INK's suggestion to rework the Icon is interesting.
If you think about it, including the shortened name for each con is a kindness but, contributes to a certain timidness visa knowing ones own skill level in ones current ride. Polar to that, removing the name probably would bring about an epidemic of timid flying like watching a convention of blind people trying out canes in Madison Square Garden.
In the AvA, you know with some certainty what the dot is based on reading the MOTD describing the matchup. Mentally that's a kindness in disguise since you know up front what you are getting into versus the polyglot MA.
Currently we get what in the Icon while in fighter mode?
Country
Plane ID
Distance 200, 400, 600, 800, 1k, 1.5k, 2k, 2.5k, 3k, 3,5k, 4k, 4.5k, 5k, 5,5k, 5.9k
From INK:
more realistic would be the icon getting smaller as the enemy gets closer, to the point of a tiny dot above plane once within say 400 yards, text disappearing.....
Country - To a point it's important. But, if you chose to up from a field next to a rook field to fight rooks, who cares about the chess piece in the icon. You logged on to kill "RED GUYS" and get your name in lights when you landed.
Possibly inside of 600 yards for fighters the chess piece changes to - b, k, or r.
Plane ID - In an Air Combat Simulator that provides only WW2 aircraft as your choice with no historical countries. Yes you want to know what you are facing as soon as possible. At the longest ranges it's important to know what just entered your combat air sphere. But, at say 1k-1.5k we can tell a P51 from a Bf109. Just not which version. In WW2 this was the same issue for pilots and crew, and why they learned to identify silhouettes not Hi-Def photographs.
Possibly inside of 600 yards for fighters the aircraft ID goes away since you can visually recognize the fighter or bomber.
Distance - Inside of 600 yards it's obvious what type and version of plane your con is. Also your gunsight rings do a bangup job of telling you range with the fix to the perspective and 512x512 allowing 2pix-1Mil. Especially since now the icon is under the con, and starting at 400 can be hidden by the engine deck of your fighter. Only thing you need 200-400 is something small and obvious to keep you from shooting at your countrymen by accident. Zoom would be a bit more important in cases like furballing in Hi clutter bushes for the kill shot.
Possibly in fighters: .6, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5.9
Per INK's observation, a simplified Icon might not be such a bad thing for the immersion aspect of close quarters ACM. As long as something was visible at close range to let you know one P51D from another so you don't kill shoot on your countryman. I think it would remove some of the close range lazer lockon to the icon aspect of furballing. Allow a bit more last minute evasive escapes from loosing momentary sight. Currently we do walk a slight edge of the arcade line with icons inside of 1000 yards where Aces High has the supreme ACM physics engine in the industry.
Note: For the Dorks who will say just turn off enemy icons in the MA. With enemy Icons off, until I'm about 600-1k, I don't know if I'm chasing a sneeze dot on my monitor, a terrain dot, or a plane shadow. In most cases being forced to use zoom to figure it out. Suddenly I'm in the tower because I sat there looking for and not evading the sqweeker who flew up my kester. On occasion I will turn off enemy icon in the MA. It's obvious the game was not optimized for this every time I've done it in the last decade. INK's observation is an elegant compromise.
