How can we keep the small arenas fun?

[Simaril]

Originally posted by FALCONWING
...snip....

3) Sim..you are getting stale...you start by saying there were 60 rooks and 20 bish and 5 knits...then it suudenly becomes "a certain large bish squads fault" that they dont fly against superior numbered rooks for you. AND (even though 60 rooks didnt switch countries) it becomes again the fault of "a certain large bish squad" that they didnt fix an unfixable solution.  Instead they winged and had fun as they could...likely didnt whine on 200...and didnt run in here to post on the "unfairness" of the rooks.  

Please try to start looking for real solutions that dont include YOU telling others how to be fair...ty

Falc:


Not looking to get into attack mode here. Please actually look at what I said...I have not assigned "fault" or "blame" in ANY of the posts in this thread. I have said "to each his own" and "wouldnt it be nice if..." Neither of those are whines, and neither are attacks. I started by suggesting the Rooks could have changed arenas; you imply that you agree in your comments about an "unfixable" situation. What exactly are you mad about?

Some guys think the only solutions will come when HiTech changes the rules; I think we players can solve the imbalances ourselves, and I've tried to have a rational discussion about how we can do that. There's nothing more to it than that.



My posts on this topic have from first to last focused on one point: Good manners and good sportsmanship include considering how your actions affect others.

If I've gotten vehement, its because I simply cant understand why a simple application of the Golden Rule is so stinking difficult -- and if that message sounds "stale," well, I'm guilty as charged.



In fairness, you must admit that members of your squad have claimed in the past that they attack the strong side, and dont milk run the hopelessly outmatched one. Last night they did the opposite...which is, as I said, OK if thats what floats your boat.


And if that sounds like "blame" to you....well, to quote the Bard, "Methinks thou dost protest too much"!

[Toad]

Originally posted by Oldman731
Won't happen so long as the stated goal of the game is winning the reset.  As these boards have shown over the past few weeks, there are a lot of goal-oriented people playing AH.

- oldman

Exactly.

In all of the suggestions in this thread, the goal remains the same. The only differences are slight changes to the maze the participants have to negotiate to reach the goal.

As a result, I don't think you'll see any major changes in player behavior.

Reward a behavior and you will get more of that behavior. That's what has led us to where were are now. We reward behaviors that essentially ensure poor overall gameplay.

Basically, we need to reward behaviors that provide better gameplay. Then we'll get more of those.

[MOSQ]

Originally posted by Toad

Basically, we need to reward behaviors that provide better gameplay. Then we'll get more of those.

Any suggestions?

[Dichotomy]

Originally posted by Sweet2th
but it's all about them them them them!!!!!

"minemineminemineminemineminem inemineminemineminemineminemi nemineminemineminemineminemin emineminemineminemineminemine minemineminemine"

[Toad]

Originally posted by MOSQ
Any suggestions?

Yep.

But I've been around the game and the BBS long enough to realize that to post them here would have absolutely no effect on the game and would only start a "mud" slinging match on the BBS.

It shouldn't be too hard to imagine a few things if you think about what you actually want out of the game.

In short, why do you play? What gives you true personal satisfaction when you play?

Then think about what would encourage more of those situations.

[lazs2]

I don't know if the idea would help or not... I am suspicious when so many toolsheders and griefers like it tho.

I think that in the early war at least, we need to have some new maps with the fields at the minimum (3/4 sector) setting.

I honestly don't care if the milkrunners are taking fields so long as there are close fields with good furballs.  

HT's idea might be the answer tho.... don't pretend to know... I have a feeling that if it forced the milkrunners to fight.... they wouldn't like it and would do their best to work around that...  as some have said... kill supplies or troops or whatever instead of the field in question... anything they can hit on a milkrun.

I mean... they have been avoiding any fighting all this time and embracing the milkrun...  Why would they want to embrace a good battle with the change?

lazs
Public Relations Officer for the BK's

[storch]

last night in the MWA there were 30 bish when I logged on.  15 being from a toolshedder/griefer squad who were basically rolling over bases on the nit front which was undefended.  as long as there are players who are rewarded for killing buildings and "winning the war"  the nature of the game will not change.  frankly it's becoming old, perhaps there should be a toolshedders arena and they could all fly in clockwise circles perpetually avoiding fights and killing each other's toolsheds.

[jaxxo]

ahh where to start...steamrolling bases is a newb tactic, they enjoy it for a while ( 2 years or so AH time). They get vets who tag along to rack up kills using said newbs as bait. I did it..everyone did it for a while, it was fun but every player develops past this eventually. AH has grown so much that the player base has turned into 50% ( just a guess) newb. This is why there is so much conflict now IMO..I do think its a great idea HTC, you now have some leeway (success) to try some new things.

I have watched the early and midwar arenas get lower and lower numbers unfortunately..when there IS a good number its often lopsided, and most are steamrolling bases..


 just a sugg...Implement your idea using early and mid as testing areas, leave the late alone. This will give some focus to the 10 "knights" online defending VS 40 "rooks"...or implement in LW only and see how many switch to early or mid just to capture..

Than u have two testing areas to watch us guniea pig addicts scream at each other

I love the fact you guys are making an effort

[FALCONWING]

Originally posted by Simaril


I figured, what the heck, and played the 2 country game -- switched from Nits to Bish. I located a certain very large squad, and upped in their zone for an expected fight against the Rooks. I engaged a few, got some assists, and finally succumbed to a perked tiffy...

But the Large Squad had disappeared. I located them on the other side of the map, doing a base capture mission unopposed. I trailed their mission.... and helped take down some ack, grabbed another assist.

Only after I landed did I realise that I had just helped capture a base from the low side Nits-- who had climbed all the way to 7 players. Meanwhile, the Large Squad was upping to take another Nit base. I left.


Since we see these imbalances, wouldnt it be nice for:

1)  the high sides to readjust themselves (after all, the rooks were low side in the EW...a few movers would have changed the entire flavor of the MW), either by changing countries or arenas?


2) and, for the two highest sides to at least try to fight each other, instead of worsening the disparity by milkrunning unopposed against a country that simply can't fight bacK? There were more players in the Large Squad mission than there were on the entire low side COUNTRY!

AND (i dont know how to double quote)

 "Of course, this may not happen. It appears that some Large Squads prefer to attack where they know they will win (like the infamous BOPs did last night), rather than enter the fray with equal DAR bars."  -simaril


Gee simaril....i dont think i protest too much...perhaps you would rather i ignore YOUR own comments and not protest at all?  please feel free to reread YOUR own posts and see what other large squads YOU mentioned?  i again find it intriguing that you NEVER name any other squad in your posts event though that night there were at least two rook squads in action on the way imbalanced side..and i dont see you calling out any of those players for not adhering to your standard of game play???

And for your information...half the bops were in LW1..only about 12 guys were in MW...i kept in private text with them through squad ch to see if they needed our help...they responded "No..the rooks are rolling everyone...knits are in truble..down to 7 bases now."  I went over and we retook 2 rook bases...

So i hate to muddle your muddied thought process with strategy...but when a country is rolling both other countries...then (in that situation) taking a few knit bases will nudge the rooks away from resetting bish to focus on knits...i understand you feel above the strategic (i.e. winning the war) side of the game but it exists and is rewarded under the current system by both the scoring and perk systems.  no amount of "swapping partners" will fix this...

i again commend hitech for considering ideas of disrupting hording and allowing undermanned countries the ability to focus on only a few frontline bases.  i have posted numerous suggestions including doing away with the concept of "winning a war".

Until the proper "carrot" is removed, then i suspect simaril will continue to focus on and beat the wrong horse.  forgive me if at times i get tired of being beaten via senseless random posts and choose to respond. always seems to be one of three people...

[FALCONWING]

And TOAD!!

i never thought i would so wholeheartedly agree with a BK...but your two posts were spot on!!!:aok

the other thing to rememebr is that only a handful..if that...of the guys that "pay the bills" bother to read or post in here...one must change the nature of what is rewarded in the game if you want the masses to change their behaviors...

LOVE the idea of AI being assigned to make up for the discrepencies in numbers...dont know if that program is at the stage where 20+ AI can run at the same time??

[Flayed1]

Sim I was on at the time you were helping us with that base and after we took it we started on the Vbase NE of it and had several nits foil our capture.  It was only after we took that Vbase and started rolling GV's tward the next that I happened to look at the country status tab and actually asked on squad vox  

"Why the heck are we attacking Nits?"  

  I don't think any of us actually looked at the stats befor embarking on that first mission..    Maybe HT should put a country status bar in the tower so you would always see the country #'s in tower..

I know this won't fix all the steem roll type play but it might help. I know I try not to roll the low #'d side if I know they are the low #'d side unless we are really even with an oposing side and are going for reset.

    But if you don't think to check the country stat tab you can make a mistake. Like last night, and after we realized that the nits were so out #'d we started taking rook fields. 2 or 3 at least by the time I logged off.


  And I must say your finger pointing to us BOPs is a bit unfair...  I didn't see any rooks changing sides... In fact they continued on thier merry way taking near undefended Nit fields long after we had realized our mistake and started hitting them. So please lay off of us.   We do try to be fair for the most part...      Also I was a bit surprised to see you over there helping out sir.  Maybe next time it will be under better circumstances, or how ever you spell it

[Atoon]

Its the players that make the game- good or bad.  HTC just sets up the playing field, we are responsible for the play.

Right now there or more large squads that get their jollies going into small arenas and making gameplay completely lopsided, than there are squads that come in & check out the numbers and choose to even things up. HTC can only do so much. When Bops,  Ltars, and the like, decide they want to use their masses to dominate an arena by using large numbers  and taking undefended bases- well this is what we get. ENJOY!

[Atoon]

Originally posted by FALCONWING
And TOAD!!

i never thought i would so wholeheartedly agree with a BK...but your two posts were spot on!!!:aok

the other thing to rememebr is that only a handful..if that...of the guys that "pay the bills" bother to read or post in here...one must change the nature of what is rewarded in the game if you want the masses to change their behaviors...

LOVE the idea of AI being assigned to make up for the discrepencies in numbers...dont know if that program is at the stage where 20+ AI can run at the same time??

When I USED to brag about this game to people I knew, one of the high points was "every plane you see in the game is another actual person, at their computer, flying their plane". Although I havent bragged about the game for some time now..........

[Toad]

Originally posted by FALCONWING
And TOAD!!

i never thought i would so wholeheartedly agree with a BK...but your two posts were spot on!!!:aok

Your post is not spot on, I'm afraid.

I have never been a Blue Knight, or even a Burger King. I think it's a fine squad with some great people and great cartoon pilots in it but as my avatar suggests, I was 13th TAS until OZ died and then we changed the name to Wardogs.

While you may agree with my posts, don't lose sight of the fact that I think toolshedders have pretty much ruined what was once a fantastic air-to-air combat game and I think large lemming squads have also played a major part in dumbing this game way down.

Do you still agree?

[Toad]

Originally posted by Atoon
"every plane you see in the game is another actual person, at their computer, flying their plane".

I feel reasonably certain you won't see AI in the AH public online arenas; more likely it will be CT only.

In a way, I think that's too bad. While I certainly prefer to fight other people, I think it's also true that the AI is far closer to a fighter pilot personality than 90% of the current online players.

In short, I imagine CTAI001's little silicon heart beats a cpu cycle quicker and when examined under an electron microscope all the tiny little electrons actually show a when CTAI0001 detects an enemy to engage.

At the present time, CTAI001 is one of the relatively few that is fun to engage. I haven't seen him run from a fight yet.