Cool hardware without strat is such a waste

[Sparks]

I know I don't have much experience and am relatively new to AH and am risking the wrath of HTC but here goes

 

Originally posted by Pyro:
There are things like resupply which will make nice feature additions, but they really won't change things much.

I have to disagree here about the basic principle - for me as a relative newbie it
would make the game much more emmersive.

Every war's end objective is "capture the flag".  I don't know how you remove that or why it would be desirable to do so.  Being that this is an airplane game, airfields are the natural center of attention.

Absolutely agree which is why I would say the supply and usage model should focus at the airfield level rather than dependance on cities.

The main arena to me is the equivilent of going down the gym for some pickup games of hoops.  It's a lot of fun, popular, works well and gives you a lot of opportunity for lots of practice and exercise.  However, it's not like a regulation game of basketball and is missing many elements.  It's only 3v3, there's no clock, no free throws, no foul limits, possession is make-it-take-it, it's only half court, there's no coach, no refs, no scorekeepers, etc.  Much of the strategy of basketball is missing.  There's no managing of player minutes and fouls, clock management, strategic time-outs and substitutions, etc.  But that's not a bad thing, it makes it a workable format.

Although I don't know the first thing about basket ball I understand what you're saying.

Now maybe some of the better players might prefer if the gym were utilized in a more structured manner with full court regulation games taking the place of the pickup games, but would that be better?

I don't think that's a question that anyone can answer with a straight yes or no (neither HTC or any user)and I also don't belives it has to be a "black or white" choice of minimal structure or full blown. The question should be, does the demand for a more involved strat model justify the work and risk to see whether it is better or not and what would be the cost if it went wrong.

This goes full circle to how people view the role of the MA and other arenas.  For them, it's time for more.  They've fought in every matchup and situation so many times that they could write a Kama Sutra of ACM.  But where were they when they started?  Why was it fun then?  Why is a new player now different?

I think this summarizes what sets AH apart from the others in my opinion. You have an extremely high level of pilots who have come from other sims who have fallen for the improved flight model and great graphics - the realism. These people learnt in older less complex sims and have developed with the sims.
My view as a newbie is that the new starter is different because they are coming into a sim with a very high level of realism in the basic flying and I would suggest that the learning curve at the beginning point is steeper and longer than was experienced by the now aces. In that respect the fun element from the game has to come from several alternative routes because if you rely on pure flight combat which requires a high skill level just to survive then the frustration level soons build to a point of dumping the game.
For me one of the reasons I enjoy this so much is that I can take a relatively easy to fly bomber and take part in squad ops and solo ops and still have fun in the game.
I can go to the TA and practice ACM in a fighter and tehn go to the MA and get my bellybutton kicked and when it stops being fun being shot down I can go bombing.
However if the bombing starts to become boring and limited then there is the risk that there is nothing left to keep me here - I haven't got good enough to hold up a fight in the MA in a fighter and therefore get fed up getting shot down, and because the bombing has limited scope it becomes boring in the months it takes to get reasonable in a fighter - it all stops being fun.

It's hard enough converting potential players to players.  The player vs. player aspect of the game makes it very difficult by nature and requires a lot of time and practice to make it.

My point entirely - see above paragraph.

Those who've done it for awhile tend to forget the value of the MA format in cutting your teeth on this.  But the fact is, it's going to require new growth to successfully implement other formats, and to do the latter at the cost of the former is a losing proposition.

This is what I was talking about before, about assessing the risks and benefits and clearly, Pyro, HTC has taken the decision that the current MA format is right. I can accept that but maybe not agree with it.
For me as a newbie AH represents the best in realism in an online flight sim and in that end requires a great deal of work to become a competant fighter pilot. The complexity of the flight modelling and a/c operation seems to reinforce that perception.
To then reduce the strategic element to a lower level to simplify the game for newer pilots seems to me contradictory. The bombers are clearly the easier planes to fly in terms of pilot skill to simply keep them in the air and get them from A to B and so it would seem to me that if the strat model was made more effective and realistic it would give new pilots something to work with while they build their Fighter skills.

To repeat your previuos quote:-
It's hard enough converting potential players to players.  The player vs. player aspect of the game makes it very difficult by nature and requires a lot of time and practice to make it.
Surely during that time - which is surely months not weeks - there could be something to offer people on the strat level to keep there interest in the game.

Again respectfully

Sparks

[/B]

[Mox]

 

Originally posted by hitech:
Funny how ive heard this cry before and then i look how very few time's people use the strat elements that are already in the game.

Do people even know its posible to knock out fuel ,ack, ordance at fields for 2 hours?

HiTech

HT, While some of us are aware of what your talking about here, I'd say at least half of the players don't know this.  I'm sure I don't know all the times either.

Did you ever publish this information?  If so where is it?

Mox

[popeye]

Mox,

On the home page see:

Help/Game Overview/Strat and the Map Room

Granted, no one reads the instructions, but there is some info there.  

popeye

[Mox]

 

Originally posted by popeye:
Mox,
On the home page see:
Help/Game Overview/Strat and the Map Room
Granted, no one reads the instructions, but there is some info there.    

popeye

Thanks Popeye!  I skimmed the page real fast but I don't think it listed any times and or requirments for disabling certain things like HT eluded to.  I'll read it again later when I have some time.

Example:  Does killing ALL the buidlings at the Training Barracks do anything if the HQ and City are still up?  What does it do if only the City is up?  Does the Training Barracks need to be killed "before" other buildings such as the HQ?  Etc...

I have been bombarded with some newbie's asking these types of questions when I realized I truely don't know some of these answers myself and I've been playing since beta.

Maybe a better way to explain it would be to give an example like:
What has to take place for a given country to be without troops for X number of minutes?

What has to take place for a given country to be without fuel for X number of minutes?

Well I think you see where I'm going with this line of questioning.  Maybe this is one of the reasons very few people play using our existing strat in MA.

Mox

[llbm_MOL]

Punt!

I'd like to know some of what Mox is asking to

LLB OUT!!!!!!!

[hitech]

Start with base down times. Right now all objects have 30 min down times with the exception of hangers which are 15 mins.

All releation ships work the same via level city effects factorys and HQ, factorys effect there counter part at fields.
So in our example the refinery is the factory and the fuel tanks are there counter part at the fields.

All factory currently have a 1 - 4 time multiply. So if all the fuel reinerys  are living the multipliyer is 1. If 50% are dead the multiplier is 2.5. If all are dead the multiplier is 4.
So if you first kill 50% of the fuel refinerys and then hit the fuel tanks at the field the tanks would be down 30min * 2.5 i.e. 75 mins.

Citys effect factorys and hq in the same maner.

Killing 50% of the city first then hitting the hq or factory will increase the factory/hq down time by a 1 - 4 multiplier.

HiTech

[lukster]

Just a sugestion: How about a ranking system similar to that of the military, Lt, Capt, Maj, etc....

Rank could be based on score. Only those flying for the country that won the 'war' would keep their rank into the next 'war'.

Switching countries would immediately reset your score to 0.

Higher ranks could fly the 'super' planes.

This is very much like what HTC has already suggested with the exception of applying a rank to a score. Rank displayed in front of a name would for many provide the incentive to do well and work to win the war.

Just a thought,
Lukster  

[Wanker]

Lukster, you ever heard of a guy named "-bobn- from Warbirds? Don't even go there!  

The rank thing sounds cool, but the egos come out of the woodwork when it's implemented.

[Stiglr]

somebody hold banana up.......he might faint dead away.

I agree.  

[Wanker]

<thud!>