Oleg and Team.

[LEXX]

Feuerfalke::

LEXX, I really wonder how you know all these details if you don't play online. Some things from the social street-life just don't transfer into computer business.

Hi Falke. I'll take the two items in turn.

I know these details from (1) hearing about snotty gamer behavior in anonymous public servers and (2) having myself seen for years many of the "leading" anonymous public server computer gamers attack and insult Oleg's paying customers who only asked for either some additional modding abilities or for Oleg not to cripple his sim to prevent "cheating" -- an example is crippling the flight models for non-slider users by slowing elevator trim. This snotty anti-social computer gamer behavior seen among even "old timer" anonymous public server gamers is one reason so many Online players either go back to Offline play, retreat to private servers, or leave the sim entirely.

Social street-life may or may not transfer to computer business, but it translates directly to social interaction among Online players. Online players have always advertised that human vs human gameplay is superior to Offline play against the AI. Why? Because when played Online, the sim becomes real life social interaction, and not just a simulation anymore. Online play can add the only true hint of reality to a sim -- social interaction.

The flip side is that many anonymous public server players, after advertising that social interaction is the prime mover of Online play, refuse to admit that Online cheating is a social behavior that can only be consistently avoided through social awareness. When you play with society, you take risks, risks that some here don't want to talk about, so they blame the mods, or the modders and happy mod users, but never blame the cheaters since they can't find them. Somebody has to take the blame.

[tater]

While community is one (important) aspect of online play, it is far more than that, lexx.

The AI is pretty crappy, frankly. The reason it's better to play vs people is that people are both better AND worse than AI in important ways. They have real LOS issues, so you can actually surprise them (well, if the idiotic ability to hear anything but your own motor was removed). When you get in a real fight, they are not predictable (except maybe their target-fixation).

Even a few human players mixed among the AI (coop) makes a huge difference because the automatic tendency to fly vs AI in a way you know will win becomes ineffective... we all do it offline, it becomes habit. You KNOW a shallow turn will throw off the AI, they'll waste all their ammo astern of you. Try that vs a person, lol. If you know that even ONE of the AI is not AI, but real, you cannot do that behavior.

[LEXX]

Well yes, those are more technical aspects of social interaction I had in mind. Thanks for brining them up though tater, especially the mixing of multiple humans and AI together. One good one that I think I maybe might have possibly heard about being used Online is pretending to fly like AI, sucking in any opposing humoid player to a nice surprise.

[csThor]

Lexx - *holds out hand to shake* Your post cleared it up. The matter is settled from my side.

tater - The problem with humans is simply that they're (we're!) playing this game for enjoyment. And this means noone likes to be on the receiving end of a fighter's weapons and/or flying an aircraft that cannot defend itself or is an easy picking, which does stuff that's boring or unpopular. This results in a flurry of "adjustments":

- servers go for pure fighter vs fighter engagements
- planesets are being doctored to keep certain "groups" happy
- historical facts are being thrown out of the window for "player's convenience"

Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The result of all of this is the extreme number of fighters and fighter-bombers compared to other aircraft classes as the Stukas, the bombers or dedicated ground-pounders (such as the namesake of the series). You don't see swarms of gunner-less Il-2s trying to destroy all artillery pieces in the target area on a 1942 map nor will you see a large formation of Stukas hunting tanks. These jobs are being done by fighter-bombers or destroyers because they can deal with the load of fighters and do not take that long to reach the target zone. The issue here is that people are unwilling to venture off the beaten tracks, even on so-called "historical servers". This is the primary reason why SoW will need to combine the strengths of the dedicated dogfight server with the ability of the COOPs to have moving AI units (aircraft and ground/sea objects) - to overcome the insane fighter and dogfight fixation. Otherwise it's always going to remain "Quake in the air" as opposed to a simulation of aerial warfare in WW2. You can't change the people - you have to change the rules and the environment.

[Feuerfalke]

Originally Posted by LEXX

Feuerfalke::
The flip side is that many anonymous public server players, after advertising that social interaction is the prime mover of Online play, refuse to admit that Online cheating is a social behavior that can only be consistently avoided through social awareness. When you play with society, you take risks, risks that some here don't want to talk about, so they blame the mods, or the modders and happy mod users, but never blame the cheaters since they can't find them. Somebody has to take the blame.

And I think that is the problem here. Nobody blames the modders of anything except their behavior towards Oleg and his team, which has become very obvious several times in this thread and for cracking a protected game and making this crack officially available. That is against the law, that is unfair and it is wrong.

But you have to admit (and already did) that cheating is a problem and that we wouldn't have that problem, if this whole thing hadn't become much larger than most expected.
And when I speak of online-cheating, I do not talking about the "3 or 4" bohoo-hidden top secret servers for pay-for-play registered members only. We're talking about these "100" baddy worn-out-ugly-dirty servers on Hyperlobby, ASE and UBI. You cannot control who's joining and you cannot know everybody online, as well as you cannot really ban them effectively. So, this whole social control thing simply doesn't apply. The same way you cannot check everybodies pockets going down your street.
And the problem is not, that I'm feeling cheated everyday, but because it's in the minds of people you play with.

[tater]

One, I think that the notion that cheating is new is... naive.

Two, as to csThor's post (no mention of my reply before regarding maps? ), there is a place for mods in the online world in the aspect of reality that you allude to.

One problem we see is that planes have a wide array of loads available, and the servers really don;t have a good way of controlling player load CHOICE.

So we have Zeros with 250kg bombs, even though that load was simply not used except for suicide planes. As a result, online (DF) you see bombed up Zeros all the time at the expense of Vals. The US planes are worse since they all had HUGE (by japanese standards) bomb loads. Why take a bomber when you can take more bombs (and rockets) in a fighter bomber?

Heavies? Not even possible without having cockpits off, which is far worse "cheating" than the theoretical plane with the HP increased a few % for an "edge" that is talked about (but unavailable as a mod).

Mods could add variant planes that are unchanged except deleted loads. Pure fighter US planes, for example, naught but their guns and drop tanks. Ditto japanese planes (or whatever side). Sticking a b-25 cockpit in a B-17 allows cockpits-on servers to have heavies. Given good mission design, targets can be set up for a sort of area bombing that requires loads of bombers (ZvW has messed with this, and you see bettys used).

There is certainly room for online improvement with careful additions, IMO.

The trust factor is still there, use honorable squads as a baseline, and play with them.

<EDIT> well said (and entirely true), Urufu!

[csThor]

tater - I did not respond to it as I am not "in the know" about the mapping tool (= I never saw it) nor do I know (and care) about the way "your" maps are being made. I know part of the legit process and so I said how things look from my perspective.

Regarding the rest of your post: I do not care for the operations of the "heavies" as my prime area of interest is the eastern front (so I see no need for additional planes). Basically what the Il-2 engine does best (tactical operations in a limited area). It's certainly true that there are no elegant ways of limiting user loadouts - the way SC and FBD do it is rather clumsy IMO but at least they offer the chance. IMO a player has to update himself/herself on the latest "rules and regulations" regarding the maps played on the server. Those who ignore the briefing and complain about kicks because of wrong loadouts or planes do not deserve any sympathy. I'm certainly not in favor of catering to the "most brain-dead users". You want to play? Then RTFM!

[LEXX]

Falke, perhaps tater says it better than I...

tater::

The trust factor is still there, use honorable squads as a baseline, and play with them.

Granted, there is something to be said for wide open anonymous Online gaming without a fear of cheating; for one thing that's where I'd guess Newbies would go first before they find friends in the private squads. One of the problems with private servers with trusted people using mods nor not is schedule timing among the people -- but that leads us back to the best things in life take time and effort. However, so far Oleg has not been able to allow, as tater says, the best of both worlds.

Thanks Thor. The whole kill score system seems to encourage fighter vs fighter Dogfight. Oleg has always favoured Online Dogfight, at least until recently as far as I know. I think a good Online War, or Lowengrin's Offline dynamic campaigns, give primary importance to destroying opposing forces or supplies on the ground, of which fighters are useful in either enabling or preventing these ground attacks. The whole issue is confused in the community by Oleg's personal favoritism toward simple Online Dogfight shooter gaming. About 2 years ago, Oleg poasted at ubi that "dynamic campaigns are arcade" but I hope he is learning new things for his new sim. Simulating air warfare through a dynamic campaign depends on success or failure of ground attack or heavy strategic strike aircraft. It seems to me that a static campaign, either Online or Offline, does not require bombers to succeed or fail in their missions.

Oleg or 1C could pay me a Monthly Fee and I still would not join a static Online War with a fixed outcome.