New ProPilot FAC System

[EHM-1800 Franz]

Dear Management, dear Harmony-Pilots !

For having been absent last time, I could not discuss with you about the changing of  the new FAC - anyway I want to tell you my opinions about it - although it´s too late..
In general I feel well to be in your VA and the few new members I could win for your (our) VA  do the same. But what we are missing is the virtual-contact to each other. We are flying on IVAO and during my 200 flights I met in less then 10% another EHM Pilot. If you look in the "eye of IVAO" - there often flying hundreds or thousands of pilots, but you find only seldom EHM Pilots among them. It was so nice meeting the one or other EHM Pilot on an airport or in the sky, having a small talk or changing opinions via chatting - but this happend very seldom. Also in teamspeak I met hardly someone.  I think it should be the efford of the management, to bring the pilots "online" - so that we get a "living Airline" with active  pilots that meet frequently in the air and are present in all FIRs over the world. And I never heard from a (good) pilot a reasonable argument why flying offline. In contrary - you have to take care not getting addictive from it - that´s not a joke, I know what I´m writing from. Otherwise we degenerate to a company, administrating  statistics of  pireps, sent from pilots sitting anonym and isolated in front of their PC. :{
This was the reason, why my interest for the good idea of the very good tool of PRO PILOT was decreasing last time.  First  I felt it as an exiting challange and I was really avidly to get good results - and angry about myself, as FS Passengers made me an enginefailure during take-off and I lost a PSS A-340. And it costed me a lot of penaltys till I found out the bugs of PSS. o.k. - I have learnt about it. But to get a better rank this system enforced me to make a lot of "perfect" Flights and so I began to fly only short flights from Zürich - Geneve - Zürich - Milan - Zürich - Munich - Zürich - with a handsome Airbus A320 from Eurowings an if I took only a minimum of care and my wife didn`t disturb me with "telefon for you" or "please come quick, there is sombody at the door who wnats  ......" (mostly when passing 10.000 ft or "passing transition altitude") I got always my 0 points - if I would fly offline, with a default aircraft, with no long preparation from cold&dark, with always clear sky, no winds, starting and ending at the active runway, after start "shift + F9" handover to FSNavigator I could  even made a lot of more flights and better results - but some day I asked myself if this could rearly be the way spending my time and challenge against any anonym pilots - not knowing how they do their flights - and I was asking forewhat I have so many beautiful addons (AustriaPro, SwissPro, FranceVFR, a lot of italian, Greece, Spain, .....scenerys), active weather, Flight environment, ......  and many good but also realistic aircraft (PMDG, LEVEL D, Flight1, PSS, ....) for hoping always in circles with any handsom plane for not risking to much penaltys.
For making a fair competition for everyone - I would suggest:
1). PRO PILOT ONLY ONLINE !!!  There is no reason why not to do and if you realy like your hobby, you will be able (even with the help of the management) to learn it in a short time and then we are flying with the same rules and (wether-)conditions, in front of the cockpit - or would you like to climb a mountain and meeting there the tourist in tennisshoes on the peak wich arrived by cablecar???
2). Privileging long hauls - ?   If you are a pensioner and/or living as a single with a lot of time you can benefit of it, but with family or hard job ?  

What about If we would make - for example:  (X?) a number of flights mounthly, x of them a long haul, using at least 3 different aircrafts (Class 1 - 3 - 6)   and fly once a year at least one Tour - (more difficult - more points of course) but  get registered  only 10 flights por month(of course the best)  or 100 in a year. So we could get a balance between pilots with a lot of time and the one who cannot spend so much time for this beatiful hobby. It should be also honored if pilots investigate a lot of time studying manuals and tutorials of  realistic payware modells.
This should only be a suggestion and an apply, not a negative criticsm !

With friendly greetings
and hope to see you in the air !

Franz

[EHM-1703 Philip]

Hi Franz,

Thanks for your input, it is welcomed by all and I am happy that you have brought this topic back up. we certainly value you opinions and those of all our pilots regarding this issue. Let me take the time to put up a few bullet points regarding the new FAC and how we perceive it working....

1) The idea of the new FAC is to make a fair and complete scoring system for all pilots.

2) Pilots who use the system more will benefit from a better score. This stands to reason, I know we all have different amounts of free time, but the ones that use it most are always certain to be those that benefit from   it the most and that is the same for for almost anything in life. We are trying to encourage pilots to particpate in ProPilot more, not give them an excuse to fly less. You can look at this as though our most active members will receive a bonus for their dedication. That is fair isn't it?

3) Long haul flights will benefit from an improved score. It makes sense that somebody who does a 6 hour flight should benefit more than somebody who does a 1 hour flight. This said, the score benefit will be reduced therefore somebody who flies five perfect 1 hour flights will receive a better score than somebody who flies one perfect 6 hour flight.

4) Online flights will benefit from a higher score than offline flights. There are more challenges associated with online flying not only procedurally but also with real life weather situations. We will not force people to fly online to participate, as many people do not feel comfortable with levels of english language etc. The aim of ProPilot is not to exclude members but to "encourage" them to fly more seriously and realistically. This said, we do agree that the online community should be encouraged.

Now although many aims of the new FAC have been decided, we are still fine tuning it to ensure that it achieves it's goal and that is to improve participation on ProPilot. We will be announcing more in the coming month and we are still listening to suggestions and or ideas regarding this. There is no silver bullet that will fix the situation and make every pilot fly every flight on PP, all we can try to do is continue to improve and tinker with it so that more people see the benefit.

Thanks again,

[EHM-0471 Peter]

Phil. The next month is already here! So, please HURRY UP!!!

Peter LGAV HM