Community Discussion > Flight Operations

ProPilot FAC

<< < (5/5)

EHM-2387 Eric-Jan:
A very good and enlighting post, Andrei ! Thank you for taking the time to write it all down.

An extensive post warrants an extensive answer ;)
I'll follow your numbering, and give you my opinion on the matter.

1) The two scores idea suits me well. I will probably not end up high on either one score, because I do not fly very often (nor very well ;)). Recently I even slipped into the inactive state as far as PP is concerned... I will not accumulate as many bonusses, nor will I accumulate as many penalties (if still applicable) as my frequent flyer friends will.

2) A bonus system is a good approach. It's positive, motivating, instead of negative, punishing. A FAC reset, for me, is good thing. But then again I'm near the bottom of the PP penalty pit at this moment, so I can only be better off ;) With that, I am assuming that the reset will be a one time thing. I don't think a yearly reset should even be considered. If one can earn his (her) way back by flying properly, then that should do.

3) An absolute value has one big drawback: It becomes impossible to compare to others. Because my one near perfect flight will only get me 63 points (example), while some Andrei (example :)) has flown 10 terrible flights in the same month, and therewith accumulated 127 (example) points. So, for mutual comparison reasons, an average value would be best. So my vote is for the average value. Of cause it has a drawback: it does not reflect the fact that someone could be flying 24/7 and exposing the network(s) to the EHM callsign. But then again, the total number of hours flown is kept in a different statistic elsewhere, and combined with a proper average score gives a good indication of the pilot's presence and quality of flying.

4) I have no problem with a bonus for online flying. Online helps the company gain name awareness, so it should be "rewarded". Offline flying has less workload (no real person ATC, so it can be ignored, or even turned off, if that suits you best), so less bonus sounds fair. And yes, the bonus should be proportional to the flight duration. I am of the opinion that it can even be a linear relationship. The un-linearity (is that a word?) for longer vs shorter flights will automatically come into place with event driven bonusses. Most events are defined near take-off and landing, so the majority of points can be gained by completing a flight correctly, and then some for cruising.

5) Wonderful, if a time delay for error correction can be implemented! Takes away a lot of the current hassle with those overspeed issues due to radical wind changes and the accidental light switching issues :)
On the overspeed issue: I think a distinction needs to be made between a "structural" overspeed, and a "regulatory" overspeed. By that I mean that the overspeed warning bell denotes a different overspeed than the ">250 KIAS <FL100" rule. The first is defined basically by Newton and can cause an immidiate disintegration of the aircraft. The regulatory one is in place to set boundaries that make ATC procedures possible and workable (and nowadays we like to add the emissions to the reasoning behind it). In my opinion, the latter is less severe.
Oh, and by the way: in pt. 5 you are talking about "penalties" again. I assume you mean "missed bonusses"? ;)

6) Woopie!!!

- Save in progress and resume: I can have an attempt at crossing the pond!!! Would always have to be offline, though... Not a problem for me, but I would not be able to get a 100% bonus score...

- break a flight into two pieces: Great! Would that also mean a safe landing on a highway, followed by a continuation to the destination (like a SAR mission, perhaps) is possible? I want to implement something like that in a tour I am working on which I might make available to EHM in due time. Would be nice if it could be a PP tour ...

- No live internet connection needed: great too! As things are now, I need all the resources I can free up to have FS running smoothly. I don't need any network traffic (could even kill the virus scanner) with the network cable unplugged...

- More comprehensive flight selection: bring it on! I'll form my opinion then...


Conclusion: I like where this is heading. Keep up the good work.
If you need any hand- or footwork (beta testing, e.g.) gimme a shout. I'd be more than happy to assist in any which little way I can.

Eric-Jan

EHM-0975 Ragnar:
I'm liking the way this is looking (not just the score reset which I would benefit greatly from  ;) ). Jan-Eric says a lot of good stuff, so I'd like to say 'hear, hear' to his post. That doesn't mean I'll be totally quiet though...

%-counting and average is the way to go, in my opinion.

To further encourage improvement and showing development I'd suggest some graphs showing personal FAC over time (as Hector did above) in a few ways (total, last 3 or 6 months etc) as well as top lists. I happen to have a great php script on-hand for drawing graphs on-the-fly from date-based MySQL data, if needed. Also possibility of downloading of data as csv or xls for those who want to play with it is a good idea.

I personally don't fly online, but I really think those who do should benefit. My suggestion is that online flying get (for example) up to 10% extra (making 110% possible) to signify that it is an added value, rather then required. If I get 92% before addition on a flight online, I would get 92+9=101%. For 87 I'd get 87+8=95% etc.

I've said it before, but I really think it's a good idea to keep the calculation as simple to understand as possible, today PP is to much of a 'black box', calculations being made that I have to search the forum to maybe get a grip on.

100'%' to start a flight, set deductions for errors, extra deduction for multiple errors, up to 10'%' extra for flying online, drop to 0 when crashing, average (for different time periods) is simple, clean and understandable.

The only drawback I see is that the guys who fly the most and best (top of current PP list) does not really get their due from it, they'll 'just' be 100 or 110%. I think that might be solved through web interface (who flew the most >=100% flights, etc...). I think it's important that these guys should be shown as the great examples they are.  :)

I'd like to volunteer for beta testing FL4, specifically in Wine (Linux) (can't get FL3 to work there even though WideFS does), but also in Windows if needed. I'm not one of the guys who fly a lot, but I do have lots of programming and IT experience.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[*] Previous page