Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aircraft and Vehicles => Topic started by: 2stony on December 13, 2002, 03:44:30 PM
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When I first came to AH, I was disappointed that the buffs could only carry one gunner. It would be much more realistic if you could sign on as many gunners as the particular buff had guns. Figs would think twice about solo attacks on buffs if all the guns were manned.
"Bring the Death Star to AH"
Stony
:D
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Originally posted by 2stony
Figs would think twice about solo attacks on buffs if all the guns were manned.
"Bring the Death Star to AH"
Stony
:D
humm ... I don't think so.
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What I meant was that figs wouldn't be able to swoop by as the cone of fire of the next gun(or gun from sisterships)would be firing on them. Or, more than one position at the same time would be firing on them.
Currently, the gunner has to jump around from position to position, and by the time he does that, the fig is usually out of range.
With a multi-manned buff, the fig would be succeptable to multiple fire.
Stony
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I think it would make them easier to kill.
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One factor that makes buffs in AH so deadly is that all possible guns point at the target.
A player in the tailgun of a b17 doesnt just have the tail gun, he has the top and the ball gun too. You have four to six MG's shooting at you, not two.
There is no effective delay in switching between gun positions.
Anyways Buff formations can have two gunners(the pilot, and an attached gunner)
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Now i cant be sure but i seem to remember HTC saying it wasnt possible to have more than 2 players joined together.
it was a LONG time ago but its something that seems to have stuck in my mind so i think im remembering right.
it is a shame as 10 man b17 crews would be fantastic! well, 7 men i guess, dont need radio operators or co pilots or navigators :)
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Naw. I think he said its not in the game because when they did it in another game it was almost never ever used. Which is a poor use of development time.
It would almost never be used here either. Gunners are almost never used now...
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Who'd have thunk figs were such a dangerous fruit.
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The more gunners are, the less deadly they'll be ;)
Inn is right. All defensive buff guns within angular range fires its guns simultaneously at one single target point. It's like facing a P-51D or a P-47D in a head-on. The more gunners there are, the less "mechanically perfect" they'll be, and thus, lot weaker defenses.
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The more gunners there are, the less "mechanically perfect" they'll be, and thus, lot weaker defenses.
The other game was Air Warrior, and I flew in a five ship Death Star formation once. We were attack very heavily from many directions, and because we had multiple gunners we were able to have better protection.
By the time the bombers got to the target we had lost only two bombers but had a return of 14 fighter kills. The three bombers destroyed their intended target.
Other nights someone would up a B-17 flying deathstar and could on it's own most of the time get to the target. I don't know how well it would work here though but think about it. How many people that have had a gunner got shot down because they couldn't defend against fighters hitting from two different directions?
BTW I was one of the two bombers that died. I took an engine hit and couldn't keep up and stay in formation. While the ship I was flying lasted a while it didn't take long to finish off a crippled bomber. If any of you old AW'ers remember, correct me if I am wrong. But I seem to remember that the gunners could be killed just like the pilots could.
I believe currently in this game, gun positions are immortal. Except until almost the end of AW, the pilot could not gun the ship at all. No crew, no guns. Without good fighter escort, bombers alone with no crew rarely made it to a target.
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Guns or no guns, multiple gunners or not, buffs are just targets anyway.
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yay multiple gunners! some not paying attention, some afk, some n00b who sprayed all his ammo at friendlys on takeoff. No more of this laser assisted all 10 nm they fixed it so only at least 6 guns on the B-17 point at you at once, so now those 6 guns will be pointing all over creation so when my 30mm rips the buff to shreds I get 7 kills? cool I want it!
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Putting a whole squad in bomber(s) was one of the most fun things you could do in AW. With in plane intercom, everyone shared in the score, was a great team activity.
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Originally posted by hazed-
dont need radio operators or co pilots or navigators :)
Still could use a radio operator, hazed. A designated person to spew on channel 1 would take a great burden off of the pilot...
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I flew in a regular buff squads in Air Warrior for years. A fully loaded Death Star with your squadmates was great fun ! We regularly flew Death Stars whenever possible.
I disagree with the automated targeting be more accurate. Having individual gunners at each gun would make the buffs much more dangerous !
1) The current formation model is next to worthless for getting the formations guns on target. The reason is convergence. The other planes do not account for the convergence problem.
2) The same applies to the guns on a single buff. Again convergence will only be accurate at your pre-selected convergence point. On either side of that point only one gun position is firing accurately.
Therefore only one gun on one plane is actually aimed at the enemy.
3) Mulitple attackers cannot be engaged from different directions with only one gunner. A fully staffed buff can handle multiple directions at once.
Again I want to repeat, having your squadmates all on one plane, each relying on the other for their virtual lives, with the intercom going full speed, is tremendous fun.
Fully staffed buffs is probably the single biggest thing I miss in the transition from Air Warrior to Aces High !
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The B-17 in AW included the navigator position as a placeholder in case two people wanted to switch positions.
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Well, I flew in Air warrior from the time it was introduced on GEnie (6.95 an hour) to just about the time it closed up shop. My handles are as you see here as well as =AXE=. I will say this. No matter how well a buff is gunned, a good fighter pilot will kill it with relative ease. Why? Because a pilot will always approach a 17 with the notion that it is gunned. In RR in AW death Stars were more leathal because of increased effectivness of the guns as well as the ability to defie gravatational effects on the fusalage. In other words pilots would turn like a fighter and do High G manuvers which increased the leathality of the platform. That thankfully is not possible here. On the notion that the current modle here is not as leathal. That is not true because it is rare when all the gunners in the adjacent stations will train on the same target. The one thing that I miss about the death stars though is that it was a lot of fun to smoke and joke with your pals on a fully gunned buff. Due to the programing limitations that isn't possible though from what I gather. In either case I think the formation flying makes up for it. Buff drivers can now up an entire flight of 17's or lancs etc. To me, I think a full fomation of 17's in a good strong box formation is not an easy thing to approach. That's when you start remembering all those World at war episodes when they are talking with the German Fighter drivers about the head on, and shear diving tactics. Still gives me the shivers thinking about diving into a cload of .50cal. :eek:
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Originally posted by Turbot
Putting a whole squad in bomber(s) was one of the most fun things you could do in AW. With in plane intercom, everyone shared in the score, was a great team activity.
Yep, upping your entire squad in a couple of B17's was a blast. Even when we could only get two or three gunners for a mission it was still a great time.
If AH had the ability it would get used.
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I miss the good old days when I flew AW with 1st NASTY.
Deathstar were really deadly because of hit bubble making it easy to hit attacking figs even for newbies like I was back then(and still am :)
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I can remember loading 7 gunners onto a B17 in WarBirds. Was a blast. I really felt like a bomber pilot haha.
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Hi everyone,
I think it's worth remembering that Death Stars were so effective in Air Warrior because though the game supported multiple gunners, it wasn't really balanced for it. I'd say it was rather balanced for a single gunner who was able to give an intercepting fighter a run for his money.
With multiple gunners on board, firepower truly multplied, making the Death Star live up to its name. That wasn't really a feature designed into the game, but a side effect - so I'm not sure that wishing it back is a good idea if you think it through to the end.
Still, the multi-crew (and multi-bomber) missions in Air Warrior were some of the best I flew in that game, and the emotional immersion factor alone is reason enough to bring them back, no matter whether the the "Death Star" really is going to be as lethal as in Air Warrior.
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)
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hehehe dogbuffing was fun.
i'd often give a fighter in FR fits, even ungunned by simply denying him a shot and ending up chasing him.
a lot of people had fun riding my dogbuff. i had fun flying them now and then.
then my best gunner performance was in RR Med (or big?) ETO...
just one gunner-me... we had like 22 kills, 9 were kinda vulches, but then we had a swarm of angry 109's and other planes coming after us. we ended up landing with almost no ammo left. thankfully 2 squaddies came to our rescue in 38's and helped us get out of that mess. it was hilarious... never laughed so hard.
but basically even a gunned buff was meat for someone with a clue. and i loved chewing up vaders (a-26's) who thought they were fighters.
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Hi Shane,
>i'd often give a fighter in FR fits, even ungunned by simply denying him a shot and ending up chasing him.
Quite tantalizing for fighters - to catch a low and slow buff and to be unable to get a shot on him because he turns like a top!
>we ended up landing with almost no ammo left. thankfully 2 squaddies came to our rescue in 38's and helped us get out of that mess.
LOL! That's very mean, surviving with all those kill under the belt :-)
I had a mirror image experience when vulching an airfield and only shooting the bombers who were about to leave. After I got three of them, the situation got so hot so that I decided not to go for the fourth which was just starting its takeoff roll. I still had a bomb, though, and thanks to the F-16-style CCIP of Air Warrior, I hit this B-17 right on the head with it. Surprise! Six names flashed up in the kill buffer in the same instant :-)
The harrassed enemy had gotten tired of my vulching and sent up a death star to put an end to it. My bomb struck them like lightning out of the blue, but they really took it with great spirit and a good sense of humour :-) There's no weapon against luck, after all!
Regards,
Henning (HoHun)
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As long as we are recalling old history, I would like to have the guns enabled while still on the runway. It kind of sucks, limping a formation home having a vulcher light you up before you get the brakes to stop you.
Oh... and I PROMISE... I would Never EVER use this feature as a base defense and I would Never EVER use it to land at a deacked base and park behind the spawn point on a runway! :D
Hehehe... well... maybe the spawn parking... those "missions" were hilarious.
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some n00b who sprayed all his ammo at friendlys on takeoff. "pooh21"
LMAO