Consider this. When there were five planes, the noob with a level 2, which most had coming over from the training wheels server was outclassed, by three steps up. Now a noob can come across earlier, and it is not uncommon to be outclassed by up to six classes.
I slid into Moraf without having bought and upgraded all the palnes yet, as the prices went up a year ago, and even with a couple buys to suport Zup I don't have either Sopwith, the Italian Nueiport, or the Fokker DVII. I do have a DVIII, without a single upgrade, and for BTC or BTB palying German its the go to plane. Head on against my Fokker triplane, with it target mass I usually run 2-1. With the slow, unstable D-8 it's more like 3-4 to 1. It is hard to hit, and if you are trying to move pixel by pixel to hit one you are a big target in any allied plane, especially my formerly top rated Se5 and the immensely massive tripehound, which leaves tripe all over the field.
I don't have a problem with the D-8, i just don't think you should have to enagge a late 1918 aurcraft with an early 1915 one, as this is historically innaccurate and frustrating game play. As rabbit suggested, bring in the Allied Buzzrd, also low profile and FAST, or reduce the speed of the D-8 to something historically accurate (it was slower than the Se5, SPAD, Camel, etc in real world.) Or make the matches set by year, and only the top plane in that year is available (1917, no D8)