Does HTC understand that the ENY thing has totally failed?

[TequilaChaser]

another thing the ENY limiter has brought forth is now the map looks like this:

Rook horde hitting an undefended field or lightly defended field

Knight horde hitting an undefended field or lightly defended field

Bish horde hitting an undefended field or lightly defended field

everyone is to scared to engage with out numbers, this is a very sad sight to see in a WWII flight simulation combat fighter online war game.........when I say with out numbers I mean if they don't have a 4 to 1 advantage they will not engage yet they will call "whimpy monkey runner" to the 1 when it is 4 chasing him.....

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by Pongo
Slapshot.
I have played over 30 hours this month. I think that is a valid sample.
It has been going on for weeks. I didnt embelish at all.
I did see within 10% of parity last night though!
Maybe flying knigit you dont notice as much. those 3 rooks your 40 person hoard is chasing put up such a good fight that your not noticing how few they are.
As soon as there is anywhere near parity in numbers the knights get slaped down...

Your disareements would have had more meaning if you had used them when the knights where whining about what was near parity in comparison to what we are seeing now.

Your basically full of crap.

Pongo ...

If you would put your ego and internet tough guy act, off to the side, you might be able to hold an argument. I am done discussing this with you ... you bring nothing to the table but BS and testosterone.

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
For the hours I check the arena, this has been the player load for weeks. Sorry ... but those are the numbers I've been seeing. I wouldn't say "for weeks" if I hadn't seen it for that long. When I embellish, you'll know it because it'll be very graphic and completely over the top. If this was the occasional or even weekly Sunday-night bash kind of thing I wouldn't even mention it - but it's every night.

ENY was supposed to make things better and all it did was move the problem and intensify it. If the goal was to make playing worthwhile for anyone logging in, then there is clearly much work left to be done.

DoK ...

Well what you see and what I see are not completely different ends of the spectrum, but rather a different interpretation.

Yes  ... maybe the Knights have out-numbered Rooks, but has it been terribly lopsided ... consistently ... for weeks ? I don't think so ... haven't seen any real swarming and complete bulldozing of the maps as of late nor have I had to revert to flying a P-47 or a C205 all the time.

I logged on this afternoon and logged on tonight and really haven't seen a tremendous swing in base ownership ... yet supposedly we are tremendously overnumbered .. according to some.

Listen ... I am not comfortable, at this point in time, fighting for the Knights ... but the squad has not chosen to move as of yet, so we must endure the ENY limiter and forced to fly higher ENY planes when its active ... which is not something that I have had to endure alot lately ... even tonight I could fly the Spit V and the P-38 with no problem.

[DoKGonZo]

Bases won't change hands much if vultching is the goal.

[XrightyX]

I like Flakbait's idea.  Make distance and supplies more of a factor.  


And, I like being outnumbered and gangbanged.  I won't complain.  Just more people to shoot at.  Newbs and the "poor of spirit" start to log.  Then the 262s and 163s are cheaper.  All the better if the NME are forced to fly 205s and P40Bs .

[flakbait]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
Interesting, FlakBait ... I'll need to ponder on it some.

You'd need to make the capture timer something a bit longer so that it is at least possible to ferry 3 loads of troops to capture a field.

But I would expect massive whineage when folks can't up from the nearest base with full fuel and ammo - regardless of the reason. Many, many good ideas have been axed because flying more than 5 minutes to a fight is just too long.

Oh I agree that there's a few points which need refinement, and some tinkering with the capture timer is required, but the idea itself is sound. I originally proposed this in HT's own thread regarding a time limit between sorties. Since the original idea stank to high heaven, I figured that instead of hollering long and loud that it reeked, I'd cook up something better and holler about that.

I also agree that the whiners will come out in droves if this idea is ever implemented. $5 says it's the Quake XXVIII mentality FFA tail-chasers that whine the most, since they won't be able to do what they want when they want. Well, here's another surprise: with the current system, you can't do that anyway! And what's worse, with the current system you're forced to swap sides to fly the ride you want if your country is over-populated. With this system you won't have to change sides; just change bases and there's your ride. The supply limits would spread out the horde, which can mean either:

A) The Mongolian Horde is forced to fly an extra 3 minutes to hit the target they want
B) The Horde hits many targets along a wider front to spread out, and minimize, the supply strain.

Another benefit is that a resupply lag will choke off the horde if they over-extend a given base. Fly too many ops from the same field and there's not enough gas to fill everybody up. Bombs? Sorry, those P-38 drivers took the last six. You'll have to wait for a resupply convoy before you can load any. Want to fly anyway? I hear A22 doesn't have a supply problem, you could fly from there. I'd also limit how much resupply could be flown in by players. A single C-47 can hold 3,700 lbs at max weight. Which is half a dozen 500 pound bombs, or about 600 gallons of gas if you're ferrying fuel. Not nearly enough to fuel a whole squadron as our current "magic box" allows. Then again, if twenty people want to get crates from twenty bases and fly 'em in to bring the op level up, there's no reason to stop 'em. I'd like to see them keep it up, though. Cause eventually someone will get bored of supply runs and dump the goon to drive a hot rod fighter.

Base repairs would require shipments of replacement parts from the factory. Creating a supply network slightly more expanded and orderly than the current one would be required. Trains would ship the big loads out to forward supply depots, where trucks would take over to spread things out to the dumps, and then the bases. Again this creates a lag between a base getting damaged and getting fixed, but after a period of time since the forward dump would have some spares on hand. However, the instant base repairs from six trucks would cease. Flying in repair supplies would not be limited, but there would be a slight (a minute at most) lag between dropping them off and the base getting fixed up by a given percentage. Why this odd limit? Aside from stopping the insta-fix, its also logical: you have to unload and unpack that stuff to use it. Yes, automated truck convoys that drop off stuff would also be subject to this.

Freighters would haul a similar load from the main port out to smaller ports, where trucks could take over to move those shipments to dumps or depots. Another benefit of the smaller ports is increased use of naval forces. Manned subs, destroyers, and PT boats could strike out from the mini-port to almost anywhere. They could also defend it rather effectively. If you manage to take an enemy mini-port, then a few of your freighters will start moving supplies in. Once you take a field near the mini-port, trucks would start supplying it. Miniports would also have a single runway, rearm pad, and a small hangar along with basic Gv facilities. More for defense or to rearm a fighter/gv than to attack outright.


Well, there's the whole monster. It would most likely take several dev cycles to get the whole thing implemented. The kicker is, once implemented players will actually have an effect on the country. Bombing a radar factory means nobody gets their radar rebuilt until the factory is rebuilt and new parts can be shipped. If the main port gets bombed, it'll be a while before freighters can start hauling stuff to your outlying bases. Smart players will quickly figure out how to strike a country without over-extending their own supplies. FFA furballers will most likely whine their heads off about the lack of fuel. There's a reason for the dueling arena, and H2H hosts are usually running FFA games. But this system doesn't break up squads, it lets a player fly what they want, and yet chokes off The Horde if too many fly from the same field or group of fields.

It'll also do one other thing: give new life to a strat system that hasn't really changed in basic function in nearly five years.



-----------------------
Flakbait [Delta6]

[Pongo]

Slapshot. then leave the thread. You think your being mr polite or reasonable. Your not, your just lieing. You like haveing a huge advantage in numbers so you lie to maintain it.

The Knights at the time I posted this thread had had a routine 2 to 1 advantage vs the rooks and it had been as high as 3 to 1 on several occasions. That was for weeks at a time.


At the time I posted the original post in this thread it was true. Your just full of crap for denying it.
The knights only start to get effective a 50% advantage.

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
Bases won't change hands much if vultching is the goal.

So very true !!!

[MOSQ]

Slapshot,
I agree that the bases keep going back and forth on the big maps, with little progress made. Since this thread started we were on the big maps, the last few nights we've been on small maps and they've been reset twice in 24 hours.

I'm sure a great deal of the reason that the hordes are having troubles steamrolling is the out numbered side has figured out that if only 2-5 players concentrate on killing troops at the horde's bases, you can bring the steamroll to a dead stop.

I admit that I have been using this tactic quite effectively to stop the Nit steamroll first on the southern part of Ozkansas, and then on the Nit advance on northern Mindanao.  Even though we Rooks were out numbered 2:1 by Nits both times, all they could do was send a horde to a base and trash/vulch it, but we had killed their troops for two bases back behind their lines.  On Mindanao Nits had taken all the Rook northern coastal bases clear around to A61. A couple of us took out the troops at all the back bases clear back to A1. That was the end of the Nit offensive drive.

And before someone complains about Mosq suicide/ base troop killing/ augering; I almost never died doing this. If you take a fast plane like a Tiffy for nearby bases or P-51 for the longer range ones, the ENY limiter pretty much assures you the opposition won't have a plane that can catch you. But only because they were too stuck in the horde vulch program to bother having a moderately high fighter/interceptor cap on their bases where troops were still available. They would only try to intercept once I was inbound in radar range, in which case it's too late to stop or even to catch on the egress.  

So in that regard the ENY limiter works. But I still don't like it. There has to be a better system.

[Pongo]

Well as to the purpose of this thread.
The numbers have settled to where its just a normal in the bucket type situation with occasional parity.
So the ENY thing couldnt be demonstrated to have failed as it could when the thread started. It can just be demonstrated to have not changed anything.

[Urchin]

I don't know how much experience you all have playing PvP MMO type games.. but I can tell you from experience (and I've run the gamut from FPS[Counter-Strike, BF-series, etc], to RPG[EQ, DAOC, Shadowbane], to Aces High) that people in general, as a herd, will ALWAYS take the easiest way possible.  

For games like CS, that means finding the "best weapon" and using it.. constantly.  To the exclusion of all (and I do mean ALL) others.  For games like EQ, or DAOC, it means finding the best "template" and using it.  Cookie cutting prevails.  When I played on Rallos Zek in EQ (kind of a 'almost FFA' scenario.. you could attack and kill any player within 4 levels of you either way).. the server was absolutely filled to the brim with naked wizards.  Why?  Because the risk-reward was tilted absolutely in favor of a naked wizard.  A wizard could kill hurt people in one hit, didn't need any equipment to do it, and could teleport away from danger if he happened to get in over his head.  So.. for every 10 people on RZ, at least 6 of them were playing naked wizards.  

DAOC shifted the balance somewhat... instead of everyone playing naked wizards... everyone played as a rogue.  Furthermore, one "country" had much more powerful rogues than the other two, so for most of my DAOC career probably 50% of the people on my server played as "shadowblades" (the "best" rogue.. or the "best" version of the "best" class).  Some innovative guy discovered that a different class could do it all exceedingly well (a caster), so after the shadowblade craze came an enchanter craze.  The folks that could afford to run more than one account still used shadowblades, but for people who wanted something that was dominate in both PvE (killing monsters, i.e. 'levelling') and PvP (killing other players.. for shadowblades and EQ's naked wizards a.k.a "ganking"..) an enchanter was ideal.  

The dev's for Camelot tried to keep abreast, every time some guy found a new way to make a class "uber" and set off a new craze, that class would get nerfed back into line with the rest... but it is a losing proposition.  

How does this tie in with AH?  Simple.  In games like EQ or DAOC, your "template" decides about 45% of how "good" you are... and the amount of time you spend playing the game determines about 45% (i.e. level, equipment).  "Skill" is probably about 1-2%, with luck making up the rest.  

In a FPS like CS, your equipment is about 75% of what makes you effective, with "skill" making up most of the balance, barring luck's (mis)fortune.  

In a game like AH, again the biggest factor is equipment (what plane you choose to fly), but the second biggest factor isn't skill.. it isn't even close.  The second biggest factor is numbers.  How many people are you flying with and against.  Those two factors account for about 90% of "who wins".  

Don't get me wrong, there is a definate (if small) effect on the outcome if one is "skilled".  However, a "skilled" pilot in plane X will not defeat 3 or 4 "unskilled" pilots if they are in planes that are equal or better than plane X.  

Obviously, taking the time to "master" the "art of fighting" (ACM, BST, OMGWTF, whatever you want to call it) is MUCH to difficult for your average gamer.  It is a truism.  It should be immediately obvious to anyone who spends more than about 1 minute a day in the MA.  I saw a guy talking to some other guy after a kill (not sure who killed who, wasn't really paying that much attention until I saw) "Yea, great flying.  I was trying to drag you back into the pack but you wouldn't bite."  When I asked the guy that said that how long he'd been playing, he told me "3 years."  

That really hit home... the "newbies" that refuse to fight unless they've got an overwhelming advantage, and run at the drop of a hat AREN'T NEWBIES!  They are "cagey" and "skilled" "veterans"... at least they think they are.  And if you are a new player, who do you learn how to fly from?  The people around you.  At least I did, I assume some of you folks out there may have just started playing this out of the blue and known what the hell you are doing, but for most people the learning curve is pretty steep.  

I know back when I first started playing, I saw guys that would fight.  Under any circumstances, they'd fight.  I used to look up to Hblair... he was very good in a 109 (well, far better than me anyway).  I bugged the hell out of him... "Let me join your plane.. send me some film of you fighting.. etc etc".  I wanted to be as good as him someday.  I wanted people to see a 109/190 and go "Oh ****, that might be Urchin!"  Why did I want that?  Simple, I am a competitive person, and back when I first started playing, the game was full of competitive people that enjoyed flying (and fighting) in WW2 fighters.  In fact, I picked the LW planes because I wanted to make a name for myself fighting in planes that weren't the "best" planes available.

When I first started playing the C-hog was the "best" plane.  Actually, it was the "best" purely because it had 4 Hispanos, which are modelled as one-hit kill guns in this game.  The flight performance is actually pretty average, but if one got a snapshot on you the fight was over.  So, people flew the C-hog.   Why?  Because it made it easier for them to kill other people.  Back then the population was small compared to now, and the average skill level quite a bit higher, so most people would fly in small groups (well, smallish anyway) and typically if you took off alone and headed to some enemy field, the odds were good you'd be met in between by some enemy plane looking for a fight.

After HT decided the C-hog was being "overused", the atmosphere in the MA changed a bit.  It has been sliding towards the "run" side of the "fight---run" bar ever since, probably because the "best" plane is now also the fastest plane.  However, as the population grows (with the concurrent decline in skill), people find that is is usually much to difficult to kill someone if they are in a plane with similar performance to their own.  And since HT has decided to make the planes available to all sides equally, typically the "best" planes are fielded roughly equally by all 3 sides.  So, what other options do your average gamers have?  

Only 2, as far as I can see (seeing as 3 things impact the outcome of a "fight", which I am defining very loosely as two planes interacting with one another and involving gunplay)

1.  They can get better.  

2.  They can fly with more people.  

Which one do you think is easier?  

HT can't cure this problem... it is a basic flaw of human nature in my opinion.

[DoKGonZo]

Originally posted by Pongo
Well as to the purpose of this thread.
The numbers have settled to where its just a normal in the bucket type situation with occasional parity.
So the ENY thing couldnt be demonstrated to have failed as it could when the thread started. It can just be demonstrated to have not changed anything.

For years and years it always was that the two smaller countries ganged up on the biggest - that's why 3-country configurations worked. Now it's backwards - the two bigger countries gang up on the smallest. It's not even a question of going to a 2- or 4-country alignment - the behavior will be the same and will ruin the game for a substantial percentage of people.

You Bish/Knits better hope that the Rooks don't just start bailing. Because if we do and HT sees this becoming a 2-country game he may start putting in balancing code that'll make ENY look like a pinch on the backside.

[Waffle]

It's all in the eyes of the the one who's having a tough time- because they think they're getting "pinched" by two sides.

Got news - happens to all sides. Bish get hit in the middle from both sides...don't say it doesn't happen. Look at last 2-3 resets.

Early AM times, (1am-5am central US) you will find an average of around 40-60 knits - 35-45 rooks and 15-30 bish.

I wish the eny limiter would be enforced when the numbers are low...under 100 people  total. Would set it so maybe if theres under 50 folks - the eny  limiter would not take effect.

[Midnight]

Good post, Urchin

I've explained my feelings on HTC's ENY limiter many times already. I say again that it is a horrible idea, poorly executed and the simple way out. Rather than improving the game and making the horde ineffective by limiting supplies (many methods have been offered) or altering how newly captured fields can be used, HTC just continues to let the game become more and more of a simple furball that moves around on un-rememberable pieces of hilly terrain.

I also want to get out of this stupid stereotype of flying in the horde. Anyone who flies in the 412th can tell you that we are always the ones who find out where the enemy is and the friendlies aren't. We HATE competing for kills against the hordes of cannon-armed spits, La7s and N1ks. That is why you will usually find us somewhere between an enemy field and a friendly field that is being attacked. We are looking for the hordes of enemy (who think they are going to a vultch-fest) so we can shoot them down.

The 412th has gone the route of switching countries to keep our preferred aircraft (P-51D) and it is just a big hassle for the members who have to keep asking where we are and who can switch countries or who is stuck in what country for the next 5 hours, etc. - And NO, I'm not flying something else.

[CavemanJ]

Originally posted by Midnight

The 412th has gone the route of switching countries to keep our preferred aircraft (P-51D) and it is just a big hassle for the members who have to keep asking where we are and who can switch countries or who is stuck in what country for the next 5 hours, etc. - And NO, I'm not flying something else.

Can I get an 'Amen Brother!'

the whole ENY thing sucks to much that the total amount of suckage cannot be measured with existing technology.

People cried about the "Rook Horde"...  RJO was dreamed up and got started, and several squads changed thier squad nights to be the same night as RJO.  Eventually "The Horde" was present once a week even if it wasn't an RJO night, just because several squads all had squad night on the same night, and as they started hitting places they'd build momentum and draw more people to them.