I love the game, but heres the little things

[Zigrat]

Man I think AH is a great game but heres the little things I think HTC could improve to make the game better.

1) Make ditching harder. I think ditching should be possible, but only if you are in a non combat situation, IE mabye good equirements would be speed<120 knots, VV<-200feet/min ie you could ditch but this "unintentional ditching" where a wing gets sawed off on a extremely low level con and he just kinda ditches instead of dying.

2) Make hispanos slightly less effective versus armor. Right now its near impossible to kill a tank with 20mm mausers, but with 20mm hispanos its fish in a barrel. I have gotten over the F4u-1c, it has enough weaknesses that it CAN be overcome, I just think its hitting power versus tanks is slightly exagerated (at least compared to mausers).

[popeye]

Yeah ditching is too easy.  Maybe it should depend on the plane.  Would it be more likely to survive a ditch in an F4U than in a Spitfire (given the same speed and ROD)?

popeye

[SFRT - Frenchy]

Ditching is 'not' a matter of speed but rather where you ditch. I already explained the P47 pilot ditching twice around 300 Mph but it was on the airport area.

Ditching at 300Mph in a corn field or in the Borneo jungle should not have the same outcome.

Ditching in a forest doesn't necesseraly means dying. Usually u try top stall at tree top, meaning slow speed required.

Not modeled in AH yet, flying between 2 trees and ripping wings is considered 'safe' in the ditching process.

Salute all.

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Olivier "Frenchy" Raunier
       www.sfrt.net

[This message has been edited by SFRT - Frenchy (edited 06-06-2000).]

[Rojo]

I've suggested this before.  Tie the likelyhood of a successful ditch to the texture mapping of the terrain you touch down on. Ditch on light green (ie. grass), and your chances for a good ditch (you live  ) are maybe 90%. Ditch on gray (ie. rocky, broken ground) and you've get a 1 in 10 chance of saving your neck.  My two pence worth.

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Sabre, a.k.a. Rojo
(S-2, The Buccaneers)

[popeye]

I like it Rojo.  Trying to make it to a "safe" terrain to ditch sounds a lot like Frenchy describes.

popeye

[Soda]

Zig,
  Let's face it, people ditch for 2 reasons, to not hurt their score, and to not give someone else a kill.  The kill assignment is something that I think 90% of people agree should be a kill, it's just now to score it properly.  The score thing, well, it's a matter of pilot skill to ditch well and it should be rewarded.  It's also a risk though, sometimes you can lay that plane down and it flips and kills you...

  I just haven't seen that many people manage to ditch seriously wounded planes lately.  At VERY low alts and high speeds, sure, I've seen people lay their plane down at 400mph and skip for a mile or two, but I haven't seen many one winged planes ditching lately.  Of my past 25 or so ditches, maybe 1 is what I would have considered a lucky ditch, all the rest were simple engine damage making a ditch necessary.

  How many people are actually seeing these ditches where majorly wounded planes manage to put it down and survive?  Of the 3 encounters I had last night I only got 1 kill because the other 2 planes ditched, but I knew I only wounded the other planes lightly so I expected that they'd get away.  Saw a wing off and then try and watch them ditch....



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Soda
The Wrecking Crew

[DoctorYO]

I think if you ditch and the enemy is over your position say 3km radius it should be a kill recorded but not necessary a death for the ditching pilot either..

Say the ditching pilot is on the ground for say 15-30 secs before he can find cover from the respective aircraft...  Hence if you really dont like that guy strafe him.

Nevertheless If you force your opponent to the ground in aircombat it is a kill.

That alone would solve the problem...


Might need some fine tunning on the strafing part...


Regards,


DoctorYO

[humble]

Historically, weren't "kills" awarded for planes forced down due to damage? you got a kill for killing the plane...not the opposing pilot .

[WarChild]

OH AND HOW ABOUT THIS

i get royally torn in battle, my plane is a mess, i'm wounded and blacking out from loss of blood, engine is out and i'm spilling gas all over the sheep.

But through it all i got my poor carcase of a plane to base and put it down in the lawn between the 2 airstrips.. AND THATS CALLED A DITCH

Seems to be a succesful landing u gotta be on pavement... a sidewalk or a runway.

BUMMERS!

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WarChild
I/JG2~Richthofen~
"Where's the Charmin!"

[Zigrat]

DrYo i thinks thats a great idea.

I think if you managed to extend 3 km and then ditch, you should get away. This i agree with.

I think your suggestion about 3km is a VERY good one. If the plane ditches within 3 km of an enemy, its a kill. (whoever put the most bullets into him).

Or if that was impossible, the forced stay once stopped of 15 seconds would be sufficient, it would allow you to strafe the guy  

If I am in a fight at 20k and I smoke a guys engine and he dives for ground, and i stay high, I don't expect the kill, he got away.

If I am scisoring at 50 feet off the ground, i get a snapshot and take half his wing off, and he goes into the ground but lives, i expect the kill. This is where the 3km rule would be good (it could be radial not just over ground level so if your opponent stayed above 10k feet you could safely ditch too.

[Lizard3]

Not to mention that EVERY mission from a vehicle base is a ditch or a capture.

[funked]

If you damage a plane and he doesn't make it home, that should be a kill.  That's how it was in WW2 and how it oughta be here.

[Hangtime]

Hiya Soda... sorry; gotta disagree.

I have had literally dozens of AC worked down low in turnfights and have delivered catatsrophic terminal damage to them, BOTH wings gone; completly turned em into a tumbling wreck; tail gone; with just a tent peg fuselage spewing flames... Then they just thud into the ground, skid to a stop and get a safe ditch.

Certainlly; if I had hit this plane at 2k feet; I would have a kill for my efforts.. but some of these planes; particularly buffs and La5's (dunno why) just get a safe ditch when they hit the ground at low AOA's from low alt, regardless of catastrophic structural damage or speed. Certainly; this should be addressed.

Hang

[Karnak]

Soda, not everyone ditches for thoses reasons.  Did it ever occur to you that the ditching person might not give a rats bellybutton about score and might just be trying to save his/her simulated life?

I think ditches should count as kills for the player that forced the ditch, but ditching itself is not the dishonorable act you make it out to be.

A lot of the bravado that gets posted by people here, i.e. "Don't be a wuss, ride it down", "Never run from a fight, even if the odds/position make the fight hopeless" and "Ditchers are just score-potatos" would have fit in great with the Japanese honor system that had pilots not wearing parachutes because they didn't want to shame themselves and maybe bail out a couple of seconds before they had too.  The Japanese high command HAD to order their pilots to carry parachutes, and then ended up HAVING to order them to wear the parachutes.  This bravado is just stupid.

When I fly I am kinda roleplaying at being a combat pilot, and thus I will do everything I can to stay alive while accomplishing something.  It is more important to stay alive than to save the kite.

My opinion.    

Sisu

[This message has been edited by Karnak (edited 06-06-2000).]

[Zigrat]

Thats fine.
Then bail   If you waited to bail until you got to low to the ground, oops, you're gonna die. So, can we get word from HTC if they will address this? Especially the instances that hangtime cited, they are the worst, the guy asnt even going for a ditch but he just gets it and gets lucky (yes i have had the same thing happen, flaming fuselages surviving).