Pickers and runners please help me understand...

[SlapShot]

Yea, I was in a bad car accident and had to have major neck surgery. I wasn't able to play for several months. It's still painful and uncomfortable to play, but it's getting better.

WOW ... sorry to hear than, and glad your back on the mend.

[Dadsguns]

Pickers and runners, please help me understand what is the fascination with this style of game play.  Maybe it's a "your $15" thing, but what possible enjoyment can someone get from only engaging cons when they are already engaged and running from a 1v1 when you have an E advantage?  To me, 90% of the fun is the fight, not the winner.  I am so confused..

I hate pickers and runners, I am usually successfull at chasing them down like the slimy dogs they are and destroy their ego before they can land and have their name in lights. 
I will not show them any respect or mercy, even if they are landing, dives for ack,  the only way I will go away is seeing them go down in flames. 

My friend, thats SATISFACTION!!!

[mensa180]

I don't get all this  separate talk of Energy fighters and TnB.  A good stick should use both during a fight, switching seamlessly to do so.

edit:  If someone does only one of those, purely turns horizontally; or just gets alt, dives, zooms back up, and repeats.  They are severely limiting themselves.

[ink]

Yea, I was in a bad car accident and had to have major neck surgery. I wasn't able to play for several months. It's still painful and uncomfortable to play, but it's getting better.

damm Zazan13 taht sux, but its good you are still with us

[moot]

Ghastly, it doesn't matter if SCCA or anyone else snubs or doesn't.  All I'm saying is that it makes no sense to him or others.  As for "my" type of play.. I don't play any one type. I might be mainly into furballing and more or less tactical combat, but I've done all of them.  The one I do think makes no sense, except in an anti-gameplay sense, is e.g. porking CVs for no tactical or strategic gain and only because it boinks with others' fun...   Sure, it "makes sense".  That's beside the point, though.  It's a lot like lawyers defending murderers and rapists (not to equate porkers in the game to those obviously), saying they have a pertinent and defendable technical point... It's really beside the real point.
Sure, it "makes sense" if I were to fly in the most timid and treacherous way.. I could (and have) fly only taking advantage of all the easiest vulnerabilities in others' flying, I could fly in the horde and "win" by brute size, etc.  It's all pretty shallow, though.  I can read that perspective and understand it easily, but the real question is how those guys persist playing so cheaply and for such shallow victories, when it should be obvious even for the most dim witted that there's a lot more fun and satisfaction in winning a fight with more rather than less peril.  How do they insist on being a big fish in a small pond?  What is it that makes some players act just like the K4 in the OP, not occasionaly (myself I'll fly like that when I'm starting to doze off) but every time?  It's hard to believe they just don't have the balls because it's all pixels. So yeah, it will make a lot of people incredulous.  I don't see how that's hard to understand.

I can relate to the guys who play the game just to oogle at the pretty planes or pretend they're Bong or Hartmann or Sakai or whoever, but it's a lot like seeing guys in power ranger suits raving about how thrilling it is to act out some fantasy.  I can relate to it, but it doesn't make sense.

And Humble, I dunno what you're trying to say.  Or at least, it sounds like you're talking about something else. I'm not saying tactics biased toward the higher speed end of the spectrum are what's wrong.  Just like Mensa says.

[BnZ]

G

I can relate to the guys who play the game just to oogle at the pretty planes or pretend they're Bong or Hartmann or Sakai or whoever, but it's a lot like seeing guys in power ranger suits raving about how thrilling it is to act out some fantasy.  I can relate to it, but it doesn't make sense.

Really? I can't see any reason to play this game OTHER than the "pretend I'm a WWII pilot for abit" aspect. I'd make the comparison to those guys who dress up like Civil War soldiers, march about and fire blanks at each other.

[moot]

No, that's not what I'm saying.   But if it were, you could very well take up pixel dogfighting the same way people take up chess without pretending they're Deep Blue or Kasparov, or learn fencing without going effeminate or necessarily pretending to be one of the Musketeers. 

[Anodizer]

   Please forgive the fact that I decided to skip the last 14 pages of posts and just decided to state my opinion on this matter of pickers/runners.

First off, I've been playing a little over two years on and off (combined of probably about a year or so)..  I'm fairly experienced with being picked off or the attempt of a pick and then running..  It is not a tactic that I like to use, nor do I enjoy flying most of the plane-set that is categorized as being most able at picking.. 

   I spent a significant amount of time in the day for the past 2 months just to get some more practice in without having to fly 10 minutes or more to find a fight (and probably get picked off while I'm AFK during climb out).  So, here's my reasoning for the existence of pickers and runners: They like to see that low number and high k/d ratio next to their name(possibly for lack of true accomplishments in actual life )..  Yes.....I said it..

  Most of those pickers who just happen to have the tables turned on them will complain to no end on the almighty channel 200 while quickly going through your score on the roster and going to hitech's website to do an investigation of what plane you have gotten the most kills in (if it's an LA7, Spit16, etc. be prepared for more whining than a 6 month old infant how needs a diaper change) and shouting it out loud on 200 for everyone to see what a "dweeb" you are and that you really didn't work for that kill, but just got lucky..  I'm sure you've all seen the comments posted by certain individuals with regards to one's rank, score, and K/D ration or something similar..  Yes, one may have a low K/D ratio..  Maybe landing isn't truly important to them but the thrill of the fight is..  Can't tell you how many times I've flown against decent sticks who say to me "Good Fight!!".  Yeah, I may get beat in the end a majority of the time, but I pushed my skills and my plane to the limit as best as I know how and even learned a little in each fight (filming all of them as well)..  I believe this is more "respectable" than running away or picking (you learn virtually nothing from this type of playing)..

I will give one more instance of my DA experience and then I will not bore you anymore.  As I said, for the last 2 months, I spent 99% of my time in the DA.  There were two players in particular who flew nothing but Tempests every time they were on..  Personally, I was picked off by them dozens of times each evening..  I happened to switch countries just to follow them around to see what they did..  They took off in the opposite direction of the fight, climbed to 15K (sometimes higher), came in way above the fight, and dove in and picked off people who were RTB or damaged or fighting another plane..  This was the ONLY tactic they used.  So, I figured I will beat them at their own game in a lesser plane and see what they think about that..  I upped a Jug D40, climbed to 21K from 10K base away from the main DA area, spotted my prey (obviously they never felt the need to look up so they never saw me), dove in, shot one up, climbed out..  The other guy dove to the deck..  I dove down after him, caught up to him (at the speed he was going he could not even maneuver) and picked him as well..  I cannot begin to elaborate on the tirade that happened afterwards.  I was called every name in the book..  Afterwards, I challenged both to a 1v1 duel.  Neither took me up on the offer..  They need to keep the score up!  No sense taking a chance at someone damaging their score!   
I'm not trying to give myself props or anything, just explaining that these guys (and most like them) are quite hippocratic in their philosophy.

[NoBaddy]

Back in 1997 (ish) on AOL AirWarrior RR Europe, I recall a certain "well known" pilot in a Dora picking people left and right.  Myself and Sin upped and got a bit of alt on 'em, and chased them all over the place.  They ran to the ack at Assasin, we deacked it, so they then ran to the ack at the base to the East of it (can't quite remember the name), again, we chased and deacked it.

Said player did finally land as we deacked the last base, more 'cause we "let" them than anything, but the fact still remains they ran all over the map and wouldn't fight the two of us.  Me and Sin sure did have fun taunting them on channel for not fighting it out.

Can anybody guess said players name?

Hint: Cuba

Hmm, you go from "pilot" to "them" and "they". You might be confused about specifics...since "Assassin" was an A-land field and "he" didn't fly in A-land (at least, not with that handle) and he almost always fought outnumbered.

Btw, I do remember fighting you guys often in a Dorka.....invariably outnumbered. I also remember folks grabbing their Spits and getting above my Dorka then trying rag me for not staying to turn fight them and their friends....could this be one of those instances? 

BTW, your hint is weak...since his handle had nothing to do with "Cuba".

[Ghastly]

Moot, the snubs only matter because they give the impression that the person who's saying "explain it to me" has already made up his/her mind that the person who's actions they are questioning is a low-life of some sort and that whatever the answer is, it's moot.

Assuming sincerity in the request, I don't think SCCA (and others) are ever going to get the answer that they are looking for, because most of them have done all the things at one time or another that the person in the K4 was doing, and they didn't find (as much) enjoyment in it (as they get doing something else) - and so what they are really asking is not what the K4 pilot's reasons are, but rather how he could value things so much differently than they do.  And barring having some sort of epiphany on their part when the K4 pilot put's forth his reasoning (which would require them to see or experience something they haven't before, which is improbable at best) what you're left with is simply a difference in subjective valuation.

In the end, it's going to be no different than trying to explain why your favorite sitcom is so funny to someone who doesn't see it as funny at all.

<S>

[moot]

Impression doesn't matter.  When you walk into a different country, you don't just take impressions for granted; it's what the other guy's actualy thinking that matters.  Nor is it valid to say that some guy is wrong in trusting his instincts when he says that "as far as he can tell" something doesn't make sense. 

"what they are really asking is not what the K4 pilot's reasons are, but rather how he could value things so much differently than they do"  <<  One and the same.
The sitcom analogy doesn't work because you can make sense of the seeming absence of funny to someone else and likely give them a wider range of known funnnies. 

[Ghastly]

"what they are really asking is not what the K4 pilot's reasons are, but rather how he could value things so much differently than they do"  <<  One and the same.

No, they are completely different things - but apparently it's time to agree to disagree, because you see them as one and the same and I do not.

I'll leave you with one more example, however, as I sign off the thread: I own a BMW motorbike, I have a couple of brother in law who ride Harley's, and my son in law owns a Honda sports bike.  We can each explain why we prefer our own ride over theirs until we're blue in the face, and we each hear and understand the words coming out of each other's mouths when we explain which factors are more important to each of us in our choices, but the bottom line is that we each VALUE those factors differently.  The only guys who really understand why the other guy rides the bike he does are the two guys who both ride Harley's - and even they disagree on how important certain things are.

<S>

[moot]

The reason for the K4 doing what he did was because he values the satisfaction of flying as he does for the same reason someone else will value the satifaction he gets from another sort of flying.
The reason you laugh at one sitcom is the same as that for which someone else laughs at another different sitcom.  Which doesn't exclude the possibility for you or him to understand each others' sitcoms, EVEN IF in the end they recognize that they value the sitcoms or bikes or ACM preferences differently.  It's disingenuous to see that someone's "stuck on stupid" (as un-PC as it is to say) in the way he flies, but pretend that he conveniently (for the sake of some argument on a forum) is one of the few players who aren't merely clueless about how to properly fly the plane, but is purposedly flying like a coward because it's the most fun thing to do.

That said, I really doubt you could call the sort of super timid tactics "fun", if Aces High suddenly had nothing but that sort of gameplay, because it's the one sort of gameplay that most deminishes the amount of AIR COMBAT that actualy happens.

And yeah, we're going to agree to disagree if in your opinion there's no way to really understand why a Harley guy rides Harleys unless one rides a Harley himself.

[pluck]

Yea, I was in a bad car accident and had to have major neck surgery. I wasn't able to play for several months. It's still painful and uncomfortable to play, but it's getting better.

sheesh sorry to here zazen, on all fronts, really a terrible thing to have to go through.  I happen to work alot with people who have these types of injuries (mostly on the repair side) and sincerely hope everything is going ok and things continue to improve for you. <S>

[BnZ]

That said, I really doubt you could call the sort of super timid tactics "fun", if Aces High suddenly had nothing but that sort of gameplay, because it's the one sort of gameplay that most deminishes the amount of AIR COMBAT that actualy happens.

Referring to what I said earlier, and how I think about this game, what would a real fighter pilot, in this case a Luftwaffe flyer in a 109 K-4, do?

Would he disengage at first sight of a lone Spitfire? No. He would give it a go. Granted, sustained turn, for a variety of reasons, is more important in sim dogfighting than R/L, but it is still entirely possible that the Spitfire pilot will make a terrible mistake, giving the K-4 driver a kill.

Now, if he gives it the ol' college try and finds the Spit locked onto his long six, with bugging likely his only surviable option, would he run for it? I think he would, and I do not feel ashamed making the same strategic choice.