Observation: Changes in MA style in the last month or so..

[Taiaha]

Numbers, poopster.  Pure and simple.  In the year and a half I've been playing even I've seen a slow and steady (well, OK, except for the AW influx) rise in the numbers.  Evenings US time it's regularly pushing 600 in the MA.  Nearly fell off my chair when I logged in a couple of weeks ago and saw over 600 people on the pizza map.  And now a lot of the maps are straining a little at the seams.  I love the Mindanao map for the terrain, but it feels really crowded now because the fronts are so narrow that ganging is the order of the day everywhere.  The same with the islands map.  The one that is, for me, starting to work really well is the Pizza.  With the kind of numbers you get in there in the evenings (again, US time, earlier in the day it can be another story, although not anywhere near as bad as it was a couple of months back) you get big fights, and I've also had some of the best one on ones or small group fights anywhere (except, of course, for the CT); the kind that leave you shaking and wondering how the hell you managed to survive that.  (Big drawback with the pizza map, of course, is that you have to face all the people who haven't turned their monitors on and yet are complaining they can't find a fight.  if you can't find a fight, even in the big map, with 600 other people, you need to go back to playing Quake).

So it will be interesting to see what, if any, difference the new maps (whenever they appear) will make.

[Innominate]

This is hardly new in the last month, it's been getting worse for as long as I've been playing(Only some 8 months or so).  Over the 8 months, the number of players online has increased dramaticly.

Most of these problems all a result of our maps.  You're forcing too many people into too small of an area.  It TAKES 50 player missions to capture a base.  An undefended base is easy, but it's always possible(and fairly common) for a large number of goon hunters and other defenders to show up.  During prime time, the 256 maps become nothing but a huge furball spanning the front lines.

If you DON'T fly with a huge group, you're bound to run into another huge group.  Not so much because people are trying hard to gangbang, but because there simply isn't any ROOM to spread out.  On most of the 256 maps, at any one time, there are only two maybe three runs worth doing.  Divide this by 150 people.

It's made worse by the various "blocked paths" on some of the maps. (Especially akdesert, which could be a great map) Whole possible fronts can be killed off by fields being spaced too far apart.   25miles is a good gap, and anything over that should be there for a specific reason(Like important HQ bases and such).  Nobody wants to spend more time flying to the fight than actuallly fighting.

It's about space.  Not just map size, but the practical size of the front line.   The main arena is WAY too damn dense, especially during prime time.  There needs to be the ability to spread out.

[DrDea/Kvorkian]

It all started with the pizza and went downhill from there. Nuff said

[Zippatuh]

It’s simply numbers, space, and percentages.

The population of the MA has grown and with it the percentage of the unskilled grows faster.  There is safety in numbers so stay with the numbers is what is happening.

It just means learning a new tactic.  Dogging the mass as it heads to target.  It’s great diving into a group, taking a snap shot here and there, hitting the deck and seeing half of them behind you, ordinance left behind .

[gofaster]

The only difference I've noticed is that there are more Mustangs doing the jabo work and fewer Typhoons.

Oh, and I've also noticed more opportunities for ground vehicles to actually survive sorties since the armour model was corrected to make them viable weapons. My air fighting skills are getting ruined by my addiction to the ground war!

Oh yeah, and a third thing I've noticed is that the side-balancing program seems to be working - Rooks actually have been holding ground for more than 3 hours.

[Ripsnort]

Originally posted by gofaster
The only difference I've noticed is that there are more Mustangs doing the jabo work and fewer Typhoons.

 

Hehehehe!  The new thing heard quite often on the range vox channel is "Suicide P51 in on field"...months ago someone would have asked you what you meant by this...today its SUCH a common occurance.  They come in fast, drop ord, fly thru AA trying to shoot spawning planes, and die quite fast.  All for maybe a fuel and maybe catching someone off guard that just rolled.

My how we've changed in 4 years.

[lazs2]

no... it can't simply be the numbers because the pizza map is the most boring and it has a population density that is about the same as the smaller maps with the old 200 player base.

I think perking 1000 and even 500 lb bombs would be a start..

tougher and/or more CV's would help a lot.

carving out about a third of the pizza map and making it "early war area" would be heaven.

ripsnort hit it... you have to have the fastest planes or you can't get away from the gangbang.

What poopie is talking about is real.. look for big red and green bars at a place where there is a CV or... close fields.. those are the fun fites for a lot of us but they are getting rarer and they don't last long.... some attention starved twit will suicide the fuel or FH's or CV... Or, some moron will organize a "missun".   "come on my missun so we can milkrun a bunch of buildings and fight over the one or two cons dumb enough to re up over and over again.

For early war planes to be viable they need to be able to disengage.   Toad points out that you can hang out near the enemey field but.... only if you fly fast planes that can run away when it gets hot.   early war planes that try it don't make it home.

we really don't have much choice 90% of the time as to a viable plane to fly in the arena.
lazs

[maxtor]

Originally posted by Vulcan
Strange, I logged onto the MA for the first time in two weeks last night. I've been really pushing WW2OL to see whats under the hood. Anyway, I had no problems finding several 1 on 1's, and the most I ever had was a 3 on 1. I landed an 11 kill run after CV ack tore up my radiator, none of those kills was a vulch.

The MA is what you make of it. Personally I like those big mission field hitters, usually they are so focussed on themselves you can dive in like a lion among antelope and find one who's not looking, zoom up and come back for a another couple.

What DID piss me off is seeing some very dweebish tactics being used (rooks specifically). P-51's, Jugs, and P-38's doing suicide runs on field fuel and ordnance. They seemed to attack a field, and combine with suicide jabo's at nearby fields targeting fuel, barracks, and ord. Thus making surrounding fields ineffective to launch a defense from.

I can't wait til HTC sort out this stupid suicide tactic the hordes are starting to use.

I find I am having a similar experience.  There are always any number of styles of fights except when the numbers get over 400 or so then these maps (except "pizza") are too small.

Some people would like HTC come up with a system to make everyone else play their way, and go further to ridicule others for what they find fun.  This isn't right.  

"The MA is what you make of it." is a very true statement.

[maxtor]

Originally posted by poopster
I agree with Vulcan a big improvement would be adding a suicide penalty of some sort...

...That needs to be addressed. There's a whole thread on just that topic. I would think there's a solution in the works. We'll see what HT comes up with. They'll cypher it out and come up with a solution.

I wonder what happened to hitech's anti-suicide measures for 1.11?  I was somehow under the impression he had something planned to address this.

[maxtor]

Originally posted by Innominate
It's about space.  Not just map size, but the practical size of the front line.   The main arena is WAY too damn dense, especially during prime time.  There needs to be the ability to spread out.

I think this is it in a nutshell.  Would make the kill/time freaks happy, and also the 1:1 people too.

There is another map, "that wasn't quite yet ready" for release with 1.11 which we can hope will do these things?

[maxtor]

Originally posted by Ripsnort
Hehehehe!  The new thing heard quite often on the range vox channel is "Suicide P51 in on field"...months ago someone would have asked you what you meant by this...today its SUCH a common occurance.  They come in fast, drop ord, fly thru AA trying to shoot spawning planes, and die quite fast.  All for maybe a fuel and maybe catching someone off guard that just rolled.

My how we've changed in 4 years.

I was having some fun for a session or two perching up in a Tempest and zooming these ponies before they could do their death dives.  Was fun for a bit

[lazs2]

spreding out simply makes people more timid and forces people to fly the faster late war planes.   There is no map that we have.... nor is there any time during the day that you can't find a spot on any map that you are at least 4 sectors away from any action if that is what you want....  the map is what you make of it as you say.

make 1000 and 500 lb bombs a perk issue (adjust as needed) and add a lot more CV's...

If people want to "spred out" then why are do they all go to only a few spots?

When the fields are far apart... you don't know what you will find when you get to the enemy field so.... you travel in huge packs to be "safe"  you pick only the fastest planes so that you won't get "caught"  for many of us this is not good gameplay.
lazs

[DREDIOCK]

I think I know what your talking about and I've seen  the same thing happen. here is a classic example of what I've been seeing. Not ALWAYS but ALOT more
 
I was defending a base  pretty much by myself against 3..bish I think it was (it was a couple  of cycles ago) 2 were fighters one was trying to goon. pretty successfully I might add. a few more bish showed up. then a whole bunch of friendlies came to help and were basically wiping the place up with em. but as soon as the numbers equalized  and the kills weren't so easy all these friendlies left for someplace else and I found myself  and MAYBE two others at pretty much an undamaged base trying to fend off what was now 4-5 to 1 odds. so the next time Im in the tower I click find the name of one of these friendlies and click on the ol "go to" button" and low and behold. there they all were doing the same thing. flying where they had vastly superior numbers. Until... yup you guessed it the numbers were the same again. then they moved on.
Seems a bit cowardly to me but.. to each their own.
I think though some may be having delusions about winning some money though LMAO

Could be just perk/point mongers too. Not a hard task to get into the top rankings if all you ever do is fly in groups where the numbers are always massivly in your favor.

Drediock

Originally posted by poopster
Just a personal observation. Qualified by low flying time, Holidays and all.

I see a large shift to the "safety in numbers" style of play. Primetime regardless of map, large groups of pilots are the norm. Usually with little opposition.

Small fights of 10 to 30 people with equal opposition have disappeared for the most part. I haven't seen a good CV fight in a couple of months..

Large groups taking a base with little opposition. The vulch cycle, off to somewhere else..

Large numbers versus small numbers is a vulch regardless of altitude..

A half dozen pilots are met by thirty, two pilots by six..

If it isn't lopsided one way or another, it doesn't occur.

What caused this change ??

Is it better this way ?? More fun ?? Am I seeing things ??

Am I missing out on the fun here ??

Spent an hour and a few flights last night in the island map looking for an even-up little fight, bunch of guys going toe to toe..

There wasn't any.

Primetime Friday night 400 plus..

There WASN'T any.

Just big groups overwhelming small groups doing the vulch cycle..

Why ??

I saw an entire Knight "mission" chasing one La7  

I don udrstan....

I have seen something that might be contributing to the change. In primetime I've seen up to sixty pilots not in a squad online. Healthy influx of new blood. That explains alittle, but not all of this "play it safe" change.

[gofaster]

Originally posted by Vulcan
What DID piss me off is seeing some very dweebish tactics being used (rooks specifically). P-51's, Jugs, and P-38's doing suicide runs on field fuel and ordnance. They seemed to attack a field, and combine with suicide jabo's at nearby fields targeting fuel, barracks, and ord. Thus making surrounding fields ineffective to launch a defense from.

Why not include Typhoons in that Jabo listing?  I've seen plenty of that, too.

You don't need troops and bombs to do a defensive flight.  You need those to do an offense.  25% gas is enough to set up an orbit just inside an airfield's radar zone, and is actually the preferred load for dogfighting due to decreased weight improviing aircraft performance.  Killing fuel, troops, and bombs is a defensive tactic used for limiting offensive potential, and is used by teams as a way to stymy a base-capture push by a horde.

What I'd like to see is increased hardness for vehicle hangars so that it takes more than 1 plane to bring it down, with 2 VHs at medium fields and 3 VHs at the larger fields, with 3 Vhs at the stand-alone vehicle fields.  Sending multiple jabo fighters wouldn't be so bad if the defenders had a fair shot at getting Ostwinds and M16s onto the airfield so that defending planes could launch.

[gofaster]

Originally posted by lazs2
make 1000 and 500 lb bombs a perk issue (adjust as needed) and add a lot more CV's...

Yes!  Yes!