Hardcore Arena

[Karnak]

I'd like to keep pointing out that again most are arguing the wrong point.  The issue is not whether the eye sees better than the game. It's who much visual acuity is required for best/realistic game play.

What's realistic? The answer should include the statistical probability that you would miss a camo airplane when looking down from 18K ft above the bandit. Without Icon that probability is 70% if I'm looking at a camo 109. But probably only 30% if I'm looking at a shiny P-38L.  

With ICON the answer is ZERO % In real life was the probability ZERO? If not then Icon are over kill that affect game play by making to too easy to spot aircraft. That affects strategy and tactics and makes for less realistic attack scenarios.

In Real life was it 70% for the 109? Maybe that's too high.  This discussion needs to drop the snobbery and hidden-agenda-conspiracies and focus on how to improve the visual system to allow a little more "realism" in terms of game play.  

Without icons it is near 100% and dependent on one's personal computer's capabilities, and sometimes eyesight.  It doesn't have to be 18,000ft either, 3,000 has much the same effect to the point that many times in the AvA it has been reported that the best tactic isn't the historical truth to be above your enemy, but rather to be below and get lost in the clutter allowing a zoom up to ambush attack.

[Vinkman]

Without icons it is near 100% and dependent on one's personal computer's capabilities, and sometimes eyesight.  It doesn't have to be 18,000ft either, 3,000 has much the same effect to the point that many times in the AvA it has been reported that the best tactic isn't the historical truth to be above your enemy, but rather to be below and get lost in the clutter allowing a zoom up to ambush attack.

!00% only if you are visually impaired and have a low performing graphics card. But if it's that bad, you can't read the icons anyway. 

 

[Puma44]

You guys started the hostility.  I was there at the start when it was called CT and there was no hostility.

News flash: it's no longer called CT and to the best of my knowledge, none of the current staff were a part of it then.

Enough of your generalizations, name calling, and accusations.  When you say "you guys" that's pointed at me personally.  So, since you are attacking me with that statement, you state specifics where I have come out of nowhere and attacked you with hostility.  YOU don't even know me, who I am, what I stand for, and why I am on the AvA staff.  

If YOU don't like the AvA arena, then don't play there.  There are a couple of the other arenas and events that I don't particularly care for so, I choose not to play there.  I certainly do not come on the forums and blast others with unfair, inaccurate generalizations, and name calling because "their"  arena doesn't suit me.  



So, put up or shut up!

[jimson]

The people running the AvA have had, for years, a demonstrated contempt for the RAF, Spitfires in particular, while being detail oriented about German and American units.  It seems as though balance is not so often sought as a predetermined outcome that is acceptable to the Luftwaffe fans that dominate the AvA and when this is challenged we're told it is for "balance".  Sometimes it is, but there are other times when it is blatantly not.
You guys started the hostility.  I was there at the start when it was called CT and there was no hostility.
I acknowledge those times, such as the recent Dieppe setting.  I, however, greatly dispute that the 1942 Spitfire Mk IX is balanced against the Bf109K-4 and Fw190D-9, against which you guys have repeatably set it in 1945 scenarios in the apparently uneducated (remember, Spitfire knowledge is verboten/dirty) idea that a Spitfire Mk IX is a Spitfire Mk IX and since you see many Spitfire Mk IXs in the RAF order of battle for 1944 and 1945 it is appropriate.  The apparently persistent refusal to understand that saying "Spitfire Mk IX" is similar to saying "Bf109G" in terms of how precisely that identifies the expected performance is irritating to any RAF fan who would like to fly against their historical opponents rather than the all vs all of the MA.  The RAF fans don't want to be functionally saddled with a war weary cast off from 1942 while their Luftwaffe opponents come at them in kites that are 50mph faster with a climb rate 1000fpm higher.  It isn't fun because it isn't the historical match up we want when we think about RAF vs Luftwaffe.  Spitfire Mk IX vs Bf109G-2, Bf109G-6 and Fw190A-5?  Bring it on.  Spitfire Mk IX vs Bf109K-4 and Fw190D-9? I'll pass, thanks.
Every time I go to play in the AvA it has literally 0 players in it.  You can hardly blame me for not jumping in to play by myself.
Sorry.  You guys damaged your "brand" and we're at fault?
I don't have that option.  Sorry.  I can bring myself though, if you can suggest a time when there are players in the AvA.

It depends, the view that the Spit 16 is an unbalancing super plane isn't confined to AvA. but we do have them sometimes. I really think people often see demons or agendas when there aren't any. Some of the things you suggest we are guilty of would be counter productive. Unless you really think we don't want players in the arena and if you think that, well I don't know what to say.

I truly do believe that in all cases the planes are chosen to be as historically accurate without being unbalanced as possible. We make mistakes sure and there have been times where you very diplomatically and constructively pointed them out. Those have been good exchanges.

Tone and choice of wording makes a lot of difference and that is something we all, me included, would do well to keep in mind.

Whether you believe it or not, we get a ton of crap no matter what we do. No matter what settings we run, we get raked over the coals by a segment of the player base.

The arena may evolve again. With the addition of staged missions, players won't always be dependent on a population to have fun in there which may in turn draw more players, turning staged missions into largely player populated missions.

[Karnak]

Spit VIII is a good stand in for the Spit LF.Mk IXc.  Much better than the Mk IX.  That is something I made clear going all the way back to when I suggested it be added for just such a purpose before the Spit's were redone.

I know you'll get flack regardless, but from an RAF fan's standpoint the setups have much too often looked like the RAF players were just supposed to be punching bags for the Luftwaffe fans and that gets old.  Look at the Dieppe scenario that just ran, it had to err either in favor of the RAF by having Spit IX with only the weak restriction of a single field or on the side of the Luftwaffe by pitting the 1941 Mk Vb against the 1943 Fw190A-5 and, of course, it picked the latter.  That is fine and all, but when the choice seems to usually go that way it gets frustrating.

That said, I note in the current setup the Germans don't have their jets and putting the Ju88 and He111 against the 1945 Allied rides seems gruesomely unfair.  I suppose a significant part of my view at this point is colored by the arguments I have had with past choices.

I do continue to pay attention to the AvA and I would play in there at times if it wasn't empty.

[bustr]

Sounds like Hitech could introduce an A2-3 kluge FW to solve this 1941 problem. The A5 against the spitVb is over kill. The spit9 by the A5 time was the answer to FW dominance. And even at that only "if" the A5 driver wants to stay and play close.

That's one of the reasons when later matchups happen with the mossi6 available, many use it instead of the spit9. Or the matchup leaving out the spit9 but, allowing the 51B and mossi6 against G6, A5 and A8. Even though the spit9 was the primary Brit contender.

Historical matchups are such a pain since they quickly showcase the reasons for the evolution in each breed's arms race. So often in an attempt to make one period of the war "more fair", it just makes one side dominant by reading that nights matchup list. After all, most of the players looking at the list have spent years in the MA getting to know the relative value of any two in 1 on 1 situations. That "certainty" probably has a bit to do with the low foot traffic. In the MA you have many ways to counter the "certainty" other than joining the side with the better rides for the given matchup. Then I wonder how many pop in, look at the roster names and leave??

[jimson]

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[Karnak]

The spit9 by the A5 time was the answer to FW dominance. And even at that only "if" the A5 driver wants to stay and play close.

Against the Merlin 61 Spitfire F.Mk IX at low altitude, sure.  That is the Spitfire Mk IX we have in AH.  There were only about 300 of those made and they entered service in June of 1942.  The F.Mk IX with the slightly more powerful Merlin 63 followed and then in 1943 the lower blown Merlin 66 was introduced in the LF.Mk IX, which while still slower than the Fw190A-5 at low altitude did greatly close the speed gap.  In reality the two stage Merlin engined Spitfire versions we have in AH were powered by the Merlin 61 for the Mk IX, Merlin 66 for our Mk VIII and Packard Merlin 266 (same as Merlin 66 but with critical altitude 1000ft higher) in the Mk XVI.  In AH the Mk IX is has a Merlin 61 and the Mk VIII and MK XVI both have a Merlin 66, meaning that our Mk XVI is actually a LF.Mk IXe.

Due to those facts the Mk VIII ought to be used in place of the Mk IX for European settings at some point in the 1943/1944 time range and the Mk XVI introduced in any setting that includes the RAF and the Bf109K-4 and Fw190D-9.  I recognize that the Spit LF.IXe/Spit XVI is a very potent fighter, but so are the Fw190D-9 and Bf109K-4.  Using the Spitfire Mk IX against the Bf109K-4 and Fw190D-9 forces a significantly ahistorical situation on the RAF players in the name of balance, pushing them into a version of the MK IX that is two years or more out of date and built in small numbers when they should be in the LF.Mk IX or Mk XVI of which about 4,500 were built.  I honestly cannot believe that the D-9 and K-4 don't match the Mk XVI.  Certainly in the MA I find K-4s in particular to be nigh impossible to beat.

[jimson]

My opinion is that the D-9 and K-4 can be an effective counter but not so much in the hands of the average. We don't have a Mk XVI without clipped wings. A slightly diminished roll rate might be just enough of a chink in the armor to feel better about including the fighter more often.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I started to talk about staged missions. When using these, we will be able to further tailor the battle by enabling only limited numbers of certain AC available on a first come and served basis and model attrition.

Really looking forward to having this system fleshed out and large numbers of missions to run.

It just seems that whenever we enable the 16, few even want to fly axis. The beauty of staged missions is that everyone could be on the same side and still have a battle, only against AI and that would cause some heartburn, but the bots seem to be better now than they were in some of the past offline mission versions.

[Karnak]

I think the reason isn't the Mk XVI so much as the myth of the Mk XVI that has grown in this game.  "It is over-modeled"  "It can do a 180 and run down a BnZing fighter that is doing 450", "It only saw 36 hours of action in WWII" and so on.  No film of it performing these miraculous feats ever surfaces, but all these, and other, myths persist.  I strongly suspect based on the posting of Luftwaffe fans on the boards that their boycott of facing the Mk XVI is along the lines of "<Bleep> that setup.  I am not going to go against a fantasy plane that's favored by history ignorant MAers." 

The problem with that is the counter response is that RAF fans have mostly just given up on the AvA entirely.  I recall some fan made videos for a BoB event the AvA ran some time ago and every single video was from, and pushing, the Luftwaffe's view.  That is fine as it is fan made (I certainly don't have the skills to put such a video together) but it is part of the tapestry of evidence about where the energy is.  Look at the BBS avatars in the AvA and they are dominated by Luftwaffe symbols.

As to the clipped wings, that was a 30 minute conversion at an airfield to change the wingtips between standard, clipped and extended.  By 1944 most LF.Mk IXs were clipped and all Mk XVI's were delivered clipped, though you can find photos of Mk XVIs with standard wings that had standard tips put on at the field.

When the AvA was created as the Combat Theater I joined in supporting it by joining the CT squadron "27th Sentai" because we knew the Japanese side would need support to make x vs Japan settings viable. We wanted it to succeed.

[Old Sport]

Back to R/L visual detection of airborne targets for a moment.

After looking around the net I found a few interesting pdf's on BVR and WVR, etc.

Lt Col Patrick Higby, in Promise and Reality: Beyond Visual Range (BVR) Air-To-Air Combat, presented to the Air War College, cited an USAF officer who evaluated missiles:

"Colonel James Burton selected five nautical miles—in daylight—as his BVR limit for evaluating air-to-air missiles."

footnoted: Burton, James G., “Letting Combat Results Shape the Next Air-to-Air Missile,” USAF Slide Presentation, 1985

So, evidently these two aviators have some lack of optimism on detecting enemy A/C at great distances.

The following citations are taken from a PhD thesis:

IMPROVING TARGET ORIENTATION DISCRIMINATION
PERFORMANCE IN AIR-TO-AIR FLIGHT SIMULATION
May 2003

"A total of 759 training engagements at the Naval Air Station Oceana Tactical Air Combat Training System (TACTS) range revealed that in 624 of the engagements the pilots first sighted the target as a dot against the background at an average distance of 5.67 nmi (Hamilton & Monaco, 1986; Monaco & Hamilton, 1985). In the remaining 135 engagements exhaust smoke, contrails and sun glint off the aircraft allowed the pilots to detect the aircraft at even greater distances. In the 122 engagements where exhaust smoke was the primary cue, detection distances averaged 7.64 nmi."

A dot at less than 6 miles for a jet fighter means a dot at some closer distance for a WWII fighter. E.G. ME 109's are quite a bit smaller than modern combat jets.

"In 1983, Kress & Brictson studied 87 air-to-air engagements at the Yuma TACTS range. Average unaided detection distances for the target F-5 and F-4 aircraft were 3.1 nmi. When the pilots were aided with a head-up display (HUD) symbol that cued the pilot to the target’s location, the mean detection distance grew to 6.8 nmi."

F-5's are about the smallest jets around, around Mig-21 size, but they are still some amount larger than WWII fighters.

"Another study that investigated detection distances was Temme & Still (1991). They measured air-to-air target detection distances at the Naval Air Station Oceana TACTS range to see if there was a performance difference between those pilots who wore corrective eyeglasses and those who did not. Those with eyeglasses did not detect the targets until they were about 10% closer than those with unaided vision. Two very closely matched groups of eyeglass and non-eyeglass wearers had average detection ranges of 4.52 and 5.64 nmi respectively when using all detection means including aircraft sighting, target glint, contrails and exhaust smoke. When limiting subjects to aircraft-only detections, the corresponding distances were 4.35 and 5.54 nmi respectively."

"Another study by Hutchins in 1978 at the Air Combat Maneuvering Range (ACMR), which is the earlier name of the TACTS, involved 45 air combat training engagements. The mean detection distance of the A-4 targets was 3.09, with a range of 0.38 to 6.23 nmi.

"Other studies were done using observers on the ground. With visibility conditions spanning 7 to 10 miles over an 8-day testing period, O’Neal & Miller (1998) found detection distances for approaching T-38 aircraft to ranged from 4.77 to 6.73 nmi."

"Another ground observer study used 400 visual detections of a T-38 aircraft (Provines, Rahe, Block, Pena, & Tredici, 1983). The aircraft was approaching from a known direction and a distance of 9 miles and mean detection distance was 4.55 miles over the 400 trials."

So these studies put an outer limit on unaided detection of modern jets to a range of less than 6 miles. IMHO, during WWII in many combat situations where there was no CGI to guide pilots to the enemy, unaided visual detections of smaller WWII fighters are going to be less than the distances listed above.

IMHO, as I've mentioned before, for FSO or AvA there could be a parameter for a neutral icon color at greater distances that lets people see the "dot" as a bogey with the descriptor - inline, radial, twin, multi, or something like that, and then depending on parameter settings, the closer it gets it suddenly reveals itself to be friend or foe.

Best.

[Karnak]

3.1 nautical miles is 6278 yards, a tad longer than the AH icon range.  Remember, the AH icon range also accommodates bombers that are larger than jet fighters.

[bustr]

I'm curious.

It appears in the past 9 months Hitech has made some strides in haze as a 3D effect to your ability to see at distance. What are the specific arena settings to adjust that? Are they an H2O air density value 0-xxxxx, or a combination of layer colors for different times of day. Or a cloud generation setting that allows you to change the density of a world covering fog cloud?

Can the air density or haze along with the ambient light be set so that dots stand out with clarity so everyone can see them on maps? And if that is possible, wouldn't it be easier to attract players to no-Icons by starting everyone out at being able to see the dots. Then over time gradually lead them to the more hazy dots?

If there is a setting to make the dots visible, I'd like to experiment with it offline and see how it looks.

We often kill great ideas because we are addicted to the complexity of our cherished dreams we assume others will cherish just the same. So the unintended consequence is, rejection of your dream becomes a personal rejection of you, and a knee jerk fight against mean haters of you. This is one of several basic reasons small businesses fail. I suspect if Hitech required you guys to turn a profit with the AvA, you would be looking for answers to the low foot traffic rather than your status quo. Since some one else is paying all the bills and not requiring accountability and performance. I will venture the fires you light under yourselves don't burn very hot near your dreams.

I still think the CT\AvA has a role to play with the AH community. So far your implementation of the offering is less attractive to the goodly number of two sided historic matchup fans than the MA or special events. If you treated it like foot traffic equaled profit, your outcomes might change. But, then you might have to change your cherished dreams a bit to suit the paying customer. Even Hitech makes changes to his offering for the customer, which keeps your arena doors open even if the foot traffic is very light.

Do you think if Hitech duplicated your AvA as the MA that he could keep his company running?

[jimson]

Edit:

It's a waste of time conversing with you because you seem to be stuck on the fantasy that we killed the already dead arena. If it was required to show a profit it would have been gone long before any of us got there.


It's always going to be a low use arena and I swear I'd love to turn it over to you and watch you be unable to keep it populated either. That goes for the K squad too.

The addition of the staged mission system offers us a chance to be a real alternative and that's what I am working my butt off on.

If all you are ever going to do is talk and never offer any sort of realistic ideas (We can't change color or size of dots) or compromise, then I am done with you.

[bustr]

Edit:

It's a waste of time conversing with you because you seem to be stuck on the fantasy that we killed the already dead arena with the settings. If it was required to show a profit it would have been gone long before any of us got there.

At least now we are having an honest conversation with the cherished dreams set aside.

Does AH survive because the game is tailored to the wants of the 20% or to attract the 80% such that they feel like staying around and paying the rent to keep the doors open?

So with no-Icons there is no way to improve the dots for the 80% then?

Honestly I was hoping there was........

The old CT and the AvA before your group took over ran into the periodic difficulties that 20%ers would run out the 80% and get bored killing each other. The secret for the MA and the SEA events is the 80% feel they have options to counter the 20% other than their whole evening being abused for their $14.95. The AvA periodic side balancing problems and then the favoring of one country's rides over another from setup to setup showcases this human nature. Why do the 80%ers like furball lake but, the 20% duel?

And what really will the staged missions populated with AI give the 80%? The illusion of not getting their kester whomped all night long by 20%ers.

Over the years some of the best times in the CT, the skill levels were about even across everyone fighting on both sides. As the resident sharks grew in skill level, the 80% stopped showing up. At that point the CT was turning into the DA's annex with resident CT squads of sharks.

So there is something to Icons and the illusion of safety they give to the 80% who constitute more $14.95's than the 20%. And don't play this game for the same reasons the 20% do. And Hitech is offering them enough illusion of safety and chances of personal accomplishment in the MA that they stay.

The CT\AvA acts like a dinner bell for the 20%. I've always wondered why after they run off the 80% that they don't stay and beat each others brains out in their now uber 20%er utopia? As soon as the 80%er kibble is gone, they leave it a dead waste land. Many of them don't even hide this irony by at least choosing to fly only the worst rides of the matchups to show case their superior skillz before finishing off the kibble in a few bites.

Guess maybe the AvA should be renamed the Shark Diner and a for sale sign put up.

I bet Lusche could come up with a (Kill to Death\Hit%) ratio average to reasonably determine the 80% at any time. Then Hitech could adjust access to a "fun combat" arena based on that number for each player's LWMA K\D. That which drives a 20% to be one will keep most of them from trying to play with their own K\D just to get into that arena to crap on everyone's fun.

And this is human nature. For any given moment it's not about the future concept of the 80%er can get better, or see a Trainer, or keep upping over and over again to loose to a 20%er as the price to get better. It's about the quality of the 80%er's fun in this moment that he is paying for. 20%er's love free lunches of 80%er's any time they can find that free lunch line, and in general don't care how badly they are humiliating them. It's a free lunch is all that counts. Even 20%ers have 20%ers who humiliate them.

And Hitech is doing something in the MA that gives the 80%ers the idea they have a chance to survive the sharks that keeps them coming back every day.