It's a bit like this one armed bandit. There's no hold buttons or anything which don't improve your chances of winning anyway, just a lever on the side. I could program the session parameter screen accordingly, following the number one programming rule: 'keep it simple stupid!'. Just a launch button and leaving everything else to the machine. Of course the disadvantage is that you can't choose your own plane, or the weather, time of day or region but it's about the simplest way to get a game going. But why change something which is already a beautiful piece of programming design which even a child or the mentally challenged will almost immediately understand. So no additional choices in our game, which may only confuse players or start arguments and have no real impact on the upcoming fights anyway. It's always worked wonderfully well and will take you anywhere in the EAW world. What's easier to remember and learn then 5 regions in the on line EAW world, certainly not a list of 300+ target names of which you never learned where they are in the world, where in God's name is Lutjebroek or Villacoublay? It becomes harder with every theater you play, more names and the problem of making more choices for a group of players. There is no games master with us, if there was who would take over after he's gone? Anyone can take the job, the game engine does it all for you from a familiar selection screen everyone will immediately understand and recognize. If you're interested in making choices and want to train making selections, don't apply for membership! We train to fight and have lots of fun with fast, furious, merciless and ruthless missions, after all time is short and we believe that improved AI skills with faster reaction times is what really improves this game and provides a more authentic WWII pilot experience, not more choices. You don't have to be ashamed if it's not what you're looking for, neither are we,

Nothing else to see here and no further explanations of the user interface, it hasn't changed at all and never will, because we just love it as is and can't afford to waste any time.

VonBeerhofen

Sorry I lied, never say never. A minor adaptation was done to the on line region selection to allow the game a wider choice without having to go through the regions sequentially. Now any region can be set before the game picks a target and transmits the data to the other players. I.e. the routine can directly switch from let's say Channel to Berlin or Normandy or any other region without first going through adjacent choices, resulting in 30 possible choices, where the stock game only has 12 (up and down for 6 regions) . This to better use the resequenced target lists which in most cases are laid out from East to West, whereas Stock EAW uses North to South with overlapping regions already set in the target list. This change can now also select the 'in between targets' in the list, which previously was not possible and therefore often limited the choices available causing the game to regularly default to the failsafe target in each region if you didn't switch through the year selection and forced the game routine to reposition the pointer in the target list due to a changed frontline. At first glance nothing has really changed, the selection still works the same way as always for the host who makes the selection, but the players will receive the region selection upon the game countdown or when the host selects something which also forces transmission. Hope you guys understand what I mean, that it's still simple for anyone to use but more effective,

VonBeerhofen

Well after a few months of testing I can only say that things work like a charm. Our daily missions now take us to the furthest boundaries in the game and are now covering all possible targets, irrespective of how the target files are organized. I've now been to places which I had forgotten even existed, the sad thing though is that on many occasions I didn't survive for very long



VonBeerhofen

The new region selection has now been thoroughly tested and I found a new additional benefit from it. The game uses the first selection to set the host's home base in an air started mission and selects an appropriate target based on the mission type and year selection. When the 2nd selection uses the same region as the first then home base moves very close to the front line in that region and often just 10-20KM from the battle. This leads to interesting new scenarios where the host can drag the enemy over it's own airbase and enemy players obviously get a chance to destroy it. Multiple selections can be made to jump through various regions to influence the choices as the game seems to base it's choice on the last made selections and then reselects the new criteria it encounters in the target list, i.e. select Berlin first and then London and the game will try to select something in between, when the choice is there, and if necessary use those choices again when another selection is made, similar to how I expect a campaign to progress. However the selection is only made after data transmission to the players and NOT when the selector is moved, so until then you can keep switching through the available targets and bases with the above in mind. If you can't be bothered with such manipulation you just select your region as before and forget what I typed here, as I often do. I just switch things around and forget about where the game will take us, the resulting surprise hasn't bothered me before and hasn't changed my choices very much, but when I have sufficient time between missions I try to guess where the game will take us and it's just as much a fun mission as it ever was

VBH.