You say potato, I say potatoe... two views of FsP

[CowlFlapsOpen]

I just finished reading about my 35th post in which someone asked about the ability to edit the database for some reason and part of the response was
a curt "that would be cheating". I must admit this response long puzzled me and some people will recall I posted a rebuttal or two about this on
occasion. But I think I've come to understand it better and have an observation:

I think the FsP world is divided into those who view the program as a game and those who see it as an addon utility. These perspectives co-exist
nicely until it comes to the database question, where they clash. "Gamers" think of FsP in the same way as one may think of Civilization IV or Thief
etc. The object is the challenge of finishing (depending on goal). "Utility-ites" enjoy the program because it makes their performance during their
flights matter, it gives them a task (rather than just fly aimlessly), and the program has some great functions like a co-pilot and failures and adds
realism to the experiences such as the need to obey procedures concerning emergencies and speed restrictions. For the "Gamers" these are important
means to an end, for the "Utility-ites" these are the end itself.

I fall in the latter group, and in fact have disabled all the goal options and the 50 multiplier. I fly my planes and enjoy reviewing the history of
my company's income versus expenses. I watch my performance closely, fret when I make mistakes, and try to maintain a 100% reputation and distribute
the flight time evenly among three fictional pilots, with no particular hurry around advancement. Nothing beats looking at the flight map at the end
of flight and seeing the routes pile up. When I have enough cash (a long way off) I will rehab my planes or buy new ones. I am looking forward to
this milestone but it doesn't motivate me. To me, the database is an archive, and it bugs me if I've entered something incorrectly (mistyped) or
inadvertently given the flight credit to the wrong pilot, etc. I want to fix this, for I want accurate records. Likewise, if I didn't understand the
implications of option when I created the company, I would like to change it when it was better understood without disposing of the company I have
come to love.

It was curious then when folks said this amounted to "cheating". But I think I understand that side too. To "gamers" any effort to alter values in
the database are the equivilant to hacking a game so you finish sooner by giving your character extra strength or skipping levels, etc. To a
"utility-ite" this is silly: What purpose would served by giving their pilot hours/points he didn't earn or to deleting a flight that some technical
glitch makes invalid? But if the focus is on finishing, I can see how "gamers" would fear that others would be tempted.

The beauty of FsP is that it offers much to both "gamers" and "utility-ites" . just a late night observation when I should be asleep...

[runibl]

Well said.
I usually don't mind that people cheat or hack a game or program. I say that as long as people paid for something, they can do with it as they will
(As long as it is not illegal), only ones they cheat are themselfs. But what worries me here is the Export to VA option. I personally wouldn't like
people to cheat or hack the database, that they would use with the export (If the possibility is there, then there is always someone that takes
advantage of that). Then they would not only cheat themself, but also everyone else in the community.

But as you said, there are different views by different people and this was just my thought.

[DBE]

Totally agree with you both!

I say that as long as peeps want to hack the settings to tweak one parameter or another, or change their company or pilot's name then why not?

But, as mentioned, using the Export to VA option then provides a comparison between a hacked DB and a standard one.

[Covoxer]

To CowlFlapsOpen:
Good observation!
But I would like to comment if you dont mind?
Thanks.
So, I agree that we can separate all FsP users on two categories like you did - gamers and utiliters.
Generally it is true that the main reason of using FsP for gamers is the challenge of some kind of airline career. Scenarios are just
made for them.
Now, utiliters use FsP just to imrove some aspects of their usual flying. Career mode is not exactly what they need, even though I believe
you play in it and you put yourself into this second category.
So far I agree.
The thing I am not quite agree is what you say about cheating. You say that it is prohibited for gamers and I think it's obvious, but you think
that it has to be all open for utiliters - and that's I think is not so clear.
There are many different types information about your cmpany and pilot in FsP database and definitely not all of it is required to be
editable for utiliters.
Iet's take finances for example. This should not be editable by utiliters simply because they do not play career. So they do not need or
depend on money. So what's the reason to edit it? On the other hand, if you depend on money then this is your critical resource and so
it's your challenge. In this case free editing of this would be a cheat. Am I right?
Same thing can be said about almost all other resourcers you have in FsP.
If you depend on it, then it's a challenge and editing is a cheat. If you do not depend on it, then I can't see any reason for you change it.
You should just don't care.
Do you understand?
This point may complicate gamers/utiliters separation a bit . Simply, some people are gamers with one resource, others with others. Only
absolute gamers are dependant on all resources and only absolute utiliters depends on none. These last, may use FsP only for inflight
features like co-pilot, pax services, failures e.t.c. They do not really care on the company history or it's future.
Now let's look at your personal position.
You state that you are utiliter. Right?
Not quite, my friend!
You are not absolute gamer though. But you say that you want to have perfect or nice flight list and also you are a bit interested in
company finances. Right? Correct me if I'm wrong.
So, flight logs, pilots hours and ranks, health, company reputation, finances, planes state, and probably some more are your critical
resources. You play to make them as good as possible. This IS your challenge!
So you are a gamer on these parameters, not absolute but atleast partial
As a result, for your particular case it is a cheat to freely edit money, flight list, some company info like reputation e.t.c.
Just think about it - would you be happy if you just added a 100 new flights in your history? And upgrade all 3 of your pilots rank to C23?
Is it what you want? I guess not. And you know why? Simply - it would kill your gameplay, which you have with FsP.
You see, the problem is that some other gamers (partiall or absolute) are not so mature, and they do not understand this. Give them a
chance and they would edit all out to 100% on the first day of playing. On the second they would get bored from the lack of the gameplay
and finally, on the third day they would go online and tell eweryone that they've wasted their money for crap that is not even interesting to
play for more than 2 days. This is the sad truth. Some games suffered this way a lot.
Oh well. This getting long
So I have to assume:
- if some resources are challenge for you then editing them is a cheat;
- if some resourcea are not a challenge for you than you are not interested in editing them;
It's so simple at the end...
Conclusion: free editing of any resources in FsP database is either not needed or is a cheat in other case.
Nothing to add.
I guess....



Post Edited ( 01-17-06 10:15 )

[jboweruk]

I guess I fall somewhere between the two as well, since I don't fall fully into either category. I would not see the point of editing the
database to cheat as such, but in real life companies do change their name, they get taken over. It would be nice to be able to reflect this
sometimes, especially if you were playing say a historic mode, for instance starting out in the 1930's as Empire Airlines and through the
years would become BOAC then finally British Airways. I can see how an edited database would be a problem for VA's who are using
FSP to log flights too. In this case it would be a bad thing. Maybe a solution would be some means of editing those values without being
able to cheat. Perhaps Dan if he could find time to do so can write a small Database editor that allows us to change small things such
as pilot names, airline names etc. ?

[runibl]

jboweruk wrote:
I guess I fall somewhere between the two as well, since I don't fall fully into either category. I would not see the point of editing the
database to cheat as such, but in real life companies do change their name, they get taken over. It would be nice to be able to reflect this
sometimes, especially if you were playing say a historic mode, for instance starting out in the 1930's as Empire Airlines and through the
years would become BOAC then finally British Airways. I can see how an edited database would be a problem for VA's who are using
FSP to log flights too. In this case it would be a bad thing. Maybe a solution would be some means of editing those values without being
able to cheat. Perhaps Dan if he could find time to do so can write a small Database editor that allows us to change small things such
as pilot names, airline names etc. ?

Or like I said in another thread. Create a feature in company manager, to be able to change company name and prefix letters, company description and
after that a newspaper article will appear about the changes (kind of like when you create a new pilot or company).
The changes should also appear in the exported flight under company name, for example Company= "new name" previously= "old name"
I'm not sure if this could be done, or if this is what we really want. I don't mind not being able to this. It's up to Dan.

[pegase]

I think I am mostly a 'utiliter" but nothing is 100% and there is also the gamer part coming when I watch how many points to get on next
level or Company income to buy a next plane.

Now, in which occasions I wish to changes values in Database ?
-When creating a company name and wishing to change the name
-When having planes name like "CS Boeing 707 Paint21". I would llike to change it to CS Boeing 707 Pégase". OK in aircraft.CFG but
annot be changed in the database. I must sell the plane and buy it again under its new name with some cash losses.

Could be the same about Pilot's name but I don't need it for me.

I fully understand to keep locked the flight results, company financial, reputation status, pilot rank, hours data locked. Should they be
editable too easyly, a few would edit them. From my side, never mind it is the cheater's problem if he want to fool himself. But if too
unrealistic flying results go into VAs or others website, It would undermine FsP's reputation as product. It would also undermine the
honest player satisfaction as "those logs would not proof anything".

Would we like things going tn such way?

[SaVas]

There are some good replies on this thread and I can say I agree to some extent with most.

I dont personally want to hack FsP and make it easier. I do disable a few criteria that have given me issues before that were not the fault
of FsP but instead with FS9 design which is OK. I dont ahve autosave flights because every once in a while FS9 will lock up for a moment
with a frozen screen but the sim is actually running (happens sometimes on approach) and the plane crashes into the ground.

One thing I would like to see but not sure if it could be implemented, is if two of your 'airlines' have the same modifier, and other specifics
the same, being able to puchase one of the other companies and aircraft in the fleet at a discount, but it isnt necessary. I enthusiastically
enjoy FsP as it is, and like others have said, am in no hurry to reach any particular goal. I just want to fly in my virtual world (which might
be construed as almost obsessive as a hobby lol)

[Jason]

yeah..um sorry for starting the hot topic in the other post.

My goal is to grow my company honestly and to progress the way it is meant to be done. What I did was create a company (my first one)
without even playing around with the addon for a couple days first. So therefore I didn't completely understand all options. I was too
excited lol, I saw the addon whilst searching for random fs stuff, and downloaded the demo, 30 minutes later I purchased it hehe. I
intentionally set economic mode, and career mode, and I chose a 30M start fund ( i think that's the one below default). But what I thought
I had did was turn off random failures (which i actually wanted) because my thought process was if the aircraft maintenance affects your
reliability then that's a beautiful thing and more realistic than random failures. What I didn't understand was that if you turn off the random
failures, you disable the failures based on aircraft health % because of mx. When I learned that you just simply couldn't fly that aircraft
anymore rather than have a failure in flight, I became upset that I might have to create a new company (at least i could of transfered my
pilot, nice feature) from scratch. But what I did was create a couple test companies experimenting with different settings and I figured out
that I had actually set my company to accept whatever the menu settings are

WOOOOOOOOOO HHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

So now I'm at 1% and am weary of keeping my aircraft maintained I understand that the x50 multiplier actually means that my 1% is a
5,000 flights to 1 ratio of flights simulated. But maybe I'm wrong in thinking this, but if you have a failure in one flight, doesn't that mean
with the multiplier that you had a failure on 50 flights simulated?? Or am i just retarded and suck at math?

Ok now to not hijack the thread.


I agree with the policy of not being able to modify the database because of the VA's out there. Even though some people are willing to
stay honest in modifying the settings, others won't be, and they always ruin it for everyone.

[CowlFlapsOpen]

good stuff guys.

I think you're right: few of us are 100% gamer or utilitor, even me. the distinction just helped me understand some of the replies and differences
I've seen between folks. I better appreciate both sides. Gamers are fair in pointing that tweaking undermines the challenge and rules (I think John
made this point) and utilitors are fair in wondering who on earth would cheat to have records or income that was not actually acheived (certainly not
me!). Case in point: I had a flight the other day in which i had the plane on autopilot. While in flight my daughter had an accident and i got
busy with bandaids, crying, etc etc. and didn't make it back to the aircraft until it had hit a mountain. I was glad i had turned off automatic
recording since i felt the flight in no way represented anything important. What was interesting was that I almost didn't turn off auto-record
because it seemed like cheating to pick and choose which flights to record. this is the only time I have not recorded a flght, no matter how bad my
performance. Clearly I am struggling with my identity as a gamer vs utilitor :-) I need a psychologist...oh, wait!, I am one!


Anyway, i think why I posted was because it dawned on me that this bodes well for the future of FsP. It can be different things to different users
and, as most of us agree, it even different things to the same user at different times. What more can you ask!

[Covoxer]

Ok guys! I have a proposition.
How about creating a list of parameters that can be freely edited by users?
I would stay on point that there's no such parameters, and let you try to convince me that I'm wrong.
So, here we go!
Who gonna be first?

[SaVas]

I love FsP, and things I disable or enable are for my benefit and mine alone. I dont use it to compete or to advance faster than the next
avid simmer, nor do I use it for a VA.

Knowing my sim, and the hundreds of add-ons I have, sometimes I find conflicts that cause a crash of the sim or the plane, so I turn off
crash detection, however if I crash my plane from user error I will record it. If I have a bad landing, I record it. I dont do this to benefit
anyone else, only me, and its helped my simming tremendously.

I have flap detection off because with a very low modifier most of my planes in my fleet dont require flaps for take off.

Sometimes I start at a gate and other times on the active runway. Sometimes I fly waypoints, other times direct GPS.

Occasionally I will set the autopilot after reacing my flight level and go to bed, or go to work, or go shopping, etc. Some disagree with this
one, but hey, its my sim and impacts no one other than me however most of the time I am at my PC or near it. I never use the time
acceleration feature, but others do. Is it cheating that they do? Not if thats how they enjoy their simming experience. Some people will
design weather scenarios while others might fly during the summer when its January. I always fly real time weather, real time of day/year.

We are all different in personalities as well as flying skills, and ways we sim, and you know what? Thats OK by me.

Is there really a definition of 'cheating' with FsP? I think it only becomes cheating when you do something that bypasses the goals you set
for yourself

[scandahl]

Well said SaVas
I would add something, but there is really not more to be added.

Cheers buddy,
David.

[crowebird]

I think that the database should be chanageable by the user, but there could always be somthing that dan sets, so if that flight was
altered then it wont be accepted into the VA database (from there the script could have settings to allow altered databases and not to)
or if someone changes the db that no more flights from the company will be accepted, or somthing of the sort...

Also execpts could be made, simple edits could be allowed without being concidered a hack...

I didnt read the whole thread so sorry if its been said...

[WBHoenig]

I agree with Michael and fall into both groups.

BTW, speaking of Civ4, has anyone played it yet? Sorry to go off topic...