War thunder started as a plane game, but then tanks, boats, and helicopters were all added over time and each came with their own game modes and trees.
There are two main ways that infantry can be added to the game, as a new first person shooter gamemode or as npc’s to shoot at. I’ll only be talking about the first person shooter option.
First things first the tech tree, this is pretty simple, different lines for different classes such as anti tank, anti air, regular assault, and smg. You’d progress through the tree the same way as you do with the rest of the trees, researching the next soldier.
The modifications for the soldiers would come in the way of body armor, sights and other attachments, more reliable guns, better stamina, and other things that soldiers can carry like grenades and mines.
Crew levels would still affect these soldiers, things like vitality, agility, awareness, reload rate, and targeting would all still effect your soldier accordingly. And every soldier would take up a crew slot.
When you get into a match you’d have to spawn your soldiers with spawnpoints, if you manage to get enough spawn points you will also be able to spawn a tank, heli, or plane, which go into your lineup like usual. There would be points to capture and building that you can actually go in and destroy, the maps would need to be more detailed than the current maps but they wouldn’t need to be as large, though massive maps for infantry would be pretty cool.
The last thing I’d like to touch on is damage, I’d like to see a detailed damage model for each soldier, so where you get shot and where you shoot people actually matters, like getting shot in the leg makes you fall over and slows you down and getting shot in the arm massively effects your ability to aim, but I’d also like to see a healing mechanic so you aren’t stuck injured. Basically you’d have to repair your soldier like you do with your tanks.
If anyone has anything to add please do.