Quick beta available

[stevecree]

Back to 757's. I am still monitoring them on short hops across the pond, and with no competition loads are still a little disappoint.

I have just ordered a 763 to try on ATL-GLA to see what LF that gets in comparison....will report back accordingly....

[JumboShrimp]

Back to 757's. I am still monitoring them on short hops across the pond, and with no competition loads are still a little disappoint.

I have just ordered a 763 to try on ATL-GLA to see what LF that gets in comparison....will report back accordingly....

I am not too crazy about te concept of pax rather not flying than flying a narrowbody.  If there is no other choice, they should take narrowbody just fine.  But have a slighe preference to widebody if one is available....

[Sami]

For info:  Uploaded another revision of the code. And money and bankruptcy restarts are also reset for everyone.

But noticed also that lowering the ticket price may not have any effect at all in some cases; bug somewhere that I cannot find just now.

Back to 757's. I am still monitoring them on short hops across the pond, and with no competition loads are still a little disappoint.

I have not looked into this at all yet.

[ezzeqiel]

I have a problem... this message appears:

"Error: You cannot schedule this route to this aircraft since the maximum allowed daily frequency between two airports has been exceeded (max 40 flights per day)."

But I have 30 daily flights scheduled...

[schro]

But noticed also that lowering the ticket price may not have any effect at all in some cases; bug somewhere that I cannot find just now.

If it helps debug, I just opened LAX-IAD, discounted 50%, then went up to 100% and had no change in load factors between the two prices. Opened with 7x daily A321's with at least 1 hour spacing.

[Sami]

Another revision uploaded, that should fix the price issues. Please test; both low and high prices.

All other variables such as flight time, seat type, CI, flight departure/arrival times (etc) are now factored into the calculations. For the flight dep times, do note that it's not advisable to start early morning flights at 05, but make it 06 instead (slight change of settings compared to current worlds).

[schro]

Another revision uploaded, that should fix the price issues. Please test; both low and high prices.

All other variables such as flight time, seat type, CI, flight departure/arrival times (etc) are now factored into the calculations. For the flight dep times, do note that it's not advisable to start early morning flights at 05, but make it 06 instead (slight change of settings compared to current worlds).

Pricing doesn't seem to be working. I opened KLAX -> BWI and CLE on the same day with A321's. I discounted CLE by 50% and left BWI at standard, yet, they're getting the same number of passengers carried. When the route first started (RI of less than 5), I was seeing maybe a one or two pax difference.

[Sami]

That must be the RI messing it then there, I did not test that (only RI 100). Gotta check tonight.

[schro]

On a route with competition (LAX-FLL), where I'm supplying about 100% of demand and have about 100% of demand supplied by competitors, I was averaging 98-101Y and 9C seats sold per flight (on A321's) at standard pricing. I dropped pricing 25%, and that has increased sales to about 114Y and 10C. I just dropped them to 50% of standard pricing to see what happens.  I would assume this is working as designed, though, still from a player perspective, its more profitable to keep  standard prices still.

That must be the RI messing it then there, I did not test that (only RI 100). Gotta check tonight.

Well, the initial loads were about 2x higher than they were before the last tweak for both flights, so it seems like that changed as well.

[Sami]

Seems logical. But I am still thinking if the price reduction effect is too small?  (excluding the RI related bug of course)

However, I don't want to make it too large either, as it will be then very easy for established airlines to force newcomers out of business.

[schro]

Seems logical. But I am still thinking if the price reduction effect is too small?  (excluding the RI related bug of course)

However, I don't want to make it too large either, as it will be then very easy for established airlines to force newcomers out of business.

The 50% price drop seems to have me carrying fewer passengers than the 25% price drop (only have a couple days of data, but its looking like 108Y/10C sold).

If one of the goals of this change is to make pricing a relevant decision point in competition, then I think it needs to have a greater effect than what I'm seeing at the 25% price drop level. However, from a new competitor perspective, its already going to be near impossible for them to fill planes with an RI=0, so I can see how price drops from the incumbant can essentially nuke them from orbit, though, if the new player has a lower cost basis than the incumbant, the lower prices/loads should be sustainable....

Perhaps there's a way to structure the preferences that would protect a new airline with discounted flights (i.e. RI < 100) from incumbant airlines (RI = 100) with discounted flights (by having less of an effect), but once RI for both airlines reaches 100, then the gloves come off and the price war really starts?  (though, this would need to be revisited if RI becomes more dynamic). The "real world" theory on this would be that new airlines in many towns often get free press in the news for starting flights which gives them a bit of a halo effect over the incumbants....

[stevecree]

New starts would struggle if price had such a big effect.  If I had 400 a/c I could well afford to fly against a new start up airline with say just 5 a/c, with 5 of my a/c on the same routes but with 75% discount....they would go bust quicker than in MT6, as to have an effect in MT6 I would have to play the "fly more often card", which meant messing with schedules to outwit the competition, which is time consuming and a hassle.   Having to do nothing but reduce prices to kill off new airlines seems a little too easy for the big airlines....a one click way to BK little guys.

I can see Ryanair style $9.99 flights on the horizon....until competition is wiped out and then normal price plus +10% comes back !

[esquireflyer]

Perhaps there's a way to structure the preferences that would protect a new airline with discounted flights (i.e. RI < 100) from incumbant airlines (RI = 100) with discounted flights (by having less of an effect), but once RI for both airlines reaches 100, then the gloves come off and the price war really starts?  (though, this would need to be revisited if RI becomes more dynamic). The "real world" theory on this would be that new airlines in many towns often get free press in the news for starting flights which gives them a bit of a halo effect over the incumbants....

Or have price changes for airlines with low RI have more effect than price changes for airlines with high RI (if that is possible?)

IRL new airlines often do need to offer low prices to attract customers when they first start up, in order to steal pax away from older airlines and not be BK'ed. Low prices are one way that people find out about your route if they are not familiar with your company.

[Sami]

The 50% price drop seems to have me carrying fewer passengers than the 25% price drop (only have a couple days of data, but its looking like 108Y/10C sold).

I saw it too after looking your airline. Possibly some changes over at competition's routes. I will 'debug' that one anyway to see what it counts on background.

[schro]

I saw it too after looking your airline. Possibly some changes over at competition's routes. I will 'debug' that one anyway to see what it counts on background.

FYI, I've moved the route to standard + 25% now. I'm seeing 91Y/8C sold, which makes it FAR more profitable than selling at standard...

[Sami]

Yes, if you are the only airline supplying a route (or many airlines, but unmet demand), or otherwise you have full planes already, you can now safely increase prices quite much even. There's no steep "cliff" in the price sensitivity anymore. In other words default price is only a rough suggestion, instead of something you'd need to reset to every now and then.

[schro]

Yes, if you are the only airline supplying a route (or many airlines, but unmet demand), or otherwise you have full planes already, you can now safely increase prices quite much even. There's no steep "cliff" in the price sensitivity anymore. In other words default price is only a rough suggestion, instead of something you'd need to reset to every now and then.

Right - this is a route where it is supplied to about 200% of demand between myself (100%) and others (the other 100%). the lack of price sensitivity is going the other way as well - just wanted to alert you the route change incase you start debugging thinking the price is still at -50% 

[ArcherII]

Question, could it be that the other airlines are discounting as well?

[schro]

Question, could it be that the other airlines are discounting as well?

That's entirely possible - though, I was making and observing changes so quickly that at least my price changes were likely done against a constant price supplied by the other airlines...

[Sami]

I wish to tune this properly, so here are some numbers. Test results on LAX-FLL route:
- 3 airlines operating, demand approx 900-1000, seats avail approx 2200. 11 flights for this given day.
- each airline uses proper equipment for the route, RI 100.
- variables of CI, dep/arr times and seat quality eliminated, as well as cancellations and delays (= none).
- every route & airline set to default prices at beginning.

Standard prices:
- each route (11) sells 86 seats (Y class)

Airline 1 (6 routes) lowers prices 50% from default ($362 > $181):
- others sell 67 (Y) while this airline sells 103 per flight.

Airline 1 (6 routes) lowers prices 20% from default ($362 > $290):
- others sell 77 (Y) while this airline sells 95 per flight.

Airline 1 (6 routes) lowers prices significantly from default ($362 > $30):
- others sell 46 (Y) while this airline sells 120 per flight.

Airline 1 (6 routes) ups prices 10% from default ($362 > $398):
- others sell 88 (Y) while this airline sells 85 per flight.

Airline 1 (6 routes) ups prices 30% from default ($362 > $471):
- others sell 108 (Y) while this airline sells 68 per flight.

Airline 1 (6 routes) ups prices 50% from default ($362 > $543):
- others sell 126 (Y) while this airline sells 54 per flight.

Airline 1 (6 routes) doubles prices from default ($362 > $724):
- others sell 161 (Y) while this airline sells 25 per flight.

Every airline (11 routes) changes prices +50%:
- each route (11) sells 62 seats (Y class).


Note that extreme price decreases will not capture the entire market, which is intended. And the price increase seems to work logically too, you are losing revenue that big increases are not any good if you have competition. All of the above is one example case only still, it varies according to demand and amount of competition (= you cannot make any direct calculation formula of the data above ...)...

Overall I would like to note that passengers are all of similar type still. There are no penny hunting leisure people with no hurry and no "no matter what it costs" type businessman. I would like to introduce the different traveller types and "necessity of travel" in the future to make the demand more dynamic; but for now each passenger represents a sort of average joe..

So anyway, thoughts.. Too big or too small effect on this? This effect is something that is rather easily tuned.