Friday 2010-02-19 Screenshots AND Discussion Thread

[Les]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

With all these different type of detection gear at our disposal, I keep on thinking that it would be great to have a player manable 'plotting table'. Where the location and altitude of the various contacts would be displayed.

A member of a on-line squadron could use teamspeak (or a built in Radio Communications???) to vector his squadron members onto the enemy contacts. Of course the historical accuracy and limitations of the various detection devices would need to be programmed and as the various devices are located and destroyed by the attacking planes those stations would not be able to send in any more plots!

I know one person wouldn't be flying but they would be able to co-ordinate their teams efforts.

It would also give a real reason for finding and taking out the listening posts, other than points!

Cheers and thanks for the updates.

While it's not totally different to what we have now in overall concept, (wherein, one team is tasked with defending an airfield or other position, the other with attacking it,) the inclusion of player-controlled ground-based units has so much more potential for player interaction that it could result in a whole new co-op or team vs. team game-play mode.

With the defenders using player-manned radar, listening devices, and anti-aircraft weaponry to locate and destroy the in-coming attackers, preferably with someone in a commander role to co-ordinate the information being gathered. As a defender in a static position, you also might be able to choose where exactly on the map you initially appear, if you're not in a mechanized, mobile unit altogether. There could be your usual player-manned or AI planes scrambled as well. And, just to keep it interesting, if there were planes still available, as a ground based defender you could swap positons and get into one of the planes and join the air fight once and if the ground-based action dies down, but it would obviously limit your whole teams ground-based info gathering and defending capabilities.

As an attacker, you could have some fore-knowledge of the defenders positons, or you could be totally reliant on what you see once you get there. In this case, as a pilot, you'd have to get a visual fix on a defence position and hold your view on it until it 'locks in' and then appears on your in-game map. You might have to also manually pass on this information to your other team-mates so it appears on their maps too. You'd also have to make more decisions about which targets to attack. You could do a pure hit and run, focussing only on pre-determined targets, getting a head-start on any pursuers, but at the same time knowing that there probably will be more pursuers because you didn't take them out while they were on the ground. Or you could try to totally destroy the opposing forces while they're still on the ground, but at the same time have to deal with more direct oppositon, maybe even enemy aircraft (probably AI) called in from nearby.

I'm sure others who have thought about it could suggest other details that would make it more interesting too. In any case, it certainly has potential.

Les.