A more strategic game in AvA?

[jimson]

I've been toying with ways to run a strategic, objective based game in AvA.

We can't use the base capture, win the war map reset as it doesn't work with custom 2 sided arena tables. Every thing we do is manual, but being a 7 day a week arena, whatever we do has to be fairly simple and easy to track.

I've gotten some feedback from the AvA community but would like to get some more.

This is what I've come up with so far.

This will be a mostly unsupervised strategic game that can result in "winning the war."

Victory won't be based on field capture, but on a combination of strategic targets destroyed and number of enemies killed.

Field capture will be possible and can be done for any reason, including to gain strategic position from which to launch attacks on enemy strats, but will not in itself, be a factor in victory.

The foremost objective will be to destroy the enemies factories. Once they are destroyed, they will not regenerate for the length of the set up.

This will represent the total destruction of the enemies war material production capability.

On some terrains, these factories are deep within enemy territory or tucked in out of the way places. It will be players choice whether to use bombers, fighter bombers or ground vehicles for these strat attacks.

Depending on how difficult this is to accomplish, city strats could also be added.

The second factor will be a higher number of enemy kills. These numbers will be taken from the AH stats and will be separated by type of aircraft. Those that cannot be distinguished, such as those accomplished with ship or field guns, chutes, or any vehicles that are substituted and in use by both sides will be thrown out of the totals.

Once either countries factories have all been destroyed, the kill numbers will be counted and if the prevailing country also has the higher number of kills, they will have won the war.

If said country does not have a higher number of kills, the war will continue until both conditions are met by either country.

Once a victory has been determined, the arena will either be reset back to the beginning, advanced on the same map or changed to a new set up and new terrain.

Designated strategic targets will only be in play between the hours of 6pm to midnight est. At all other times they will be hardened to indestructible.

The arena will be open for dogfighting at all times.

There will be no time of day restrictions on kills of other players.

[LThunderpocket]

we need to trash Titanic Tues and make it AvA only day.it seems like it would have a little more meaning to the game.

[jimson]

we need to trash Titanic Tues and make it AvA only day.it seems like it would have a little more meaning to the game.

Yeah, that's never gonna happen.

How bout the original post about an ongoing strategic setup in AvA?

[LThunderpocket]

Yeah, that's never gonna happen.

How bout the original post about an ongoing strategic setup in AvA?

i think the problem is no one is ever is AvA.theres almost no point in even having it as of right now.everyone would just rather fly the planes they want so they dont go into AvA where planes are restricted.i would spend 80% less time in MA and be in AvA if it had a decent amount of players in it.

[drfritz]

any thing better than the gang banging hord style play the the late war arenas have become.just wish there were more guys that would log into ava arena.the few times i logged i it was a ghost town.

[Seadog36]

I'm surprised there aren't more people in AvA. As the only place where you can find historical match ups, usually a short flight from an enemy base it's a blast. Just add a few players and presto. It is also a great place to improve your game because it is not a perpetual vulch fest and the absence of icons mitigates alt monkey advantage. Players are more likely to respect a 1v1 and pick and ho less~ it also changes every week! How cool is that?

[captain1ma]

i think the problem is no one is ever is AvA.theres almost no point in even having it as of right now.everyone would just rather fly the planes they want so they dont go into AvA where planes are restricted.i would spend 80% less time in MA and be in AvA if it had a decent amount of players in it.

So go in the AVA, fly around for a bit, and/or start pm'ing your friends. Next thing you know, you'll have a population in there and probably alot of fun!

[Lusche]

Designated strategic targets will only be in play between the hours of 6pm to midnight est.

That's 10 PM to 6 AM for us in Europe 

But yes,  I do see why this is (unfortunately)  necessary 

[Shuffler]

So go in the AVA, fly around for a bit, and/or start pm'ing your friends. Next thing you know, you'll have a population in there and probably alot of fun!

I have not been in for some time. Had great times there with no icons. Just rarely see anyone there. Then something was attracting some folks who have no move but head on.

I'm not sure that attracting the "win the war" types will improve anything. I could be wrong..... I was once.

Good luck. I just hope you don't have to ruin the idea of the arena to make it more popular.


As for PMing my friends... I have no friends. My squad uses me for bait when corky is not around.  :

[captain1ma]

thats funny, i use you for bait too when i see you in there!

[jimson]

I'm not sure that attracting the "win the war" types will improve anything.

None of us are sure about anything.

I just wonder if the arena is limited by a lack of objectives/goals.

As it is, there is no compelling reason for people to fly more variety of missions, no real role for bomber pilots here etc.  

An objective based scenario that focuses on something other than base capture is a bit different dynamic.

Objectives can be pursued without killing bases, shutting down fights and encouraging vultching etc.

[tmetal]

None of us are sure about anything.

I just wonder if the arena is limited by a lack of objectives/goals.

As it is, there is no compelling reason for people to fly more variety of missions, no real role for bomber pilots here etc.  

An objective based scenario that focuses on something other than base capture is a bit different dynamic.

Objectives can be pursued without killing bases, shutting down fights and encouraging vultching etc.

This is a big reason why I don't drop in more often. To me the AvA is most similar to the DA and I don't spend any time in there because I get the most fun out of the game when flying a bombing mission or a jabo strike.  The AvA is little fun to run these kind of missions because of things like raised object hardness, occasional low alt ceilings (compared to the MA's), and the amount of action going on due to low attendance numbers means little or no escort for bombers and little or no chance to sneak a flight of bombers into and out of their target.  Also when compared to the allied bombers, the axis bombers where slow, and under armed.  So with all that working against pilots who like to fly bombers, plus knowing that your flight will have little or no effect on the arena as a whole; why would a bomber jock drop in on the AvA?

The Idea I have to help add some strategy to the AvA is to try out what has been wished for repeatedly in the forums. Implement strat targets similar to the factories in the MA's but make their destruction affect the arena.  For example have factories corresponding to the plane lists so that if the allies destroy all of the factories for the bf109 then that plane is not available to the axis for a certain amount of time or only a certain percentage of the axis pilots can up a bf109, same for GV's. This way each side can have an objective to try to achieve that would have an effect on the AvA situation but it won't necessarily "win the war" or cause massive land grabs.

Just my long winded .02

[Shuffler]

None of us are sure about anything.

I just wonder if the arena is limited by a lack of objectives/goals.

As it is, there is no compelling reason for people to fly more variety of missions, no real role for bomber pilots here etc.  

An objective based scenario that focuses on something other than base capture is a bit different dynamic.

Objectives can be pursued without killing bases, shutting down fights and encouraging vultching etc.

I can tell you one thing for positively sure.... the problem with non-increasing numbers in AVA is NOT for lack of trying.


I commend all of the AVA folks for sticking to their guns on trying to get the AVA going. Do what you have to do. Try what you have to try. I'm hoping for yalls success in the end...... hopefully before October 21st.

[jimson]

Implement strat targets similar to the factories in the MA's but make their destruction affect the arena.  For example have factories corresponding to the plane lists so that if the allies destroy all of the factories for the bf109 then that plane is not available to the axis for a certain amount of time or only a certain percentage of the axis pilots can up a bf109, same for GV's.

These are cool ideas but without any automation tools, we have to fake things manually and in a 24/7 arena, there is little way to accomplish that.

Soo..... that leaves us with trying to do something in a simplified manner that's easy to keep track of.

Make it as run by itself as much as possible.

As for altitude ceilings and object hardness, that is something we can control.

In this example, I wasn't planning on any ceilings and the only time object hardness would be raised is during the times the arena is mostly empty, just to help prevent folks from logging in and destroying everything when there is no chance of defenders slowing them down.

Also, we can disable bomber load outs in order to keep Axis within the same capability range as Allied at least as far as weapons go.

[tmetal]

Yeah, I didn't figure the tools where already in place for what I suggested; but I think the AvA would be a good place to test out some of the better ideas for strategic targets/gameplay listed over on the wishlist forum (i guess that would be a decision more for the guys at HTC wouldn't it?).  My comment about the bombers being under armed was more about the smaller caliber and fewer numbers of defensive guns on most axis planes than the bomb load they can carry; and I know there really isn't much that can be done about it either. I was just listing some of the things that keep me (as a bomber pilot) from logging into the AvA more often. btw, more scenarios using the graf zeppelin would definitely lure me in more often.