you're just thinking of u.s. bomber formations that were developed during the strategic bombing initiative
...russians, germans, japanese and other countries thought differently
I know there were instances of small attacks by bombers. But 24 aircraft is not representative of the strategic bombing you are trying to compare this to. 24 is nothing. All sides conducted missions of this size regularly, especially the Jap, Ger, and others. They couldn't muster much more and wouldn't risk much less if they had a choice because it was too unsafe and unproductive to send them in smaller numbers.
safety and survivability is a matter of player learning and interaction...just giving them more drones won't increase their survivability.
Even without AI gunners it absolutely would.
Even 4 fighters (with good aim) attacking a formation could have a tough time finishing off 24 bombers before they run out of ammo OR got shot by the dozens of gunners The odds 24 bombers get shot down is nil, EXCEPT during the initial novelty of this new feature when the likelihood of hordes of fighters looking for formations to swarm on is highest. When the novelty wears off, furballers will likely still prefer dogfights.
With AI gunners, bomber survivability increases slightly with vet pilots, mostly due to situations where a vet is alone against multiple attackers. Survivability increases more with inexperienced players (relative to his survivability without AI) due to his lack of gunnery skills, SA, and multi tasking while on approach to target.
as for marketing, you're way over estimating the appeal. showing a p-51 vs a 109 or a corsair vs a ki-43 has more appeal than any number of bombers.
The word "showing" suggest you're looking at this from a television commercial viewers perspective. Look at it from a new or old players point of view. Imagine yourself flying a formation, look out the window or in f3 mode and look at the bombers. Which is more awe inspiring 3 planes or 24 in a typical ww2 formation like Fish posted?
Or from an attackers perspective. You're in a fighter and you come up on formations of 24. Still again, which is more incredible?
I would wager that the biggest, most glaringly noticeable dissimilarities between AH and the real war is a lack of large formations of bombers or nice coordinated formations of ANY aircraft for that matter. Everywhere you look you see poster children of the uncoordinated no matter how hard they try. At first sight, little in the game gives a strong sense of "being there."
Formations of 24 aren't the end all be all of ww2 sims, but they can create a huge first impression of an epic, coordinated air war.
and there isn't anything more realistic about 24 planes in a bomber formation than there are 3 or 12.
There is though. Those 4 plane missions you referred to earlier were often by smaller faster attack bombers, not the 17s and 24s. But the most typical mission size was way over 12 regardless of what type of aircraft you describe.
Plus, a 24 plane drone formation will always stay in better formation than a mission put on by 24 players who attempt to fly formation. As a result better mutual defensive fire. The look and the effect are more realistic than player coordinated missions.
how many new players would know that they must circle the field to allow all the drones to get off the field?
They'd learn the first time they did it. That learning curve is certainly easier than learning how to shoot well enough to defend three planes or be obliterated. There is only one bomber pilot I know of that is truly feared in the game due to his shooting ability and many players have played for a decade. You keep insisting on teaching them, but it won't ever happen, it's a factor you can't control. Adding drone formations is a factor we can control and it benefits all of us.
that is not even mentioning the reprogramming of bomber formations to prevent them all from trying to take off at the same time like they do now.
That is not difficult to program, all it takes is changing a couple numbers. And they don't exactly take off at the same time. I could care less if they changed that aspect or not but the pilot would still have to fly in a circle for form up even at the current rate drones follow.
a lot fewer people would be doing the bomb n bail thing or going with the lancstuka maneuvers if there are perk points involved.
Bomb and bail or lancstukas is off the subject a bit. I don't like seeing either personally but they are not hugely important to me. I consider lancstukas the gamier. Stopping them could be a matter of perk use, but I don't think that needs to include charging for each bomber. There are plenty of ways htc could stop this if they wanted to. Bombs could be prevented from releasing below XXXX feet AGL in high alt bombers. Bailing could be prevented for XX minutes after bomb release. It seems Htc doesn't care to stop it so it does no one any good discussing it.
there are people right now that go to the ew and mw arenas and do whatever they can get away with to earn perk points so they can use them in the main arena.
There is nothing you can do to change that until they change the perk system. If you state specifically how it affects this idea I might have an idea that would deter it otherwise I don't see how this has anything to do with bomber formations.
