Fun as watching grass grow

[Arlo]

Strategy in Aces High (and all air combat sims), in the context of air-to-air combat, is ACM.

ACM stands for "air combat maneuvering." This involves tactics and not strategy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_combat_manoeuvring

Strategy, when it comes to air combat (sim or real life), generally involves attaining long term goals (winning a battle or war - in game terms, winning the game).

Tactics can win a dogfight. Strategy can win the game.

The main difference being the individual versus the team.

Granted, tactics can (and in many cases probably should) involve pairs or flights. But this is still a tactical issue. While some may contend that strategy is nothing but several tactical engagements rolled together to yeild an overall result, that is not always the case.

Strategy can be illustrated by the attack on Pearl Harbor or Bombing Raid on Ploesti. On a grander scale it can be illustrated by the entire 8th Air Force plan on how to conduct war in the skies over Europe.

There have been books on both tactics and strategy. One of the favorite books known by most of the players in this community was written by a gentleman named Shaw who has been a guest at conventions, at times and even an Air Warrior player.

You'll find a lot of his material in this Wiki article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_fighter_maneuvers (BFM - part of ACM - again ... tactics).

What you reference: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_dominance  involves strategy games where a single player takes on the role and control of an entire side.

Anyhoo .... this is really neither here nor there unless you want to discuss how a team wins the game (in Aces Hgh) and not your preferred method of dogfighting.

Back to ENY - your claim appears to be that the 'problem' with ENY is that it's directly tied to overall plane performance, instead of overall plane effectiveness/efficiency. I'm not sure how that ties in to players refusing to switch sides yet preferring to log off, entirely, because they have just one plane they like to fly or because they are devoted (individually or as a squad) to playing for one imaginary chesspiece nation. The ENY attributed to each individual plane has nothing to do with that, whatsoever.

Again, ENY was designed as a balancer (whether you think the values used are fair and accurate or not).

This isn't a new thing in AH (it existed when player numbers were at peak):

http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,191244.msg2223766.html#msg2223766


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ENY Value?
« Reply #2 on: November 03, 2006, 06:45:03 »


When you check in HANGAR, each plane has a ENY value. The lower the ENY, the "higher performance" the plane is.

The amount of perks you get awarded for a kill also depends on the ENY value of both planes. The higher your own planes ENY and the lower the opponents, the more perk points you get. Also into play comes the perk multiplier which gets calculated from how many people on your country are in flight as compared to the other countries.

ENY *limit* was installed for side balancing reasons. Above a certain total number of people online, the limit takes effect if one country highly outnumbers the other two. At one point, HT posted the formule used to calculate the limit. The stronger the imbalance, the higher the "ENY limit" ie you cant up planes below a certain ENY value.

This means the country that has the numerical advantage gets a "handicap" in plane choice. Also, not being able to fly the plane of your choice makes people either change country or log alltogether, which in turn helps evening the numbers.

As you can imagine, the higher the total number of players, the better the system works (for mathematical reasons... one single player doesnt make that much of a difference). With the new arena setup, the number of players per arena is lower, closer on the edge of minimum numbers needed to make the system (as it is now) work. This might lead to extreme turnouts of eny limit, which is cause of lot of gripes - of course. HiTech repeatedly has stated that hes working on tweaks to make the system more effective and smooth again.

That some sort of side balancing tool is *needed* was shown in the EWA, where the eny limiter was turned off for a while, resulting in 40 players on one country beating on 12 players (on *both* other countries!) with perked rides.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As you see in the above post, HiTech monitors ENY and tweaks it as need be.

[icepac]

Dang arlo.........you didn't leave anything else for us to add.

[Arlo]

There will always be something to add. 

http://www.hitechcreations.com/wiki/index.php/Side_balancing

[Vraciu]

Dang arlo.........you didn't leave anything else for us to add.

If it has to do with being wrong I would say you're right.   No doubt party line true believer stuff that misses the target.  Per par. 

Skyyr and Fugitive nailed it.  Arlo cannot rebut.   They are right and he is wrong.  (It is Groundhog Day.   You know what he will say before he writes it.  -yawn- )

ENY and the 12-hour rule are in opposition to one another and drive DOWN numbers.   Maybe with a full arena they didn't cause problems but in an empty one they are a disaster.    Throw in HQ griefing and well... "Fun as watching grass grow."

[ImADot]

It seems to me that that biggest factor in not finding fights is the majority of the current player base doesn't want to fight.

[Vraciu]

It seems to me that that biggest factor in not finding fights is the majority of the current player base doesn't want to fight.

That's certainly why some exploit the HQ hole and grief a third of the player base with a single bomb run.

[Arlo]

If it has to do with being wrong I would say you're right.   No doubt party line true believer stuff that misses the target.  Per par. 

Skyyr and Fugitive nailed it.  Arlo cannot rebut.   They are right and he is wrong.  (It is Groundhog Day.   You know what he will say before he writes it.  -yawn- )

ENY and the 12-hour rule are in opposition to one another and drive DOWN numbers.   Maybe with a full arena they didn't cause problems but in an empty one they are a disaster.    Throw in HQ griefing and well... "Fun as watching grass grow."

For someone who's ignoring me and supposedly not reading my posts you sure like to claim you know them well. Honestly, you couldn't grasp the meaning or intent of my posts before you were 'ignoring' me. This is something personal to you. I actually had some hope for you when you joined this game and community (though it was based on nothing more than your choice of forum name with a measure of hope that you would at least honor it even if you couldn't live up to it). As things are, though, you've become one of those pizzed off non-players that hang around the forum and act like they know what's good for the game and community but exemplify something that is actually toxic.

Is that what you imagined you're ignoring? 

[Vraciu]

^^^^^^ Stalker. 

[Canspec]

Why are so many people quoting wikipedia in here these days.......Wikipedia is not considered a credible or authoritative source for information, and yet it is constantly quoted on these bulletin boards as being "what must be" information....kind of sad really.....

[Dragon Tamer]

And now rule #15 has been invoked.

[Vraciu]

Why are so many people quoting wikipedia in here these days.......Wikipedia is not considered a credible or authoritative source for information, and yet it is constantly quoted on these bulletin boards as being "what must be" information....kind of sad really.....

Says who?

Depends on the sources cited within each article.

[Skyyr]

ACM stands for "air combat maneuvering." This involves tactics and not strategy.

...


As you see in the above post, HiTech monitors ENY and tweaks it as need be.

I'm glad you took the time to compile this... assortment of information. The disconnect we have here is that you're defining ACM as a tactic as part of a strategy to win the map (in that regard, ACM would not be actually even be a tactic, but rather a subset of air superiority/supremacy - the actual tactic). So no, ACM would not even be a tactic in your example. That said, even though it's flawed, I understand your core argument; that is to say, ACM augments a bigger picture or goal. Yes, in that scenario, you're correct.

However, ACM can also be a strategy (and it is), and its tactics can be in the form of the maneuvers that make up ACM. This all depends on how you define what the overarching goal is.

For example, if our goal is winning the map, then air superiority is a tactic by which we can achieve it. Other tactics would be superior ground control, removal of enemy resources, etc. However, the majority of players here aren't discussing how ENY affects winning the war, they're complaining that ENY disrupts the balance to aerial combat and makes it less-balanced. In that light (and in the scope of this discussion), our main goal is ensuring that tactics remain valid for both tactics; ergo, the goal being discussed IS the augmenting of ACM and ensuring that both sides are balanced so that all ACM options remain available and unbiased. If we ensure that neither side has an inherent advantage when considering air combat maneuvering, then both sides will have balanced air-to-air engagements, separate from the ground war or any other game aspect.

The problem with ENY is not the overall balance as it affects winning the map (one might argue that it's very effective in that regard due to the continuous stalemates we appear to have on several maps); the issue is that the overall ENY solution does not fairly address air-to-air combat effectiveness, which is ultimately what this thread is about.

[Arlo]

^^^^^^ Stalker. 

It's kinda funny how some forum trolls think that placing other forum members on ignore means that their posts are now immune from rebuttal from that person. No, V, if you post on the AH forum I'm allowed to rebut your posts as much as anyone and, no, that's not stalking .... it's

[Arlo]

The disconnect we have here is that you're defining ACM as a tactic as part of a strategy to win the map

Um, no. I'm the one that understands the difference between 'tactics' and 'strategy.' I was explaining to you that your use of terms is wrong. Air superiority (air supremacy) is where one side holds complete control over the opposing force and is, as such, a desired strategic goal. But you seem to be confusing that term with ACM, which is another thing altogether. ACM is not strategy (although if you want to pretend it is, whatever makes you comfortable). ACM is (again) 'air combat maneuvering.' There's not only books written about it, the term is all over the internet with explanation.

And ENY is a balancer, plain and simple. It is not related to ACM, tactics or strategy. It is a game tool.

[Someguy63]

So how should we revamp the ENY system in order for it to fairly address the effectiveness of air-to-air combat.