Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: Thor on September 16, 2000, 10:56:00 PM
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<S> all ,Here in this sim everyone gains experience in the first month or two that would have killed pretty much all of us off had this been a real war with real planes. We all are probably better with SA and tactics than most of the real fighter pilots of ww2 after playing AH for a couple of months, this is not knocking any of them or the incredible feats they accomplished but with this exposure rate to "combat" in AH we gain "combat" experiece very fast.
From what I've read about fighter combat 70-80% of all kills were made without the victim even knowing he was under fire till it was toooo late. Here the figure is probably more like 5% or less. Reducing the size and information of the icons would enhance this sim. Wouldn't it be nice if the tactics of real world fighter combat applied here somewhat ? instead of this radar drone arena. I know my post will not be well recieved by the "I want to fly by wire people" that want to have everything laid on a silver platter to get a kill. But think about it... WE ALL ARE BETTER THAN WE THINK and that 70-80% blind kill ratio probably wouldnt apply here due to the "combat" experience of the AH crowd and future players.
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wrong.
no one that plays this game is as good as the aces of ww2.
this game only models the Air Combat maneuvers aspect of flying warbirds and dogfighting. the rest is erased and treated like it didn't affect real combat.
navigation? we have in flight GPS. they had at most a nondirectional beacon and dead reckoning.
aquisition? we have idiotproof icons and laser rangefinders, in flight AWACS and JSTARS. they had only eyesight and sometimes vectors from ground control if they were on the defensive
identification? we have idiot proof icons that spell out what an enemy aircraft is. they had only their eyesight. plane types were hard to make out even under ideal conditions
systems failure? we only get damage from bullets they had airplanes that regularly broke down on their own and guns that jammed after only a few rounds.
gunnery? we have laser rangefinders hit flashes that apear below the nose, warping bandits and a perfect atmosphere they had turbulence they could not see through their plane they had to guess range and deflection shooting was difficult
icons off and no radar and you will get bounces like you wouldnt believe and more realistic gunnery simulation
in flight awacs is another reason for gangbanging and lack of surprise
[This message has been edited by Citabria (edited 09-17-2000).]
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Right,
as far as the statement 'no one is as...' that cannot be determined by you or anyone else.
Shooting down planes didnt usually require being a great pilot, reading from the annals of history ,but having SA and knowledge of tactics and the aircraft is what made for the most kills. Here in AH you still have to determine E states , you still have to spot the dots (be it they are big and no realistic sun here). WW2, Getting from point A to point B is difficult in itself ....but knowing what to do when they got there was the crux of their problem. Thats why the blind killed ratio was so high in ww2 and the turkey shoots whether in the asia theater or the euro theater with green pilots.
You're wrong about ability there Cit ...ask any present fighter pilot if he was sent up without time in simulators how long he would last in gun-combat without the adjusted gun pipper but with just his standard HUD info and just knowing how to get from point A to B against a pilot with months even years of simulator time.There's still a lot to be analyzed in this sim by the player even with all the mapo stuff, do you pull your clipboard out in a dogfight? or when positioning for an attack? As far as gunnery unless its a dead 6 low or zero g shot you still have to learn how to hit the target with the variety of armament configs here, there's still alot of gunnery issues involved even with the laser range finders (which i vote to eliminate). Then there is the fact that the players of AH have to deal with problems never seen in real life, warps , veiw lag , incorrect angled view representations ect.
Just imagine this, 25,000 russian pilots in ww2 with simulator training like the AH commmunity has here , you can safely assume the success rate of the russian fighter corps would have been much greater, and would have pummeled the German fighter corps.
Personally I think just a red or green dot near the ac would be nice and eliminate the distance icon totally, it sounds tough to alot of people but after 2 months of that we all be killin regualarly again....probably even more.
[This message has been edited by Thor (edited 09-17-2000).]
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Cit add to your list:
Few people here know how to land properly.
Few people here know how to fly formation properly.
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Let alone know the proper procedure for the relief tube. (http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/Smileys/default/wink.gif)
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Just imagine this, 25,000 russian pilots in ww2 with simulator training like the AH commmunity has here , you can safely assume the success rate of the russian fighter corps would have been much greater, and would have pummeled the German fighter corps.
-- They didn't have time and life to learn about their mistakes or perfect knowledge of that how enemy plane flies like.
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Originally posted by Thor:
Just imagine this, 25,000 russian pilots in ww2 with simulator training like the AH commmunity has here , you can safely assume the success rate of the russian fighter corps would have been much greater, and would have pummeled the German fighter corps.
Think of this..........Not only the Russians having a "simulator" to train pilots on but what if every country would have had a simulator like they do now? I imagine that not only would the Russians have had less attrition but also the Germans, Americans, British, Japanese, Australians, Belgians.....well I think you get the idea.
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Maj. LJK_Reschke
Jagdbomber I-31, StaffelKapitaen JaboStaffel Ein
Kommandeur Jagdbomber, LuftJagerKorps
www.luftjagerkorps.com
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Thors post reflects HT's own words, online, many have alot more experience than the actual pilots did in ACM and BFM.
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Fear of dying, being shot down and spending the rest of the war in a POW camp, and moral etc aren't modeled either.
Real pilots had to deal with these factors and keep their cool in combat, which, pyschologically wouldn't be an easy thing, also you had to deal with pyhsical stresses from G forces.
I could gaurantee you if you took a random ammount of people that play AH and put them in WW2 combat, 99.9% of them wouldn't be successfull.
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I agree with Nath - it's kinda like saying that someone who plays F1 racing games a helluva lot could then go on and drive the real thing (http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/Smileys/default/wink.gif) !
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"There is a big difference between if you are in actual war and if you are playing war."
Erich Hartmann
I am not a pilot so I will leave it to them to explain all the things you dont learn about flying in AH. But certainly there must be a lot more to really flying a pony then we see here.
This game gives you great insight into the weaknesses of the planes modeled.(assuming they are modeled accuratly)
This game gives you an increadable understanding of advantage and postion in air combat. Certainly this would be of near non matchable value to someone entering WW2.
The game does a credible job of gunnery training I think. With access to the info that they had at the time in WW2 HT could certainly make it much more accurate quickly. ie no range read out, gun reliablity, ammo loadouts. But even as it is it would have to give a signifigant advantage vs your contemporaries.
I think that a person that could otherwise qualify for service in the RAF/USAAF/LW fighter service in WW2 would benifit greatly from a year of AH.
With out all the training that the real men recieved, 80 % of us would just be killed trying to take the mustang off..
Pongo hits
alt-x...dam where is this thing going?
alt-x DAM
DAM
DAM
boomm
/.ef
/.ef....
dam
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Pongo has it about right.
We're certainly not better, or even as good, but most of us would have a leg up on the other guys if we were to enter training in that environment. We have practiced deflection shooting over and over. Some of us have a good grasp of ACM tactics. We understand many of the principals of air combat that our fellow trainees would have no idea of yet and would need to have drilled into them.
This assumes that we could pass the physical.
I think that I could easily get my Wings in such a situation. How I'd do in real combat, well, that's a different subject.
Sisu
-Karnak
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Oh and btw exhaustion isn't modelled either ...
i do an aerobatic rountine that does less G than i pull in a normal dogfight in AH .. and it is shorter in duration thana lot of fights in AH now .. and i'm exhasuted after´wards , drenched in sweat...
Some people were able to litterally "wrestle" their opponents down by shere strength and dexterity... another reason why most Aces in WW2 preffered Bomm and Zomm or Hit and run tactics...
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Ever tried to really pull negative Gs?
Your first instinctive reaction upon hearing bullets suddenly hit you aircraft would be to push the stick down into redout.
Your second reaction after half a second of a serious readout would probably be "pull up, pull up, better die then that".
miko
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I knew guys in the army that were great at shooting paper. You sould have seen what happen to there shooting, when the targets started shooting back (http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/Smileys/default/smile.gif). This is a game. What we do here bears only a passing resemblance, at best, to what the real vets did.
We are just cyber punks next to the real fighter pilots.
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I think perhaps Thor's real topic has been side tracked here by people understandably eager to prevent minimalization of WW2 flyer achievements under very trying conditions. It is certainly true that no sim faithfully reproduces real life- you just can't with available computer power. If you think the flight models give a good representation and prepare you to fly the real thing, consider how much they change even from release to release: many planes 'feel' totally different. Which 'version' is the correct one? So would I die instantly if I tried to take off in a real Spitfire? No... but mainly because I wouldn't even know how to start the engine. Conversely, would a real WW2 ace be able to take up this game and instantly win against me every time? I don't think that's a given as I probably have many thousand times as many virtual sorties as he has real ones.
But what Thor was trying to point out, I believe, is that most kills in WW2 were 'easy', i.e. the target never saw the enemy coming and the enemy only had to pull onto his six and fire. That almost NEVER happens in AH, but it doesn't have to be that way. As Thor suggests, just have an arena, like War Birds, that has NO icons.. ever. (Well.. in the WB Historical Arena friendlies have icons but only at very close range.) I can say from experience that this environment is quite a bit more 'interesting' than the ones where everyone pulls a big neon sign behind them. It increases your SA and also increases real tactical radio comms (thereby cutting back on useless chatter and flaming). It also gives you way more of an immersive 'fog of war' feeling: with the current all seeing AWACS environment one can often predict whether one lives or dies way before even the first pass on a group of enemies. True- it's quite hard to design a workable 'no icon' arena because of the very severe limitation of visual accuity on a computer screen (instead of distance AC having recognizable optical qualities they are just a pixel).
So I think what Thor really wonders is why AH doesn't have an icon free arena. So how do people feel about a no icon, or no enemy icon, arena?
715
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I've always thought that the point of having icons was to simulate the basic skills I pilot would have (which people have already mentioned), namely,
i) Excellent eyesight
ii) Knowledge of aircraft types
Obviously there is a case for reducing the distance at which the icon appears (which has been done in this version, I think).
When it comes to the game itself, its always going to be limited by the fact that it is a computer program, an approximation to reality and therefore is not able reflect the chaotic, poly-variable nature of real life generally, nevermind flight. So the pilots who become masters at this game can only put a proportion of their success down to knowledge and application of ACM, that could be transferred to real life - the rest is learning the ins and outs of the 'game'.
I think people should see AH for what it is and not try to make too many comparisons with real life (it's just too complicated).
Having said that, it's a damned excellent game and I love every minute of it. (http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/Smileys/default/smile.gif) Even getting shot down, which happens alot.
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Originally posted by Pongo:
I am not a pilot so I will leave it to them to explain all the things you dont learn about flying in AH. But certainly there must be a lot more to really flying a pony then we see here.
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Pongo,
I am a pilot so I can say that flying any aircraft is completely different to AH. Sure it's a good attempt at recreating the real thing but it still happens in your home and not in the air.
At the end of the day, AH will never be more than theory. It's great to have a bit of fun and learn to fly and fight in the virtual world but step into a real fighter plane and almost every AH pilot wouldn't even know how to start it...
Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the way that AH has been modelled. It's a heck of a lot better than any other flight sims I've seen for the PC. Take my advice, though, and treat it as a game and leave the unanswerable questions unanswered...
tssfka
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I'm rather new here... so take my opinion with a grain of salt if you want... but...
I think icons are needed. When I am in a plane I can see other planes miles off... tell what type of plane it is and what direction it is headed. You can't get that resolution on a computer monitor. Since this is a *simulation*, the icons are a tool to simulate what you'd be able to see in a real plane. If you want to simulate a half blind pilot... take away the icons, but I hardly see how it would be more realistic.
There is a vast difference between flying a real plane and a virtual one. Obviously we don't fear for our lives like a real pilot, and we don't have the blood rush to our heads while inverted or feel G's etc... but I think most AH pilots have better ACM skills than most WWII pilots. Could they/ would they do this in a real plane? Don't know... but AH pilots have more time practicing flight maneuvers in an environment that fairly realistically reproduces the characteristics of the actual plane, than a WWII pilot could ever dream of. How many times did a WWII get a chance to die? Once... and well... he didn't get a chance to get any better after that. =) We do... we can make mistakes, learn from them and get better. We are immortal God's in a virtual sky, and of course it isn't real... but we are flying somewhere where most of the laws of physics are simulated, and the experience gained would be valuable to an actual pilot. Learning where the buttons are and starting the thing isn't the hard part people... if that was true any idiot could be a WWII ace. I would think that the hardest part of being a great WWII pilot, would be learning how to get the most from your plane and how to fly it in a variety of situations. In that respect, I think AH pilots would do very well.
I agree 100% with what Easymo said though... there is a huge difference between paper targets and real people, and you can't tell how someone will react without actually experiencing it.
715… I think part of the problem is in adjusting the head position… in RL it takes time and effort to sit up and look around that headrest… in AH just save the head position and boom… you have superman six view. Maybe moving to saved head positions should be slower than a snap, so you couldn’t just glance back there every second while continuing to fly.
[This message has been edited by Paxil (edited 10-02-2000).]
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I would love for absolutly everything to be modeled realistically, right down to the canopy fogging over.
I'm still waiting for the perfect WWII flight sim that is realistic as it could possibly be in every aspect. The changes I wouuld make to AH would be:
#1. No Icons
#2. Historical teams
#3. Proper G restraints.
#4. No Radar - realistic navigation.
#5. No range indicator.
#6. Full day/night cycles
#7. Realisitc weather and wind conditions
#8. Random system failures.
#9. Serious penalty for death, thereby inducing some fear of death and promoting more realistic manuvers and engagements.
I highly doubt this would every happen in a sim though. It would only draw the true simmers to the game and even in a game like this, probably only 10% of the people would play. I would love it though.
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Squadron Leader, Igloo.
C/O RCAF 411 Squadron - County of York (http://www.trueorigins.net/411rcaf)
"Problems cannot be solved with the same awareness that created them" - Albert Einstein[/i]