Being able to destroy trees would be a nice feature, it isn't that us naysayers don't want it.
The problem is that there are too many trees for the server to track a destroyed/not destroyed flag for them. It is a technical limitation.
ya know, this can be all avoided if they added napalm in the game, and gave it the ability when droped, it could burn down the trees/bushes and clear a path for the tank ppl, they can make it so trees "pop"
like buildings, just every 10 mins
As Karnak says. It has nothing to do with HOW they are destroyed. It's just the fact that they ARE.
Every building that gets blown up in town or on a base has to be tracked by the server, and then that information relayed to every player in visual range. This can be done because there's a relatively small number of buildings (and part of why the new cities can have such a big performance impact).
There are FAR more trees in a given 1 mile x 1 mile terrain tile than there are on an airfield or town. Multiply THAT but your current visual range. That's how many trees would have to be tracked as destroyed or intact by the server.
For example, let's say your visual range in all directions is 25 miles. If I did the circle area calculation right, that means your visual area encompasses a circle of about ~1962 sq. miles. If each 1 sq. mile terrain tile has 30 trees, that's nearly
60,000 TREES that the server would need to track whether or not they were destroyed. And that's JUST for you. Now consider there may be 20-30 people in the air and on the ground that ALL need to be updated with that information.
Can you say lag?