Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

[Chris_Redfield]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

Well, here's a rough diagram that shows what I'm talking about:

Each missile image is placed to show a "tick" where it would try to aquire it's target. As you can see, the tight missile has no chance of ever hitting a plane that goes into a tight turn. The wider tracking missile has no chance of losing it's lock.

Without adding some kind of random break code, this system cannot be anything other than a binery one. Hit/miss, nothing in between.

Edit: It occurs to me that IF it were possible to make the tracking angle based on "fuzzy logic", it would improve things a bit. Instead of the tracking angle being an absolute, it would have to be based on a chance to tack that starts at 100% within a fixed angle, then drops off as the target moves away from that cone. Still, it's not optimal since it would still make simple hard turns your best evasive maneuver.

HOWEVER, if you were to use this in combonation with a delayed tracking script where it uses the prevous tick's information, the lag it would induce would make drastic changes in flightpath more effective DACM (Defencive Air Combat Maneuvers).

That's getting perty complicated tho. The increased complexity will impose a hit on CPU and raises the possiblities of bugs creeping in.

Ah, roger that. I´m going to dig into this and post my opinions/suggestions afterwards. Is this whats going on in 1.2 right now? Or is that a theory?

[WarGimp]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

See the edit for some more info (infact, if you could edit to re-quote with the additional info, it would be apressiated).

This is partly theory and partly based on AI code I was personally working on for a project some time back.

Edit: I also forgot to mention that adding random breaking code would also suck... a lot.

[WarGimp]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

Its all simple really then. Its a conflict of opinions. You prefer hunting while I prefer chasing. You are overly looking on the defensive side of the dogfight where I am concentrating on the offensive side.

This hear is a very good observation on personal preferance.

Yeah, I like the hunter/hunted aspects of modern dogfighting. I do believe that chasing skills are a good thing as well, but since the system will only support one or the other, I have to pick a side. I'd rather see the dynamics leaning towards tacitcal aspects than pure reflex.

This, BTW, is why I sometimes get a little short tempered with these forums and you in particular, Chris. I love to see thinking going on, but mon-sided ranting based on personal opinion makes me want to shoot people.
:p

[Chris_Redfield]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

This hear is a very good observation on personal preferance.

Yeah, I like the hunter/hunted aspects of modern dogfighting. I do believe that chasing skills are a good thing as well, but since the system will only support one or the other, I have to pick a side. I'd rather see the dynamics leaning towards tacitcal aspects than pure reflex.

This, BTW, is why I sometimes get a little short tempered with these forums and you in particular, Chris. I love to see thinking going on, but mon-sided ranting based on personal opinion makes me want to shoot people.
:p

LOL, Wargimp. ~2000 posts and you still have to learn the fundamentals of forum behaviour. Dont carry **** from tone topic to another, leave and forget a conversation once its over. This way, you can be on different sides of an argumen, and on the same sides aswell and there will be no grudge. Once personal attacks come in, this rule wont apply anymore though.

Im going to go through your last one and then proceed to the drawing.

Yeah, I like the hunter/hunted aspects of modern dogfighting. I do believe that chasing skills are a good thing as well, but since the system will only support one or the other, I have to pick a side. I'd rather see the dynamics leaning towards tacitcal aspects than pure reflex.

I have to disagree. People who dogfight using pure reflexes are easy to dodge, easy to loose and easy to take down because even if you loose them from your LOS, youll regain the lock in a matter of seconds by easily assuming where they would be. Those peoples shoes are easy to get in to. Prepatch, I would make a bold statement here, a player with the better tactical approach for a dogfight would prevail.

Heres my typical scenario. I know most pilots dont share their secrets, but Im doe with BF2 a long time ago now.

Battleplan- each engagement must have one. What are you going to do? When are you going to shoot? How long will the engagement last? How will you prepare the enemy for a lethal blow?

Intel- It takes 3 engagements max to know the enemies weakness. Every pilot has a trademark evasion maneuver. Theres a short timeframe where a pilot will prepare for a maneuver, its a window for missiles. It should take you 3 chases to make a mental note on his behaviour and then blow him out of the skies.

Skills- simply, if you cant maneuver, youre not ready. Skills determine the lenght you are being able to chase a jet. If you lack skills, your chase-time is low. If youve got what it takes, you should be able to do a LOT more.

Selfawareness, pre-work- This has mainly to do about the weapon youre wielding. Not only theres an absolute MUST to know that every plane is extremely different, you also have to implement that into your flight pattern. Depending on yours and enemies plane theres a list of DOs and DONTs. Theres also some fundamental truths why some pilots fail and blame it on their jet. True, one jet acts differently than other, but NONE of those pilots adjust their flight to the strenghts and weaknesses of named jets.
Why does a MiG chase a F-35B with relative ease?
Why do F-35B pilots lose against J-10?
Research. Research.

Theres a list of various scenarios in dogfight. The sudden blow, which is extremely popular. My favourite was wearing an opponent down from his afterburner, watch for his mistakes.

Research will also bring in the issue of throttle control, which is extremely useful in any dogfight turning a superior plane into inferior and vice versa.

Dogfights prepatch was hell of a work if you were against an experienced pilot. Nothing more fun than a prolongued dogfight that in the end rewards with a victory (for me personally). The "Man, nice dogfight, youre damn good" "Thanks, youre a slippery bugger yourself" is just great.

This, BTW, is why I sometimes get a little short tempered with these forums and you in particular, Chris. I love to see thinking going on, but mon-sided ranting based on personal opinion makes me want to shoot people.

Im not here to be 100% objective, Im here to have fun through ranting, bitching, learning, communicating . EVEN if I showed what I have in my sleeves, people generally ignore it, so theres no need for me to approach to things like I did a few lines above, generally.


Now to that pictorial information. Lets suppose its the truth. Wouldnt you think that leaving a pilot 0% chance to evade the missile through maneuvers would be a little too harsh? Ive got a couple of my own ideas.

STA missile 1.12 with 2X speed.
ATA missile 1.12 with 2X speed.

STA missile 1.2 the same.
ATA missile 1.2 which flies at 2000 (?) knots. Or any reasonable figure that we can get through research+ less lifetime. 3-5 seconds of fuel time for missiles.

Ive found out that there is no speed limit when youre flying vertically upwards. Theres speed limit when flying vertically downwards. Theres speed loss (~860~890 kts without afterburners- with afterburners equipped, theres the regular maximum afterburner speed (1420 kts for F35B for example)) and theres maximum speed. Theres also speed loss when changing altitude and speed gain/loss accoording to the angle.

So much in flight that depends on speed, maybe change in speed in the missiles would actually be a better way to sort it out?

For example- AA couldnt hit a jet that often because you needed to time the shot accoordingly to the maneuvers of the jet. Now. With added speed of the missile, the time before the "lockon-warning" and "hit" is gradually reduced. Very often a pilot has the time to shoot down/bomb a target before he makes an evasive maneuver. The added missile speed will bring the pilot to a choice- break off or be hit. This will also increase the "decoy" tactics, as I mentioned using one AA as a decoy to hit with another. Or using the Essex to hit with a jet. Faster missile flight will directly impact on pilots choices and thus making the AA break the jets intentions. Of course the tracking area of the missile should be just enough to leave a jet a possibility to break loose when making a very sharp turn with afterburners equipped.

What would this achieve?

STA vs Helicopters- All choppers perform a "leveling out" maneuver. Shooting at them while they are stable will leave them very little time for countermanevuers thus beating down pilots that are aiming for a TV shot at the AA/tank/et cetera. A chopper should constantly be in a move once the lock has been achieved to not to be hit. There should be enough accuracy and maneuverability for a missile to not to let a chopper strafe around the AA.

STA vs planes- as explained, very little time between a lockon and a hit. Pilots are forced to decide in a blink of an eye- evade or die. This is essentially your "AA umbrella". If a pilot has chosen to attack, he dies, if he breaks loose, he still has a chance to break loose with a maneuver that even a new pilot can make. Hard turn with afterburners.

Planes vs planes- similar to STA vs planes.

[F-1]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

Well, here's a rough diagram that shows what I'm talking about:

Each missile image is placed to show a "tick" where it would try to aquire it's target. As you can see, the tight missile has no chance of ever hitting a plane that goes into a tight turn. The wider tracking missile has no chance of losing it's lock.

Without adding some kind of random break code, this system cannot be anything other than a binery one. Hit/miss, nothing in between.

Edit: It occurs to me that IF it were possible to make the tracking angle based on "fuzzy logic", it would improve things a bit. Instead of the tracking angle being an absolute, it would have to be based on a chance to tack that starts at 100% within a fixed angle, then drops off as the target moves away from that cone. Still, it's not optimal since it would still make simple hard turns your best evasive maneuver.

HOWEVER, if you were to use this in combonation with a delayed tracking script where it uses the prevous tick's information, the lag it would induce would make drastic changes in flightpath more effective DACM (Defencive Air Combat Maneuvers).

That's getting perty complicated tho. The increased complexity will impose a hit on CPU and raises the possiblities of bugs creeping in.

That is exactly what I said in one of the posts which got lost in the useless discussions. The AA is done right now to either hit or not hit all the time.

When you open the AA files in the game's folder that is exactly what you will conclude. I think the AA ticking time is now set to something like 50msec. I probably forgot it but need to go back and check that number again. I think they did it that way to reduce the lag. if they make that number smaller then the whole game will become laggy when someone fires a missle. it is the same reason why the tank's shell is very slow. you can see a tank shell moving during the game. in reality those shells are very fast. if they make the speed realistic the game will become very laggy. probably this is one reason why the game is laggy after the patch. They made that ticking time smaller after the patch.

probably the best thing will be to tweak the AA to a critical point such that turning at full speed with the afterburner will save you. just a thought. this way you may have a chance of survival... although it is a slim chance. But the problem with this idea is that different jets have different maximum speeds. a way to balance that probably can probably be done by making some jets reload the flares faster... just a little faster... like a second or two.

[Chris_Redfield]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

That is exactly what I said in one of the posts which got lost in the useless discussions. The AA is done right now to either hit or not hit all the time.

Someone has an egoproblem.

[phen0m]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

I would put money on I could kill Plane whore if he had a J-10 and I have a F-22 or whatever.

[tsh2005]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

I would put money on I could kill Plane whore if he had a J-10 and I have a F-22 or whatever.

wasnt the topic.. anyone can kill anyone

why so many people defend and like it i guess

[Brindled]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

before the patch i had only been shot down once by a skilled pilot using the sukhoi on Oman. i have been shot down by the su a good many times now and it is definitely no fun. but what can you do?

[stormwolf]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

After many requests for a dogfighting video tutorial, I've finally delivered. On an obvious sour note however, as this is dogfighting in the 1.2 patch, but I often find satire to be quite effective at getting a point across.

All of this footage was filmed during a single round of 64 player Wake, I would've liked to get more dogfighting footage in but towards the end of the round the enemy team stopped bothering with the planes.

Stream the video online at:

http://media.putfile.com/Highway-to-the-Boredom-Zone72

Dog fighting does not exist anymore for sure. Basically you need to be ok in handling the jet and be the first to see the enemie's 6. I think you are right in that matter. I would like to mention though, that PlaneWhore - you don't dog fight that much. You are mainly a spwan camper juding from the two part video in Gulf Of Oman. So I'm not sure whether you are the one that should bring up this thing, as I can guess you are ****ed it is now much easier to take you out, and because you can't dog fight as much as you did, because you didn't dog fight much before.

Regarding the ground AA:
1) It seems pretty fair as it is now when the enemy uses it.
2) There is a serious problem with Team Hits - When 4 out of 5 missiles that hit you in the air, are friendly fire, it means there is a game play problem. The AA is now more accurate. The missiles still like to change course towards friendly targets. DICE should either let there be no TK possibility from AA, or if it's that hard for them to resolve, even use a simple statistics an reduce the possibilty of missiles to lock on friendlies.

It ****es me off to avoid all those enemy missiles, and then have to repair or break away from combat because of idiots on the ground shooting at me while I'm on someone elses tail.

[KickPhucker]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

I was thinking, ff you apply this logic to any other competitive activty or sport it sounds so ridiculous. In a game of skill, the best should dominate, it's really that simple. And while some might consider this kind of an environment "unfair" or overwhelming then that's really too bad and they should probably be playing minesweeper instead.

Imagine if say... in golf (no, I don't like golf), they decided to make the hole where you have to hit the ball 10 times larger to make the game for "accessible" to less talented players. That is better for everyone, right? The new on the golfers, uh.. the spectators, and of course, the top ranked golfers who are good enough that they win every single competition... everyone, right? As you're less likely to have a single golfer with a dominant score every tournament. How do you think that'd go over with all of the people who love golf because it is a game of pure skill on the most basic level?

Fact is, everyone loses in 1.2 but EA. EA has made their game initially more appealing (or rather, shallow) to the casual gamer who isn't all that good where he actually has a chance of fragging some of the top players, but really it's just a cheap thrill that will soon wear off. And those same "casual" gamers could potentially soon find themselves capped off by the same silly game mechanics that neutered the best players in the first place.

BF2 is supposed to be a "TEAM-ORIENTED GAME", Golf is NOT.
Ok, so let's apply you're point to a team game like football (american football, not soccer). In the game of football quarterbacks score more points and handle the ball more than any other player. Now let's say, for the balance of the game and in sake of fairness to the other players that don't get to touch the ball as much (poor linemen), that quarterbacks aren't allowed to pass the ball more than 20 yards (arbitrary number) in the air. No more "Hail Marys" or "Long Bombs", just little **** passes (much like how the famous West Coast Offense is run but that's beside the point). Also, to be fair to the poor linemen who never touch the ball, the quarterback must hand off to a lineman a certain amount (insert arbitrary number here) of times each game.

What will happen to the game?

Will it take away all the skill?

Nope. It just takes away from the glory that the quarterback is used to receiving. His wide receivers and tight-ends will have more passes thrown to them (since you can't score with a single long pass anymore), the running game will definately change and evolve, and the linemen wil finally get a modicum of respect and (gasp!) glory for actually being able to run with the ball!

Read into this analogy carefully: The pilots who are complaining that they can't "own" everything in the sky, sea, and earth anymore because of the 1.2 patch - YOU are the quarterbacks. You're used to the glory (i.e. Gold Star every round and ridiculous stats) and now can't stand the fact that others can share in this. This is a normal response. If I was used to being number one without a doubt and someone changed the rules on me I'd be upset too. But the point is that this is a team game. a TEAM GAME. I know how you're going to say how much you helped your team when you got 100 kills a round but let's not forget the people on the other team too. If you missed the fact that I mentioned that this is a game....GAME.....I'll spell it out for you again. A game is played to have fun, and the patch was meant to balance the game to provide the most fun for the most people.

For those of you who take this all very seriously.....take a break and relax and remember that Battlefield 2 is not your life....your spm or kill/death ratio or rank do not determine who you are as a person. Now ou might say, "Well I always play to win." Well, so do I. Winning is nice and all but there have been many times when I've had more fun LOSING a game of BF2 than winning. When I find myself ****ed off because of a game I'm playing that is supposed to be fun for me than there's something wrong with my thinking. Vince Lombardi may have said, "Winning isn't everything.......it's the ONLY thing." but then again he DID play games for a living unlike 99.99% of us.

1.2 patch is fine except for the bugs. Gameplay is better than ever. No more mass exoduses from servers because awesome pilots are raping everyone and taking away our fun.

PW I'm sure you can still have fun flying.....just accept this game (read:game) for what it is and above all enjoy yourself.

[Bungalow_Bill]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

I would put money on I could kill Plane whore if he had a J-10 and I have a F-22 or whatever.

You're silly.

[Bungalow_Bill]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

Dog fighting does not exist anymore for sure. Basically you need to be ok in handling the jet and be the first to see the enemie's 6. I think you are right in that matter. I would like to mention though, that PlaneWhore - you don't dog fight that much. You are mainly a spwan camper juding from the two part video in Gulf Of Oman. So I'm not sure whether you are the one that should bring up this thing, as I can guess you are ****ed it is now much easier to take you out, and because you can't dog fight as much as you did, because you didn't dog fight much before.

That video was all about being an effective and efficient pilot, going for pure impact on the battlefield. Although I did not do much dogfighting in that video, I did do quite a bit of plane killing. Rule number one for me, is take the path of least resistance. As I recall, I shot down the bomber (a critical priority for any pilot in 1.12) right at the beginning of the match and I kept that potentially devastating bomber (in the hands of even a newbie) on the ground for nearly the entire game. The MiG pilot, well, the MiG pilot was simply not very good, and as such another rule for me in 1.12 when actually engaging in a dogfight is that if the enemies currently occupying a plane suck, then let them keep the plane airborne, as it could potentially prevent some one like me from getting the plane after it has respawned, and the only exception I'll make to that rule if they're hindering my effots, then I'll take them out.

If anything, my 1.12 video showed how absolutely vulnerable and frail planes are when the proper tactics, and technique are applied. As I proved in my video when I destroyed the bomber plane at least 8 times that match (twice while it was in the air, with well timed skilled missiles *AND* cannons). That is why I can only let out a laugh and sigh when I hear people refer to all 1.12 pilots as some sort of newbies in an invulnerable vehicle of destruction, as I never once encountered that problem, and neither did any player who was lucky enough to be on my team.

Thanks for bringing up that old video, in any event, because it only strengthens my initial case.

http://files.filefront.com/FILE_VOTE.../fileinfo.html

[Chris_Redfield]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

KickPhucker. Your argument is flawed because the "quarterbacks" score the same. The glory you speak of is received from the 3rd party, but many of us speak of the personal satisfaction after a hard round of dogfigting.

[Bungalow_Bill]

Re: Highway to the Boredom Zone, a pilots perspective on the 1.2 patch

I can tell you from personal experience your diagram is incorrect on some level, but what level that is I'm not exactly sure.

When evading missiles with the kind success rate I had, it was more than simply "durrr, turn really hard!". If that was the case, every pilot you'd see would have an easy 100:1 KDR like me.

I had a process I'd go through when a missile was locking on to me.

First, I'd hear the lock, then I'd ask myself, "Ok PlaneWhore, which sources could potentially be locking on to you at this moment". I'd then list in my brain the potential point of origin from this AA which is about the complete its lock, and then I'd do a quick check behind me to check if it is a plane locking on me (if the planes are somewhere else, or grounded, I won't check, but if I'm unsure, I'd check). These decisions and operations must be made in the short second before the AA is launched at you, as all of these questions and answers help me calculate my final evasive strategy for the missile that is about to be coming at me.

So lets say that I'm on the outskirts of a map, I've checked for planes, and pretty I'm sure this missile will be coming from this one and only AA site I'm in range of. Now, I've got to guesstimate the range of the AA site from my current location, the direction, and my altitude in relation to this AA site.

A few general rules I'd have when evading AA, were simple, don't turn towards the source (this one was important, and the reason it was critical to know exactly what was firing AA at you), don't turn directly away from the source either (as this also made you vulnerable to missile strikes), use afterburners during the turn, don't gain altitude during the turn I've executed, and use plenty of downwards rudder to help swivel my plane down a touch for an extra bit of speed while I'm turning. Over all of these rules though, the most important of all was to be sure to be in the "climax" of your turn, before the AA reaches you. You can't sustain a very fast sharp turn for long, and they take time to get in to properly, so you've got to estimate the time to impact, and adjust your turn accordingly so you're properly prepared by the time the missile reaches you.

And then I had a final layer of evasion patterns, some of which I can't even put in to words, almost as if it is an instinct which is developed through trial and error, and functions on almost a subconcious level. Slight adjustments to my angle, trajectory, rudder, and afterburner, and though I can't say exactly what these are for every given scenario, which are countless, but I can say they just felt right to me. Just as strange is even without looking in my rear view I had the uncanny ability to know if a missile was going to strike me or not, as if I knew if I'd made a mistake in executing my evasion strategy after it was already done.

Though as you read this, it might sound it a little elaborate, but it was all very necessary to achieve the level of success I did when evading 1.12 AA. If I got lax, or lazy, I'd almost always get hit by the missile, as dumb luck and "hard turns" only got you so far). Any good pilot will understand exactly what I'm saying here. Bottom line and the point of this perhaps overly lengthy post is my counter to the people saying that a simple hard turn would dodge all missiles with a 100% success rate in 1.12. I find such a statement is ridiculous at best, and contrary to all of my experience with BF2 piloting.