Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: Vinkman on March 24, 2020, 12:47:30 PM
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IF you're going to comment that score and rank are meaningless blah blah...please don't. Save this thread for those that like stats and goals read the scores and appreciate them however they view them. We all know rank doesn't equal skill blah blah... So if that's your position, please refrain from clogging up the thread. Thank you. :salute
Now:
Simon and Violator are tied for first. Never saw that before. 1 week to go. Good luck gentlemen!!
So I started looking at the stats for the top 15 players. I think the metric calculation is odd. It sums your rank in K/D, K/Hour, K/Sortie, Hit%, and Damage Points. That means there are 4 categories out of the 5 that are normalized. At 1 point a person with 38 fighter kills for the tour was ranked 5th while the person ranked 4th and 6th had 400+ kills.
Hit% seems very arbitrary with large rank differences between 7% and 11%. Not sure why this would have equal weight in the rank with Kills, Damage, or K/D.
#kills (not in rank), but Damage is highly correlated to it and damage is in there so that's fine.
Kills/Hour is a big differentiator.
Kills per sortie is not a big differentiator.
There should be some normalized metrics, otherwise it would only go the people that spent the most time online. Maybe that's ok too. But the downside of normalized metrics is a guy logs on, shows up at a capped base, vulches a bunch of people and puts up monster numbers in 4 categories (K/D, K/H, %, K/S) and never flies fighter again he could finish 100th in damage points and win the tour's fighter Rank category.
If it were me I would have K/D, and damage points only. But I would weight the damage points by plane ENY differential. (You should get more points for killing a Dora in a P-40, than killing a P-40 in a Dora) or include Perks earned which is mostly the same thing. Those are my thoughts. :salute
Vinkman
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The hit% is probably the only true skill scored.
To be honest, I feel should be more things scored on than what is currently used.
I would add a "Perk points earned" + "perks per flight" score/rank. Making high ENY planes and low numbered sides more desirable for score potatoes.
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But the downside of normalized metrics is a guy logs on, shows up at a capped base, vulches a bunch of people and puts up monster numbers in 4 categories (K/D, K/H, %, K/S) and never flies fighter again he could finish 100th in damage points and win the tour's fighter Rank category.
Vinkman
In 20 years of our current score system has that ever happened?
The current 1 fighter is Simon , his total combined rank for fighter is 101, so under your assumption of 100 rank in Kill Points even if he was #1 in all 4 categories he still would not be #1. With only a few kills I doubt if you could rank much above 300 at the end of a tour in Kill Points. I'm sure Snail has some stats on it.
Next remember that one of the score system purposes is to motivate players to fly a certain manor. As an example if our score system consisted only of K/D what would be the effect on the way people fly. Hence why Kills per hour is there to make people more aggressive.
HiTech
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The hit% is probably the only true skill scored.
To be honest, I feel should be more things scored on than what is currently used.
I would add a "Perk points earned" + "perks per flight" score/rank. Making high ENY planes and low numbered sides more desirable for score potatoes.
Yes ;-)
Welcome back :salute
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To be honest, I am not a very good fighter pilot (in ahiii) but I now look at
my stats to see if I am improving... for me that is all they are good for :salute
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I try to look at hit% to see how I’m doing, the rest can get depressing lol
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I think kills/hr is valid. Otherwise you could have a 100:1 kill ratio in a 190d but only get 1 kill/he because you dont take risks.
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In 20 years of our current score system has that ever happened?
I guess we'd have to ask Lusche. I tried to find a thread I started on the subject for exactly that reason...but as yet I can't. there have been several threads on the subject and in one of them I recounted how someone won the tour flying limited missions in a tempest killing only bombers. Not that killing bombers shouldn't count, but the top scoring fighter pilot only killed something like 5 fighter planes the whole tour. And didn't have anywhere near the most kills.
The current 1 fighter is Simon , his total combined rank for fighter is 101, so under your assumption of 100 rank in Kill Points even if he was #1 in all 4 categories he still would not be #1. With only a few kills I doubt if you could rank much above 300 at the end of a tour in Kill Points. I'm sure Snail has some stats on it.
True. And dropping hit% wouldn't change who finishes in this tour's top 5 rank much, but it does effect it.
Next remember that one of the score system purposes is to motivate players to fly a certain manor. As an example if our score system consisted only of K/D what would be the effect on the way people fly. Hence why Kills per hour is there to make people more aggressive.
HiTech
I agree that is a huge opportunity for a scoring system. To that end, what behavior is driven by hit% that makes the game better? What would I change to raise it? To check I raised mine from 7% to 9% in one day by unloading machine guns into buffs when I had the chance instead of just blowing them up with taters. I can put 400 rounds of MG hits into a formation at 80% hit rate (under the right circumstances). Since I normally just use the taters, my total fired rounds is pretty low. So when I dump 400 rounds of hits into an easy target, my rate skyrockets. But why is that an objective? On the other hand the way I normally use the machine guns is to scare bandits off a team mate's six o'clocks, de-ack town, or range a bandit, or mark a tank for a team mate. Every time I do that, I'm dropping my hit% so the metric says don't do those things if you want to win. If you fly a K4 and get most of your kills with the 65 taters, firing off 300 MG round on these other useful things is really crushing to your hit%.
Winning the tour means having a total rank around 100. The difference between 7% and 10% of rounds landed is worth is 65 rank points. Doesn;t that seem like a big effect for missing 90% or missing 93% of the time? :huh
I think the Plane ENY modifier discussed in other posts in this thread would encourage more plane diversity, and encourage top pilots to fly lower ranked planes, which could help balance game play.
:salute
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Let's be honest the real rank 1 men are hoagie, cmex and yucca :cool:
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In 20 years of our current score system has that ever happened?
The current 1 fighter is Simon , his total combined rank for fighter is 101, so under your assumption of 100 rank in Kill Points even if he was #1 in all 4 categories he still would not be #1. With only a few kills I doubt if you could rank much above 300 at the end of a tour in Kill Points. I'm sure Snail has some stats on it.
Next remember that one of the score system purposes is to motivate players to fly a certain manor. As an example if our score system consisted only of K/D what would be the effect on the way people fly. Hence why Kills per hour is there to make people more aggressive.
HiTech
Do I get credit for shooting trees? I do that a lot. I also like the shells splashing in the water. Do I get credit for that? :devil
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I guess we'd have to ask Lusche. I tried to find a thread I started on the subject for exactly that reason...but as yet I can't. there have been several threads on the subject and in one of them I recounted how someone won the tour flying limited missions in a tempest killing only bombers. Not that killing bombers shouldn't count, but the top scoring fighter pilot only killed something like 5 fighter planes the whole tour. And didn't have anywhere near the most kills.
True. And dropping hit% wouldn't change who finishes in this tour's top 5 rank much, but it does effect it.
I agree that is a huge opportunity for a scoring system. To that end, what behavior is driven by hit% that makes the game better? What would I change to raise it? To check I raised mine from 7% to 9% in one day by unloading machine guns into buffs when I had the chance instead of just blowing them up with taters. I can put 400 rounds of MG hits into a formation at 80% hit rate (under the right circumstances). Since I normally just use the taters, my total fired rounds is pretty low. So when I dump 400 rounds of hits into an easy target, my rate skyrockets. But why is that an objective? On the other hand the way I normally use the machine guns is to scare bandits off a team mate's six o'clocks, de-ack town, or range a bandit, or mark a tank for a team mate. Every time I do that, I'm dropping my hit% so the metric says don't do those things if you want to win. If you fly a K4 and get most of your kills with the 65 taters, firing off 300 MG round on these other useful things is really crushing to your hit%.
Winning the tour means having a total rank around 100. The difference between 7% and 10% of rounds landed is worth is 65 rank points. Doesn;t that seem like a big effect for missing 90% or missing 93% of the time? :huh
I think the Plane ENY modifier discussed in other posts in this thread would encourage more plane diversity, and encourage top pilots to fly lower ranked planes, which could help balance game play.
:salute
The bolded section is what I think covers the whole score system. Your hit% suffers because you use taters to drop bombers. So to "score/rank" better you have to dump a bunch of machine gun rounds in them to bring that % up. Thats one of the biggest issues with the scoring system, it can be manipulated. If you add more categories it will just open it up to more areas for manipulation.
Is the scoring system perfect, hell no. It does give someone who cant fly 400 hours a month a chance to rank up there with those that do. It "evens out" over the long run and number of categories so that it seems more "fair". I dont think there is any way to make it so you could have the top pilot always ranked there. How would you rank yourself against someone like Yucca? You fly a tater tosser, he flies with 50's. I dont know what style you fly, but I know Yucca is always turning and burn down low in a fat old jug. Is he a top 10 stick or is he really in the 80s like he is ranked?
There is too many ways to "tweak" your score for it to be a true measuring stick of rank. Some people go for rank and do those things .....like fill bombers with machine gun rounds.... to get to the top. Lusche is a master of the scoring system and how it works. It would be interesting to see his take on a system that would be fair and acurate.
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The bolded section is what I think covers the whole score system. Your hit% suffers because you use taters to drop bombers. So to "score/rank" better you have to dump a bunch of machine gun rounds in them to bring that % up. Thats one of the biggest issues with the scoring system, it can be manipulated. If you add more categories it will just open it up to more areas for manipulation.
Is the scoring system perfect, hell no. It does give someone who cant fly 400 hours a month a chance to rank up there with those that do. It "evens out" over the long run and number of categories so that it seems more "fair". I dont think there is any way to make it so you could have the top pilot always ranked there. How would you rank yourself against someone like Yucca? You fly a tater tosser, he flies with 50's. I dont know what style you fly, but I know Yucca is always turning and burn down low in a fat old jug. Is he a top 10 stick or is he really in the 80s like he is ranked?
There is too many ways to "tweak" your score for it to be a true measuring stick of rank. Some people go for rank and do those things .....like fill bombers with machine gun rounds.... to get to the top. Lusche is a master of the scoring system and how it works. It would be interesting to see his take on a system that would be fair and acurate.
You do not even see the bias in your own post, you make statements like this "How would you rank yourself against someone like Yucca?" you are making the huge assumptions of what you think better is. Your post shows a desire to measure the BEST (not sure what) you believe in the way someone flies. But you fail to define it.
The next issue is that you believe knowing how to tweak your score is NOT a skill? By definition knowing how to optimize your scoring is what the score system is measuring. Knowing how to optimize and then being able to execute scoring plan IS the game when trying for rank, it's not a system where the score is trying to measure some preconceived notion what some people of the best "Pilot".
HiTech
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The bolded section is what I think covers the whole score system. Your hit% suffers because you use taters to drop bombers. So to "score/rank" better you have to dump a bunch of machine gun rounds in them to bring that % up. Thats one of the biggest issues with the scoring system, it can be manipulated. If you add more categories it will just open it up to more areas for manipulation.
Is the scoring system perfect, hell no. It does give someone who cant fly 400 hours a month a chance to rank up there with those that do. It "evens out" over the long run and number of categories so that it seems more "fair". I dont think there is any way to make it so you could have the top pilot always ranked there. How would you rank yourself against someone like Yucca? You fly a tater tosser, he flies with 50's. I dont know what style you fly, but I know Yucca is always turning and burn down low in a fat old jug. Is he a top 10 stick or is he really in the 80s like he is ranked?
There is too many ways to "tweak" your score for it to be a true measuring stick of rank. Some people go for rank and do those things .....like fill bombers with machine gun rounds.... to get to the top. Lusche is a master of the scoring system and how it works. It would be interesting to see his take on a system that would be fair and acurate.
The ranking system is actually pretty decent to measure your performance.
1. If you want to try for a high k/d, fly a faster plane and attack bases rather than defend. Planes will typically be under you and you will be able to kill more plus run away easier if you get in trouble.
2. If you want to increase K/S, always try to get at least 3-6 kills per sortie even If you die.
3. If you want to increase hit%, use 50 calls and shoot bombers once in a while.
4. If you want to increase k/h. Defend your base rather than only attack, defend against CV attacks, or launch from CVs near enemy bases for shorter flight distances.
5. If you want to increase points, use 50 calls and attack bombers, or play a lot. (Points have always been my biggest weakness)
If you take the opportunity to do these steps in different situations during the tour. You will generally have a top 10 fighter rank.
Rarely do people who only fly one plane and one style ever get #1, and even being top 5 is tough unless you fly a Temp, 262, P51, 190D, or f4u4 every sortie and really know what you are doing. Mixing up your styles and planes are what gives you the high rank. That makes it good IMO.
For example, I was still #1 and top 5 this tour so far even with dying more than 50% of the time. I normally get ganged about every other sortie low n slow in a fight which leads to my death. However, I typically get 2-5 kills a sortie. Focusing on getting more kills a sortie is very important. Though dying really reduces the amount of points you score. Plane choice really determines how many points you get per sortie. Landing really matters in that regard. I normally get top 5 most every tour because I like to mix up the styles of play. I dont normally play for rank unless I think I have a chance at being #1, that being said, I hate to die a lot without kills so it gives me a pretty decent rank most of the time. That's what 15 years of ACM and MA study get you.
I like the fighter rank because people with different flying styles can be top ranked if they try.
I do wish there was a ENY metric however, anything to get players into mid war planes instead of super late war planes. The plane choice really matters. It is incredibly difficult to be top 5 flying early war planes.
There is always that challenge of trying to be top ranked in midwar-early war planes. Challenging yourself like that will really help you become better at the game.
Players like Yucca are extremely skilled and very good fighters in the MA, but flying as risky as he does in a fighter that's meant to BnZ and jabo, he gets shot down quite a a bit from being ganged. That's his choice and his preferred style of play. His metrics are one thing. His ACM skills are another. It's hard to measure ACM skill like that. I wish more were like him, but that is a dying breed as most people dont care about ACM contest anymore. It's all gang and kill by any means necessary. This has led to a lot of timidness is late war planes which has made the gameplay boring and slow for many.
I think If you are trying for rank or to increase your MA performance, the metrics are very good. Many players dont care or try, even if they are good. So they dont have as high of a rank. Luckily it changes every tour so it always washes out and a person always has a new opportunity to try for it. That is something I really like. I also like that you dont have to play every day to be top ranked, though you do have to find a way to get points.
Even if a person shoots bombers 25 times taking off and never flies again, they will still have a chance at not becoming #1 because of the points. I proved that last year against a player who did that very thing.
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Filling buffs with mg rounds instead of cannon is bad for your health.
I have a better hit percentage with 20 and 30mm than 50 cal planes because i change my shot selection to shoot closer in and not waste my precious limited rounds. When. I have 2000 50cals I spray them 600+ out routinely
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Just as I was about to go to bed, I discovered this thread. Oh well... :bhead
Maybe that's ok too. But the downside of normalized metrics is a guy logs on, shows up at a capped base, vulches a bunch of people and puts up monster numbers in 4 categories (K/D, K/H, %, K/S) and never flies fighter again he could finish 100th in damage points and win the tour's fighter Rank category.
To my knowledge this has never happened in the LW/Main/Melee arena - yet. It's not impossible, but very difficult to pull off, there are still a lot of players with very good scoring stats AND a massive amount of play time-> damage points. It happened before only in the much smaller EW & MW arenas, with their much smaller populations and much fewer average hours of play time per player per tour.
Let's take last tours fighter ranks. Lets assume someone did a freak single vulch sortie and ended up with 10 kills.
Let's say
K/D 10 - would result in rank 10
K/S 10 -> rank 1
K/H 20 -> rank 3
hit% 10 -> rank 38
Kill Points 1400 -> rank 463 (determined by the avg. kill points per kill for the top 100 fighter pilots)
This freak sortie (which would, vulch or not, already take an excellent pilot to pull of) result in a overall fighter rank of around 45.
Even with two such sorties in a row and increasing the hit% to 15% he would not have made the top 20.
(Disclaimer: for technical reasons, my rank numbers can differ slightly from HT's, but that usually has little impact on top ranking calculations)
Hope I did not make any errors, it's quite late over here ;)
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Filling buffs with mg rounds instead of cannon is bad for your health.
But can be good for your hit%.
If you really want to boost that, use .50 for killing bombers and taters for shooting at fighters. After all, it's all about maths here :old:
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But can be good for your hit%.
If you really want to boost that, use .50 for killing bombers and taters for shooting at fighters. After all, it's all about maths here :old:
Sure but you wont live long enough to increase your hit percentage. And kill/death kill/sortie and kill/hr will suffer
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Sure but you wont live long enough to increase your hit percentage.
That's entirely untrue, unless you are one of those slow 6 o clock creepers. :)
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Just as I was about to go to bed, I discovered this thread. Oh well... :bhead
To my knowledge this has never happened in the LW/Main/Melee arena - yet. It's not impossible, but very difficult to pull off, there are still a lot of players with very good scoring stats AND a massive amount of play time-> damage points. It happened before only in the much smaller EW & MW arenas, with their much smaller populations and much fewer average hours of play time per player per tour.
Let's take last tours fighter ranks. Lets assume someone did a freak single vulch sortie and ended up with 10 kills.
Let's say
K/D 10 - would result in rank 10
K/S 10 -> rank 1
K/H 20 -> rank 3
hit% 10 -> rank 38
Kill Points 1400 -> rank 463 (determined by the avg. kill points per kill for the top 100 fighter pilots)
This freak sortie (which would, vulch or not, already take an excellent pilot to pull of) result in a overall fighter rank of around 45.
Even with two such sorties in a row and increasing the hit% to 15% he would not have made the top 20.
(Disclaimer: for technical reasons, my rank numbers can differ slightly from HT's, but that usually has little impact on top ranking calculations)
Hope I did not make any errors, it's quite late over here ;)
What's the least number of kills someone had while still #1?
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That's entirely untrue, unless you are one of those slow 6 o clock creepers. :)
Your still gonna have a lower kill/hr than if you use the cannon rounds. And since you force yourself to be exposed more since your rounds do less damage you run a higher risk and chances are your k/d and k/s will suffer.
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I think we should have some different variables for our metrics (at least in my case)
1. If I am wearing my glasses or not
2. How many beers I have drank
3. If I am wearing my daytime or nighttime pajamas
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Your still gonna have a lower kill/hr than if you use the cannon rounds. And since you force yourself to be exposed more since your rounds do less damage you run a higher risk and chances are your k/d and k/s will suffer.
No. I know that because I did all that in all possible variations, and of course watched the stats.
Just a few overall career stats in some of my more prominent prop buff hunters of both types:
Ta152 3965 bomber kills to 143 deaths by bombers - K/D 28
109K 3466/191 K/D 18
P-51B (yes, that 4x.50cal thing) 1301/53 K/D 25
P-51D 909/40 K/D 23
P-47M 458/13 K/D 35
As you can see, there is not much difference in the K/Ds vs bombers (of course I used differend attack tactics for both types of armaments). There wasn't much difference in kills/hour either.
With that in mind you can see how using the .50cal planes is hugely benefical to overall hit% due to the large absolute number of rounds hitting the target. I can show you a sample calculation if necessary.
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You do not even see the bias in your own post, you make statements like this "How would you rank yourself against someone like Yucca?" you are making the huge assumptions of what you think better is. Your post shows a desire to measure the BEST (not sure what) you believe in the way someone flies. But you fail to define it.
The next issue is that you believe knowing how to tweak your score is NOT a skill? By definition knowing how to optimize your scoring is what the score system is measuring. Knowing how to optimize and then being able to execute scoring plan IS the game when trying for rank, it's not a system where the score is trying to measure some preconceived notion what some people of the best "Pilot".
HiTech
After reading the OP, I thought that was what he was looking for, a way to narrow down the scoring/ranking so that it showed the "better pilot". His statement......
So I started looking at the stats for the top 15 players. I think the metric calculation is odd. It sums your rank in K/D, K/Hour, K/Sortie, Hit%, and Damage Points. That means there are 4 categories out of the 5 that are normalized. At 1 point a person with 38 fighter kills for the tour was ranked 5th while the person ranked 4th and 6th had 400+ kills.
Hit% seems very arbitrary with large rank differences between 7% and 11%. Not sure why this would have equal weight in the rank with Kills, Damage, or K/D.
says to me that he wants to do away with the hit% because it doesnt help with naming the top fighter, after all some guy with 38 kills was ranked higher than guys with 400+
He goes on to say ...
If it were me I would have K/D, and damage points only. But I would weight the damage points by plane ENY differential. (You should get more points for killing a Dora in a P-40, than killing a P-40 in a Dora) or include Perks earned which is mostly the same thing.
which to me says he is looking for metric that will define a better fighter as in Killing a dora with a P40 takes more skill or is harder than the other way around so should be worth more.
I wasnt making any assumptions, but was just continuing to show the folly of trying to score/rank players as the "best" (what ever that is) fighter in the game, which is what I thought the OP was looking to do.
As for the tweaking of score, yes I guess you could call it another aspect of the game, much like the achievements and such. However I believe "most" people look at scoring/rank as more of an absolute, a defining stick to judge themselves as compared to others. In football a team with a 14-2 record is ranked higher than a team with a 10-6 record. The 14-2 team is not only ranked higher but is over all considered the "better" team.
If players come into this game and try to use the scoring and ranking system as the same type of yardstick they are getting false info due to the ability of some players ability, or willingness to tweak their score.
Personally I couldnt care less about the score/ranking system. I think the OP was looking for adjustments to the system to show much better who was the better fighter pilot. The only part of the score/rank system I look at is my data. I like to see my hit % but dont load up 50cals in bombers to tweak it, it is what it is and I fly and fight the same way month to month. This way I can see if Im getting a better "eye" from month to month. I like to see my damage % and like to keep track of total kills in a number of planes for when I hit mile stones...100, 500, 1000 and so on. I dont have the time, skill, or inclination to bother to make a run at "Top dog".
Basically my post was pointing out to the OP that the score/ranking system while setup to give even players that dont play a lot a chance to place high in different categories can be tweaked and can no way be used as a measuring stick to compare which fighter pilot is the "best" (what ever "best" is).
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I try to look at hit% to see how I’m doing, the rest can get depressing lol
I think hit% is the most important, regardless of how the system ranks everyone.
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I think hit% is the most important, regardless of how the system ranks everyone.
But then people would only engage c47s and lancasters!
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But then people would only engage c47s and lancasters!
....if your trying to tweak the scores/ranking then yes, but if you are honest with your self and shoot the same at everything you go after then you can use it as a yardstick as compared to your other months. Dont bother comparing it to other players as you can never tell "how" they are playing the game because the game allows you that room to tweak it.
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First thank you all for a good discussion and no one got snippy and sarcastic. :salute
After reading the OP, I thought that was what he was looking for, a way to narrow down the scoring/ranking so that it showed the "better pilot". His statement......
Sorry, but not what I was implying. Let me clarify...
I think I agree with HiTech's position that it is a list of positive fighter behaviors, and just ranks you in each one. So those who choose have a goal. I mention hit% because if you want to try to finish in the top ten or top 5 or 1st you can attempt to design your game play to improve in the categories listed. It's a game within a game. But there are categories that improve everyone's game play (good category) and one's that would detract from everyone's fun game play (Bad Category). For example Tracking damage to your plane, where less is better would promote running and avoiding combat, or flying very high and only BnZ-ing. I would NOT recommend adding that to the rank, even though avoiding damage could be considered a positive fighter pilot skill. There are million stats that could be used, but these 5 were chosen. 4 seem obvious but one seems less obvious.
so to recap I had a question and a suggestion.
The Question: Why did hit% make the list? I see a lot of negatives for conserving ammo, and listed them in the OP.
Suggestion: Adding perks or an ENY/ENY points modifier is not to determine skill, but to drive prolific killers into lower ENY planes. This creates a more balanced game. Newbies and the older crowd have a tough enough time not getting whacked all day by great sticks in great planes. Maybe they would have a chance if all the most prolific killers weren't flying the fasted, most heavily armored aircraft all the time. What's the incentive to fly a P-40? or a P-39, or C202? Romance? How's that working out? If hot shots flew some of the hangar queens on a more regular basis, the newbies in spits and La7s might even get few kills and live to talk out them in the O-Club.
Wasn't ENY added to create force balance when the numbers get lopsided? If force balance makes game play better, then why not bake it into the score to encourage force balance all the time?
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Score definitely does not encourage flying the early war plane set. Each tour I try to pick a new plane as my main ride just to make things interesting (this tour I am primarily flying the P38G) but there is otherwise no real incentive to break out the hangar queens.
I'd love to see some kind of score categories where you could break score down by ENY categories or filter by plane type but I dont think it would be easy to programmer worth HTCs time.
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....if your trying to tweak the scores/ranking then yes, but if you are honest with your self and shoot the same at everything you go after then you can use it as a yardstick as compared to your other months. Dont bother comparing it to other players as you can never tell "how" they are playing the game because the game allows you that room to tweak it.
You can only "tweak it" until the last day of the month. Once you hit over a certain amount of sorties, "tweaking" any of the metrics becomes a much harder task.
I hear what you are saying in your previous post, but I think people who dont play for rank, don't care about others perception about who is good or not. Some people like to play for rank, some get decent ranks without meaning to, some dont care. I think people who have high ranks are pretty good at the game. It shows they can maintain a playing style that is metrically successful in the MA atmosphere compared to the pool of players. Being successful in the MA metrically is a different skill set than being good in regards to ACM. Some are good at both. Many guys who are good at ACM dont care about MA score metrics.That is their choice. Some high rankers arent great at ACM or 1v1 fights. That doesnt mean they arent good in the MA though. You just have to find a away to kill them at their disadvantage.
First thank you all for a good discussion and no one got snippy and sarcastic. :salute
Sorry, but not what I was implying. Let me clarify...
I think I agree with HiTech's position that it is a list of positive fighter behaviors, and just ranks you in each one. So those who choose have a goal. I mention hit% because if you want to try to finish in the top ten or top 5 or 1st you can attempt to design your game play to improve in the categories listed. It's a game within a game. But there are categories that improve everyone's game play (good category) and one's that would detract from everyone's fun game play (Bad Category). For example Tracking damage to your plane, where less is better would promote running and avoiding combat, or flying very high and only BnZ-ing. I would NOT recommend adding that to the rank, even though avoiding damage could be considered a positive fighter pilot skill. There are million stats that could be used, but these 5 were chosen. 4 seem obvious but one seems less obvious.
so to recap I had a question and a suggestion.
The Question: Why did hit% make the list? I see a lot of negatives for conserving ammo, and listed them in the OP.
Suggestion: Adding perks or an ENY/ENY points modifier is not to determine skill, but to drive prolific killers into lower ENY planes. This creates a more balanced game. Newbies and the older crowd have a tough enough time not getting whacked all day by great sticks in great planes. Maybe they would have a chance if all the most prolific killers weren't flying the fasted, most heavily armored aircraft all the time. What's the incentive to fly a P-40? or a P-39, or C202? Romance? How's that working out? If hot shots flew some of the hangar queens on a more regular basis, the newbies in spits and La7s might even get few kills and live to talk out them in the O-Club.
Wasn't ENY added to create force balance when the numbers get lopsided? If force balance makes game play better, then why not bake it into the score to encourage force balance all the time?
I agree with your ENY comments. There really needs to be more of an incentive for players who want to play for rank to fly in older planes. I think it would be much better for noobies.
Hit % maybe doesnt matter so much, but is an interesting metric. I dont believe K/H should be in the attack score, but that's the way it is I guess.
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Violator - attack score is a bit weird too. If you kill a lot of gvs with bombs it significantly hurts your damage and bomb hit percentage categories since I believe those categories only count buildings.
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Violator - attack score is a bit weird too. If you kill a lot of gvs with bombs it significantly hurts your damage and bomb hit percentage categories since I believe those categories only count buildings.
Vehicles count too, but it's only one vehicle you hit and dropping a bomb on a town can give you dozens of hits.
If someone is having score in mind, he can happily bomb GVs as long as he drops a big (!) bomb on a town center every once in a while.
By the way, completely refraining from bombing vehicles and only hitting town centers for optimum score kills a lot of fun for very little gained scoring efficiency because of the law of diminishing returns. Same goes for almost all other scoring things.
But then, the overwhelming majority of AH players does care very little about score. It's just that most players seem to suspect that everybody else is doing this or that "because of score" :D
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Scores and people with 4 stars are over rated. Someone of the best fighter sticks are not in the top score lists.
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Vehicles count too, but it's only one vehicle you hit and dropping a bomb on a town can give you dozens of hits.
If someone is having score in mind, he can happily bomb GVs as long as he drops a big (!) bomb on a town center every once in a while.
By the way, completely refraining from bombing vehicles and only hitting town centers for optimum score kills a lot of fun for very little gained scoring efficiency because of the law of diminishing returns. Same goes for almost all other scoring things.
But then, the overwhelming majority of AH players does care very little about score. It's just that most players seem to suspect that everybody else is doing this or that "because of score" :D
Lusche, for fighter score does hitting a GV with bullets count? It would make sense that I can kill on M3 with machine guns, that those round count against Hit% but I have yet test it.
My understanding is that hitting OBJ like buildings doesn't count as hits (Fighter Score: makes sense), but does hitting a building or a vehicle count as a 'missed' round? Maybe some tweaks to it's calculation would improve it's 'Good' metric standing. For example, Hitting OBJ counts as neither a hit or a miss. That way if I need to help drop town guns, or a building to help a group white flag a town, I'm not lowering my score to do so. Maybe that is how it works now?
More good input from Fugi and Violator and Atlau. :salute
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Scores and people with 4 stars are over rated. Someone of the best fighter sticks are not in the top score lists.
We know its just a goal, and not a measure of talent Rud3. :salute
You're one of the more prolific killers in the Melee. And you have won the top fighter rank at least once I believe, probably more. For Tours where you're in the hunt, and you decide you feel like making it a goal to try to win it, what do you think are the pluses and minuses of the current categories? :salute
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Let's be honest the real rank 1 men are hoagie, cmex and yucca :cool:
pfft I raise you an SHAWK, Bruv119 or Fester.
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Just as I was about to go to bed, I discovered this thread. Oh well... :bhead
:rofl
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Lusche, for fighter score does hitting a GV with bullets count? It would make sense that I can kill on M3 with machine guns, that those round count against Hit% but I have yet test it.
My understanding is that hitting OBJ like buildings doesn't count as hits (Fighter Score: makes sense), but does hitting a building or a vehicle count as a 'missed' round? Maybe some tweaks to it's calculation would improve it's 'Good' metric standing. For example, Hitting OBJ counts as neither a hit or a miss. That way if I need to help drop town guns, or a building to help a group white flag a town, I'm not lowering my score to do so. Maybe that is how it works now?
More good input from Fugi and Violator and Atlau. :salute
Hitting GVs and buildings/guns as a fighter does hurt the fighter rank hit%. I wish it didn't though. It's one of those things where its either help your team or help yourself.
If you do want to attack GVs, bring a bomb and rockets as a fighter. This will not effect any score in terms of hit% or damage.
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Lusche, for fighter score does hitting a GV with bullets count?
It counts for hit%, at least it did a few years ago in AH2.
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To my credit I fly F4U variants exclusively and under any and all circumstances, including base defense. To my chagrin, my rank tends to land based on how much I fly on a given month. It's higher this month because I flew more than usual. Now that I haven't logged in since the weekend, it's dropped off. Ranking has never been an objective (been there done that in Fighter Ace), but is a good reflection of the ebb and flows of all the intangibles. Having a wingman (Bricker and Waxx have been a huge help this month), flying decent maps (that crappy spiral map didn't show up yet) and whether I happen upon buffs make all the difference.
I'm well aware that there are many pilots that are far better than me, but simply don't fly as much. 2CMEX as an example, is awesome to watch in a furball.
Guys like that should be celebrated (read: targeted). Leave us run of the mill pickers out of the spotlight, please :)
To me what matters is KPH, or more specifically FPH (fights/hr). That's why I'm here.
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Is this a Fighter Game? :headscratch:
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I'm well aware that there are many pilots that are far better than me, but simply don't fly as much. 2CMEX as an example, is awesome to watch in a furball.
Guys like that should be celebrated (read: targeted). Leave us run of the mill pickers out of the spotlight, please :)
To me what matters is KPH, or more specifically FPH (fights/hr). That's why I'm here.
2cmex is an incredibly prolific killer but he books most of his kill under the ATTACK heading. I think he has 800 kills in attack mode. :rock
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Is this a Fighter Game? :headscratch:
It's a forum & spreadsheet game to me :old:
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It's a forum & spreadsheet game to me :old:
by the way Lusche, how do you down load all the data you run the stats on?
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by the way Lusche, how do you down load all the data you run the stats on?
Ten years ago I painfully learned just enough of python to slap together a few small programs that somehow scrap all the required data from score & stats pages.
When I now look at the code, I only have a vague idea what's happening there anymore. That's ADD for you :D
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Ten years ago I painfully learned just enough of python to slap together a few small programs that somehow scrap all the required data from score & stats pages.
When I now look at the code, I only have a vague idea what's happening there anymore. That's ADD for you :D
Well done :aok
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Ten years ago I painfully learned just enough of python to slap together a few small programs that somehow scrap all the required data from score & stats pages.
When I now look at the code, I only have a vague idea what's happening there anymore. That's ADD for you :D
How do you think I feel with the Aces High having over 2000 files and about a million lines of code?
Dale
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How do you think I feel with the Aces High having over 2000 files and about a million lines of code?
Dale
I am currently sub contracted to tootsie roll pops. Working on how many licks it takes to get to the juicy tootsie roll center. When I am through with this project, I would gladly sub contract to HTC to count lines of code and confirm the exact numbers for you.
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How do you think I feel with the Aces High having over 2000 files and about a million lines of code?
Dale
Keep that quiet. Or, InGen might sub-contract you out to run Jurassic Park. :devil
We need a T-rex emoji.
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How do you think I feel with the Aces High having over 2000 files and about a million lines of code?
Dale
That's a headache for sure. I was just complaining today about editing 1500 lines, heh not even close.
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Keep that quiet. Or, InGen might sub-contract you out to run Jurassic Park.
Hah!
But seriously...what could go wrong...?
- oldman
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Hah!
But seriously...what could go wrong...?
- oldman
LAYING SOMETHING ON THE BACK KEY WHILE MAKING NOTES ON A PAD?
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Make scores in any category to be ranked/included in pull after 30 sorties. Or even 50.
This gonna sort out some crazy results. Simply the rule of big numbers. The bigger the sample, the more it is closer to what it really shall be.
Honestly, AH score system is broken right from the start. I wrote about it numerous times like 20 years ago, it is crazy that after so many years nothing changed, even some crazily obvious gaps.
If this discussion has any sense, and may really change something, I can write my suggestions.
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Make scores in any category to be ranked/included in pull after 30 sorties. Or even 50.
A threshold of 50 sorties would eliminate more than 50% of all fighter pilots from ranking. :old:
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How do you think I feel with the Aces High having over 2000 files and about a million lines of code?
Dale
I don't know, because I don't think I ever wrote anything over a hundred lines in my life :D
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A threshold of 50 sorties would eliminate more than 50% of all fighter pilots from ranking. :old:
That's because with so few players on, the total kills category isn't that important. So the percentage/ratio categories play more into it
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A threshold of 50 sorties would eliminate more than 50% of all fighter pilots from ranking. :old:
The threshold is adjustable, but 10 is minimum. Anyway, a lot of people do not care about stats or ranking, and if a player does not play let's say 30 sorties in fighters most likely he does not care.
The score crowd is quite an important part of any game and usually an active part of it. Not a big part, but still. The current score system reflects people's motivation to get scores much more than their actual skill.
Fighter score is ok, btw, there are some stats in other categories that need to be removed or changed.
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The threshold is adjustable, but 10 is minimum. Anyway, a lot of people do not care about stats or ranking, and if a player does not play let's say 30 sorties in fighters most likely he does not care.
The score crowd is quite an important part of any game and usually an active part of it. Not a big part, but still. The current score system reflects people's motivation to get scores much more than their actual skill.
Fighter score is ok, btw, there are some stats in other categories that need to be removed or changed.
It might make sense too to allow people to select attack mode for planes for the 47m, even if historically they were used as interceptors/escort, in AH they are used a lot for strafing
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It might make sense too to allow people to select attack mode for planes for the 47m, even if historically they were used as interceptors/escort, in AH they are used a lot for strafing
The N isnt really that much of a difference and can fight just as good the M.
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The problem with hit % is planes that have wingmounted cannons / machine guns (specially if you take an 190a5 that have 3 different trajectories if you mount all 4 cannons) are at disadvanage compared with, as an example a Mosquito fighter that have it all in the nose at close to same trajectory.
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The problem with hit % is planes that have wingmounted cannons / machine guns (specially if you take an 190a5 that have 3 different trajectories if you mount all 4 cannons) are at disadvanage compared with, as an example a Mosquito fighter that have it all in the nose at close to same trajectory.
That's not a problem, only a fact.
HiTech
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The N isnt really that much of a difference and can fight just as good the M.
Violator in a slow speed fight I find the N to actually be a bit better. However in the MA the M has better climb and acceleration and in my opinion roll rate so makes for a better pure BnZ plarform.
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The problem with hit % is planes that have wingmounted cannons / machine guns (specially if you take an 190a5 that have 3 different trajectories if you mount all 4 cannons) are at disadvanage compared with, as an example a Mosquito fighter that have it all in the nose at close to same trajectory.
So not sure why hit percentage isn't a valid measure of skill. Maybe it should be weighted less than k/d. Firepower, convergence, ballistics, etc are all factors we make in deciding on the plane to take, just like acceleration, roll rate, etc.
My hit percentage last tour was higher with the 152 than with the p38g despite the 38 being much easier to aim with. However the k/d and k/s are higher in the 152 (for me)
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How do you think I feel with the Aces High having over 2000 files and about a million lines of code?
Dale
Is HiTech hiring any programmers? I can work pro-bono on the codebase, as long as I get to fly 262s for free forever. ;)
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So not sure why hit percentage isn't a valid measure of skill.
For me it's not about skill, but whether it's a good Objective. It's a not a really bad objective...but as I said previously, If I'm on a fighter sortie, it discourages me from doing things that are productive. Killing a base gun, or town building, or strafing the map room seem like a productive things but it makes my Hit% worse.
Example: If you fly a K4 and average 2 kill/sortie. That's about 30 rounds per kill (using the 30mm). And if my hit percentage is 15%, I've landed 4.5 Rounds per kill. If I have 400 kills I've landed 1800 rounds and fired 12,000 rounds. A single ammo load also has 600 MG rounds which I use for OBJ. If I shoot 200 rounds per sortie at OBJ. (Then 200 sorties)X(200 Rounds/Sortie) = 40,000 Missed rounds in the Fighter Hit% Calculation. My hit % drops from 15% which I think is Top-10, to 3% which is >300th. Those are huge swings for what seems like a paltry number of rounds/sortie fired at field guns and map rooms in the course of helping defend a base, or take one.
It's not a bad Objective to have a high hit% but it seems hyper sensitive in some planes to attacking OBJ...Even if I'm hitting the OBJ. :)
Perhaps the calculation could be modified to not include hitting OBJ as "misses". Do not count OBJ as hits either. :salute
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IMO, and yes, it's just my opinion. Kills/Sortie is the metric that shows the highest level of skill (in scoring). The 10th ranked K/S right now is 2.7 give or take. That shows just how hard it is to average a K/S above 3 for a month.
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IMO, and yes, it's just my opinion. Kills/Sortie is the metric that shows the highest level of skill (in scoring). The 10th ranked K/S right now is 2.7 give or take. That shows just how hard it is to average a K/S above 3 for a month.
Maybe instead of saying "Skill" you could say "Hardest to achieve". I think there is a strategy for each category, and they are not aligned so one has to choose which way to play to move your score in a given category. I have found that Kill/Sortie means a lot of Re-Arming and making sure that your plane doesn't take damage. That's because I avoid massive furballs. For some it means jumping in at Prime time only, and finding the biggest furball, picking a 4 cannon plane, and getting 3 kills before you get picked. My strategy will mean low K/H and High damage points, while the second strategy will mean High kills/H and lower damage points. :salute
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I scored a 35% hit rating once,but I used attack mode and shot up some towns so it wasnt all that great. :furious
:salute
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That's why kill/hr and kill/sortie complement eachother well
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Maybe instead of saying "Skill" you could say "Hardest to achieve". I think there is a strategy for each category, and they are not aligned so one has to choose which way to play to move your score in a given category. I have found that Kill/Sortie means a lot of Re-Arming and making sure that your plane doesn't take damage. That's because I avoid massive furballs. For some it means jumping in at Prime time only, and finding the biggest furball, picking a 4 cannon plane, and getting 3 kills before you get picked. My strategy will mean low K/H and High damage points, while the second strategy will mean High kills/H and lower damage points. :salute
I agree with you. One thing I like about this scoring is that different styles can be at the top. You dont have to be perfect in all of the categories to succeed.
Once a lot of people start playing again, that's when points really do make a difference. Looking back at some of my best scores from 2006, as Catfish6 in tour 78, I broke 1001 kills in 65 hours (most hours I've ever played, dont know how yall play so much lol). I scored over 110K points and still was #16 in points. (89th with a 5.34 k/d) sheesh. In tour 82, my best score ever, as Dmonslyr, I had 49,500 points with a rank of 110 in that category. Crazy that only had 23 hours of play that month with 425 kills.
Gah, looking at those scores compared to now are just ridiculous. I was so much better back then LOL.
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That's not a problem, only a fact.
HiTech
Because it is a fact is why I think hit% should be of much less importance than other parameters, wing-mounted guns should not be of a disadvantage IMHO, else we see stupid attack of town buildings to increase the hit% - circumventing the whole idea.
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Score, rank and stat.. It only weighs up to the importance you place on it.
Therefore it is right that each ranked stat is weighted equally and devoid of bias.
I have thoroughly enjoyed my first 43Hrs 48Minutes and 47seconds in 3-4 years.
The "Total Time" flying was much more important to me than any other rank-able, score-able, percentage-able set of numbers that will be forgotten by all in a fleeting moment.
Perhaps the real skill is not forgetting how good it feels.
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Score, rank and stat.. It only weighs up to the importance you place on it.
Therefore it is right that each ranked stat is weighted equally and devoid of bias.
I have thoroughly enjoyed my first 43Hrs 48Minutes and 47seconds in 3-4 years.
The "Total Time" flying was much more important to me than any other rank-able, score-able, percentage-able set of numbers that will be forgotten by all in a fleeting moment.
Perhaps the real skill is not forgetting how good it feels.
For many it's just the next fight.