Aces High Bulletin Board
Special Events Forums => Friday Squad Operations => Topic started by: Virage on September 17, 2001, 12:01:00 AM
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promotes massed suicide Jabo raids.
I commend the Allied Command for figuring this out first. :)
Kudos also go out to the TOD organisers. I am new to these events and have had a blast. They have started on time (HUGE) and have run smoothly. I can't begin to imagine reading a 2 hour log and tallying the scores by hand. OUCH!
Virage
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Well, the scoring parser is still affected by the +1 Death bug, where it attributes the number of AC losses to a side as (Actual losses+1). I checked both the 308 and JV44 and they only have one and two losses respectively, but they're credited with 2 and 3. (Unless, of course, discoes without damage are counted, which I doubt)
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Well... First off, forget any speculation that the Allies planned "massed suicide Jabo raids". Come on... as if. :)
Here are the orders I sent out:
http://modena.intergate.ca/personal/cwharton/sbm/sledge.htm (http://modena.intergate.ca/personal/cwharton/sbm/sledge.htm)
You wont see the word "suicide" anywhere. :) And you'll also notice that I grouped our planes up in such a way that the extent of our casualties *should* have been totally avoided if the mission were executed a bit better.
The fact is we made it to our targets and destroyed them as planned... we just did not maintain our formation sufficiently enough to prevent the losses we incurred.
Another thing...
Maybe some people augured (I only know of one firsthand). The rest (many) were shot down. This means that our Jabo points were not clean at all - if 25 of our AC were shot down that's 500 points to you guys. It didn't happen in a vacuum - you benefited from our deaths... and it's reflected there on the scoreboard.
It was a peculiar frame. It was I think the first time either a massive blitz strategy and a feint, almost delayed strategy were utilized to such an extent. And these two strategies ended up facing each other in the same frame. The result - massive A/G destruction by one side, and massive A/A destruction by the other... and a slim 100 points was the margin. Seems kind of natural to me... It could have gone either way, but not by much. It was a very close frame, unless you only counted the damage from one perspective.
A/A victories aren't going to be a deciding factor if these aircraft are still allowed to meet their objectives - which they did.
Personally, I couldn't be happier about the way this thing turned out... but not for the reasons you may think. A single point separated both sides going into the final frame of the last series. This time it's as close as 15 points (a single building or plane)... These make for great nights. :)
Another thing I wanna point out is that these TODs are young. There *are* going to be problems... and that's obvious just by witnessing the responsiveness by the CMs in adjusting things as we go. There may be scoring problems, planning problems, whatever... but they *are* being listened to and where appropriate, fixed. So I don't begrudge anyone for pointing out issues such as this (for this frame already has exposed some problems which have either been fixed or are currently being discussed)... Just try and keep in mind that this thing is continuously developing as we go. Nobody should get *too* worked up over this stuff... the TOD is just gonna keep getting stronger as we go.
<S> to both sides and best of luck in the final frame.
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Hey both sides played by the same rules. Allies happened to score more points by the rules. Imagine if the rules greatly penalized dying, and one side won just because their aircraft flew around and didn't engage anything, then landed. Now THAT would suck.
My squadron will always be flying to survive, regardless of the scoring system. So if the scoring system encourages the other side to come at us without fear of death, then it's just more targets and more fun for us. If my squadron can get an 11:1 victory:loss ratio every frame and "lose", then we will be happy to "lose" every time. :)
Maybe for future tours, we can have a different scoring system that more strongly penalizes losing aircraft. One or more of the following:
1. A penalty for losing aircraft. 5-10 points per plane that does not RTB or disco undamaged, tacked on to the final score.
2. Give each side points for kills by its AAA.
3. Change the existing point values so that their relative values are closer to real life. Fighter is still 15 points, but a bomber becomes 50 points. Make AAA worth 2 points, buildings worth 5 points, and hangars worth 20 points. Or something like that. I'm just pulling these numbers out of my errr head.
But let's finish this tour first. And remember that if the scoring system encourages people to be less aggressive, they'll be well, less aggressive.
[ 09-17-2001: Message edited by: funkedup ]
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PS
Looking at the score sheet, SBM/Mongrels/Viking/MAG did an incredible job at A1 and city considering the small amount of time they had to work with. It wasn't just their willingness to die that caused their high point total, it was very efficient and accurate bombing and rocketing too.
Also you have to give credit to their planning - they DID overwhelm the local air defense, putting (if I'm reading the results correctly) 34 planes in an area protected by only 7 interceptors. Even though we (Axis) managed to quickly get 4 more interceptors into the area, it was too late, and in the time it took us to whittle them down, they kept hammering ground targets. And they weren't ignoring us to hit the targets. Both times we bounced them, they fought back fiercely.
Finally, they almost got away with about 1/3 of their force after they hit A1. If not for one dot I saw sneaking through a mountain pass south of A1, we might not have discovered their city strike until today.
So it wasn't all about suicide.
However I think the current rules do reward kamikaze. If you ram a building and release your bombs right before impact, it's 15 points for your side and nothing for the other side, which is silly. Furthermore if you realize you are going to be shot down by an enemy fighter, or you are running out of fuel deep inside enemy territory, your best move is to auger so the other guy doesn't get the 15 points for killing you.
[ 09-17-2001: Message edited by: funkedup ]
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I think the key here gentlemen is for Squad CO's to remind pilots that the goal is to follow your orders, and LIVE to RTB.
Daddog has been reminding us every flight before we roll. It adds to the immersion, keeps things more realistic IMO.
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Good feed back gents.
However I think the current rules do reward kamikaze. If you ram a building and release your bombs right before impact, it's 15 points for your side and nothing for the other side, which is silly.
Actually the one side would earn the points of the building and the other side would earn the points of the AC lost. Both sides receive points. That is how I understand the parsers to work, (been wrong before). :)
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no offense nash that plan was obviously within the scope of gameplay.
I just wonder if in future tods this will become the norm.
Mass all your forces together for one huge flight.
In the first tod we saw some of this but was more a result of lo axis numbers and the closeness of allied targets. In frame 2 of london calling we had only 9 109s to cover the entire northern coast of europe. frame 3 we saw 4 of the allied targets within 50 miles and again small numbers of allied defenders.
t30 into this tod it was basically over. Some axis squads saw very little action. the 308 and JV44 benefited by being in the right place but had we been in an area of little action I would find it hard to get my guys bac for the next one. Who wants to stay up late and be bored?
I dont know what the solution is but if this becomes standard practice then I dont see it being very fun except for those who happen to be in the right spot..... :)
My guys had a great time this tour and to date tod has been very fun with (imo) 3 exceptions
1. the terrain bug in london calling (not any in tods fault)
2. lo turnout or no shows by squads who have committed a certain number of players. This affected jv44 more in london calling then this tod but I imagine the allies have to deal with this now.
3. the idea of massed raids and formations. While jv44 was not affected this frame I can imagine spending 2 hours with no prospect of nme contact seems boring as hell.
imo
Wotan
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Well this issue and the timing issue for the Axis raid are both a result of the move to put more planning in the hands of the frame CO's. I had no issues with the previous system, and as a potential frame CO I was pleased that it meant a smaller workload. Why did we switch again?
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I think it was changed back to take some of the burden off of the CMs trying to get the TOD setup. By putting mission objectives fully in the hands of the CO's, it eliminated the need for 3 CMs to work on the TOD frame. It just saves the CMs from scrambling to get missions out, and work out all of the settings for the arena. Plus it gives the frame CO's the fun of getting to have more control over what's going on. The drawbacks are exactly what we saw. Lots of planes in one area from one side, so only a few squads in the other side actually saw any action against the enemy (and some were able to get to their targets with zero interference). When daddog and the CMs mentioned the shift in mission plannings, this was one of their concerns in doing so. I didn't even get to fire ammo in Frame 1 (flying IJN that frame, we switched for numbers balance), the cons we did come across were already flaming by the time Vaderr and I got there. This was more because the Hellcats didn't make it to their target and hit a secondary one instead. This frame, other IJN squads saw no action, due to Allied planes only being in two places.
We'll see how it goes in Frame 3 this weekend. TOD is still work in progress, so the CMs will need our feedback on which we mission planning method WE prefer. After all, we're the ones they're doing this for. :)
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Good answer. I'll have fun either way. :)
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Hell we didnt need any contact with the enemy....we do a good enough job dieing on our own. :D
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FYI gentlemen, designing a stable system of checks and balances that not only works. But also has to deal with the 2 CO's decisions, flight leaders decisions & timeing. Plus all the other variables that come into play is ONE TOUGH JOB!
<S> to Daddog for comeing as close as he has so far. TOD is obviously still in beta, but we are learning fast! Have patience & bear with us please :)
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rgr that ghost :)
wasnt trying to take anything from the job that you all have put in to tod.......
was just an observation on my part..........
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That's a great point Ghosth... There are little issues here and there, and that was to be expected. But daddog nailed the overall design pretty dang close right off the bat... It coulda easily been total chaos had very good planning not been done by him ahead of time.
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Since the missions are in the hands of the players we can increase the chances of contact by:
- having fewer targets on each side
- request that no more than 2 squads fly together
- require that at least 3 targets are attacked
Thoughts?
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There's already the requirement to hit 3 targets (one of these must be either a city or factory).
In our target map we only had 5 targets to choose from. We could chop that down to 3 targets each, guaranteeing people will see action... but do we want that? That'd essentially be a big slug-fest.
Asking that not more than two squads fly together may be the best route, but I wanted everyone to be on the offensive... if I had to limit the size of the attacking force I coulda held a couple of squads back to circle and protect our fields, and I'm not sure how much fun that woulda been nor is there the guarantee of seeing action anyhow.
And basically, that's getting into technicalities. I could just as easily have "designated" two flights (composed of two squads) that did essentially the same thing we did as a single force of 4 squads, as we *did* use that force to go after two targets.
To truly ensure contact, you could make the launch fields of one side the target fields of the other, and visa versa... Not sure if we wanna go there. Or perhaps we limit the number of people that are able to up from a field... this would spread the forces around a bit. Again, I dunno if we want to restrict things to that degree.
Hmm... but, would it be a good idea or bad if we removed the field plane restriction and replaced it with a launch restriction? Ie., all planes can fly from any of your fields, but you are limited to only a certain number of people upping from each field. I dunno...
It's tough. By spreading people around more, does this really ensure more contact, or create greater gaps where people wouldn't see anything? Keep in mind that in every frame so far at *least* one squad didn't see any action - so last Friday's frame, despite the tactics used, wasn't out of the ordinary.
Uhm... hehe no answers here - just tossing it out there. :) Someone's prolly gonna come up with a good idea.
[ 09-17-2001: Message edited by: Nash ]
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I'll let you CM types figure it out. I've had too much fun so far to complain much. I think my squad accepts the fact that there will occasionally be a milk run or a lonely CAP.
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I think your idea of only allowing 2 squads to hit the same target is a good idea daddog.
That should help split things up. Perhaps we should be looking at hitting 4 targets? For sure if the numbers come up any higher I'd recomend adding to the minimum # of targets.
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On a final note we are going to make some changes to the scoring system. Hblair, nash, exile, and some others came up with some good ideas on a long thread in the CM forum.
This is not in stone and will not be used for this current TOD, but maybe by TOD 3.
A.Death 25%
B.Bailed, enemy territory 50%
C.Ditched, enemy territory 50%
D.Bailed, friendly territory 65%
E.Ditched, friendly territory 80%
F.Landed safely 100%
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Just gotta ask. My understanding was that once you exit a plane for any reason you are done. Is that correct?
I was told that we are allowed to refuel and rearm but not repair or leave the plane even if there is no damage.
Would have to assume that percentages would apply even though I might get all my points before first refuel/rearm and die three refuel/rearms later.
AKIron
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Right one life. If you exit you are done.
If you refuel/rearm you gamble. If you refuel and rearm it is still just one sorte going by the parsers. Up to the player if he want to try for more points. Personally the only reason I would rearm/refuel is if a squadie was in trouble and had a chance to save him.
Also remember the frame is 2 hours long. If you are airborne when the time is up you are considered lost.
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Wouldn't it be best if when you landed to refuel, you got 100% of the points for that "sortie"? You take off again and that's another sortie. Seems that if you completed your first mission and successfully return to base you ought to get full credit for that mission.
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Fields are locked down after 30 minutes. Pilots can "only" refuel after that. If we let people take off again it would be a nightmare to figure out who landed and took off vs who died/bailed/ditched and took off.
Do you or can you check the logs as to if someone refueled? If not then we don't have a choice.
I am at work I can't check the logs to see if that is in them.
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Originally posted by daddog:
Do you or can you check the logs as to if someone refueled?
Yes ... Refuel/Rearm is a logged event.
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np then. :)
Full points for each sortie yhat has a refuel/rearm in it.
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Originally posted by daddog:
np then. :)
Full points for each sortie yhat has a refuel/rearm in it.
hmm, how about full points for everything above the refuel/rearm in the log? Then the next event (death, land, ditch, bail, etc) determines the point modifier for kills after the refuel/rearm occurred.
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Nifty, that's how I'll handle it. I'm sure that's what dd meant.
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Good man Exile. You know what I meant even though I did not know what I said. ;)