To HTC...

[mERv]

It’s honestly impressive how paying subscribers are encouraged to 'switch sides' when ENY gets too high—meanwhile, nothing is ever done about chronic tower sitting. It's almost like the game punishes the players actually putting in the work.

It's 11PM CST, on a Saturday, and here I am sitting at 29 ENY after spending the entire day fighting tooth and nail to secure both fronts. I log off briefly, come back four hours later, and everything we fought for is gone—again. We lose ground, take it back in just two hours, and now my reward is being locked into HE111s?

But sure, tell us again how this is all working as intended.

Keep it up, Dale. You're really nailing it

Baaaahhhh

[mERv]

Knights have had a dozen players minimum sitting in tower last 2.5 hrs and its only been 17 of us actually playing. Anyone can switch sides and stay logged in just to drive ENY up. A few consistently do...

ReTaRdEd

[mERv]

Please cap ENY to 19.9 when the difference of towers sitters versus actual paid playing customers cancels out the numbers advantage that warrants plane/gv restrictions

 

[Animl-AW]

Change your approach bro.....this won't work.

[mERv]

Change your approach bro.....this won't work.

Nothing ever has and I havent crossed a line. I also will not go quietly into that good night. I will be here til the end. However, im trying to play til 1am. When a group of players log it severely affects the main arena. Im just doing my thing then bang.... im now punished for 45 minutes for populating a game. Why do I have to switch sides??? I been here all day. Done fought hordes and mowed through em.... again 

This game needs to only promote activity at all times. This issue negatively impacts the majority of active players. The hordes of 2007 are not the hordes of 2025.

Am I trying to draw attention? Absolutely 

Do I want what is best for the game? Absolutely   

Am i doing this for personal gain? Absolutely not! 

Apply the same rule that was used to change the HQ systsm into what it is today. Not done away with just perfected. 19.9 is realistic for todays numbers at anytime of the day.

You should hear the moans of a dozen or more players for 30 minutes while eny resides at 29 max

[caldera]

As the self-proclaimed bestest gunner evar, flying the He-111 should be just another day at the office for you. 

[Eagler]

Smaller maps would allow faster map swaps so wouldn't that fix your issue?

Eagler

[Animl-AW]

I get it. I know you’re frustrated. I’ll prolly see another thread.

Keep in mind I’m not defending anyone or anything, except the impression some of these threads give newer players. Just words like “decline” can blow off new players, even if its true.

1) Majority rule probably applies. I could be wrong, but there’s not really a majority revolt.

2) Shaming will not have your desired effect. From the other side of the fence, give into shaming once, give into shaming 1000 times. It may actually make sure a change won’t happen.

3) we made a comeback from a gang-bang. Once we crossed the line to be dominate to both countries we now take the hit. I think, not sure, I don’t pay much attention, the other countries get hit too when they dominate us. Since we get ganged a lot it works to our advantage. Yin -yang.

Besides the fact I grew to dislike wing guns, like the 51 (because I suck these days, don’t get enough air time) the 51 seems to be one of the first to go. go in ENY. So I fly D9, because its goid fir what I do, and mire likely to get it, if not the A5 is a decent replacement. Going from a 51 to an A5 my aiming has to change.

When I was on, we took 8-10 bases back in an hr, then 4-6 on enemy land in 30 min, and their numbers shrunk. We kinda ran ourselves into ENY. Over-aggressive can bite back.

As a another player mentioned, we were pretty much milk-running as they do in day hours. I don’t see it as milk-running taking bases back

ANYWAY, not really defending, just another POV. ENY and current dar just doesn’t effect me as much. I care more about the threads that chase new away. When firmer players troll me it does the same. But they don’t care, they don’t play, they have no stake in it. And frankly they find joy in causing decline.

I dunno, maybe I’m not as emotionally attached, I just fall back to “it is what it is”.

Our game may not be modern, but as far as bugs go its a very solid game. These other games may be getting new content, but they are also introducing more bugs to wade through. It just goes with new. I never wrote software and not had bugs to kill.

I guess what I’m saying is, the lack of bugs compensates a few settings I may disagree with.

It probably affects you more as going from a B17 to a HE111 is a bit of a slope. But again, we became very dominate as players went to bed, hard for me to complain.

Mashing HT on bbs instead of a direct convo probably doesn’t help numbers much. Please don’t post with negative titles to give former players something to milk and keep on top. It just hands them a gift.

Vent to me instead

<S>

Crap I just wrote a book





 

[uptown]

I suspect people tower sit like described are waiting for the 25 perk pts. for winning the map. Giving these pts. to players on the winning side, whether they're logged in at the time or not could possibly fix some of this. My only other suggestion would be to find an EW plane and get good in it.
The ENY is baked into the game to keep numbers somewhat even by allowing side switching. Refusing to switch sides is completely understandable to me, but if we make that choice, we have to work with what we have.

[RichardDarkwood]

It’s honestly impressive how paying subscribers are encouraged to 'switch sides' when ENY gets too high—meanwhile, nothing is ever done about chronic tower sitting. It's almost like the game punishes the players actually putting in the work.

It's 11PM CST, on a Saturday, and here I am sitting at 29 ENY after spending the entire day fighting tooth and nail to secure both fronts. I log off briefly, come back four hours later, and everything we fought for is gone—again. We lose ground, take it back in just two hours, and now my reward is being locked into HE111s?

But sure, tell us again how this is all working as intended.

Keep it up, Dale. You're really nailing it

Baaaahhhh

He put the " Auto Switch " button in for a reason

[DmonSlyr]

ENY should measure only who is in flight at the time. It shouldn't take tower sitters into consideration since there is no autokick feature. After 20 eny it does become increasingly difficult bomb and jabo fields.

[Animl-AW]

ENY should measure only who is in flight at the time. It shouldn't take tower sitters into consideration since there is no autokick feature. After 20 eny it does become increasingly difficult bomb and jabo fields.

Hmmm, I do agree in theory. However a tower sitter can jump in the fight in seconds, eny would be zig zagging on that number change.

Define tower sit I guess. Some are in tower to take s 5-10 bio break or do something, I do that very often. If someone is sitting for 30+ minute now your point applies, but again, if 15 tower sitters all suddenly jump in the fight it would change.

I can be wrong about a lot of things, and I’m sure I often am.  Grain of salt.

I just don’t see a majority revolt

[Mayhem]

F-IT

[mERv]

F-IT

Mayhem, while I do agree with your comment, I want to state for the record that I will support this game to its dying breath. Dale created a truly remarkable product—one that has stood the test of time for decades. It has given me countless good memories, incredible challenges to overcome, and friendships I never would have made outside of this game.

[The Fugitive]

Does Hitech still read the BBS? I hope he does, Id love to get his take on a few thoughts.

ENY, yes it sucks, especially in the scenario that Finetime has brought up, but that is what it was designed to do....limit the time with a numbers superiority so that they cant run over other teams. Is it perfect? no, but it does give the lower number team a fighting chance to defend or even maybe reverse and attack the other team. Giving the lowered numbered team that advantage encourages those players NOT to give up and log off. If Im in a "Mary" and have to fight my way through a bunch of yaks, temps, and ponies only to get to 3 flights of B17's or B24's flown by Finetime Im going to log pretty quick after getting killed a few times. If I can blow through a bunch of slower planes....avoiding the HOs  to jump Finetime in 111s then that might be a bit more fun given that I might have a chance to take a few with me when I die. So I wouldnt change ENY. It works but is a necessary evil. For the "Tower Sitters", put a timer on them. After 15 minutes in the tower they no longer count toward ENY. Nobody is going to sit in a tower for that long waiting for a mission (which is when the big swing would happen in ENY as a mission launches)

Maps, please get rid of the larger maps! We just dont have the numbers to populate them enough to hit that critical mass where the action can get going. Its not the map makers fault, these are just different times. Should the numbers come back up add them back in by all means. Its happened before, pulling maps that just dont work with the numbers. I miss some of those maps we dont use any more, the old Crater map WITH Tank Town (only time I lived long enough to get any kills in a tank!), the map with those huge mountain ranges that separated the teams (great fights trying to get a foothold on the other side of the mountains). But we got over it, these players will too. Pull the big maps PLEASE.

Free to Play, I would love to see this happen. Add a small group of planes and vehicles to a FTP setup in the MA. Granted these players are going to get hammered, but if they stick around long enough to see how deep this game really is I think you could get some turn over to subscriptions. The only downside would be players that cancel their subscriptions to fly the free stuff. Personally I really dont see that happening. Most of the players here have been paying the $15 a month for years, many who dont even fly. With that kind of loyalty I think your safe from that happening.

Subscription cost, Only you (Hitech) can decide on this one. How close is the margin right now? Can a drop in price still keep a reasonable margin? What is a reasonable margin? You have to decide, are you running the game to make money for as long as you can, or are you running the game just for "old times" sake and giving us old men a toy to play with for as long as we can? Many other games are $5.99 or $9.99 if they do have a subscription, like many of the streaming services. That "under $10" doesnt seem to bother people. If dropping the price doesnt kill the margin, which ever margin your looking for.... it certainly wouldnt hurt dropping the price to attract new players.

Game Adjustments, the ammo bunker hardening seems to have worked. It hasnt stopped the bunkers from being destroyed it just takes a bit more effort and co-ordination. How hard is it to cut down some trees? How about changes in the icon ranges for the vehicles? How about M3 resupply of the towns, are they able to bring the towns up to easily? Maybe changing that time might get players in the air to defend in stead of resuppling. What other tweaks could be done to adjust the game to the player count we now have to make the action quicker/better?

Hitech in game, This is a big one. Does Hitech play in the MA any more? Is he burned out and that is why he is seemingly so absent? If he would log in a few times a day, 5-10 minutes on each team and just check out whats going on, how the game is played, how the players interact, and so on would he be more inclined to work things out? Try new settings? I think that is one thing that is missing. Long ago this game was one of his kids, you got to keep an eye on your kids!

Game Future, I think all of use would love to see Hitech get back into the game, writing coad, switching to a new graphics engine, and so on, but none of us know what Hitech is up to. Is he working a 9-5 punching coad for some big company? Is he retired and playing Dad Cab to his girls? Are his kids out on their own and he is home in dirty underwear in his fussy slippers with a patchy beard, all bleary eyed from playing on-line poker for 15 hours a day? We just dont know. After all these years of doing the same thing, like many of us, we just dont want to bothered any more. If he is keeping the game going for extra income, or for us old farts, or he is thinking of selling (NOT TO EA!!!), it is up to him. We can all hope he will keep us in the loop, like maybe a monthly post even if its just "Same as last month still not selling, see you next month!" it would be great. I hope he gets back into it, if not himself, maybe an up and coming coad writer just out of college looking for some supplement cash flow. It would be great to see the numbers climb just 50% this fall.