The DA then and now
NOOBS TALE OF THE D.A True the D.A was not used as it was intended most of the time, and by most of the people that went in. There were many a times I admit i got so frustrated and furious at people fighting in the D.A and logged off wondering why HT would not post the rules. Yet I still kept coming back and logging on till I finally got hooked on AH.
Looking back on it now D.A was the reason I got interested in AH. Guess it still holds true (or did) for most of new people that joined the community. Seeing that there were increasingly large numbers of NEW people (that numbers guy, certain jra cough cough ) that did not know or cared about the rules in the D.A. The effect was a lot of people complained about the intent and disorder the D.A was moving towards.
This was back in the day’s when I didn’t know which button to press to talk, type or give check 6’s. The M.A for me was a place where flying for 6 to 10 min for a fight only to get shot down was extremely mind numbing game play till I discovered D.A. Taking off the runway and finding a fight was something exciting and new. As there were no rules posted I thought shooting down what ever you can hit was fair game, until I got schooled (in other words grounded) by couple of regular flyers, learned how to message begged them to stop and learned that the D.A stands for dueling Arena. Using the vox for help on general game play or fight maneuvers got me more response then it did in the M.A. The T.A helped a bit but guess due to the timings of my log there were 1 or 0 players in there. For me this is where i meet the members of 52kiwi and went on to fly in the M.A with a Squad. After a while D.A became an alternative when it felt like the M.A got to be a never-ending war, just the flights were too long or the squad was not on or just any other reason you can think off not to fly. I’ am sure everyone has felt the same at one point or the other.
It was in part D.A had become more then just a Duel Arena. Cant say about the others I would go in there for a quick fights or the adrenalin rush that comes after 2 to 3 noobs (which became obvious as they could not hit you) that chased you only to get shot down, and don’t tell me it is not fun. Generally I would help people that were new, because of me going though the same thing and knows how complicated thing seems when your fly for the first few times. It was sometimes surprising seeing people screaming their heads off to one another for not following the rules. They would generally be the numbers guy or a kid or someone like me just a kid at heart.
For those people who really wanted to duel 1 on 1 could always go to another airfield or change countries, fly to a different location. Take their whole squad to a different location change countries and what not. Turning on the KS has just turned it into another mini M.A. My point being is D.A turning into something it was not intended for is it really that bad a thing for the community of AH. Physics tells that is no such thing as 100% perfection every time and always again and again there will always be a variance. People will always complain about one thing or the other, the fact is there really was an alternative to the M.A and for people that really wanted to duel 1 on1 doesn’t exist anymore. The discussion of how the DA should be, would be and was is all done with this just my opinion and experiences of the D.A.
