Speaking as someone who pretty much ONLY plays AH weeknights from 10pm to midnight Pacific time over the past 4 years....
I must say that the current "late-night, late-war" situation is bad enough that I'm just not motivated to turn off the TV and start flying.
The problem is that there aren't enough pilots in any single area to make for exciting, multi-country fights.
At this time of night, there seem to be about 200 pilots online when I start (10pm) and it shrinks to, say, 120 by midnight. Yes, the absolute numbers may be different (hey, I'm not tabulating the statistic here), but the ratio is probably spot-on.
Anyway, that seems to break down to 120 pilots in one LW area and 80 in another LW area, and due to the totally haphazard manner that pilots have chosen their arenas earlier in the night, one country's numbers are 1/6th of the other two country's numbers combined. Pilots from this dimished country inevitably switch to the other LW arena, where a different country's numbers are 1/6th of the two other country's numbers.
And in both arenas, there aren't enough pilots flying overall to make for an interesting battle anywhere.
And here's the rub: if both LW arenas were combined, there'd be more-or-less equal numbers of pilots for all the countries, AND there's be enough pilots in the arena overall to make for an interesting war with lots of hot-spots.
Now don't get me wrong - for those rare occasions when I am online on the weekends, or earlier in the night, there are enough pilots to make the split arenas a lot of fun. I also agree that splitting the arenas is a good idea for growth overall.
But, as HT said, the split arenas were designed to accomodate situations when there are too many players for a single arena, so conversely, why shouldn't the arenas rejoin when the numbers drop? It is the exact same equation, and it's based on the same logic.
My Proposal: As the numbers in the Late War arenas drop, some things start happening automatically to the less-populated LW arena. First, there are system-wide announcements: "In 30 minutes, new plane spawns will be stopped. Please move to the other LW arena." Then after 30 minutes, stop new plane spawns, and announce it. This will allow for battles to continue, but as people land, they'll switch over. After 30 minutes, they'll HAVE TO. This also allows bomber pilots on long missions to take as long as they need to complete their flights and land, AND there'll be less enemy to harass them upon landing because they'll be less friendly fighters to defend them.
And then, after there aren't any more planes in the air, close the Arena.
Now for all I know, this already happens when 3 LW arenas reduce themselves to two. Fine. Whatever. Do whatever works.
Then open new arenas as necessary, based on the rules already discussed.
Again, I really like having multiple arenas where there are enough players to support them. But clearly, there aren't enough players too suppport them late at night on weekdays.
-Llama
