What is the best system to use if I wanted to run a game based in the Ace Combat setting?
 Shopping Cart Returner Shirt $21.68 |
 DMT Has Friends For Me Shirt $21.68 |
Shopping Cart Returner Shirt $21.68 |
What is the best system to use if I wanted to run a game based in the Ace Combat setting?
Didn't we *just* had a few air pirate threads in a row?
That's a good thing, it's a fun topic.
Yeah, agreed. But wouldn't it be more constructive to pick it up where we left rather than start all over again every time?
I'm sure lots of the usual questions have been answered already.
Hey, here are a few question I have and still haven't seen any answers to:
>Where can I find cheap "flying" base in Europe?
Greenstuff world is all I found and it comes with the transparent rod separate, that you need to cut and glue to the base yourself.
>Could water dipping (pic related) work for painting dazzle camouflage pattern on miniatures?
>Is there a wargame system that could be used to mix real aircraft and fantasy/sci-fi stuff? Like jets vs flying saucers, or biplanes vs pterodactyls, stuff like that?
>Is there a wargame system that could be used to mix real aircraft and fantasy/sci-fi stuff? Like jets vs flying saucers, or biplanes vs pterodactyls, stuff like that?
There might be elements of that in Flying Circus given its fantasy elements but beyond that I don't think so, or at least none that I'm aware of and I've looked around. Things like Shadowrun and 40k rpgs have rules for flying monsters and vehicles that could allow you to have that situation but aerial combat is always an afterthought so unless the system was purpose built to be about planes and dogfights, I wouldn't use it to run an ace combat game. If you were to implement a flying monster like a giant dragon into Warbirds you could probably treat it like an airship in many ways (big, massive, lots of firepower but too slow to zip around like a plane) I don't know how you would model a dragon in Project Sidewinder or Mercenary Air Squad.
Never cared much for air pirates but an Ace Combat style game seems neat, a mercenary group or special forces/blackops squadron doing extremely risky and dangerous missions.
You know, this reminds me. For a while now I’ve actually wanted to run a game that uses the setting but focuses on ground forces.
Like I know it’s all about the planes but there’s a lot of interesting stuff happening on the ground as well if you listen to the dialogue.
>Like I know it’s all about the planes but there’s a lot of interesting stuff happening on the ground as well if you listen to the dialogue.
Such as? I've never really played the games.
The examples I always use are the two missions in 7 where you have to identify your targets.
Kessler Syndrome has occurred so basically every side is now in the dark. In the Anchorhead Bay mission it’s this grueling slog of nighttime urban warfare, and you hear that people who were once Allies have now turned on each other resulting in hellish urban warfare. You hear a news broadcast, you hear
Tyler Island is more interesting because there’s talks about blatant war crimes and piles of civilian corpses, children included, in this horrific scorched earth campaign across the island all because a few members of a conspiracy might be in it.
What’s going on with the ground forces is very compelling and a story worth telling. The pilots stories are all interesting, but there’s a lot going on the ground that would make a good story.
Thinking about it now I could probably do my idea for a group of Osean Marines trying to evacuate Tyler Island using Twilight 2000.
Skip any RPG that doesn't (if only conceptually) model a Doghouse Plot (Energy-Maneuverability Diagram), and ignore any advice from anyone who doesn't know what one is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_envelope
I mean, what's the point of playing a game about flying a plane if it doesn't move the way a plane does?
>Doghouse Plot
Ok, I'll bite:
What's a doghouse plot and which tabletop games (wargame or RPG) do models them?
A Doghouse Plot relates Rate of Turn (usually in degrees per second) to Airspeed. The important point here being, how fast a plane can turn CHANGES with what Airspeed it's moving at. So any game system where you aren't ALWAYS checking your Airspeed to see how fast you can turn is DEAD WRONG.
Moreover, it's not a simple case of one plane being categorically more maneuverable than another; one can have the edge in maneuverability at one convenient Airspeed, while the other can have the edge at some other convenient Airspeed; or maybe one has some convenient pocket of maneuverability advantage in the middle, and the other has convenient pockets at both ends. Optimizing maneuverability through changes in Airspeed via changes in Altitude DOMINATED combat between U.S. and Japanese fighters in WWII; you're not really Dogfighting WITHOUT this mechanic.
What's more, the harder you turn, the more Airspeed you lose due to Drag; before the jet age, this frequently led to aircraft trading Altitude for Airspeed in order to compensate for that additional Drag. This could even lead to top-tier dogfighting pilots pitted against one another finding themselves just above the ground after outmaneuvering one another for long enough, if neither had a good opportunity to safely disengage.
In summary, any good game ACTUALLY about Dogfighting requires:
Rate of Turn for a given gameplay turn depending on the Airspeed over the course of that gameplay turn
Changes in Altitude being used to adjust Airspeed, and, by extension, Rate of Turn
A High Rate of Turn requiring losing some combination of Airspeed or Altitude to compensate for the increased Drag
So, there you go. I don't often see game systems with these rules. The closest I've seen is FFG's X-Wing games, but only in the grossest possible terms.
So, here's a picture. You'll notice the curved line on the left; that's the Stall Line. Obviously, if you try to go slower than your current attempted Rate of Turn allows, your plane stalls.
The line that starts at the peak of the Stall Line and goes to the right is usually an estimate. Depending on the aircraft in question, the relevant limit may be the G-limit of the Pilot, or the structural integrity of the aircraft; for ones that focus more on structural integrity, and attempt to model the limits of individual parts, this line can get quite jaggy. So, if you try to turn faster than your current Airspeed allows, you experience some combination of blacking out and/or your plane falling apart (whichever are relevant).
The thing is, though, in a Dogfight, you want to MAXIMIZE Rate of Turn, which means operating as close to those limits as possible for any given maneuver, without going over.
As you move through a turn, you're almost certainly (outside of turning during a steep dive, for instance) going to be starting from some place to the right of the maximum Rate of Turn, following the top right curve as best you can to as close to the maximum Rate of Turn that you can, and then down the Stall Line a little, where you stop turning before you lose so much Airspeed that the wing will stall out regardless of angle of attack.
THIS is what a good Dogfighting game has to make approachable in order to reproduce plausible gameplay experiences.
This is very interesting but I have absolutely no idea how all this could be turned into an interesting and fast-resolving tabletop mechanic.
Even assuming the DM and all the players have a strong mathematical background.
In all honesty, the exactness of the graph doesn't matter so much. If you abstracted it at a low resolution, with, say, 3 or 4 different Rates of Turn, and maybe 6 different Airspeeds, that would suffice. The point is, the variables still have to MATTER. If NOTHING changes relative to Airspeed, it just ISN'T Dogfighting.
Keep going. What else do I need to make a dogfighting game fun?
>weapons
>fuel
>other plane properties
>pilot skills
>etc
Just give me the key things you would like to see. I can autistically research a lot of stuff myself. I'm going to try to cook something up
I think for an arcadey type of game manoeuvres might be an interesting mechanic
You expand some speed and in turn either make a rapid shift direction, a way to get out of missile lock or an opportunity to attack you wouldn’t normally get
Pugachev’s cobra is probably the most famous one but there are others
The Doghouse Plot applies to ALL maneuvers within the regime where the Plane wings provide Lift. The Cobra Maneuver is technically NOT one of those, but most of the rest are.
See here for a list of such things: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_fighter_maneuvers
The problem with going "arcadey" is that there's not enough resolution to make the performance of aircraft distinct from one another, without artificially banning maneuvers from Planes that rightfully aught to be able to do those. Existing Plane mechanics are too "arcadey" already; there's no point in heading in that direction again.
Most of more basic manoeuvres like scissors or even barrel roll can be simulated fairly well using doghouse plot
Cobra and it’s derivatives , along with supermanuevrability, are much harder to do so. Giving planes that can do them an ability to spend some airspeed to do them would be great for setting certain planes apart
First off, if you haven't read this already, do so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_fighter_maneuvers
In all honesty, the most important thing to get right (for whatever level of resolution you choose to implement) is the Rate of Turn and Turning Radius (whether that's horizontal OR vertical) for a given Airspeed for a particular Plane and loadout. Lift is dependent on Airspeed, and Turning Radius is dependent on Lift providing the Centripetal Force; and so Turning Radius will be dependent on Mass, too. Once you have your Turning Radius, Airspeed will get you how far around that circle the Plane went, which is how Rate of Turn plays out.
Thrust:
Thrust is what overcomes drag, particularly during a high-G, tight Turning Radius maneuver; THIS is why Fighters care so much about acceleration, in spite of (in general) having lower top speeds than they used to.
Weapons:
For Machine Guns/Cannons, there's no real value in complicating it beyond chance to hit when you get Line of Sight. Ammo types would be pretty significant, though; there's plenty of differentiation there, in any given time period.
Modern missiles can be complicated, particularly with regards to Flare and Chaff; some sort of potentially failure-prone homing mechanic would be appropriate.
Assuming dead-drop Bombs, the key part is whether you're flying on target and straight (not inducing any additional motion so it lands off target) when you release it at the right height for the distance. Depending on the time period, guidance computers will help immensely, even with dead drop bombs, making it more like firing a Gun in terms of "put reticle on target and pull the relevant trigger".
Continues...
>What else do I need to make a dogfighting game fun?
You need to keep it fun instead of trying to make a simulation unless you want to pursue a very niche market of plane-obsessed weirdoes who were ex-pilots or too fat to pass physicals. There are two excellent games that try simulation of combat flight in the jet era already I know of (Birds of Prey and Air Superiority) but they're not going to be good RPGs, and most people will not find them to be fun because of the volume of math, bookkeeping, and knowledge they required to play. These are extremely heads-down games where you are buried in sheets and charts. I would tell you to take a look at these games if you want to try and take a realistic approach though, and crib what you like.
Otherwise, there's a reason these are tiny niche games played by mostly 50+ year olds who still jerk it to F-14s while stuff like Wings of Glory found wider audiences. It's a question of accessibility. When you move into the RPG realm, you also have to balance audience expectations of character interaction and story vs being worried about the drag on your pylons due to asymmetrical bomb deployment, as well as the workload of the GM vs players. Even in Air Superiority tournaments back in the 90s, most people were ever only flying one plane. The cognitive load on the GM to operate even a 1-to-1 opposition force would be nightmarish.
Here's the thing.
Do you want a game ABOUT Dogfighting?
Or do you want a game that POSES as being about Dogfighting?
Because, unless your game models the Physics that makes Dogfighting such a unique combat problem, you're just playing a game that POSES as being about Dogfighting.
>unless your game models the Physics that makes Dogfighting such a unique combat problem, you're just playing a game that POSES as being about Dogfighting
What exactly is the problem with this. Most other games abstract combat to a die roll with some skill and equipment modifiers. It doesn't accurately depict all the intricacies or a sword fight or a gun fight as doing slow would drastically slow down the game. Additionally I feel like trying to have a perfectly realistic simulator of aerial combat detracts from an ace combat style game, as those games have you constantly pull ridiculous stunts you could never actually do in real life. There definitely should be some unique stuff to it but trying to implement a ton of math will result in the game grinding to a screeching halt. If you want to do stuff like tying airspeed to turn rate, then create a table for it. A SMALL table. This isn't a simulator, it's an RPG, I shouldn't have to consult an excel spreadsheet and do anything more than basic addition/subtraction/multiplication.
Well, there ISN'T a problem with it, unless you WANTED a game that was ABOUT Dogfighting.
It's only a problem if you wanted what the game advertised itself as, rather than merely a good game with an airplane-themed coat of paint.
It's like if you wanted to buy a Chess set, and wound up with a Go set. Sure, Go isn't bad, but it ISN'T Chess.
I don't care what a game is about as long as it's good. Pen and paper games won't emulate the feeling of flying a plane in any manner, much less dogfighting. The skills and inputs required are too different, the experiences are almost as disparate as you can get, and the mediums are at odds. Tabletop games are abstractions that use themes to draw people into interesting mechanics or vice versa. Warbirds is a very good RPG with lots of dogfighting, but the rules have almost no attempt to accurately portray air combat because it doesn't matter for the game to deliver the expereince the designers intended. Birds of Prey is a great game if you want to learn about flying in the abstract, but a terrible foundation for a roleplaying game. Ace Combat is a wonderful franchise of power fantasies with a very thin airplane skin. Il-2 was fun for me when I was in my early 30s and had lots of free time. I just like good games.
Posing is just fine. All games are doing it. As long as the game is good I don't care about other arbitrary criteria.
Is division ok?
Dividing something by 2, 3, or 4 is fine but anything more than that I'd be skeptical of. I don't wanna seeing something like 44/13. The general point I was trying to make was that I shouldn't have to do anything too strenuous. It's supposed to be a make believe game about flying planes, not a pen and paper flight simulator.
I don't mind if a game poses, so long as they're honest about it, and doesn't waste my time and'or money as a result, and doesn't pollute the market for a game that does the job of ACTUALLY being a Dogfighting game, which is a bit of a problem regardless.
I'm not opposed to good games; just good games masquerading as something they're not, to the detriment of something that is having no room left on the market.
Maybe this could be represented by Gaslands-style movement templates, then, which would only be available at different speeds, depending on your airplane.
Speed would be a straight movement template with... say... six increments.
So, beginning of the round you first move along the "speed" straight movement template. Then you add the turning template of your choice, among the ones allowed by your initial speed.
Could be fun.
Wings of War/Wings of Glory tries something similar to this, but has flaws in its execution. They essentially picked two different Airspeeds, with the EXACT SAME maximum Rate of Turn. They really should have done at least 3 maximum Rates of Turn, so that the optimal Rate of Turn for a given Aircraft could be done, also. There really aught to be maybe about 3 Rates of Turn, and about 5 to 6 Airspeeds. I figure, 3 Rates of Turn, and associated Energy costs, per Airspeed card, aught to do it. Then, as you spend Kinetic Energy on Turning, you have to compensate with some combination of Engine Power (and spending the required Fuel), Altitude Loss, or Airspeed Loss. Altitude and/or Airspeed can be regained by Climbing or going roughly straight respectively at high Engine Power (with Fuel Loss, as appropriate).
Maybe, you could make it so that your aircraft and pilot g-force thresholds are at a certain limit. Say, 10 and 8 respectively. Roll 2d6 to initiate a turn during a dogfight. Go over your G-Force? You begin to black out, and the pilot suffers harm. Go over 10 and your plane takes damage.
Of course then you could modify this base mechanic with pilot skill, abilities, experimental equipment, control over dice results, etc.
Or you could do similar things but have a gambling system involving these limits, maybe akin to the Dogs in the Vineyard escalation system.
Those numbers are too high. The maximum Positive G Limit of the F-18 is 7.5G; F-22 and F-35, 9G. But bear in mind, those guys mostly fight "over the horizon", with long-range missiles. There's no fun Dogfighting in there. As such, any plane that has to ACTUALLY outmaneuver their opponent, from a more historical timeperiod, is going to have MUCH lower G Limits; unless you want to fight ALIENS, or something, then, well, sure; but there's not much point in realism for that.
Anon named 8 and 10 as just off the pot example numbers, anon. Your immediate focus on that combined with the idea that there's no point in realism if you include one unrealistic element (you MUST keep your ideas and settings neatly separated like Lego piles) is what makes me suspect you've got the spectrum.
You're misunderstanding me. If we're talking fighting against aliens, then part of the presumed setting is that the aliens are NOT using airplanes, and aerodynamic lift. At which point, focusing on a physics problem that applies to only ONE side of the fight is poor game design.
I mean, as a Tabletop RPG setting, realistic fighters fighting off aliens sounds like fun. As a Tabletop Boardgame, it sounds like crap.
If you're cool with some abstraction and bullshit, aeronautica imperialis
realistically speaking PlayStation 4 but you could probably run it in PlayStation 5
>Primetime Adventures
This show is set up like a television series, which AC is kind of like. It will let you focus on the drama and stuff without worrying too much about the reality of the aircraft, probably what you should lean into in a game with multiple protagonists.
>Warbirds
A bit more mechanically-focusaed on the aircraft. You'll likely want the jet age suppliment unless you want to run something in Strangereal during the prop era which could be fricking dope. Unfortunately the Jet Age book isn't very good.
>FATE
I don't like it, but it could work.
>Project Sidewinder
This is an obvious Ace Combat emulator. The rulebook has some sketchy bits but if you're used to working with indie stuff (like, published online and pdf only) it's nothing insurmountable.
>Use a wargame
you can rely on a super-simple genericsystem for roleplay and then just play a wargame for combat resolution. I would recommend something light for this to save time, like Missile Threat or AirWar C21. This is the worst option imo.
I really like Project Sidewinder, and so does my group!
This is really interesting reading, I hope you have time to post the rest of the PDF's later, I appreciate it!
Tell me more about the Sidewinder. How does it play?
You bid resources against targets to resolve effects by making an escalating series of bids where you invest stuff to try to outdo the target to apply an effect. If you back out of a bid you get some stuff back but lose the contest. This system works pretty well and is neat at first, but can be slow when every action has three rounds of bidding and some players are slow at this or tense moments can make people overthink a bid. Otherwise it's a basic wargame that is pretty bland and can take up a lot of space on the table if you have fast planes that aren't just jousting. The bidding stuff is novel, and I think I'd like to see it used in another game.
In the end I prefer Warbirds purely because it's faster and neither really has a visceral "flying a plane" feeling and neither is trying to be simulationist. Warbirds also has rules for stuff other than planes, which Sidewinder has essentially nothing for like Lancer outside mechs. So that's an issue you may have.
There's some barebones setting stuff but we just played Area 88 with the serials filed off, and I'd assume anybody else playing it is also going to ignore the setting stuff and adopt it for something they already had in mind as well so no harm there.
>Warbirds also has rules for stuff other than planes, which Sidewinder has essentially nothing for like Lancer outside mechs.
Mercenary Air Squad also does not really have rules for non-flying stuff. I'm not sure why but this is something I've noticed in a lot of modern flying and mecha RPGs and I don't know why. I appreciate all the effort they go through to make flying and mech piloting involved and interesting but it just seems strange to include little to no rules for doing things outside of the wienerpit.
>It will let you focus on the drama and stuff
that's not ace combat tho
the entire thing is about being a super ace pilot, it's not a gundam where the mecha are just there so they can exposite about how war bad
I mean, there's still a lot of "war bad" in AC, but it's relegated to the background.
Best AC wingman just because he never complained about war.
I played my WIP air combat game this weekend with both groups, pretty interesting games. Both games are set in the same universe and I definitely take queues from Ace Combat, but it's set in the 1970s so no ultramodern stuff. The early tiers of aircraft are Korean War stuff and the apex is F-4s and MiG-23s. Picrel is one of the parties, a Russian defector in his 'Murica F-104, an Indian idealist in the Su-9 and a crusty old British guy in the A-37.
I don't know if my game would be too technical to be interesting for people interested in something AC-ish. The system has a good deal of crunch and there's a certain degree of physics emulation. Nothing indepth like , it's mostly a sort of plane goes up = plane slows down, and some planes fly better at certain speed/altitude combinations. I'm hoping to release it when their campaigns wrap up, in a few months.
House-rule heavy Settlers of Catan
ttrpgs don't work for everything.
Oh boy, I have a list of a few RPGs. Generally for aerial combat RPGs the ones I know are:
-Air War C21 (more of a wargame)
-Flying Circus
-Mercenary Air Squadron
-The Few
-Warbids
A few years ago though, some anon talked about how they were running a sorta Ace Combat style game in a modern fantasy setting. They were using Warbirds with a ton of homebrew rules and was nice enough to write it all up. This is the most final version. I have the pdfs for all the other RPGs i mentinoed but im gonna be busy for the rest of the day. If this thread survives till late tonight I could probably post them.
Air War C21 is basically a war game. Some people added a few basic RPG elements and ran a game with it documenting it here on 1dGanker. It's been a while since I read through it.
https://1dGanker/wiki/Mercenaries_and_planes
I haven't looked through Mercenary Air Squadron a ton although based on what I saw when I briefly skimmed through it, it seems kinda similar to Project Sidewinder in some ways, primarily with the money system.
One notable thing about it is that you have a very limited amount of fuel. Typically on a mission, you will only have a few turns of fuel to dogfight. This is pretty realistic as fighter pilots must constantly be checking their fuel and measure their time over target. The downside however is this doesn't necessarily mimic the extended over the top aerial engagements you see in Ace Combat and Project Wingman. Personally, if I used it, I would ignore the fuel stuff, or at least make it far more generous.
This one is not made for modern jets but rather WW2 engagements, specifically the Battle of Britain.
Warbirds and Flying Circus books are too large so I just threw them all in a file here along with the rest.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/14rNUPfORhqCYQXpBk0sRC5ii4PZVygOl
Warbirds is what Aurora Anon was using and I quite like it with their homebrew rules. It's dog-fighting system is effectively everyone makes a dog-fighting roll at the start of the round (which also serves as initiative). You can only attack people who get a lower Dog-fighting score. Dog-fighting rolls are made at the start of each round. It gives options for specific maneuvers but overall tries to keep it simple. This can be good or bad as it lets combat flow faster but it doesn't really let you model exactly what is going on. If you and your group really want to emulate flying and all the details associated, then maybe go with Project Sidewinder or Mercenary Air Squad (or Air War C21 if your up to it). If you're the only massive plane autist in your group then the simpler, more straightforward Warbirds might be better as its easier to bring people around to.
Flying Circus is, much like The Few, not meant for modern jets although it focuses more on WW1 era stuff (though I believe there are a few rules for scram-jets and lasers oddly enough). It does have a fantasy setting leading it to have several other additional things that a more conventional game would not have. A lot of aerial rpgs tend to be pretty light on the rpg aspect (or in Air War C21's case, entirely absent given it's a straight wargame), spending most of their focus modeling aerial combat. Flying Circus, along with Warbirds, definitely have the most fleshed out for stuff on the ground.
I don't know how much material Project Sidewinder has for doing things outside of the wienerpit, nor have I looked at it before.
Thanks for sharing.
I am an oldgay and I am suggesting Planes & Mercs.
Out of curiosity do you know what rpg elements they added to Air War. Like basic character stats or skills for doing things on the ground.
Nope, I just remember lurking a few threads and people generally having fun with it. Never played P&M myself, though I was pretty interestedb(my group and most of my old LGS turned their nose up if it didnt come out of a GW or WotC box : )
I think it was mostly just in the air stats. Air War does have rules for pilots of differing skill levels which you could extend to have different skills for different types of actions such as BFM, BVR, Ground-pounding, etc.
FATAL
crimson skies
Mongoose Traveler (Customized)
What exactly would you customize about it?
I don't know: I don't play Mongoose Traveler or Ace Combat; I was merely answering intuitively in a real "shoot from the hip" kind of way that usually works out for me. If I had to guess, I'd say it would need slightly finer initiative rules, slightly improved g-force/blackout/redout rules, and so forth.
>t. owns 1e mongoose traveler core and has spent maybe ten minutes watching or playing ace combat firsthand
This might sound crazy, but if you wanted to do air and ground in the same system, why not try a system that starts with ground and can be/has been converted for vehicles and go from there?
Lancer was brought up, and maybe AdEva, Heavy Gear, or whatever Battletech or MechWarrior system is current might do the trick? It might be wonky, but it could make things easier if you wanted some combat variety.
Another idea comes to mind; established sci-fi systems in general. Star Wars the, Expanse, Traveller, etc.
The setting needs more Heavy Command Cruisers
... Continued
Fuel:
Depending on the scenario, fuel is either interesting or a buzz kill; it's better off as an "only sometimes" thing. Also, keep in mind that Drop Tanks are for GETTING to the fight, not DURING the fight, as the drag, weight, and radar return are too high. Impose relevant limits on Plane performance, so that the Players are forced to drop them well BEFORE combat. This ALSO means they have to be careful about bailing on the fight soon enough to have enough fuel to get back (or at least to a refuelling plane).
Flight Ceiling:
Flight Ceiling is less important for Dogfighting stuff. Sure, without radar, or with functional stealth, an altitude advantage can give you a potential surprise attack, and some additional speed advantage when engaging an enemy plane, and maybe even somewhere to be where you can stay out of reach, but not much else. And mission requirements, like flying at a certain altitude to avoid satelite or radar coverage, are going to determine engagment altitude MUCH more often. The part that matters more here is limits on Ground to Air, and whether those SAM sites and such can even hit the plane at a given altitude.
Continues...
... Continued
Skills:
Bear in mind, I'm a GURPS player, but also one that prefers their Guns Skills simplified to basic types. So I'm going to answer this within that context. "Piloting (Fighter Jet)" covers everything with regards to flying and maneuvering the Plane; Familiarity penalties apply to specific models of Plane, due to differences in what is mounted on the Throttle and Stick, and where the relevant control panels are, other ergonomics stuff, and performance differences; also, there's room for Techniques, here; when you practice Aircraft Carrier Takeofss and Landings, those are Techniques; as are Basic Combat Maneuvers, like a "High Yo-Yo". I'd have an "Electronics Operation (Interactive Flight Displays)" Skill for Primary Flight Displays and Multi-Function Displays, and interacting with those. Also, an "Electronics Operation (Sensors)" Skill, for the various Radars. Firing the Autocannon is a Specialization of Gunner. Firing Missiles and Bombs are Specializations of Artillery.
If you have any other questions you'd like for me to be opinionated about, feel free to keep asking.
Anthem of Aces.
What is that? I've never heard of it.
An In-Progress Homebrew system. from what I've read in the thread, it's alot like Project Sidewinder.
TL;DR on how the system works:
Planes have a resource known as Energy, which they gain at the start of every turn, or by diving and lowering their altitude. Energy is then bet on performing various maneuvers, which can either protect your plane from your opponent's maneuvers, harm your opponent, or make it easier for you to harm your opponent.
It uses a deterministic resolution method, where if you've bet significantly more energy than your opponent (Or if they aren't opposing you at all), you can usually automatically succeed to varying degrees against them. If not, you roll off, and energy is treated as d10s where you try to roll equal to or above various target numbers, which all depend on your chosen maneuver(s) and various other factors.
>Planes have a resource known as Energy, which they gain at the start of every turn, or by diving and lowering their altitude.
With that layout I'd call it speed instead of energy. The (mechanical) energy of an aircraft is after all due to its speed and altitude, and diving trades altitude for speed, not altitude for energy. As a side benefit(?) this also means you have the speeds there ready to go if one aircraft decides to break of and just run for the horizon.
(Though one could have a somewhat simpler system that doesn't track speed and altitude separately, and then we call the resource energy, though that might loose a bit much flavour.)
I'm not too concerned with realism to be frank, playing Ace Combat was the only that inspired its creation.
Energy just sounded nice, and feels more intuitive to say you're spending or betting it, as opposed to speed.
I mentioned the "Doghouse Plot" before, but it's more formal name is the "Energy-Maneuverability Diagram", for reasons that will be clear soon.
YES, you gain Speed when you convert the Potential Energy of your Altitude by Diving; specifically, as Kinetic Energy (which is related to Speed). The reason why Energy is more important than Speed in this context is that Kinetic Energy relates more directly to Drag than Speed does; YES, you lose Speed due to Drag, but Kinetic Energy is the more proportional, more immediately relevant, and more easily accounted for physical property that is both lost to Drag, and gained from Diving.
About how much energy do you see players having to work with in a turn? How many different things can a player spend energy on in a given turn? ill they be breaking up their energy across all sorts of different actions and modifiers in one turn, or will they have to pick between only 1 or 2 different things to blow all their energy on.
First step to getting it right would IMO be to set things up so that if you run out and your enemy still has a decent amount to go you're pretty thoroughly fricked. For a more realistic take you'd probably make increasing pilot skill largely cut down the amount of manoeuvres you need (so the unskilled pilot bleeds out to zero faster, and that's it for him) but since players like to be doing stuff it's probably better to at least partially let pilot skill reduce the cost of manoeuvres instead.
If speed sound bad then perhaps instead of betting energy you might have your various manoeuvres that simply reduce your speed, and then they instead give you dice to roll at the end (it just so happens that the number of dice you get is directly correlated to how many pips of speed you lost).
Yep, if you run low on Energy and the other guy hasn't, he'll usually have no trouble cutting you down. Creating that disparity is the usual win condition of most fights.
Also, factoring in Pilot Skill was a real pain due to the delicacy involved in not making fights too lopsided.
It ultimately ended up having three separate influences: Energy regain, Awareness/Visibility, and Talents. Awareness is just used for handling surprise attacks and such. Talents are in-progress, but the intention with them is to open up the possibility for different strategies, or to give oneself more room for error before crucial resources run out.
It depends on what they're intending to do. Turns consist of two Actions, where one can declare 1 Offensive and 1 Defensive maneuver, with the ability to declare an additional Offensive and Defensive maneuver if they're in an aircraft that has a co-pilot.
There's also certain maneuvers (Like climbing to a higher altitude or descending) that can be performed freely at certain points.
To top it off, maneuvers can also be modified or even swapped out for increasing costs and under certain circumstances.
An example turn of combat would be:
A P-51 Mustang and a Focke-Wulf 190 are dogfighting.
On the first Action, the Mustang goes first as it started with more Energy.
It decides to try and Strafe the Focke for 2 Energy.
The Focke responds to by just trying to Evade for 3 Energy, and burns some altitude to gain +8 Energy.
The Mustang responds by beefing up its Strafe, paying a tax of 2 Energy, and adding 6 more energy to its original Strafe for a total of 8.
The Focke accepts this, and the Mustang can now actually hit the Focke.
On the second Action, the Mustang tries to burst down the Focke with its guns for 12 Energy.
The Focke takes advantage of the Mustang's high energy expenditure from before, and declares a Turn-Up for 16 Energy, where it also has to pay 1 Energy as a Tax. It's a pretty costly defense, but it lets him regain his Altitude from earlier at no additional cost, BUT prevents him from lowering his altitude to regain any more energy in this action.
The Mustang doesn't have enough energy to try and up the ante any further, and so the Focke gets his maneuver off, gets some of his altitude back, and in the following Turn, would have enough energy to try and go after the Mustang.
I'm not buying the "Two Maneuvers" bit; there should be ONE Maneuver, and the Pilot should pick whichever one gives them the best combination of Defensive and Offensive in a given situation. There are plenty to choose from, if implemented properly:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_fighter_maneuvers
Also, bear in mind that a Pilot can save on Energy by not turning as aggressively, if they want to; which means you should have lots of angular and/or Airspeed resolution.
Singular maneuvers with an extremely wide range of possible factors was something I considered early on, and attempted to test out.
In the end though, they proved very limited, difficult to give any balance to, and too lacking in granularity. By having multiple maneuvers, it would allow one to tailor their strategy more finely, and innovate more easily, while also being significantly easier to design for.
You're not really giving me enough detail to work with, here. You tried WHAT Maneuvers? At what sort of Angular, Linear, and Time resolution?
There are LOTS of variables at play, here; you have to get more specific.
I'm not saying you're wrong, per se, but you're not making your case.
your variable related 'tism sounds completely anti-fun and a huge time sink for both the GM and players, and you should learn when to let off the shift key
Game design is what it is. You account for the variables, or you fail. EVERY ONE of those variables is PURELY a design choice, to which the related Physics must be adapted, if you want a game ABOUT Dogfighting, instead of just using a thin veneer of "plane go whoosh".
>Game design is what it is. You account for the variables, or you fail.
This is a completely meaningless statement.
O.K., let me be more specific, then.
Games live or die by their mechanics. What SHOULD be in the gameplay loop, and what SHOULDN'T be in the gameplay loop are key to a game being fun to play, feature a wide variety of gameplay, and have enough depth to be worth investing a player's time in over and over again.
When I mentioned "Angular, Linear, and Time resolution", EVERY ONE of those variables DIRECTLY impacts the gameplay loop. How much real-world time does a round represent? How many angles can the planes fly in? How many degrees do they turn per round? How far do they usually fly per round? Those are all DAMN solid questions that potentially affect how good any given air combat game is.
And if you can't find meaning in that, then I'm pretty sure you should go back to checkers.
>Games live or die by their mechanics
They mostly live or die by whether they're fun.
>When I mentioned "Angular, Linear, and Time resolution", EVERY ONE of those variables DIRECTLY impacts the gameplay loop
Depends on whether they actually matter within a given set of mechanics. In most systems, for example, real-world time is essentially a non-factor, and exists as an approximation for the sake of conversion at best.
Well, again, I've been talking about games that are ABOUT Dogfighting, rather than games that merely dress up and play pretend as a game about Dogfighting. As such, for such a game, a relationship to what happens in real-world time over the course of a round is pretty damn important. So too is how such a game manages to maintain those mathematical relationships within the constraint of a variable resolution small enough to remain playable.
>As such, for such a game, a relationship to what happens in real-world time over the course of a round is pretty damn important
Not really.
>So too is how such a game manages to maintain those mathematical relationships within the constraint of a variable resolution small enough to remain playable.
Kinda but also no.
All that really matters for a game is to be fun. In large part, this can be done by having an intriguing way of engaging with what it's attempting to present. Simulationism factors into this hardly at all, and is usually the bane of having a fun game that plays well.
Besides, this is an Ace Combat thread.
Again, the DIFFERENCE is between whether you want a game ABOUT Dogfighting, or a game that POSES as being about Dogfighting. BOTH can be fun. But the one that's ABOUT Dogfighting HAS to present the ACTUAL problems that Dogfighting poses to its Pilots; and you're NOT going to get there by neglecting the physics which dictate whether a given maneuver can be made or not.
"Ace Combat" was provided as a constraint on the SETTING. As such, it has NO BEARING on the GAMEPLAY.
The thread specified the "best" System to play in this Setting. And the BEST System would be BOTH simulationist AND the most fun. Anything that fails to meet BOTH criteria requires a value judgement by the original poster on which they value more.
>But the one that's ABOUT Dogfighting HAS to present the ACTUAL problems that Dogfighting poses to its Pilots
Shoot down the other plane without getting shot down.
That's about it.
> And the BEST System would be BOTH simulationist AND the most fun.
No, it would just be whatever lends itself to the most fun. Nobody but gameless spergs care about simulationist aspects.
I feel like "a game ABOUT Dogfighting" as you describe would be less of a game and more of a simulator.
Yes and no. There are multiple paths to game design. Frequently, with Dogfighting games, you have some jackass in complete ignorance of the Physics at play making up mechanics that make the planes SEEM to move right, and, upon achieving that result, they think they'll have a successful product; and, when it comes to the ignorance inherent in the mass market, so long as they made something fun, they're not necessarily wrong.
But there are other approaches. You can take a mathematical formula, make a gameably low resolution version of it, and, in that way, guarantee that the relevant mechanical effects make it into the gameplay. By doing so, you preserve most of the decision making made in the real-world situation the game is an analogue of, and make it a much more immersive experience, because you can still apply your applicable real-world knowledge of the subject to playing the game.
What, if anything, would you have in the way of out-of-the-wienerpit ground stuff. A lot of the rpgs listed here don't have much and it feels a little lacking which is a shame really. A lot of other rpgs will usually force players between being good at social stuff or combat stuff, meaning that about half the time there isn't a whole a player can do. The party face usually can't fight well and the fighter usually cant talk that well. With flight or mecha games, you can mechanically separate the pilot half of the character from the rest, meaning that everyone will be a fairly good pilot (as they should be given its the whole draw of the game) while also having other non-piloting stuff they're good at. Whether they're in a dogfight or goofing off around the airbase, everyone will always have something they can do.
Funny enough, it's actually based off the bones of another homebrew system that was meant to simulate firefights in a Max Payne/FEAR sort of way. So it'd be pretty easy to do ground stuff.
I was intending to run the finished version for an anthology-style campaign that was going to cover a war from the perspectives of a group of pilots, infantrymen, and later on, power armor pilots.
Any Doghouse Plot modeling in there?
I like the concept so far, but, rather than betting or not betting, I'd roll Piloting Skill to see how much additional Energy over the maneuver's base Energy cost you waste; the better a Pilot you are, the less Energy you waste for a given attempted maneuver.
Remember, due to the potential to Stall beyond the Angle of Attack at Maximum Lift, or of tearing off the wings, a Plane can only be so aggressive at Turning; a Pilot can't simply dump MORE Energy into Turning to turn faster.
>Doghouse Plot modeling
Definitely not. Making a system that's fun and innovative is a struggle already, but throwing in simulations of reality makes it practically impossible outside of a stroke of utter genius, or incredibly coincidences.
>I'd roll Piloting Skill to see how much additional Energy over the maneuver's base Energy cost you waste
This is how most systems would probably do it, but the problem for me is that it takes away choice from the player's end. The more randomness is factored in, the less decisions they can make, and the less those decisions will actually matter.
For comparison, by having a variable energy cost that they can decide upon, there's as many possible decisions to make with a single maneuver as there are points of energy they have to use - Which is typically in the 10-40 range, depending on the era and the pilot.
Having piloting skill or the likes as a roll they make would also lead to universal solutions, which is particularly bad for mechanically involved games.
I think you are perhaps misunderstanding me.
You have a suite of Maneuvers you can pick from, with a fixed (optimally performed) Energy cost; you then have your Piloting Skill, which modifies the Energy cost when you roll poorly, but still successfully. The issue is NOT that you don't have multiple maneuvers you can pick from, as your Energy allows; you still do. You just SPEND that Energy more efficiently if you're a better Pilot. The Altitude and Engine Power options to gain more Energy are always there, when a Player needs more Energy recovery options. There's plenty of room for decision making.
No, I fully understood you. The problem is that there is no rolling, unless both maneuvers have similar amounts of Energy dedicated to them.
It been ages ago, so I can't recall the nomenclature in use. It's not very relevant. My point is that by having maneuvers that can be combined and used in tandem, you achieve greater depth than if you were to have singular maneuvers, and less complexity and work than if you tried to make those singular maneuvers capable of the same amounts of depth.
I haven't read the entire thread carefully, nor any of the suggested rulesets, so forgive me if its been brought up already, but
When it comes to emulating aircraft combat I think I would personally prefer a ruleset where events happen simultaneously, rather than in a fixed turn order. In the context of aircraft combat, where the amount of distinct actions you can perform is very limited, essentially "move" and "use weapon/counter-measures" I think it may be possible.
I'm imagining something like this:
>Dogfight begins, squadron of players vs squadron of NPCs
>(1) GM decides the actions of all npc planes
>(2) Players decide their actions, they may coordinate with each other however much they want (as long as comms are operational)
Actions may be like "ascend to higher altitude", "chase target", "ready weapons and fire against target", "evade target by breaking left", etc.
> (3) GM and all players then reveal all decided actions
> (4) All actions are performed simultaneously
> (5) Results are tallied and a new round begins with (1)
The results all depend on how opposing combatants have acted as well as their dice rolls, plane specs, etc. For example: after the last round, A is on the tail of B. This round, A decides to launch a missile at B, but B happened to predict that and chose to deploy flares, so A gets a large penalty to their dice roll for hitting their target.
This need to analyze and predict the movement and actions of the enemy is the source of most of the "chaos" of the gameplay. Dice rolls, which depend on more "gamey" aspects such as raw numbers for character stats and aircraft specs, are a smaller modifier on top of this.
This is all just off the top of my head, haven't tried to actually design it. Any thoughts?
Sounds like ORE, which is an unplayable mess.
Simultaneous resolution gets more and more cumbersome as the number of actors scales up.
>Dice rolls
>Revealing actions post-decision
You could also drop one or the other. The latter leads to paper rock scissors, and combined with the former, it leads to paper rock scissors but scissors is always the correct choice.
Wings of War/Wings of Glory works like this, and it plays out fine. It really well reflects that you have to gain Offense by outmaneuvering your opponent, rather than just taking turns on Offense and Defense.
There was "In Harm's Way: Wild Blue", but it didn't impress me much back in the days. I prefer to just integrate "Mercenary Air Squadron" to some other system.