67 replies to this topic

[berubium]

The cost of building terminals depends on the cost of gate rental at that airport.  For those small-town airports, it costs virtually nothing to build a massive terminal.  Just checked on one of my airlines and to expand my existing 70 gate terminal to a 200 gate terminal at YVR (Vancouver) costs over $214,000,000 whereas a 200 gate terminal at a small airport YQZ (Quesnel) only costs a paltry $326,000.  Therefore it is very easy to set up tons of big terminals at small airports all over the place.  Once you hub them all and have a decent sized route network, it creates a massive amount of connecting pax demand.  So much that you can overcharge many of the flights & make big bucks on connecting pax only.  Not my cup of tea, but for those that want to try to win, it's probably the best way to do it.

As a semi-realistic player, that strategy doesn't seem to bother me at all because most of the routes are between city pairs that I wouldn't set routes on.

 

Also, joining one of those big spam-alliances helps boost connecting pax early on as well.  In the R-alpha world, the #1 airline chose to join the alliance that I had created for my own airlines.  Once he joined, I was able to get absurd amounts of connecting pax on my routes departing from a hub.

[JimBob1]

berubiam, can this strategy amplify the number of passengers by over 1,000 times ?

 

And it still doesn't explain his 400 gates per airport.

[Michael.]

Yuxi could easily put a stop to this by just deleting such airlines, don't give any warning just close them down. They are appearing in more and more worlds. At lease this is a fun world with an endless supply of aircraft, I haven't ordered any yet just rely on the used market. world doesn't last long either.

I don't think there's anything within the rules to stop this. While it would be understood, it (technically) couldn't be justified

[Michael.]

berubiam, can this strategy amplify the number of passengers by over 1,000 times ?

No but it it helps marginally, based on my experience of alliances

[JimBob1]

Anyways, although I've learned a few more ways to get a little more out of an airline from this thread.......no one has come remotely close to explaining the extreme results were seeing with this airline.

And I've tried experimenting with this sort of strategy in the last few hours and so far nothing is close to explaining what's happening, other than the obvious.........he's using a cheat

 

Hopefully Yuxi does something about it.

[berubium]

(edit due to double-post)

[berubium]

berubiam, can this strategy amplify the number of passengers by over 1,000 times ?

 

And it still doesn't explain his 400 gates per airport.

It likely is able to, yes; although I don't run spamlines, so I can't confirm it.  I can only comment on what I've seen other airlines do in the game worlds that I have been a part of.

If you're running 100+ hubs and running hundreds of daily flights connecting all of them, it makes for insane amounts of connecting flights.  I've seen airlines run upwards of 700x weekly flights on a short route with 0 demand & have fares at $5,000.  Because there is no actual demand, ALL of those pax are connecting.

 

It is important to note that you can't start setting up those kind of routes until you are a pretty big airline.  That's why the airlines that use this method don't necessarily start the game in the lead.  After 5-10 game years, they'll leapfrog over other airlines in the standings.  They'll still spam in the beginning; but just the more traditional style of spamming to start with.

 

And it still doesn't explain his 400 gates per airport.

I wasn't trying to attempt to answer that part.  I have no idea why that occurred, although if you are playing to win, you can likely just have a tonne of 200 gate airports & still pull it off.

 

 

Anyways, although I've learned a few more ways to get a little more out of an airline from this thread.......no one has come remotely close to explaining the extreme results were seeing with this airline.

It's this kind of disrespectful BS that drives people away from these threads or at least causes people to respond rudely or sarcastically.  Care to explain how it's not "remotely close"?  I'm pretty confident that those results can be achieved using that method.  There are likely other ways, but I have seen several airlines set up that way & milk connecting pax for all they're worth.

 

And I've tried experimenting with this sort of strategy in the last few hours and so far nothing is close to explaining what's happening, other than the obvious.........he's using a cheat

To do it properly, it'll take more than a few hours.  Not to mention that your airline already has to be pretty big to start doing that.  The strategy can be employed without cheating.  As for the 400 gates, maybe you have to cheat for that...

[LJ Aviation]

I had seen that airline in S4B as I also play in that world. I thought I was one of the fastest growing airline (Korean Air), but that guy actually amazed me. I am afraid that he will become the number 1 and never be beaten. Air China, good luck dealing with that guy! Also I think most of his flights are very short, kinda like Southwest, as his pax per day is 2,097,299, the largest in the game, but his daily distance is a stunning 2,765,671, which means his pax-distance ratio is EXTREMELY good. I hope he does not eat in trans-Pacific market

[JimBob1]

It likely is able to, yes; although I don't run spamlines, so I can't confirm it.  I can only comment on what I've seen other airlines do in the game worlds that I have been a part of.

If you're running 100+ hubs and running hundreds of daily flights connecting all of them, it makes for insane amounts of connecting flights.  I've seen airlines run upwards of 700x weekly flights on a short route with 0 demand & have fares at $5,000.  Because there is no actual demand, ALL of those pax are connecting.

 

It is important to note that you can't start setting up those kind of routes until you are a pretty big airline.  That's why the airlines that use this method don't necessarily start the game in the lead.  After 5-10 game years, they'll leapfrog over other airlines in the standings.  They'll still spam in the beginning; but just the more traditional style of spamming to start with.

I wasn't trying to attempt to answer that part.  I have no idea why that occurred, although if you are playing to win, you can likely just have a tonne of 200 gate airports & still pull it off.

 

 

It's this kind of disrespectful BS that drives people away from these threads or at least causes people to respond rudely or sarcastically.  Care to explain how it's not "remotely close"?  I'm pretty confident that those results can be achieved using that method.  There are likely other ways, but I have seen several airlines set up that way & milk connecting pax for all they're worth.

 

To do it properly, it'll take more than a few hours.  Not to mention that your airline already has to be pretty big to start doing that.  The strategy can be employed without cheating.  As for the 400 gates, maybe you have to cheat for that...

 

I'm not the one BS'in here.

Are you actually saying that just from the extra passengers you get from a large network and hubs you can increase the passenger traffic of a small airport from about 80,000 a year to over 93 million ?

Have you even looked at this airline ?

 

By the way, until this airline caught my attention I was the bigger airline with the second highest number of terminals and hubs on the map.

And those extra passengers from hubs only pay half fare.

And common sense tells me if someone is doing something over and over that should be impossible .......like 400 gates in about a hundred small airports.........he's using a cheat.

[Mr PAG]

Can anyone tell me how this airline is able to build terminals with 400 gates in every one of these small towns ?

I tried and I can only build 200 max.........and this looks nothing like any kind of normal, well run airline in AE.
He is literally creating millions of passengers out of thin air in these small towns with zero or maybe few hundred or a few thousand annual passengers.

His largest and only major airport with a terminal & hub is Charlotte Douglas with only 3 gates.
His next largest city with a terminal and hub is Nashville with 200 gates............all the rest with terminals are small towns with 400 gates with a few with 200 gates.

Building terminals increases your valuation and thats honestly one of the best mtds to climb ranking as u face no competition at all

[JimBob1]

Building terminals increases your valuation and thats honestly one of the best mtds to climb ranking as u face no competition at all

 

Yes, were all aware of that.

Take a look at this airline, it's link is in Fly Evans post #17

[berubium]

I'm not the one BS'in here.

Are you actually saying that just from the extra passengers you get from a large network and hubs you can increase the passenger traffic of a small airport from about 80,000 a year to over 93 million ?

Absolutely!!!  Every time you open up a new route, you're creating more demand for connecting pax.  If you're demand is insanely high, you can jack the ticket prices up so high that 1/2 of your fare is still massive.  We're talking Y-class prices of $5,000 for a 200 mile flight.  The $2,500 that you'd get per pax is far more than the standard fare of $150 or whatever it is.  At that point, 1/2 fare means nothing!

 

Have you even looked at this airline ?

No I have not as I'm not in that game world.  I have however been playing this game upwards of 6 years & have seen some MASSIVE airlines in that time.  Snowy Pacific Airlines was probably the craziest example.

 

By the way, until this airline caught my attention I was the bigger airline with the second highest number of terminals and hubs on the map.

Try opening up a route between city pairs with no demand that you have hubbed up with say daily 737 flights or something.  If your airline is big, you will easily fill the entire plane with connecting pax at base fare.  If you do, try tripling the fare & see if you still fill the plane.  If you can still fill it, your airline might be ready to start expanding using this method.  If you can't fill it once you've tripled the fare, try joining the biggest alliance in the game & see if that helps.  If you are able to do that, you can likely gradually increase frequencies & fare until you find your tipping point & then stop there.  Just keep making more of these spammy routes & you'll notice that your tipping point will get higher & higher & eventually you can run 700x weekly frequencies.  To best take advantage of this when you get big, make seating configs with the same amount of F,C, & Y pax.  While that doesn't work for normal routes like LAX-ORD, it sure as hell works for routes with absolutely zero demand.

 

As mentioned before, I don't run spamlines, but some of my airlines have had a few spammy qualities.  Case in point.  In R-alpha, the #1 ranked airline is in my alliance, which has boosted connecting pax on all routes that involve at least one hub.  One of my smallest airlines (Prairie Airways) runs daily flights in a little 18 seater plane to far flung remote communities in Northern Manitoba, Ontario, & Saskatchewan from YWG (Winnipeg).  The demands for those routes are usually only 1 or 2 pax per day, but I fill my planes completely with connecting pax & charge about triple the base fare.  So yeah it looks spammy because I'm flying routes with no in-game demand & with very high fares, but it is actually true to real life as there are little bush airlines that service those communities & cost an arm & a leg.  Anyways, a normal tiny airline in AE wouldn't usually be able to pull this off, but I was able to because I was riding on the coattails of the massive ailrine in the same alliance that has 100+ hubs (Prairie Airlines has 2).

 

There are so many ways to figure out how to take advantage of the game if you want to... 

[highland]

just because, I tried to get 400 gates. and I can't do it.

 

I first come across the game governor that says 200 gates is the limit... no if's and's or but's... it just wont sell

me anymore then the 200.

 

so yaa, book Serbia's got something going on there.... and it at the moment doesn't seem to be on the up & up....

 

 

but hey ? ? if the game warden doesn't mind it, um' well, neither do I....

[Pineair]

The bottom line is anyone who builds a400 gate terminal is cheating which is agsinst the rules and they should be removed from the game. if you find a cheat thst works you are ecpected not to use it..


well it has taken me less than five minutes to work it out. You build a terminal with 200 gates then you sell it. you then build a terminal with 200 gates, you will see a 200 gate terminal is available to buy but you ignore it. you then go back and although you now have a200 gate terminal there is still a 200 gate terminal available to buy.. Buy that snd you now have a 400 gate terminal . A cheat thst ought to lead to you being kicked out of the game. will now defete my 400 gate terminal.

[Book Siberia]

Your missing the point Michael.

 

The only way he could have terminals with 400 gates is with some kind of cheat.

And I don't call it smart buying 50 times more slots than you will ever use.........unless this is also part of a cheat that creates millions of passengers from nothing.

 

Also, would Walmart stock 50 times more product than they sell in a season ?

 

 

Hi, Im the person playing in S4B  as Mr. Robot.

 

while it is true that you can only build 200 gate terminals at a time  max.  You can construct another 200 gates by doing the following:  Construct a 200-gate terminal, then sell it.  Then build another 200 gate terminal at the same airport.  Buy back the 200 gate terminal you just sold.   You now have a 400 gate terminal.  Create your hub and you're good to go.  [No cheating necessary]

 

PS:  If you peruse all my posts, you will see the posts where I describe what terminals and hubs really do.  So if you understand what you are doing, anyone can do it.  As I have stated over and over again, AE is a game that has nothing to do with reality.  And the dev made it that way on purpose.

 

Hope this clarifies things for you guys.

[JimBob1]

There's the culprit .............lol.

 

Now that I've done some follow up I see now what's really happening.

 

Thankyou.................Book Siberia

[Book Siberia]

Anyways, although I've learned a few more ways to get a little more out of an airline from this thread.......no one has come remotely close to explaining the extreme results were seeing with this airline.

And I've tried experimenting with this sort of strategy in the last few hours and so far nothing is close to explaining what's happening, other than the obvious.........he's using a cheat

 

Hopefully Yuxi does something about it.

 

 

Hi, JimBob.  Allow me to explain how this works and why I am doing this.

 

I like playing in the US because of the large numbers of airports that one can create terminals and hubs at.  China is also a good place to play using the  techniques I will describe here.

 

When I first start an airline and set up,  i start at some of the larger airports (though I try to avoid the largest ones)

 

I do exactly what everyone else does - I try to fill  the green passenger demand or aat least the majority of it.  Once I generte 150 million in cash, I build 33 gate terminals at airports where the lease costs are 12 thousand or less.  I hubify every single such airport as early as possible in the game.

 

The reason for this is that creating a hub starts a connecting passenger generating process that builds over time.  So the earlier you build, the more connecting passengers you will have access to.  Also noteworthy is the fact that terminals and hubs are assets that are owned.  When you buy terminals and hubs, you are merely exchanging cash for much more valuable assets.  Terminals and hubs boost your valuation more than the cash purchase equivalent thereof.  so there is no reason not to build terminals and hubs at every airport you fly to/from in your home country when and as soon as you can.

 

whatever alliance I am a part of benefits tremendously from me being a member.  That's because every hub I have can be used by any other member of the alliance to participate in the connecting passenger generating process without any of the other members having to do a thing other than fly to or from any of those hubs.  Member airlines who share the same home country as me benefit the most, as they can fly most of the very same routes I fly.  And how many connecting passengers they can pick up has absolutely nothing to do with how many connecting passengers I pick up.  Because hubs are a generating process that builds over time, the newer the hub is, the less the number of connecting passengers one can pick up at first.  But over time you would be able to add additional flights on existing routes, and then a game month or so later, you can revisit and add even more flights and thus over time create a truly  massive number of connecting passengers. 

 

when I can afford to, I eventually create 200-gate terminals or larger in anticipation of later utilization as time goes by and I acquire sufficient numbers of planes to deploy and fill those connecti g passenger routes.

 

The reason I am flying to all those tiny airports is so that no one falsely accuses  me of flooding their routes.  Also I am demonstrating by example to show the newer players what is possible and how to do it and to demonstrate how it works.  That's the main reason I am playing is S4B in the first place.   I have no real interest in getting to 1st place per se,  at least in S4B (Heck, we dont even get no stinkin trophy! lol)

 

But if you encounter me in any of the R- or O-worlds (I play as LeerJet Air almost exclusively) know that I will be quite a formidable competitor wherever I play.  There are at least 2 players I know of who are actually better than I am, but they aren't sharing their methods.

 

I do want to state that I am not cheating nor am I making use of illegal exploits.  The most that anyone can legitimately accuse me of is playing unrealistically.

 

Just to be clear, let me restate that:

 

I am not cheating nor am I making use of illegal exploits.  The most that anyone can legitimately accuse me of is playing unrealistically.  Any one of you can do exactly what I do -  all you were lacking was the requisite knowledge and understanding.  And of course I will gladly help anyone who asks.

[Book Siberia]

 

[JimBob1]

I do most things very well in AE but I didn't fully appreciate the power of the purple passengers and how it builds over time.

And of course........how you ended up with 400 gate terminals.

 

So, just want to clarify this........does this strategy work even better with larger airports.........or does it not make any difference?

[Book Siberia]

I have built 200 gate terminals at all the major airports in the US when I was playing in O2.

 

For the vast majority of you, 200 gate terminals at any of the airports is more than sufficient, and there are very few players who are able to utilize the entire 200 gates, never mind 400 gates. (By the way, you can if you wanted to build 600-,800-, etc gate terminals - It's sort of like the Catholic life cycle, just go through the steps: Sin, Repent!, Confess, Repeat! lol

 

From past experience, I noticed that in the mid- to late-game, I sometimes end up running out of gates when I only build 200 gate terminals.  Because I must decide in advance whether to build more than 200 gates and since I cannot really determine which airports I will actually need more than 200 gates at, I just said - What the heck? I'll just build 400 gate terminals at all the smaller airports and connect them all over time,  Once I get into midsized airports like IND, CPH, SPG and the like, i might scale back to 300 gate terminals or less  And as mentioned in a previous post  I'll just stay away from the largest airports altogether.

 

The point is that 200 gates is plenty, and how I play doesn't depend on 400 gate terminals per se.

 

And yes, I am wasting cash, but my opinion is that cash is the worst asset to have too much of in this game.  And this game seems to throw more money at me in a single day than Trump can blow through in his entire lifetime. lol