AirwaySim

Okay, this would take a TON of work to do...

Here is an example of what I thought up:

Small Airlines:

Propeller Operations 1:  -->  Turboprop Maintenance 1:  --> 

Small Aircraft 1: --> Regional Pilot 1: -->

Short Routes 1:  --> Small Airfield 1: -->  Short Route Image 1: -->

So, I get X number of points over Y time.  I can put those points in one category until another one unlocks.  Only after Z researches can I go on to tier 2. 

At the end, all three trees come together for some massive benefit (limit 1 per customer). 

As you go down a specific tree, the benefits get better.  You specialize.  You can then become much more efficient at what you prefer to do.   Right now, I'd say give a massive benefit to small airlines looking to do short routes... But then again, that's just now.

Have some be prerequisites of others. 

LASTLY, make the research based on time for small airlines and MASSIVE costs for those looking to specialize in large ones.   

Again, this is just ideas. 

The net benefit is that we will see airlines that choose to specialize receive more benefits versus those who lease and fly everything.

What would be some examples of benefits of this research?

For instance, increased desireability, lower maint costs, cheaper plane costs.

There are a few variables that can be toyed with.

So for example, one tech will give you a 0.5% decrease in lease costs for all propellor a/c.  Another would do the same for maint costs.   Perhaps another will give higher benefits but only to c and d checks.

I know this would have to be balanced and would slightly increase server load.  It would increase the fun factor.

I don't think lower leasing cost would be a good idea.

Lowering maintenance cost might be an idea.  A couple of things I can think of:
- higher employee productivity (in general, or per staff category).  Meaning, you might need, say 95 rather than 100 employees
- higher marketing effectiveness ($1.00 of marketing spending may give you effect of $1.05, or $1.10)
- lower probability of delay due to scheduling by, say 5%.  25.5% would become 20.5%

I am just commenting on possibilities of research, not if it is a good idea to invest programming time into it - ahead of other projects.

Nice to hear the feedback.  I'm trying to figure out something that will help engross a player and keep them involved until the end

As far as keeping players interested, IMO, number 1 item would be passenger connections.  You would start from low demand between cities, and it would grow as you add connections.

Right now, you can schedule a flight that supplies, say 120% of demand on a route, and that one flight, the same airplane may stay exactly the same for 20 game years.  With demand being dynamic, there is always room (and need) for tinkering, optimizing things, new ways to compete.

Throwing alliances into the mix, and code-sharing, every airline in the alliance is contributing, and there is actually a reason for alliance members to communicate, plan and tutor newer players.

I do like the idea of research trees, but its effect would be much smaller compared to passenger connections.

Can't see how this would relate to any realworld operations? or?

Sami, perhaps it isn't 100% authentic.  Anything to keep a player engrossed will help keep players playing.

Quote from: sami on September 30, 2010, 10:17:43 PM
Can't see how this would relate to any realworld operations? or?

I think in general, it would be management effectiveness:
- Doing the same amount of work with fewer employees, making each employee more productive.
- Avoidance of errors.  People make mistakes, and keep repeating the same mistakes over and over.  The whole field of Quaity Control is there to identify, measure and come up with strategies to avoid the same mistakes.  Then, implementing the strategies.

another "tech"

1.  XXXX efficiency.  2% less YYYY staff needed for that job.

Quote from: sami on September 30, 2010, 10:17:43 PM
Can't see how this would relate to any realworld operations? or?

I think this best relates to having a competitve advantage that has been built in the real world.

For example, Americans advantage post deregulation was the Sabre reservation system. Allegiant is turning itself into a major Md80 parts dealer to suplly its own fleet and profit from helping others out. Deltas tech ops group becoming trained and certified on airbus maint a long time before the northwest merger was announced ( delta was all boeing/Douglas at that time).

Basically, hes suggesting a system where you choose one or many specialization that will bring a competitive advantage to your airlines bottom line as a rwult of the significant investment that you make imo the skill.   

You know, at first I found this idea pretty comical actually.

Then I thought about it some more.

One of the problems with AWS is that the entire game is based off averages of averages.  So regional is unfeasible and long-haul makes a ton, just to give one example.  This makes the game difficult for people trying to do a single strategy -- the game works best once you know how to game it and manage the right mix of short/long and domestic/international to make the averages work in your favor.  So we end up with a very homogeneous mix of airlines of what works most effectively in AWS because all the 'rules' are the same, which is VERY unlike the real world where different airlines focus on very different operating strategies because it takes a very different method to be an effective Southwest versus an effective American Airlines versus an effective British Airways for example.

Additionally there are no union or government regulations here that often times play a massive role within an airline's history and decisions they must make -- they might keep it from being able to maintain 4-engined planes effectively, to operate long-haul competitively, or to put a base where they want. And it's not that I envision these 'techs' (which is a poor word in this case, but a game mechanic that most people can identify with) taking the place of exactly those situations but rather the mechanic could serve to function as those sort of strategic decisions that an airline has to make and that can often effect its performance negatively even decades later with unforeseen consequences.

The idea of choosing a "Regional Pilot" "tech" seems stupidly gamey.  And, to be frank, taken that simply, it really is.  But if you look at it another way it makes a lot more sense.  Call it a new labor contract where you've manage to get a nice pay cut out of your small aircraft pilots in exchange for a pay raise on long-haul pilots.  This is a perfectly realistic concession that a union would make.  And if you're a regional airline you're thinking "So what, I don't have any of those pilots anyway".  And maybe you don't for 10 years, but then you decide you want to and now you're faced with higher labor costs on those routes.

Or you work out a concession with the machinists that will you to operate a 4th fleet type with a minimal penalty at the cost of a much higher penalty if you go to 5 fleets.  Or you open a base and you have to decide whether you're only going to operate short-haul or also want long-haul and that impacts that huge overhead salary penalty you pay.  Really I could think of dozens if not hundreds of these that could really differentiate one airline from another, even on multiple game-worlds with the same base, whereas now they're all the same.  This could really make a different in the long-term replayability of the game.

So instead of calling these "techs" or some sort of "research tree" akin to some RTS game, let's think of them as "strategic decisions" (which isn't to say that some of them may not involve time or money).  With the ultimate goal of making your airline a little more unique than all the others.  If you're a fan of the Fallout series of games, you could think of these as the Perks and Traits that the series is famous for.  "Traits" are chosen to start and they are bonuses to certain stats that also have negatives to other stats.  And "Perks" are earned every X levels and allow some sort of bonus to a particular stat.  I would envision more "traits" than "perks" in such a system here, meaning that your choices weren't just bonuses but rather also effected something else negatively.  That way it's about balancing both the upside and the downside.

And I think these, at least usually (some might be private), would make for great "Announcements" within the Airline News section too and give that section a little more liveliness and a lot more interest.

Have you been playing too much Civ 5?  ;D

^^^ only a few playthroughs  ;)

Instad of calling them techs or research, this would be the same as achieving higher efficiency or level in staff training or company procedures etc .. (= the older the company gets, it knows more about stuff...)

And in that sense it's something that can be considered.

Wouldn't it be possible to "exploit" this game-like style a little further? Why not let the user choose a certain "airline type" at an airline's inception, much like choosing a class in RPG's? So for example you could choose Regional airline, International airline, Budget airline etcetera, where each business model incorporates different economic variables (e.g. salary as Sigma pointed out). In fact, this is not much different from the real world, where an airline decides on its business model before they start operations. I think this would differentiate airlines even further.

Quote from: Quinoky on February 01, 2011, 08:53:53 PM
Wouldn't it be possible to "exploit" this game-like style a little further? Why not let the user choose a certain "airline type" at an airline's inception, much like choosing a class in RPG's? So for example you could choose Regional airline, International airline, Budget airline etcetera, where each business model incorporates different economic variables (e.g. salary as Sigma pointed out). In fact, this is not much different from the real world, where an airline decides on its business model before they start operations. I think this would differentiate airlines even further.

The problem with this, while easier to do, is that you're kind of stuck then.  It's not fun to be stuck with a certain style of play in a world that constantly changes -- even moreso if sami gets all the things done he wants, namely dynamic airport sizes and city-based demand.   Business may all decide on a business model to start, but if they stick with it in the face of changing circumstances, they're simply doomed to failure.

If you wanted what your suggesting, I would think it would be easier for the game to simply determine said variables based off actions -- i.e. fly a bunch of short routes there should be minimal overhead compared to an airline that flies a bunch of long-range routes and then adds a short route.  Anytime an airline branches from its core competencies it would cost more versus someone who does business that way all the time.

Quote from: Sigma on February 01, 2011, 10:56:47 PM
The problem with this, while easier to do, is that you're kind of stuck then.  It's not fun to be stuck with a certain style of play in a world that constantly changes -- even moreso if sami gets all the things done he wants, namely dynamic airport sizes and city-based demand.   Business may all decide on a business model to start, but if they stick with it in the face of changing circumstances, they're simply doomed to failure.

I agree.  It is not fun to be stuck to one style of play.  It is good to have freedom to start one way, and then, mid way adopt a completely different strategy with the same airline, replace / upgrade fleet as player chooses or finds necessary.

Quote from: Sigma on February 01, 2011, 10:56:47 PM
The problem with this, while easier to do, is that you're kind of stuck then.  It's not fun to be stuck with a certain style of play in a world that constantly changes -- even moreso if sami gets all the things done he wants, namely dynamic airport sizes and city-based demand.   Business may all decide on a business model to start, but if they stick with it in the face of changing circumstances, they're simply doomed to failure.

Changing your core business model then isn't really a smart thing to do for any sort of business. It's like having Ryanair to decide to go from a budget airline to a "quality" airline, which is the most stupid thing they could do. Of course, change is an essential part of business (hence the vast amount of literature on it), but that only in very extreme cases applies to the entire business model. It would completely discard a firm's knowledge base and FSA's (Firm Specific Advantages) which make up the business as it is.

Quote from: Sigma on February 01, 2011, 10:56:47 PMIf you wanted what your suggesting, I would think it would be easier for the game to simply determine said variables based off actions -- i.e. fly a bunch of short routes there should be minimal overhead compared to an airline that flies a bunch of long-range routes and then adds a short route.  Anytime an airline branches from its core competencies it would cost more versus someone who does business that way all the time.

This is a much better implementation of what I was suggesting, though this might require much more work. I think it should also take into account ticket pricing, seat configuration, salary and so on to get a more complete picture of what the company is doing. This would also get the player much more involved into salary decisions for example than he is now, making the game closer to reality. Penalties for moving from one model to the other should firstly increase with the airline's age, and secondly be huge. Why? Because again, changing your entire course of action (budget -> quality) is an extreme form of organizational change.

Quote from: Quinoky on February 02, 2011, 12:57:40 PM
Changing your core business model then isn't really a smart thing to do for any sort of business.

Not always, Aer Lingus would have gone bankrupt or been bought out by Ryanair if they hadn't changed their staffing and pricing structures to meet the growing number of low cost competition. Sometimes it can be a prudent business move. Another example, US carriers changing their route structures from point to point to a hub and spoke structure.

Quote from: Sigma on February 01, 2011, 10:56:47 PM
If you wanted what your suggesting, I would think it would be easier for the game to simply determine said variables based off actions -- i.e. fly a bunch of short routes there should be minimal overhead compared to an airline that flies a bunch of long-range routes and then adds a short route.  Anytime an airline branches from its core competencies it would cost more versus someone who does business that way all the time.

I'm in major agreement here. What type of business model you are should just be from the decisions you make. Also liking Quinoky's contributions in their second paragraph above.

Quote from: alexgv1 on February 02, 2011, 01:13:25 PM
Not always, Aer Lingus would have gone bankrupt or been bought out by Ryanair if they hadn't changed their staffing and pricing structures to meet the growing number of low cost competition. Sometimes it can be a prudent business move. Another example, US carriers changing their route structures from point to point to a hub and spoke structure.

I think this applies as a very extreme case. Their choices were either bankruptcy/hostile takeover or radical change. And so I explained:

Quote from: Quinoky on February 02, 2011, 12:57:40 PM
but only in very extreme cases

I think these things happen more often than you realise. Of course you are not going to change your business model unless there is a situation that calls it.

But two further examples:

1) Ryanair was operating as a regional carrier for a decade before it became the low cost giant you and most others would recognise. Michael O'Leary came in and re-wrote the business plan from scratch.

2) BMI has recently dropped all domestic routes and has cut down on the long haul. It is focusing on the European routes and has reconfigured it's planes. A less extreme example of these decisions that get made.

Indeed I can think of two game worlds where I changed my business plan, one was quite early on in my airline, the other was 10 years into a gameworld. These decisions were all just dictated by the changing market.

Search for 'business plans' on that topic.

Quote from: alexgv1 on February 02, 2011, 02:00:29 PM
I think these things happen more often than you realise. Of course you are not going to change your business model unless there is a situation that calls it.

But two further examples:

1) Ryanair was operating as a regional carrier for a decade before it became the low cost giant you and most others would recognise. Michael O'Leary came in and re-wrote the business plan from scratch.

2) BMI has recently dropped all domestic routes and has cut down on the long haul. It is focusing on the European routes and has reconfigured it's planes. A less extreme example of these decisions that get made.

Indeed I can think of two game worlds where I changed my business plan, one was quite early on in my airline, the other was 10 years into a gameworld. These decisions were all just dictated by the changing market.

Right, but this is AirwaySim. People mostly change their business plans here because they think it is fun and AWS doesn't penalize for it. In the real world it is not even nearly this easy.


Let me try to explain organizational change clearly.

When an organization is faced with a change that alters its very nature, the change of this magnitude is called revolutionary change. In the real world, revolutionary change usually emerges as a response to significant technological and environmental changes. An example of revolutionary change to significant technological change is the computerization of banking. An example for environmental change would be a greater demand for cheap air travel, such as the case of Ryanair. What AirwaySim doesn't take into account and what is very important, is that revolutionary change is often accompanied by:

-Redundancies and downsizing
-Shifts in power
-Changes in strategy
-A new organizational structure

Which takes a lot of time, effort and investments depending on the size of the firm.

So you are saying you shouldn't be able to change the way you run your airline in AWS? Whether for fun or profits.

Quote from: alexgv1 on February 02, 2011, 02:55:19 PM
So you are saying you shouldn't be able to change the way you run your airline in AWS? Whether for fun or profits.

You definitely should. But I think most people have an incorrect picture of organizational change due to the way it is modeled in AWS. There is much more to it than just pulling used aircraft off the market and hugely profit from them. Changing your entire business model is not a wise thing to do unless absolutely necessary, therefore I think there should be huge penalties when an airline does decide to do so (i.e. revolutionary change).

Quote from: Quinoky on February 02, 2011, 12:57:40 PM
Changing your core business model then isn't really a smart thing to do for any sort of business. It's like having Ryanair to decide to go from a budget airline to a "quality" airline, which is the most stupid thing they could do. Of course, change is an essential part of business (hence the vast amount of literature on it), but that only in very extreme cases applies to the entire business model. It would completely discard a firm's knowledge base and FSA's (Firm Specific Advantages) which make up the business as it is.

Well, sure, if we were talking about overnight changes.  But businesses change models over long periods of time, years, even decades, all of the time.   The span of AWS presently runs 2-3 decades and there are certainly players that want it to run a lot further than that.  And it would actually be fun if the world and the players (via the airlinse) was dynamic.

Southwest went from going so far as telling the US government it only wanted to be an intra-state carrier and therefore they had no standing to regulate it -- to being the largest airline in in the nation.  It just took 30 years is all.

Airlines migrating from point-to-point to a hub-and-spoke system applied to every single major airline in the world, hardly an extreme case.  And now some of the most successful newcomer airlines are moving back to point-to-point and then finding their sheer size at some point sometimes necessitates a hybrid operation of sorts.

Outside of the airline business, Hyundai went from making cheap econoboxes that sold for about the price of a high-end television to now making $50,000+ luxury sedans that compete with BMW and Lexus.  And that's just the most obvious, widespread example.  There's countless examples in the automotive industry of particular models changing in extremely significant ways -- i.e. why a Taurus, once the proverbial apple pie of American midsize sedans for the masses, is now a near-luxury $45,000 full-size car.

Outside of large dynasty companies, usually mired in labor contracts preventing any appreciable changes or simply their gargantuan size making mobility difficult, a dynamic business plan is pretty much the norm.  Google certainly didn't start out with any visions of taking over the software world from top to bottom -- but it has, and now is constantly faced with difficulties of remaining as nimble as it once was due to its size.  10 years ago nearly on the brink of bankruptcy Apple certainly didn't plan on being the largest tech company in the world within a decade on the bank of a simple MP3 player -- but it did.

Most companies have a 'business model' vague enough to allow them a great deal of flexibility without the need to start over again.  No one would ever start a business saying "I'm gonna fly turboprops and ONLY turboprops for the entirety of my existence else I'll just bankrupt my business".  What if excessive short-range competition forces them to have to look further away?  What if new jet engine technology brings the operating costs down so much that ignoring them is a shortsighted move?

The way I envisioned it, and I didn't expound on every thing in my original post so perhaps this wasn't clear, was that, of the "dozens or hundreds" of "strategic decisions" that there was to choose from, you got to pick X of them every year (depending on the number coded in) and maybe a few to start with to establish a baseline model.  But the important thing is that, as I described, every one of these has a potential negative to go along with it as part of the cost of this 'revolution'.  So you're a few years in and you get a single choice -- this year you negotiated your pilot salary on small planes down at the expense of a higher salary on large planes.  So you've begun the process of moving your airline towards focusing on smaller planes and the 'cost' was a concession to your pilots of larger planes (so you've either increased some costs immediately, or hindered your ability to move in that direction in the future).  The next year you make a new "strategic decision" that gives you a large maintenance penalty for jet engines in exchange for superior mechanical efficiency at turboprops -- so you're furthering your path down the regional turboprop 'core competency'.  And so on and so forth.

And if someone comes in to compete against you, they are hindered by their previous choices and you are hindered by yours.  Or maybe they've been planning this for a long time, and they're ready to compete with you head-to-head after a series of decisions they made over the past 5 years.

Quote from: Quinoky on February 02, 2011, 03:04:16 PM
You definitely should. But I think most people have an incorrect picture of organizational change due to the way it is modeled in AWS. There is much more to it than just pulling used aircraft off the market and hugely profit from them. Changing your entire business model is not a wise thing to do unless absolutely necessary, therefore I think there should be huge penalties when an airline does decide to do so (i.e. revolutionary change).

Quote from: Sigma on February 02, 2011, 03:05:29 PM
Most companies have a 'business model' vague enough to allow them a great deal of flexibility without the need to start over again.  No one would ever start a business saying "I'm gonna fly turboprops and ONLY turboprops for the entirety of my existence else I'll just bankrupt my business".  What if excessive short-range competition forces them to have to look further away?  What if new jet engine technology brings the operating costs down so much that ignoring them is a shortsighted move?

Well these are both sentiments which I can agree with. And perhaps Sigma's post has bought us back on topic, as he is integrating it with the research tree idea.

Quote from: Sigma on February 02, 2011, 03:05:29 PM
Well, sure, if we were talking about overnight changes.  

That's exactly what I was talking about because this is what happens in AWS now.

Quote from: Sigma on February 02, 2011, 03:05:29 PM
But businesses change models over long periods of time, years, even decades, all of the time.   The span of AWS presently runs 2-3 decades and there are certainly players that want it to run a lot further than that. Southwest went from going so far as telling the US government it only wanted to be an intra-state carrier and therefore they had no standing to regulate it -- to being the largest airline in in the nation.  It just took 30 years is all.

Right, but that is evolutionary change, which involves ongoing minor changes that are incorporated in the existing organizational structure. Most change in business is evolutionary: it involves minor adjustments in response to circumstantial and unanticipated events. An example of evolutionary change is upgrading a firm's existing production process.

Quote from: Sigma on February 02, 2011, 03:05:29 PM
Most companies have a 'business model' vague enough to allow them a great deal of flexibility without the need to start over again.  No one would ever start a business saying "I'm gonna fly turboprops and ONLY turboprops for the entirety of my existence else I'll just bankrupt my business".  What if excessive short-range competition forces them to have to look further away?  What if new jet engine technology brings the operating costs down so much that ignoring them is a shortsighted move?

Fair enough. Still, changing from that knowledge base of only turboprops to large jets is quite a substantial move and again, involves redundancies, shifts in power, changes in strategy and a new organizational structure. I'm not saying a player should not be able to change, I am just trying to point out that they shouldn't be able to do it as easily as it is right now.

Quote from: Sigma on February 02, 2011, 03:05:29 PM
The way I envisioned it, and I didn't expound on every thing in my original post so perhaps this wasn't clear, was that, of the "dozens or hundreds" of "strategic decisions" that there was to choose from, you got to pick X of them every year (depending on the number coded in) and maybe a few to start with to establish a baseline model.  But the important thing is that, as I described, every one of these has a potential negative to go along with it as part of the cost of this 'revolution'.  So you're a few years in and you get a single choice -- this year you negotiated your pilot salary on small planes down at the expense of a higher salary on large planes.  So you've begun the process of moving your airline towards focusing on smaller planes and the 'cost' was a concession to your pilots of larger planes (so you've either increased some costs immediately, or hindered your ability to move in that direction in the future).  The next year you make a new "strategic decision" that gives you a large maintenance penalty for jet engines in exchange for superior mechanical efficiency at turboprops -- so you're furthering your path down the regional turboprop 'core competency'.  And so on and so forth.

And if someone comes in to compete against you, they are hindered by their previous choices and you are hindered by yours.  Or maybe they've been planning this for a long time, and they're ready to compete with you head-to-head after a series of decisions they made over the past 5 years.

Great idea. ;)

Edit: These kinds of discussions are very productive, gentlemen. :laugh:

Quote from: Quinoky on February 02, 2011, 12:57:40 PM
Changing your core business model then isn't really a smart thing to do for any sort of business. It's like having Ryanair to decide to go from a budget airline to a "quality" airline, which is the most stupid thing they could do. Of course, change is an essential part of business (hence the vast amount of literature on it), but that only in very extreme cases applies to the entire business model. It would completely discard a firm's knowledge base and FSA's (Firm Specific Advantages) which make up the business as it is.

Changing a business model has its costs - in Real Life and AWS.  So the costs are there to make you think twice.  But I wouldn't want to see an outright prohibition in AWS from doing something, or being completely locked in from beginning to the end to one strategy.

Quote from: JumboShrimp on February 02, 2011, 08:35:36 PM
Changing a business model has its costs - in Real Life and AWS.  So the costs are there to make you think twice.  But I wouldn't want to see an outright prohibition in AWS from doing something, or being completely locked in from beginning to the end to one strategy.

There's been quite an extensive discussion about this already. I'd recommend reading it.

Thanks, Quinoky...

No one said you'd be barred from doing anything. 

Let's say you were a long haul carrier and went down that path.  If you decided to order 40 turboprops and plop them on short flights, you will find it difficult to compete with the guy who went down the turboprop route.... just as he would find it tough to go long haul.

It may also finally solve slot hogging once and for all, as the penalty for operating cheap props would be pretty substantial.

Quote from: Quinoky on February 07, 2011, 03:06:06 PM
It may also finally solve slot hogging once and for all, as the penalty for operating cheap props would be pretty substantial.

But some people are advocating making operation of cheap props - even cheaper - in future revisions, making it a more viable business.

If that happens (operating small aircraft becomes a more viable business), slots are going to become a much bigger headache than they are today.  If there is no ongoing slot rental charge, and frequency benefit remains what it, and there is no airport slot expansion based on demand, it may very well ruin the game, since it would encourage flying at very high frequency with small jets even further.  The slot problem will become a complete nightmare, possibly making the game unplayable.

Quote from: JumboShrimp on February 07, 2011, 03:32:31 PM
But some people are advocating making operation of cheap props - even cheaper - in future revisions, making it a more viable business.

If that happens (operating small aircraft becomes a more viable business), slots are going to become a much bigger headache than they are today.  If there is no ongoing slot rental charge, and frequency benefit remains what it, and there is no airport slot expansion based on demand, it may very well ruin the game, since it would encourage flying at very high frequency with small jets even further.  The slot problem will become a complete nightmare, possibly making the game unplayable.

That's because too many people think that small-plane operations need to be as ludicrously profitable as long-range jet operations.  When the reality is that it's the small plane operations that come anywhere even remotely close to being financially realistic in the game.  Other models need to come down to the profits found in the small planes not vice versa.

Not that that's the only problem finance-wise with the game -- flying nothing but a small fleet of a couple-dozen BAC's out of SAN, a level 5 airport that even shuts down at night, I'm still able to make a ludicrous 60% net margin in JA3.  And that's sustaining a needlessly high CI of 70, a fairly meager 70% LF, and a sizeable chunk of my fleet converted to superior seating just because I didn't have the demand for high-density seats.  $2.2M in net profit on sales of $3.5M.  Insane.  I could easily surpass 70% margins if I could operate my planes at night and dropped my CI down, and 80% margins if I had slightly denser routes that would fill my planes a bit more.

Quote from: Sigma on February 07, 2011, 11:48:54 PM
That's because too many people think that small-plane operations need to be as ludicrously profitable as long-range jet operations.  When the reality is that it's the small plane operations that come anywhere even remotely close to being financially realistic in the game.  Other models need to come down to the profits found in the small planes not vice versa.

Not that that's the only problem finance-wise with the game -- flying nothing but a small fleet of a couple-dozen BAC's out of SAN, a level 5 airport that even shuts down at night, I'm still able to make a ludicrous 60% net margin in JA3.  And that's sustaining a needlessly high CI of 70, a fairly meager 70% LF, and a sizeable chunk of my fleet converted to superior seating just because I didn't have the demand for high-density seats.  $2.2M in net profit on sales of $3.5M.  Insane.  I could easily surpass 70% margins if I could operate my planes at night and dropped my CI down, and 80% margins if I had slightly denser routes that would fill my planes a bit more.

I am not one of the people advocating small planes to be more profitable, and I would not mind if the environment was more challenging for larger aircraft.  I am not that familiar with early era games, I play only 2000+ games.  One way to make things challenging is with high fuel prices.  It was the case in the previous 2000-2020 game (ATB) where fuel prices hovered in 1000 to 1200 range in the second decade.  Not even 1/3 of the airlines survived to the end.  In current MT3, the fuel prices are very low (700 - 800 in 2010 to 2015).  Outside of a short fuel price spike, hardly anyone goes out of business because of financial difficulties...  So fuel prices are a good tool to make the game more challenging...

What I am concerned about is that if the algorthms are changed to make flyig small aircraft more profitable, it will just exacerbate the slot constraints at all major airports.  They will be so flooded with small aircraft that routes such as LH routes from JFK / LAX / NRT / LHR that exist in RL and in current games will be severely constrained by lack of slots.

I think most people agree that frequency (with smaller aircraft) is already a competitive tool that is too powerful.  Making it even more powerful would un-balance the game even more.

Quote from: JumboShrimp on February 08, 2011, 12:45:12 AM
I am not one of the people advocating small planes to be more profitable, and I would not mind if the environment was more challenging for larger aircraft.  I am not that familiar with early era games, I play only 2000+ games.  One way to make things challenging is with high fuel prices.  It was the case in the previous 2000-2020 game (ATB) where fuel prices hovered in 1000 to 1200 range in the second decade.  Not even 1/3 of the airlines survived to the end.  In current MT3, the fuel prices are very low (700 - 800 in 2010 to 2015).  Outside of a short fuel price spike, hardly anyone goes out of business because of financial difficulties...  So fuel prices are a good tool to make the game more challenging...

Right, but the reason why people bankrupt is because of the sudden increase in cost, which makes their unrealistic operations.. well, prove to be unrealistic. I also think the aim should not be to bankrupt as many airlines as possible. The aim should be to have a different algorithm to completely change the way players invest into planes, routes, personnel etc., making things more realistic, balanced and challenging.

Quote from: JumboShrimp on February 08, 2011, 12:45:12 AM
What I am concerned about is that if the algorthms are changed to make flyig small aircraft more profitable, it will just exacerbate the slot constraints at all major airports.  They will be so flooded with small aircraft that routes such as LH routes from JFK / LAX / NRT / LHR that exist in RL and in current games will be severely constrained by lack of slots.

I think you're missing the point here.. It is only when a player invests heavily in (for example) long haul operations, that other aircraft types would be penalized (as per the ideas expressed in this thread). If a player starts with props operations, however, the algorithm adapts so that operating props becomes more realistic, not more profitable. (And as the current algorithm for props already comes close to reality, not much would have to be changed here.)

Getting back to my original idea here.   Too many of you are focusing on it using the current in game data/profits and more.  This isn't something that id want adopted overnight. 

I agree that lh is way too profitable right now especially in the beginning of games.  This isn't just to slow these airlines down.  It is for all of us to mainly think of an airline idea early on, and focus on it.  No more running lh, continental, regional, and sh as one airline