New Levelling system.

You decreased the amount of aircraft tiers in the game – from 20 to 5 and now you say that balance will be more precise. How is that so? You need to increase tier amounts, not decrease them!

No, Aircraft “Tiers”, no longer exist (not in any visible or recognisable form anyway) The Tiers have been replaced by Ranks which supersede the previous air force ranking system, with this in mind, we are saying that the current ranks are a secondary factor when it comes to match making. The Main factor is the Battle Rating of the plane (you can see it on the plane characteristics) which may be different for each of the game modes, so in this regard our match maker has become more precise. Since the new ranks are loosely based on eras or the periods of warfare development with the plane, they are used like an additional filter that ensures that you won’t ever face planes that are higher or lower than yours by more than one rank level (the previous system would never take that in to consideration). This means that for the match maker we have increased the amount of ‘tiers’ than before (Battle Rating), but fewer tiers for the levelling of aircraft. Read about our match maker in more detail in our “Developer Diaries”

Why couldn’t you use the old tiering system, why did you decide to change it?

Because the tiering in the old system was the main characteristic of the plane that would determine its place on the tree and the amount of battles that you would need to “unlock” it. Because of the requirement for different tiers for different game modes, it would be impossible and it was impossible to make a robust custom balance for the individual sessions in different modes. The replacement ranks are also a characteristic of the planes, but there are less of them and they count towards the research. The plane allocation under different ranks is not the battle efficiency (tier) that the match maker uses.

What happened to the aircraft I had already purchased in 1.35?

The planes that the player already had are still there, along with any purchased modifications on the owned planes. The planes that were available for purchase in 1.35 are unlocked and ready to be purchased without any further research in 1.37.

Do premium planes count towards the total required number of planes needed for the next rank unlock?

Yes. Premium and Gift planes, as well as the planes from the packs count towards progress through the ranks.

What happened to my free experience?

Free experience has been converted to Research points which you can use to speed up the research of the new modifications and planes.

How many planes do I need to research and buy to get access to the next rank?

For each nation, type of vehicle (aircraft or tank for example) and rank – it could be different. Usually it would be four planes. You can see all the information on the left side of the research tree, where you can see rank numbers.

I don’t want to fly the plane, which is in front of my desired aircraft. How can I skip this plane?

You can fly any plane of a nation to open any plane of the same nation. It’s not the most efficient way of unlocking the new planes because there are bonuses for researching a plane if you fly on the plane just before it, but it is possible nevertheless. Also with enough free Research Points and Golden Eagles, a player has the ability to research the plane instantly by converting free Research Points for it.

Can players purchase “top” tanks and get an advantage straight away if they already are a high enough level with aircraft?

Existing high level players will not be able to move straight to the top. With Ground Forces release, just like with the implementation of new planes for the aviation trees – players will have to research new vehicles with research points.

In the previous game version the “top” Japanese plane was on the 17th tier. If I reach tier 20 in Japan – will I be able to buy all the planes of tiers 18-20 in the new levelling system?

No, all the new planes of any nation and any rank will require research before you will be able to buy and put it into service.

Why couldn’t you do calculate Battle Rating individually for each game mode while keeping the same tiering system?

Because it would be confusing. We tried to group the planes based on their historical use and combined “historical era”. It is understandable that some planes were much better for the time and others conversely, were obsolete right from the start, but as a whole this way of grouping is more logical than 'mixed' tier that was within the  combined 'era' with a different battle efficiency.

Premium planes had a longer experience line before, what is the special bonus with premium aircraft now?

The “experience line” is gone for all the planes so now you can fly them as much as you want! A Premium planes will bring a higher rate of research points and lions gain that you can spend on modifications purchase, new planes and for conversion training of a crew.

So because there is no “experience line”, I can research all the planes by flying on a single one in the same nation?

Theoretically, it is possible, yes. But it will take a longer time than researching and playing with different planes. The most efficient way to research a new plane is to fly the plane of a same (or adjoined) rank and a plane that belongs to the same line. Also, if you research a line of  modifications and all the modifications on the plane you will get a massive bonus for the plane research – that mean that if you fly on different aircrafts you will progress the ranks faster.

Random battles matchmaking

What is the main difference between the old and the new Match Maker?

The old system was almost exclusively based on one parameter – the plane tier. Because of this factor some planes were more effective in one mode than in the other yet they were still matched in the same way, this was the case in all of our three game modes. Besides the obvious armament and flight model differences we also had less obvious factors, like view arc from the cockpit in the SB mode. This was partially compensated for by the fact that effective tier of the plane could be adjusted by +/-3 tiers depending on efficiency of the player in the certain game mode. That by itself was causing additional issues.

Real battle efficiency in different game modes may vary by more than 3 tiers. This system doesn’t look any clearer for the players than Battle Rating in different game mode. This system generally would decrease fairness of the battle. There could be a time when two players would meet in battle, one of which would fly on tier 8 +3 “efficiency” (for the matchmaker) and another on tier 13 -3 “efficiency” - they would be almost equal for the matchmaker calculation, but in reality they would be flying the planes 5 tires apart from each other, which would be more than one rank in our new system!

The new system allows us to create matches that would be easily understandable for the players – players won’t ever, under any circumstances, see planes that have more than one rank difference from theirs (in arcade battles this is calculated from the top ranked plane in the line-up of the player/squad), and real balance in the battle depends on battle rating (which you can see listed in the plane characteristics).

Could you describe to us how does the new matchmaker work while you still gathering statistics for the new balancing method?

Battle Rating for the planes is the same for every game mode right now. The temporary matchmaker attempts to gather enemies in such a manner that the player won’t see a plane with more than 1.33 battle rating difference than his plane. Rank of the planes creates an additional barrier – the player won’t see any plane that differs from his for more than one rank. For example, the German jet fighter Me.262, at the moment, has the battle rating of 7.3. That means that it will meet only planes of 5-th or 4-th rank with battle rating not being less than 5.97 and not more than 8.66. That is all jet planes and the best piston planes, for example the La-9 (battle rating of 6.3) or the BF.109K-4 (battle rating of 6.3). At the same time, most of the planes of rank 4 won’t meet Me.262 in the battle, since their battle rating, for the most part, is lower than 5.97. For example P.51 Mustang (rating 5.3), Spitfire.LF.Mk.IX (rating 5.3), Yak-9p (rating 5.7) – they are all located at the 4th rank, but none of them will meet Me.262. Also we should mention that the matchmaker is influenced not only by the rank and battle rating, but just like before – the player efficiency is also taken into account. In our example, a very bad pilot of the Me.262 theoretically can meet P.51 Mustang in a battle, but the chance of that happening is very low. But in the new matchmaker, thanks to the difference in ranks, there won’t be situations where the “lowest” jet planes will get a match with ‘medium’ piston planes – He 162A-2 will never meet a Yak-9 or P-63 Kingcobra.

Another example: let’s imagine that a rank 4 plane A has a battle rating of 6, and a rank 2 plane B has a battle rating of 4.8. Can they meet each other in one battle? No, they won’t because of the rank limitation – you only can play with the planes of your rank or one rank up or down. Even if battle rating of those planes suggests that they are close, a difference of more than one rank won’t allow them to be matched together.

But still keep in mind – the current battle rating is a temporary one and it doesn’t count the difference in efficiency for different game modes just yet. The situation will change with us getting more statistics on it.

How does matchmaker select the battles for the squads?

The battles for the squads are matched by the rank and battle rating of the “top” plane in the squad.

Will we get our special 'sandbox' back for the reserve planes?

Right now they are on the first rank and fight more serious enemies. If an experienced player takes his reserve planes, he won’t ever get into the “sandbox”. We don’t want to ruin the first experience for new players because they constantly get shot down by seasoned warriors that decided to join the “sandbox” for fun. You have a lot of different interesting planes – fly those. And if you really miss biplane-only feeling – check out the “Custom Battles”, where you and other people may train their skills on the biplane battles.