Pilot training is a massive, unnecessary time sink

[Hugo Olsson]

EDIT: I changed the headline, because the original ("Pilot training kills the game") was a little over aggressive and not really called for. The annoyed comments below were written in response to the original headline. The rest of this post is unchanged.

Edit 2: Added "unnecessary" to the headline.

Don't get me wrong: I find the pilot training mechanics pretty cool. But it takes TOO MUCH TIME. And most of that time is spent just clicking the mouse, moving pilots around according to a pre-planned schedule which was decided long before. A computer programme could manage the actual shuffling of pilots better than me, in something like one percent of the time.

So I have a suggestion which has the potential to halve the playing time, getting rid of the boring, mindless part and letting me concentrate on the fun parts, like planning convoys.[8D]

1: introduce a switch for air squadrons, turning them to training squadrons. This should be separate from the training mission - it's likely that one would sometimes want to set a frontline squadron to training for a while without enabling automized pilot recruitment and discharge.

2: a training squadron would be set to the training mission, 100%, range 0 by default, but it should be possible to change these settings manually. Exp is better trained through the CAP mission, for example, and I'm sure there is a myriad of reasons why people would want to let the computer handle pilot management while doing something else than 100% training.
What mission to train would then be set manually.

3: the programme would recruit pilots into a training squadron according to preferences set by the player. This would include which pool to recruit from and what stats the recruited pilots were required to have. For example vet bomber pool, ground bombing min 70, nav search max 40, nav bomb max 40, lo nav max 40. (For a US army squadron intended to train dedicated ground bombing pilots, avoiding to recruit pilots who have already begun training as dual ground/nav bombers.)

4: the player would set how many pilots to recruit, default probably being number of pilots = number of planes, and most common player choice probably to simply max out number of pilots.

4: the programme would also have a target when to discharge pilots, such as lo ground min 70. Or an Exp target, or several targets.

5: the programme would override the incredibly annoying requirement to manually activate supernumerary pilots - or there should at least be switch to turn it off. Might be useful for frontline squadrons, but not for training, IMHO.

Manual recruitment and discharge from these squadrons would still be enabled, to maximize player control and flexibility. (For example to allow elite trainers in the squadron, whom it would still be possible to manually protect from discharge.)

With this scheme it should be possible to plan a comprehensive training programme and let the computer do the dull work.

For example: Bomber squadron 1 recruits from the replacement pool, no required stats for recruitment, trains nav search and will discharge pilots when they reach nav search 70. Fighter squadron 1 will draw recruits from the bomber vet pool, min nav search 70, max grd bomb 40, max nav bomb 40, it will train lo nav and it will discharge when pilots reach lo nav 70. Fighter squadron 2 will recruit from the fighter vet pool first, replacement pool second, it will recruit any pilots with Air skill less than 70, train escort at some height above 100' and discharge when they reach Air 70. Fighter squadron 3 will recruit from the fighter vet pool , recquired air skill at least 70 and defend skill max 69. It will train sweep at 100' and discharge pilots when they reach defense 70. Fighter squadron 4 will recruit pilots with Air 70, Defend 70, Exp max 49. It will fly CAP somewhere safe and discharge pilots when they reach Exp 50. In this way able fighter pilots would be trained automatically, and some of them would be trained for effective naval bombing.

The player would still be responsible for setting up training squadrons and keeping the number of different training missions balanced. A degree of player supervision would be recquired, but nowhere near the micromanagement needed now. There would be no loss of detail, flexibility or control on the part of the player but the amount of time spent just clicking the mouse without making any actual decisions would be reduced most drastically.

I'm a relatively new to WITP:AE, I just reached '43 in my first campaign game against the AI. (Which I jumped straight into - I figured the Allies made a mess of things in the beginning and came out on top anyway, so why shouldn't I.) I haven't seen any proposals resembling this one on the forums so I thought I'd share my ideas. I have no programming skills though so this is as far as I can take it on my own.

[Rising-Sun]

I agreed, what bother me the most is random delay. Should have been calculated from distance of hexes. Having one pilot needed to transfer in same hex took him seven days lol.

[Feltan]

Pilot training may well be boring and tedious to you, but I hardly think that it "kills the game."  This topic is one of those issues that you can make as easy or difficult as you like; people on this forum train pilots from a top-level down broad brush treatment, and others embrace a super-anal micromanagement perspective.
 
Perhaps you might want to consider that one of the great things about this game is that there is no "right" way to train pilots, and that the genius in the game is that it supports different approaches to achieve the same goal.
 
Regards,
Feltan

[Chickenboy]

Meh. I don't think the current manifestation is worthy of so much vitriol. It works fine for my purposes and isn't near the time suck you decry.

[Jorge_Stanbury]

Pilot training may well be boring and tedious to you, but I hardly think that it "kills the game." 

+1

and it only take a lot of time the first time you set it; afterwards you just need a quarterly review

[witpqs]

+1 to Felton, Chickenboy, and Jorge_Stanbury.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Jorge_Stanbury

Pilot training may well be boring and tedious to you, but I hardly think that it "kills the game." 

+1

and it only take a lot of time the first time you set it; afterwards you just need a quarterly review

+1

Yep. And some of us actually like it!

It's a personal thing, but as you can see in the other recent thread here about a program to do pilot training, there are all kinds of differing opinions and practice on the subject. If you're playing the AI just don't train pilots and you'll actually have a more enjoyable game! [:)]

[geofflambert]

+?‡ Proper air crew training will never be like auto convoys (and I don't even do that). It has to be flexible and adaptive to circumstances, but should have theory behind it. I admit it takes a lot of time periodically, but in my view it's the number 1 most important job you have. Try organizing your time better. Someone will come up with various apps but I will be very skeptical about them until I try them. I am not interested in cookie cutter solutions to anything. I must also admit that there are some very fine players who spend less time than me on it. Figure out who they are and solicit tips, but that is now what this thread is for.

[Treetop64]

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Jorge_Stanbury

Pilot training may well be boring and tedious to you, but I hardly think that it "kills the game." 

+1

and it only take a lot of time the first time you set it; afterwards you just need a quarterly review

+1

Yep. And some of us actually like it!

It's a personal thing, but as you can see in the other recent thread here about a program to do pilot training, there are all kinds of differing opinions and practice on the subject. If you're playing the AI just don't train pilots and you'll actually have a more enjoyable game! [:)]

+1

I like it. Pilot training was certainly well-received by the community when it was patched in a few years ago. One of the better, more flexible aspects of the game, IMO. "Kills the game"...? Whatever...

[Kull]

Here's the real deal: You can get 90+ of the desired result by setting up a few training units and just doing the bi-monthly or monthly check-up that many here recommend. What you are seeking is pilot training maximization through coding of some sort. Which is probably not going to happen, because the existing system is more than "good enough", results wise.

For people like me (and perhaps you), the real problem is we keep tweaking and tweaking and tweaking, not because we really HAVE to, but because the game will let us. The number of pilots I know by name and unit, is actually kinda scary......

[BattleMoose]

What really bothers me is the way the game draws the "wrong" pilots into squadrons. Maybe I am doing something wrong. But when I want to draw in new pilots into a "level bombing" squadron as an example, from "reserve", exp 50+, and it brings in "fighter pilots!", with air skill +70, or "transport pilots" with transport skill +70 or some such. I like having reserves of well trained pilots but it just makes it too difficult when the game puts fighter pilots into bombing squadrons and or torpedo bombing pilots in fighter squadrons. :-/

And I don't have the life to invest into manually selecting each pilot. Its just something I have lived with. Maybe there is a way around this?

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Kull

Here's the real deal: You can get 90+ of the desired result by setting up a few training units and just doing the bi-monthly or monthly check-up that many here recommend. What you are seeking is pilot training maximization through coding of some sort. Which is probably not going to happen, because the existing system is more than "good enough", results wise.

For people like me (and perhaps you), the real problem is we keep tweaking and tweaking and tweaking, not because we really HAVE to, but because the game will let us. The number of pilots I know by name and unit, is actually kinda scary......

From memory I know my top ace is Uchida in a Tojo IIc right now with 10 kills! [:D]

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Kull

Here's the real deal: You can get 90+ of the desired result by setting up a few training units and just doing the bi-monthly or monthly check-up that many here recommend. What you are seeking is pilot training maximization through coding of some sort. Which is probably not going to happen, because the existing system is more than "good enough", results wise.

For people like me (and perhaps you), the real problem is we keep tweaking and tweaking and tweaking, not because we really HAVE to, but because the game will let us. The number of pilots I know by name and unit, is actually kinda scary......

From memory I know my top ace is Uchida in a Tojo IIc right now with 10 kills! [:D]

Pappy Boyington with 43. Eight of my top ten are Dutch pilots ranging from 28 down to 19.

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Kull

The number of pilots I know by name and unit, is actually kinda scary......

From memory I know my top ace is Uchida in a Tojo IIc right now with 10 kills! [:D]

Pappy Boyington with 43. Eight of my top ten are Dutch pilots ranging from 28 down to 19.

CVL Ryujo had a fighter pilot named L.Tokuda, 75+, went MIA over Mindanao, was recovered, eventually returned to the unit, and a few turns after was KIA during a crash landing on the carrier. That was sad & frustrating. And here it is months later, and I still remember. Pretty immersive game!

[blueatoll]

I also feel this is the most frustrating aspect of the game, especially to new players. I have sent many a 55 EXP pilot to the front to get blown out of the sky trying to figure things out.

I have some pure training squadrons flying in various parts of the theater but my most effective training has been taking squadrons into areas where the Japanese units are basically isolated and out-of-supply (like Rabaul and parts of Micronesia) and just flying bombing missions with CAP and Sweeps to build up ground attack. I set the squadrons to not upgrade and they basically resupply whenever a frontline unit upgrades to a better model (like P-38 upgrades or Bolo upgrades). It seems like skills go up faster on actual missions. Tougher on airframes but who cares how many Bolos or P39s you lose in 1943.

[HansBolter]

You will likely never see overall experience climb above that 55 range if you only train one skill to 70.

After getting that primary skill to 70 switch to another skill and you will see the overall experience start to climb again.

After the primary skill for fighters and bombers switch to a "low" skill and you will not only see increases in overall experience again but significant increases in defense.

I train fighter pilots to 70 air skill and then switch to sweep at 100 ft to train strafing and defernse and overall experience.

For bombers train their primary (nav or ground) at normal high altitudes and then switch to low nav or low ground, even if you don't want to ever use the "low" skill in combat training it will spur advances in both overall experience and defense.

Training nav bombers in nav search is always a good thing just as training ground bombers in recon is a good thing and again, these added skills will boost overall experience.

Don't send 55 experience pilots with only one skill at 70 into combat unless you have no choice.

Pilot training is an incredibly rich an immersive part of the game that is very rewarding of attention to detail.

After all isn't that what we grognards crave in a mega-game? [;)]

[blueatoll]

Pilot training is an incredibly rich an immersive part of the game that is very rewarding of attention to detail.

After all isn't that what we grognards crave in a mega-game? [;)]

Well sort of.

I've never played any computer game that is still going on over four years since I started turn 1. My game has literally lasted almost as long as the actual war now. The invasion of Japan continues in April 1945 and I still am gripped at every turn, so it definitely has a lot of legs.

My son already calls this game War in the Pacific Accountant's Edition.

The Pilot Training part of this however reminds me a lot of my favorite Sci-Fi game - Master of Orion III - Spreadsheets in Space.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: blueatoll

I also feel this is the most frustrating aspect of the game, especially to new players. I have sent many a 55 EXP pilot to the front to get blown out of the sky trying to figure things out.

I have some pure training squadrons flying in various parts of the theater but my most effective training has been taking squadrons into areas where the Japanese units are basically isolated and out-of-supply (like Rabaul and parts of Micronesia) and just flying bombing missions with CAP and Sweeps to build up ground attack. I set the squadrons to not upgrade and they basically resupply whenever a frontline unit upgrades to a better model (like P-38 upgrades or Bolo upgrades). It seems like skills go up faster on actual missions. Tougher on airframes but who cares how many Bolos or P39s you lose in 1943.

Leaders help a lot, and training with full groups of planes.

Sending 55exp guys out to get killed may be frustrating, but that's what happened in reality too. If guys made it past their first few battles the were much more likely to survive a good long time as a pilot in the war.

ORIGINAL: blueatoll

Pilot training is an incredibly rich an immersive part of the game that is very rewarding of attention to detail.

After all isn't that what we grognards crave in a mega-game? [;)]

Well sort of.

I've never played any computer game that is still going on over four years since I started turn 1. My game has literally lasted almost as long as the actual war now. The invasion of Japan continues in April 1945 and I still am gripped at every turn, so it definitely has a lot of legs.

My son already calls this game War in the Pacific Accountant's Edition.

The Pilot Training part of this however reminds me a lot of my favorite Sci-Fi game - Master of Orion III - Spreadsheets in Space.

MOO III - That is a great game!![:D]

Spent more time playing MOO II though. Very addictive.

There could still be improvements, but I do like the pilot stuff, and once I figured out how to move guys in bulk by 5s and 10s it all got so much easier. I spend a bit of time on each turn doing pilot training stuff both because I like to check in on it and that spreads it out. I'm pretty systematic about how I do it though so there isn't much difficulty involved.

[geofflambert]

ORIGINAL: blueatoll

I also feel this is the most frustrating aspect of the game, especially to new players. I have sent many a 55 EXP pilot to the front to get blown out of the sky trying to figure things out.

I have some pure training squadrons flying in various parts of the theater but my most effective training has been taking squadrons into areas where the Japanese units are basically isolated and out-of-supply (like Rabaul and parts of Micronesia) and just flying bombing missions with CAP and Sweeps to build up ground attack. I set the squadrons to not upgrade and they basically resupply whenever a frontline unit upgrades to a better model (like P-38 upgrades or Bolo upgrades). It seems like skills go up faster on actual missions. Tougher on airframes but who cares how many Bolos or P39s you lose in 1943.

I try my damnedest not to send any fighter pilots under 70 exp air to the front. Occasionally I will break down and send someone in the high sixties, but 55? Keep training them and save the planes. If you don't have enough pilots that's an indication you've got too many squadrons at the front. Pull one out and put those 50+ or 60+ guys in it and get them training.

[geofflambert]

In my opinion a minimum of 50% of your squadrons should be doing training, I like something approaching 2/3rds. Within certain specialties you may have to do differently, just keep in mind that in many cases you can use one type of plane to improve skills for another type. I forget how it works for the Allied side, but many of the Japanese float planes can train at escort, just as an example. Just be aware you may have more choices than you think. If you do this sort of thing (and I do) you have to remember that the pilots may well be in the wrong reserve, in the case I just gave you will have future fighter pilots in the patrol reserve. When you're drawing pilots to the front look at the other reserves you've been using and suck those guys out of there before going to the fighter reserve. It's work but well worth it.