Messages

1

Implemented Suggestions / Re: Two minor suggestions on viewing fleet

« on: July 14, 2010, 07:22:10 am »

Thanks.

But there appears to be a problem with the 'view aircraft by type' feature at the moment. For example, I own 80 A319s in PW#1481 (which incidentally has already been completed), among which 31 are A319-131's (the 2086nm range variant with IAE V2522 engines), and 49 are A319-132's (the 4254nm range variant with IAE V2524 engines), and when I click the link to view all A319s it turns out that only the -131 type aircraft are displayed.

The same goes for other models with more than one variant.

2

Implemented Suggestions / Two minor suggestions on viewing fleet

« on: July 09, 2010, 07:45:48 pm »

I have two minor suggestions which would make it more convenient for us doing statistics:

1. In addition to the fleet management function (which I use primarily for sorting aircraft based on which hubs they operate out of), perhaps it would be a nice idea to be able to do a fleet breakdown based on aircraft type (i.e. add hyperlinks in the 'aircraft summary' table below so that the game can display the fleet according to aircraft type). This would enable us to compare aircraft age and aircraft DOC within a single subfleet, among other things, i.e. would work in the same way as the fleet management function.



(Yes, I know that when we opt to view all aircraft in our fleet we have the option to arrange them according to type, but this does not conveniently enable us to view a single type, nor does it permit us to compare aircraft DOC for a single type easily).

2. In addition to the 'aircraft ranking' function, which presently allows us to view the number of aircraft in the world according to aircraft type (as well as the airlines which operate a particular aircraft type, ranked according to the subfleet size), it would be useful if there is a function that allows us to rank airlines according to the total fleet size. I believe this is easily doable.

3

General Chat / Re: Can anyone explain why 0.5x 737ER hurts even more than 1x 737ER on long haul?

« on: June 18, 2010, 04:14:57 am »

Slight correction: AA is flying this route everyday with 290 pax, not alternating days.

Correct, but I think the difference is that AA was flying each direction on alternate days with 290 pax, while I flew BOTH directions every day with 145 pax each way. Since AA would have to fight for 290 pax each way on alternate days, it would be reasonable if yields end up depressed.

The following is what happened when the route was still a 2-way bloodbath ages ago.

My guess is that adding 140-ish pax to this route will cause a ripple in fare pricing and load factors.

Not sure. My key point is that from experience, I can forsee that NH doing 1x B737ER (290-ish pax) would not depress yields and loads that much, but I don't see why doing 0.5x B737ER would hurt that much.

Let's look at the following two examples that illustrate my point on 0.5x vs 1x frequency:





Remember, the two Amsterdam routes are of similar distance and DEN-AMS is supposed to be the one with greater potential.

Right now, IAH-AMS enjoys far better yields than DEN-AMS even though the total capacity offered on IAH-AMS is a tad more than DEN-AMS. The difference between the two is that someone is doing DEN-AMS on a 0.5x frequency. If NH were doing DEN-AMS with a 0.5x B762ER this would be reasonable, but the problem is, they are only using the way smaller 0.5x B737ER and it still depresses the yields and loads that badly.

For the sake of comparison, I had to lower the fares on DEN-AMS to $1,022 to make my flights go out full, and the profit becomes $167,980. This is not quite reasonable from a logical perspective.

4

General Chat / Can anyone explain why 0.5x 737ER hurts even more than 1x 737ER on long haul?

« on: June 17, 2010, 02:45:10 pm »

Let me use an example in the world I am in (PW #1481) to explain a little bit.



What happened on this ORD-AMS route was:

1. I was the first one to fly the route, which is a hub-to-hub route in my alliance (AMS being a British Airways hub, while All Nippon Airways is also another fellow alliance member), and charged $1025 on the daily A319 service. In fact, I concluded from earlier experiments that long-haul routes are most profitable on 1x A319/A319LR whenever possible, as long as no one else flies the route with bigger equipment.

2. Then AA came in with 0.5x B767-200ER (which offers the same average capacity as 1x A319) and was only able to offer a fare of $780. My load dropped to just above 60% and I had to lower my fare to $815 to compete. This is understood because AA is probably offering way too much capacity on alternate days, and concurs with my earlier experimental results.

3. AA probably realized that flying 0.5x B767-200ER is sub-optimal, so it switched to 1x A319LR. BA then came in with 1x A319 and charged $970. I then raised my fares to $1057; as a result, the ORD-AMS route once again became my most profitable route systemwide.

4. Here comes the problem:
Fellow alliance partner NH wanted to conquer the entire world and came in with 0.5x 737-700ER (which is roughly 1/2 the capacity I am offering) as a tag-on of one of its Asia-Europe routes. NH charged the highest fare, but it immediately trashed my loads to just above 60% again. If NH was using a bigger aircraft this could have been easily understood, but it is offering less-than-daily service and the least capacity among the four players.

My point is not to bash another player (I have no intention of such), but I want to understand the rationale behind the AM program code that 0.5x service trashes the yields even if done on a small aircraft. Since this appears to be not quite reasonable, I would be happy if this part of the code could be fixed as a remedy.

5

Game Strategy / Re: Airbus vs. Boeing

« on: June 06, 2010, 02:50:14 am »

Transcontinental route->Depends on the distance between the hub and destination, use only 1 type for a hub

On routes that can be flown by an A319 (the 4254nm variant), doing 1x A319 is much more profitable than 0.5x B762ER or A332, especially if no one else flies the route; that's because daily service commands a much higher fare premium even though the number of seats offered by 1x A319 is the same as offered by 0.5x B762ER or A332.

For routes between 10 and 12 hours I believe a 1x A319LR is more profitable than a 0.5x B762ER as well.

Widebodies such as the B762ER should only be used on missions over 12 hours as well as tag-ons associated with it.

6

Bugs / Re: Typos - centralized thread

« on: December 25, 2009, 02:39:28 am »

Baltimore Washington International Airport, BWI, is NOT located in Glen Burnie as you have the name is, its Linthicum... just take out that part altogether I think....

Glen Burnie is the one stated by FAA

Really? According to this FAA source, Glen Burnie appears nowhere in the name of BWI (not even on this page). It identifies Baltimore, MD as the city/metropolitan area in which the airport is located.

http://nfdc.faa.gov/nasr/airportLookup/airportDisplay.jsp?category=nasr&airportId=BWI

Of course, the airport's official website doesn't use 'Glen Burnie' either.

http://www.bwiairport.com

7

General Chat / Re: Daily maintenance shot up to 50m, from 21m!!

« on: September 26, 2009, 03:52:57 pm »

The formula isn't perfect, but I cannot really comment on a case by case basis unless I start pulling data on each persons fleet and number crunch it that way.

Okay, so I will present a real example here.



I own a fleet of 297 aircraft, including 11 A330-200's, 17 B767-200ER's, 18 A321-100's, 39 A320-200's, 110 A319's, 28 A319LR's, 7 B777-200 ER VIP's, 26 E170's and 37 E190's. Some of the aircraft (especially the A320 series and the widebodies) are on average quite new, as I commenced plans to replace old aircraft over the past game year.

In particular, the following aircraft were scrapped and replaced in the past few months, mostly between the 19th and 20th of the month concerned:

Jul 2006: 3 A319's, 3 A320's, 4 A321's
Aug 2006: 9 A319's, 2 A320's
Sep 2006: 9 A319's
Oct 2006: none
Nov 2006: none

Yet my maintenance cost increases steadily over these months, apparently independent of the number of aircrafts replaced over the previous month. (I mean, the fact that maintenance expenses are on the rise is not itself a problem; the pace of the increase vis-a-vis aircraft replacement is THE problem.) This appears to be quite strange.

8

Game Strategy / Re: Profit calculations

« on: September 26, 2009, 03:38:38 am »

Exactly, TY. However still - isn't it unusual for case above?

No, because the A320 is too large for the great majority of routes on the game. Even to "large" airports like YYC. I get a chuckle watching people waste money on A320s from any airport except the 350k's.

To put in real perspective, AC uses an E190 for PHX-YYC.

It would be disastrous to apply real life logic to the game, since the game does not take into account demographic factors. If it did, you would be able to earn heaps of money sending 767s or even 777s on LAX-JFK, and would make more profit flying HKG-SFO than HKG-ATL, for example.

But then, an A320 generating less revenue than an A319 on PHX-YYC does not mean that putting an A320 is the less profitable way to fly the route. You'll want to utilize as many hours out of your aircraft as possible. It is always better to put a plane slightly larger than optimal on the route to fill up the hours than to buy another airplane dedicated to that route and leave the larger aircraft not fully utilized.

9

General Chat / Re: Daily maintenance shot up to 50m, from 21m!!

« on: September 19, 2009, 04:01:36 pm »

My maintenance cost is hitting me hard. I had not been expanding my fleet over the past year and instead focused on scrapping old airplanes and replacing them with new ones of the same model, though this was not something I did every single month. It turns out that the aircraft maintenance cost increases LINEARLY irrespective of the number and types of airplanes I scrap over the previous game month. This appears to be pretty weird since, at the beginning stages of the game, I noticed that the maintenance cost of each single airplane increased linearly. I would sort of suspect that the script for the calculation of maintenance expenses is recursive in nature, rather than adding up the cost of each individual airplane at the start of every month - am I correct?

10

Bugs / [Fixed] Alliance hub not showing up

« on: September 19, 2009, 03:22:33 pm »

Airline Details: Delta Air Lines [W737/ID 22903]
Airport codes and IDs: BKK [147], NRT [254]
Alliance: SkyTeam [ID 1]

Bug description:
Super Asia [ID 22781], a fellow member of SkyTeam (the only alliance in W737), recently closed two of its hubs at Fukoka (FUK) and Osaka-Itami (ITM) and opened new ones at Bangkok (BKK) and Tokyo-Narita (NRT). Yet, I failed to fly the sectors DXB-BKK and BOM-BKK of my proposed new routes ATL-DXB-BKK and ATL-BOM-BKK, only to find out that BKK and NRT are absent from the list of alliance hubs and the list of departure airports available, even though I already have a gate at Bangkok.

Many thanks if this could be fixed.

11

Game Strategy / Re: When to replace an aircraft?

« on: September 10, 2009, 03:36:59 pm »

I wasn't saying it is impossible to make a loss, I was saying that I was not saying before that that you will certainly make a loss.
It certainly is possible to make a loss on aircraft (although, in a private world I have a fleet with an average age over 10, and a number of large aircraft, still making money - admittedly competition is not as fierce as in some public worlds).
My point was simply that you make less money overall with an old plane (less does not mean you will get a profit, nor does it mean you won't get a profit (and make a loss), but nevertheless, is not desirable).
This is starting to get confusing...

Anyway. Buy new planes.

It boils down to whether you can accept the maintenance costs vis-a-vis your daily income. I own 279 aircraft in one of the private worlds, with an average fleet age of over 2 years; among these 279 aircraft, 21 are widebodies (the oldest one is 4 years old) and the biggest narrowbody is the A321 (the oldest one being 5 years old). Maintenance cost amounts to roughly 25% of my monthly income, and I think that is still OK for me.

Replacing old airplanes is of course less fun than opening new routes, and is time consuming as well (it takes me about an hour to replace 8 airplanes). As your own airline grows, it becomes much more time consuming to keep track of aircraft age. Until routes can be transferred from one aircraft to another of the same type, replacing airplanes will remain a nasty feat.

You might also want to consider the cost of writing off an aircraft when replacing it.

P.S. The last time I played in a public world, most of my aircraft would be replaced between the ages of 1 and 2, and put on the open market with a 133% markup - and of course made huge profits out of that. I ened up being one of the top 15 airlines even though I had far fewer routes and destinations than any of the other top 50 airlines in that world. This strategy cannot be implemented in a private world, however.

12

Game Strategy / Re: [W850] - but applies to all worlds - POLL: Multiple frequency madness

« on: September 10, 2009, 03:22:35 pm »

It all depends on the routes and the number of competitors on that route...

If its an intra-city flight (say.. Gatwick - Heathrow), well, I think most of the players will have multi-freq flights just to max out the time left in the plane...

If its an inter-city flight (e.g. Chicago - New York), then it should really be banned

However, I think it should be remained as an option in private world, as the owner may want his world to be as close to RL as possible.

"thinking if this should be moved to suggestion... but probably wont be implemented anyway...."

Well, I think that intra-city flights should be banned (or at least strongly discouraged by means of tuning the profitability formula) in the first place... These unrealistic flights have become a way for airlines to earn money easily, at least at the beginning of the game.

But then, multi-frequency flights can be profitable (despite not being optimal) when done in the right manner. I would also propose that as in real life, flights between major airports should somewhat benefit from multi-frequencies - at least, an airline flying a 150-seater twice daily should be able to charge a higher fare than another airline flying a 300-seater on the same route daily.

13

Game Strategy / Re: NEWBIE (completely hooked) IS THIS A GOOD START?

« on: September 10, 2009, 03:13:31 pm »

An A319 LR should be able to make a profit from a base like Hong Kong doing two 0.5 frequency routes long haul. It naturally won't make as much money as a short haul A319, but I wouldn't worry about it actually making a loss like some of the big heavies might. A319 LRs are good to allow you to have some long haul without the expensive price.

Ultimately, if you are approaching the game solely with the view of making money, then long haul is hardly ever worth it. However, if you want to make some routes to interesting places, these are quite good aircraft.

It is not true that an A319LR cannot make as much as an A319. I own 28 A319LRs in one of the private worlds; some of which are based in Atlanta, Chicago or JFK and are used to fly to secondary destinations in Europe (between 10 and 20 million passengers), while others are based in Salt Lake City, Portland and Memphis (which are of course secondary airports in North America; if you wonder why I have hubs in these places, that's because of a regulation of that private world restricting the number of hubs with gate value above $200,000). Almost all of these LRs make between $300,000 and $400,000 each day, roughly the same as the majority of the 110 A319s that I own. In other words, A319LRs make even secondary long-hauls work perfectly well.

However, it has to be noted that if someone else uses a widebody on the same route, the profitability of the A319LR would dramatically be lowered.

14

General Chat / How can I return/eliminate built gates?

« on: August 10, 2009, 10:57:07 pm »

I built one more gate that I would need a moment ago by mistake (you guys probably have some idea how Firefox refreshes a page), and this extra gate won't be utilized, at least in the near future. How can I eliminate this gate so that I can save the gate maintenance fee?

15

Game Strategy / Re: B767-200ER versus A330-200?

« on: July 31, 2009, 07:30:43 am »

...fuel costs were negligible most of the time.

DC 8-72 FTW!!!

But it's out of production since 2002, and I need something that can be used profitably until 2008. FYI, it's now March 2002 in the private world that I'm in right now, so the DC-8-72 is obviously not a possibility.