Trianglemoon, great question. What to do: 1) if you see a countryman in danger give him a check-six. You do this by looking at him in your views and tap the apostrophe key '. That's good etiquette. So is giving an enemy a "salute" by typing .salute thiername
Also, taking a minute or two to see how the game simulates warfare, I'd recommend also. Though you'll find some if not many for whom the objective of Aces High holds no appeal.
On the masthead of Aces High II, you'll see the SUPPORT link. New players usually don't take the time to read it. The "help" section, especially the two points under GAME PLAY. I know I didn't 6 years or so ago. I wish I had because it really opened up the game from an arcade "i'm going to shoot you down" to a game that's much more sophisticated and team oriented.
Here's the basis upon which Aces High gameplay rests.
hap
p.s. Also, the next bullet point "Strategic Targets" is well worth noting. It'll save you many questions and why folks do certain things. It's just as important as the "Gameplay" section.
Gameplay
Capturing territory through the use of air, land and sea power is the objective of Aces High. The arena terrain is divided into three countries, with each country starting with an equal number of fields, towns, cities, task groups, and a single headquarters for each country. All countries have an equal amount of territory at the beginning of a war.
The map is broken up into zones, with each zone having an master field. The master field controls the ownership of the factories which supply all other fields in the zone.
When a master field is captured, the factories will supply all fields in the zone owned by the capturing country. Each country has a primary zone which contains the country HQ, and this zone cannot be captured.
Capturing territory
Territory is gained by capturing a field. A field consists of an airfield, vehicle field, or port and an adjacent town. The town is situated 2-3 miles from the field or port and contains the strategic map room for the entire field. All buildings in the town must be destroyed before attempting to capture the field. Destroyed town buildings will stay down for 45 minutes, during which time 10 troops must be delivered to the map room via one of the troop carriers to capture the field. After the tenth troop safely makes it into the map room, a system message will appear in the message buffer announcing the captured field number and the capturing country.
Resupplies
Damaged field and city objects can be rebuilt with the successful delivery of supplies. Conceptually, the objects are being resupplied but visually they are being rebuilt. This is done by reducing the downtime by 30 minutes depending on how much of the supplies reach the destination. If only half of the supplies reach the destination, the downtime is decreased by 15 minutes.
Trains, convoys, and barges
Trains, convoys, and barges are built into the terrain. Each train, convoy, or barge has a source point and a destination point, and each can be damaged or destroyed while traveling from point to point. When a train, convoy, or barge is destroyed, they will automatically respawn every ten minutes.
Each time a train, convoy or barge spawns, it first checks to see if there has been damage to the supplier (cities supply factories and factories supply fields). The amount of supplies carried to the destination depends on the amount of damage to the supplier. If the supplier has been damaged by 50%, only one out of every six train cars or convoy trucks will carry supplies.
The destination point is where the train, convoy, or barge attempts to resupply. The destination can be either a single field, or a number of objects within a defined radius. If a destination field is captured while a train, convoy, or barge is enroute, the train, convoy, or barge continues to the destination, and resupplies from the factories of the capturing country.
Once a train, convoy, or barge has successfully reached it's destination, a new supply convoy spawns.
Supply drops
The C-47, LVT-2, and M-3 have the capability to drop supplies on a field to repair the field or shorten the downtime. These object supplies will repair all resupplyable objects in a one mile radius from the point where the supplies land. The supplies are selected as a loadout option in the hangar, and .25 perk points are awarded to the player who dropped the supplies for every object that's affected by the resupply.
A vehicle supply type is also available to repair and supply vehicles with ordnance. When these supplies are dropped, any friendly vehicle within a half mile radius receives a Load Supplies button on their screen. Clicking this button will use the supplies to both repair and rearm their vehicle. If the supplies are unused, they vanish after 15 minutes. Vehicle supplies will not reload troops or the vehicle and object supplies.
Winning the War
The war is won when any country is reduced to one field. At that time, the arena is reset, a different terrain is rotated in with the country territories randomly set, and a perk point bonus is awarded to players that have been in the winning country for a minimum of 12 hours prior to the end of the war.
