Okay... I've decided I hate the new progression system. Every feature I've come across (barring one, which I'll get to later) I've absolutely hated.
I could get used to the new UI elements, even though I feel they're clunky at the moment and it takes me longer to do things than it used to.
I'm okay with the new flight models and damage models and how everything seems more fragile. I was okay with it before, but this isn't bad either.
But this progression system pushes things over the edge. I'd always thought this game was the grindiest of the games of this sort out there. But they've gone and made it worse, and while I'd threatened to quit several times, accepted it and slowly gotten used to it, they've gone and made it worse, much worse, and I don't think I can stand for it any longer. Maybe they're still on the balancing act period of this new update, but even if they roll back the difficulty a little, I don't see them returning to where they were, and as I said, where they were was right at the knife edge of what I was willing to accept.
It's not so much the numbers on the research tree. Those are sort of reasonable, if we were still working under the old system. But we're not. The XP that we gain now is SIGNIFICANTLY less than the XP we gained before. I'm not sure of the exact ratio, but where I was earning 10-15k XP on a good game before, I'm lucky if I get near 1k aircraft research now. I just don't feel like there's any sense of progression anymore. You've got bars filling up, but it's all confusing and that part of my brain which actually responds to those bars slowly filling isn't responding anymore. (I don't think I hit 1k aircraft xp in any of my battles even with the current 4x event going on)
You're also now forced to pick where you want to work on the tree. And where before you'd just get a bunch of planes dumped in your lap, now you have to decide. Those decisions aren't always easy. I'm looking at the American tree now and I honestly don't want to touch any of the next tier of planes. I'm not interested in the B-17s, even though I'll be forced to research them. The P-51 is a classic, but I've heard so many horror stories about it in the game, I'd just planned on avoiding it altogether. Besides, you never see it being flown outside of historical events with plane limitations. That leaves the F8F which, I honestly know nothing about and it doesn't excite me to have it in front of me to unlock. And the rest of the trees aren't much better. Before, it was just a slow steady crawl through the level numbers to my goal of jets, but now I just feel like I'm working on things which I don't want.
The one redeeming feature is since now the tiers are compressed a bit, you've got planes meeting up now which never did before, and while that might be a bit unfair at the upper tiers as it's always been when jets meet props, I just giggled with joy when I made a P-38 absolutely explode in mid air with my tier 1 Lagg-3-8.
Am I giving up on the game?
Not yet. I'll wait and see how they handle rebalancing all of this.
Will I give up on the game if they don't fix it to my liking?
I'm not sure yet. It's still one of the most fun multiplayer flight sims around. I do have fun when I fly. But even if I don't quit completely, you won't find me grinding anymore, for basically any reason no matter what sort of event they put on. Even Golden Eagles couldn't fix this problem. So I'll probably just make do with what I've got unlocked already, and if I unlock anything in the process, eh, it's there.
What it has done is given me a grim outlook for ground forces. If this is what I can expect from the bottom up on a whole new set of vehicles, I'm just going to say no thanks.
TL;DR: No sir, I don't like it. Grind is even grindier and Ground forces might be completely off the table for me as a result.