One major flaw in the current system is that extra squad slots cannot be unlocked free of charge. Only event-exclusive squads can use dedicated event slots. F2P newcomers without past event rewards are stuck with merely four basic slots. One slot has to be reserved for vehicles, leaving three for infantry, which greatly restricts tactical options.
What adjustments should be made to the game?
- Add two silver-buyable squad slots for every player following War Thunder’s design
- Double in-match silver income without adjusting experience points
- Implement protection rules across BR1 to BR3
- Extra revisions to be supplemented
As a veteran player, I purchased extra gold slots during discounts plus two bonus slots from premium account, totaling 12 slots. I can build versatile squads for all four nations across every battle rating.
Playing on my friend’s account made me realize the massive gap between veterans and new players. Casual gamers mostly buy the monthly battle pass at most. Few will get premium squads or an extra slot, and most refuse continuous premium subscription. They cannot gain extra slots and are confined to the original four slots, hindering long-term progression.
Maxing out squads and fully upgraded weapons costs massive silver. Slow resource farming traps numerous new players at BR1 and BR2. They frequently get outmatched by well-developed max-rank premium squads. According to community statistics, plenty of gamers quit the game at low tiers.
We have no intention to restrict veteran players, nor is account banning a viable solution. The only way out is system optimization to offer better development prospects for beginners.
Compared with War Thunder, overpowered vehicles are scarce and mostly traded on the marketplace, unable to dominate matches widely. In Enlisted, veterans with abundant slots can assemble a full lineup including machine gun units, radiomen, assault troops, APCs and tanks, gaining overwhelming advantages over new arrivals.
The shortage of starting slots is the main reason for poor player retention. Three or four friends I invited have quit eventually. They complain about limited initial slots, underpowered event squads, and locked premium vehicles restricted to vehicle slots instead of event slots. Besides, most players are unwilling to pay annual fees for premium account.
Therefore, the dev team needs to revise relevant mechanics to improve new players’ gaming experience and keep more people in the game.
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Ultimately, the game gives people an impression that players can hardly thrive without spending real money.
Free-to-play users get no bonus gold coins, extra experience buffs or additional squad slots from a premium account.
Stuck with only four basic squad slots, players have to pick between aircraft or tanks for their lineup, and they will struggle badly in matches
This so-called free-to-play game is more akin to offering nothing more than a trial pass.
Compared with it, War Thunder is far more player-friendly.
I played WT for two full years without any purchases before I decided to spend money voluntarily. Its monetization guides players gradually. By contrast, this game makes it obvious that power largely relies on top-up payments.
I will say, if premium went on sale more often, and for straight cash OR gold, it would help a lot. I never realized how limiting 4 slots (and 1 vehicle) was until i did a couple elite BP and had enough spare gold left to buy 1 Axis squad slot on sale. Even just that was a complete game changer.
I got 1 year of premium during the last sale, and it’s the best deal in the game by far. Premium squads look cool, but don’t add much functionality, if any, depending on the squad (they’re ALL extremely over-priced) but extra squad slots totally change the game (was lucky enough to get and event squad for ussr and usa in the boxes last round as well, to fill the free event squad slot, but unfortunately I don’t play them much. Still good fortune though).
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For instance, one of my friends doesn’t have much disposable money. I felt bad for him and gifted him the Sichuan Thompson squad. Later, he used the bonus gold from the pack to buy an extra squad slot during a discount.
Without bonus slots from premium account, he barely managed to assemble a viable lineup: M42 Union Defense, Charlton machine gun squad, Sichuan Thompson squad, Chaffee, Bren and P38.
Other than tedious silver grinding or direct real-money purchases, I can hardly see how free-to-play or low-spending players can progress smoothly from BR2 to BR3 and BR5. Outfitting squads and vehicles costs hundreds of thousands of silver, which drains savings rapidly.
Right now, playing US BR2 is extremely frustrating for him; he constantly gets overwhelmed in combat.
It’s hard to see how the game can keep attracting new players. Newcomers frequently get crushed by fully built veteran squads, and most quit after repeated bad experiences.
Squad slots and premium accounts do go on sale, but they still require continuous spending. Honestly, it’s almost a better deal to buy the Object 279 in War Thunder.
New players are basically forced to spend money just to get a decent gaming experience right from the start. This overly aggressive monetization design simply drives new audiences away.
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Also i think more frequent sales on premium time and squad slots, OR, reducing the cost by 25% but keeping the on-sale price the same (so less of a discount, but the same cost on sale as now) would get more people onto the premium time bandwagon. Also maybe every major update they could give 1 week of premium to everyone as a marketing tactic. Once you’ve played with extra squad slots and extra silver (especially 2 vehicle slots and bonus silver while boxes are on) it’s good incentive to buy in. Hard to live without after having it.
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Frequent discount promotions would be ideal, yet price cuts only show up on anniversaries and Christmas, such opportunities are pretty rare.
Veteran players have to save up funds all year long and make bulk purchases once these limited sales kick in.
The battle pass with regular updates is currently the only cost-effective option available.
When I try to invite new players to give this game a shot, they always complain that it is cheaper to buy Battlefield 1 and Battlefield V for just a few bucks.
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I get that. I technically have the money, but find it real hard to justify spending it on freemium content (when i could spend it on beer and food and guitar fx pedals…). For people who actually don’t have the money, but also like the game, it’s gotta be annoying at the least, and completely off-putting at most. They (snail) need to understand that having more people playing, even if they spend zero dollars, still ultimately enriches them and is better for the game, as fuller lobbies and more balanced games means more money-having people spend more of their money
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Exactly. On top of that, the current pre-order bundles always guarantee one underwhelming unit out of the two. Take the Skink as an example; it overheats after firing merely 20 rounds, the heat management is absurdly poorly designed.
The game is plagued with numerous bugs, arbitrary mechanical restrictions, and no official roadmap updates. It looks like the project is barely hanging on. The roadmaps for 2025 and 2026 turned out to be practically meaningless.
While War Thunder keeps shooting itself in the foot with questionable changes, Enlisted seems stuck in stagnation due to insufficient development funding.
To put it plainly: the devs aren’t capitalizing on chances to boost revenue, nor are they taking opportunities to promote the game. Players on the Chinese server are growing impatient waiting for updates.
The target audience is WWII enthusiasts, yet everything here costs far too much. Many players would rather spend a small amount of money to buy Easy Red 2 instead.
Carry service providers within the community usually demand accounts with premium time, premium squads and enough squad slots. Plain starter accounts are generally looked down upon.
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As a Canadian I would have bought (overpaid) my first premium if the Skink came with a Canadian squad, even if it sucks. I’m not the only one. Wasted opportunity for basically the effort of putting a slightly different coloured green uniform and giving names like “MacDonald” and “Gallant” to some soldiers.
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As much as i hate it if they properly implemented skill based matchmaking this could be possible… too many vets prefer to sit in br2-3 or even BR1 Should be ashamed if you main BR1… honestly.
However i do understand the dislike of high tier… but playing in BR1 routinely i find shameful.
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They would need to adjust the matchmaking to +/- 0 AND implement a new rank system. New BR1 players should never be uptiered, BR4 is in a bad spot because it doesn’t compete well in BR5. For 1 point a win and 1 for BH, it is hard to get too 200 points playing top tier, hence why vets grind BR2-3. If they gave a point for EVERY BH award, then vets can play for fun in top tiers and not worry about the grind.
It is not hard to get marshall only playing 5 
And that is not the reason people only play 3… it’s because they don’t like the gameplay of 5… so let’s not make things up.
Or wait are you implying that’s how it would be if they implemented new point system?
True…but it’s more headache with the spammed HE. It’s the gameplay of BR5 that’s off and BR4 becomes irrelevant.
-Silver slots for new players will not help them because new players need the silver to buy supplies and unlock more squads. Silver squads would be for players that are half way done with a nation
- more silver per matches could help a fair amount but they did reduce the amount of silver needed to buy equipment and perks are now free
-If youre in br2 or br3 you do not need “protection rules”. what new players in those BR need to do is go back to br 1 and learn the absolute basics of the game because to get to br2 or 3 you need a good 10-50 hours of gameplay.
- the best thing they can do for new players is keep them at br1 for X amount of hours or have some type of custom match where they can try the higher BR vs only bots and still get silver and exp at a boosted rate so they can upgrade squads and buy upgraded weapons