High Altitude Sweep Rant

[herwin]

@ChezDaJez

I'll add that you've addressed my criticisms more than adequately and given me food for thought for a future autonomous robot grant proposal. There are three areas where you might have some insight into bat behaviour:

1. How do bats control violent flight manoeuvres in heavy acoustic clutter on the basis of no more than 13 active sonar pulses a second?

2. How do bats outperform Kalman filters in the target intercept task? We know they don't do a tail chase and instead cut across the circle using a predictive model of some sort.

3. The hard one: how do bats recognise sub-microsecond jitter in the range to an acoustic target measured using active sonar. (Jim Simmons claims they can detect jitter on the order of 5-10 nanoseconds. Sensitivity to 100 nanosecond jitter is well-established.)

[ChezDaJez]

ORIGINAL: herwin

@ChezDaJez

I'll add that you've addressed my criticisms more than adequately and given me food for thought for a future autonomous robot grant proposal. There are three areas where you might have some insight into bat behaviour:

1. How do bats control violent flight manoeuvres in heavy acoustic clutter on the basis of no more than 13 active sonar pulses a second?

2. How do bats outperform Kalman filters in the target intercept task? We know they don't do a tail chase and instead cut across the circle using a predictive model of some sort.

3. The hard one: how do bats recognise sub-microsecond jitter in the range to an acoustic target measured using active sonar. (Jim Simmons claims they can detect jitter on the order of 5-10 nanoseconds. Sensitivity to 100 nanosecond jitter is well-established.)

?????

I'm sorry but I have never studied bats nor do I want to. If you wish to discuss submarine passive and active acoustics, then I'm game.

The point that I was trying to make to you, without being disrespectful, is that theorectical predictions are not neccessarily borne out during real world testing and operations. I recognize your academic expertise but I would appreciate some recognition that real world observations do not neccessarily support a person's theorectical computation.

Chez

[JWE]

ORIGINAL: ChezDaJez
I'm sorry but I have never studied bats nor do I want to. If you wish to discuss submarine passive and active acoustics, then I'm game.

The point that I was trying to make to you, without being disrespectful, is that theorectical predictions are not neccessarily borne out during real world testing and operations. I recognize your academic expertise but I would appreciate some recognition that real world observations do not neccessarily support a person's theorectical computation.

Chez

My original point, too, Chez. Theory and books lead you down the garden path into the weeds.

Mariner was the hottest thing since Dacron on the AC circuit. The theory was perfect and Brit Chance was one of the best internationally recognized designers in the world. But Ted Turner, neither designer, nor naval architect, nor engineer, but a highly experienced ‘pilot’ of racing sailboats, took one look and said ‘this is a piece of .. um’. Turns out is was quite a piece of .. um. So much for theory. Hundreds of other examples in the world of hydrodynamics.

Academic expertise doesn’t signify when compared to practical experience in such a highly dynamic and subjective field. That's why there are test pilots and why the information flow goes from 'experienced pilot' to designer - not the other way around.

[LoBaron]

ORIGINAL: castor troy
nothing wonders me anymore... you are most obvious the AE god and know how to handle everything, you even believe your guides lol. Now the pity is that I am talking about my Lightnings that are shredding the enemy´s second generation fighters. Nothing is broken and I´m fine with mentioning again that you blow out your senseless fantasy blah blah about pre Cap flak too and we all know how it turned out. But you sure can ignore that as long as you wish. AGAIN, I´m not saying there is something bugged, it´s the design that is working exactly how it was designed and doing ceiling sweeps is gaming the system (quote air team lead).

That says enough about it, it´s not the game that has a flaw, the players are the ones having the flaw. And please stop giving people advise "how to handle things" that obviously don´t work, at least not in ANY of the ongoing AARs it seems. But hey, perhaps it´s just you that is smart on the internet. [&o]

No. Not really. I believe I understand one single aspect of the game quite ok because I grabbed some of the mechanics behind them.
There are many people on this forum who can best me easily with their knowledge on the game.

Whatever youre babbling along about pre CAP is a mystery to me as, in case your memory really fails that bad, it was Rob Brennan and me who provided the first savegames to help the devs analyse
if there is an issue or not.

You neither need to follow my advice nor do you have to read it. Sleep well and watch your blood pressure.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: ChezDaJez

ORIGINAL: herwin

@ChezDaJez

I'll add that you've addressed my criticisms more than adequately and given me food for thought for a future autonomous robot grant proposal. There are three areas where you might have some insight into bat behaviour:

1. How do bats control violent flight manoeuvres in heavy acoustic clutter on the basis of no more than 13 active sonar pulses a second?

2. How do bats outperform Kalman filters in the target intercept task? We know they don't do a tail chase and instead cut across the circle using a predictive model of some sort.

3. The hard one: how do bats recognise sub-microsecond jitter in the range to an acoustic target measured using active sonar. (Jim Simmons claims they can detect jitter on the order of 5-10 nanoseconds. Sensitivity to 100 nanosecond jitter is well-established.)

?????

I'm sorry but I have never studied bats nor do I want to. If you wish to discuss submarine passive and active acoustics, then I'm game.

The point that I was trying to make to you, without being disrespectful, is that theorectical predictions are not neccessarily borne out during real world testing and operations. I recognize your academic expertise but I would appreciate some recognition that real world observations do not neccessarily support a person's theorectical computation.

Chez

Point accepted.

You described how you spotted and tracked targets. My experience is that all mammals I've worked with do this task in about the same way. Let me unpack how your (and Ian's) experience is relevant to these questions.

1. What a bat is doing is in many ways similar to what a fighter pilot does. How does a pilot maintain situational awareness during violent maneuvers?

2. Do pilots also outperform Kalman filters in the target intercept task, and what tricks are they using?

3. Do humans also show extreme sensitivity to target jitter?

A question I left out is how important is general situational awareness to the immediate target tracking problem? Bats seem to operate in an internal model what is used to control their behaviour and is only updated from sensory stimuli when and if new and relevant data are available. How much is in the pilot's head and how much is based on current sensory stimuli?

I'm not sure I should discuss sub acoustics here. I know too much theory and haven't had enough practice. I've often wondered, however, whether bats use TMA.

[TheElf]

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

ORIGINAL: Sardaukar
Not according to my experience. Sweep and CAP are different missions and there seem to be lot of difference how combat altitudes are calculated. Note that CAP also includes scrambled fighters that are still climbing to CAP altitude. Plus, one can always use same rule for CAP too, if needed.

A very good point.

The dynamic Sardaukar is refering too may be erroneously interpreted as a "Larger" CAP failing vs. a "Smaller" Sweep force. Though not all inclusive it would be easy for one who only reads CRs, and doesn't watch replays, to view a CAP of 50 Zekes being beset upon by 16 Hurricanes as being nerfed. But as Saraukar mentions there are typically many elements to a CAP that be at lower altitudes when combat is joined and further more may never actually get into the fight.

The simple perception would be 50 zekes got trounced by 16 Hurri's when in fact maybe 12 Zekes got trounced and 38 never got into position to affect the outcome either way.

[TheElf]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

ORIGINAL: castor troy
hope you´re never going to be any tester for anything. you would be a great novel writer though... fairy tales for 1-3yo by LoBaron. guess there would also be a chance to do a command & conquer manual. unfortunetely, you aren´t funny [:(]

we also could discuss the now working pre Cap flak, that would be fun for sure... or you can just ignore it...

Ok, just in case I have missed your point: So if I write fairy tails for 3 year olds or a command & conquer manual
this makes your op less BS? Or are we now discussing out of context? [:)]

we are always out of context because what you write here and sell as gospel is not what the game is doing. Same as the pre flak gospel BS and that was proved wrong by michaelm who got the balls to actually say "ok, here is something wrong". YOU never miss the point and are spot on. [&o] That´s why michaelm is around, to actually look at what is happening if people provide him with saves to look at. And he obviously also doesn´t refrain from saying something is wrong if another dev insists on "it´s wad". I of course agree that in the dive or sweep issue (however you want to call it) it´s not a bug, it´s the design and noone here on the forum will ever get tired to say "it´s right" or "it´s wrong". You may not believe it, but I´ve ever been fine with it since the day I saw the statement "it´s an exploit and people are gaming the system". That´s it for me as this is telling me, there is something wrong.

how often do you think has my opponent changed his fighters´ altitude to all possible combinations? Hundreds of times. I did the same. You sure think it would have helped him against 39-42000ft sweeps? No, but hey, we all agreed that this is gaming the system. All you can do is agree on everyone on the same alt and then the one who gets radar help or has plain luck ends up a couple of feet higher which is going to be enouh. Tojo vs Corsair is a good example, the Corsair can go a couple of feet higher... that´s enough for the dive.

Actually it was me who had the balls to look into it. Michaelm is my looking glass, but as often as not brings things to my attention when he sees something in the Matrix.

Whether you see it or not, we look into most complaints on this forum. Especially when they are expressed sincerely and with supporting data.

[TheElf]

To answer the question that was posed a few posts ago, how to determine when Sweep altitude is approaching silliness: The answer can be found in the stats.

As I have said before, and will again...Aircraft perform differently at different altitudes. Without a long discussion of Aerodynamics, it essentially comes down to where the Power of the Engine(s), the aerodynamic efficiency of the Design, the topspeed is reached, and the weight of the Aircraft are in harmony. This place is called Critical altitude, and most commonly is used in the context of relating the point where the Engine begins to suffer oxygen starvation. It manifests on paper where Topspeed begins to drop off. To the pilot is may just feel like the plane is bahaving a little sluggishly. There are many ways to forestall this sad loss of performance. Modulating fuel mixture, Reducing drag, supercharging or turbocharging (ie. increasing manifold pressure) desiging broader propellers, or just using 2200 Horsepower and a 14 ft Prop. The list goes on.

In the Game this point can be discerned in the Maneuver stats. When MVR begins to decrease you are starting exceed the design limits of the aircraft in question.

Aircraft in general do not fly well above 20k'. Even modern Jets. It's all relative of course, but the air up there is thin. It impacts EVERYTHING about an airplane. ALL Airplanes like LOTS of Air molecules to fly through.

An EXCELLENT variation of my original rule to deal with the exploit of the altitude system can be found here
tm.asp?m=2530819&mpage=3&key=TheElf�

Simply: no fighter sweeps higher then the ALT with the second best MVR value

I credit Vettim89 with this great rule, though it may have been his opponent.

When looking at the stats Max ceiling is just that. Some Test pilot (they are good for some things...) got into a prototype version of said Airplane with half a bag of gas, no weapon systems, on a cold COLD Day in the middle of a high pressure system and flew as high as he could possibly fly. They may have attempted this a handful of times, and noted the altitude. That is what you see in the stats. Why? Because it is an innocently accurate factual stat.

Why did we not limit this in the game to some more realistic Combat Ceiling? Well as players (the designers) we felt that giving the players the latitude was more important than hard coding. We also felt (hoped), due to the niche nature of this subject matter, players would play historically. And accordingly the same people who lament the current code would likely lament that Aircraft "so and so" could fly higher than "X" altitude and we'd be wrong again...I might be projecting here, but you decide...

Unfortunately as someone has already said maxing out ceiling on every occasion is gaming the system because
the game does not model all of the drawbacks of this altitude. It's not gaming the system pruely because of some loophole, it is gaming the system because those who do it usually know that they shouldn't. That it is historically wrong, inaccurate, unfair, etc. But they choose to do it. There WERE real drawbacks to Hi altitude operations. One of them IS represented in the game, and it is the most important one....pay attention here CT.

any edge in performance of one aircraft over another, typically was magnified as combat increased in altitude.

So if you are facing an enemy with a superior plane it is not a good idea to try to outperform that enemy at a higher altitude. Human nature being what it is however, this situation leads to altitude brinksmanship, or an Altitude race. Then end of the race occurs withn the A/C with the highest max ceiling owning the other.

[witpqs]

Thanks much for the post.

You mentioned only sweeps, but how about CAP - should the the same rule be applied? Based upon your essay it seems that it should (apply to CAP also).

[Nomad]

Just to be fair Elf, it was guctony who came up the 2nd best maneuver band house rule in our 2x2 daBigBabes game.

And I will also thank you very much for your continued discussion of this matter.

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: TheElf

To answer the question that was posed a few posts ago, how to determine when Sweep altitude is approaching silliness: The answer can be found in the stats.

Aircraft in general do not fly well above 20k'. Even modern Jets. It's all relative of course, but the air up there is thin. It impacts EVERYTHING about an airplane. ALL Airplanes like LOTS of Air molecules to fly through.

An EXCELLENT variation of my original rule to deal with the exploit of the altitude system can be found here
tm.asp?m=2530819&mpage=3&key=TheElf�

Simply: no fighter sweeps higher then the ALT with the second best MVR value

I credit Vettim89 with this great rule, though it may have been his opponent.

Hi Ian/Elf,

Thx for ur answers i think many appriciate that.

I've played a game that sadly recently stopped not that long into the war where we had use best MVR as max CAP/Sweep altitude and it seemd to work well. Not that 2nd best wont be as good or better.

Back then i was looking ahead through the planes to try and detemain how the rule would affect the allowed altitude.
Seems to me that u have been relutant to answer direct question non the less i will pose a few. U can always as it is ur right not answer them.[:)]

It seems to me that the clear intend of the rule is to limit the max altutide used in combat.
Since im sorta a rule lawyer, yeah that annoying type[:D], i did notice that using the MVR bands espciallly if using 2nd best u later in the war runs into some issues. I assume ppl havent made it that far into the war using these type a rules so i thot i'd pose the issues before ppl run into the possible issues.

A number of planes in particular using the 2nd best MVR bands actually allow u per rule if not intend to max out ur altitude since MVR or 2nd best is the same all the way up. I assume, but i could be wrong that in the case of the P-47 ur intend isnt for it to fight at 44k.

Ok so that doesn stop per that rule in some case ppl being "allowed" to go to max ceiling. In lieu of that is there some sorta addition to the HR u suggest as a good one to have a max altitude if MVR band doesnt provide it?
(reading ur posts one might deduce 20-25k as ur target)

2ndly would u suggest the rule to cover both sweeps and CAPs?

Kind regards,

Rasmus

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: LoBaron

ORIGINAL: castor troy
nothing wonders me anymore... you are most obvious the AE god and know how to handle everything, you even believe your guides lol. Now the pity is that I am talking about my Lightnings that are shredding the enemy´s second generation fighters. Nothing is broken and I´m fine with mentioning again that you blow out your senseless fantasy blah blah about pre Cap flak too and we all know how it turned out. But you sure can ignore that as long as you wish. AGAIN, I´m not saying there is something bugged, it´s the design that is working exactly how it was designed and doing ceiling sweeps is gaming the system (quote air team lead).

That says enough about it, it´s not the game that has a flaw, the players are the ones having the flaw. And please stop giving people advise "how to handle things" that obviously don´t work, at least not in ANY of the ongoing AARs it seems. But hey, perhaps it´s just you that is smart on the internet. [&o]

No. Not really. I believe I understand one single aspect of the game quite ok because I grabbed some of the mechanics behind them.
There are many people on this forum who can best me easily with their knowledge on the game.

Whatever youre babbling along about pre CAP is a mystery to me as, in case your memory really fails that bad, it was Rob Brennan and me who provided the first savegames to help the devs analyse
if there is an issue or not.

You neither need to follow my advice nor do you have to read it. Sleep well and watch your blood pressure.

and you didn´t insist (together with an important official person) that pre Cap flak was working perfectly for months? Exactly to the point when the bug was found that made it not working as designed. Did you provide your save because you wanted to prove it´s wad or to prove it´s not wad? We sure are 100% different person but if I would insist for months that something is good and wad then I would provide a save saying: look at it, it sure is ok.

we´re heading into the wrong way with our discussions all the time anyway... sayonara

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: TheElf

ORIGINAL: castor troy

ORIGINAL: LoBaron




Ok, just in case I have missed your point: So if I write fairy tails for 3 year olds or a command & conquer manual
this makes your op less BS? Or are we now discussing out of context? [:)]

we are always out of context because what you write here and sell as gospel is not what the game is doing. Same as the pre flak gospel BS and that was proved wrong by michaelm who got the balls to actually say "ok, here is something wrong". YOU never miss the point and are spot on. [&o] That´s why michaelm is around, to actually look at what is happening if people provide him with saves to look at. And he obviously also doesn´t refrain from saying something is wrong if another dev insists on "it´s wad". I of course agree that in the dive or sweep issue (however you want to call it) it´s not a bug, it´s the design and noone here on the forum will ever get tired to say "it´s right" or "it´s wrong". You may not believe it, but I´ve ever been fine with it since the day I saw the statement "it´s an exploit and people are gaming the system". That´s it for me as this is telling me, there is something wrong.

how often do you think has my opponent changed his fighters´ altitude to all possible combinations? Hundreds of times. I did the same. You sure think it would have helped him against 39-42000ft sweeps? No, but hey, we all agreed that this is gaming the system. All you can do is agree on everyone on the same alt and then the one who gets radar help or has plain luck ends up a couple of feet higher which is going to be enouh. Tojo vs Corsair is a good example, the Corsair can go a couple of feet higher... that´s enough for the dive.

Actually it was me who had the balls to look into it. Michaelm is my looking glass, but as often as not brings things to my attention when he sees something in the Matrix.

Whether you see it or not, we look into most complaints on this forum. Especially when they are expressed sincerely and with supporting data.

so thanks to you Elf for having the balls to look at it even that there was a monthly discussion on the forum that had the official statement "it´s wad and it´s ok as it is".

and yes, I definetely do see that the officials look into complaints and provide pretty much the best support you can get for a computer game. This has never been a point in any of the discussions and I guess there´s noone here that would think that the game isn´t very well supported.

[Moss Orleni]

Hi all,

The number of posts on this whole altitude thingy is now close to overloading the forum storage limits... enough stuff for a trilogy if you ask me (Lord of the Wings or something like that)

As an attempt (maybe idealistic, certainly bold [:)]) to wrap up the discussion, allow me to ask three short and humble questions:

1.To theElf:
from a code perspective, is it possible/feasible to link plane and pilot fatigue to plane altitude? (Either simplified to the altitude set by the player, or more advanced, to -a proxy of- the altitude used during combat resolution?)

2.To the non-believers of the current model:
would linking plane/pilot fatigue to altitude be sufficient to solve your issues?

3.To the believers of the current model:
would linking plane/pilot fatigue to altitude still make the current air model acceptable?

I realize that a 'no' to the first question makes the other two irrelevant. But somehow, I have high hopes that the creators of this already wonderfully advanced air model will be able to pull this one off as well!
But if we get three times a 'yes', then let's kindly ask the support team - and I think anyone, believers and non-believers will agree when I say I know of no other game that receives such a dedicated and qualitative supported as this one - to consider including this request for the next patch.

And then we can quietly go about our own ways and use our additionally gained free time to fight it out in the sky some more! (at altitudes of your own choosing [:D])

Cheers,

Moss

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: TheElf

To answer the question that was posed a few posts ago, how to determine when Sweep altitude is approaching silliness: The answer can be found in the stats.

As I have said before, and will again...Aircraft perform differently at different altitudes. Without a long discussion of Aerodynamics, it essentially comes down to where the Power of the Engine(s), the aerodynamic efficiency of the Design, the topspeed is reached, and the weight of the Aircraft are in harmony. This place is called Critical altitude, and most commonly is used in the context of relating the point where the Engine begins to suffer oxygen starvation. It manifests on paper where Topspeed begins to drop off. To the pilot is may just feel like the plane is bahaving a little sluggishly. There are many ways to forestall this sad loss of performance. Modulating fuel mixture, Reducing drag, supercharging or turbocharging (ie. increasing manifold pressure) desiging broader propellers, or just using 2200 Horsepower and a 14 ft Prop. The list goes on.

In the Game this point can be discerned in the Maneuver stats. When MVR begins to decrease you are starting exceed the design limits of the aircraft in question.

Aircraft in general do not fly well above 20k'. Even modern Jets. It's all relative of course, but the air up there is thin. It impacts EVERYTHING about an airplane. ALL Airplanes like LOTS of Air molecules to fly through.

An EXCELLENT variation of my original rule to deal with the exploit of the altitude system can be found here
tm.asp?m=2530819&mpage=3&key=TheElf�

Simply: no fighter sweeps higher then the ALT with the second best MVR value

I credit Vettim89 with this great rule, though it may have been his opponent.

When looking at the stats Max ceiling is just that. Some Test pilot (they are good for some things...) got into a prototype version of said Airplane with half a bag of gas, no weapon systems, on a cold COLD Day in the middle of a high pressure system and flew as high as he could possibly fly. They may have attempted this a handful of times, and noted the altitude. That is what you see in the stats. Why? Because it is an innocently accurate factual stat.

Why did we not limit this in the game to some more realistic Combat Ceiling? Well as players (the designers) we felt that giving the players the latitude was more important than hard coding. We also felt (hoped), due to the niche nature of this subject matter, players would play historically. And accordingly the same people who lament the current code would likely lament that Aircraft "so and so" could fly higher than "X" altitude and we'd be wrong again...I might be projecting here, but you decide...

Unfortunately as someone has already said maxing out ceiling on every occasion is gaming the system because
the game does not model all of the drawbacks of this altitude. It's not gaming the system pruely because of some loophole, it is gaming the system because those who do it usually know that they shouldn't. That it is historically wrong, inaccurate, unfair, etc. But they choose to do it. There WERE real drawbacks to Hi altitude operations. One of them IS represented in the game, and it is the most important one....pay attention here CT.

any edge in performance of one aircraft over another, typically was magnified as combat increased in altitude.

So if you are facing an enemy with a superior plane it is not a good idea to try to outperform that enemy at a higher altitude. Human nature being what it is however, this situation leads to altitude brinksmanship, or an Altitude race. Then end of the race occurs withn the A/C with the highest max ceiling owning the other.

with the above mentioned hr for sweeps, I guess this would imply for Cap too then? And would this lead to the Cap being higher then most of the time due to them being sent higher to intercept and it therefore would only reverse the effect of alt and giving the defender the dive instead of the attacker? Or is the chance for the Cap lower to get the ongoing dive like the attacker gets it when you send them in higher than the defender can go?

[castor troy]

btw, I don´t have the aircraft stats in front of me but with the second best man rate, wouldn´t that mean we are again talking about near max altitude for all the US second generation fighters? Corsair, Hellcat, P-38, P-47... [&:]

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Moss Orleni

Hi all,

The number of posts on this whole altitude thingy is now close to overloading the forum storage limits... enough stuff for a trilogy if you ask me (Lord of the Wings or something like that)

As an (maybe idealistic, certainly bold [:)]), attempt to wrap up the discussion allow me to ask three short and humble questions:

1.To theElf:
from a code perspective, is it possible/feasible to link plane and pilot fatigue to plane altitude? (Either simplified to the altitude set by the player, or more advanced, to -a proxy of- the altitude used during combat resolution?)

2.To the non-believers of the current model:
would linking plane/pilot fatigue to altitude be sufficient to solve your issues?

3.To the believers of the current model:
would linking plane/pilot fatigue to altitude still make the current air model acceptable?

I realize that a 'no' to the first question makes the other two irrelevant. But somehow, I have high hopes that the creators of this already wonderfully advanced air model will be able to pull this one off as well!
But if we get three times a 'yes', then let's kindly ask the support team - and I think anyone, believers and non-believers will agree when I say I know of no other game that receives such a dedicated and qualitative supported as this one - to consider including this request for the next patch.

And then we can quietly go about our own ways and use our additionally gained free time to fight it out in the sky some more! (at altitudes of your own choosing [:D])

Cheers,

Moss

I would just stand down the fighter squadrons for three days instead of two days in between of their missions. Would reduce the pace of the game though. I couldn´t spot a decrease in combat performance in very long ranged sweeps, op losses might go up but over the target, my P-38 work just fine, no matter if they are flying 6 hexes, or 15. I do think that forcing stubborn people like me to a more realistically altitude would be good though, tripple fatigue (not only pilot but also plane, tripple op losses for these Sputnik missions. That way you either run out of combat ready P-38 after one long range Sputnik mission (all in the garage for repairs) or you lose more fighters to ops than to combat (due to the pilots being rather dead than alive from flying at this alt).

Combat ceiling would have been great, but we, the forum members, for sure would have said what Elf mentioned above: "that´s wrong, aircraft x could have flown x ft higher" so the way to go sure were the stats they used. You just gotta be more punished for using your ac at heights like most people do and my impression still is that most people (not all) are using their aircraft far higher than they were used in real life and that´s where I think it should be the game to force them into more reasonable altitude bands to fight the Pacific airwar.

And note that neither my opponent nor me were using our fighters the way we do now right from the start. We began at altitudes we thought would be best for our aircraft, but ended up in the spiral to the fighters´ ceilings because we both thought we get the best out of our aircraft at their ceiling (whenever that is higher than the enemy´s).

[Central Blue]

ORIGINAL: TheElf

Simply: no fighter sweeps higher then the ALT with the second best MVR value

[ellipses]

So if you are facing an enemy with a superior plane it is not a good idea to try to outperform that enemy at a higher altitude. Human nature being what it is however, this situation leads to altitude brinksmanship, or an Altitude race. Then end of the race occurs withn the A/C with the highest max ceiling owning the other.

I take this to mean that there is something to be said for historical lessons learned, even if I don't understand all of the science and real-life experience being batted around -- which is not to say that I don't enjoy the discussions ongoing.

Hours upon hours of playing this game -- albeit against the AI -- since it was PacWar, leaves me with the conclusion that there is little to be gained by the Allied player pushing the air envelope in the early days when his planes are not so good, the good planes rare, and his pilots are not so experienced or always well led.

While it may be possible to obtain local superiority in some situations in the early days, it is no fault of the designers that the AFB can't obtain general superiority unless he is facing an opponent more incompetent than the AI.

I think it takes a certain amount of iron, or lead, in the pants to rely on armored cockpits, self-sealing gas tanks, and pilot recovery doctrine to create a possible offensive opening for Allied fighters at some future date when good fighters, and trained pilots and leaders are more plentiful; but wouldn't the grognards be disappointed if it were otherwise?

Historical lessons are available to those of us that aren't pilots or scientists, or even real historians. And I think there is something to be said for players having to learn tactics as they go. It is certainly nice to learn anything we can about how to optimize pilot training to match design choices and constraints. I do have some concern that such info seems to come out because of constant complaints from players unhappy with the situation in the early days of the war or the blurring that results from designing the air game to the existing hex size.

If life deals yo a squadron of P39's, train them to defend themselves over their own base and bust the chops of enemy shipping in range if they aren't CAPed or armored, but don't expect them to win you air superiority over an enemy base far from home.

Crikey, I'm rambling. I just mean to say that I am getting about what I expect, so kudos to the devs for keeping the flow close to real. Alt-history is up to the scenario designers. Maybe I'll cry if I play a PBEM.

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: castor troy

btw, I don´t have the aircraft stats in front of me but with the second best man rate, wouldn´t that mean we are again talking about near max altitude for all the US second generation fighters? Corsair, Hellcat, P-38, P-47... [&:]

Yes and no. P-51,-P-38, F4U no. 25K IIRC is max for those which seems reasonble enough.
F6F and especially later P-47 which have same value through out the bands, yes.
Non the less the idea is to ammnend the HR regarding those to some max rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Some of the late war jap planes have same issues with 2nd best band.

Kind regards,

Rasmus

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Walloc

ORIGINAL: castor troy

btw, I don´t have the aircraft stats in front of me but with the second best man rate, wouldn´t that mean we are again talking about near max altitude for all the US second generation fighters? Corsair, Hellcat, P-38, P-47... [&:]

Yes and no. P-51,-P-38, F4U no. 25K IIRC is max for those which seems reasonble enough.
F6F and especially later P-47 which have same value through out the bands, yes.
Non the less the idea is to ammnend the HR regarding those to some max rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Some of the late war jap planes have same issues with 2nd best band.

Kind regards,

Rasmus

just checked ingame, most of the fighters will end up in the 25-31k band. Zeroes, Tojos and Oscars then meet P-38 and most of the other Allied fighters at 31k. So it´s going to change the 39k to 31k? With fighters like the Hellcat or Thud being still near 40k. Of course I can see giving away the dive for the sweeper when most fighters meet at 31, with the chance for the defender to send his fighters up higher if radar is present. I kind of miss what should make it really better. [&:]