Control of a destroyer

[bustr]

Destroyers are with the CV task group for historical reasons and for mutual defense. Everything in this game like a task group, PT, LVT or tigerII is dictated to their effectiveness by time, distance, and everything from 30cal to 1000lb bombs.

We all know how long lone CV, Cruisers, destroyers, PT, LVT, and tanks last after some kiddi with 1000lb bombs finds them. We also know because of the scale of our game world the PT, LVT, and tank has to be spawned to it's combat area which is a very tiny operational space, often less than 2x2 miles versus the ability of those conveyances to get there in one evening directly from another base. Time, distance, and 1000lb bombs.

Where do you want to spawn a single destroyer to? Airplanes with bombs will take out a single destroyer as so cruiser 8in batteries out side of the max range of 5in and torpedoes. Massed 5in from the task force will take out a single destroyer. And shore batteries will, just like taking out PT, LVT and even tanks. Tanks have a few advantages for hiding up to a point that sea craft do not.

It's not like you don't have destroyers in the game with guns you can man. You will get an entirely new battleship object in AH3 with 16in guns that good chances will be the heart of it's own task group with destroyers. I've tested the salvo and it only takes three to sink a carrier with a longer reach than the 8in.

How are you going to bring a single destroyer near anything to fight and even survive against in a world that would swallow up the standard arenas of our competitors? Instead of punting it onto Hitech at this point, use the game functions as we are familiar with them to conceptualize this outside of a member of a task force. Where do you want to spawn a single destroyer to that it won't get sunk after it is located? This game is not world of warships protected from planes, it is Aces High an air combat game with task force sinking experts once they are located.

[Mister Fork]

As for player-controlled DDs, I'm not fundamentally against the idea. As with any new component under consideration, it depends on how it is added. Some may remember this, but I used to be part of the events team (one of the original in AH, as it happens). One of the single-frame scenarios I designed was an all-surface ship battle, using the old Philippines map. I set it up so there were 8 cruisers, 4 versus 4, along with PT boats available for spawn and a couple scout planes for each side. The battle lasted close to two hours and was great fun. Having player-controlled DDs would allow similar action. Give the "skipper" direct control of the wheel and throttle, instead of the clunky course plotting we use now, would make them much harder for the lone-wolf pilots to kill. Providing the ability to take on extra gunners to man the main guns and to augment auto-ack (the smaller calibre AA could be auto-ack), and this would be a blast!

Sabre - that is exactly how I envisioned it being implemented. The spawn points would be no different that PT boats - and for scenario based events, having player controlled destroyers completely opens up the game to new possibilities. Why shouldn't you be able to spawn a destroyer from a  CV - or peel one off from the CV if you want to take control of it...

With the decent accuracy of the tank modelling we have now, why not add another element to the gameplay?  Destroyers open up something no one else has done well in a MMO.  And if HTC continues down the path of their development plans, this also allows the addition of subs, VLS's (which become vehicle spawn-points when deployed/landed), etc etc?

I think it would be a very smart and strategic move to add player-Captain'ed Destroyers.

Bustr- what's your big idea to improve the game? I see nothing but complaints and the fact you don't like it for this reason or that. Improve the idea! You've got a brain - and great ideas...we've seen it. And the fact you see all the possible limits on how it won't work, also means you're thinking on how it 'should' work...

[guncrasher]

mister fork, you ever heard the expression "safety in numbers" or something like that?  you take the fleet away from the cv and they will all die easier than it is now.

a single destroyer will be easy to kill using mg's from a couple of planes.  a fleet can be destroyed but it takes some work and a lot more firepower.

think the idea needs to research all the if's instead of "it would be cool to control a destroyer away from the fleet.".


semp

[bustr]

How do you not get sunk in a solo destroyer faster than in a task group in the scale of the world we play in? The scale of the world and the power of aircraft dictate how long single sea craft survive against the fun factor and any effective combat outcome. The scale of the task group is proportional to the scale of the world for survive ability and effective combat outcomes. With a task group have many ships to be sunk and gun potions to be destroyed before the fun factor of a group of players is diminished. The PT as an asset is not expected to survive very long as is demonstrated nightly since it was introduced into this world. And so it only has a single player controlling it and it's weapons. A PBY with bombs would be more effective as a solo conveyance in the scale of our world.

The destroyer's 3D object has been updated to AH3 standards in a giant scale world. There is a new battleship object that is waiting for new players in AH3 scaled to our giant world. A single destroyer or capitol ship needs a very small world that proportionally scales up the effectiveness of it's speed, maneuverability, and maybe it's firepower. And the absence of bored players with pin point accurate 1000lb bombs. 

[Skyguns MKII]

One plane isn't as effective as a squad. One destroyer isnt as effective as a fleet. Personally I see player controlled destroyers by the numbers breaking off and acting as an escort for lvts landing. Or perhaps sailing ahead of the CV route if there is a known carrier in the area. I understand many of you may disagree but I can imagine effectiveness if done properly and in numbers. That way destroyers can do what taffy three was able to instead of being unmanuverable robots. Destroyers are fast and maneuverable and I think the player control option along with numbers would be deadly. Sumner class 

[68EZPkns]

I would go for DE's ,destroyer escorts. They  were just smaller versions of DDs, I think they carried 2 5 inchers instead of 5 like the fletcher class. If you read about the battle of Leyte Gulf a handful of them fought off the Japs main force of BBs and H Cruisers that were poised to decimate the landing beach. With help from some jeep carriers. Problem was all the air craft had were HE bombs as they were there for ground support at the landing. Japs almost pulled it off but got cold feet thinking they were fighting a much bigger force, so they turned tail.

[bustr]

One plane isn't as effective as a squad. One destroyer isnt as effective as a fleet. Personally I see player controlled destroyers by the numbers breaking off and acting as an escort for lvts landing. Or perhaps sailing ahead of the CV route if there is a known carrier in the area. I understand many of you may disagree but I can imagine effectiveness if done properly and in numbers. That way destroyers can do what taffy three was able to instead of being unmanuverable robots. Destroyers are fast and maneuverable and I think the player control option along with numbers would be deadly. Sumner class 

How our world is scaled, individual destroyers would die as quickly as individual PT in your scenario. The close packed task force is configured to survive in our world. The concept of fast on water in our world versus airplanes is not possible. Fast in a gaming world for a destroyer is only possible in a game that is scaled to a fraction of a single sector of our vast world and has only ships to contend with. I doubt Hitech would allow destroyers to re-spawn like PT back into a local base attack which would destabilize the game. "Properly in numbers" for the giant scale of our aircraft with 1000lb bombs centric world, is ship groups (task force) setup for mutual support tied to long land base style re-spawns.

[Hungry]

How our world is scaled, individual destroyers would die as quickly as individual PT in your scenario. The close packed task force is configured to survive in our world. The concept of fast on water in our world versus airplanes is not possible. Fast in a gaming world for a destroyer is only possible in a game that is scaled to a fraction of a single sector of our vast world and has only ships to contend with. I doubt Hitech would allow destroyers to re-spawn like PT back into a local base attack which would destabilize the game. "Properly in numbers" for the giant scale of our aircraft with 1000lb bombs centric world, is ship groups (task force) setup for mutual support tied to long land base style re-spawns.

Whose to say that as multiple bombers are taken up by multiple players, a Destroyer group couldn't be formed as a "mission" by multiple players? of course the game / ports would have to be configured in a way that this would be possible for the multi destroyer group to form up

If its "code" feasible why limit the possibility's for more depth / fun to the game?

[bustr]

It's not code, it's a single destroyer in the scale of this world is just a bigger PT boat that will get fragged as soon as the first player with bombs finds it. It will get nowhere in our gigantic world any faster than our CV groups do. And while it's getting there, some kiddy with bombs will sink it. 

Player missions of a group of destroyers. There you have a code perspective that it would be easier for Hitech to introduce a destroyer task force object which would be scaled to this world and have the mutual air defense ability of CV task forces. How much effect an all destroyer task force would have against the new battleship task force or, the CV task force the way our world works is questionable. And there is the ever present player with 1000lb bombs who will make that task force a moot thing.

A destroyer task group object will be used to super saturate the area a CV task group is attacking an airfield with ack, to deny the players on the other side the fun of fighting the players from the CV group. You see this when two and even three CV groups are brought together next to an airfield.

We also know our ship to ship 8 inch are almost lazer guided. If I'm not mistaken, when I tested the new battleship, one 16in salvo sank the destroyers while three sank the CV.

[Hungry]

Fletcher Class

Known at first as “US Destroyer No. 445” for the hull number of the lead ship, the design incorporated ten torpedo tubes in two quintuple centerline mounts plus five 5-inch/38 caliber dual purpose guns, anti-aircraft weapons and depth charges.

I still think a few of these could hold their own long enough to make it fun,

Bustr, I don't always like your answers but I always appreciate your thoughtfulness of the game and I'll leave you with this I didn't read it as George Bernard Shaw but I heard it in the speech (unfortunately not live)

"Some people see things as they are and say why?  I dream things that never were and say, why not?"

its sort of stuck with me my whole life and in some ways I attribute it to my success in life.

[Mister Fork]

Bustr - what then would work for player controlled Destroyers if it were introduced?  Cause all you've done coming in here is but down the idea because "YOU" don't like it.

It would work. Really really well.

[bustr]

You don't see the canvas that our game plays on and why the CV has a task force.

You see a canvas from another game that was shrunk down to give the deception that a single destroyer is faster than it is and inside of the limited battle time clock more effective than it really is. Other games don't have weenies with 1000lb bombs putting carriers and CV on the bottom with lazer guided accuracy anytime they see one. Combined with a vast world that their battle arena would be a pinpoint in.

A destroyer to survive for very long would need it's own group which wouldn't survive very long if the destroyers were the only target. The guns are ineffectual to taking a field, or quickly defeating a cruiser, battle ship, CV, shore battery or plane. Battleships, Cruisers and planes have longer arms than the torpedo's on a destroyer could be effectively aimed. Knowing that allowing destroyers to pass through a CV group the way we do now with remnants meant close range torps, the destroyers would become a primary target and eliminated off the bat. A destroyer group would quickly be coupled with a CV group to increase the auto ack for sissies to hide in instead of fight.

As is, against the canvas of the AH world, they are best utilized where they are and will survive the longest providing a support service for the CV. Generally, once it's only the destroyers left of a task force, they are ineffectual and quickly put on the bottom if anyone really wants to expend the effort. 

[Hungry]

A thousand replies have rolled through my head, 1000 more would fall on deaf ears, a thousand more will not be said, as time will judge the years

[Oldman731]

You don't see the canvas that our game plays on and why the CV has a task force.

Please excuse Fork.  He is an Epsilon-minus semi-moron, who of course cannot grasp the overall concepts of this game.  No matter how many years he spends here, no matter how much time he has devoted as a staff member, he simply is incapable of understanding the basic functions of tactics and strategy, not to mention how things like boats could work in this game.  I apologize on his behalf, and I will try to ensure that his wife gives him his shot before she lets him near the computer from now on.

- oldman

[Hungry]

last one,

it could have been a destroyer, a bicycle with 50 cals on it, skateboards that carry troops, or jeeps with wings, the goal was to enhance the game and attract new players, particularly the sea battles, all we heard was were idiots and no it cant be done, a simple acknowledgment that enhancing the Sea portion of the game may be helpful to attracting new players and should be looked into would have sufficed

I get the feeling that there's a hierarchy at work here that wants the game just how they want it and on their terms for the future.  so I've seen the light and enough said good luck