"Written Off" Mechanic

Returning player, started back as far as 2013. Just started getting back into the game, whose neck do I wring for the positively stupid addition of planes becoming written off and killing you randomly at times? I’ve now had a few occurrences of successfully winning a dogfight, flying back to base, only to randomly crap out due to being “Written off due to excessive damage” in a plane that is easily under control and still operable within spitting distance of a landing strip. I will accept the head of the intern who proposed this utterly useless and infuriating mechanic as recompense. Jokes aside, what’s the point? If a plane crashes or burns down then it makes sense, a plane that’s only partially damaged getting written off and killing you is irritating.

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Joined 15 minutes ago 💀. In all seriousness ima give you the benefit of the doubt here and believe you started in 2013. It’s the games way of giving credit where due. You’d be pretty mad if you got severe damage in a plane and then died, only to not get credit for it. It also is “realism” because at certain points it’s better for an Airforce to just buy a new plane than to repair the damaged one, so it’s modeled in game that way. Kinda dumb and RNGish but it doesn’t happen too often.

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Yeah I used to take quite pride for getting my plane back to the airfield with one wing and repairing it to haunt my attacker, but even before the severe damage mechanic, I keep getting kicked out of the plane when I landed, invalidating my effort and it annoys me to no end.

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Search for “severe damage” and “written off” - you find a hell of posts explaining the phenomenon.

Basic rule: Always check scoreboard - if the guy you killed has a “+1” in the column for kills you have to land immediately. Otherwise you lose your plane if the time or tickets run out…

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This has literally only happened to me once, and I don’t even know why it happened, AND it was in Ground RB.
From what I can remember, I’ve successfully landed with worse damage, repaired and rearmed, and gone back into the fight.
I occasionally lose a wing in the A21RB or regular A21-A3 and make it back to base, belly land, and I just repair and rearm.
But the one time it did happen it was infuriating because as I’ve said, it let me repair with worse damage.
I don’t understand how this works.

The game will also decide to “write you off” if you land with some arbitrary level of damage.

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Severe damage has been one of the best things they have done to this game in a few years I have been playing. Being written off has happened to me maybe three times since it has been introduced and while it does kinda suck, it’s a very small price to pay for the benefits this system brings.

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Probably because we used to land with no landing gear, and a missing wing lol.

Screenshot 2023-08-24 141909

I landed this one safely and repaired…

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What benefits? A few of the “benefits”:

  1. Clear kills from the past are now “severe damages” - you get only 80% for them instead of 100% in the past…
  2. You need more ammo if you want to finish your “own target” (=to get 100% before a team mate finishes the target) compared to a clean kill in the past
  3. Together with the “severe damage” mechanic came a clear reduction of critical hits - so you have on top of that also less SL/RP income and your mission score is also lower (=mission score for a crit: 150 points)
  4. Written off means also even if you win a match 1 vs many but you lost 50% of your elevator you lose a plane (after: Mission Accomplished) just because you could not land fast enough before the enemy tickets ran out…

Just curios what you actually like -
all in all we talk about an income nerf of at least 10-15%…

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Yeah, The Old Guard title says otherwise my friend. I’ve been around, even if I’ve not used the forums(Or to be honest, my PC account that much) before.



I get why the mechanic exists, the implementation though is idiotic. I know that planes reach a point of being so damaged that you’re better off just getting a new one. In that case, let me fly back to base if I can and land, give me my points and then trash the plane. Don’t just arbitrarily kill me as I am coasting down the strip or am 10 yards from setting down.

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That’s weird, because I’ve landed with half a wing gone, repaired, and took back off quite a few times without being written off. Of course, if the game ends and you are flying while heavily damaged then yes - that’s to give the attacker a reward for probably getting gaijined in their gun damage.

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What benefits? Giving kills to players who didn’t earn it and punishing players who can keep a crippled plane airborne?

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Exactly, nothing better than making it back to a strip crippled beyond belief and getting another go at the guy who tore you up. I get the general idea on why they made it a thing, but damn if it isn’t just a soul sucking thing to get randomly killed because RNG decided I’d taken too much damage.

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Having Old Guard is just a rank in this context, you may be a Veteran of the early years of War Thunder but we do not “Salute” you, we respect the rank. Otherwise to all of us, you’re nothing more than old rusty not an insult I’m stating your inexperience humorously.

It seems so arbitrary. I sometimes fly back with a plane that’s more holes the plane, other times I crap out as I am rolling down the airstrip with only a red engine and some holes in my wings. It sucks the fun out of trying to get back to the air field for me.

It only happens if the game ends before you can repair on the airbase.

Get over it.

I am aware, I just brought it up since he was claiming that since I had just made a profile for the forums that it meant I was clearly not an older player.

That’s because you wrote off your comment as an old veteran but didn’t provide proof the moment you wrote your comment. A lot of folks in the forums expect it immediately. Otherwise, you get 50-question charades.

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I don’t whip out my veteran ID for everyone I talk to in real life either. Guess I’ll open with my full credentials next time. Lol, fair, I don’t get what the usual is in the forums, never used it before because I’d never found anything worth posting in here. This mechanic though, probably the one I like least since I first played.

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Good to know, guess the old days of trying to put her down safely are over. Just gonna belly land as fast as I can. Still, not a fan of it. Lol

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