Base flat, ack down and CV offshore. Thank goodness there are:

[Lusche]

Wow !!!! The Snailman stumped

That could have been a bit too long ago for me... apart from that, player names and squads  that kind of "social" stuff I was never good at, never having been member of any squad myself.
Heck, I even had a player named "snailboy" winging up with me for a tour or so... and I have completely forgotten who that really was 

But the AK's I do remember... it was about the first squad I noticed by having to listen to all the complaints on range & country about that "lame horders" 

[Wiley]

This is the stupid non-argument that kills this discussion every time.   It's the same attitude that allows players to derail the trend of quality air combat in the arena by rolling 50 player hordes "because it's their 15$" "because we wanna hang out with friends" "because we can" "because no one should tell us how we should play".

'trend of quality air combat'?  Really?  Horde whines go back for time immemorial.  The people who want quality air combat seek it out, those who don't, don't.

You can't make people want 'quality fights' (whatever that means to you) if they aren't already looking for it.

The vast majority of this game are relatively casual, meaning they don't have the inclination to sit down and approach it systematically to get better, or to become as good as they can.  Not everybody lives and dies for 1v1 either.

What's the alternative?

Wiley.

[moot]

Forget the whines.  They are only a consequence of lopsided "combat".

The vast majority of this game are relatively casual, meaning they don't have the inclination to sit down and approach it systematically to get better, or to become as good as they can.  Not everybody lives and dies for 1v1 either.

Forget extreme purists' 1:1s.  I am talking about any fight where the players actually get to choose and execute at least a handful of tactical choices before they win or lose. IOW gameplay. You do not get that in a 4:1 pileup or any "base fight" where it's nothing but a string of such engagements.  The extreme instance being vulching.  There is no fight there.  There's no gameplay, no exchange, for the vulchee and no peril nor victory for the vulcher. 

What is the purpose of e.g. the AH Trainer Corps?  To teach people to fly and fight.  It says something about the bang they get for their buck when players don't get a chance to put to use much if anything such as what the AHTC teaches.

[The Fugitive]

Zoney, "we" are the people who use to play. Unlike many of my contemporaries I'm still here, they have moved on.

Grizz, LOL!!! talk about grumpy old men, you don't even play the game any more...could it be because it sucks or has become boring?

Lusche, players change, and some drastically. I know I change 3 or 4 times a day when I get a chance to play, because it is what the game allows. Stats are stats, not FACTS.

It doesn't matter what "I remember" about the game, we can all agree that the game needs changes. This game MUST cater to many styles/types of players if it is to flourish. We have

• Fighters- love to do nothing but fight don't even know you can win the war
• Tankers- only know planes are around when their spawn camp gets hit by A20's
• Mission/group players- will do what ever it takes to see that system message pop up

 

In side these groups are sub groups.

• Fighters- made up of lone wolves, winged teams/historians, full squads both as fighter sweeps types as well as mission orintated/history type flying cover missions and such.
• Tankers- spawn campers, attack battle groups, defender groups the use wirbles and Osties as there main rides
• Mission/group players-Hordes protecting the new/weak, missions/historians team up to "play war", land grabbers do what ever is needed to grab the next base, vulchers will join a mission in the hopes that ack gets cleared so they can grab some easy kills and have no interest in grabbing the base

I'm sure there are more, and ...let me put this in big letters so everyone understand... THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH ANY OF THESE STYLES OF PLAY! These are are all, and some of the players that HTC has to accommodate for this game to continue and grow. The problem is how to make it so that all of these groups can play they way they want with out crushing someone else playing style.

Suggestions

• Bring the old strat back- The separate zone base created major battle for a zone base. Depots spread about the map created a wonder land of "porking " opportunities both for helping in the war effort as well as easy points/perks for both buffs and GVs. With the old depot setup GV hunting was a fun pass time for many as well as clearing a depot with a GV. The same can be said about buff hunting as well as buffs making the shorter quicker run to the depots instead of the long flight to ones that may not be there when you arrive because they have retreated.
• Towns- remove the ack, make the GV spawn points be opposite side of the town than the field but the same distance as the field is to the town. HTC made these beautiful towns with streets and sign posts and bridges and building all over the place. What a wonderful place for a GV battle! It doesn't happen because the spawn points are on the other side of the fields. Campers kill them before they can get to the town and battle it out. Ack only hurts GVs. Planes can bomb the towns with out ack bothering them. Put a coupe around the map room to cover it, but make sure they don't fire through buildings and trees. An equal footing should give the GV places to battle it out in the towns by making the ride in equal. More GV battles make more spots for dive bombers.
• Captures- tie the hardness of the buildings to the incoming raid numbers. The larger the number of enemy in the DAR circle the more ordinance needed to take down a building. Hordes will still come in, but now everyone's bombs will be needed. This also goes the other way. A small force won't need as much to take the town down and so can capture WITHOUT the need of a horde. This way small attack groups have the same chance at a capture as the hordes. With no ack at the town the newly captured base will have to be defended for 30 minutes until the building pop back up other wise as it is still "white flagged" it can be recaptured with ease.
• Missions- create a mission ready room like "that other game" use to have. Building a mission and having the meeting room for everyone to meet up before the mission in builds comradiery , and adds immersion for those "history" types. With the wall board with waypoints and wings and such will lead to missions with a purpose instead of the old "everyone grab a 110 heavy". Added immersion would add to the team aspect of the game.
• points/perks- these could be used to promote combat as well. Like ENY is used to reward you for winning a fight with a 109G2 so could they be used to winning a base with smaller numbers, or holding the base after capturing it, or defending it from an attack.

Making changes like these won't stop a horde, or change the win the wars ideas, but it would create more combat to accomplish the same things. You can still run in a horde if that what you need, or you can work a side battle with a few of your squadies. HTC has most of this stuff in the game. By adding more and leading people to using whats there it will make the game have more content. Missions will be something people would look forward to as more interest would be generated by anything other than "here comes the same old same old"

[RTHolmes]

zone system and mission planning for sure

new maps would help alot too - a change is as good as a rest. maps of an appropriate size for the player numbers would help too, many are just way too big.

[Melvin]

An interesting post

While I agree with some of the suggestions, I found the "Capture" idea to be a bit gamey.

The one that really piqued my interest was the suggestion of removing ack from town. I'm not so sure about that, but what I was thinking is that perhaps after the ack reaches a certain low point in it's elevation (say 2-4 deg) it would be disabled from firing. This would allow tankers to use terrain to get in close.

I tried to do some research on the factual numbers for ack gun elevations, but wasn't sure which type is modeled in-game.

[Lusche]

Lusche, players change, and some drastically. I know I change 3 or 4 times a day when I get a chance to play, because it is what the game allows. Stats are stats, not FACTS.

Individual players do. Some times I fly this way, one the other.
But the arena as a whole, a group of 4000 to 5000 players does not, not literally all at once and completely radical from one day to the other, not "just because". And that's what you are trying to make believe.

Oh, and I think a further comment on the "facts" statement ain't necessary. 

[The Fugitive]

zone system and mission planning for sure

new maps would help alot too - a change is as good as a rest. maps of an appropriate size for the player numbers would help too, many are just way too big.

I forgot to mention maps. I think that we ran into issues when we went to the big maps. It looked like the numbers were growing fast enough to support them but with the recent decline it hurts more than help. What we need is some "middle sized" maps. We could use the same size maps we have now, but like ...I think it was fester said, "you don't have to use the whole map". So instead of hundreds of bases covering the whole map put like 90 in the center of a map leaving the outside couple of sectors on each side empty. This way you could still meet the base per sector limits HTC wants on his maps but the fronts would be concentrated closer rather than more spread out.

While I agree with some of the suggestions, I found the "Capture" idea to be a bit gamey.

The one that really piqued my interest was the suggestion of removing ack from town. I'm not so sure about that, but what I was thinking is that perhaps after the ack reaches a certain low point in it's elevation (say 2-4 deg) it would be disabled from firing. This would allow tankers to use terrain to get in close.

I tried to do some research on the factual numbers for ack gun elevations, but wasn't sure which type is modeled in-game.

What do you mean by gamey, it what way? To me it would be simulating a bigger battle. If defenders don't show up to match the the enemy with the hardness factor it would give the defenders a chance to defend. If the defender have a chance, maybe more people would defend?

Individual players do. Some times I fly this way, one the other.
But the arena as a whole, a group of 4000 to 5000 players does not, not literally all at once and completely radical from one day to the other, not "just because". And that's what you are trying to make believe.

Oh, and I think a further comment on the "facts" statement ain't necessary.  

But who's to say a third of them changed one day, and eighth the next day, and then a quarter the day after? If the bish horde everyday, and the rooks and Knits only do it every other day your still going to see the same "third" hording but it doesn't show you the real picture that the Bish are a bunch of horde pigs!    j/k See what I mean, stats are just stats, not facts.

[Melvin]

What do you mean by gamey, it what way? To me it would be simulating a bigger battle. If defenders don't show up to match the the enemy with the hardness factor it would give the defenders a chance to defend. If the defender have a chance, maybe more people would defend?

The whole idea of linking object hardness to the number of enemy in the area is very gamey in my opinion. For the program to say, "Sorry, there are too many of you. The buildings shall now be hurricane proof." or "Hey look, it's just a few guys coming, their bombs can now blow this town down like a house of cards." just doesn't seem right to me.

What would stop the "horde" from splitting into many "hordlets" and attacking numerous bases at once? After all, their bombs will be much more effective when they fly in small numbers.

However, I am fully in support of leaving ack down for a certain time period, thus requiring the base-takers to defend.

Another VH in or near the town would be sweet too, but alas, that wish has so far been ignored. 

[Chilli]

BTW, the last two days I went through a lot of old threads from 2001-2004 to help me to explain some stats... what I found was the very same stuff: "Nobody fights anymore" "game went downhill" "nothing but hordes" "gamers have taken over" on every second page. It's just as if todays people just copy & paste these old complaints  -- quote from Snailman
 

Fugitive, you have some interesting suggestions about spawn points towns and GV battles.  As I said somewhere before, I believe that tearing up the town with Heavy Bombers and Jabo fighters is gamey (looking at the historical war time targets, being factories and supply lines).  I agree the role of destructible buildings in town should be dedicated to ground vehicles.

One step toward this goal would be to move the maproom onto the airbase or even better a control strat.  The more troops you fill up at certain strats the more bases are available.  Such a spin would shake things up enough that some would whine and pout, but I think the majority would breathe an air of relief, that their beloved game of the ages is not getting dusty and about to retire, instead it would again be making steps into the future that their competition could only hope to duplicate.

Having said again, that the game play should be tweaked, I would like to see the custom arenas take the initiative to produce some of these alternative win / capture servers.  Then let the player base decide which are more popular.  This is one of the many great tools that HTC has given us that we can produce examples of what we like to see.  Not just jabber on about it...... we have player made skins, custom sounds, player made AI missions, Terrain editors, and now Custom Arenas.  <-- Will be my month's task.  Please join me and help me through this process. 

[Melvin]

As I said somewhere before, I believe that tearing up the town with Heavy Bombers and Jabo fighters is gamey (looking at the historical war time targets, being factories and supply lines). 

I yearn for the day when we get more logistical targets to hit. Trains, truck convoys and merchant shipping (that moves at life-like speeds) would do wonders for this game. In my opinion anyway.

[The Fugitive]

The whole idea of linking object hardness to the number of enemy in the area is very gamey in my opinion. For the program to say, "Sorry, there are too many of you. The buildings shall now be hurricane proof." or "Hey look, it's just a few guys coming, their bombs can now blow this town down like a house of cards." just doesn't seem right to me.

What would stop the "horde" from splitting into many "hordlets" and attacking numerous bases at once? After all, their bombs will be much more effective when they fly in small numbers.

However, I am fully in support of leaving ack down for a certain time period, thus requiring the base-takers to defend.

Another VH in or near the town would be sweet too, but alas, that wish has so far been ignored. 

There would be nothing wrong with that. Like I said, if defenders feel they have a chance at fending off the attack, more would defend. As it is now there is no defending against a horde. Split the horde into 3 attacks and maybe you stop two of them. It's still a win win. Attackers win because they got a base or two. Defenders win because they stopped and attack or two. Fighter guys win because they were some fights instead of 10 to 1 odds. Mission people win because they had a part in the mission whether they took the base or not, they participated, unlike now where the late guys circle the field waiting for something to pop back up.

Looks like a lot of people might have fun in a senario like this, and thats the point of playing a game right?

[Melvin]

So a mission planner gets things going...

"OK guys we're gonna go NOE to A-XX. Grab yer 110's and let's head out."

"Oh wait, we can only have nine guys because any more and the building hardness increases."

"Sorry Melvin, you can't come."

        


Totally gaming the game is what I predict if this sort of thing comes to fruition. 

[grizz441]

Grizz, LOL!!! talk about grumpy old men, you don't even play the game any more...could it be because it sucks or has become boring?

This is the first month I've been canceled in in quite some time.  It does not suck but it has become a little on the boring side.  I mostly attribute that to just being burnt out and needing a break and secondary reasons being not as many friends are flying.  Game play issues are not the reason, as the game has not changed much at all since I started flying years ago.

[Guppy35]

This is the first month I've been canceled in in quite some time.  It does not suck but it has become a little on the boring side.  I mostly attribute that to just being burnt out and needing a break and secondary reasons being not as many friends are flying.  Game play issues are not the reason, as the game has not changed much at all since I started flying years ago.

Going to agree with Grizz on this one.  The whines are consistent from the beginning going back to Airwarrior.   As one also going through one of the times where the game feels like a grind, I know that's on me.  It tends to cycle and I'll get my fire back again.  My first instinct is to find fault with the game, and I'm sure if I went back through all my posts over the years I'd find many where i blame it on the game or how the game is played.

Would I like it if there was a way to set up the fights so it wasn't so often a one sided mob?  Sure.  I don't know that there is a way however unless HTC starts to choreograph the battle in the MA so that there are things like zone limits etc.  In the end I don't think it should ever come down to that though.