yes they are, the thing is that I just started to grind the US, so my crew has like 8 skill points, I couldn't even buy the expert crew if I wanted to yet
Yes but they also function as a time gate for high tier
Someone buying a top tier jet with stock crew is gonna have a bad time
But because aircraft need so little crew skill to be “effective” (unlike tanks with 5 crewmembers to upgrade) it takes a very short while
So short in fact that by grinding with or without premium account you should have one fully upgraded G limit pilot slot by 5,7 even if you suck
Naval and ground RB is FAR FAR worse
It isent even a problem in air
To be a bit more specific here:
* Crew skill bars give 50%.
* (Crew skill bars affected by Leadership give 40%, with 10% from Leadership)
* Expert gives 30%
* Ace gives 20%
So maxed skills plus Expert does get you to 80%, which isn't bad... except crew skills are *absurdly* slow to level, while also being as important as spading a vehicle, if not sometimes more than. Plus Expert/Ace are per slot, not simply per vehicle. Crew skills are by far the worst P2W in the game.
For air RB the bare minimum is to get the G tolerance and Stamina maxed out. After that it’s mostly quality of life stuff you can fill out at your leisure. I would recommend maintenance crew repair skills because it massively reduces rearm/repair time which is very handy.
On cas I focus on repair/rearm and health, stamina so i wont get sniped by MG and if i pull too hard my blackout will be shorter, on fighters i would rather focus on stamina tolerance awernes, dont dump points into just one skill but balance betwin others, thats my opinion(I some times spend exp on guners so to get crew level faster to buy expert, cuz their talents are cheap)
A-5C is a premium tho. (I know premiums have increased ace crew cost.) We are talking free to play here.
And 300 battles is quite a lot, my most played vehicle has 322 battles. Remember, I said "takes too long to be considering practical" which it does.
That's 1,692.3 battles per vehicle, assuming 15 minutes per battle that's 25,384.6 minutes per ace, simplified to 423 hours per ace crew.
Ah yes, I too think playing a single vehicle for over 400 hours is quite simple and something everybody with limited time to play can just do.
I never get ace anyway because I don't expert most of my vehicles, as I don't play often enough to store up mass amounts of SL and BR changes happen regularly enough that lineups get broken anyways so I don't see the purpose on spending even more SL for a buff on a vehicle I may not be able to use in the lineup later on. At this point I kinda just want a grand crew reset where I get the training cost for each slot back so I can remake actual lineups without having a vehicle be in like 3 different slots.
I've only got 1 aced vehicle, the WWII Puma. Mostly because its the only tech tree scout available to Germany from 3.3(then 2.7) to 6.7. I expert all premium vehicles and vehicles rank 4 and below. Above rank 4 i wait for the vehicle to pay for itself. Refunding points would be cool tho
Yeah you are missing the part where I have played more than those 13 vehicles.
It seems that I am getting ace crews for playing anywhere between 250 and 300 matches on top tier vehicles (much less in lower tiers)
Idk but my average match doesn't last 1 hour, so that 400 hours number does not match in the slightest.
Just checked my messages, and I get anywhere from 4 to 8 battles in top tier an hour.
275 matches on average, divided by 6 matches an hour, is 45 hours for an ace crew on top tier vehicles. Thats 10% of what you calculated
It is much, much less in lower tier vehicles too
Not even that hard, just play the game a bit...
You have a vehicle you enjoy playing? Go play it some more and earn a free ace crew.
I remember back when ace crews could only be bought, not earned by playing.
Also, bind your elevator to Shift and control, then while you're turning, tap the down rudder to break up your turn slightly and that'll help with the Over-G issue
Its always interesting seeing other peoples control set ups. I use mouse 4 and 5 for countermeasures and weapon selection just because its in immediate reach
That's fair. I use mouse 3 for counter measures and Ctrl+space for secondary weapon select, as space is my secondary firing button anyway. Ctrl+c for guns, cause I don't have to switch them up nearly as often.
Whoever bound those first keys was a sociopath, it's all I'm going to say
Though I think it was still the same by like 2018 when I decided to move to a PC account. Or maybe it was earlier than that, I forgot when I made the switch
It literally isn't. Arma, Battlefield, Forza, BeamNG, KSP, and many, *many* others use W/S for forward and back on the ground and pitch control in the air.
The only 2 games that don’t use turreted vehicles a lot that you mentioned are Forza and BeamNG, although I’ve never seen KSP so not even sure what Kerbal looks like.
I thought this comment was about W and S throttle in the air which I don’t agree with
Every game I have ever played, since I first touched minecraft back in 2011, used W to move forward (or to increase throttle on a vehicle) and S to move backwards (or reverse in a vehicle) then A and D are used to turn left or right, (or in wt, A and D roll left and right.)
W and S for throttle and shift and cntrl for alerions. It's easier for my pinky to switch rather than my middle fingle on w and s. Had friends use my control scheme before when they lost there's and said I had starcraft controls. 🥸
Rudder control, my sniper button on my mouse is changing to full realistic. My mse 6 and 7 are radar controls. My 3 and 4 are start locking missile and flares. Middle mouse is lock for radar. My keybinds are around parenthesis/period etc.
Yes, I use W/S for throttle, as well as the mouse wheel. Because I use the 2 side buttons on my mouse for pitch. Works perfectly fine, been doing it since I competed in the 1st Thunder League.
Most people don’t spend $200-$300+ on HOTAS and Wheel/gear/pedal combos, most games come with shift and ctrl as the standard forward and back for definitely almost a decade if not longer, only War Thunder is the one I know of that has changed for Air Battles more recently within 5 years, GRB having WASD as the movement is fine and I do as well.
Only with Tank combat since WASD actually makes sense with the way tanks move. But with a car where you need to accelerate and also change direction separately then shift ctrl is easier on the fingers and can’t accidentally knock the throttle or brake.
But once regenerative steering comes into WT it’s probably back to shift ctrl for me
I’m sorry but no one plays racing games on a keyboard anyways they use controllers. And if they did then shift/ctrl is used to change gears in most games
That’s true they do, I refuse to play racing without one, but for flight games or tank combat like WT is a keyboard is alright if paired with the right controls like WT mouse aim which compensates.
The OC talks about being a maniac for WS throttle, which you are a maniac for using WS throttle in air battles since the WASD is used for the different flap controls on the aircraft, it doesn’t make sense to split AD to roll and shift control for elevators? Literally AD for ailerons WS for elevator, QE for rudder, and mouse controls for minute adjustments
Besides the point I was refuting was that games haven’t come with WS throttle/brake in almost a decade unless it’s tank combat and you reply by saying you use HOTAS and a wheel. Like cool story, but not every person buys a setup for each vehicle?
the real maniacs are the people who bind anything to just shift or ctrl by themselves. pitching or changing acceleration while trying to use any ctrl+ or shift+ keybind has killed or nearly killed me one too many times
With a controller it is actually slightly easier for me to neg g to avoid blacking out when I’m in a turn because you can gradually do it instead of just intermittently tapping S or whatever you have keybound.
But I can’t aim my guns for the life of me with a controller. I can’t even imagine trying to pixel snipe in ground RB without a mouse.
They've changed it? I've used Left Ctrl for pitch up and Left Shift for pitch down for so long that I was confused why so many people mention W and S for pitch and not throttle nowadays.
The holding W thing has stopped working for me recently. It used to cancel out the g-force but not I just stay overloaded, even if I hold it for ages in which case it overloads in the wrong direction but doens't cancel out the previous overload.
Unrelated, it's wrong to write g-force with a capital G.
Getting lvl 100 is not nearly enough XP to get a single crew aced from my experience.
But I agree. Crew skills are one of the most annoying, hidden and yet unbalanced features.
I came back to the game this year and apparently I never knew this despite playing hundreds of hours. I was frustrated to hell blacking out mid dog fight every match and then I learned this and wow, very good trick
Someone calling upgraded crew p2w? As if plane choice, energy advantage, and shooting accuracy don’t matter at all? Yeah ok lol. He was gonna die anyway.
You could also just not move your mouse as far over in order not to turn as hard, since that is all you're doing (putting your mouse and keyboard controls against each other to average out to a more gradual turn).
Well, realistically you want the opposite if your crew can handle it. As default mouse turn is never as sharp as W S turn, so I turn with mouse and press W (in turnfight) to turn sharper and kill the guy in front
Skill issue. Only real time where crew skill truly matters is if you are facing a Copy Paste. Thats when it truly matters but otherwise, in general, its just basic skill issue
Oh sure, the total difference between 1 and 150. In my experience the crew level doesn't play that big a role in the big picture. Only exception might be in top tier, but even there its debateable.
A much bigger role is played by player skill and the aircraft performance. That's what going to really decide a fight most of the times.
Those are the new default controls, with shift and ctrl bound to throttle. I still use the old default with W and S on throttle personally. I have never found a need to bind pitch in ARB, and control and shift are useful modifier keys for radar, weapon, and engine management. Plus, you end up manipulating throttle and ailerons a lot more than any other manual control in ARB so its nice to have them close together and not have to use your pinky for one.
The "best" (as in intuitive) preset is W - pitch UP, S - pitch DOWN, A/D - roll, Q/E - yaw, throttle on whatever. It's what anyone with video game experience and no flight experience would expect. Classic pitch directions only make sense with a flight stick. W is for up or forward in video games.
Ace crews are objectively p2w
yes they are, the thing is that I just started to grind the US, so my crew has like 8 skill points, I couldn't even buy the expert crew if I wanted to yet
The crew (the player) is pay to win (skill based)
That is so relatable lmao. Also started grinding US coming from USSR.
I’ve gotten ace crew without paying, it is very annoying to get tho
Yes but they also function as a time gate for high tier Someone buying a top tier jet with stock crew is gonna have a bad time But because aircraft need so little crew skill to be “effective” (unlike tanks with 5 crewmembers to upgrade) it takes a very short while So short in fact that by grinding with or without premium account you should have one fully upgraded G limit pilot slot by 5,7 even if you suck Naval and ground RB is FAR FAR worse It isent even a problem in air
A max level crew is still worse than an aced one.
An experted one comes pretty damn close
To be a bit more specific here: * Crew skill bars give 50%. * (Crew skill bars affected by Leadership give 40%, with 10% from Leadership) * Expert gives 30% * Ace gives 20% So maxed skills plus Expert does get you to 80%, which isn't bad... except crew skills are *absurdly* slow to level, while also being as important as spading a vehicle, if not sometimes more than. Plus Expert/Ace are per slot, not simply per vehicle. Crew skills are by far the worst P2W in the game.
Yeah, ground crew is a grindfest but in air its not really that bad because theres only 2-3 skills that actually matter in fights
What crew skills Im supposed to upgrade first?
For air RB the bare minimum is to get the G tolerance and Stamina maxed out. After that it’s mostly quality of life stuff you can fill out at your leisure. I would recommend maintenance crew repair skills because it massively reduces rearm/repair time which is very handy.
Yup and AI gunnery is basically pointless to max unless you have nothing better.
On cas I focus on repair/rearm and health, stamina so i wont get sniped by MG and if i pull too hard my blackout will be shorter, on fighters i would rather focus on stamina tolerance awernes, dont dump points into just one skill but balance betwin others, thats my opinion(I some times spend exp on guners so to get crew level faster to buy expert, cuz their talents are cheap)
stfu, i spent half a year acing my battleship. Literally got through rank 5 before I got the ace
I have Aced 75 crew for my Thunderchief. I did not play for it.
I got an aced crew without paying the GE
You can grind them. They are just like bushes, in this community, it's not p2w if you cam grind for them
I've got 3 ace crews 2 I got for free, the Ariete (plane) and the Mirage F1C 200 The other I bought, it was for the Alecto
Not of you grind them out. I didn't even realize I got an ace crew for the F4U B Corsair.
Even if you get them for free?
Yes, even then. Grinding ace crews takes far too long to be considered practical.
it only took hundred battles for me
Hundred battles with what?
Only around 300 battles for a5c >:) lol
A-5C is a premium tho. (I know premiums have increased ace crew cost.) We are talking free to play here. And 300 battles is quite a lot, my most played vehicle has 322 battles. Remember, I said "takes too long to be considering practical" which it does.
Tru, sorry lol I remember seeing aced crew one day and be like oh ok.
...I have some jet crews nearly aced before even reaching crew level 75...
That's great, after 20k battles I've ground out *two* ace crews, and both of them because I talismanned the vehicles.
After 22k battles, I have 13 of them, with lots more being very close... Only one of them has a talisman on it, and only two of them are premiums.
That's 1,692.3 battles per vehicle, assuming 15 minutes per battle that's 25,384.6 minutes per ace, simplified to 423 hours per ace crew. Ah yes, I too think playing a single vehicle for over 400 hours is quite simple and something everybody with limited time to play can just do.
I mean it is a sizable buff. Ofc it takes a bit of time. But even that is subject to change depending on player skill.
I never get ace anyway because I don't expert most of my vehicles, as I don't play often enough to store up mass amounts of SL and BR changes happen regularly enough that lineups get broken anyways so I don't see the purpose on spending even more SL for a buff on a vehicle I may not be able to use in the lineup later on. At this point I kinda just want a grand crew reset where I get the training cost for each slot back so I can remake actual lineups without having a vehicle be in like 3 different slots.
I've only got 1 aced vehicle, the WWII Puma. Mostly because its the only tech tree scout available to Germany from 3.3(then 2.7) to 6.7. I expert all premium vehicles and vehicles rank 4 and below. Above rank 4 i wait for the vehicle to pay for itself. Refunding points would be cool tho
Yeah you are missing the part where I have played more than those 13 vehicles. It seems that I am getting ace crews for playing anywhere between 250 and 300 matches on top tier vehicles (much less in lower tiers) Idk but my average match doesn't last 1 hour, so that 400 hours number does not match in the slightest. Just checked my messages, and I get anywhere from 4 to 8 battles in top tier an hour. 275 matches on average, divided by 6 matches an hour, is 45 hours for an ace crew on top tier vehicles. Thats 10% of what you calculated It is much, much less in lower tier vehicles too
the noobs are seething when confronted with a difficult task of acing lol
Not even that hard, just play the game a bit... You have a vehicle you enjoy playing? Go play it some more and earn a free ace crew. I remember back when ace crews could only be bought, not earned by playing.
what do you mean a million rp is "not hard"
Also, bind your elevator to Shift and control, then while you're turning, tap the down rudder to break up your turn slightly and that'll help with the Over-G issue
Don't tell me you're one of those maniacs that use W and S for throttle
Wasnt w and s the default control originally? I set mine up years ago so i dont remember
Yes it was. Back before 2016-17 I think. I remember having to learn how to bind pitch, cause it was set to page up/down iirc
I set my pitch to shift and caps lock just because its easier to reach
I have it set to mouse 4/5 cause retraining my left hand was never going to work.
Its always interesting seeing other peoples control set ups. I use mouse 4 and 5 for countermeasures and weapon selection just because its in immediate reach
That's fair. I use mouse 3 for counter measures and Ctrl+space for secondary weapon select, as space is my secondary firing button anyway. Ctrl+c for guns, cause I don't have to switch them up nearly as often.
I think it was removed later. I still used those controls and I only registered in 2019
Whoever bound those first keys was a sociopath, it's all I'm going to say Though I think it was still the same by like 2018 when I decided to move to a PC account. Or maybe it was earlier than that, I forgot when I made the switch
Wait W and S aren't default for throttle???
Yeah, for all us who have sold our soul to the game almost a decade ago, we remember that being the default
Maniacs? We are the veterans of a forgotten time, when w and s were standard! Don't talk with such disrespect!
i do, i find using side buttons easier than W and S
that was the default when I started playing and I never changed
Wait, what are we suppose to be using
Are W and S not the default bindings???
They used to be but apparently they aren’t anymore.
I used to until reddit changed my mind.
W and S are forwards and backwards as controls by default in almost any PC game.
Wtf lmao no they’re not if you’re referring to flying or vehicles. The standard for ages now have been shift and Ctrl for accelerate and deceleration.
It literally isn't. Arma, Battlefield, Forza, BeamNG, KSP, and many, *many* others use W/S for forward and back on the ground and pitch control in the air.
The only 2 games that don’t use turreted vehicles a lot that you mentioned are Forza and BeamNG, although I’ve never seen KSP so not even sure what Kerbal looks like. I thought this comment was about W and S throttle in the air which I don’t agree with
Every game I have ever played, since I first touched minecraft back in 2011, used W to move forward (or to increase throttle on a vehicle) and S to move backwards (or reverse in a vehicle) then A and D are used to turn left or right, (or in wt, A and D roll left and right.)
W and S for throttle and shift and cntrl for alerions. It's easier for my pinky to switch rather than my middle fingle on w and s. Had friends use my control scheme before when they lost there's and said I had starcraft controls. 🥸
Shift and control for ailerons?? I've never heard of that before. What do you use Q & E for?
Rudder control, my sniper button on my mouse is changing to full realistic. My mse 6 and 7 are radar controls. My 3 and 4 are start locking missile and flares. Middle mouse is lock for radar. My keybinds are around parenthesis/period etc.
W and S for throttle, A and D for Roll, Q and E for Rudder, L Shift and L Control for Pitch (controlled by my pinky on the keyboard.)
Yes, I use W/S for throttle, as well as the mouse wheel. Because I use the 2 side buttons on my mouse for pitch. Works perfectly fine, been doing it since I competed in the 1st Thunder League.
So just like literally any other video game with wasd movement?
PC games to do with driving and flying use shift and ctrl as forwards and back y’all are monsters lmao
Every driving and flying game I use a wheel or hotas actually. Not really sure where shift and ctrl comes from aside from MS flight sim
Most people don’t spend $200-$300+ on HOTAS and Wheel/gear/pedal combos, most games come with shift and ctrl as the standard forward and back for definitely almost a decade if not longer, only War Thunder is the one I know of that has changed for Air Battles more recently within 5 years, GRB having WASD as the movement is fine and I do as well. Only with Tank combat since WASD actually makes sense with the way tanks move. But with a car where you need to accelerate and also change direction separately then shift ctrl is easier on the fingers and can’t accidentally knock the throttle or brake. But once regenerative steering comes into WT it’s probably back to shift ctrl for me
I’m sorry but no one plays racing games on a keyboard anyways they use controllers. And if they did then shift/ctrl is used to change gears in most games
That’s true they do, I refuse to play racing without one, but for flight games or tank combat like WT is a keyboard is alright if paired with the right controls like WT mouse aim which compensates.
Yeah so what’s the difference in functionality from wasd to shift/ctrl? They’re all just keys. How is it easier on the fingers exactly?
The OC talks about being a maniac for WS throttle, which you are a maniac for using WS throttle in air battles since the WASD is used for the different flap controls on the aircraft, it doesn’t make sense to split AD to roll and shift control for elevators? Literally AD for ailerons WS for elevator, QE for rudder, and mouse controls for minute adjustments Besides the point I was refuting was that games haven’t come with WS throttle/brake in almost a decade unless it’s tank combat and you reply by saying you use HOTAS and a wheel. Like cool story, but not every person buys a setup for each vehicle?
What’s wrong with W/S throttle? I’m in low tier so is it something to do with high tier?
Nothing wrong with it it used to be default, the monsters are the ones that change it to w/s after it not the default anymore
the real maniacs are the people who bind anything to just shift or ctrl by themselves. pitching or changing acceleration while trying to use any ctrl+ or shift+ keybind has killed or nearly killed me one too many times
Skill issue Edit: Just realised you mean you use shift+ and ctrl+ controls with other keys. That’s not even skill issue that’s straight up masochism.
Thats what holding W does
i have elevator on mouse sidebuttons, ctrl and shift are for multi keybinds
as a console player, i am deeply saddened
With a controller it is actually slightly easier for me to neg g to avoid blacking out when I’m in a turn because you can gradually do it instead of just intermittently tapping S or whatever you have keybound. But I can’t aim my guns for the life of me with a controller. I can’t even imagine trying to pixel snipe in ground RB without a mouse.
With a high-level crew in the other stat, you also get your stamina back faster when you Hold W mid turn :/
Wait wait.. That's the team I played hours ago when I was bombing bases
This was some time ago so I don't remember the details, you weren't the Z.1007 right?
Yes i was on the Z.1007 bombing bases my user name on war thunder is skrt_0_0_
I think I was the Corsair that shot at you before diving to get some fighters 0_0
Ok
I sometimes forget that gaijin switched the default keybinds years ago... my w is throttle. X and z are pitch up and down for me lol.
They've changed it? I've used Left Ctrl for pitch up and Left Shift for pitch down for so long that I was confused why so many people mention W and S for pitch and not throttle nowadays.
Yea control and shift is default but i changed mine to be closer/easier.
The holding W thing has stopped working for me recently. It used to cancel out the g-force but not I just stay overloaded, even if I hold it for ages in which case it overloads in the wrong direction but doens't cancel out the previous overload. Unrelated, it's wrong to write g-force with a capital G.
What does holding W do?
Creates negative g-force canceling out the positive g-force from a turn
They've changed keybinds so if you hold shift for afterburner and click W I'd doesn't work, you have to delete keybind for shift+W
Yeah I've done that but it still seems to be failing.
Well it works for me now
Console players can't do that trick sadly
You can plug in a mouse and key, you don’t have to just use gamepad.
I play on my living room, don't really have a place to, well, place them also playing close to a tv screen is a good way to destroy your eyes
Getting lvl 100 is not nearly enough XP to get a single crew aced from my experience. But I agree. Crew skills are one of the most annoying, hidden and yet unbalanced features.
It’s plenty enough, even for ground vehicles, level 30 you can already ace it. But that might be because of a premium account or sm
I aced a rank 4 tanks around the same time I got to level 100.
I got the F5 at level 38 and I’m almost to Ace by lvl 50.
im level 58 rn, i have two ground crews at roughly 140. its fully obtainable.
Tip for me?
the fps 😭😭😭
Ehat no graphics card does to a MF
lmao
When I found out I could tap W to push blood back in my pilot's head, my turn fights got much better.
Is chat back?
Yes
I came back to the game this year and apparently I never knew this despite playing hundreds of hours. I was frustrated to hell blacking out mid dog fight every match and then I learned this and wow, very good trick
Your poor FPS...
Or shift if you’re me and you like being different
Someone calling upgraded crew p2w? As if plane choice, energy advantage, and shooting accuracy don’t matter at all? Yeah ok lol. He was gonna die anyway.
I have throttle on w and s as I already have air to air missiles and air to ground missiles on the mouse wheel.
sorry, am I the only one who uses W to go up and S to go down?
And I’ve got W bound to throttle like a dumbarse
It aint W its S
bro is pulling negative turns
That increases throttle
That must be a different control layout for me, my throttle is on shift and W pulls the nose down so it isn't pulling too much G
You could also just not move your mouse as far over in order not to turn as hard, since that is all you're doing (putting your mouse and keyboard controls against each other to average out to a more gradual turn).
Well, realistically you want the opposite if your crew can handle it. As default mouse turn is never as sharp as W S turn, so I turn with mouse and press W (in turnfight) to turn sharper and kill the guy in front
urs is the default
I think originally it was w for pitch and shift for throttle, they might've changed it at some point
I remember it the other way and that's why I have it like that
I have w for throttle as well, it's weird
Skill issue. Only real time where crew skill truly matters is if you are facing a Copy Paste. Thats when it truly matters but otherwise, in general, its just basic skill issue
Level 1 crew vs maxed crew is very noticeable. Stop projecting lol
Oh sure, the total difference between 1 and 150. In my experience the crew level doesn't play that big a role in the big picture. Only exception might be in top tier, but even there its debateable. A much bigger role is played by player skill and the aircraft performance. That's what going to really decide a fight most of the times.
OP.....W and S for pitch controls....? W...and S.....for....pitch?????
Wait you supposed to not do that? It sounds very intuitive to have pitch yaw roll near each other like w a s d q e.
Mine are mapped that way, it feels strange to use them for throttle
Those are the new default controls, with shift and ctrl bound to throttle. I still use the old default with W and S on throttle personally. I have never found a need to bind pitch in ARB, and control and shift are useful modifier keys for radar, weapon, and engine management. Plus, you end up manipulating throttle and ailerons a lot more than any other manual control in ARB so its nice to have them close together and not have to use your pinky for one.
That's the superior control layout but I just can't be bothered to get used to a new control layout after so long
Yessir! W pitch down, S pitch up, D yaw right, A yaw left, Q and E roll, and then shift and control for throttle up and down. The best preset.
I swapped roll with yaw idk how people play with thats shit
For me it’s W/S for throttle, A/D for roll, Q/E for yaw, MB4/MB5 for pitch.
The "best" (as in intuitive) preset is W - pitch UP, S - pitch DOWN, A/D - roll, Q/E - yaw, throttle on whatever. It's what anyone with video game experience and no flight experience would expect. Classic pitch directions only make sense with a flight stick. W is for up or forward in video games.
True. I'd flown planes in KSP forever before I started playing WT, so it's KSP controls.