How the economy works:
Relevant parts:
Google doc screenshots for sake of "i wont click random links."
Key take-away:
Win: Play time x activity x coefficient x RP multiplier x 2
Defeat : Play time x activity x coefficient x RP multiplier x 1.34
What do we observe looking at the screenshots and the above formula?
The game significantly rewards staying alive without respawning and maintaining ~1500 RP/15 minutes in ARB perspective (and something comparable for GRB).
Staying alive until end of match , getting 9 kills for Skill Bonus (or 4 for air RB) and winning is where the bulk of your income comes from. Rather notably, as one can see from the formula - skill bonus is multiplicative with win/loss. To claim " “rewards losing as much as winning” is to be grossly uninformed on how the rewards system works. Now, it is true that the way the economy works and the way probabilities stack up (can you get a 70 to 90% activity on a second respawn 5 minutes in? 10 minutes in? 15 minutes in? 20 minutes in?), there are scenarios where respawning to try and force a match win provides lesser rewards than ODLing and going next without risking a low activity period due to how much of your RP gain/battle it makes up (1 kill is worth 47 RP in RB, plus change for crits/hits. That’s equivalent to staying alive for 50 seconds at 100% activity if you lose the match, 33 seconds if you win)
The only game mode where winning/losing THE MATCH makes no significant difference is in air simulator battles, as you only get a small SL bonus for winning with no change to RP gain. This makes sense given ASB is rewarded in a 15 minute cycle and you can join/leave ongoing matches without limitation. On the flipside, as you pay silver lions to spawn (not repair), and you only receive 80% of the reward for surviving the full 15 minute cycle and must return and land to gain full reward - ASB massively enforces winning to maintain a positive silver lion income… but also shafts winning very hard (2 kills is worth the same as 8 kills due to being paid by the minute rather than individual actions). This has the nasty consequence that you have dead BR brackets where spawn cost is 18k, max possible reward is 19.7k - meaning you need to survive and get 2 kills/15 minutes twice (30 minutes) and land both times to afford to respawn a second time. This occurs at 7.0-8.0 with likes of horten, shooting star and meteors.
I will concede that if you have a premium account, the skill bonus’s benefit is significantly reduced as the 100% acts on the base income rather than premium income, leading to scenarios where it only increases your total reward by a measly amount (something like 1/4? I cant remember how shafted you get) if using both a premium vehicle and a premium account.
Looking at the aforementioned 7.0-8.0 dead BR zone in SB. Do you know what happens?
People spawn in their planes and are in -18K SL in debt. You have people fly to objectives and compete. It’s a 3 hour game mode with respawns.
One side beats the other. The winning side has barely offset their debt. The other side now asks the question: Do I double my debt, or do I quit and go to next lobby hoping the enemies are worse than me?
The losing side makes the logical choice (not double their debt) and now the lobby is dead without enemies to fight with.
That’s the outcome you desire.
At prop BRs where spawn cost is 3K and max income is ~9K, or even spawn cost of 10K and max income of 18K or so - this occurs less consistently. Statpadders will still ditch lobbies if the enemy can threaten them, but others will stay and fight to the bitter end (or exhaustion/boredom. Or the teams got too unbalanced and you’ve no desire to fight 6 vs 12) and there’s actual competition and a chance at improving your piloting.
Turns out, where losing doesn’t punish you as much, people stay in the game and fight to improve and it’s actually competitive rather than “stomp once and enemies give up.”
Tell me how a comet can kill a yak-9k or a F4U-4.
Tell me how a centurion Mk 3 can kill a P-51H.
For planes, you can pick 2 fighters within a 1.0 BR step (that aren’t seriously under/over-tiered) and find a legitimate way to force a victory for one side. Maybe it’s something boring and requires strict discipline like “BnZ the japs in your mustang and keep your energy high at all times.” Maybe it’s something more fun like “spiral climb the spitfire in your messerschmitt” or “drag the yak into a spiral descent in your hellcat” or force one-circle/two-circle. There’s a plethora of options, some more fun than others, some easier than others but they exist.
Tell me how a comet can kill a yak-9k or a F4U-4.
Tell me how a centurion Mk 3 can kill a P-51H.
Even if the F4U-4 has massive skill issues, you’re not killing it in your comet. Okay, maybe if the F4U-4 decides to land in an open field or flies with gear & flaps out at 100 meters altitude. Just for sake of covering all bases - yes, there exist scenarios where a tank can get kill credit on a plane but those scenarios are rather contrived and more of a freak accident.
You grind planes by playing AAB/ARB/ASB. Planes use entirely different controls and playstyle to tanks. To expect players to play planes is absurd. Even if someone really enjoys playing planes, maybe they don’t enjoy the same bracket as they play tanks in or maybe they don’t enjoy the game mode (either they only want to play planes in arcade or sim but like GRB for tanks (or play GRB because GSB doesn’t let you play whatever tank whenever)).
Expecting plane use when you want to use a tank is a non-justified argument.
And Expecting SPAA per…
This requires teamwork.
Which requires role queue (in Dota 2, I queue for pos 5 and my team is guaranteed to have a hard support. I queue for pos 1 and my team is guaranteed to have a hard carry and so forth.).
We have no such thing for Warthunder.
Teamwork also requires SBMM. Imagine trying to play Dota as at 3K MMR equivalent when your pos 1 is at 1500 MMR equivalent. Or imagine trying to play Dota at 3K MMR equivalent when the enemy pos 3 is a 6000 equivalent.
You can’t.
Using SPAA to hit planes is significantly harder than planes to hit planes.
SPAA are on a 2D plane shooting at a vehicle in a 3D plane. SPAA are stationary, planes fly at 350-550 km/h at prop tiers. SPAA are always shooting with significant altitude difference. Planes don’t.
In a plane, you can neutralize speed differences with maneuvering and aligning your fuselage with the enemy plane’s and getting on their six. In a plane, you’re almost always shooting at the same altitude. In a plane you control your distance for shooting. And in SB, in a plane you have gunsights that tell you how much to lead and give an estimation of distance. Oh, and in planes you have vertical targettting and convergence that allow you to put the enemy dead-center of your gunsight, pull the trigger and boom goes the yak/ki-84 even if you’re using the fridge launcher.
