Messages

1

General Chat / Time to stop new sign-ups for this era?

« on: November 19, 2007, 08:47:20 pm »

Rankings page reports 1,786 players in the 1950s.

2

General Chat / I want to buy the AM team a round.

« on: November 17, 2007, 05:50:42 pm »

server located in miami?

The server is hosted at Volico, a small co-location provider inside the 100 N Biscayne Blvd data center in Miami.  Volico is multi-homed to both Cogent and Level 3 inside that data center.

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General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 07:35:04 pm »

t is somewhat accurate and realistic, the death spiral that is.  As i recall, i once saw a fact that a fully loaded United Airlines flight from JFK-LAX only made $1 (one USD) profit.

Yikes!

the spiral itself is accentuated, and somewhat sped up, in AM which is a bit of a problem but this is largely due to overcrowding of the game.  We're hoping we can alleviate some of this by getting multiple worlds out so we can spread our impressive player base (around 1960 active accounts) across more worlds.  This is also a little due to the unrealistic speed at which airlines grow, we're hoping down the line to slow the game more (we've been taking small steps as we can to slow it a bit, and some leaps between ages, but it's so far not as effective as we would like) which should slow down the spiral as well.

Think about it sometime, look up prices between ORD and ATL (two of the largest airports in the US), they face high service so their prices are low, while routes with little competition and demand tend to face little service and high ticket prices.

But yes, the spiral is being looked into, however it is a fact of life.  prices will not stay high, especially when competition comes into the picture.

*nod* I have seen you post on this before, and it's one of the things I appreciate most about you and Stephen -- I am fully confident that over time, the major issues of this game will be remedied and the game will be even more fun than it is now!  

4

General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 07:01:15 pm »

This should be done through PM.

The thread, by being out in the open, has fostered discussion.

Airplanes with more seats need lower price to fill because say out of 100 people, 10% are willing to pay higher fare, a 9 seater would have been filled. A 100 seater needs to lower the price to the acceptable level of the 100th pax to fill all 100 seats. Simple, no?

Not at the level of 10 seats vs. 100 in markets with 10 million+ passengers.

Fare war is all part of this game. There is never only one party responsible for the drop. Stop singling out players.

While my subject line did refer to a player, most of this thread has been about the game and its mechanics.  

(And I kind of think you have singled out the wrong player this time in addition to that)

Very possibly, though I didn't know that at the time of the post, and this discussion has shed light on the game's mechanics and how they may have mislead me to believe fozzy was the cause of my consternation.

And finally, you yourself don't have time to manage every single route doesn't mean the players who have time and patience have to not manage theirs because of you. That is totally illogical.

Illogical, and a thought not attributable to me.  As previously posted, I login 5 or 6 times a day and manage my routes very granularly.  I believe I take more time than most to keep my load factor at or near 99%.

The whole undercutting is meant to get you demotivated to manage your route anyway

If that's true, then maybe AM isn't for me.  AM's attraction has been airline building, and the "death spiral" of prices seen in some markets is both unrealistic and unfun.  I see the downwards spiralling of prices over time as one of the game's biggest flaws.  I'm hoping over time, more true-to-life economic factors are put in to ameliorate this and make the game more complex.

5

General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 05:19:15 pm »

Hiya LOT,

You wrote:

Larger plane=more seats=harder to get seats filled with current price=lower price to fill all seats.

I'm sorry, but that's not parsing for me.  If there's demand for seats on a route, customers will tend to choose the lower price (discounting such factors as brand loyalty and other things AM doesnt consider). If you have a 12 seater running a route at 300 and I have a 100 seater running a route at 299, a rational customer chooses my airline, no?

6

General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 05:09:29 pm »

I'm not sure I understand why a larger aircraft can't charge as much as a smaller plane. I've seen a bit of that while I've graduated to larger planes and markets, but I'm not sure I get how the economics work like that.  Plane size shouldn't matter except to further diminish demand.

Edit: Fozzy, really? You didnt edit it this afternoon?  Wow, then that's really weird!  I created the route 90 minutes before having to edit it.  

7

General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 05:00:57 pm »

It happened again, while I composed the above post.

Oakland -> Cincinnati.  Look at the routes:

Stealth Bomber Air    Lockheed R6V Constitution    1    €373
Coastal Air    Boeing 377 Stratocruiser    1    €499
Northwest Airlines西北航空    Lockheed Super Constellation L-1049    1    €500
Piedmont Airlines [FTG]    Lockheed Super Constellation L-1049    1    €500
Ramathorn [OT]    Lockheed Super Constellation L-1049    1    €509
☺↑ ▲ Island Air ▲ ↑☻    Lockheed Super Constellation L-1049    0.5    €900
Shayne Air [FTG]    Curtis CW-20    1    €980
Celestial    Bristol 170 Wayfarer    1    €1,300

Is the game forcing you to price 1RT at 373, which is 36% lower than the nearest competitor?  My route dropped from 100% to 78%. (Sadly, I created the route 90 minutes ago *laugh*).  

Just curious,
David

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General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 04:57:44 pm »

Hiya fozzy,

Thanks for replying.  From what I've been seeing the past few days, your prices for 1RT are about 25-50% of what the market is bearing.  I had one route go from 100% to 2% because of your change in price.  That's why I said 200-400% (I guess that number is relative to the market before you priced your 1RT).  Take Orlando to Hartford/Springfield.  There were 3 routes previously (0.5 @ 1350, 1 @1145, and 0.5 at a rate I don't know because it looks adjusted).  You priced 1RT at 530. That drops everyone else's load factors by a lot.  Is there a reason to price at 530?

I'm not saying you're doing anything wrong, and for the third time, I defend everyone's right to undercut, but I guess I'm starting to feel the game's mechanical deficiencies, and in a big way, and over the last 3 days, it's mostly because of your prices

Best,
David

9

General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 04:41:58 pm »

Why shouldn't I mention the airline's name?  It's a general discussion about the disruptiveness of going into a market and effecting it so drastically as to take people's 100% load to 25% in one fell swoop.  Stealth Bomber Air is taking all his routes and moving them into silly cheap territory.  And while I'll vigorously defend his right to do so, the problem is the game is not well setup for it. I went from 99.70% utilization on almost 300 routes to 70-something % overnight because of what he's doing.  The effect is me having to retool too many routes, demotivating me from caring (because it's so much work, and so much point and clicking).  

If we can't have open discussions about this, then there's no point to having a forum.

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General Chat / To player: Stealth Bomber Air

« on: November 12, 2007, 04:22:48 pm »

Stealth Bomber Air operator:

While I respect and appreciate your right to price routes competitively, you've created an extraordinary amount of work for everyone in game by lowering the rates on all your routes by 200 or 300 or 400% in the last 3 days.  Because there is no automated way of managing routes, you're forcing every player who competes with you to manage all their routes individually. I play this game 5 or 6 times a day, managing routes carefully, and this morning I had over 100 routes that fell below 75% (and some below 50%, and some below 25%) because of what you're doing.  Again, I have no problem with your undercutting, but the results of it -- the pain of point and clicking and typing 100 routes of management -- is very uncool.  The game's lack of featureset will remedy over time.  Maybe you could be a bit less drastic in your actions so that your fellow players aren't demotivated from playing?

Just an opinion,
David

11

General Chat / Aircraft selection page...

« on: November 08, 2007, 12:03:56 am »

As long as they get to the same destination, it would be fine. If not, your player's id is needed.

AirlineID: 6654   Three routes go to the same destination, but the fourth route (Cincinnati) doesn't appear to be connected at all.   This is just one of a few examples I think I have in my fleet.

12

General Chat / Aircraft selection page...

« on: November 07, 2007, 11:42:18 pm »

(Though it should be noted this is buggy, as I have instances of planes with routes initiating at disconnected airports.  Admins: see aircraftID 52068 which has routes starting at four different bases.)

13

General Chat / A Distance Calulator Would Be Nice

« on: November 07, 2007, 11:09:05 pm »

am i the only one that plots using google earth?

Until I found the "Research Route" function, I was plotting via mapquest place-to-place directions.  It was really pathetic

14

General Chat / ROI on Super Constellations

« on: November 07, 2007, 07:52:10 pm »

I've only been playing for a few weeks, and just took delivery of my first Lockheed Super Constellation.  I'm having a little bit of trouble figuring out how to maximize revenue for these puppies.  For my first plane, I did one long-haul route, and filled-in the rest of the hours with some short-haul routes.  If I take the purchase price and divide by the current DOP for the plane, I get a complete ROI after 6.6 [RL] days.  Does that sound about right?  It's much longer than it takes for me to recoup the purchase price of the smaller planes, so I was curious if 6.6 days is a good, medium, or bad number, in your experience.

Thanks!
David

IonWorks
AirlineID: 6654

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General Chat / A Distance Calulator Would Be Nice

« on: November 07, 2007, 06:13:12 pm »

This exists.  Look for "Research Route" in the menus.