Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: SpinMan on November 14, 2011, 01:14:36 AM
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Im sure this is here 100 times, can you devs please look into reducing the lethality, range and accuracy of puffy ack? Most times you can be taken out by puffy flying over half a sector away to the point where the first you even know your near a fleet is the puffy bursts around you, you have at this point no vis even on the fleet. Today I was half a sector away from a fleet in a 262 doing well over 300 mph, puffy started to blow around me I made several changes to altitude whilst attacking a flight of buffs, not once dropping below 300+ and pop I die! the fleet had just come into long range view on the horizon! This is rediculous can it please be addressed!
Appreciatedly yours,
Spin
Id like to hear others thoughts keep it as it is or reduce its range, accuracy and lethality?
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Agreed. Puffy ack in the game is stupid. It can take out a small 400 mph jet in one burst but can't hit large lumbering bombers with 50 shots. :rolleyes:
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Bomber get hit just as much as anything if not more , they are just harder to kill with one large round .
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Agreed...extremely to legal for the auto....I would like say no auto ack period either man or nothing
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Bomber get hit just as much as anything if not more , they are just harder to kill with one large round .
Not really.
Ive flown b25s from 9k to as low as 3k, ive sunk 26 cvs flying b25s at 3k.
The puffy ack will miss the big-bad bombers. Ive seen CV's lanc-stuka'd, and even my own b25s will fly threw it with no problem.
Yet when it comes to fighters, the ack has no problem hitting them. So many times ive had my oil/radiator/PW/engine hit by flack while chasing an enemy plane over their cv.
Worst time was when i brought a 262 to a carrier battle, was trying to protect our carrier, saw the b17s sink our cv at 9k, didnt look like the flack even touched em. Chased the same buffs over their cv, ended up dieing from a PW from the first hit a puffy flak.
Flak couldn't hit those buffs that were going below 300 and a huge hitbox, but they sure didn't have a problem hitting a tiny 400mph+ jet.
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IN before "Puffy ack is fine, you guys just want the game easier." :paranoid
There's a difference between "easy" and "fun". Keep the manned guns, remove the retarded AI puffy.
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Perhaps change the Puffy and CV ACK where a plane cannot be hit by the first salvo at your plane. More than once I was hit on the first salvo and the odds of this occurring seem astronomical.
This point is both reasonable (without a lot controversy) and an easier programming change.
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What I don't understand about puffy is why it targets a plane that is farther out than others. You'd think it would target the closest target.
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Im sure this is here 100 times
winner
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from my understanding, puffy ack is deployed using a 'box' concept. Each plane has a designated box size and the puffy ack hits inside this box, the same amount each time... This means if the puffy ack is firing at a fighter, the box is smaller, but the amount of puffy shots is the same there by hitting fighters more often than bombers. This is because the bombers are much larger, leading to a larger box, but spreading the puffy out more, there by reducing the chances of a mortal wound to the bombers.
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from my understanding, puffy ack is deployed using a 'box' concept. Each plane has a designated box size and the puffy ack hits inside this box, the same amount each time... This means if the puffy ack is firing at a fighter, the box is smaller, but the amount of puffy shots is the same there by hitting fighters more often than bombers. This is because the bombers are much larger, leading to a larger box, but spreading the puffy out more, there by reducing the chances of a mortal wound to the bombers.
All planes are target the same regardless of size.
variables are speed, range and acceleration (in all directions).
The What I don't understand about puffy is why it targets a plane that is farther out than others. You'd think it would target the closest target.
This is incorrect, the closet plane is targeted.
HiTech
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lol hitech, ty for fixing the puffy target everyone bug but here it goes again... I dont know how yall do it..Htc sure luvs their puffy..
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Well I think redesigning how the puffy works could go a long way to reducing the complaints. I think (after my last chat with Pyro) the best structure would be to have puffy ack fire within an envelope that looks like a class B airspace.
(http://jcmservices.net/airspace.jpg)
I think having steps every 2000 feet (just like the wind settings) with an adjustable range, and lethality, for each step would be tremendous. This would eliminate most problems with ack shooting through hills without the overhead of collision detection.
Then I would add an additional factor to the size of the ack box. This pertains mostly to CV groups but could be applied to the strat citys and HQ's (and I think large airfields should have puffy ack). I think the ack box should get larger if the radars in the CV group are destroyed. So over a healthy CV group the box is as small as possible. Then for each of the 6 radars destroyed in a CV group the box would get some percentage larger.
Additionally I think the radar hardness needs a bump to make it more difficult to destroy, go from 250 lbs to something like 1200 lbs to take out the radar.
And one final thought, I think manned ack guns should have kill shooter on.
Those are my $0.02 for making puffy ack better for the game.
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I think the only problem with puffy ack is its accuracy. One sortie I'm helping defending a base from a CV and making sure I stay below 3,000ft. I get in a fight with an F4U and accidentally climb over 3K for just 2 seconds, but in that 2 seconds I lose half my plane to the first two puffy shots.
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it's not only enemy puffy ack that is the issue.
I've been toasted 3 times by my own this month :ahand
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Baumer, I think that is a pretty good idea.
My biggest complaint with puffy is a CV can be parked a mile off shore, and auto puffy can blast away at the defenders as soon as they pop over 3,000'. I think the altitude puffy kicks in at should be a wee bit higher, that way if players want to use puffy against upping aircraft, they need to man the guns.
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Baumer, I think that is a pretty good idea.
My biggest complaint with puffy is a CV can be parked a mile off shore, and auto puffy can blast away at the defenders as soon as they pop over 3,000'. I think the altitude puffy kicks in at should be a wee bit higher, that way if players want to use puffy against upping aircraft, they need to man the guns.
(http://i1143.photobucket.com/albums/n623/Gkitt/whathesaid.gif)
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I really don't understand peoples attitude about puffy ack. My experience has been 100% the opposite. In fact, the only time I have been killed by puffy ack it was my own ack (I was following an enemy attacking our CV). But, certainly, go ahead and completely remove it. It is utterly useless at its job of defending CV groups from bombers. I have watched many many bombers attacking CVs, mostly level, and while the manned puffy can occasionally kill the bombers before they sink the CV, usually only if they are low, I have never seen the AI puffy kill any bombers before they sink the CV... not once. Removing puffy ack will not change the survival rate of CVs one iota... it will remain 0%.
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715, I disagree a bit. It's pretty effective against single engine bomb slingers. Heavy/medium bombers, I would agree with your statement more.
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All planes are target the same regardless of size.
And that's the problem. With puffy ack being random inside a box that is much larger than the plane, if plane A is 4 times larger than plane B, it should take 4 times as many hits on average. A plane that has 4 engines should average 4 times as many engine hits as a plane with 1 engine.
Try this out at the shooting range with birdshot and plane silhouettes on paper. A scale Lanc will have a lot more pellets hitting it than a scale Spit.
Also, the lethality of the ack should vary with the number and type of ships remaining in the task group - a CV with no escorts should be vulnerable, that's why they had them!
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I think the only problem with puffy ack is its accuracy. One sortie I'm helping defending a base from a CV and making sure I stay below 3,000ft. I get in a fight with an F4U and accidentally climb over 3K for just 2 seconds, but in that 2 seconds I lose half my plane to the first two puffy shots.
I got hit twice by our own puffy ack today, didn't kill me but could hear the damage sound it was a close call
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And that's the problem. With puffy ack being random inside a box that is much larger than the plane, if plane A is 4 times larger than plane B, it should take 4 times as many hits on average. A plane that has 4 engines should average 4 times as many engine hits as a plane with 1 engine.
Try this out at the shooting range with birdshot and plane silhouettes on paper. A scale Lanc will have a lot more pellets hitting it than a scale Spit.
Also, the lethality of the ack should vary with the number and type of ships remaining in the task group - a CV with no escorts should be vulnerable, that's why they had them!
Why would the number of engines determine the number of hits? In both cases the AAA is shooting at a single aircraft. As stated above, the size of the aircraft is not a variable.
Now, take your example and turn it around. A Lanc should be able to take X times more hits than a Spit before damage is done.
It all makes sense now, doesn't it?
25Mar45-21Jun45. Off Okinawa -- Ten "Kikusui", swarms of Kamikaze, up to 350 attackers at a time, 1,900 in total, damaged 250 ships with 34 destroyers and smaller ships sunk.
Assuming one plane per damaged ship, 1650 kamakazis shot down.
86%.
Puffy ack.
wrongway
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Why would the number of engines determine the number of hits? In both cases the AAA is shooting at a single aircraft. As stated above, the size of the aircraft is not a variable.
Now, take your example and turn it around. A Lanc should be able to take X times more hits than a Spit before damage is done.
It all makes sense now, doesn't it?
Assuming one plane per damaged ship, 1650 kamakazis shot down.
86%.
Puffy ack.
wrongway
I think he is saying this in a box model if 7 ack rds say for example fire in the box, the chances of getting hit in the fighter box is awhole lot more lethal
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MMMMmmmmmm look at all this scrap metal coming my way
Forget those bombers...there's a jet...hehehe...he's gonna lose his peerrks
Welcome to the club XXXXXX
:D
Sorry had to
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Why would the number of engines determine the number of hits? In both cases the AAA is shooting at a single aircraft.
Because 4 engines give you roughly 4 times the target area (for engine hits) as 1 engine. Whether they are attached to 1 plane or 4 planes is irrelevant in this context. Each engine will average about the same number of hits, so the four engines taken together will average 4 times the hits of the 1 engine.
Try it. With arrows or darts if you don't have a shotgun, or dropping a bunch of pennies or pebbles or other small objects from eye level onto the floor, anything that gives a random distribution of hits. Because the shots are randomly distributed within the target area (the "box"), an object that takes up X times as much space inside the target area will average X times as many hits.
This is different from air-to-air gunnery, where you're trying to put a concentrated stream of bullets into a single spot. With puffy ack, even with proximity fuses, you aren't trying to hit the target with the shell, you are filling a volume of space with lots and lots of randomly distributed little pellets or shell fragments and hoping enough of them hit to disable the target, which is effectively like shooting a shotgun at an object that is much smaller than the shot pattern. A good ack shell, like a good shotgun, will give you a more even distribution, but it is still random.
What you're saying - it's only shooting at a single aircraft - is like saying you should get the same number of hits whether you're shooting at a basketball or a golf ball, because either way you're just shooting at a single ball.
As stated above, the size of the aircraft is not a variable.
Exactly. In the game it's not a variable, but in anything remotely based on the laws of physics in the real world it should be a variable. Saying the size of a target is irrelevant to the number of hits you should expect to get on it is nonsensical.
Now, take your example and turn it around. A Lanc should be able to take X times more hits than a Spit before damage is done.
Right. The Lanc should take X times as many hits to kill, but it gets hit X times as much, so puffy ack should be at least as lethal against a Lanc as a Spit if they're both flying straight & level. As it stands, puffy ack is X times as lethal against a Spit as against a Lanc, which is wrong. I've had the same experience as everyone else is relating, I've bombed CV groups hundreds of times in buff formations and it's rare that I lose a bomber to puffy ack, and almost never before dropping, but to fighters it's deadly.
Again, this is not like air-to-air gunnery, where your burst either hits or misses and contains the same number of bullets and shells, and thus gives you roughly the same number of hits, if you hit at all, whether you're shooting at a Lanc or a Spit.
It all makes sense now, doesn't it?
It made sense before.
TnDep, your diagram isn't how it works. The box is the same size for every plane, with the same number of pellets in it, but the Lanc takes up more of the box than the Spit does, so more of the pellets will land in space taken up by the Lanc. (I won't try to draw that in ASCII art though.)
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I'll turn this around for a moment. I like playing CV gunner a fair amount and I can kill most fighters while sitting in a 5" gun relatively easily. At the same time I can probably count the number of bombers I've killed on my fingers and toes.
I guess the way it is it keeps most of the dive bombing fighters away but if it didn't it would make playing the 20's and quad 40's a lot more fun. At this point they're pretty much useless because the fighters get killed by the 5"ers while out of range and they can't reach the buffs.
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it's not only enemy puffy ack that is the issue.
I've been toasted 3 times by my own this month :ahand
Stop dragging us into your carrier ack, and we'll resolve that friendly fire downing you issue most eagerly and promptly, good sir.
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The
This is incorrect, the closet plane is targeted.
HiTech
Ok...you should know...but. On more than one occasion near an enemy CV I'll have a low furball between me and the CV...and I'll be surrounded by ack burst but don't see any around the furball. What's up with that?
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Well I'll be filming all my sorties for a while because I thought I've seen the same thing. It could just be due to my poor SA that I don't see the Ack properly. :)
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Ok...you should know...but. On more than one occasion near an enemy CV I'll have a low furball between me and the CV...and I'll be surrounded by ack burst but don't see any around the furball. What's up with that?
Low furball. They're probably below 3k feet. You are probably the closest target above.
Because 4 engines give you roughly 4 times the target area (for engine hits) as 1 engine. Whether they are attached to 1 plane or 4 planes is irrelevant in this context. Each engine will average about the same number of hits, so the four engines taken together will average 4 times the hits of the 1 engine.
This:
all planes are target the same regardless of size
variables are speed, range and acceleration (in all directions).
HiTech
The Lanc should take X times as many hits to kill, but it gets hit X times as much, so puffy ack should be at least as lethal against a Lanc as a Spit if they're both flying straight & level. As it stands, puffy ack is X times as lethal against a Spit as against a Lanc, which is wrong. I've had the same experience as everyone else is relating, I've bombed CV groups hundreds of times in buff formations and it's rare that I lose a bomber to puffy ack, and almost never before dropping, but to fighters it's deadly.
But the chance of getting hit as it is coaded is the same. A plane is a plane. The damage taken per hit is the same. Fighters just have the ability to take less damage.
Most of the time I've been shot down by puffy ack, other than the "magic bullet", is by the manned variety. I really haven't noticed a difference in frequency of hits from being in a fighter or a bomber. It's just that getting hit while in a fighter is more lethal.
One also tends not to linger in the ack in a bomber as much. In and out. Get the job done, versus around and around chasing someone while in a fighter.
wrongway
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I have understood puffy ack to work like this: The faster a plane is traveling the smaller the "kill box" will be. For example if your in a set of lancs and your buddy is in say a 262 headed toward a cv. The 262 traveling at 375 IAS will have a smaller "kill box" as opposed to you doing 195 IAS. Smaller kill box would result in taking hits. Of course i may be way off on this.
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All planes are target the same regardless of size.
variables are speed, range and acceleration (in all directions).
HiTech
So does that mean the faster a target is going the more lethal the ack is? Because that would make a lot of sense for why a 500mph 262 at 16,000ft is such an easy target for autoack?
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Stop dragging us into your carrier ack, and we'll resolve that friendly fire downing you issue most eagerly and promptly, good sir.
thats the thing though I was fighting well away from CV, it was firing on a BnZ P51 that didn't want to engage. Timed the crack of puffy just when I was about to kill him on the overshoot. :D
I'd rather have no auto ack puffy at all.
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I have understood puffy ack to work like this: The faster a plane is traveling the smaller the "kill box" will be. For example if your in a set of lancs and your buddy is in say a 262 headed toward a cv. The 262 traveling at 375 IAS will have a smaller "kill box" as opposed to you doing 195 IAS. Smaller kill box would result in taking hits. Of course i may be way off on this.
You have not understood correctly, faster = bigger box.
I.E. Faster = less chance of being hit.
HiTech
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I've found that staying away from the water reduces the chances of being hit by puffy ack. :old:
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Hitech,
Does the box grow when maneuvering as well?
Also, are the shells actually "fired" and have to travel to the hit box, or is the hitbox basically where the shells "land?"
If it's where the shells "land," like I'm imagining, I'm wondering if maneuvering doesn't seem to help avoid getting hit since you aren't maneuvering away from the shell is being fired.
In other words, if the hit box where to lag behind the aircraft's acceleration in any given direction, it could emulate the time it takes a shell to travel from the muzzle to the aircraft since you can't steer the shell once it's been fired. This way, the box would stay more concentrated on big lumbering targets, but would have a harder time tracking the smaller and more nimble ones, particularly in radical direction changes, like in dogfights.
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Hitech stated in last months Puffy Ack thread, that the box will increase in size if you are maneuvering. Also, HTC has stated that the shells are not fired, they just spawn in the box.
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Hitech stated in last months Puffy Ack thread, that the box will increase in size if you are maneuvering. Also, HTC has stated that the shells are not fired, they just spawn in the box.
That's kind of what I figured it would do, plus I think I had heard that before, I just wanted to make sure this was actually what I was recalling. :)
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You have not understood correctly, faster = bigger box.
I.E. Faster = less chance of being hit.
HiTech
So in the case of losing my 262 to puffy, over 20k, over 300kias, above cloud out of vis range of the fleet diving repeatedly on buffs, having just made 1 pass, at that range not flying straight and level, I assumed id be nigh on impossible to hit! By the 2nd pass I was a gonner! Whats the percentage chance of that shot hitting in say a real world situation? Is the AH modelling close to realistic in this instance and many more like it? We dont expect perfect, but many of us do expect a good go on realism. We sure could use some detune on the puffy and 5", but at least 5" and the rest of the guns require "Visual" range, you fly in their range ya know your taking a risk, this puffy has literally hounded me out of a sector lol!
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Hitech stated in last months Puffy Ack thread, that the box will increase in size if you are maneuvering. Also, HTC has stated that the shells are not fired, they just spawn in the box.
ooo this makes alot of sence as to why it is so lethal! Getting accurate modelling on something like this im sure is a pain and a half. Turn it off until ya figure out a better way:) thanks for the pulpit!
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So in the case of losing my 262 to puffy, over 20k, over 300kias, above cloud out of vis range of the fleet diving repeatedly on buffs, having just made 1 pass, at that range not flying straight and level, I assumed id be nigh on impossible to hit! By the 2nd pass I was a gonner! Whats the percentage chance of that shot hitting in say a real world situation? Is the AH modelling close to realistic in this instance and many more like it? We dont expect perfect, but many of us do expect a good go on realism. We sure could use some detune on the puffy and 5", but at least 5" and the rest of the guns require "Visual" range, you fly in their range ya know your taking a risk, this puffy has literally hounded me out of a sector lol!
% Chance of getting hit in real life?
@ 85%
262s aren't particularly known for their durability in game either.
wrongway
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it's not only enemy puffy ack that is the issue.
I've been toasted 3 times by my own this month :ahand
No Bruv as I informed you on Vent (thank you by the way for having me on) you have reached the top of your curve for ability within the game, you will notice over the coming years your ability will deminish :old:
As you stated to me I shot you down twice (I cannot remember the instance of the aforementioned ownage),as I am senile and reflexes of snail reaffirms your inevitable decline into the lowers ranks within the game :old:
:rofl
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As you stated to me I shot you down twice (I cannot remember the instance of the aforementioned ownage),
I can remember that occurrence - Bruv claimed lag :D He said his modem was on the fritz but I believe he was downloading dirty movies :old:
It was indeed good to have you on Vent last night you old fettler...come back whenever you feel lonely
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I now speak to myself when alone :old:
How are your fox hounds doing Coombzy :old:
Ack with 7.1 surround headphones is brilliant by the way :)
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Yesterday, I've been killed 3 times by puffy acks at the same area.
First was just losing left wing.
Second was just losing engine.
Third was just got a direct hit and go back to tower.
I was an unlucky pilot...
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Yesterday, I've been killed 3 times by puffy acks at the same area.
First was just losing left wing.
Second was just losing engine.
Third was just got a direct hit and go back to tower.
I was an unlucky pilot...
The other day us knights had three carriers hiding behind a hill and within 5" range of an enemy airfield. The sound of the AAA was deafening, everytime we dragged a con above 3k. :rofl
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On the one hand, I recoil from the lameness. On the other, I find the concept funny as hell... So conflicted... :lol
Wiley.
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:neener: Oh how I love the 5". I get PMs all the time..at least I dont welcome you to my kill club! :x