Right now you can open them as soon as they are dropped which doesn’t give others much time to reach them.
There’s been several times where a good skirmish that could have broken out didn’t because one faction wasn’t able to reach it in time to stop someone from opening it.
Even a 15 second timer after the crate drops before you can open it would help a lot and make supply crates a spot for some fights.
I think it’s because they drop too fast. In DF you had more time to get there and you’d still be waiting for the crate to hit the ground.
The underground theme of TWW doesn’t work as well for this.
I’m 90% sure that crates dropping instantly is a bug. I remember vividly in beta having to wait for the crates to drop with the parachute. I forget when they broke it in beta, but I did report that several times as a bug.
Just like all of the other War Mode bugs though, they ignore it. It’s a low priority for them and they don’t care.
They could add a timer to it, have it display above the crate so you know how long it has until it can be opened. Would bypass the underground problem.
I agree with op.
Indeed, if you don’t happen to be near the drop point when it spawns it is already claimed by the time you can get out of combat and fly even halfway across the zone.