There should be noted that Game Development is significantly planned ahead of time. And it is like that to fit to a certain set of goals that achieve at least one of the following: 1) visual stimulation for a retention of player interest, 2) expansion of the game content to retain player interest, 3) diversified gameplay to retain player interest, 4) enhanced goals to retain player interest.
The thing is - and this goes both ways. These roadmaps often go one, even two years ahead into the future. And while Game Development is very agile, the process of creating complex systems like supersonic aerodynamic simulations (even if simplified a lot) to work reliably is very time consuming. This is why you won’t alter your plan as much unless there’s extremely critical indications that you are doing something very wrong.
Player retention is arguably one of the primary sources you need for a multiplayer game. Perhaps even the primary source. Money comes right after, because servers and developers are expensive. But the French TT community in WT isn’t that large, which comes from a lack of content and a very punishing tech tree, this in return means that player retention of other tech trees is of arguably higher interest because it can achieve more for the same effort. That is not to say that the French TT community is of less importance or should be, but to understand that a French onslaught of vehicle additions is unlikely. Especially since the practice changed from "nation A, C and F get a lot, while nation X get’s actually nothing this patch "to “every nation gets at least one vehicle”.
Now personally, I’d be all for an armada of French vehicles coming. Call it the french revolution for extra laughter. Because it can generate a lot of interest for the French TT. This comes with a big caviet though, and that is the BR placement of the machines. A lot of the vehicles are massively overtiered, making them extremely punishing to play and really… why would you stick to a TT you get so severely punished when you can play a sherman or a Tiger an clap everybody, because you can pen them through the front? French vehicles can be extremely enjoyable for players, as WoT actually shows, but it is the game around them that determines that. And when you fight T-54AM-1s in your Bat’Chat, it just isn’t fun (the challenge can be, but it will be a brief duration that makes it enjoyable). It requires you to put in extreme effort everytime, because you operate in an extremely small range of optimal conditions for a kill. To stay in that range means everything and it takes extreme amounts of focus to do so. That makes vehicles like this so exhausting and very forgiving machines, like a relict plated T-90M or a Leopard 2A5+ so chill to play. They don’t require you to be in a state of hyperfocus to ensure you can achieve kills and mitigate the weaknesses of your vehicle. And as a player you have to become that good first and then have to sustain this focus for the time you play. And that is stressfull and requires a lot of your mental power, which will reduce over time.
Perhaps there’s a beatiful opportunity to wonder about normalized stat adjustments, experimenting with the system and how good players can influence a vehicle when they are 10-20% better than the average joe and make up 50% or more of the players that use the vehicle.
I’d love a sort of “housekeeping effort” to arise to look at tech trees (or gaps in tech trees) with little player bases or interest. Of course I think of the french one in particular. The idea was to create a program to flesh out said tech tree specifically before moving to the next, bolstering weak areas like the french light tank line or gaps in the TDs (these are mostly at high tier).
Obviously we can help with all of this by feeding resources into the system to create new vehicles. Smin mentioned the amount of players we are and that we outnumber the development team in manpower (and very likely in focus too, because we have such specific interests). So let’s use our ability and power to aid!
