front of you etc.)
Along with that clouds in this game aren’t always at the same position for every player, their positions get desynced and some smaller clouds are also (or at least used to be not long ago) client side (they go away on ULQ for exmaple) which further makes them absolutely unbearable for anyone trying to get consistent above average results in their battles.
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I’ve played sim before. If anything, bringing up sim further supports my point because it is literally impossible to visually spot another plane through a cloud. And at BRs where you don’t have radar that means you’re literally just blind.
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Best part in high tiers or mid all the derps bombing bases in fighters have a missile free lane againts any IR missile lol they dont have to turn or flare just drive to base untouchable gun them I guess but you cant even see anything but nametag till 200 meters and some things just outrun you so missile shot was only chance except clouds stop it…
When RB players complain about clouds lol. Come play sim with us… Lots of fun… Nice cloud cover, fully instrument control, only radar and RWR to help you. To be honest it sounds like you cant seal club anymore. A good pilot can fly in any weather.
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Literally everyone playing the game and not complaining about clouds/fog.
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i think clouds should be removed and all planes should glow bright red so everyone can see them
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Play arcade (insert nerd emoji)
Edit: /s
I was joking. You flying a plane in the sky there’s going to be clouds
i know lol dw bout it (hence the /s for sarcasm), OP just wants everything hand delivered to him on a silver palette, handheld and spoonfed by game design instead of yk, learning how to adapt and overcome the obstacles.
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Especially the when i see such sentences:
When RB players complain about clouds lol.
…ending with a “lol” i ask myself what the goal of such remarks?
Or where is the topic relevant part in this sentence?:
To be honest it sounds like you cant seal club anymore.
I mean even with good faith i am not sure that your last sentence:
A good pilot can fly in any weather.
is helpful, despite it is the only topic relevant sentence.
A short self awareness and topic check might be a good idea as :
- A k/d ratio of 0.16 in Air RB and 0.4 in Air SB are actually not really a kind of proof that somebody is able to determine what a good pilot should be capable of or not.
- Inviting somebody else to play Air SB despite it is clearly mentioned that it is about Air RB with such “interesting” stats in Air SB is rather disturbing.
So seeing the whole picture i ask myself quite often (the rhetorical question) why some people feel the necessity to add nonsense posts…
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I have a monthly 1.41 kpf because I fly only awful aircraft these days, but as one of the players who has over 1.5 to over 2.0 kpf stat on most aircraft in ARB, I don’t think clouds should exist in the ARB.
It is beautiful, but in gameplay it is just annoying.
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Specifically talking about introduction jets and props who don’t have their hand held with a radar