Radar change

[Oldman731]

We ran full radar coverage for the first half of the war.  Now we'll use historical settings for the remainder, and see how it works.

Check the new MOTD.

- oldman

[Jester]

YOU IS DA MAN!  

(Bribe of the Fifth of Crown Royal is on the way.    )

Think this will work for everyone. The "Furballers" can still meet mid channel at 5K to duke it out while the guys doing Mission Oriented stuff can do their thing as well.

!

[Boxboy]

Originally posted by Oldman731
We ran full radar coverage for the first half of the war.  Now we'll use historical settings for the remainder, and see how it works.

Check the new MOTD.

- oldman

The problem is Oldman,

 that the current setting are NOT historical.  Chain-Home Radar had a range of 225 nautical miles, the English channel at its' widest point is 150 miles and at the shortest point 21 miles.

The settings you have are about the center of the channel and even less at the wide points which of course are unhistorical.  Now if you are setting them short to gain some type of Buff advantage fine (I guess) but you cannot say it is historical.

A quick google search will give you the same info I got I even copied a schematic of the Chain-Home performance sheet if you would like it.

[Platano]

IMO i think the radar is fine the way it is... I like to have to look for people and then find em...it adds some realism to the whole thing...

[KONG1]

Frankly my dear I don’t give a DAR.  Full, short, long, no – don’t care.  What I do care about is finding some action.  Short dar plus long down time quickly leads to no dar, which results in a lot less action and lot more logging.  Bottom line is we just don’t have enough players in the AvA to support the cross-porked-horde-fest that goes on in the MA.

Let me cut through the BS. Any mention of the word ‘Historical’ as reason for why anybody wants anything in this game is complete bovine k-rap. Truth: The ideal dar settings for most players is for their side to have full dar and the other side to have no dar.  

Players want the game to support their personal version of ‘success’.  Jester’s been whining in the forum and typing ALLCAPS rants in the game because full dar does not support his version of success. (Flying real high outside of dar range jumping someone and maybe getting a single thuper-duper-wootwoot kill before being turned into virtual aluminum shards)

In RL dar was long range, not as detailed, not available in planes, and not turned off by one plane on a pork run.  Who cares.  Dar in the game is there to make it fun and playable. My stated preference is this:  I don’t care if the dar is short, long or full let's have it unporkable.

[KONG1]

Saturday night...dar hosed...AvA empty...nuf said.

[storch]

wurzburg covered well beyond london as well.  also what kong said.  net result no one on tonight.

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Boxboy
The settings you have are about the center of the channel and even less at the wide points which of course are unhistorical.  

Thanks, Boxboy, the criticism is useful.

We are fortunate to have on staff someone with a bit of experience in radar and with the history of radar (not me).  We're rechecking the figures, but part of the confusion now may be caused by this:  AH's radar gives you exact position of an object (at the instant the radar is refreshed).  The 1943 radars were far less accurate, apparently, and depended a great deal on the interpretation skill of the operator.  The combination of DAR bars and shorter-range dots are the AH attempt to produce the same effect.

Kong, Storch and others eloquently express the view of the AH player segment which is less concerned with attempts to achieve more historical accuracy than with finding a good fight.  This has always been a criticism of the CT/AvA.  While I have some sympathy for this perspective, I do ask you to try this with an open mind.  It forces a noticeably different way of flying on you, which is at least going to be interesting for the next week or so.

- oldman

[KONG1]

OM,

You sure it's not broken.  Doesn't work like any dar I've ever experienced. If not broken please explain how it is working.

I'm going to assume it is broken at the moment and say I don't mind short dot long bar.  My point is (I'll use the BS word now) 'historically' one plane can't turn off all the dar with his guns, so to be more (here it comes again) 'historical' make it unporkable or very short downtime.

Lastly, nothing interesting about an empty areana.

[Boxboy]

Originally posted by Oldman731
Thanks, Boxboy, the criticism is useful.

We are fortunate to have on staff someone with a bit of experience in radar and with the history of radar (not me).  We're rechecking the figures, but part of the confusion now may be caused by this:  AH's radar gives you exact position of an object (at the instant the radar is refreshed).  The 1943 radars were far less accurate, apparently, and depended a great deal on the interpretation skill of the operator.  The combination of DAR bars and shorter-range dots are the AH attempt to produce the same effect.

Kong, Storch and others eloquently express the view of the AH player segment which is less concerned with attempts to achieve more historical accuracy than with finding a good fight.  This has always been a criticism of the CT/AvA.  While I have some sympathy for this perspective, I do ask you to try this with an open mind.  It forces a noticeably different way of flying on you, which is at least going to be interesting for the next week or so.

- oldman

Well I guess it's all in how you "see" AH's radar.  No WWII aircraft had dot dar or bar dar it was all thru radio communications from the operators on the ground, AH just eliminates a bunch of typing by showing the dots rather than an actual communication.

As far as accuracy of the WWII radar that is subjective and could argued at length back and forth with no real solution, but the Chain-Home radar at the time of BoB had the ranges I indicated and were for the most part accurate (which is why the Brits won BoB BTW).

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by KONG1
You sure it's not broken.  Doesn't work like any dar I've ever experienced. If not broken please explain how it is working.

Just checked, it's working at 4:25 p.m. Eastern (Sunday).

How it works is this:  You get the dar bars still, showing that enemy (or friendly) forces are within a particular quadrant.

You don't get the dots until enemy (or friendly) planes are within the radar coverage of the radar at each base.  On the map, right-click and select "radar."  This shows the radar coverage for each base.  You'll get the dots within those circled areas.  The dots are being refreshed every five seconds currently.

It is possible to take out a base's radar.  When this happens the radar will be down for 60 minutes.  The circle will be red on the map during this time.  Thus, is feasible to do what the Germans tried to do at the beginning of the Battle of Britain, and clear the radar coverage in preparation for a raid on another target.  I believe that the people who are on-line at the moment are trying to do this.

When we move into 1944 later this week, the radar circles' radii will be enlarged.  Again in 1945.

Twenty-four people in the arena when I checked.

- oldman

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Boxboy
As far as accuracy of the WWII radar that is subjective and could argued at length back and forth with no real solution, but the Chain-Home radar at the time of BoB had the ranges I indicated and were for the most part accurate (which is why the Brits won BoB BTW).

I'm familiar with the Chain Home radars.  While they showed raids building up over France, they didn't accurately transmit either the altitude or the number of planes on the raid, the way our dot radar does.  That information was obtained much further into each raid's progress by a combination of Chain Home and Observer Corps observations, and was certainly not accurate, to the degree we have in AH, for any of the raids over England during that time.

- oldman

[Boxboy]

Originally posted by Oldman731
I'm familiar with the Chain Home radars.  While they showed raids building up over France, they didn't accurately transmit either the altitude or the number of planes on the raid, the way our dot radar does.  That information was obtained much further into each raid's progress by a combination of Chain Home and Observer Corps observations, and was certainly not accurate, to the degree we have in AH, for any of the raids over England during that time.

- oldman

They were accurate enough to vector fighters to intercept those formations, and the schematic  I have shows range to up to 34K high so it certainly was used to ascertain alt of incoming.