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General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: LYNX on August 05, 2004, 01:25:39 AM

Title: Hordes and why
Post by: LYNX on August 05, 2004, 01:25:39 AM
Since the release of AH II everyone has been complaining about the "HORDES".  IMO the hordes have come about or been induced by 1 single factor.......THE SIZE OF THE TOWN.

As it was one flight of 17's could nail 85% of a town in 3 passes.  Kmart, Woolies, Tescos, Buger king the lot would be reduced to ashes.  A good NOE squad could take a town out in 2 passes in jabbos and have the goon drop as the last building went down.  A cruiser could take a town down with 21 hits from nearly half a sector away....if it wasn't blown by newbies upping to soon:rolleyes:

It's a tad different now the towns nearly 4 times as big.  So we end up with 30 + guys on 1 field but the VULCH is to great an oportunity to miss so the town takes ages to go down anyways.  As the HORDE starts over and over.  Multiple bombers have to hit town now to make any effect.  The cv now needs at least 2 good gunners to dispatch town before it regains and to finish the stuborn last few buildings the cruiser has to be right off shore.

Being a Bishop I'm not maoning here about Rooks numbers.  I am trying to point out why the Hordes have come about.  I think the days of the suprise NOE attacks are coming to an end because of  the time needed to kill town.  Coupled with large and seemingly manditory LA7 defence many folk are turning to the High jabbo attacks which just starts the whole horde from the get go.

So what do we do folks.  Do we ask HTC to reduce the size of the town?  Do we hit towns before field NOE style?  You tell me ?
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: Kweassa on August 05, 2004, 01:55:12 AM
Nothing's different with the NOE missions except now it needs more people, more secrecy, and more skill and precision to take down the town quickly, suppress the field, and a bring a goon in.

 The nature of the game is exactly the same as it was in AH1. However, like you've commented the size and the scale of the town stuff has changed.

 To cope with it, the effectivity of cooperation must also change to bring any perceivable results in various missions - exacept cooperation among individuals in the MA has always been horrible, messy and stupid.

 Thus, instead of becoming better in organization and precision, people took the liberty of assembling larger hordes to do the things the messy way.

 It's a testament of great inefficiency - but it's also our own fault than any other fault of the system or the map. People want to fly what they want and how they want so badly, that ultimately everyside owns a great bunch of people who knows jackshi* about doing things the right way, or much less even care about it.

 Alas, since we're in no military here, unless people voluntarily organize themselves and follow reason and logic in strategical and tactical thinking, we'll always have a 'horde' no matter how big or small a town is. Get over it dude.
Title: Re: Hordes and why
Post by: Ack-Ack on August 05, 2004, 01:58:52 AM
Quote
Originally posted by LYNX
Since the release of AH II everyone has been complaining about the "HORDES". ....



Since the dawn of online combat flight sims actually...



ack-ack
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: rod367th on August 05, 2004, 02:36:56 AM
Steve, 1 good bomber pilot could kill town ditch grab goon capture a base. This was way to easy, now you have to attack in mass which can lead to good fight. Like other night when our squad went for rook 30   10 of us went and rooks put up great defence. This was more realistic in my opinion.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: TequilaChaser on August 05, 2004, 02:45:53 AM
Dedicated  well planned missions are the ticket, as long as no "SPYS" are poking around,  RipSnort use to have some of the best laid out missions, was always a hoot, 10 to 12 guys we knew the roles of our job for the capture, just takes effective strategy planning, doesn't really take a horde if done right, regardless of the town size.

Fact is 30 planes take off to capture a base now, all 30 get there waste their ordnance on GV's fuel, etc.then instead of touching town get shot down by not straffing the ack or trying to vulch with out knocking ack down first........then when goon arrives or M3 the troop carrier waits and waits and waits, why the 30 plane gang fight over who gets the next vulch, if any tryed knocking out the town, by time last building goes down, the town is already respawning , Gvs are rolling to protect town now and it is all a lost cause. better strategic planned missions go along way, and no horde is really needed.


my 2 cents
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: Ghosth on August 05, 2004, 07:23:13 AM
It can still be done by 4 to 5 guys if they fly smart & know what they are doing.

Must take out field acks first. VH should be next, followed by ord if its a CV attack, so they can't counterattack & kill cv.

So now the field acks down, VH is dead, 2 vulch/cap the field while the rest flatten the town.

Everyone caps while waiting for the goon. And not just low over the field cap, bar cap
to intercept those goon hunters before they can see the field.

Yes gameplay wise we are still adjusting to the larger city.  Bad news is yes it can lead to hordes of attackers.

Good news is that fields are defendable even against hordes. Because of the longer time involved you can up from the next field over & get there in time to save the day.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: ghostdancer on August 05, 2004, 09:00:12 AM
Agree with Ack-Ack .. you have always had people complain about the "hordes" all the way back into AW.

A couple factors in AH allow the hordes to be biggers. The fact that arena can have 700 people in it .. allows for a large horde to form on any side. If you have only 4 hot spots and say 200 on your side (remember people tend to fly toward big fights because they want to fight and don't want to spend the time trying to find somebody to fight .. fly a couple sectors and hope somebody opposes them) then you figure you might get 30-40 guys per hot spot and the rest off doing smaller strikes.

Next I agree with Kweassa and the premise on towns. Taking down an airfield and capture a base is harder now. FHs and BHs stay down less time, it takes more ordinance to kill a town, etc.

Meaning you have to be better organized at taking down a town or if you are not organized (sloppy as Kweassa puts it) you tend to throw a larger number at it to supress fighters and GVs from upping, kill the town and try to keep it in place until goons come in. Many times the attacking force will have a goon rolling after the base is attacked and don't realize by the time the goon gets there the FHs, VH, etc probabl will be ack up and spawning defenders.

This also tends to push people to fly in bigger groups, imo.

And I agree that since this is not the military it is very hard to actually get people better organized or trained across the a whole country. Some squads yes but generally its tougher to do. Meaning people tend to lean toward larger numbers to accomplish base capture.

Plus the defense is always easier than the offense .. 6 determined guys to hold up and stop 15 loosely organized guys. Again leading to the loosely organized guys to grab more numbers to put down the determined 6.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: FBRaptor on August 05, 2004, 01:12:00 PM
As I have said before........ Too many people mistake a well organized mission that continues to roll bases as a horde!!!!

This game has mission capabilities and some squads and groups like to use that capability.

Next time you see a "horde:, realize it is most likely an organized group of people with the same goal in mind. And if you dont like it, maybe you should find some organized people to fight it or join a large squad :p
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: Furious on August 05, 2004, 02:29:18 PM
Quote
Originally posted by FBRaptor
...Next time you see a "horde:, realize it is most likely an organized group of people with the same goal in mind...

And that goal is to mash through as many undefended/lightly defended bases as possible.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: phookat on August 05, 2004, 02:57:11 PM
"Horde" doesn't mean unorganized.  It means unopposed, or at most opposed by a couple cons taking off and preparing to be vultched.

And there's nothing wrong with it.  Some people enjoy it.  It's just nice when you can find other kinds of fights as well.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: LYNX on August 05, 2004, 06:10:17 PM
It's a testament of great inefficiency - but it's also our own fault than any other fault of the system or the map. People want to fly what they want and how they want so badly, that ultimately everyside owns a great bunch of people who knows jackshi* about doing things the right way, or much less even care about it.

So better planning is the key!  Quick capture instead of horde vulch.

Fact is 30 planes take off to capture a base now, all 30 get there waste their ordnance on GV's fuel, etc.then instead of touching town get shot down by not straffing the ack or trying to vulch with out knocking ack down first........then when goon arrives or M3 the troop carrier waits and waits and waits, why the 30 plane gang fight over who gets the next vulch, if any tryed knocking out the town, by time last building goes down, the town is already respawning , Gvs are rolling to protect town now and it is all a lost cause. better strategic planned missions go along way, and no horde is really needed.

So better planning is the key!  Quick capture to move the game on instead of stalemate.

So now the field acks down, VH is dead, 2 vulch/cap the field while the rest flatten the town.

A tad optamistic for 5 guys but theres almost a full plan here.

Meaning you have to be better organized at taking down a town or if you are not organized (sloppy as Kweassa puts it) you tend to throw a larger number at it to supress fighters and GVs from upping, kill the town and try to keep it in place until goons come in. Many times the attacking force will have a goon rolling after the base is attacked and don't realize by the time the goon gets there the FHs, VH, etc probabl will be ack up and spawning defenders.

So the underlined plan is better planning.  Designated important field targets  COMBINED with a large town strike and timely arrival of troops.  A kind of 1, 2, 3, knock out blow instead of a 1, or 1, 2 or a 1, 3.

Guys, don't mind me.  It ain't going to happen.  The thread was hordes and why.  You have answered it as I have.... as you can see I lost the plot let alone the thread:confused:

Good luck
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: beet1e on August 05, 2004, 07:49:24 PM
Quote
Originally posted by phookat
"Horde" doesn't mean unorganized.  It means unopposed, or at most opposed by a couple cons taking off and preparing to be vultched.
I don't see what the level of opposition has to do with it.  A 50 plane blob is a horde whether opposed or not. Saying that it ceases to be a horde if a couple of guys up to fend off the attack is like saying that the swarm of flies in my back room ceases to be a swarm if I happen to be there with a can of Raid in my hand.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: phookat on August 05, 2004, 08:46:23 PM
Quote
Originally posted by beet1e
I don't see what the level of opposition has to do with it.  A 50 plane blob is a horde whether opposed or not. Saying that it ceases to be a horde if a couple of guys up to fend off the attack is like saying that the swarm of flies in my back room ceases to be a swarm if I happen to be there with a can of Raid in my hand.


I am simply defining a term the way most of us are using it on this board.  One word means a unicolor blob, and there is another term for a multicolor blob.

We use the term "horde" to refer to the former, because it has the connotation of a uniform crowd.
Title: Hordes and why
Post by: Jasta on August 05, 2004, 09:04:55 PM
I think if you get enough people that are sick of flying in a large mass between a base or two, someone is going to organize a mission and take an unopposed base. if its done right, then some real action can take place.

if the mission there fails, then let the horde have at it between the two now hot bases, and move the small mission group to another area and try again to cap.

Rinse, repeat.

If all your missions succeed, you've just advanced your front quite a few bases.

If they fail, the masses of people are spread out between a bunch of different bases, therefore leading to smaller fights and less "horde"-ish fighting.