Are you good enough to tell when a player won't HO?

[68ROX]

What it really comes down to is that the HO is the move that SCREAMS: I have no ACM, no talent, no skills, nothing besides one move...the HO.

Players who are proud of their ACM skills and have worked hard on their tactics will ALWAYS look at the HO-advocate as a one-trick-pony.

Even Manfred von Richthofen used the HO tactic in WWI until he was shot in the head and nearly died.  He never used the HO again.

Pilots in WWII used the HO as a last resort, especially since the enemy had 20mm's and they were only packing 50 cals & 303's.

For the nutjobs above who preach that you can ALWAYS avoid the HO..well, ya can't.  In some cases you can (I have plenty of films to prove it)....and in some cases you can't (I have plenty of films to prove it).  This game is just like real life driving where you only have a split second to see/evaluate/react.

There have been many threads and many posts on the subject, but the HO is the only move that AH'ers love to hate.  It's GAMBLING at it's finest, and the odds are not in your favor.  You are GAMBLING that YOUR cyber-weapon will cause more damage than THEIR cyber-weapon in the timeframe before someone dies.  There is no skill or tactics to it, it's just a fight between kids.

In game, it's VERY easy to assume that (especially in a 1v1) your are going to be HO'ed EVERY TIME.  There are just too many kids with no ACM and the HO is all they know.  I stated my percentage at 95%, and others have quoted a number close.

If someone is damned and determined to HO you, they will.

What makes the victim angry about it is the cheap, no skills way they did it.



68ROX

[BaldEagl]

I thought the question was "can you tell when a player won't HO", not "Is the HO the right thing to do" or "what's the definition of a HO".

Since we're now beyond the initial question, for me, there's times that setting up a HO makes perfect sense.  There's times it doesn't.  There's times accepting a HO makes sense.  There's times it doesn't.  Expect it and perfect it (including avoidance manouvers) but don't rely on it.

The only time I'm frustrated by a HOer is when it's me against many and one of the many feel they need to HO (happened last night in a me on 6-8 or so near a Rook base.  Also happened one night in a me on 3 where one of the guys tried HOing me 3 times!).  HO's are sometimes unavoidble when manouvering in those types of situations.  If you see me whine on 200 about a HO, this is usually why.  If you already have a numerical advantage, don't HO.  You probably don't need to.

BTW, head to head merge high angle front deflection is still a HO in my book.

[bustr]

The line of questioning that no one really wants to directly answer that I have attempted to engage you all in resulted from the following.

My wife has been an HR Manager for a number of companies. She is some what informed about day to day in the life of Aces High the soap opra because of my particapation. She reads these threads once in awhile to attempt to understand and support my interest in the game. She read this one in particular yesterday.

Last night she asked me a hypothetical question about the game from the stand point of HR having to feild a customer complaint. Since I respect her observations and insights it made me think about the HO not as a player in the game. She knows this is a private company and the game is association at will for both parties.

Is it acceptable for a peer group of players to force thier view of game play on other players, attendant with derogitory personal language descriptors over a tactic which obviously the host company included in the game and deems an equal non-stigamatised part of the game experience?

If this is true, it could be mistaken that descrimination is condoned by one group of players against those they deem less than themselves for using that tactic. In essence some players $14.95 fee is worth more than other players $14.95 fee by virtue of a special group of players who refuse 98.2% of the time to use that tactic.

Kinda like christians saying all gays are sinful then identifying and forceing anyone gay to act in line with the dictates of christians even though being gay is not against the law in that christian country.

Then she observed that the HO seems like a tactic that might equalise the differences in skill levels for newer players to higly accomplished players. She surmised from years of reading these threads that it must be hard to have developed lots of skill and be taken out by someone with a sucker punch.

But she was mostly concerned with the perception of descrimination  and cohercion by a peer group to control how other players enjoy their $14.95.

Had to admit it to her I never considered it up to this point. I to am guilty of decrying the HO at times. Yep it sucks to get sucker punched.....

[Getback]

I can generally tell if a guy is going to HO. First thing is, Is this guy for certain going to die. If he is surrounded by a ton of countrymen I expect an HO. Why not I would. 2nd on the merge is he weaving, lowering his nose or raising his nose or working his rudders. And I guess the third would be is his plane damaged.

Yep, I think those 3 items will tell the story.

[Yeager]

good point bustr.  

Bottom line game definition is: Head On is two players coming at each other nose to nose.   if this is a true statement then Head Ons are purely avoidable.

To criticize people who have attacked you Head On is self incriminating.

There is no point to the Head On debate, it is just people complaining who have lost the fight.

[BiGBMAW]

Lute....very well said..I really enjoy breaking early to Kill the Jousters...


But..I often get many kills when I play like Im the Jouster and I see them try to get "evasive"   I think its my SNap shot skills and the plane i ride...Typhoon O DOOM..those 20s only need to tickle you to break you in half..


I often give the folks an impression im going to Joust...I i see them go for "evasive roll" I shoot them..I think I get the kill 70% of the time....If I see them try for a Joust..depending where im at an dE state..I will Joust..Its hard to beat the 4-20mils...I always try a short burst then roll Like Cheech and Chong...

I would think the FWs must be the best at this since their roll rates are insane..


Salute to the Honorable Time Tested JOUST!!! an to all the whines you get.,...whaaaa

[BaldEagl]

Originally posted by Yeager
To criticize people who have attacked you Head On is self incriminating.

If I'm coming around a break turn with 3 cons on my a@@ and get HO'd by the fourth that's hardly self-incriminating.

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by bustr
Last night she asked me a hypothetical question about the game from the stand point of HR having to feild a customer complaint. Since I respect her observations and insights it made me think about the HO not as a player in the game. She knows this is a private company and the game is association at will for both parties.

Is it acceptable for a peer group of players to force thier view of game play on other players, attendant with derogitory personal language descriptors over a tactic which obviously the host company included in the game and deems an equal non-stigamatised part of the game experience?

No one is forcing anyone to do anything, Bustr.  The anti-HO crowd is making fun of the pro-HO crowd.  The members of the pro-HO crowd are free to smile back, yell back, change their ways or continue on their current paths.  Your wife would recognize this as the gaming equivalent of a "hostile work environment," but, so far as I know, there is no prohibition against a work environment being hostile based on HO discrimination (as opposed to, say, sex or age or race).

Same thing with vulchers and gangers.  We can make fun of them and call them names, but we have no power whatever to force them to stop vulching or ganging.

- oldman

[soda72]

oldman is a HO'r.....

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by BaldEagl
BTW, head to head merge high angle front deflection is still a HO in my book.

Well, in my book in a 1 v 1 engagement, it's a crappy merge, and if I die to a deflection shot on a merge, I only get pissed at myself for making such a crappy merge.

[bustr]

Oldman,

I'm aware of your position.

I personaly have been so immersed in the game that I was unprepaired for her observation as a human resources professional. I met her at one of the corporations we worked at because I was the head of e-mail and had to help her during a complaint of bias and verbal cohersion by a manger towards subordinates. The managers e-mails ultimatly tipped the investigation in the subordinates favor. Chances are that past incident biased me and her observations triggered a line of reasoning.

I never looked at AH before as a place that possibly had a veild culture of peer preassure to influence other players not to use a tactic they dissaprove of. Grousing on a BBS usualy is grousing on a BBS. I just figured what she observed might be what some parents might be thinking. After all they are paying customers.

[Yeager]

If I'm coming around a break turn with 3 cons on my a@@ and get HO'd by the fourth that's hardly self-incriminating.
====
To me this isnt even a merge.  Thats just a bad situation to let yourself get into.  Again, the fourth con is practically obligated to shoot you down.  If he doesn't, one of the other three surely will.

[BaldEagl]

Originally posted by SlapShot
... if I die to a deflection shot on a merge, I only get pissed at myself for making such a crappy merge.

I agree that if I die to a deflection on the merge I get pissed at myself for allowing it.  

On the other hand, if I set up for a HO and the guy beg's off at the last moment and I kill him on the deflection, I still know it was a HO.  I intended to HO the whole time and carried it through and won, even though my opponent tried to avoid it.  I don't try to justify it as a deflection shot to save my honor... it's still a HO.

[toonces3]

Bustr,
I'm not sure what your question has to do with the topic at hand.

My question stems from a not-infrequent occurance.

One night I'm in Mid.  I'm flying off the CV with Mole and some other guy, 3 of us against 3 or 4 guys about 20 miles away at their field.  Not trying to capture, just dogfighting.

I log on and Mole says, "I've got some good fights going on with Oldman over here."

So I up a Seafire, head on over and get into a great fight with Oldman22.  He goes down, comes back up, we are getting ready to merge.  We're nose to nose, but just so he knows I'm not going to shoot I do my little wing wiggle nose bump out thing.  We merge go into our fight and I get shot down.  We .  Nice fight.

Now, I have 2 kids and alot of work to do, so I only have an hour to play.  This is all the AH I'm gonna get today.  I up a F4U-1, a plane I'm not too good in.  Heading to the field, taking a few minutes to grab alt.  I see 2 Hurri 2c's coming in.  I go into the merge with Hurri #1.  I do my wing wiggle nose bump thing so he knows I'm not going to HO him.  His nose is a bit off the side too.  Should be a clean merge.  Then 400 yards out, "Stickpig" kicks his rudder into me and opens up with his cannons and takes off my wing.  I go down.

For 30 minutes I've been having good fights, now I just wasted 10-15 minutes of my hour of game time flying into a freaking HO.  Not fun.

I up again.  Same scenario.  I'm hoping this time it's Oldman22 and not Stickpig.  I open up a bit, nose comes right to me and opens up and before I even have a chance to evade I am right to the tower by NC33.

Now my game time is up, with the last 30 minutes taken up with two quick HO deaths.

For me, I would have like to see how I could handle that Corsair against a Hurri for a few minutes.  For them, I was a quick kill and a few perks.

I don't have all day and night to play this game.  This was a total waste of my time.

My question to YOU was whether, by performing an early avoidance maneuver to get my nose close, but not on you, could you tell that I was setting up NOT to HO you, because I don't want you to HO me because you think I'm gonna HO YOU.  That's it.

Somehow, I think in that situation Stickpig and NC33 were gonna HO me with their woobiecanes no matter what I did.  Maybe not.  Maybe they thought I was gonna HO them.  Did my maneuver make a difference?  That's MY question to YOU.

Whether you should or shouldn't HO, or whether the community has any input, I've read that discussion enough times.  I really don't care what the answer is.

[hubsonfire]

Honor? Are you serious?