Frame 2 incident.....

[Nomde]

I was the Allied CO for the Squad Ops last night and knew it was gonna be hard from the get-go. I studied the Logs from last week, the tactics used by the axis, and the allied response. To makle a long story short, I spent alot of time trying to develop a plan to stave off the axis, reduce the allied casualties as much as possible, and optimise our attack returns. I expected it to be hard and really didn't expect to come home alive, but I have fun in these events and play these more to be with the community and to fly the planes I love.

I really didn't expect to find anything surprizing looking back at last night logs, given the number advantage the axis had. I just wanted to review the stats and see if there was anything that could have been done differently and to see who had shot what. Nothing was out of the ordinary until I came across a couple players stats, that on second glance, didn't add up. I looked at it again and cross referenced the logs to verify, and then it dawned on me just how much these two players negatively impacted the game for a group of other players, just because they felt they were higher then the rest of us who follow the rules.

I'm writing the following because I want everyone to understand the consiquence that 2 players can have on the outcome of another's enjoyment in the game by not following the CM's 1 life directive

For each attack squad, I had an escort squad. I asked each escort squad to send a couple men out fast and low in a feigning move so as to get the radar flashing elsewhere in order to allow the attackers time to hit their objectives. I know this worked on one occasion, because I saw it first hand.
The 56th was assigned heavy p40's and were met by 2 higher 190's directly over the 56th's target. If these two axis planes had not been there, the 56th would have been clear to drop, as the other axis fighters had been drawn south by the feign move. What really bothers me, is these two 190's i'm talking about had been killed earlier and decided to up for a second life, thereby being able to harass and kill the attackers. This squad would have lived otherwise and would have been able to hit their target, then move south to help the Arabian Knights who were fighting for their lives.

Here's the Logs:

412th FS Braunco Mustangs
azmtrhd[/u]  
22:42:31 ------ Departs From Field #26 in a Fw 190A-5
22:52:37 ------ Bravely Bailed From Damaged Plane.
22:52:41 ------ Departs From Field #26 in a Fw 190A-5
22:58:29 ------ Helps Pand Shoot Down Nomde.
23:02:02 ------ Helps Erebus Shoot Down bustr.
23:02:29 ------ Was Shot Down By shubie. (Crashed)

Pand[/u]  
22:42:29 ------ Departs From Field #26 in a Fw 190A-5
22:50:16 ------ Was Shot Down By Swoop.
22:50:50 ------ Departs From Field #26 in a Fw 190A-5
22:57:07 ------ Shot Down A P-40E Piloted By gorf.
22:57:53 ------ Shot Down A P-40E Piloted By Vlkyrie1.
22:58:29 ------ Shot Down A P-40E Piloted By Nomde.
23:01:15 ------ Helps Tango Shoot Down Thwack.
23:01:27 ------ Shot Down A Spitfire Mk V Piloted By pony.
23:02:02 ------ Helps Erebus Shoot Down bustr.
23:02:32 ------ Shot Down A P-40E Piloted By POLLOCK1.
23:07:46 ------ Shot Down A Spitfire Mk V Piloted By Sandog.
23:08:17 ------ Shot Down A Spitfire Mk V Piloted By Dux.
23:10:57 ------ Shot Down A Spitfire Mk V Piloted By snake3.
23:13:36 ------ Bravely Bailed From Damaged Plane.
23:14:33 ------ Departs From Field #26 in a Gunner-Observer
23:32:52 ------ Arrived Safely At Field #26

Not only did azmtrhd and Pand harass this flight, Pand goes on to shoot down an additional 4 allied pilots. I'm not so upset about my death, but the gentlemen in my squad could have gotten a little more enjoyment out of the Ops. The axis numbers were high enough as it was, so it doesn't seem to me that azmtrhd or Pand were such an assest to the axis that their presence couldn't be done without after being shot down the first time. But because these two just had to up a second life, 12 other players enjoyment were sacrificed.

Midnight,
I've been playing this game awhile and have gotten to know many of the 412th as friends. I've enjoyed flying with and against you as our squads have flown on the various teams. That's why it disturbes me to write this, especially to a squad such as yours who's members knew better, and had a little more respect for the spirit of the game, or so I thought.
I would like your account of what i'm writing up here so I have a better understanding of the stunt your 2 members pulled.

[wklink]

I wouldn't go completely based upon those logs when it comes to some bails and crashes.  I have had instances where I was supposedly shot down although took off, landed and exited the plane.  

I have also seen instances where someone will have a disco on takeoff and it counts as a bail or someone gets credit for being shot down.

[daddog]

Looking into it.  Shot out an e-mail to all concerned asking about it. I hope it is a mistake with the logs or how we are reading them, but it looks pretty clear.

[Nomde]

wklink,
I couldn't agree more. When looking at the logs, you'll see that mike619 is credited with 2 kills. The funny thing is, mike was having problems with his keyboard and wasn't able to fly, so he tried to join reddog or myself as an observer just to have fun watching the game unfold. I believe mike was credited these kills because the nme planes crashed and somehow the game determined he was the closest proxy. I don't know the answer, but it shows the game does have anomilies.

The logs are fairly accurate overall, and all events are listed so you are able to question any events you're not sure about. You can pick those events out by using the log time stamp and constructing a timeline of events then post the questions here.
 
That's why i've posted here, to find out wheather the logs have posted the events correctly. If i'm in the wrong, so be it and I will be the first to apologise to those effected. I have alot of respect for midnight and the 412th. I know pand very well and was surprized to see he was involved. I don't know azmtrhd as well, he may be new and had trouble with the plane, but it was 10 minutes into the game before it shows he crashed and that brings a question to my mind.

In any event, this does show how much any player in the event can effect the outcome of the game tremedously. Even if you only help kill a player and get an assist. That nme player is out of the game and you never know how many friendly players you may have saved by getting that assist. This is part of why I love this game so much, it's realtime against other players.


Dadog,
Thx for getting those emails out, I would like to resolve this quickly. I don't want this to turn into a flamefest even if it was intentional. Let this just be shown how the game and the outcome can be effected.

[daddog]

No problem Nomde. I appreciate your candor. I don’t see a flame fest arising from this thread. The 412th have always been straight up and if anyone had an error in judgment Midnight and or Tango will deal with it I am sure, so I don’t have to. I will keep you posted.

Say hi to ammo for me. That old dog still flying?

[Midnight]

Investigating...

I will inquire with Pand and Motorhead directly.

[Midnight]

I've recieved a response from Pand. Somehow, a mis-understanding of the rules occurred. He believed, at that time, that as long as the fields were still open, players were allowed to take-off again, be it disconnection, crash, shot down, etc. He understands now that this is not the case.

Motorhead, still being somewhat new to squad ops probably had the same mis-understanding.

I appologize for not clarifying this with my squad prior to take-off for the frame. I will be sure to do so from now on. I wish that I knew they were taking off again, as I would have told them that was not allowed. Unfortunately, we were involved in heavy action at that time, and I didn't realize what was going on or that they had been shot down in the first place.

I am not trying to gloss this over any, as breaking the rules is a bad thing to do, no matter what the excuse is. I will suggest, however, that being shot down in the first few minutes of a frame, while the fields are still open could lead to this happening in the future by other players not so farmiliar with the rules. I know for a fact that I have seen this happen in the past when players crash on takeoff.

So, I have 2 questions from this

1. Didn't hitech add a setting for the number of lives a player can have during a session? If so, can or should this be changed to 1?

2. Would it be possible to either design frames so that combat does not occur until the fields are closed, or in cases where fields are so close that combat is bound to happen in the first few minutes, close the fields earlier?

Lastly... should we (as a community) ask HTC to put some more controls into the game that would allow a CM to close fields and only allow new takeoffs on a case-by-case basis by adding a new 'dot' command such as .takeoff playerID fieldID. With this, CMs could close fields right after initial roll time, then if a player discoed, etc. they could ask the CM for permission to takeoff again, the CM could type the command, and that player (and only that player) would get a single take-off window for the specified field. The window would last for 1 minute and if the player didn't take off by then, the window would be closed.

[Dawggus]

First of all, I want to commend Midnight for diligently following up on this.  It shows a lot of integrity on the 412th's part not to get defensive, acknowledge the issue and apologize when appropriate.  If everyone reacted this way, we wouldn't have anything to talk about on the BBS .

Attempting a system fix to these types of situations may create as many problems as it solves.  Many times, because of system lags, pilots crash on take-off, and my opinion is they should be allowed to re-up.  Also, there are many times squaddies show up within 5 minutes or so of launch, and again I think they should be allowed to take off and form-up.  To have all these type of folks send messages to the CM would be a barrage I wouldn't want to deal with.

I think the more practical approach comes in Midnights initial comments.  We should all feel free to question things that look strange, like Nomde did.  We should all follow through on these queries, like Midnight did.  And we should all read this BBS and learn from the mistakes, such as Midnight's idea of reminding the Squad this is a one-live event before each FSO.

We should put in system fixes where practical to address things that could go wrong, and fill in the rest with good, common sense.  This is a great event, well run, with excellent Squads participating.  Because of that it is easy to overlook the few problems that come from time to time .

Cya Up!

Dawg

[daddog]

1. Didn't hitech add a setting for the number of lives a player can have during a session? If so, can or should this be changed to 1?

2. Would it be possible to either design frames so that combat does not occur until the fields are closed, or in cases where fields are so close that combat is bound to happen in the first few minutes, close the fields earlier?

1. Yes they did but it has some "issues" with it that keeps the CM's from wanting to use it.  We are talking about it again on the CM BB. I would like to see a way to have a default flag for everyone to have "one death" and then be able to flag certain squads to have 2 or more. Would be very useful for all our events not just Squad Ops.

2. We could do this, but sometime the design really leans toward early action.

We do leave them open for the guys that make mistakes on take off. This is especially true when we use CV's. I remember about 3 years ago 3/4 of my squad crashed on take off from a CV when there was a very strong cross wind. None of use reuppped. We were not the only ones. Your right Dawg the Setup CM would and had been very busy in the first 10 minutes. Some guys are a few min late. Others might lose a drone for some reason. Some might have to wait 5 or 10 min to launch due to orders. After that we figured it would be easier to leave them open for the first 15 minutes.  Now... well we need to look at this again.

Thanks for posting Midnight.

[Nomde]

I'd like to thank Midnight for looking into this and getting back to us. I've known most of the members of the 412th for a long time and they are an honorable group. Alot is happening during the 15 minutes before and after the frame starts, just getting the orders out to squadmembers as they arrive is enough in itself. To ask any CO to try to get every rule out to every member before the frame starts is an impossibility. The rules are generally learned "on the fly" and take a few times playing to have a good understanding. The matter is resolved from my standpoint ~Salute~

I'd like to apologise to Pand and Motorhead for the implication given in my initial post, but just given raw data from the logs leaves much to speculate on motives. I understand the confusion which comes along with playing these events. All of us join these to have fun and really don't pay alot of attention to the "details."

Reflections on Midnight's questions:
1. This wouldn't be feasible, the reason for this are numerable. It's best to leave a "window" for players to re-up for valid reasons and to give the Axis or Allied CO's a little leaway on planning orders for squads upping.

2. This is a hard call depending on the arena setup. In this frame, I had our attack squads go in low and quick after they upped, because I knew we had no chance of winning a climbing war with the LW planes. Also, I remember playing in the BoB frames and not seeing any Axis player the entire mission due to our assignment.

It might be a good idea to have a 20 minute window before the beginning of hostilities on smaller arenas. On the larger arenas, like the one BoB had, remove the 20 minute window.

3. This ties in with with number 1 above, the one life option isn't feasible as I believe too many honest errors could cause someone to CTD or crash on takeoff, we should leave some leaway. As for controls for the CM's, i'm all for giving the CM's more commands to help them with making the frames more managable. However, there's just so much going on when 200+ players are trying to get ready for take-off, it's hard to imagine one CM being able to handle the load.


I want to get my response posted and this requires more thought, i'll write more on this later

Midnight, thanks again for looking into this. Daddog, thanks for moderating this, most excellent sir  

[azmotorhead]

I will publicly apologize here for my actions in the SEA this past Friday.
I wrote a email to Tango of the 412th explaining my actions.
I didn't set out to intenionally break the rules and I do not wish to bring any disrespect or dishonor to the other members of the 412th.
I sincerely apologize to my fellow Squad members and all other players who participated in the frame for my indescretion
Azmtrhd

[daddog]

Thanks azmoterhead. Your post goes a long way. I appreciate it.

[SpiveyCH]

Think this was just a simple mistake.  Don't believe that any big changes need to be made.  Just have to make sure that the CO's get that rule out ASAP.  I know that my squad members got sick of hearing me say. "Remember, YOU ONLY GET ONE LIFE!!".  You guys have done a great job and this should be looked at as what it is, a simple mistake.    Looking forward to Friday.


<>  Spivey  CO  ~C HAWKS~

[SonHiro]

Listen. i may be new to the game, but the community is unlike any other I have seen. Most players are arrogant, cheating, punks who are all to common in the online environment. But here is something different. We play with honor, which is more than some can say. and we are fair to each other. So this can be simply resolved.

I SINCERELY HOPE, considering these are SQUADS, not random flyers here, that the squadron CO's can keep an eye out for trouble in their own squadron.

We Play On The Honor System.

We should be truthful about what we do. Dont up just because you got taken out on a one-pass.

I dont want to spew out a holy gaming bible, but we should play fairly. its up to us to make the game enjoyable. And, god forbid, its up to squad CO's to keep their boys in line. What happened was unfortunate. Sure, we could petition HTC for tighter controls on arenas, but I ASSUME these are usually isolated incidents, which involve 1 or 2 pilots, maybe on a mistaken claim. Tighter controls may cause more hassle on the CM.

Personally, I say let it slide. The pilots charged have apologized. let the CO's deal with their own squad issues. But remember that we should play fair, because it helps all of us. Honor system. Our system.

But thats just my 2 cents.

0SonHiro
56th Fighter Squadron

[daddog]

Yup. All been dealt with and everyone is fine with how it turned out after trading some e-mails.

Now if I could just get the sides to balance.