The Aces High War Doctrine

[bustr]

Agent,

There is a spectrum of human neurobiological oriented types. The extream of the types on each end are extream right brain dominant and extream left brain dominat. That would equate to Salvidor Dali and Geroge S. Patton.

A.) The ERB person is motivated by and rewarded by the pursuit of Novelty. A constant barage of new ideas and sensory experiences with no delay of gratification. Attendant to this is an extream ambiguousness to right or wrong and ambivolence to the concept of any being greater than itsself.

B.) The ELB person is motivated by and rewarded by the definition of goals and the resultant solutions to acheiving those goals. Attendant to this is an extream beleif in right and wrong. Delaying gratification to achive future rewards and a faith based certanty in a creator greator than themselves to live up to.

So you can use your imagination to fill in the spectrum between these two. Agent how are you going to reward everyone involved? The muppets recruit for a muppet standard personality to the game and so you are being a tad unfair. Step outside of your box and formulate a bigger picture. This is HiTech's greatest problem in presenting the game. The diverse personality types and what constitutes a reward for effort to them.

[wayneman47]

Not surprising how Rapiers entire post got missed.Typical forum fashion,a post that is 100% bang on get's missed.Slinging insults over substance.IN a lot of cases these insulters carry this off the forums into the game.They chose to be belligerent to ANYONE who refuses to play this game their STYLE.This game is what YOU make it,I will not belittle anyone for choosing to play it their way.However,there are grown MEN in this who have created quite the atmosphere and language,and they waste little time in game to let you KNOW you are: NO skillz horders,hotard,ace pilot,etc.These people know who they are and they don't give a ratz bellybutton what they say and to who
There are several playes(1 or 2 squads as well) who do NOTHING but horde together run to a base and endlessly chase fighters sometimes 7 or 8 of them chasing 1 enemy fighter,they do this DAY in DAY out,changing sides just to find a fight to score even more perk points.They contribute ZERO to the entire sides eventual goal to win a map.To them that is how THEY have adapted the game to their specific fun factor.So far they are BY far the most vocal in every forum,complaining about everything from other fighters not flying THEIR fight,to flying "dweeb planes".They are the furballers.THey sit, hour by hour, endlessly chasing and usually ganging up on weaker fighters.They have honed their fighter skills,yes they are decent sticks,however as individuals have shown very poorly in game. Yet time and again these are THE single most vocal complainers about the other styles.The base takers.
Yet this game is designed around capturing territory and eventually winning a map.
I choose to be the base taker,my skills are not that good in a fighter but I can hold my own at times. I enjoy the game very much,which is why I pay my 16 bucks a month.I do NOT enjoy being pm'd by someone I shot down,insulting me,I do NOT trash talk in a video game that I play for relaxation and squad fun,and I certainly do NOT get on vox and  force a furballer to play the base taking game.Hence Rapiers POINT!!! I have seen post after post on the forums denigrating base takers as no skillz this and no skillz that...(This from so called grown men)Post after ranting post  about basetaking ruining a fight....imagine that.
It's even been taken to new lows in game where an entire squad is being  slandered for its base taking. Slagged for taking undefended bases!! Well you know if your bases are being taken,here's a concept for you .....DEFEND them!!! Instead of taking up an entire day stuck on one base up at the base being "horded" and show basetakers that furballers DO have a point!
There is one thing I wish hitech WOULD implement,a PERMANENT squelch on problem players,players who consistently,day in and day out go WAY over the top in denigrating others style of play.In a game. READ RAPIERS whole POST.

P.S. I only have 1 post on the forums,recently just registered.I usually avoid forums like the plague,I have been in and out of Aces high for years,lately the sh*t talk and personal attacks in game have gotten way way way out of hand.

[Agent360]

Agent,

There is a spectrum of human neurobiological oriented types. The extream of the types on each end are extream right brain dominant and extream left brain dominat. That would equate to Salvidor Dali and Geroge S. Patton.

A.) The ERB person is motivated by and rewarded by the pursuit of Novelty. A constant barage of new ideas and sensory experiences with no delay of gratification. Attendant to this is an extream ambiguousness to right or wrong and ambivolence to the concept of any being greater than itsself.

B.) The ELB person is motivated by and rewarded by the definition of goals and the resultant solutions to acheiving those goals. Attendant to this is an extream beleif in right and wrong. Delaying gratification to achive future rewards and a faith based certanty in a creator greator than themselves to live up to.

So you can use your imagination to fill in the spectrum between these two. Agent how are you going to reward everyone involved? The muppets recruit for a muppet standard personality to the game and so you are being a tad unfair. Step outside of your box and formulate a bigger picture. This is HiTech's greatest problem in presenting the game. The diverse personality types and what constitutes a reward for effort to them.

I thought my OP was pretty open ended. I did not intend to favor furballing or strategic play. I hoped to spawn a debate on what "combat" really means.

Thus I mentioned a "holy Grail" (I spelled it correctly this time for the word police). I agree with you that the problem is to figure out what "constitutes a reward for effort".

I did make a few assumptions. One being that if "combat" was the doctrine that the maps should contribute to that.

I said "It is my opinion that as the game exists now the doctrine even in its simplest form can not be realized. The "soldiers" simply can not see any reward for their efforts."

I meant this to apply to everyone. Not just furballers. The rescent dar changes is a good example.

I think my OP may have been taken the wrong way due to my reputation of prefering direct combat in fighters.

[Agent360]

Not surprising how Rapiers entire post got missed.Typical forum fashion,a post that is 100% bang on get's missed.Slinging insults over substance.IN a lot of cases these insulters carry this off the forums into the game.They chose to be belligerent to ANYONE who refuses to play this game their STYLE.This game is what YOU make it,I will not belittle anyone for choosing to play it their way.However,there are grown MEN in this who have created quite the atmosphere and language,and they waste little time in game to let you KNOW you are: NO skillz horders,hotard,ace pilot,etc.These people know who they are and they don't give a ratz bellybutton what they say and to who
There are several playes(1 or 2 squads as well) who do NOTHING but horde together run to a base and endlessly chase fighters sometimes 7 or 8 of them chasing 1 enemy fighter,they do this DAY in DAY out,changing sides just to find a fight to score even more perk points.They contribute ZERO to the entire sides eventual goal to win a map.To them that is how THEY have adapted the game to their specific fun factor.So far they are BY far the most vocal in every forum,complaining about everything from other fighters not flying THEIR fight,to flying "dweeb planes".They are the furballers.THey sit, hour by hour, endlessly chasing and usually ganging up on weaker fighters.They have honed their fighter skills,yes they are decent sticks,however as individuals have shown very poorly in game. Yet time and again these are THE single most vocal complainers about the other styles.The base takers.
Yet this game is designed around capturing territory and eventually winning a map.
I choose to be the base taker,my skills are not that good in a fighter but I can hold my own at times. I enjoy the game very much,which is why I pay my 16 bucks a month.I do NOT enjoy being pm'd by someone I shot down,insulting me,I do NOT trash talk in a video game that I play for relaxation and squad fun,and I certainly do NOT get on vox and  force a furballer to play the base taking game.Hence Rapiers POINT!!! I have seen post after post on the forums denigrating base takers as no skillz this and no skillz that...(This from so called grown men)Post after ranting post  about basetaking ruining a fight....imagine that.
It's even been taken to new lows in game where an entire squad is being  slandered for its base taking. Slagged for taking undefended bases!! Well you know if your bases are being taken,here's a concept for you .....DEFEND them!!! Instead of taking up an entire day stuck on one base up at the base being "horded" and show basetakers that furballers DO have a point!
There is one thing I wish hitech WOULD implement,a PERMANENT squelch on problem players,players who consistently,day in and day out go WAY over the top in denigrating others style of play.In a game. READ RAPIERS whole POST.

I didn't miss it.

And, I actually read your post..although it was a bit hard due to the formating.

I really think you shoud re read my OP. It's not about furballing. It's not about why we should have furballing. It's not about anything to do with furballing.

It's not about telling people how THEY should play.

It IS about how to create a situation of combat which appeals to EVERYONE.

Can we agree that playing against predictable AI enemys offline is of limited fun for pretty much everyone. I then ask WHY does one play online?

WHY WHY WHY do we play online. I can tell you. Because we want to experience interaction with other players. We want to engage in combat.

What "combat" means is the whole intent of my OP.

Read my OP as though you never heard of me or had never seen any post I made.

[TheRapier]

Agent, I'm pretty sure I didn't intentionally insult you. I could equally say, what I posted went over your head since you haven't really addressed it. However in the interest of elevating the level of conversation in here, let's drop that.

I'm not sure what you are advocating here? Your original post seemed to be saying that the territorial game should be the focus? I'm assuming this since you seemed to be tying it to combat doctrine that countries reflexively create to win wars. No country creates a combat doctrine to make wars longer or more costly, that would be waaay counter intuitive, even though that is the model that AH uses.

While I applaud your intention to create combat that appeals to everyone, that kinda creeps over into game design, which is what HTC does. AH by nature and design has aspects of a sandbox game, that is pieces are made available in the game (A/C, GVs, Bases, CV groups) and the players make use of them as they will. The surest way to fail is for the developer to try and tell the community that there is one, right way to play (which prompted my initial response).

If we accept that HTC's goal is to make it difficult for one side or another to "win", then what could the doctrine be? Is it:
A: We go along with making it difficult to win, so we will change sides more often and choose the highest ENY planes available.
B: We try to overwhelm the system to get the win quickly.


(A) is counterintuitive to most people who like to win so community support may be tough. If you succeed in (B) HTC will put in more mechanisms to slow you down to achieve their goal of endless combat.

So what exactly are you trying to say? Your Subject is about doctrine but you are posting about maps. Do maps contribute combat? Absolutely. But this is again game design. For a map to work it has to be matched a number of variables that change quickly. Population has a huge effect. If you've ever played on a huge map when there aren't enough people, you get this one. It might be an awesome map for 2000 people but it won't work for 200.

There are a host of other variables. What are you trying to get to? And how is that NOT trying to tell people how to play? Wayneman makes some good points. I too am tired of being PMed by losers who try to rewrite what just happened so they actually won, instead of died. Most of what passes for dialogue in game and in this forum is testosterone laced hyperbole about how great my ideas and my skills are. That is beyond futile.

Alternatively, this place is filled with innumerable people who are willing to tell you how to play and enjoy your $15. It's frankly tiresome.

I tend to go the other way, which is HTC has created a great sandbox. We should start from the place of being thankful that others are willing to spend money and be in this space so we have playmates.  Without it, this would be dead and all the game design in the world would be useless. I personally don't feel that we need anyone else trying to tell us how to be.

[The Fugitive]

I think some people take things a bit too seriously including themselves.

To me it looked like he was asking what can be done to make it fun in the game. My suggestion was to have less bases on a map seeing in most case we do not have enough people to populate a large map and capture a large number of bases. Like you said Rapier, the game is like a big sand box and there are many ways to play in it.

HTC isn't making it more difficult to take bases and win the war, they are just making it so it isn't so easy. The idea of the game is combat. I don't care who you are, if you are here to try and avoid all conflict you should just save your money. It's like playing Monopoly and not spending any of your money or trading. Why are you bothering, you are NOT playing the game.

This is a game and the object of the a game is to win. To me winning is fighting in my cartoon plane and shooting down other cartoon planes. To others its the same but in GV's, to others it's taking bases. The doctrine should be as simple as "to engage in combat at every opportunity" because, after all that is what the game was designed around.

Nobody is saying how you should play other than what the owner and designer said, which is to engage in combat. How you engage and why is up to you.  

[Agent360]

Agent, I'm pretty sure I didn't intentionally insult you. I could equally say, what I posted went over your head since you haven't really addressed it. However in the interest of elevating the level of conversation in here, let's drop that.

I'm not sure what you are advocating here? Your original post seemed to be saying that the territorial game should be the focus? I'm assuming this since you seemed to be tying it to combat doctrine that countries reflexively create to win wars. No country creates a combat doctrine to make wars longer or more costly, that would be waaay counter intuitive, even though that is the model that AH uses.

While I applaud your intention to create combat that appeals to everyone, that kinda creeps over into game design, which is what HTC does. AH by nature and design has aspects of a sandbox game, that is pieces are made available in the game (A/C, GVs, Bases, CV groups) and the players make use of them as they will. The surest way to fail is for the developer to try and tell the community that there is one, right way to play (which prompted my initial response).

If we accept that HTC's goal is to make it difficult for one side or another to "win", then what could the doctrine be? Is it:
A: We go along with making it difficult to win, so we will change sides more often and choose the highest ENY planes available.
B: We try to overwhelm the system to get the win quickly.


(A) is counterintuitive to most people who like to win so community support may be tough. If you succeed in (B) HTC will put in more mechanisms to slow you down to achieve their goal of endless combat.

So what exactly are you trying to say? Your Subject is about doctrine but you are posting about maps. Do maps contribute combat? Absolutely. But this is again game design. For a map to work it has to be matched a number of variables that change quickly. Population has a huge effect. If you've ever played on a huge map when there aren't enough people, you get this one. It might be an awesome map for 2000 people but it won't work for 200.

There are a host of other variables. What are you trying to get to? And how is that NOT trying to tell people how to play? Wayneman makes some good points. I too am tired of being PMed by losers who try to rewrite what just happened so they actually won, instead of died. Most of what passes for dialogue in game and in this forum is testosterone laced hyperbole about how great my ideas and my skills are. That is beyond futile.

Alternatively, this place is filled with innumerable people who are willing to tell you how to play and enjoy your $15. It's frankly tiresome.

I tend to go the other way, which is HTC has created a great sandbox. We should start from the place of being thankful that others are willing to spend money and be in this space so we have playmates.  Without it, this would be dead and all the game design in the world would be useless. I personally don't feel that we need anyone else trying to tell us how to be.

I am not advocating anything. I simply brought up the concept of an actual war doctrine of AH. And that is combat.

Obviously, maps are the root of the combat. Otherwise we would have a giant DA furball lake.

I intended my OP to include base takers as well as furballers. I did not favor either side.

Your post has some good points. This is the kind of discussion I hoped to spawn.

 

[xNOVAx]

Hell why not.. I'll throw in my $.02..

It seems the general concensus is that "combat" is the purpose of the game, however "combat" has no purpose if you aren't "combating" against or towards some kind of goal..

The way I see the game now is we really have nothing to defend that affects anything, and we have nothing to attack except eachother and inconsequential/meaningless ground targets.. All we have to shoot at that matters "at all" is eachother, which in my opinion can get fairly boring quickly.. The only thing we have to show for our efforts in this game is score (which I truely believe doesn't add a damn thing to the game) and bragging rights by seeing your name in lights when you land 50 kills in a 262 and get 100 WTG's in the text buffer to inflate your ego, or pwning people, filming it, and posting it here on the boards so everyone can grovel at you..

Taking bases doesnt matter.. "Yay we took your base, we are better than joo!" No you're not.. You just had 50 more players in a certain area of the map.. Good for you.
Defending bases doesnt matter.. "Great the entire (insert chess piece here) air force is on my 6!" Screw it.. I'll go find an equal number fight somewhere else..
Bombing strats doesnt matter.. Seriously why? SOO boring and pointless..

Whats left? Furballing, but that only lasts until one team overpowers the other and then you're back to trying to find another "good fight." Everything else in this game honestly is pointless..

I'm not sure I really have an answer on how to fix these issues in the MA, but I've always thought some kind of deathmatch style arena would be fun (no the dueling arena doesn't work for this as its not structured).. Something like a base capture map 2 teams, 20 on 20 or something similar.. Auto balance etc like many modern shooter games.. Or 10 on 10 furball/GV battles etc etc. This would provide an immediate goal and the goal (winning) would be fair game for each side with more weight on skill than sheer numbers..

[Ardy123]

Nova,
I agree there is a clear lack of 'objective' in the game and all actions are pointless, hell, the map resets, and the war continues. Where I disagree is that the only 'point' is to furbal. I too enjoy to furbal but for alot of people, its more like hanging out, drinking and cracking jokes, with airplanes as a pretext around the social occasion.

Personally, I enjoy a good fight, and what drives me to the game is to get the rush from a good fight. Now what others get from it range from, 'cool look at that move I just did!, I just discovered something', to 'I pissed you off, I have power over you, this is fun', to 'I pwnd you, I'm gonna post it, I'm god's gift to cartoon aerial combat and I have digital confirmation of my greatness', etc... But regardless, they all stem from the fact that there is no clear objective and thus it resorts to everyone having some personal 'goal'. When the goals conflict, verbal arguments erupt on 200.

The challenge,
The obvious goal is, to have fun, but that is meaningless. What is the 'Tangible' goal. How do you have a goal in a game like this? is the goal to be as good as possible at '(aerial/ground combat)?

What is 'fun' combat? (obviously winning, but thats stupid, how can you have 'fun' combat with out disfranchising groups in your player base)?

[xNOVAx]

What is 'fun' combat? (obviously winning, but thats stupid, how can you have 'fun' combat with out disfranchising groups in your player base)?

So I'm going to compare apples to oranges a bit, but take for instance the game Team Fortress 2 and Aces High..

Team Fortress has structured and fair combat system where two teams battle to achieve a specific goal (capture the flag, get the bomb to the other base etc).. You can play 9 different character classes where each class has its own purpose to achieve that goal.. 2 teams, equal number of players.. Have at it! Great fun.. The higher skilled team will most likely win using correct tactics and pwnage..

Aces High has an unstructured combat system where 3 teams battle to achieve nothing (essentially). 3 teams, tons of different planes to fly, unbalanced number of players (almost always).. No goal, unfair, and the team that has the most players will most likely win regardless of any retarded ENY values imposed on the higher number team.. Also there's no common satisfaction among your team mates (except for when you might take a base, but 99% of the time when a base is taken its capped and the fight is completely over.. Boring)..

From a pure '"this is a video game standpoint," I find I have MUCH more fun in a 'combat' situation playing team fortress than I do Aces High. The fight isn't over until one team actually wins a fair win.. Period..

[TnDep]

So I'm going to compare apples to oranges a bit, but take for instance the game Team Fortress 2 and Aces High..

Team Fortress has structured and fair combat system where two teams battle to achieve a specific goal (capture the flag, get the bomb to the other base etc).. You can play 9 different character classes where each class has its own purpose to achieve that goal.. 2 teams, equal number of players.. Have at it! Great fun.. The higher skilled team will most likely win using correct tactics and pwnage..

Aces High has an unstructured combat system where 3 teams battle to achieve nothing (essentially). 3 teams, tons of different planes to fly, unbalanced number of players (almost always).. No goal, unfair, and the team that has the most players will most likely win regardless of any retarded ENY values imposed on the higher number team.. Also there's no common satisfaction among your team mates (except for when you might take a base, but 99% of the time when a base is taken its capped and the fight is completely over.. Boring)..

From a pure '"this is a video game standpoint," I find I have MUCH more fun in a 'combat' situation playing team fortress than I do Aces High. The fight isn't over until one team actually wins a fair win.. Period..

interesting I like that concept of actually winning something, seems like more heart pumping team oriented action

[RufusLeaking]

HTC isn't making it more difficult to take bases and win the war, they are just making it so it isn't so easy.  

My head just exploded.

But seriously, great thread. 

  to all contributors.  Who's been handing out the smart pills?

[hitech]

I see no difference between team fortress and AH in basic game principles. Both are nothing more then capture the flag. Both have different rolls for players fighters,tanks,supplies ....

Both have an end game, I.E. win the war in AH.

Both have players not simply trying for the goal, but just playing to kill people.

NOVA: Under your idea of no purpose. All games that are simply played for enjoyment have no purpose other then enjoyment.

HiTech

[xNOVAx]

I see no difference between team fortress and AH in basic game principles. Both are nothing more then capture the flag. Both have different rolls for players fighters,tanks,supplies ....

Both have an end game, I.E. win the war in AH.

Both have players not simply trying for the goal, but just playing to kill people.

NOVA: Under your idea of no purpose. All games that are simply played for enjoyment have no purpose other then enjoyment.

HiTech

I don't see AH as a game of capture the flag.. I see AH as 100 capture the flag games going on at the same time, all of which are unfair.. Capture the flag is only viable and enjoyable to me when its fair and balanced (equal numbers on both sides battling for superority of a small area), therefore AH is not an enjoyable capture the flag model. As far as the enjoyment factor, I enjoy shooting people down, but it would be MUCH more fun and satisfying to me if there was an "urgent" goal, IE you take a base you actually win, or lose a base you actually lose etc.. Currently if you take a base, there's 100 more you need to take, lose a base, there's 100 more bases that you have to lose before you "actually lose." Therefore there's no "urgent" reason to attack or defend anything because it take HOURS for a map to be won or lost.. I don't have the time nor do I care to play for that long to "win" and have that satisfaction that my actions mattered at all..

As far as people just trying to kill other people, sure you're going to have that anywhere, but I would say the majority of the people when I'm playing team fortress actually play towards caputring the flag when you play a "capture the flag" map, and the people that are just shooting people and not going for the flag are still contributing towards helping their team capture the flag whether or not they are actually trying to.. If you dont want any other match elements in play, just go to a deathmatch map if you want to do nothing but shoot at people..

[gyrene81]

So I'm going to compare apples to oranges a bit, but take for instance the game Team Fortress 2 and Aces High..

Team Fortress has structured and fair combat system where two teams battle to achieve a specific goal (capture the flag, get the bomb to the other base etc).. You can play 9 different character classes where each class has its own purpose to achieve that goal.. 2 teams, equal number of players.. Have at it! Great fun.. The higher skilled team will most likely win using correct tactics and pwnage..

Aces High has an unstructured combat system where 3 teams battle to achieve nothing (essentially). 3 teams, tons of different planes to fly, unbalanced number of players (almost always).. No goal, unfair, and the team that has the most players will most likely win regardless of any retarded ENY values imposed on the higher number team.. Also there's no common satisfaction among your team mates (except for when you might take a base, but 99% of the time when a base is taken its capped and the fight is completely over.. Boring)..

From a pure '"this is a video game standpoint," I find I have MUCH more fun in a 'combat' situation playing team fortress than I do Aces High. The fight isn't over until one team actually wins a fair win.. Period..

Wow, talk about off the reservation. Sorry Nova but...   Team Fortress only has a structured and fair combat system if there are squad matches, otherwise it's a frag fest.


To compare squad vs squad duels in Team Fortress to the TDM type of game play seen in the AH main arenas is way out in left field. In every multiplayer game available where equipment choices can be made without restrictions, people will always go for the class/weapons choices they think will give them the advantage; unless it's an arranged match between 2 squads where each team agrees to certain rules and limitations in an effort to "balance" the fight. On TDM servers, it's a free for all frag fest just like the main arenas in AH, every player grabs whatever they think will give them the best chances for the most frags before time runs out. Imagine Team Fortress with 100 different classes and 200 different weapons. If there is any concerted effort among the players, it's a short lived effort to "win the war" before the time runs out. In a first person shooter with smaller numbers and time limitations it's easy to have short lived team effort, but put 300 people in that first person shooter with a large number of weapons choices and a large number of objectives needed to "win the war" and run it 24/7 and you will get the same results as what's seen in the main arenas of AH.

Strangely enough, in your diatribe you failed to note that the same "team play effort" occurs in the AH Squad Dueling League, FSO and some other special events where the admins attempt to create "balance" with the available equipment so that more "player skill" and "team strategy" will determine the winner rather than how much more uber their equipment is over their opponent.