Has AB air begun its march to death? (tier 3 and 4 matches)

[SK_Caterpilar_SK 11]

Since 2019 I start to notice a decline of large battles happening at tier 4 AB air. I dont play actively anymore since 2017 but I do remember one thing. You had matches ABSOLUTELY FULL. Nowadays you have a 8x8 arcade match. It makes getting any sort of considerable rewards really difficult. As a former absolute tryhard this was the only way for me to earn SL and very small battles just dont suit my play style so I cant really gain anything worth while. (Yes I have considered RB but that aint the point and besides I suck at it. And its incredibelly boring.) 

 

Anyone daring enough to perhaps foreshadown what will be going to play down in the near future?

Broken man speaking at this point I was here to celebrate every bday of war thunder and it never was worse before. Seemingly the rewards went to pot too. I have some archaic screenshots of me having 13-15kills from 2014-2016 and even 17 18.. I cant really progress the game anymore without loosing all of my hardly fought for SL from the days of the gone and it really breaks me as I see the number just go down when I try to play the stuff I actually want to enjoy and get punished so hard its unbelievable. 

[sardinha08 1,031]

It's as if they had this great game mode with a really huge potential but instead they made all the wrong choices and turn it into the worse and most frustrating experience to play. And I don't say this with satisfaction but with sadness cause I really miss how this game was in 2015-2016. It seems to get worse by the year.

[SK_Caterpilar_SK 11]

Rest in piece for WarThunder fun I guess.... I wish I had anything else I could actually play in this genre. IL2 and DCS are out of the picture because Im simply out of money. Seems my friends who left early on like 2017 or 2016 did what had to be done and gone ran off to somewhere else before it became a addiction..

[_X_XX_ 1]

On 16/08/2021 at 10:28, SK_Caterpilar_SK said:

Since 2019 I start to notice a decline of large battles happening at tier 4 AB air. I dont play actively anymore since 2017 but I do remember one thing. You had matches ABSOLUTELY FULL. Nowadays you have a 8x8 arcade match.

 

I only joined in early 2017, obviously I can't comment on the situation before this. For the last 5 years though, I don't feel the number of AB players in the lower ranks has been going down. It's seems to be different though if you fly your hard earned vehicles in and above rank V, in particular in VI and VII. Apparently, they to compensate for the lack of players in these ranks by stuffing the session with "super bots" that often blow you out of the sky with long range missiles just a few seconds after you are in the game. 

[N4CR_ 537]

Rank 2, 3 and some 4 seem fine on AB matches I play lately, in Air or Ground (when looking at queues for servers). 

All I can say is maybe drop down a rank or two and let high BR rot until Gaijin figures out the repair cost BS.

Edited August 17, 2021 by N4CR_

[bearteeth 139]

What BR do you mean by T4? 5.0 is still packed, and I get decent games at 6.3, but while I love the planes basically everything else about that BR range is just awful. It has easily the highest repair costs in particular and some of the craziest balancing choices in general.

 

My feeling is that a lot of people recognize that T5+ is an unfinished mess better designed to separate them from their money than as an actual game, so T4 is their endgame and they settle there. Which is fine for them, but when Gaijin comes by and collects a mix of normies' stats and the bizarre numbers generated by people who've been living at t4 for five years, the spreadsheet spits out some seriously weird values.

 

This is all made even worse because these guys don't have anything to spend SL on, so they're disproportionately likely to be represented amongst the three remaining pilots of the Ki-84 Hei. Add the sheer chaos from the way that early jets consistently try to commit suicide-by-prop, and it's no wonder that the BRs don't matter and the rules are all made up.

[Barry100 185]

On 16/08/2021 at 12:27, sardinha08 said:

miss how this game was in 2015-2016. It seems to get worse by the year.

 

Yes.

[bigredsnake 29]

Not experiencing that at all tier IV is still the sweet spot and the lower tiers are still fine.  The drop off is jets for us and I think that's for a variety of reason but probably the biggest being the payouts aren't that good. 

 

I think if they stopped punishing bombers so hard you'd see a swing back honestly.  That's what drove people to RB to lessen the "grind" it was never a desire for realism or SB would be over flowing.  The whine bags got their way, got bombers pay outs nerfed, but that was the easy way to grind which even the bigger fighter players did, and once that happened it moved the majority to RB.  

 

But AB isn't going to die just log on during Russian times they seem to prefer AB over RB it looks in all modes 

[VT_88 342]

1) Depends upon the time of day you play. And yes, there has been a decline in players at those tiers.

 

2) Stop being cheap. Buy yourself a  premium account.

[Blau1941 48]

Pretty much the same as it ever was tbh. Realistic is the progression when Arcade feels monotonous and predictable. Though I do find air arcade mostly unbearable.

Edited October 2, 2021 by ArchangeL9

[FailBoatCaptain 439]

matchmaking thunder is still the same