Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: Professor Chaos

ORIGINAL: Kull
There's an easier way to make your case. Show the relevant text from the manual. In this case, we have item #5 (circled below) from the Pilot Addendum which clearly states that the presence of 80+ pilots "increases the chance of successful training". That is an answer which is crystal clear. No guesswork or need for debate.

That part of the Training Addendum seems to describe two different ways to gain experience and skill: (a) training missions, and (b) a separate chance every day, based on factors 1-5, which includes the presence of 80+ veterans. Do veterans also improve the effectiveness of training missions?

Read post #7 of this thread https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.a ... t&#4539968

IIRC I have posted a "clearer" answer elsewhere (perhaps in an AAR) but can't currently locate it.

Alfred

ORIGINAL: GetAssista

..... oversized TRACOM (several hundred guys) can eventually increase IJNAF graduation xp to ridiculous levels. I have saves with 55-60+ xp quoted in the "Replacement pilots" intelligence screen stat in mid 43 stock 1 game against Allied AI, and it is really that high contrary to the scenario-set level of average 35 xp...

There was a comment on last month's TRACOM thread that pushes this into focus. Possibly.

If you take positive action to empty your pools and pull those recruits early you might get them into squadrons at that high % level.

However, if you don't pull them early, then the exe clamps down and resets them at </= national max when they emerge from training.

I anticipate Alfred may poo-poo this, but I am just the man on the Clapham omnibus.

ORIGINAL: Professor Chaos

That part of the Training Addendum seems to describe two different ways to gain experience and skill: (a) training missions, and (b) a separate chance every day, based on factors 1-5, which includes the presence of 80+ veterans. Do veterans also improve the effectiveness of training missions?

It's hard to say for sure because it involves some element of "reading tea leaves". First of all, it seems likely (but I'm just guessing) that the five "end of the day" factors were part of a post-first-release code change, probably the one which led to the "pilot addendum" in the first place (which was NOT part of the first release, and thus has many elements not covered in the manual)

Secondly, the "dedicated training group" code was all stripped out in a follow-on patch, and it's possible that other, unannounced, changes were made to the training code at the same time. See this thread for a discussion on the why's behind the elimination of dedicated training groups, which includes several posts from the devs.

Anyway, here's where I'm going with this: The pilot addendum was not updated AFTER that change, and definitely contains misinformation (at least with regard to the training groups - see items 3 & 4 of the excerpt I posted above). So I suppose it's possible that there are other elements which no longer apply or were altered in some way. On balance however, it seems unlikely that the "end of day" experience-related factors would ALSO be replicated in the normal training code (the code which is applied at the end of each day-phase)

However, there definitely was a lot of post-release futzing around with the pilot training code. Careful parsing of dev comments in other threads may yield additional nuggets.

I have found this as Allies, an excellent place to train pilots is the groups that can be bought out. The pilot experience is low but they gain skills very fast. The lower experienced pilots are more likely to gain the experience and skill.

On that thread:

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2314379

michaelm75au
.
.
.
And yes adding experienced pilots will assist with training.

Whoever michaelm75au is.

ORIGINAL: Kull
There's an easier way to make your case. Show the relevant text from the manual. In this case, we have item #5 (circled below) from the Pilot Addendum which clearly states that the presence of 80+ pilots "increases the chance of successful training". That is an answer which is crystal clear. No guesswork or need for debate.

I'd also recommend caution in blanket recognition of the manual as being the be-all end-all arbiter of 'truth' in the game. Much has happened with the game code and revisions of the game since the manual was printed lo these many years ago. The manual as written is / was full of errors of omission and half-truths and needs to be seasoned with interpretation. Particularly for those of us that are not privy to the programming and haven't had the opportunity to 'peek under the hood' of the design.

For example, in the addendum you provided, there is room for selective interpretation of the text. The text: "These gain both skill and experience points" is not necessarily correct. More correct would be to say that "These may gain both skill and experience points" as this process is not a day-to-day binary choice. Those of us that have used pilot training know that there's never a guarantee that the training process (even assuming subvariables 1-5 are included) will gain either skill or experience points.

Furthermore, the manual doesn't state that skill or experience training is capped with on-map training efforts. Those of us know that training on-map will effectively never get above EXP or individual skill of ~75. Training asymptotically approaches these levels over time.

So there's a practical limit to the use of on-map training regardless of what is written in either the manual or in the addendum. Hence the need for debate, 'guesswork', gameplay experience and Kentucky windage. The letter of the manual and the addendum is insufficient.

ETA: Again, I'm late to the discussion. You clarify your position (and seem to be on my wavelength) in your post #24.

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe

On that thread:

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2314379

michaelm75au
.
.
.
And yes adding experienced pilots will assist with training.

Whoever michaelm75au is.

Michael is one of the developers....GP

ORIGINAL: btd64

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe

On that thread:

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2314379

michaelm75au
.
.
.
And yes adding experienced pilots will assist with training.

Whoever michaelm75au is.

Michael is one of the developers....GP

Thank you. I suspected that but I did not definitely know that.

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

I'd also recommend caution in blanket recognition of the manual as being the be-all end-all arbiter of 'truth' in the game.

To that point (but primarily as a concrete example of the changes made to pilot experience and training), there's this. Although there isn't a "Pilot National Experience" chart in the Game Manual (the one posted above is from the Editor Manual), on page 59 there is a screenshot of the "as-released" Allied Pilot Replacements window (#1). Note the 1941 national experience averages (circled in red). By contrast, here is the same screen in the current AE release (#2), same date, Scenario 1. BIG difference, but it does match the table from the Editor Manual.

So I will agree that there's a lot of "smoke" surrounding pilot training - those algorithms (and even fundamental things like "national experience") have obviously undergone a number of changes. That said, while there are some areas where the manual isn't correct, in the vast majority of cases, it still is.

Speaking of Nuggets, we have this from the coder himself. The quote is dated 12/13/2009, which is AFTER the patch which removed Dedicated Training Units. So it's *probably* a good description of the "as-is" code on the workings of TRACOM (doesn't address all aspects of pilot training, however):

ORIGINAL: michaelm75au

There is some behind the scenes action with training of raw pilots and TRACOM.

The number of TRACOM guys can increase the month's EXP rating of the raw pilots.
If the new EXP exceeds the national EXP, then a random number of pilots will 'graduate' early.
When this happens, you get a message "instructors accelerate training of" in the operation report.

In general, this jump is only going to occur in the last month of training, unless you add a huge number of pilots to TRACOM.

A rough guide is: for every 10 in TRACOM (of the correct nationality), the monthly EXP might be increased by one.

Adjustments to the pilot training happens on the first day of the month.
The monthly EXP increase of the raw pilots (ignoring TRACOM effect) is a random amount (-2 to +2).
The new monthly EXP starts out as an average of the pilots in the month and those moving from the previous month.

ORIGINAL: Kull

Speaking of Nuggets, we have this from the coder himself. The quote is dated 12/13/2009, which is AFTER the patch which removed Dedicated Training Units. So it's *probably* a good description of the "as-is" code on the workings of TRACOM (doesn't address all aspects of pilot training, however):

ORIGINAL: michaelm75au

There is some behind the scenes action with training of raw pilots and TRACOM.

The number of TRACOM guys can increase the month's EXP rating of the raw pilots.
If the new EXP exceeds the national EXP, then a random number of pilots will 'graduate' early.
When this happens, you get a message "instructors accelerate training of" in the operation report.

In general, this jump is only going to occur in the last month of training, unless you add a huge number of pilots to TRACOM.

A rough guide is: for every 10 in TRACOM (of the correct nationality), the monthly EXP might be increased by one.

Adjustments to the pilot training happens on the first day of the month.
The monthly EXP increase of the raw pilots (ignoring TRACOM effect) is a random amount (-2 to +2).
The new monthly EXP starts out as an average of the pilots in the month and those moving from the previous month.

I guess that if the pilot gets experience below zero, it ruins his whole day?

ORIGINAL: Kull

Secondly, the "dedicated training group" code was all stripped out in a follow-on patch, ...

The code is still there, and dedicated training groups can be included as a scenario modification. There was, briefly, an option in-game to switch operational air-groups to a training role. That was deleted.

The training groups which Bill Brown inserted in my mod hold some multiple of the usual number of pilots (triple, IIRC*). Whether they provide faster training than operational groups set to 100% training mission, I am not sure. I usually drop replacements into the training groups, and they stay there until they hit 70 on their core skill. I use the restricted operational groups for the same purpose, but have not monitored their progress closely enough to see if there is a tangible difference.

*I did put one of Bill's USN training groups on a carrier repairing at SFO, and upsized it to 90 aircraft. It trained 270 nuggets at a time.

This is particularly important for Japan since HI is precious and it costs "X" amount of HI per pilot per day

Five HI is the correct amount, but its assessed once at the end of the month, not per day.

ORIGINAL: Kull

Speaking of Nuggets, we have this from the coder himself. The quote is dated 12/13/2009, which is AFTER the patch which removed Dedicated Training Units. So it's *probably* a good description of the "as-is" code on the workings of TRACOM (doesn't address all aspects of pilot training, however):

ORIGINAL: michaelm75au

There is some behind the scenes action with training of raw pilots and TRACOM.

The number of TRACOM guys can increase the month's EXP rating of the raw pilots.
If the new EXP exceeds the national EXP, then a random number of pilots will 'graduate' early.
When this happens, you get a message "instructors accelerate training of" in the operation report.

In general, this jump is only going to occur in the last month of training, unless you add a huge number of pilots to TRACOM.

A rough guide is: for every 10 in TRACOM (of the correct nationality), the monthly EXP might be increased by one.

Adjustments to the pilot training happens on the first day of the month.
The monthly EXP increase of the raw pilots (ignoring TRACOM effect) is a random amount (-2 to +2).
The new monthly EXP starts out as an average of the pilots in the month and those moving from the previous month.

Now this clears up some of the 'mud', at least for myself. Haven't seen it before, thanks Kull.

Having spent wayyyyyy too much time reading through threads on this topic, I have a hypothesis that much of the testing and fingerpointing around the issue of pilot training comes down to a simple misunderstanding of terminology. Specifically: All mention of the word "Experience" refers ONLY to that ONE particular aspect of a pilot's skill set.

So when people run tests and start making counts of how many pilots had a SKILL number (of which there are 12) change from white to green...well that's a whole different thing. Trying to correlate that back to factors which are SPECIFICALLY talking about Experience....well, I suspect that is apples to oranges.

ORIGINAL: rustysi

This is particularly important for Japan since HI is precious and it costs "X" amount of HI per pilot per day

Five HI is the correct amount, but its assessed once at the end of the month, not per day.

That is what I posted.

So it actually behooves the Japanese to drain the trainee pool. Getting the trainees out before they have full experience saves HI so more aircraft can be built, plus lower experience allows them to train up in skill sets better.

Also by switching from fighters, to bombers to transports, and back the experience takes a hit so the skills can be trained better. I have seen pilots with over 50 experience with no special skills!

So it actually behooves the Japanese to drain the trainee pool. Getting the trainees out before they have full experience saves HI so more aircraft can be built, plus lower experience allows them to train up in skill sets better.

Double edged sword. By doing what you advocate you now have to spend supply to train pilots. I find I have much more HI than supply, relatively speaking. JMHO. YMMV.[:)]

ORIGINAL: rustysi

So it actually behooves the Japanese to drain the trainee pool. Getting the trainees out before they have full experience saves HI so more aircraft can be built, plus lower experience allows them to train up in skill sets better.

Double edged sword. By doing what you advocate you now have to spend supply to train pilots. I find I have much more HI than supply, relatively speaking. JMHO. YMMV.[:)]

Not necessarily. Until you draw the pilots into units, they are available, but "not named". Pilots without names do not require any supply, nor do they count against the 70K "pilot cap":

ORIGINAL: Alfred

Unless I am very much mistaken, the pilot array now allows for up to 70k named pilots in total from both sides. Pilots which graduate from the 12 month training pipeline and go to the replacement pool are not named. They are named when they are sent to a squadron and then retain their name when sent back to one of the veteran pools.

The previous global limit of 50k should have sufficed and yet already some players had come up against the limit. My reading of both michaelm and jwilkerson is that there will be no further increase in the global pilot array beyond 70k. That effectively means each side should aim for no higher than 35k named pilots. Keeping pilots in squadrons to only 133% of the TOE should easily fall within the new limit. If a player starts to have 200% or more of pilots, plus retain substantial pools, the new limit (of 35k each) will soon be reached.

As always, there are costs associated with any approach. Not a problem if players are aware of them and take the appropriate steps to mitigate those costs. Too often players only think of the benefits derived from adopting a particular course of action and then complain when the "chickens come home to roost".

Alfred

Above quote can be found here.

ORIGINAL: Kull

ORIGINAL: rustysi

So it actually behooves the Japanese to drain the trainee pool. Getting the trainees out before they have full experience saves HI so more aircraft can be built, plus lower experience allows them to train up in skill sets better.

Double edged sword. By doing what you advocate you now have to spend supply to train pilots. I find I have much more HI than supply, relatively speaking. JMHO. YMMV.[:)]

Not necessarily. Until you draw the pilots into units, they are available, but "not named". Pilots without names do not require any supply, nor do they count against the 70K "pilot cap":

Above quote can be found here.

I believe what rustysi is saying is that:
1. Normally a pilot has an average 30 air skill.
2. By forcibly “graduating” him before that, he will have ,say, 20 air skill.
3. Somehow, somewhere, you will have to train him on-board, and taking him the extra distance from 20 to 30 skills costs supplies.
4. 20-30 skill is fast, but still a supply cost somehow

But the Japanese national pilot experience average goes down later in the game, does it not? So by getting them early, you are getting them at the higher national average. Train them to be good Kamikaze pilots instead of poorly trained ones.