Proposal for the implimentation of meaningful strategic bombing in Aces High

[Chilli]

I like the idea, but not the implimentation.  I would love to see something put in place that makes the strat worth protecting/attacking besides the whole name in lights thing, but I don't think it should be made to where its mandatory either. 

Just my .02

Name in lights presently works for either large groups landing as a unit, or for incentive to grab as many scalps, sometimes at the detriment of one's own fellow countrymen.  I don't see a problem with the implimentation as long as there is room for the small group to succeed in contributing to the advance or defense of country's assets. 

Currently, a small group flying in the face of a large horde, does nothing but pad the scores of the horders.  Give small groups of individuals the option to impact the map.  Then give them names in lights to congratulate specific targets.  In an idea above, a system message does not have to name the pilot but it would be obvious is player lands with 3000 damage and next message displayed shows a specific hangar and at specific field, one could draw the conclusion of what occured. "SYSTEM: FH1 A14 Rooks downtime increased 3 mins. downtime remaining 6 mins".

It would only be as manditory as destroying an enemy CV approaching your field.  Leave it alone, and suffer the consequences.

[Karnak]

I created a revised algorithm that is easier to tweak the outcomes on.  Produced this table:

100%: 020 minutes
095%: 021 minutes
090%: 022 minutes
085%: 024 minutes
080%: 027 minutes
075%: 030 minutes
070%: 036 minutes
065%: 041 minutes
060%: 047 minutes
055%: 055 minutes
050%: 063 minutes
045%: 070 minutes
040%: 079 minutes
035%: 086 minutes
030%: 093 minutes
025%: 099 minutes
020%: 105 minutes
015%: 110 minutes
010%: 115 minutes
005%: 117 minutes
000%: 120 minutes

[Noir]

I like the idea, but not the implimentation.  I would love to see something put in place that makes the strat worth protecting/attacking besides the whole name in lights thing, but I don't think it should be made to where its mandatory either. 

Just my .02

I would not be mandatory but will give you a definite plus to win der krieg !

[DERK13]

i love the idea its not mandatory to take them out or protect but it gives us bomber nuts something to give to the war effort and all i like the idea i think Hitech should look into and be open for discussion to the players about this system. Great thought i love it. You didnt see bombers droppin bombs on hangers most of the time, mostly they dropped on factories and other important buildings. + 100000

[b4o2s9s]

I'd just like to add my support for this idea or something along these lines. I'm a bomber pilot in the 91st and I've found myself taking long breaks from the game for the last couple months. It gets boring just hitting hangars all the time, 85% of the time nobody takes advantage of it. There's nothing I love more in this game than upping with the squad, forming up, and going on a long strat run. But it's very discouraging when we aren't even halfway back to our descent point and the strats are back at 100%, and there was no effect at all. Would be nice to feel like we've actually helped our side a little, I'm sure all bomber pilots feel the same.

Along those same lines, it would encourage defense as well. Getting a milk run while going clear to strats from a rear base, it's really boring. You have the moment of excitement dropping bombs and seeing what you hit, then more boredom going home. We enjoy fighter opposition, and making strats or some other kind of valuable target mean something would bring swarms of fighters up when bomb runs are reported. Ok maybe not swarms, but more than we see now. Would give the bombers a sense of accomplishment that they're helping the war effort, and the same for the fighter jocks when they bring some of those bombers down, causing less damage to be applied to the valuable targets.

 

[icepac]

The current train logic may have something to do with that as I've seen 3 trains in 5 minutes before as well as trains that respawn a short distance down th track after being partially destroyed.

[perdue3]

You can add 15 different ways to win a war and it still wont get won. Personally, I see no purpose in this.

[bustr]

Hitech has given you a strategic target. But, you do have to bomb it down. Then blow the HQ to have your way with that country. As of yet I have seen no massive bomber missions to level the strat. Just players trying to talk Hitech into changing the game so bomber pilots by tyranny of the minority can control a single countries fun for every player logged into that country with a few bomb drops. You guys may be really stand up gents. But wait till after hours and the vTards run their creative mischief against it.

Any time this game gives the players something that can be used by a minority of players to control the fun of the majority it gets abused and Hitech steps in with unintended consiquences.

Move the strats closer to the fronts or split it up across the front closer for the bombers to get at them without a potty break or more than one beer before bomb drop time. But, move them all back at the same time as the territory shrinks. Dosen't taking out a country's strat painfuly increase the respawn time of all base objects in that country? If that is the case, then killing all of the strat is the first step to steam rolling a country. I Could be confused on this one though.

Hitech has spread the war out across the potential of 20% of your countries bases as individual small wars to be won or lost one at a time. That generates broad scale conflict in tiny limited attention span bites all across the arena smorgasbord. Until the very last few bases for an arena reset, no one thing has the potential to cripple a whole country at any point. ENY is just a challenge of your skill and determination unless not being able to fly your favorite croch rocket cripples your psychi.

Having the ability to suddenly and drasticly lower the total potential fun quality for a single country in respect to the other two is the basis of tyranny by the minority. As bomber pilots you are asking for the ability to virtualy single handedly control the quality of the game experience for the total population of your targeted country. You want your endevors removed from all of those mini wars that have to be won to achive a reset. I will venture the strat is as tough a nut to crack for reasons like this.

[Tilt]

 Seems to me that the heavy bomber is now primarily used agin towns....and it seems to work IMO.  Strat has become a redundant feature in gameplay. If we want to pull it back into game play then it ashould be simple, rewarding and achievable.


This

It would also make sense to have multiple bases attached to one given strat target.  In addition to maybe calling them "Regional Strats" which could be graphically represented by cities, I think there should also be Global Strats scattered across the map, deep to semi deep behind enemy lines, yet reachable with a reasonable amount of effort, that when bombed, would further affect the down times of fighter hangars, vehicle hangars, bomber hangars, ords, ack, etc.

seems the sort of thing

It could be zoned (and linked) or it could be nation wide but capturable.

Cities only though.  Throw all the factories and complex stuff away to leave something called infrastructure. If infrastructure is low then rebuild time is low. Dont bother with anti suicide stuff other than hitting the perks etc. I think this should be linked to a perk value on ord some day.

I would prefer to make "infrastructure" capturable and liberally scattered like Cities would be.

[Karnak]

Having the ability to suddenly and drasticly lower the total potential fun quality for a single country in respect to the other two is the basis of tyranny by the minority. As bomber pilots you are asking for the ability to virtualy single handedly control the quality of the game experience for the total population of your targeted country. You want your endevors removed from all of those mini wars that have to be won to achive a reset. I will venture the strat is as tough a nut to crack for reasons like this.

I don't think this idea does that as all it does is make bases a bit easier to take if the strats in question are pounded down.  In no way does it take the ability to fight back or have fun out of the game, which has been the failing of every other "make bombers important" idea I have seen.

[grizz441]

The reason I proposed the land portion of meaningful strat play, is because, as you proposed it Karnak, once these strats are destroyed, they stay down for a significant amount of time, as they should.  Maybe 3-4 hours.  But with this, gameplay will basically degrade to this...

1. Post strat mission
2. Suicide strats and kill as much as you can before you die
3. Off to whatever bases it will affect.

There is no combat added here, unless you can intercept this suicide raid prior to the drop which is usually impossible due to disorganization and the attackers having an altitude head start.  It basically just adds another step into the base taking formula, without adding corresponding counter combat to it. 

[Karnak]

Not sure about that Grizz.  If the value of bombing the strats, scorewise and perkwise, was equal to or greater than that of bombing town centers I think the strats would be hit regularly by people who might not even be interested in taking bases at all.  That could very well entirely obviate the need for people only interested in taking bases from ever having to hit the strats.

I would certainly be inclined to bomb them more often.  One of the biggest reasons I don't do bombers much is that there isn't any target really worth bombing.  When I do, I hit the strats unless I am trying to earn perk points, in which case I have to hit town centers.

The hitting the town centers thing is particularly silly as you are getting lots of points and perks for something that has literally no effect on the game.

[DERK13]

You can add 15 different ways to win a war and it still wont get won. Personally, I see no purpose in this.

somebodys not a bomber nut...

[Yarbles]

Hitech has given you a strategic target. But, you do have to bomb it down. Then blow the HQ to have your way with that country. As of yet I have seen no massive bomber missions to level the strat. Just players trying to talk Hitech into changing the game so bomber pilots by tyranny of the minority can control a single countries fun for every player logged into that country with a few bomb drops. You guys may be really stand up gents. But wait till after hours and the vTards run their creative mischief against it.

I led a massive bomber mission against all the Strats back in the day when the strats were still point worthy as well as influencing the game in other ways.

We simultaneously went for the city, other strats and individual bases geting at least 4 of the strats to well under 50% in some cases under 5%. I have to say if the whole effort had been aimed at a local level we would have achieved allot more and I estimte we had 20-30 people involved and a highly co ordinated and timed opperation.

It seems unrealistic to expect missions to be bigger than that and in this case it took over a week to plan. In other words the current system offers no realistic incentive to launch a major bombing raid unless the whole country is intimately involved.