AH Community question.....fix kill stealing?

[NCLawman]

Again, its the POINT of the matter.  The principal.  Even if I do not care about score/name in lights, why should the work I have done help the score of some noob chasing down and sawing up dead planes?

Again, you have posted about score.  You are torqued because the noob's score is improving where your's is not for work that YOU did.  I am not saying you are wrong.  In fact, I agree completely with you.  But let's at least call a dog - a dog.  The point of this whole thing is absolutely about score or you wouldn't care about who got the Kill Message and who got the Assist Message.  Because the only difference there is THE SCORE.

<Salute>

[NCLawman]

Kill stealing in the air does happen occasionally by accident, sometimes deliberately (though often by new players not knowing it better), and sometimes sheer bad luck (find a lone bomber, kill him and suddenly you find that someone just hat put a lot of rounds in him before)
But in the end I found it evens pretty much out over the long run.

But that kind of killstealing vs GVs sometimes really gets me upset. Especially when a player didn't simply put a bomb on a tank, but invested a few minutes to take a tank, drive to the enemy only to get "assist" after slugging it out with that enemy Tiger in front of him.
I see that literally every day... about 30mins ago, enemy T34 rolling to the base and two Ponys happily strafing with their .50cals. 

Lusche, I have to agree 100% with you there. (Because I suck in GVs, I don't see that as often as I don't engage in drawn out GV battles.)  That level of idiocy has reached the point that short of preventing a spawn / VH camp, I will not drop my bombs or engage a GV if some BB sprayer has already been through pinging the armor.  I will not "give" them the kill.  If said "Red Rider Bandit" wants the kill, he/she will have to land and then earn it.  I will just keep letting them strafe until they crash, then I will apply ordinance.    

[MachNum]

I see that literally every day... about 30mins ago, enemy T34 rolling to the base and two Ponys happily strafing with their .50cals.

Hmmm. I was under the impression that .50cals could do damage to armor, especially to the thinner top back armor, and that there was always a chance of tracking the vehicle. The .50s do work against halftracks and flak guns, although now that I think about it, perhaps that has more to do with the open top nature of those vehicles. Strafing vehicles is far too dangerous to be doing if there is no chance of damaging them.

Oh, while we're here, I often strafe GVs as a way to point them out to friendly GV'ers nearby. Is there a better way to accomplish that task? I don't have a very good GV-eye view of the world.

[Ghastly]

Machnum, what I tend to do now is put out a very short burst, and just put it fairly near them.  They don't need me to actually hit it to be able to see where I'm "pointing" with my tracers. 

And yes, perhaps you CAN track a tank eventually with 50's (and folks have said that on some tanks you can eventually kill the engine if you strafe from high rear and are "perfectly" aimed, but I've never managed it) yet for some reason a good long burst of 50's seems to nearly ensure that you get the kill attribution, despite the fact that it seems to take more than a full ammo load even in a plane like an F4U to actually cause anything to "break".

This is what I don't understand... how can I do so much damage that I get the kill credit while at the same time I do so little damage that I have to re-up three times to actually break parts by strafing? 

<S>

[Spazzter]

Over the last few years I've been on, I've seen kill stealing brought up several times.  If you have been on enough, I'm sure it has happened to you as well.  Sometimes it can be an honest mistake, but what happened today was blatant.

I shot a plane off of a fellow countryman's tail after much manuevering.  I shot the tail completely off of the plane and it was falling flat, staight down, obviously no longer a threat.  I even called out this particular plane as down over range.  As I looked back, I saw tracers from a "friendly" (I use the term loosely) pouring into this falling, tailess plane.  I look at the text buffer and of course see "assist on -----"

I really don't care about the score, or getting a handle up in lights, it's just the point of the matter.  I'm not going to lose my cool and crawl the guy, because it does no good and it's likely a noob kid that doesn't know any better anyway.  But to do nothing about it is no different than encouraging it.

If you've been here more than a couple of weeks, I'm sure you can relate to this problem.  There are some pretty sharp people here that have been playing this game for a while, so I ask you:  What can be done?  Or should we just let it go?  Let the guy you've worked hard to knock down get stolen as the wreckage falls to the ground?

HT has been exellent at listening to the community and fixing problems, so if there is enough voice, there will be a result.

I suggest this:  If a part critical to flight is missing, the plane is scored as a kill right then.  It's not hard.  Simply looking at the damage list tells you the game already knows what has been hit.  Examples are: Wing (entire), horizontal stabs, vertical stabs and tail section.  If those are missing, the plane has no hope of continued flight...it has been killed and reduced to falling wreckage.  Any shots that follow can do damage, but will not be counted as it is now a crash looking for a place to happen.


PS:  No, this is not a  or a  .  It is a question to my Brothers and Sisters.  Should it be fixed or rewarded?

I can understand your frustration and have had the same thing happen to me, but calling a plane down over range means squat in my book.  There have been to many times to count when someone calls out on range such and such plane down and the next thing you know that plane is on your tail shooting.  I much prefer for a plane to be exploded than to rely on someone's judgement of the situation.  I don't really care who gets kill credit as long as the red plane is dead.

<S>
Spazz

[Lusche]

Hmmm. I was under the impression that .50cals could do damage to armor, especially to the thinner top back armor, and that there was always a chance of tracking the vehicle. The .50s do work against halftracks and flak guns, although now that I think about it, perhaps that has more to do with the open top nature of those vehicles. Strafing vehicles is far too dangerous to be doing if there is no chance of damaging them.

Oh, while we're here, I often strafe GVs as a way to point them out to friendly GV'ers nearby. Is there a better way to accomplish that task? I don't have a very good GV-eye view of the world.

Strafing open-topped Wirbels & Ostwinds as well as Lvts, M3s and the like is fine - every gun in game can ot them out of action.

However strafing Tigers, and T34 with mere .50cals is almost worthless - but you still get the kill.

When I want to point those tanks out to my GV comrades on the ground, I just shoot the ground next to them. That's sufficient, and who cares if my attack hit % drops from 51.9 to 50.1 %
Of course, if I'm in  Hurri D or Il-2 I shoot to kill

This is what I don't understand... how can I do so much damage that I get the kill credit while at the same time I do so little damage that I have to re-up three times to actually break parts by strafing? 

It's how track damage is modeled. They basically "soak up" damage points. You may not have done enough damage to actually break them yet, but it may be still more damage points than that single 75mm round did that made the tank go "boom".

[valdals]

im not too worried about kill stealing. what most worries me is when someone flies infront of you when you are shooting at aircraft. that annoying. especially when your plane is damaged or you get kill shot

[gusman]

Strafing open-topped Wirbels & Ostwinds as well as Lvts, M3s and the like is fine - every gun in game can ot them out of action.

However strafing Tigers, and T34 with mere .50cals is almost worthless - but you still get the kill.

When I want to point those tanks out to my GV comrades on the ground, I just shoot the ground next to them. That's sufficient, and who cares if my attack hit % drops from 51.9 to 50.1 %
Of course, if I'm in  Hurri D or Il-2 I shoot to kill



It's how track damage is modeled. They basically "soak up" damage points. You may not have done enough damage to actually break them yet, but it may be still more damage points than that single 75mm round did that made the tank go "boom".

I also thought that you could track a Tank with .50 cals  From now on I will strafe next to them (some people think that I do that anyways)

Cheers,
gusman44

[Lusche]

I also thought that you could track a Tank with .50 cals 

Actually it's not completely impossible, but only very very impropable and very rare... I think I will conduct some tests in the next few days.

The main problem is, many MG strafers do believe they can kill a Tiger thinking a kill credit is the same thing as a kill itself.

[BaldEagl]

Actually it's not completely impossible, but only very very impropable and very rare... I think I will conduct some tests in the next few days.

The main problem is, many MG strafers do believe they can kill a Tiger thinking a kill credit is the same thing as a kill itself.

Sure.  You're just saying that so the n00bs won't get credit for the kills so you can have them all to yourself. 

We all know how you hang around the H&T forum mis-leading n00bs. 

[dedalos]

half the time stolen kills are a mistake. one decent solution i thought about the other day was this.
have a [dot]command to give a kill to a person who got an assist.

say if you and wingman want to swap credit for a kill i would type

.swap#3 Redtop

where #3 relates to the kill you stole.


at the end of the day, there are plenty more kills out there, not really something worth actualy doing some work on.

hehe, I can think of a couple of squads that would give every kill to their leader

[ink]

kill stealer's are the one thing in AH that aggravate the crap out of me, im such a BADSHOT, that it takes most of my ammo to kill em so when i see a "friendly"
following my kill down, i do ask them over local if thats the only way they can kill something.
i dont think you should let them get away with it, maybe they are a noob that doesn't know, and by calling them out on it they may begin to understand.

[Roundeye]

Again, you have posted about score.  You are torqued because the noob's score is improving where your's is not for work that YOU did.  I am not saying you are wrong.  In fact, I agree completely with you.  But let's at least call a dog - a dog.  The point of this whole thing is absolutely about score or you wouldn't care about who got the Kill Message and who got the Assist Message.  Because the only difference there is THE SCORE.

<Salute>

You can call the issue behind my post whatever helps you sleep better at night.  Doesn't really matter to me. 

What I wanted to know was if kill-stealing is an issue with players and could/should it be fixed.  Based on the responses of those who stayed on subject, I see it is an issue and can be fixed.

[Squire]

Of course, the late kills you get that should have been assists (when somebody else finishes off a con), we are all still cool with that right? Why no posts about how wrong, and unfair that is, and wether it can be "fixed"? 

[kvuo75]

killstealing from each other is a time honored tradition in my squad.   


in fact, at some drunken times, if the killstealer didn't get awarded the kill, we've considered that a steal from the killstealer!