The the greatest thing about the sandbox of Aces High. It is what you make of it.
Exactly ! and with more options, the sandbox gets even bigger, people have even more choice of what they can do.
There is enough gripe about players not getting to fly their precious low ENY birds, imagine telling them they may have to wait weeks.
this is where the perks come in, fly a early war plane for a few sorties, do whatever you want..... strafe the infantry, bomb the trucks, capture the airfield or hunt for other players and when you get enough points, unlock the plane which you want.
And while you do all of that, you are helping the war effort, because if you kill infantry, you move the front, when bomb trucks or train you neglect infantry of having supplies which would longer its spawn rate for example, and hunting other players to prevent them from doing this.
This gives even more options for the 'lone wolf' type of player who is not in a squad, because he can help the war effort and not feel left out even when he is not the greatest stick around.