long games "killing meé

[Springbal]

Hi all,
I joined this game in december 2015 (a beginners world, based in Nice with "Coline Bleu"). I've survived many beginnersworld, some specific scenarios as well. But an epic game mostly kills me within 5 or 10 years, sometimes sooner. I tought I would be quite experienced by now but everytime I start in an "age of flight" game. Things go wrong. Weather I take central airports, or airports with potential good traffic (Amsterdam, Brussels, New York, Tel Aviv), or a distant airport where nobody else will settle, but what will cause difficulties to expand later (Sapporo for example). I go down every time. Sometimes it's clear, when a fleet renewal takes too long and i have four types in my fleet. But sometimes I even don't get to the point. I tried long hauls or more flights on short haul, none of it worked on longer term. i defenitly like the beginners worlds, but due to the rather short time, you are not really able to do some great switches, like a fleet adaptation, so. Any of you got some do's and don't so after 8 years of trying, I finnaly might survive a game?

[groundbum2]

It's a cash flow game in the end. Its important to spend big to get the new metal in cheap,but you need the casdh to to it. Also cash to ride through downturns and fuel spikes. The trick is to be super cheap in the beginning and fly tatty metal on routes that print money. Then buy sensibly, get planes that include a cargo variant and exploit every wrinkle you,especially fuel and hedge. Kill routes that aren't working,and watch for competitors moving onto routes. Reset prices to default+4% every Jan 1st and up prices on high load factor routes. Never take a lease plane through a d check. Cash cash cash.

Its harder to be more specific,perhaps join an alliance or get a mentor so you get more real time feedback as you progress. All the best players have crashed and burned many times before get the hang of it.

Good luck ! Simon

[Cornishman]

Here are my GOLDEN RULES to become successful. This might not be exactly how everyone works, but this works for me and I'd say maybe 90% of this is what makes most of the successful airlines in the game:

1.) Keep the number of different "fleet types" (the actual aircraft categories) that you operate to an absolute minimum. To do that, first identify if you need to operate short-haul SH, medium-haul MH and long-haul LH routes because many places don't need all 3 "route-types". So never select both 737s and MD-80s for example - both are MH aircraft - instead find one of this type which could do most of your MH routes and just stick to that type.

2.) Don't try to start your airline with all 3 different fleet types all at the same time. Try to start your airline with just ONE type - (the SH or MH type is usually best to start with), then you can start flights with a second type when you are making some money, and then the 3rd type a bit later when your airline becomes strong enough.

3.) Do NOT try to "buy" aircraft when you start a new game. Do NOT try to "order new aircraft for lease" from plane manufacturers when you start - these things will kill your airline.  Instead, look for the best cheap aircraft that you can find on the Used Market (UM). Always check before you lease any aircraft that it first, has at least 4 or 5 years worth of "D-check" and second, that it has at least 8 or 9 months of "C-check" on the aircraft before you agree to lease it.  Then when you agree to lease the planes make sure you select no more than about 7 to 8 years (or just under the length of the D-check on the aircraft).

4.) Just before you start to schedule your first flights, set up a General Marketing campaign. All you need to start with is something like, "My Base Country" / Newspapers + Billboards + Radio.  Set that as a Permanent Campaign. Marketing is required to generate a decent Company Image (CI) figure - but you do NOT have to aim for 100%, ever!  The % you should aim for depends on which airport you operate from, how big your airline is, and how much direct competition you face. But in the beginning of most games - just aim to get to about 30% and have your airline running profitably at that before going to a next tier of CI  if the type of base and your airline warrants it.  BIG CLARIFICATION on MARKETING:  In real life we imagine a TV advert is different to a billboard ad for example. Also a local campaign is different to a worldwide one - but not so in this game! Here all that matters is how much cash you spend on any type of advertising. So you can add more of the exact same type of advertising as the game goes on. Unlike real life, here that has exactly the same effect as does the same cost advertising type of a different type.

5.) When the aircraft are delivered to you, start organising your new flights in a "Seven-Day Scheduling" pattern.  I can send you a separate message to explain how to do 7-Day Scheduling.  This is because you need to make the absolute best use of each aircraft, you also need to fly to every destination on all 7 days of the week at the same time (passengers don't like airlines when the flight on Monday is at 6am and Tuesday it's 10 am and Wed is 8am and every day something else - not as good !)  7-Day scheduling makes this easy and makes sure you can schedule the A and B checks at the same time.

6.) Always ensure you have a healthy turn-around (T/A) time scheduled between flight sectors. When you chose the T/A time on a new route, look to see the "Probability of delay due to too quick turn-around = no worse than about ~ 5%" . Worse ( a bigger %) than this and you will get delays caused and that has an effect of bringing down your Company Image (CI) score.  Remember that Marketing is expensive and if you have heavy delay statistics then you undo all the good from the advertising you already paid for.

7.) Maximise one Aircraft Type at a time with as many good routes as you can find from just ONE airport base. Do not be tempted to open a 2nd and 3rd base soon after you start like some people do.  Instead make the most of the potential at you home base before you start trying other bases. A good way to search for ALL routes that your aircraft type can fly, is to first understand the maximum range of your chosen aircraft. Lets take an example: "Boeing 737-200 Advanced"  The maximum range is about 2100nm. Now, one by one, search every route potential of every country in the 2100nm radius from your base. If you check each country and each airport in each country one at a time often you will find nice little surprises where nobody else is flying.

8.) Never be too worried about what your competitors are doing. This game has a very good ability to support any airline that makes sensible route and operational decisions, no matter how much competition is on the same routes. Example: If you see a route with demand for 200 pax. and already 3 other airlines already have lots of flights so that the total offered is already 600 seats, just be sensible and make ONE daily flight with something that offers about 100 seats on one flight and you can get a profitable route like this. (Better still if this route is in the range of a smaller aircraft then you can offer 2x 50 seat flights. If you find a route with no competitors great but don't be tempted to offer more than 100% of the demand. If a route has lots of competition already, then stick with just a taste of the demand and you'll make money - you can aim for bigger shares of the demand later in life when you are much stronger.

Hope that helps on any subject maybe you didn't know. Good luck

[Cornishman]

But an epic game mostly kills me within 5 or 10 years, sometimes sooner. I tought I would be quite experienced by now but everytime I start in an "age of flight" game. Things go wrong.

One further thought for you - if you're starting a game in the 1950s (or thereabouts) watch out for trying too hard to buy the first new planes that get released from the manufacturers. In my humble opinion there's a lot of completely rubbish new aircraft released in the late 50's and early 60's that folk jump on to buy. I'f you (like myself), don't have a lot of time to always be on this game, then everything sells out quickly and folk are desperate to get hold of all types of planes. Just hold out like I do until some half-decent planes start coming through like Caravelle VIN / DC.8-30 upwards, etc.  I've watched a lot of folk invest in a lot of crap in my opinion being in such haste