If I would have known I was going to be consistently matched against higher rated planes I wouldn’t have spent hundreds of dollars on research and new planes. This is a predatory practice that we should ban together and refuse to give another dime until they fix. Do not let them make the excuse that wait times would drastically increase if they didn’t uptier/downtier when there are easily 150,000+ players online daily.
3 Likes
Air assault has the BRs listed, it’s your fault for failing to check what bracket it was in.
6 Likes
this is the response i would expect from someone engaging in and or condoning predatory practices
1 Like
Uh what… I’ve gotten nothing from your first paragraph other than “I bought plane, I don’t know how game works, you guys are predatory”. If you want some help, provide more information with what you need assistance with.
3 Likes
… You paid money for a freemium product without first thoroughly testing it and seeing what it’s like?
Like, I’ll be the last person to defend gaijin and I consider a lot of their monetization systems absolutely anti-consumer and in serious need of an “OSRS treatment.”
However, you spent a hundred dollars on something you’ve had absolutely zero idea about… when you could’ve went in as a free player and tested it out to see if it’s your vibe?
2 Likes
This is on you for bad judgement and research into popular BRs in the game.
@Nerdilicious81-psn
So informing the player of BRs is predatory practice…
What’s not? Keeping everything secret?
Uptiers are a non-issue, your team is balanced* with their team.
1 Like
It’s really simple, but let me break it down for those who only see what they want to see.
When you start War Thunder, you cannot immediately play jets unless you either grind through props or purchase a jet with money.
I chose to grind props for about six months, expecting to reach jets naturally. During this time, matchmaking was fairly reasonable—I rarely faced higher-rated planes that completely outclassed me. However, as I progressed, I realized that the grind to jets was far more time-consuming than expected.
At that point, I made a conscious decision: rather than spend another six months grinding, I purchased a jet and paid for research to speed up my progress through props and unlock my first tier of jets.
Let’s be clear:
- I didn’t pay for an in-game advantage.
- I support paying for products I enjoy.
- I expected to continue having a fair matchmaking experience, just like I had in props.
However, the moment I started flying jets, everything changed. Suddenly, I found myself consistently matched against 10.0 BR aircraft while flying an 8.7 jet—and anyone who plays the game knows what that means: a slaughterhouse.
This isn’t a “skill issue.” It’s not a case of “you should’ve researched BRs.” There was no way to know, before purchasing, that the game’s matchmaking would shift so drastically once I entered jets.
And that’s the core issue here:
- Before spending money, I had an entirely different experience.
- After spending money, the game’s mechanics shifted in a way that devalued my purchases.
This is why I see it as a predatory monetization practice. Gaijin entices players into the grind, then presents a paid shortcut, only for them to discover—after paying—that the experience fundamentally changes for the worse.
And spare me the argument that “uptiers happen to everyone.” Yes, they do—but not with this frequency and severity until you hit jets. When over 150,000 players are online daily, the idea that constant uptiers are necessary for matchmaking to function just doesn’t hold up.
At the very least, Gaijin should be transparent about how dramatically matchmaking changes when entering jets, so players can make informed purchasing decisions. Until then, I won’t be giving them another dime, and I encourage others to do the same.
2 Likes
These two contradict each other, you paid to get into a BR bracket that you’re not comfortable with.
This physically can NOT happen
Yes. Yes this is just a skill issue, you should have researched the aircraft, the matchmaker, and seen what you’d face. If I was to go and buy the F-4J UK and expect to go against MiG-21 Bis every game, that would be stupid, but no, I bought the F-4J UK (Granted when it was at 11.3) and expected to be outclassed by everything as premiums usually are.
“When I knew what I was doing I was okay, when I didn’t know what I was doing I died, game’s fault refund me NOW”
Nothing devalued your purchases.
That’s due to a stupid arcade mechanic as a consequence of lineups.
I cannot give advice there as I don’t play AAB.
In ARB, max BR difference is 1.0 unless someone trolls and brings a squadmate in a biplane in.
Also, as someone who grinded from props to jets (combination of ARB and ASB) - I did not have this experience. ARB Matchmaking was horrible at propeller tiers with some planes overtiered, some planes undertiered. It was playable, but was sufficiently frustrating that I decided to ditch ARB for ASB .
Jets do have some issues - compression. Early jets face sabres and migs, korean jets face early SARH and Aim9B. Flareless subsonics and near-supersonics face Aim-9D with a ton of G. It’s pretty bad, that’s true.
The issue is compression.
Even without uptiers, it gets ugly. In air simulator battles, you choose the highest BR you face by deciding what plane to fly on what day.
9.0 aircraft facing 9.0 aircraft are completely outclassed due to BR compression making it impossible to properly uptier the overperforming 9.0 plane (ariete my behated) without making it irrelevant due to aforementioned early vietnam jets with high-G missiles.
This post is tagged AAB. Due to stupid BR averaging mechanics that worked when we were only props with Me262 and the like as the only jets.
Matchmaking by average BR
Relevant to Air AB
Air Arcade Battles follow a similar system for determining the BR range of opponents in a battle. However, the BR of your lineup is calculated as an average of the three highest BR vehicles in the lineup, rather than taking a single BR.
In general:
- Total BR will only be lowered if there is only one aircraft with the highest BR in the lineup (e.g. one 5.0, with all else 4.7 or lower).
- Total BR can only be lowered by a maximum of one BR step below the highest BR aircraft (e.g. 5.0 to 4.7, 3.7 to 3.3).
- Only BR differences within the lineup of up to 2.0 are taken into consideration; otherwise, total BR is taken from the highest BR.
2 Likes
It’s also tagged with Assault air so we can forget normal gamemodes lol, but yes thank you for informing me I don’t play arcade, only realistic and sim
1 Like
Assault air I found tends to be grabbed by new players not realizing it’s its own game mode because game demands you pick 1 tag, and “this looks good enough.”
At least that’s my experience responding to threads asking for advice or complaining about things that aren’t actually relevant to assault air/assault ground.
So unless the post makes it clear it’s actually about the PvE mode, I feel it’s high chance to be a case of “forums are not intuitive to people who didn’t grow up with forums or something.” (I don’t understand).
Like, this should speak for itself:
2 Likes
These guys are deflecting and trying to make you believe it is your fault and the game is just
2 Likes
If he is playing arcade random battles, then the MM does not change at all between props and jets. If he wants to keep the BR spread down to 1.0, he can do that, since he paid his way through the tree and has the previous planes.
I am just surprised he believed that players who got there by playing will have no more practice than those who did by paying. Hmm.
1 Like
I may have missed something…but what didn’t you know?
In the exact beginning of play where you have only reserve vehicles you get the exact scenario you describe. Almost all matches are (big) uptiers…
Then you move forward for months/years with frequent uptiers…you are top tier only about 20% of your matches…and fully uptiered more than 25%!!!
I cant really match your complain with the dozens of players that complain about being uptiered…apparently everyone is aware, except you…???
Game has a public and way documented matchmaking system that matches vehicles by BR with some margin…you can surely disagree (i personally would prefer a 0.7 spread)…but not really claim you were unaware!!!
2 Likes
Yes you did - 3.3 vs 2.3 or 2.3 vs 1.3 is a massacre.
Perhaps you didn’t notice because you were still new, but it was there.