If we went to this, I suspect we’d likely get the same response to it that we’re getting with ENY.
I advocated for something like this in free multi-tiered setup where play is free with a limited plane selection but perks could be purchased or earned to get later equipment. Perhaps with a small perk balance when an account is opened (to get the hooks in them). The concept is basically that you have a limited early war equipment selection for free players with none of the current perked hardware ever available to any of the free players (no 262 without a subscription). Perks could be earned or purchased for all the equipment we take for granted daily as subscribers. The cost for perks would be pretty substantial. Something to akin to “perked” equipment costing a buck and perks being sold in five dollar increments. Basically, if you’re a free player and want to get out of that P-40 and into a P-51, spend 10 days grinding to earn one plane or blast the credit card to get five.
I think this sounds like a great idea, however, it's been brought up in different flavors before and I'm pretty sure HT said something along the lines of "it's not going to happen" or something to that effect.
FTP would have been great for my kids and I as we sometimes only get to play together a few times a month and I can't justify a $60 a month payment for that. That ship has sailed as we all now play another game together that's completely FTP and has massive amounts of players at all skill levels.
My concern is that for the most part in games like this numbers (make the game interesting) and get more numbers. Once you get below a certain baseline, I think it starts getting harder and harder to get those numbers back, especially when a new player is trying to learn a game populated by vets of many many years and there's no alternative ai targets or anything for a new unskilled player to do for the most part.
