Here is a different reply from Hitech.
I find his argument weak. He makes some assertions about why he thinks a F2P sub-set of planes wouldn't help. Yet he has not explained why such a model has been so successful in games like WT.
Worse case is that none of those F2P'ers would subscribe. But maybe you'd still have a more populated arena so that the players that are paying can have a better gameplay experience with a populated arena with planes to shoot at instead of an endless commute on auto pilot to increasingly harder to find fights. Maybe that makes the arena look more appealing to potential customers. It's the best\cheapest AI you will ever implement. 
More F2P'ers mean more people possibly telling their friends about the game. Some of those other friends might subscribe. That's the cheapest advertising you'll ever buy.
Doesn't matter. Being in charge doesn't make you right, but it does give you the last say. It's his money.
https://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,402218.msg5331095.html#msg5331095
I see where he's coming from, clearly the issue is not the planeset if 65% of players never even leave the main screen. Those players would likely never even realize there were free to play planes. Those are people who are leaving before even getting a chance to realistically interact with the software. It's no different than opening something like Foobar, not liking what you have in front of you, and closing it again to use something you know and trust more (Winamp, in this example
) Even if Foobar offers benefits you don't realize you're missing it's simply because something immediately put you off. Customers, especially paying ones, can be very very finicky when they have lots of options.
Which, I'd argue they don't have lots of options at all. Take the Pacific Theater of WW2 combat aviation. As it sits right this moment their only options are 1) War Thunder, 2) Il-2 1946, 3) Aces High III, and 4) Warbiiiiirrrds (okay, I had to, lets be real. Steam Warbirds is way more dead than AH3.)
1) WT offers a huge playset, but next to no 'depth' to its gameplay for the average player, this is by design.
2) Il-2 1946 is aged, but still quite active with its modding community.
3) We offer depth of play, but have other issues like lack of non-playing community awareness, and UI difficulties.
4) Hahahaha, Warbirds was dead in like 2006 when I finally got the chance to try and join these communities the first time. I'm amazed it exists in any form. (Though, I'd love to tear into its source code and play with some of it. Especially the much older codes.
)
The closest we have to a Pacific WW2 aviation experience that isn't Il-2 1946 or AH3 is the F4U Corsair being added to DCS at some point in the future, which will have some secondary stuff that's very interesting buuuuut sort of vibes in the abyss like many other DCS modules do with not enough secondary bits to make an interesting scenario. Unless you call shooting down 190As painted like IJN/IJA Aircraft 'interesting.'
Though... I shouldn't talk, it's not like this community hasn't ever unloaded the cannons from a zero and pretended they were Ki-43s in scenarios before the Ki-43 got added.
I'm tangenting hard. A development strategy has to start somewhere to move forward, I hope Dale is working towards something ultimately.
