Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: Clifra Jones on May 10, 2005, 02:08:37 PM
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After reading all the posts regarding toolsheders, scorepotatos, furballers, ... the list goes on. I have given this some thought as to how we can engourage people to actually engage in combat and try and keep everyone happy.
While this is not a be-all-end-all solution and I have not given it all the thought is really needs here are some of my ideas.
Award points to individuals/squads for capturing and HOLDING land. (holding being the catch word)
1. Bases would have a graduated value based in their strategic value. This would be determined by the type of base (small, med, large), location and elevation. The elevation factor would encourage the taking of the "high ground". The value would change depending on the fluid nature of the MA.
2. Points would be awarded for the taking and holding of contiguous land. The more adjacent bases you hold the more points. If you capture a base that has enemy bases between your other bases you get points for that capture but you are awarded additional points when you capture the bases that connect this base to your other holdings.
3. Additional points are awarded for retaking of lost bases while the "owners" are on line. This would encourage the other side to fight back to retake thier bases. (See #5)
4. Teamwork would be encouraged due to the fact that land must be held. Bases taken by a squad are awarded to that squad. Individuals not in squads can gain points for joining missions planned by squads. Multiple squads can gain points by forming joint missions thus sharing in the base ownership.
5. Points are lost if bases are lost. This presents some issues as to the 24hr/day nature of the MA. Some quotent of the base "owners" must be online for the loss of points to take place. Below this quotent no loss is incurred. This encourages players to defend the bases the "own"/"have taken" while they are online but does not penalize them for not playing 24/7.
We would obviousloy need some kind of system to know if a base is currently under "ownership", therefore making it of more value. Once the quotent of "owners" is no longer on line the base reverts back to normal value.
I think this may generate situations where fighting/combat is engouraged instead of discouraged. The current system only engourages players/squads to attack poorly defended fields and does not really engourage anyone to actively defend their territory. What I see in the current system is squads taking one base and then abandoning it to take a base of the other side of the map.
Senario where everyone has something to do.
Primary Objective: Large airfield on a 5.0K plataeu, 1 base from the front lines surrounded by 6 nearby bases of small & med. size. These bases are 3 along the front and 3 behind the main objective
Heavy Bombers: Attack the 3 rear bases taking out ord, VH & FH (possibly troops).
CAP & Capture: Jabo attacks are launched against the 3 forward bases taking out the VH, the airfields are CAPed leaving the FH up which will be needed to attack the high base. Towns are flattened and troops deployed to take the bases
Pork & CAP: Jobo attack and fighter CAP is launched on the primary target taking out the VH & ord and a cap is maintained over the field.
The above takes place at simultaniously as possible. Once the forward bases are secured a capture mission is launched on the primary target. If the primary target is captured then attention is focused on the 3 rear bases. These base's hangers should be coming up by now too so Cap and Capture missions should be launched against these ASAP, keeping the FH up because they will be needed to defend the now "owned" bases.
Hopefully the enemy will see that they are being attacked and will up to defend. Common sense shuld tell them that the primary target of the attack is the high base and they should up to defend it accordingly.
Well these are some of my thoughts. Like I said I haven't worked out all the details. I was trying to think up a system that would not require a whole lot of COAD changes by HTC.
Tell me if you like it, tell me if you hate it, tell me if you think I'm completely nutz.
After this I think I'll tackle the "Purpose of Life", which will probably be easier to figure out.
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Looks like a surefire way to encourage folks to take bases no one is defending.
Any sort of ACM goes right out the window cause it's pure horde war from what I can see.
Doesn't leave much for the guys who aren't in or don't want to belong to some large squad either.
Dan/CorkyJr
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a well thought out idea, but i see some peoblems
example:
5. Points are lost if bases are lost. This presents some issues as to the 24hr/day nature of the MA. Some quotent of the base "owners" must be online for the loss of points to take place. Below this quotent no loss is incurred. This encourages players to defend the bases the "own"/"have taken" while they are online but does not penalize them for not playing 24/7.
imagine it is squad night, and working with our squad and country we take some bases. later that night, all but 1 squad member logs off for bed. that one squadmate can not defend the bases alone, and with the low numbers overall, can not get enough country mates to help.
base after base is lost, and he / the squad are losing "points" because of a situation they have no control over.
also, that lone player might be ostracized by the country for YELLING for "help" which is generally looks at as being a "little napolean" in most countries. the people asking for help in defense are usually told something along the lines of stfu, or "attack is the best defense"
i see this part of the system causing more problems than it would "solve"
sorry good work on the idea though
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That's what I wanted to know. You sometimes cannot see the flaws in your ideas yourself and need another set of eyes. "The forest for the trees" thing.
As far as the lone squad member. That's what I ment by quotent. If 2/3 of the squad is no longer on line then points would not be lost. Or something like that. Another one of those details.
As far as the hoard mentality, what can you do. I was trying to generate some insentive to get the other side to actually engage the hordes. The hordes are with us to stay I'm sorry to say so anything that would engourage players to engage them would be welcome.
As far as undefended bases, that's what I was trying to get at with the value attached to certain bases. bases far from the actual combat or bases not captured by the enemy (not "owned") would be of significantly less point value. If a squad wants to attack an undefended base there is not much that can be done about that. It's their money they get to do what they want. If they are trying to be the top squad then they would be going after the higher value targets.
One of the points I didn't mention in the original post was I was trying to come up with a system that did not "require" participation. If you don't want to participate in this scoring then you don't have to. My goal was to try and use a scoring system that would engourage players to ENGAGE the enemy as apposed to avoid the enemy as the current system does.
Like I said, I'm not sure if this is the way to do that.
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Clifra Jones. Have been considering your premis over the last week.
"How to make it worth while to defend vs attack".
And thus engage the "horde".
Basic core problems are the people who do a lot of the attacking "bombers" is a totaly different role than the "fighters" defending.
Our fist conclusions were that it would be very difficualt to not end up having everyone deffend and no one attacking.
Ive been wondering if changing the radar settings so people would have early warning of attacks would also solve most of the problem.
Also rember that althow team play can be fun, everything must also be structured so the individual can also play.
HiTech
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HT> what is say more than 10 planes took off from the same base in less than 2 miniutes a "attack inboud" or something was triggered. maybe the base the attack took off from would flash differently or something
though that might discourage oraganized missions too.
drn you are right, it is a quandry
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Like I said, that "purpose of life" thing will probably take less effort.:D
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'Our fist conclusions were that it would be very difficualt to not end up having everyone deffend and no one attacking. '
simple matter of balancing the points for gaining/losing so that losing a base isnt going to screw you over royally but enough to keep you defending, but the points for getting a certain base is enough to get you to attack, even if it means losing a lesser base though not to much or people just attack with no defense.
which is tricky, how aboot a slowly increasing point loss (to the "owners" of bases, cover that indivuals aspect) if theres not a base captured by a side within a certain amount of time, with certain modifiers so people arnt penalized because everyones involved in a long term battle over certain key bases.
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Originally posted by hitech
Clifra Jones. Have been considering your premis over the last week.
"How to make it worth while to defend vs attack".
And thus engage the "horde".
Basic core problems are the people who do a lot of the attacking "bombers" is a totaly different role than the "fighters" defending.
Our fist conclusions were that it would be very difficualt to not end up having everyone deffend and no one attacking.
Ive been wondering if changing the radar settings so people would have early warning of attacks would also solve most of the problem.
Also rember that althow team play can be fun, everything must also be structured so the individual can also play.
HiTech
Yup, I to have come up with those same problems. I like to "lone wolf" it sometimes and I wouldn't want any system that would penalize that.
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Howzabout if a side loses enough points, the negative perkies give them the Nook! I'm sure Furball would be happy to elaborate.
:D
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"Ive been wondering if changing the radar settings so people would have early warning of attacks would also solve most of the problem."
How about some radar stations scattered independently around in addition to the airfield stations?
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I doubt if any change to the scoring system will change how I play.
Since I don't play for perk points, and I don't play for "score."
My main goal is to enjoy myself in a manner that pleases me. And I like to keep a decent K/D. I don't care about kills/time, kills per sortie, or someone elses score.
I just want to improve my hit percentage, and my K/D. That is what I enjoy doing.
I don't like to: drive vehicles, bomb hangars, pork fields, take bases, defend against hordes, fly in totally losing situations, help or hinder my sides chances of winning resets, or fly perk planes.
I think there are others who are like me that just want to fly planes, furball a bit and do other arcadish things that to we enjoy. I am sure I am in a minority here, but I am sure there are probably more than 10% of the players that are in my category.
And how we fly does have an over all impact on the arena. The solution to getting guys like me out of the MA would be to have a fighter town type of arena. That or force us to drive a vehicle, or a bomber, or something else that would bore us.
You perk my favorite ride? I find another favorite ride. You put up eny limitations? I fly other planes. You give points for defending? I'll still attack.
You want to take away perk points if I don't fly like you want me to? Well take them all, I don't use them. Maybe force me to use earlier planes? Well, I'll learn to use them effectively to fly how I want too :)
Some people just want to fly WWII fighters and have fun by whatever measurement they use to call fun.
So install these new rules, I'll still fly...
But I'll fly how I want to :)
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One possibility on encouraging defense might be to base the scoring on the distance from the base.
The closer you are to the base your defending , the more points you get for your kills.
Maybe some modifiers for the ratio of good to bad guys,or something.
as for the attack thing, do it in reverse.We can already pick "fighter/ground/buff attack in the hangar
I don't no, it's a tough one.
mannable 88's would help too:D
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the scattered radar sites sounds good, especially if the triggerd radar annouced a grid location as to which was triggered. It might get more people to scan the map , take a guess at which base the force may be heading and up the appropriate base to defend.
It might also get the "lone wolfs" involed as a triggered radar site will point to a general area to hunt.
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Originally posted by AKFokerFoder+
I doubt if any change to the scoring system will change how I play.
Since I don't play for perk points, and I don't play for "score."
I to play for very much the same reasons. What I was trying to get at was to discourage the "avoid the fight" mentality. It's just that some nights it's nearly impossible to find a good fight. You can always capture an undefended airfield, bomb a base, sink the CV and generally piss off the furballers but for those of us that want to engage in "air combat" it can be very frustrating.
My goal was to get players to attack and defend the same areas by making them worth more to them.
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I don't think increasing the radar range would help much with encouraging defenders. Most people look at the radar once to find something to attack, then just keep going there. Despite having 100+ people on Bish every night I'm always flying with the same 10 or so people on defense, as we're the only people who even look for the opportunity to fly defense. So the 10 of us may be slightly more effective if we up to defend a base that isn't already under attack such as to intercept a mission, but most fights start slower and escilate. The reason most people don't like defense is that you fly with an altitude disadvantage. You can catch people and bring them down to you, but there are always more who have a sector or two to climb before they get to the fight. And because so many more people look for an attack with a couple defenders the numbers of the attacking side will grow indefinitely until our smaller dar bar is squashed. I guess for the below average pilot a dar bar advantage is about as tempting as it gets.
I have only ever seen one thing which actually increases the ratio of defenders -- larger seperation between bases. The one big advantage defending offers is that you have a very short flight to the fight. Pizza always encouraged defenders like nothing else, as the 2 sector flights to an enemy base worked very poorly for the horde mentality. The long flight made a slowly esculating numbers advantage much harder to achieve since defenders were back in the fight within 5 min while the attackers faced 20min climbs. When a country would organize it's attacks to produce more concentrated numbers advantages and thus quickly win a fight the majority of the participants would get bored quickly, as once capped defenders wouldn't fly to a field from neighboring fields as frequently. This was troublesome if you had some need to defend a particular field, but it was more troublesome to the attackers who would fly 20+min to a vulched field and find not a single plane to vulch.
Pizza also catered well to the lone wolf pilots. If you flew by yourself or with only one or two friendlys to an enemy field you could usually expect to be met with approximately equal resistance. I was almost always able to find 1v3s or 2v5s where there was a good balance between the attacker's alt advantage and the defender's numerical advantage. The horde might up to get you if you get em mad, but they can't come from a base half a sector away to cherry pick you only 3min after you start fighting.
The GVers usually had good limited enguagements around the crust fighting for all those V bases on a near direct curved line to the enemy's HQ. Milk runners had plenty of strat targets to go for, and the bordem of the below average pilots would send them to intercept. Thus the noob bomber dweebs were usually faced off directly with the noob fighter dweebs. And on top of it all squads somehow always managed to face off against each other in the canyons, producing some truely remarkable fights. The only canyon fighting we can do now is at A1 on trinity.
If you can't tell, I'm still bitter about Pizza being dropped from the rotation. It was the only map that discouraged horde flying, and once pilots learned the joys of limited enguagements they would fly with smaller packs on the other maps too.
-p.
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Here's an idea for ya HT. Set up the fighter rank and perk point award systems around damage done, similar to attack. But weight the reward by how damaged the plane you shot is. Basically it would be like each undamaged plane has an initial reward of 1.0. If you shoot him for (some arbitrary number here) 300 damage and knock off an elevator you are awarded for 300 damage points. But now missing an elevator that guys reward value is down at something like .6. The next guy who comes along and cherrys the sucker for 200 damage points would only get .6x200. Shooting that flaming wingless wreck on it's way to the ground would reward practically nothing.
Another idea is a "vulch timer". Upon beginning a flight some timer is set for 30 seconds to 1min or so which while active causes no reward to be given for killing him. The standard kill message would be replaced with a vulch message. The death of the pilot should count as normal, however, to prevent base defenders from endlessly upping en mass. This would seperate the score potatos from the land grab dweebs a little bit. It would also stop the people who dive in from 20k to take one dweeb vulch pass on the runway and then extend 10miles, ignoring every airborn threat in the sector.
Finally, just increase ack lethality and accuracy. Planes can dive in and vulch on a field with full ack up and usually get several passes before they get hit. De-acking is something that only happens when nobody is trying to take off. If killing someone on the runway who won't be any kind of threat for at least a minet while he takes off is a higher priority then de-acking, which is definately a threat, then something is wrong with the ack. The puffy ack is a random low probability kill, as it should be because of it's range. The regular ack can so easily be avoided that it shouldn't be that way. Making this fair would perhaps mean softening up the ack a bit again, though. I don't see how some little guy sitting behind those guns could survive a hail of 50cal rounds like they do now, it was better before when a quick burst of 50s could finish the job. It's rediculous that a P47 needs several seconds of guns on target, a substantial chunk of it's ammo load, to knock out an AA emplacement that 1 single 20mm round can pop.
Anyway, I know I keep drifting off topic here but it seems like all these problems are related.
-p.
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Originally posted by MaddogJoe
the scattered radar sites sounds good, especially if the triggerd radar annouced a grid location as to which was triggered. It might get more people to scan the map , take a guess at which base the force may be heading and up the appropriate base to defend.
It might also get the "lone wolfs" involed as a triggered radar site will point to a general area to hunt.
I am pretty much looking at the map the entire time I'm up. Esp if a fight is starting to die down... I start looking for another one.
Also if there's a full sector's worth of nme dar common sense tells you there's something going on there... Most likely a mission of some sort.
I'm not sure how much more early warning we need to be honest. If there's a whole lot of red in one sector with no green, 20 miles behind nme lines you know something's otw in...
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Originally posted by Morpheus
I am pretty much looking at the map the entire time I'm up. Esp if a fight is starting to die down... I start looking for another one.
Also if there's a full sector's worth of nme dar common sense tells you there's something going on there... Most likely a mission of some sort.
I'm not sure how much more early warning we need to be honest. If there's a whole lot of red in one sector with no green, 20 miles behind nme lines you know something's otw in...
ditto esp the looking all the time.
looking for what's going on, looking for a "better" fight LOL
pellic, i dont look where to attack, i look for cons IB
even though the JB's are a decent sized squad, usually there is 5-7 on tops, maybe more on a friday night. it takes more than 5-7 to capture a base so we don't usually bother with attack for capture. the only "attacks" we do is when our CO says "jb73 and 88 go kill troops at bases xx xx xx xx and xx.
then we "attack"
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Originally posted by JB73
ditto esp the looking all the time.
looking for what's going on, looking for a "better" fight LOL
pellic, i dont look where to attack, i look for cons IB
even though the JB's are a decent sized squad, usually there is 5-7 on tops, maybe more on a friday night. it takes more than 5-7 to capture a base so we don't usually bother with attack for capture. the only "attacks" we do is when our CO says "jb73 and 88 go kill troops at bases xx xx xx xx and xx.
then we "attack"
Yeah, but you JBs have been around long enough to somewhat grow out of the horde warrior phase. If I find a 190 or two that are willing to enguage without a clear advantage and stick through the fight instead of taking the first opportunity to disenguage it'll be one of you guys more often then not.
-p.
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A slight flaw in the vulch timer. Like HT can do it he wants to. But so what?
I like to vulch now and then. It is a lot of fun.... for a while, and then it gets boring. But I don't vulch for the kill to be added to my score or for the perk points.
I vulch because I really love to shoot some poor helpless slob who is trying to take off. It satisfies some primordial part of me that is at best psychopathic. :aok
It is like shooting some poor sot who is shot to hell, smoking, and trying to rtb or ditch. I don't do it for the kill to be added to my score. Often all you get is an assist. I do it for the pure unadulterated pleasure I get out of it.
There is a part of me that is purely psychopathic, sadistic, and psychotic when I play on-line. It is a vicarious Mr. Hyde that slithers out of the primordial ooze of my baser persona. And from the performance of others in the arena, I would say that I am a long ways from being an anomaly.
What you are trying to fight here is the condition of the human spirit. Religions, philosophies and governments have spent thousands of years in futile attempts of trying to control the baser part of our humanity. They have come up with all kinds of rules and ideas. None of them has been very successful. Why do you think your rules will be any better at controlling human behavior in the arena? Especially when there are so many unrepentant anarchistic reprobates like myself who will not submit themselves to the sanctimonious, and often ridiculous unwritten rules of behavior that some want to impose on me?
I don’t cuss, swear etc on open channels. I stay off of channel 200. I don’t deliberately kill steal. And I don’t do anything to keep others from having fun their way, except that I will shoot them down anyway I can. I vulch, cherry pick, gang bang, alt monkey, fly with hordes, back stab, shoot at a bogey from it’s 11 to 1 position. If I have no chance, I will HO.
All of the above is not “Honorable” behavior. But I will assure you that I have been vulched, cherry picked, gang banged, been hit by alt monkeys, back stabbed, HO’d, attacked when I have been low slow, shot to hell, smoking and trying to ditch or rtb.
I do unto others as others have done unto me. Kill or be killed, that is the only rule to fly by. All other rules are wistful romantic ideas dreamed up by people who have never been on an actual battlefield.
You want reality in Aces High? Then fly like a real fighter pilot: Kill the enemy any way you can, before he kills you.
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Originally posted by pellik
Yeah, but you JBs have been around long enough to somewhat grow out of the horde warrior phase. If I find a 190 or two that are willing to enguage without a clear advantage and stick through the fight instead of taking the first opportunity to disenguage it'll be one of you guys more often then not.
-p.
thank you for the compliment sir we try best we can ; )
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Maybe that's part of the solution. I wasn't aware (as I'm not aware of alot) that Pizza was dumped. HT, Why? I can venture a guess. "I don't want to fly for 20 minutes to bomb those FHs waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!"
What was that map a few weeks ago with the towns set far from the airbases? I liked that map.
I didn't want this tread to digress into a complaint about the fun killing bomber dweebs, but I started this thread so I can say what I want. They need to have more of a disadvantage. It should not be so easy to climb to 20K, fly over a base that no fighter can up to get to you because they don't have enough advanced warning, and bomb out the hangers. I think the AAA should be more lethal to bombers, the bomb drops less accurate and they should HAVE TO DEAL WITH WIND! If there were a 15 knot wind at the deck with 25 knot gusts and a 20-30 knot wind at 15-20k they would have to deal with it accordingly. Fly at lower alts and the drops would be less effective. Overcast skys with a 10k ceiling. And thunderstorms, yeah, with lighting, wings icing up, Yeah that's the ticket! (deep breath, ok I feel better)
Pellik makes some valid points. I though of a map where the continents only met at peninsula choke points with large bodies of water in between. It you wanted to attack the other country you had to attack the choke point. there would be islands in the water so your other options would be an island hopping strategy with CV. I can see how many would not like this and it would make it hard for the singleton or small group out looking for a fight.
Another thought I had was that in RL not all your fighter aircraft would be housed in 4 buildings. They would be parked along the taxiways covered with como nets and such. Just bombing the hangars would not kill all the aircraft. Not sure how that idea would be implemented in AH but it is a thought. I know that would not sit well with some because we have a significant player base that just can't stand to have any fighter resistance up while they are trying to capture a base.
How about covert bases? Makeshift airfields carved out of the forest with camo covering the buildings and aircraft. Not on the map like enemy CV's are not shown. These would have limited numbers of aircraft, ord and planesets. Some would have short runways so only short TOL planes could use them. You could also use them for refuel/rearm. How about letting the GVers go out and create one of these fields. They bring the supplies to point on the map and this established this field. Runways could be grass marked out with small flags. Now they also have a covert point of attack. This could open up a whole new covert operations aspect to the game.
My apologies to the hangar killing base capturers but if I had something like this I'd be upping a plane and flying to your base capture to spoil your fun every chance I could get. Because IMO I think you have it far to easy.
I personally like fly the defensive more than the offensive in this game. Even with my squad which never takes down the FHs on a base capture the offense turns into a flying circus with the fighters vulching the occasional brave soal upping a fighter to defend. The problem for us is we are so good at this is does get to be dull sometimes. The other problem is that whenever there is a good base defense going on with jabo and fighter attack happening. Some bomber dweebs will come in up in the stratosphere and kills the hangars ending all the fun. I can deal with the jabo pilots trying to kill our hangars are we have just as much change of killing them as they do killing our hangars.
Anyway, I'm done raving. Gotta go home now.
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Originally posted by Clifra Jones
I wasn't aware (as I'm not aware of alot) that Pizza was dumped.
not "dumped" but AHII does not have multiple tiles, and all new desert terrains have to be made for that map.
i am guessing HTC people have been busy with tons of stuff, and haven't had the opprotunity to make them and recompile the map.
maybe they dont have the source files anymore, and the map is doomed to extinsion, because from just the .res file i dont think they can re-tile it.
dont really know, but that is the basic reason it is not in rotation
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This sounds more like a TOD thing than a MA thing.
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Originally posted by hitech
Ive been wondering if changing the radar settings so people would have early warning of attacks would also solve most of the problem.
We already know where the attack is coming from and most likely going. Unless they are NOE. Many people simply don't care to defend, especially on maps where the front line never moves more than a couple bases either way.