Saw this thread and looked at the last page (page 9).
Couple of things to point out:
Delaying dar is a dangerous thing. It can have bad results. It only takes 5 minutes going at a measely 300mph to cross an entire 25-mile-wide sector. The second the dar shifts from one sector to the one next to it, you can head there, but with a 2 minute delay the cons are already through the 5 keypad and on their way out the other side, almost.
Further, dar bar alone isn't very useful for finding fights. Not in low-population arenas. 25 mi by 25 mi is a very large area to try and find a single speck 30k above you and 20mi apart. Takes far more time than it's worth. Dar bar almost always leads to alt-monkey-ism, as folks keep climbing and orbiting as they look for the enemy, and the enemy does the same.
P.S. I don't consider short icons to be "more realistic" because all you see is a 1x1 pixel as a plane representation until it's well within 3k anyways. Real vision allows SO much more detail to be recognized and at longer ranges, than we can see on our screens here. Keep in mind AH runs at 90-degree FOV. That's way wider than normal human vision (this replicates peripheral vision, I think Skuzzy pointed this out, perhaps Pyro). Even zoomed in halfway, about 50-degree FOV, you're still only seeing 1x2 pixels for most cons at 3k. IMO folks calling for reduced icons or no icons in the pursuit of "realism" got things backwards. More info at greater range would be realistic, not vice versa.
Anyway, food for thought in your radar discussion.
