The new damage model of bombers is too tough

[Kumiko_Senpai]

In the upcoming update, Gaijin has greatly strengthened bombers’ resistance to damage, making them nearly indestructible. I know that bombers in the game urgently need better survivability, but this should be limited to resistance against machine guns and cannons. In fact, bombers on the test server can now tank multiple missile hits, and can even survive being rammed by other aircraft; and as for machine guns and cannons, they can hardly kill a bomber at all. Gaijin has turned bombers into outright flying battleships — soaring high and impossible to destroy. As a player from mainland China, I’ll attach here some test videos from the mainland Chinese video platform bilibili showing the damage resistance of bombers on the test server. The video includes such absurd material as missiles finding it very difficult to shoot down bombers (including the high-power AIM-54 missile — even 6 AIM-54 hits cannot destroy a B-17) and a B-52 being able to directly ram and destroy a B-17 without taking any damage. This reminds me of the omnicrusher in Red Alert — it’s simply absurd beyond belief. Gaijin should adjust bombers’ damage resistance; the situation on the test server right now is just too ridiculous.

【战雷测试服】轰炸机生吃18发硫磺石_哔哩哔哩bilibili_战争雷霆

测试服最新力作——绝对刚体B52，嗯创B17如减速带【战争雷霆】_哔哩哔哩bilibili_战争雷霆_游戏试玩

【战雷测试服】阻尼人也难以摧毁的新版轰炸机_游戏热门视频

- YouTube

[Ion_492]

Changes to Bomber Survivability Feedback and Discussion

poll With the update the updated bomber model were implemented, what are your opinion on how they fare against different types weapons and different types of ammunition?

Here’s the main forum thread about that. Also, that F-14 video is more likely due to the phoenixes being bugged and detonating late than the bombers being too strong.

[LeChance]

Why? How? is a F-14 shooting guided missles at B-17’s???

What the heckity heck!?!?!

[J_ackal]

Prepare for endless ju288c in even jet tiers now

[Ckasaron]

Honestly, considering the poor things will still be largely useless in winning games, this is exactly what the game needs.

Fighters get unrealistic situational awareness and aiming ability, giving them 20-50x greater shooting accuracy, thus bombers and bomber-derived attackers get correspondingly tankier damage models.

I kinda saw this coming sooner or later, because the number of new and interesting bombers the game has yet to add both in prop tiers and jet tiers is frankly ridiculous. Not just popular ones like the V-bombers, B-36, XB-35/YB-49, but also dozens upon dozens of prototypes and obscure ones. Snail smells money to be made, and thus is preparing the field to start dumping in missing bombers for every tree imaginable.

And I’m all for it - let the fighter mains whine, recognize chasing bombers ain’t worth it, go land on their goddamn runways, and actually USE their multirole capabilities to win games by CAS instead if the bombers climb to orbit. The game already has the means for people to adapt - it just requires Fighter Mains’ raging PvP boners to get blue-balled.

[Ion_492]

@Ckasaron

let the fighter mains whine, recognize chasing bombers ain’t worth it, go land on their goddamn runways, and actually USE their multirole capabilities to win games by CAS instead if the bombers climb to orbit

Not all planes can do that easily, especially on some maps.

Also this change will lead to bombers being some of the best air superiority aircraft and will push them up in BR.

It’ll also be awful for sim if things stay as is.

[xTHE_BIG_ZAPx]

So, you want to be able to have an easier time shooting down a B-17 with a sidewinder from your F-14? Therefore you want to toss the bomber buff 85% of the community has been asking for over 4 years, right? This is so typical of the fighter mafia’s spoiled garbage.

[Ion_492]

Bombers should be buffed, but gaijin over buffed them and now they are too strong.

[xTHE_BIG_ZAPx]

@Ckasaron

And I’m all for it - let the fighter mains whine, recognize chasing bombers ain’t worth it, go land on their goddamn runways, and actually USE their multirole capabilities to win games by CAS instead if the bombers climb to orbit. The game already has the means for people to adapt - it just requires Fighter Mains’ raging PvP boners to get blue-balled.

YES ! well put, bravo

[Dregbag]

ok but also increase wing HP/armor for all aircraft, or just the one’s with long wings

[Ckasaron]

@Ion_492

Not all planes can do that easily, especially on some maps.

Most maps these days are the hyper-symmetrical ones with lots of soft ground units. Light Pillboxes can be melted by any aviation weapon that isn’t a rifle-caliber gun (and even those will eventually kill them with concentrated fire). Only the oldschool AI tanks are a bit of a problem. Player-grade tanks are on some maps, but well over half of fighters carry bombs. Between ticket losses from bombers doing their thing and all the soft ground units, you won’t need to kill very many of the tougher tanks to win games.

@Ion_492

Also this change will lead to bombers being some of the best air superiority aircraft and will push them up in BR.

Unfortunately yes this will happen. Much as I wish it wouldn’t. But neither of us can fix the average stupid player mentally insisting on winning by Dumb Fucking Deathmatch even though the ground units are right down there waiting to be killed.

@Ion_492

It’ll also be awful for sim if things stay as is.

I remember playing Sim the last time it was like that. But the mode’s already dead as far as I’m aware, or damn close to it. Already people can no longer select single missions from Air RB to go fly in Sim, where instead we have just EC.

Bombers will remain useless but tanky porcupines. But how long people will take to learn “I should just ignore him and go do the actual fucking objective” is unknown.

[Ckasaron]

This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.

[Ckasaron]

@Ion_492

but gaijin over buffed them and now they are too strong.

Not really, given how overly accurate the typical fighter is in shooting them thanks to Mouse Aim. Meanwhile Bomber gunners still artificially spray all over the place.

Personally I would make Bomber gunners have the same negligible spray as fighter-mounted equivalent weapons, but in exchange delete the AI controlled gunner logic entirely.

Then if the bomber is paying attention, they can get kills if the fighters approach from stupid directions. If the bomber is a bot-script or AFK, then the fighter easily slaughters them because they’re too asleep at the wheel to man their gunners. That could also be the way to help protect Sim from the bot-script horde.

[Ion_492]

@Ckasaron

Unfortunately yes this will happen. Much as I wish it wouldn’t. But neither of us can fix the average stupid player mentally insisting on winning by Dumb Fucking Deathmatch even though the ground units are right down there waiting to be killed.

Bombers are allowed to engage fighters directly if they want, or even chase them in some scenarios, so they can still impact matches heavily. Stuff like the Vautours, Canberras, Pe-3s, Pe-2s, Tu-2s A-20s, A-26s, B18/T18, and others all have offensive armament and they can be used to take down enemy aircraft. What are you supposed to do if one of those is trying to actively fight you?

@Ckasaron

But the mode’s already dead as far as I’m aware, or damn close to it.

And this change will entirely kill prop sim as bombers would be near impossible to take down, while still having plenty of impact on matches.

@Ckasaron

Personally I would make Bomber gunners have the same negligible spray as fighter-mounted equivalent weapons, but in exchange delete the AI controlled gunner logic entirely.

Then if the bomber is paying attention, they can get kills if the fighters approach from stupid directions. If the bomber is a bot-script or AFK, then the fighter easily slaughters them because they’re too asleep at the wheel to man their gunners. That could also be the way to help protect Sim from the bot-script horde.

That’s a pretty solid idea and I do agree.

[Venndigo7192]

I think they have been doing that in small amounts (looking at the datamines), but not enough to be that noticeable.

[xTHE_BIG_ZAPx]

@Ckasaron

Reasoning with such “Toxic Fighter Mains” or “Fighter Mafia” (pick your favorite term) is impossible, just like any equivalent attempts to reason with a Tank or Ship player who has a hate-boner for CAS. All the game can do is intentionally flip the board

Exactly, what they can’t overcome with just a little skill or simple tactics, they resort to minority tantrum foot stomping and endless whining. All the while appealing to the suggestion mods to put a thumb on the scale. Never mind that 4 years of polls have shown that 85% of the community want these buffs, they will either have their way or burn down the house.

[Casino_Knight]

You see actually it’s a good thing to have invincible space bombers taking up your entire team

Doubt.

[CommunistBalls]

@Ckasaron

this is exactly what the game needs.

yes i agree the game needs to be unplayable!

@Ckasaron

Fighters get unrealistic situational awareness and aiming ability,

so does… everything in air rb. its not like you dont have spotting either, hold c!

@Ckasaron

go land on their goddamn runways

cough cough ehh??? why dont you do that instead of:

@Ckasaron

the bombers climb to orbit.

lmao?

@xTHE_BIG_ZAPx

bomber buff 85% of the community

maybe like 2, at most… not even the forum has that many man…

@Ckasaron

half of fighters carry bombs

shockingly fighters are used to shoot planes not tanks and using bombs is entirely suboptimal im surprised a true bomber main doesnt know this

@Ckasaron

as I wish it wouldn’t. But neither of us can fix the average stupid player mentally insisting on winning by Dumb Fucking Deathmatch even though the ground units are right down there waiting to be killed.

maybe because its like i dont know, not fun to shoot bots? its also not fun to drag games out by doing literally nothing (exactly what you suggest doing with bombers)

@Ckasaron

the actual fucking objective

so there are infact multiple objectives… tickets, and kills. games tend to end with one team losing all players because its a pvp game, and most people actively seek to shoot other players. ones that end on tickets go to the end of the timer at least 90% of the time because someone is actively avoiding doing anything.

@Ckasaron

We all have suffered from the Bromans, the CommunistBalls

hi! good to see an old friend! not leaving anytime soon+

@Ckasaron

Not really

IRL 4-5 mineshell hits would do enough damage to knock out heavy bombers like B-24s and Lancasters… on dev its above 60, which is more than almost every MK108 armed aircraft carries… are you sure?

@Ckasaron

given how overly accurate the typical fighter is in shooting them thanks to Mouse Aim. Meanwhile Bomber gunners still artificially spray all over the place.

every plane has the same gun/cannon mechanics and all have mouse direction too. bomber gun turrets are leas accurate because the recoil causes the gun to swivel around while firing, which a human gunner has a harder time controlling. whereas a forward fixed cannon does not pivot around a point and is connected fully to the airframe, which is rigid.

@Ckasaron

Then if the bomber is paying attention, they can get kills if the fighters approach from stupid directions.

i mean like you can do this already like i said everything has freelook

@xTHE_BIG_ZAPx

Exactly, what they can’t overcome with just a little skill or simple tactics, they resort to minority tantrum foot stomping and endless whining

i can attribute this to the people advocating for unkillable bombers because they seem to refuse to want to use their guns or maneuver outside of a straight line. a little skill (aim) and simple tactics (turning, to give yourself a better shot) applies to… everything! including bombers!

@xTHE_BIG_ZAPx

4 years of polls have shown that 85% of the community want these buffs

please show as many as you can, and i doubt the game is getting killed by a few people whining about one type of planes.

[Morvran]

I stand by my opinion on the damage models. The structural changes are good. and there is largely no issue there, the issue is that the models after that suck and need fixing

@Morvran_

So, Changes that are needed so far imo

1. Add additional internal modules/parts such as Control veins or oil, hydraulic, fuel lines that can be damaged and destroyed. Including making the modules more accurate and to proper scale. The engines for example are tiny with their current, old and basic models. Another module as suggested by @Cmdr_Deeno could be the oxygen supply for the crew, and appropriate mechanics regarding loss of consciousness if flying too high for too long without functional oxygern supply module(s)

Spoiler

The wings are basically empty, and the engines only take up a tiny part of the housing currently.

2. Retune self-sealing tank to deal with a limited amount of smaller calibre hits but for it to have limits, including large shells and large numbers of small hits, at which point, the tanks could at best, drain rapidly, at worse actually set on fire too (essentially have the self-sealing disable after suffecient damage has been dealt to them)
3. increase the shrapnel damage from HE rounds hitting the airframe, that way crew and internal modules could be better damaged (@OliverXRed testing in this post shows some pretty insane nonsense going on with the damage dealt by HE, in that its spall inherits the pen of the round, which for non-AP, is naturally, very low. The result is that HE is very unlikely to deal any internal damage)
4. separate the vertical and horizontal stabiliers from the rest of the tail damage model, so these parts could be damaged and destroyed seperately to the rest of the tail, and given appropriate, proportional resistance to damage
5. add aerodynamic impacts as damage to the wings accumulates. Even if they arent sheered off, they should still provide less lift and control as “holes” are blown into them, making the aircraft harder to handle. @Ion_492 Made a good suggestion that the leading edges of the wings should be added as damagable parts too.

I think this would add the right balance between bombers being made of wet paper mache and adamantium

[_Zekken]

Honestly this is what I was worried about when reading the buff notes.

Bombers needed more survivability but it couldnt go too far in the other direction. If thats the sort of damage they take they will literally be invincible. Any fighter trying to take one down will be hosed to death by the gunners

Im all for buffing bombers but making them effectively invincible is going to be terrible for gameplay.

@xTHE_BIG_ZAPx

So, you want to be able to have an easier time shooting down a B-17 with a sidewinder from your F-14? Therefore you want to toss the bomber buff 85% of the community has been asking for over 4 years, right? This is so typical of the fighter mafia’s spoiled garbage.

Come on dude, its blatantly obvious that this is a limit test, and if 6 Phoenixes with a combined explosive mass being near a 750lb bomb still leave a B17 flying, what the heck do you expect any WW2 era aircraft with just a pair of 20mms to do?

Edit: not to mention the Missile itself weighs 450kg. Do really think ANY airframe is strong enough to withstand something this size hitting it without being crippled?

Let alone 5 more of them?