... Yeah, I think this may call for a "lighten up, Francis" from the congregation. The Wargaming games don't have a story or pretend that there is some reason for that (like Team Fortress has that comically flimsy-on-purpose story about the competing gravel companies), because they aren't and don't claim to be simulations of any actual war. They're just big ol' arcadey arena battle games, and restricting players' choice of what equipment to use for the sake of a realism that the game does not otherwise embrace would be arbitrary, annoying, and ultimately pointless. It would repel far more players than it would attract.

That said, War Thunder does have a "historical battles" mode in which players are restricted in what they can use - for instance, in their simulation of the Battle of Kursk, you can be on the German side or the Soviet side, and you have to use their equipment,* and their Battle of Britain sim (which was running as an event last weekend) is limited to British and German aircraft (since there obviously was no tank battle there). I don't play that mode myself because I'm a Dirty Casual, but it's there.

World of Tanks also fooled around with the Historical Battles concept for a while, but they couldn't get it to work and abandoned it. Balancing the teams was too much of a hassle, because real battles (like Kursk) tend to be a bit one-sided. Somebody had enough of an advantage to win them in real life, after all. They had to do things like let one team be twice the size of the other but limited to worse equipment, and things like that, and there just weren't enough hardcore history-oriented players to make that kind of thing worth doing. Their audience is attuned to casual tank mayhem, and even some players who had been saying "gee, historical battles would sure be great" were saying "I stand corrected, make it go away" by the end of the test. :)

All of which is a long way of saying that this is a "looking for meat in the produce aisle" situation, and if that's not a detail that you can adjust your Weltanschauung to overlook, you're probably right in avoiding those games, 'cause with the exception of the specific historical mode in War Thunder, that's not what they're for. Nothin' wrong with that, but it's where you stand.

--G.
*note that War Thunder actually models a lot of Lend-Lease and/or captured-from-the-enemy equipment - there's a Sherman and a Soviet KV-1 in the German tech tree, for instance - so there is some latitude here, but only historically precedented latitude. :)
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Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

Alternately - and this just occurred to me at random earlier today: The World of $WEAPON games and War Thunder Arcade Mode are set in Valhalla. They're not proper wars, just big ol' semi-recreational Einherjar free-for-alls.

Also neatly explains why there are so many commonly available tanks in World of Tanks that either never existed at all, or only existed as one or two prototypes; and why there can be more than two Tenryū-class ships (or more than four Kongō-class ones, or what have you) in World of Warships matches. In Valhalla, you can have as many Porsche Tigers as you want.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

But after reading your idea.. I have to say.

I like your's better.

I have to give Team Fortress 2 props for recognizing this glaring flaw in the game's premise and, rather than just ignoring it, choosing instead to mount a gargantuan lampshade upon it.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

I've been wondering, given the World of Tanks-ish nature of the gameplay, why there is a screen in the 'Mech bay for declaring allegiance to a Successor State (or a Clan, if you're a filthy traitor to all human decency). And intrigued to note that there are two different ways of declaring yourself for the Federated Commonwealth, which makes me wonder if they're planning to implement the FedCom Civil War one of these days.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

As to FedCom...if they do I suspect it's going to be a long ways from now, or run as an event like Tukayyid was.

Well, if, as the website claims, MechWarrior Online's plotline advances in real time, then yeah, it'll be a while, given that the game was set in 3050 at the time of its launch and the FedCom Civil War is in, if my memory of the dates in MechWarrior 4 serves me, 3066. I'll say this for them, if they are thinking of doing it, they're optimistic about the game's longevity. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

Oh, don't hold back. Tell us how you really feel. ;)