Author Topic: Invisible Planes First Real AH Gameplay Crisis  (Read 1614 times)

Offline Widewing

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Invisible Planes First Real AH Gameplay Crisis
« Reply #45 on: June 17, 2002, 12:42:19 AM »
Quote
Originally posted by Bullethead
Way back in DOS AW, discos were lumped into actual deaths.  This led to a lot of whining so eventually AW changed to counting discos as bails.  Apparently AW was incapable of adding more separate fate types.  Then WB started and IIRC, it always tracked discos separately and didn't count them as deaths for its K/D formula.  If AH does, then I figure it's a bug in the score formula and not intentional.


I know this, every time I suffer a disco, my K/D takes a hit. Whatever the formula is, or whether or not a bug exists in the computation, the ratio goes down with every disco. The only up side is that as the overall numbers go up, the % lost due to discos goes down by the same ratio. Therefore, the effect on the K/D is reduced.

BTW, that was not whining, it was pissing and moaning. There are subtle differences. ;)

My regards,

Widewing
My regards,

Widewing

YGBSM. Retired Member of Aces High Trainer Corps, Past President of the DFC, retired from flying as Tredlite.

Offline Bullethead

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« Reply #46 on: June 17, 2002, 01:17:48 AM »
CavemanJ said:
Quote
Way I understood it:
disco = .25 death (4disco = 1death)
bailed = 1death, and captured aren't counted cause if ya bailed near an enemy field (and didna get strafed in yer chute) it would be giving you 2 deaths each time ya were shot down and bailed out, then captured cause ya were closer to an enemy base than a friendly one


That still don't add up to the required 26 to make his K/D work out to the posted figure.  13 actual deaths + 2 for discos + 5 bails + 2 ditched = 22, not 26.

Hmm, the difference here is 4.  So assuming you're right and discos = 1/4 of a death, the only way WW can have the K/D he's got is if his 4 captureds were thrown in as well.  

That must be the case.  Think about it.  The total number of sorties = the sum of all landings, ditches, bails, captureds, deaths, and discos.  Thus, none of his fates are double-counted.  If he gets captured, it goes in that category and not also into bailed as well.  So bascially, the scoring works differently for the killer and the victim.  You get a kill immediately when your target bails, but his fate isn't decided until he ends the hop by getting killed or .esquealing.  Then the host decides whether it's a bail, death, or a capture for him.  Thus, no double dip score penalty for bailing, just the shame of having admitted defeat ;)

Thanks for pointing that out about the discos.  Now maybe I'll have more confidence in the score page, although the other day it was still showing me as the #1 buffer even though I didn't have a buff sortie to my name :).

Offline Bullethead

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Invisible Planes First Real AH Gameplay Crisis
« Reply #47 on: June 17, 2002, 01:36:55 AM »
Hortlund said:
Quote
But NO ONE will spend their $15 on getting shot down by invisible planes, or shoot down others who cant see them. If you dont realize this, then you are in for a surprise. This invisible plane-bug is killing the game for everyone.


Kids these days :D  A measly $15/month is getting this type of response now.  Geez, I seem to remember not too long ago when it was about twice that for AH.  And if you think that's bad, try $6-7 per HOUR, in 1994 dollars, for a much inferior product.  Or even a "mere" $2-2.50 per hour.  Even with that, you could still get your monthly bill well over $100 without trying too hard.

And those games had exactly the same problems AH has now, and all online games will always have:  warps, blinks, and occasional hackers or the discovery of new cheats.  No escape from it, so just be thankful you're not on G*sux where it would have cost you real bucks ;).

Quote
Fact is, the knowledge that there might be invisible planes out there, or even worse the fact that I cannot be sure that my aircraft is showing up on the other guys FE kills the gaming experience even now.


Well, let's see.  When you log on, you know how many guys are in the arena.  From past experience, you know how much visible action that number of players will cause in the arena.  I haven't noticed any decrease there, so I'd say at least 99% of the population is always visible to me.  And I seem to be that way to them, because they keep shooting me down with alarming frequency.  .

So if no other explanation for the strangeness is discovered and invisible planes are real, there can't be very many of them.  Thus, the odds of you encountering one is probably much less than that of meeting a 262.  Thus, no need to be so worried.  If that's a crisis to you, then I really wonder how you manage to face up to the realworld, serious risks involved just in driving your car every day.

Offline Kanth

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« Reply #48 on: June 17, 2002, 02:03:18 AM »
I've only been shot down by an invisible plane once.

I was pulling up on an enemy fighter with about 16 other Knights and we were all zooming in for the kill. I pulled up and started spraying from about 2.5 back hoping for a lucky shot...

about 6 of my countrymen flew in front of me directly through my stream so I let off the trigger eventually.

About 5 seconds later an invisible plane tore the back end off of my Typhoon.

I think he must have had a bad connection or something.

DmdKanth
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Offline ccvi

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« Reply #49 on: June 17, 2002, 03:39:09 AM »
Quote
Originally posted by SirLoin
I saw some weirdness the other day.I was rolling for a mission when I noticed one of the other guys showed as a PT boat.It took off from the base and a couple of minutes later it turned into a p38..Don't know if that's related to invisible planes which I have yet to see...


I've watched a chute take off :D

Offline DrDea

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« Reply #50 on: June 17, 2002, 05:28:54 AM »
LAst night as the Bish got slammed Lazer took a mission to 11.As I circled to make the second pass on ack I saw...ON the ack a P38 which dissapeared as I started to fire.The 38 was a manned gun.Kinda strange.Ive never seen that one.It wasnt there as I dove and for abotu 3 seconds it was.Then it was gone.Twilight zone stuff.:D
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Offline 214thCavalier

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« Reply #51 on: June 17, 2002, 09:44:31 AM »
Lol Kanth i think you just discovered Killshooter  :D

Offline Wlfgng

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« Reply #52 on: June 17, 2002, 01:36:18 PM »
never been killed by 'invisible' planes...
plenty of GV's have tagged me when I wasn't paying attention tho

Offline Widewing

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« Reply #53 on: June 17, 2002, 04:48:27 PM »
Quote
Originally posted by Bullethead
I recommend instead looking at your  stats page.  There, you've got 182 kills / 43 deaths = a real K/D of 4.23.


There are built-in error factors here too. It adds in kills as a Ships Gunner, kills in GVs, kills of GVs and so on. It also does not distinguish between real kills and proximity kills. All of these distort the record.

For this reason I try to keep detailed records on paper. This gives me a better perspective on what I'm actually doing. Here's the breakdown for the two aircraft I fly the most.

For example, When flying the Yak-9U, I'm 58/6. I can break down the 6 as follows (from memory, I'm at the office right now):

2 lost to bomber's guns.
1 Vulched on rearm pad.
1 lost to Flak Panzer.
1 lost to P-51 while landing deadstick (out of gas)
1 Auger, trying to get position on enemy fighter.

I can break down the 58 to:

1 M3
2 LVTs
55 aircraft

Likewise for the P-51B, 36/7.

2 lost to enemy fighters
3 lost to Ship ack
1 lost to field ack
1 lost to Bomber guns

36 breaks down to:

36 aircraft.

This method provides me with a better idea of how I stack up against enemy aircraft. Now, if I avoided the risk of ack, flak and bombers, I'd have a stellar K/D. Avoiding risk goes a long way to padding the K/D ratio. However, I don't mind that risk if it helps the cause, so to speak. I also fly a lot of attack missions, which usually results in more losses. By keeping detailed records, I can develop a clear picture of my performance. Nonetheless, discos still annoy the hell out of me. In the two aircraft I fly the most, I have a 7/1 K/D.

Others:
Bf 109G-6: 16/2 (Fighter/Jabo)
P-38L: 9/5 (Jabo)
N1K2: 14/5 (Jabo)
P-47D-30: 5/0 (HQ Cap)
Typhoon: 10/3 (Jabo)
Mossy: 4/0 (HQ Cap)
Spitfire IX: 1/1 (Fighter)
F6F: 1/1 (Jabo)
F4U-1: 2/0 (Fighter)
Yak-9T: 2/1 (Jabo)
Me 262: 3/0 (Fighter)
Tempest: 2/0 (Fighter)
P-51D: 1/1 (Jabo)
F4U-1C: 5/2 (Jabo/Fighter)
Zero: 1/2 (Fighter)
IL-2: 2/2 (Jabo)
GVs: 10/5
PT: 2/3
Fw 190A5: 11/0 (Fighter/Jabo)
Fw 190D9: 3/1 (Fighter)
La-7: 8/1 (Fighter)
Ki-61: 1/0 (Fighter)
Bf 109G-10: 1/1 (Fighter)



Obviously, the Jabo role carries greater risks than fighter sorties. It would be easy to avoid risk, but terribly dull too.
 

My regards,

Widewing
« Last Edit: June 20, 2002, 07:23:44 AM by Widewing »
My regards,

Widewing

YGBSM. Retired Member of Aces High Trainer Corps, Past President of the DFC, retired from flying as Tredlite.

Offline Kanth

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« Reply #54 on: June 17, 2002, 06:04:09 PM »
No no, I'm sure it was discovered well before I came along :)

DmdKanth


Quote
Originally posted by 214thCavalier
Lol Kanth i think you just discovered Killshooter  :D
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Offline Voss

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« Reply #55 on: June 17, 2002, 06:32:10 PM »
I believe there is an elementary error in the way you calculated your k/d ratio.

the formula is Kills/(deaths + 1) and not (Kills/Deaths) + 1. This makes a big difference and avoids division by zero.

Also, I believe that disconnects count as 1/2 a death, rather than 1/4 death.

So, if you've had 30 kills and no deaths or discos, then your k/d is 30. However, if you've had one death, no disco's and 30 kills, your k/d is 15. If, on the other had you've had thirty kills, no deaths and one disco, then your k/d is 20.

Offline DrDea

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« Reply #56 on: June 17, 2002, 07:21:17 PM »
Good Gawd.If I spent that much time worrying about my score I wouldnt have any fun :rolleyes:
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Offline easymo

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« Reply #57 on: June 17, 2002, 07:53:26 PM »
I am reminded of a clock, that a man built a few centuries back. It was a series of cannon that were set apart by timed fuse. They would go off every 15 minutes. It was a tad cumbersome.

Offline Bullethead

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« Reply #58 on: June 17, 2002, 08:15:10 PM »
Voss said:
Quote
I believe there is an elementary error in the way you calculated your k/d ratio.


Look again :D

Offline Bullethead

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« Reply #59 on: June 17, 2002, 09:00:58 PM »
Widewing said:
Quote
There are built-in error factors here too. It adds in kills as a Ships Gunner, kills in GVs, kills of GVs and so on. It also does not distinguish between real kills and proximity kills. All of these distort the record.


Yeah, there are problems with all the scoring web pages.  They don't agree with each other because they all count different things, some of them count the same things in different ways, or they use them differently in a formula.  And there's damn little clarifying info available to help you figure out why there are these differences and how to translate one page's numbers into another page's numbers.

I don't think any page, however, makes a distinction between guns kills and auger kills.  Unlike fates, where the score page tracks 6 different ways your hop can end, it only shows 1 line for kills in general and another for assists.  Maybe it just doesn't show auger kills at all, only guns kills.  But in that case, why bother awarding you an auger kill at all?

Still, that's definitely a possibility.  I know the score page already doesn't show all your kills.  As you point out, ship gunner kills don't show on that page at all.  Also, it seems that the score page doesn't show kills of GVs scored while flying a plane.  I've checked for this a number of times in my own case and am pretty sure that's the case.

Who knows?  I guess you just have to go with what you're comfortable with.  I prefer the stats page because I know it shows all kills I score.  If I don't feel like counting my ship gunner kills, because I'm at so little risk doing that, the total is clearly denoted and can be subtracted out.  Plus, the only deaths it counts are somebody got a kill on me.  No discos, no augers in friendly territory to get to a mission quickly, etc.  Of course, I only  bail like once every couple months to participate in a squadron awards or induction ceremony inside a hangar, so don't really care about all the different fates on the score page.

Quote
For this reason I try to keep detailed records on paper.


Geez, you sound like me :).  I kept a logbook of all my sorties for the 1st several months I flew AW, and until the end of both my AW and WB careers, I kept a complete list of everybody I'd shot down and what we were both flying at the time.  I was more into keeping track of nme pilots than kill numbers per se--it was a Hate thing :mad:  In those games, you could pull up a "dance card" showing all your recent victims and it was so much fun to post screen shots of it showing how you'd spanked some Hated Enema 8 times in a row, or wiped out a whole Hated squad.  Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find such a dance card in AH so I've quit keeping this record :(  Damn, I miss that.  

Also, I quite often miss it when I get auger kills.  Then I finally shoot somebody down and it says he's kill #3 or whatever, so it's impossible to reconstruct what happened without total dedication to filming and taking the time to watch them all.  

I guess what you're saying is that you just write down your guns kills and ignore the augers?  Do you do that every time?  For instance, I never fired a shot in what I consider one of my better ACM fights.  I got caught low and slow in a Jug by an La7 but, after making him bleed by turning nose-to-tail on him for several passes, he ended up stalling at low alt :D  I figure I earned a kill for that so if I was keeping records like you, I'd count that one even though it was an auger.