The Strategic Dominance Gaming Theory Book of Aces High

[Latrobe]

It's not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of logic. Players who approach ACM (and by extension, Aces High) with regard to Strategic Dominance gaming theory (as I do) will find such a system VERY easy to abuse for advantage... and I commonly do. It's the nature of ACM when practiced in a textbook definition.

The above quote really opened my eyes to a whole new level of skill that I never knew existed before. Ever since I started studying the Strategic Dominance Gaming Theory to improve my skills I have seen vast improvements in my ability to own noobs. I am now going to pass this knowledge onto you, the community of Aces High 2! Please enjoy my book "Strategic Dominance Gaming Theory of Aces High 2"!!


Strategic Dominance Gaming Theory of Aces High 2


Chapter 1: Introduction
   Strategic Dominance Gaming Theory is the theory of using strategic dominance in gaming by using epic skills to destroy your opponents will to live. A player using Strategic Dominance Gaming Theory (which I will now refer to as SDGT) will use the most advantageous strategy in order to easily achieve victory no matter how gay and cowardly the strategy is. If option A always dominates option B then a player of SDGT will always choose option A. This is the theory behind the dominance of strategic gaming.

Chapter 2: Applying SDGT to AH2
   Now that we know what SDGT is we must now understand how to apply it to Aces High 2 so we can achieve the number one fighter rank. Aces High 2 is a WW2 Flight Simulator Game so Aerial Combat Maneuvers will be our baseline for achieving our strategic dominance. However, ACM is a very rock-paper-scissor type of thing and every maneuver will have a counter maneuver that will defeat it. This of course goes against the SDGT so we will have to improvise slightly and find the easiest and safest flying style so to lessen the number of moves our opponents can use against us. In a fight speed is life so we will be developing our fighting style around this and focusing on Boom-and-Zoom tactics.
Chapter 3: The BnZ

   Now that we know what flying style is the easiest to fly we need to perfect it to minimize the amount of danger to us. The first and most basic aspect for BnZ'ing is to have an altitude advantage. With an altitude advantage we can then "Boom" onto our opponent and then "Zoom" away. This is how BnZ'ing works. Because we have so much speed from diving on them this will limit the amount of time our opponent has to react, avoid our shot, and prevent him from getting any kind of decent return fire on us.
   Another advantage to have is speed. If you have speed before you start your dive then you will increase your speed advantage even more making it even less likely that you can be killed. Remember that speed is life and you can never succeed in winning the number one fighter rank without it.

Chapter 4: Bringing Friends
   Another way to lessen the risk of harming your score is to bring wingmen with you. The more wingmen you have the better. Using your wingmen to gang up on your opponent will force them to lose altitude and speed fighting them. This will make your life easier as you use your BnZ tactics to pick your opponent while he's already busy engaged with your wingmen.
   Having friends also has the added benefit of having them clear your six if you ever make a mistake. SDGT will assure you 100% victories, however we are only human and are incapable of making the right decision 100% of the time. We will make mistakes. Having wingmen around will mean any mistakes you do make your wingmen can then bail you out and you can continue to claim amazing mistake-free skills.

Chapter 5: Picking your Plane
   The tool that we use to dominate our opponents is a crucial decision to make. In AH2 that tool is our plane. Since we already have our flying style figured out, the BnZ with wingmen, we need to pick the easiest plane to fit this style. There are actually a few planes that fit this mold fairly well.
   The Fw 190D-9 is a good starting plane. With it's high speed, great climb rate and powerful gun package this plane easily fits into the BnZ category.
   Alternatively, the Ta-152H is also a fine choice. It performs very similar to the 190D-9 but has an even more powerful gun package and can fly at a much higher altitude, a strength that plays very well into BnZing.
   Once you have gotten in enough practice with these two planes though then the La-7 is the next plane you will want to move to. The La-7 is one of the more difficult planes to fly in the game which is why you should wait until you get very good in your SDGT with the 190D-9 and Ta-152H before using it. It's extremely high speed and insanely good climb rate are superb features for our BnZ tactics and it's gun package of 3 20mm's will shred any plane we attack. Do not make the mistake of taking the 2 20mm package as we are working with the SDGT and the SDGT tells us that the 3 gun package is superior to the 2 gun package.
   Lastly we have the Me-262. Being a jet plane we can already see the speed advantage we will have over any opponent we come across. We will be allowed to engage and disengage at will with little to no risk of dying, and it's quad 30mm cannons will shred apart any and all planes that we come across.
   One thing that I must add is do not fall for the old 'Spitfire is a great trainer plane' that you will hear most everyone saying. The Spitfires are terrible aircraft to learn anything in. They turn very well, climb well, and retain energy extremely well. While this may seem like good things and make the aircraft a nice plane to learn it, it is not. These attributes will teach you wrong tactics that can not be used in our SDGT.

[Latrobe]

Chapter 6: What to do when we can't employ SDGT
   There will be cases when we can not use our one maneuver in order to defeat our opponent. The enemy can cheat, use lag, gang us/our wingmen, or use any one of the maneuvers that counter ours. In these cases it's important to fall back on our second SDGT. We don't want to waste our time learning any more ACM than the one move we already know as we want to achieve the fighter rank of one as quickly as possible. The correct procedure to take in these cases is to immediately engage WEP and dive slightly to gain speed. This may sound counter intuative to our first SDGT of BnZing with altitude but our goal here is to increase speed and separation to our opponent. Your opponent may try to bruise your ego by calling you a cowardly runner but this is a common SDGT used by many these days to make you make a mistake, do not fall for it and continue to extend. The next thing you need to do after gaining more speed than your opponent and getting out of his gun range is to stare off your six and watch your opponent while you maneuver towards some wingmen. If you see your opponent begin to break off then reverse back into him and continue your BnZ tactics. Remember that if your opponent gets on your tail or looks to be lining up a shot do not bother with any other ACM. Immediately dive and extend until they give up chase or your wingmen show up.

Chapter 7: Wrapping Things Up
   If all goes well and you followed this SDGT to the letter then you should have dominated your opponent and killed him. Now we shall cover some more minor details involved with SDGT.
   Firstly, be sure to record every single sortie you fly. This way you have video evidence of your incredible skills. The need for this is you will come across people who doubt your skills. They will try to taunt you with phrases like "Nice ack hugging" or "Nice running to friends". When confronted with such people the correct course of action is as follows: ONE: type .report [Player's name]. This will report his abusive behaviour to the moderators and show him you mean business. TWO: Correct him on his error and let him know that you were merely using your SDGT to own him. THREE: If he does not see the error of his ways and continues his ridiculous banter and doubting your skills then challenge him to the DA. If he claims you're not worth his time then you have won the internet argument. If he accepts then we shall cover what to do in the next chapter. FOUR: If the person actually does make a point and backs it up with evidence then do not back down! Deny all evidence they provide and instead look through your folder full of all the sorties you record. Find one kill you have on this person and upload it to YouTube immediately. This will show him who is boss and you will win the internet argument. Side note: It's a good idea to make multiple YouTube accounts and watch your own videos multiple times so it looks like you are popular. Also get some of your wingmen to stroke your ego in the comment section to show anyone who does watch the videos what an amazing pilot you are.

Chapter 8: DA and Challenges
   If you ever come across someone who doubts your skills or provides evidence that disproves any of your opinions then it's best to challenge them to the DA. DA challenges are the decider of all arguments. Any other challenge anyone makes to you is unimportant and will not show how awesome you are, so if anyone challenges you to anything stupid like an Ice Cream Eating Competition then tell them to go kill themself for being a depressed fat kid with an eating disorder. This is absolutely the correct course of action to take in such a circumstance. Once you do get the person into the DA then it's time to employ a variation of your SDGT. Since we can't start with an altitude advantage as we do in the MA we will have to gain the advantage through another means. On the merge go into a slow climb away from your opponent, WEP on, and spam the combat trim on and off. Spamming the combat trim will lower your drag and increase your speed slightly allowing you to gain the altitude advantage on the merge. Once you've gained the altitude advantage then just use your SDGT from the MA to kill your opponent. If your opponent matches your maneuver or counters it then things get pretty tricky as you can't get any wingmen to help you out. In these cases it's best to stick stir as hard as you can to throw off their shot and shut your engine off to make your opponent overshoot. If your opponent runs from you like some 16 year old kid who speaks in Archaic Victorian English, or, God forbid, he's some black weaboo who needs to go take a dump in the middle of the fight, then follow them for a good 15 minutes. This will show the entire internet who is the superior pilot when you upload the match to YouTube. If by some fluke you somehow get soundly defeated by a vastly superior pilot then simply deny ever having gone to the DA with them. No one will ever know.

Chapter 9: Dealing with Bad Game Modeling
   Aces High 2, as popular as it is with it's community, is actually a rather poorly coded game with many flaws. Some of which that are going to interfere with your SDGT.
   The first is the absolutely horrid torque modeling of the planes engine. It is entirely inaccuarte and nothing like how a normal plane acts in real life. However, you can get around this flaw by turning your engine off. Turning your engine off removes the terrible engine torque modeling and allows you to fly properly. In situations where you are roping your opponent up be sure to turn your engine off at the top of the loop so your plane will fly properly.
   Additionally the throttle is modeled incorrectly as well, so if you ever need to slow down to, lets say, strafe wingless F4F's then don't even touch your throttle. Instead just turn your engine off and you will slow down much faster.
   The trimming of planes is also very wonky and useless. HiTech Creations has however given us a tool that we can exploit to fix this problem. This is the Combat Trim feature. By spamming the Combat Trim on and off quickly we can trim our plane without having to deal with the terrible coding HTC has done to it's planes. Be sure to spam the Combat Trim many times in your flight to reduce drag and gain a tiny amount more speed. Remember that speed is a key strength in our SDGT.

Chapter 10: Review
   To wrap things up let's go over everything we learned.
   The BnZ fighting style will be our fighting style as it is the easiest and saftest one to fly. Fly at high altitudes to have an altitude advantage over everyone, be fast and stay fast, and remember to Never. Ever. Turn! Fly only 190D-9's, Ta-152H's, La-7's and Me-262's as they are among the fastest planes in the game and fit very well into our SDGT. Bring friends in these planes as well. There is saftey in numbers and you can hang around above a fight while your wingmen gang your opponent for you allowing you to swoop in and claim an easy kill. Don't bother with any other ACM other than the one we discussed in this book. They are not needed. If you find yourself unable to employ this one ACM then dive, pick up speed and separation, and wait for your wingmen to arrive or your opponent to give up chase. Most importantly, do not fall for the common SDGT of your opponent taunting you. Continue to extend until you gain the advantage again either through numbers or your opponent breaking off. Record all sorties for video evidence and report anyone who doubts your skills. Challenge them to DA matches and decline any stupid challenges that don't involved the DA. Post kills you have of said DA challenger to YouTube to prove your point. Remember the little tips to work around the horrible game coding. Turn your engine off to remove inaccurate engine torque or to slow down, and spam Combat Trim to gain some extra speed.

[darkzking]

[lerxst]

  just perfect good work sir!!

[hgtonyvi]

 

[WEZEL]

 

[Citabria]

great troll but there is a real theory that is actually fun to use and it was made by a fighter pilot...

"Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War" is a book you should read. hes the guy that gave you the Energy Maneuverability charts that badboy used to post a lot.

and this is his theory...

OODA loop

Boyd's key concept was that of the decision cycle or OODA loop, the process by which an entity (either an individual or an organization) reacts to an event. According to this idea, the key to victory is to be able to create situations wherein one can make appropriate decisions more quickly than one's opponent. The construct was originally a theory of achieving success in air-to-air combat, developed out of Boyd's Energy-Maneuverability theory and his observations on air combat between MiG-15s and North American F-86 Sabres in Korea. Harry Hillaker (chief designer of the F-16) said of the OODA theory, "Time is the dominant parameter. The pilot who goes through the OODA cycle in the shortest time prevails because his opponent is caught responding to situations that have already changed."

Boyd hypothesized that all intelligent organisms and organizations undergo a continuous cycle of interaction with their environment. Boyd breaks this cycle down to four interrelated and overlapping processes through which one cycles continuously:

    Observation: the collection of data by means of the senses
    Orientation: the analysis and synthesis of data to form one's current mental perspective
    Decision: the determination of a course of action based on one's current mental perspective
    Action: the physical playing-out of decisions

Of course, while this is taking place, the situation may be changing. It is sometimes necessary to cancel a planned action in order to meet the changes. This decision cycle is thus known as the OODA loop. Boyd emphasized that this decision cycle is the central mechanism enabling adaptation (apart from natural selection) and is therefore critical to survival.

.......

to sum it up if you can act and react faster than your opponent before they can correctly react to your actions you will always defeat them.

the longer amount of time you give your opponent to counter anything you are doing the larger the probability is they will have a counter move that can defeat you.

this is why speed is life in real combat but it has nothing to do with speed it has to do with reaction times.

in the same way maneuverability is so powerful in air combat it is also because of reaction times.

out fly outmaneuver and out speed your opponent before they can out fly out speed and out maneuver you its that simple.


to quote star trek... "Time is the fire in which we burn." and like the guy that designed the f16 said... "Time is the dominant parameter"

[glzsqd]

Noooo! Latrboe tricked me into reading a book!

[Lab Rat 3947]

        

 

thanks for the satire 

[Citabria]

http://www.ausairpower.net/JRB/boydaerialattack.pdf

skip to part two and the tactics are very well explained for fighter vs fighter combat. the missile tactics dont apply to aces high but everything else is still solid info on tactics and maneuvers.

[ink]

 

[icepac]

Templates are only effective against a predictable opponent.

[danny76]

Superb 

[Skyyr]

great troll but there is a real theory that is actually fun to use and it was made by a fighter pilot...

"Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War" is a book you should read. hes the guy that gave you the Energy Maneuverability charts that badboy used to post a lot.

and this is his theory...

OODA loop

Boyd's key concept was that of the decision cycle or OODA loop, the process by which an entity (either an individual or an organization) reacts to an event. According to this idea, the key to victory is to be able to create situations wherein one can make appropriate decisions more quickly than one's opponent. The construct was originally a theory of achieving success in air-to-air combat, developed out of Boyd's Energy-Maneuverability theory and his observations on air combat between MiG-15s and North American F-86 Sabres in Korea. Harry Hillaker (chief designer of the F-16) said of the OODA theory, "Time is the dominant parameter. The pilot who goes through the OODA cycle in the shortest time prevails because his opponent is caught responding to situations that have already changed."

Boyd hypothesized that all intelligent organisms and organizations undergo a continuous cycle of interaction with their environment. Boyd breaks this cycle down to four interrelated and overlapping processes through which one cycles continuously:

    Observation: the collection of data by means of the senses
    Orientation: the analysis and synthesis of data to form one's current mental perspective
    Decision: the determination of a course of action based on one's current mental perspective
    Action: the physical playing-out of decisions

Of course, while this is taking place, the situation may be changing. It is sometimes necessary to cancel a planned action in order to meet the changes. This decision cycle is thus known as the OODA loop. Boyd emphasized that this decision cycle is the central mechanism enabling adaptation (apart from natural selection) and is therefore critical to survival.

.......

to sum it up if you can act and react faster than your opponent before they can correctly react to your actions you will always defeat them.

the longer amount of time you give your opponent to counter anything you are doing the larger the probability is they will have a counter move that can defeat you.

this is why speed is life in real combat but it has nothing to do with speed it has to do with reaction times.

in the same way maneuverability is so powerful in air combat it is also because of reaction times.

out fly outmaneuver and out speed your opponent before they can out fly out speed and out maneuver you its that simple.


to quote star trek... "Time is the fire in which we burn." and like the guy that designed the f16 said... "Time is the dominant parameter"

Yep, and it's a great book.

[hitech]

Latrobe: It appears you have 2 completely on the hook and about to land them.

HiTech