I like the current scheme for "night". It seems that HTC is trying to acclimate everyone to a new possibility of flying by dimming for dawn / dusk and reducing the icon range a bit. However, going full dark would be pretty hard and while it would be interesting and challenging to fight like that, it would probably only appeal to a hard core minority while the majority would probably be frustrated and leave.
The best compromise I can think of for adding night flying is to use a mixed environment arena system that makes night fighters harder to see (look at & look out) and let them fly in the same arena as everyone else. The idea is to allow a night fighting semantic for those that want the challenge without imposing it on everyone. It would need to simulate a night environment for the night fighter (i.e. most of the time it's dark, with it being slightly brighter around dawn / dusk time frames) without making it night for everyone, so environmental brightness would be essentially opposite of what it is for everyone else. It would need to provide the visibility constraints of night fighting on everyone in the arena in a reasonably fair manner (i.e. night fighters can't be the only type with visibility impairment).
Given that, you could probably add something like the following: Night fighters will have the outside environment display dimmed substantially more than other aircraft in the same arena (i.e. the aircraft clock represents a PM time instead of an AM time for everyone else). Night fighters don't get to see icons for aircraft until they are within gun range (e.g. < 800 yds). Other aircraft in the arena won't see icons for a night fighter until they are within gun range (e.g. < 800 yds). Visibility of the night fighter is reduced for other day aircraft in the same arena. In other words, not only is it hard to see the icon of a night fighter, it's hard to see the aircraft until it is close (e.g. < 1/2 the visibility distance set for the arena). The same is true the other way around. Night fighters can't see other aircraft until they are close (e.g. < 1/2 the visibility distance set for the arena). Night fighters must use ground radar for gross positioning and onboard search radar for closure.
One potential of complaints from day flyers is that night fighters are essentially stealth aircraft that suddenly pop into existence off their tail. If you are flying at night, that's expected, but it's not expected during the day. Given that, the visibility ranges might be tweaked just a tad in favor of day bombers only. In other words, day bombers can see night fighters at a further range and must defend themselves or call in day fighters to help when the night fighter gets close enough, however, day fighters must use the short visibility ranges. Another possibility is to have the night fighter appear as translucent gray at longer ranges and become more solid as the range closes. That way, it's not a pop into existence thing.
Anyway, I don't think full night will ever come along unless it was added as some kind of mixed environment like the above.
