S3 Series

I'm about done CO'ing frames for the balance of this season.
Jabo Orders/objectives too fluid, sides unbalanced for mission objectives and unrealistic flying ops by the Axis for this scenario.
I will continue to give input and will help when a frame is flown without orders.

<S>

I know what you mean, om DDay thr Axis lost 300 aircraft to the Allies loss of 1,200. That sounds bad for the Alies but it was 1% of their aircraft, leaving the Allies with 10.800 aircraft to the Axis 300 compared to 50% of Axis aircraft. that left the Allies with 10,800 aircraft to 300 LW. Our series balance was 26 Allies to 24 Axis,hardly historical.

I am near end of life as a CO, I did 88 WB2 frames ans 75 WB3 frames for a total of 164 franes CO'd

Looks as though the S3's will go belly-up anytime soon! What's the basic problem with the scenarios? As I'm fairly, actually very new to all this, I don't fully understand why there is so much angst. I thought the whole idea was to enjoy a fuller, more intensive session that we don't see very often if at all, in the the legacy/main arena now.

I'm happy to help where and how can but I'm lacking in experience and knowledge regarding the design and implementation. I did run a few EMC's many years ago and I don't recall it being such a nause. For example, I had read about a planned raid to steal the new FW190 that was causing such problems for the RAF. The raid was cancelled because a German pilot mistook the Bristol Channel for the Channel and conveniently landed in the UK. Job done! A story I'm sure many of you know about.

I wrote an outline called 'Run, rabbit, run' where a volunteer had to fly under the radar from France to the SW of the UK in an unarmed, minimally fueled aircraft. The job of the LW was to intercept and force or shoot it down, the RAF to cause diversions and protect the lone 190. It was run for about 90 minutes as I recall with 3 or 4 people volunteering to be the rabbit and it was good fun!

So it had something of a historical aspect but was changed to suit the players. This I'm guessing is the purpose of the S3's but on a potentially larger scale. Historical accuracy is possibly the last consideration otherwise there would be all sorts of limitations imposed. in fact other than a nod of the head to history, don't you think we should just be making up an event loosely based on what actually happened but giving an opportunity to test both Allied & Axis abilities to out guess, think and fly the other side. In other words, to win!

We all know what the real outcome was; Warbirds is imaginary and it's up to our imagination to come up with challenging and interesting scenario ideas that will immerse those players for 2-3 hours. If I'm speaking out of turn, well so be it but I fail to understand what the nub of the problem really is, please do explain.

pmhb
You are not speaking out of turn, all input is good.

IMHO:
The big problem that has hindered the S3's the last 10+ years is the number of players. There are multiple reasons for the decline, which I won't rehash here. As the numbers declined the way the S3's were structured had to change, which leaves us where we are today and has frustrated many of us original S3 folks.
Historical accuracy was somewhat important originally, as well as "one life to live". These have both been abandoned for lack of player numbers. Our original Jabo retired on top of that. The new team that has been designing the S3's are newish to it, have their collective hands full and I'm sure are doing the best they can...in most cases. They are putting tons of hours into design/testing I'm sure. It is just plain hard to design a series that will be fun for all players with the numbers we have without having to resort to changing rules, etc on the fly...like this series' changes. I don't know what the answer is but it is really hard for someone to step up to Frame CO for a side anymore. We get orders/objectives late on occasion, plan something ahead, when we can, then have rules change (even for the better). The number of S3 players that frequent this board has dwindled as well, so comms is mostly lacking with many folks showing up not knowing anything about the frame they are going to fly in.

Anymore I usually don't fly S3's to win the series or stay alive all 5 frames, I fly it to have fun. When the fun stops, folks leave.

Typically the Frame rules/objectives used to be posted on Monday or Tuesday at the latest. That gave us most of the week to plan and hash things out.

Take this past week for example: Our objectives could never have been met. Then add on defending our ships at their coast. There weren't enough players to achieve any of that. Then add on the ability of the Germans to fly anywhere on the map, including England, to search out troops,bombers and fighters...which never happened during Dday.

I was going to take frame 2 CO for the Allies until I read the original orders/objectives. I threw my hands up and said no way I'm leading that mess waiting to happen. Then Thursday I see new objectives listed (less) which is a welcomed change but I don't have the time I'd care to spend developing a plan now.

It is easy to sit here and critique the S3's in hindsight. It is super hard for the series designers to anticipate turnout numbers(especially bombers) and the many ways a frame can morph into...all the while trying to make sure all can have fun.

The 23rd will show up with whatever numbers we can and do the best we can to accomplish our mission.
I'm not swearing off Frame CO'ing, I'm just not as woundup about doing it so far this series.

Enough of my 2¢ worth.
<S>

pmhb,
A well thought out and written post.

Our biggest enemy is numbers. Beaver's post implied that there were 120,000 allied a/c involved in day one, not likely to be achieved without drones even if the server could stand it. Standing patrols inland of the beach head etc.

Your "Run rabbit" sounds like a good scenario with clearly defined goals for both sides, though I do not remember it. This is the sort of imagination that is needed to create focus rather than trying to cover the whole battle field.

The EMCs ran pretty well on the honour system though they required some pretty fierce CMng at times.

Do you have access to the EMC detailed archive, also the S3? A rich mine of ideas.

Good luck with your brave efforts and if I can help at all I am willing to have a go.

Cheers.

chough

split,
Another good post, I was typing when you posted. Thanks for the S3 history.

I cannot disagree with a word of your analysis.

Cheers.

chough

Well I still fly the S3's as I believe is the proper way. I fly to live (what a novel idea). I take the kills I can get, but getting kills then dying defeats the historical perspective in my book. Some don't care now and take chances that they wouldn't of taken before all to get a kill or two before they go down. I'd rather get 1 kill and live or get lucky like the last series when got 3 shoot downs on 1 airframe.

As others said the numbers is a stumbling block also. I understand that. My fix since the change to 3 lives would be once you go down, then you can only replane from a back field. Re-rolling from whatever field you want is just cheesy in my book. As far as directives on scenarios go: With the numbers in game it shouldn't be more than 2. There shouldn't be any NOE attacking at all; although as in the old days Jabo would have at times 1 frame a series with special ops and they have been sometimes NOE or 1 squad would get a 15 min early roll for a mission per series.

The next problem is there is some angst in some squads that refuse to fly with others or against others. The problem here is numbers again. Last series both big squads were on one side and we all know just having numbers equal or close on the sides isn't the same as the large squads have the advantage of comms. That is a huge advantage when a squad of 10 is against 2 squads of 5 or less.

So as we can see everyone has a different idea and Jabo of old heard shit quite a bit I'm sure. He used to say if he didn't hear bitching, then something was wrong. At times he's probably right, but I feel there was times he needed to listen to the complaints as he didn't fly in the S3's or the Kiddy arena as I call the Main and had no idea of the issues brought up for some of the complaints.

It appears I'll still be flying the S3's, since flying with the friends I've made through the 20+ years I've been playing WB's is a special time for me. That about sums up my thoughts.

<S>

I'll try to post some ideas regarding the bombing side of life later today. I've trialled some flight times and GV's movements so I have rough idea what's achievable. Regarding the design aspect, if as you say, the scenario parameters are not settled in time, we have no chance to really plan or test so we turn up blind and do what we can. I have had a small window of opportunity to think about this but I have no idea about the fighter escort/sweep side of life. Once again it seems "it'll be alright on the night" attitude prevails, players will do what they can but there's no overall plan combining all types of aircraft.

As mentioned in an earlier post, VNSLP offered to show me some things and I'm very grateful but we haven't managed to hook up yet. If there's an archive section that can be used to get a feel, where is it and how's it accessed? After that, how do you set up the arena for an event, what's different between the event arena and the main arenas apart from the scale. I noticed during a field recce, for example, that Field 19 is a different layout for the Europe arena to the Europe 256 scale. I haven't checked every field but there may be other anomalies.

As numbers are always unknown, precise planning is going to be impossible. Therefore flexibility is required unless you start limiting player numbers by requiring people to sign up a few days ahead. This might serve to focus attention a little more and if it become oversubscribed, it can be opened up a little. Known numbers would at least allow precision planning to a greater extent.

I'm sure there's a ton more to learn, I here if needed, happy to do what I can, (time difference notwithstanding), I'll create a new post with some strategies soon.

I reposted the CO page as it hadbeen hijacked as a bitghing post or how thihgs should, but ni ine offered to CO any frane,

Frame - 1 - May 17 - Beaver
Frame - 2 - May 31
Frame - 3 - Jun 07
Frame - 4 - Jun 14
Frame - 5 - Jun 21

May 24 s off