AH HA SEA

[Baddawg]

Well for the last few weeks  i have seen alot of familiar faces working on the no icon concept.
We have had a blast doing this plane recognition gets  a little easier with experience.

On Luftwaffe planes you can see either some yellow coloring or  the spiral spinner or the cross seem to shimmer. and of course
the shape of the wings .

The spits spinner stands out as do its elliptical wings.

P51s really stand out  but i have seen the p38 almost dissapear into the haze of the horizion.

All fights  have the chance of  ending up on the deck . In fact  for a spit or a  Luftwaffe plane in thier camo scheme it is a prudent  weapon for evasion.

Cobra and his crew showed with style how it was done. The  Musketeers had RW on and showed what an advantage it was.
Some great fights ensued  unfortunately i ended up as the lead collector for the Musketeers      

Nay sayers be damned   its not perfect  but its workable

------------------
Aces High Correspondent for  www.dogfighter.com

[Cobra]

Weazel,
The cool thing about that 26 is its low-level camo scheme.  Hell, Corwin and I couldn't even hold formation at low level because we couldn't see each other that well.  

When you and Udie made your first run on me earlier, the only warning I had was that you had shot down Corwin who was my wingy, but in a trailing 6 position.  Even at that, down low, I couldn't make out exactly where you guys were (those 109's blend in with the terrain very well low)....anyway, I had to wait for you guys to open up so I could use the machine guns lighting up to really target you guys.

You did knock out my right engine, right gear, right flap, right elavator, well you get the idea, I was able to make it back at ditch her on the runway.

Funny thing was...on the way back I was low and smoking, and I hear one of my squadmates yell out over RW that he was diving on a low con....I think, hmmmm, is a bandit diving on my six to finish me, so I hop into the tail guns and I see this streak of a plane coming in on me hard...I open up on him, flame him and find out it was my squadmate that called the low con.  I apologized very much, then said next time say it is a low and smoking con....lol!

Verm,
The fights were at all alts.  Some up high, some low, some would start high and spiral down, it was truly a mix.

Swager!!
Get your *** in there!  It is a blast, I think you will enjoy it.  

I know its not for everyone, and I don't think I'm better than anyone else, its just fun for me.

BTW, HTC....you cannot taxi a B-17 out of the hangars at A14 in the SEA, you can a 26 though.

What a blast!

Cobra

[ra]

Fun is one thing, but no icons does not make for more a more realistic sim.  Ironically it makes for a less realistic sim.  Eventually you develop the tactic of flying a hard to see plane, and attacking your enemy from below.  In dogfights, you try to stay below your oppononent so that even if he gets a shot at you, it is likely to be inaccurate as you are nearly invisible to him.  BnZ is just about impossible.  Flying a silver US bird is an invitation to a gangbang.

I gave up last night after following a spit around for 30 seconds trying to get a positive ID on him.  By the time I was sure he was a spit and not a 109, I was Hispano fodder to his buddy.  I'd had 3 20mm's ready to liquify him the whole time.

No icons does a good job of simulating air combat taking place at about 30 minutes after sunset, or where all the pilots are half blind.  It sound good to talk about it, but in practice it's actually more game-like than flying with icons on.

Pilots probably get 95% of their info through their eyeballs.  The visuals available on a PC just don't cut it.  We'll be ready for no icons when the technology is.

ra

[Cobra]

Ra,
Is it fun for some, yes, for others no.

Is a big icon above your head giving you id, range, rate of closure from over 4.5 miles away more realistic than no icons....absolutely not.

There was a reason they had those aircraft recognition cards, as there was a reason the allies painted on those invasion stripes on anything with wings (I know mainly from ground fire), but it served its purpose in the air as well, just as early in the war, the planes would have their camo scheme changed from summer to winter.  You still want to attack from above with alt advantage, but at least now you can egress low, much like they did in R/L.  The didn't cons upen up at each other from 1000 yds away as a norm.  

IMO no icons does a fairly decent job, not perfect, but a better job of protraying R/L than what you are saying and the icons we have now.  It actually does a better job of simulating air combat...the fights are closer in, the opponents need to hold fire to be sure, and wingman tactics are a must...plus the bounce is more of an option which is where most kills came from.  As for the mustang being a silver beacon, I agree, but it also cuts down on the recognition issue for both sides, so if its 51's against 109's then if its dark, its marked.   Friendly fire and the fog of war are there as well.  No icons simulates that aspect of air combat, which was once the shooting began it was easy to look around and find a once full sky, now empty.

Here's the nice thing about AH's setup right now....there is the Main Arena for those who don't feel no icons is right, and the SEA for those who like the idea, right, wrong or indifferent.

I know when I'm in a Cessna 172 flying along, I sure the hell can't identify what kind of a plane a dot is from over 4.5 miles away, 8.0k yards (I'm talking small single engine planes), let alone its aspect, rate of closure or any of those things.

I won't argue with someone who says it just doesn't suit their style or taste, and I won't argue that the current technology state doesn't perfectly imitate R/L, but I don't think its as bad for simulating not just the flight aspect but also the immersion aspect as you are saying.

Maybe the middle ground (before technology catches up to our wishes) is a different icon system.

Cobra (off soapbox now, sorry)

[Udie]

Cobra,
 I was the 109 that shot down your b26 wingman    Funny part is that i was on his dead level 6 and I didn't even see him until I was about 500 yrds away.  LOL I thought I was chasing a plane about 2 miles away!  I put about 10 30mm rounds into his tail and it fell off   then you quickly shot me down too.

 As for icons, I'm torn.  I realy think they are needed out far up to about d2.0 so you can tell the bogies flight path and attitude.  The problem with that is that it would all but kill suprise attacks.  But for now it doesn't matter anyway  

 I'll back in there tonight at 8pm central time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and I can't wait  

Udie

[Badger]

Cobra....

Great post...some astute observations. <salute>

I do think that we need some form of short range friendly icons though, to balance the monitor problem against real life vision.  Unfortunately, it appears that the current AH software options only afford an ON or OFF methodology.

Regards,
Badger

[Kieren]

What I see is the problem is that escaping in the shiny fish is not possible low... and it is quite easy to follow shiny fish through anything they can do.

[Beegerite]

Nature has a way of making things come out even, the flashy and visible fish is made fast.  The ugly slow one is made dark to blend into the terrain.
Beeg
 

Originally posted by Kieren:
What I see is the problem is that escaping in the shiny fish is not possible low... and it is quite easy to follow shiny fish through anything they can do.

[daddog]

WTG Udie! Looking forward to this the moment I am up and flying again. Been reading this BB for 3 weeks without flying.  

Soon, very soon I will be back up.  

You can expect several from the 332nd Flying Mongrels to participate!  
------------------------
daddog
332nd Flying Mongrels
Snapshots
 
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in his shoes.
That way, if  he gets angry, he'll be a mile away - and barefoot.

[Beegerite]

Re:

Originally posted by Cobra:
I know when I'm in a Cessna 172 flying along, I sure the hell can't identify what kind of a plane a dot is from over 4.5 miles away, 8.0k yards (I'm talking small single engine planes), let alone its aspect, rate of closure or any of those things.

There are definetely some limitations, however, perhaps somebody could englighten me about just how difficult or bandwith effective it would be to improve on our ability to judge altitude, distance, direction etc.  My last programming was on a CoCo in basic back in the 80's so I have no idea about how these programs work with Direct X and other internet goodies but I suspect the whole program resides on our computer and only the position, direction etc. information is exchanged.  Using altitude perspective I'm guessing that HT has various shapes that are called whenever position equals X which gives you a perspective on your altitude.  To conserve something or other these aren't as many as they could be thus 20K and 10K look almost the same if not exactly the same.  If there was a way to make the download bigger even on a CD then all these things would improve, right?  I'll be there tonight!
Beeg

[Kieren]

Beegerite-

Try outrunning a G10 on the deck...  

[easymo]

 I have a friend with a 19 in. monitor. I play on a 17in. The difference in plane size is considerable. No icons, IMO, gives just to big an edge to people with bigger screens.

[This message has been edited by easymo (edited 05-16-2000).]

[Udie]

 I hope that one day we can set the icons from d3.0 to d2.0 .  This would still allow bounces.  On my 17" monitor once the con is 2.0 or closer I can pretty much tell what he is doing.

 I had another blast tonight btw  

Udie

[hblair]

Flying in there right now with a 17" monitor, it is friggin' fun   . If ya don't like it go the MA. We need a no icons HA bad   .

[This message has been edited by hblair (edited 05-16-2000).]

[Ozark]

WOW...What a blast!  

Heart pounding...hand sweating action!
Flying near a con and looking for signs..silver wings? Blast it!! Twin boom tail? Blast it!

Let's do it again.