Tips for New Players

im losing money (currently on -$11,000,000) but none of my routes are making a loss, they are all making a profit, what do I do?

What airplanes are you using? ( Models and quantity)

and also at the beginning try to lower the extra crew to 0% and lower their wages 

I disagree with the advice to stay off other people's routes.  Just saying that a route belongs to someone is silly.  In my game play, it's a free for all and competition makes it fun.  No need to tip-toe around other players.

 

At the same time, I'll also accept the consequences if the competitor turns around and shows me who's who for doing so.  I'm just careful who I think I can compete against and if it's worth it.

I would have to agree with the above statement. Mostly because any city worth flying to, is going to have competition. Any city that no one flies to, will in most cases only result in a loss of revenue. So why are so many "veterans" suggesting to new people that they should lose money? Unless you want new players to be using $10 planes that carry less than 50 people at a time, we newbies have to join the fight too.

at the beginning try to lower the extra crew to 0% and lower their wages 

The defaults should work fine; if you need salary cut, scam IFS, etc to break even, you are probably doing something wrong.

any city worth flying to, is going to have competition. Any city that no one flies to, will in most cases only result in a loss of revenue

Inactive airlines are removed regularly, some routes are being freed. I do not play open worlds; but of those I played, I have not come across one which has no profitable routes at all.

Unless you want new players to be using $10 planes that carry less than 50 people at a time, we newbies have to join the fight too.

Many "veterans" started their airlines with ATRs; if you can fly A380 ATL-LHR from day one, I guess you are far more skillful than the veterans.

The defaults should work fine; if you need salary cut, scam IFS, etc to break even, you are probably doing something wrong.

 

You make more money with the Scam IFS and Salary cut, it gains access to more funds, equaling more aircraft

Many "veterans" started their airlines with ATRs; if you can fly A380 ATL-LHR from day one, I guess you are far more skillful than the veterans.

See, I'm new. I'm not sure what ATRs are. Also not all the veterans start in ATL and if they did, they should already be fighting with others to flight routes. Not really sure what your point is.

And just because inactive routes are regularly freed doesn't mean there's no competition for it. At least not on worlds with over 200 players. Maybe it's just the open worlds or servers that have a lot of people that's like this. But so far, any route that has more than 50 demand, has someone flying that route. I've tried starting from Toronto (YYZ) and Tokyo - Haneda (HND) so far. Unless there are a lot of details not being said, there's been competition to go pretty much anywhere.

See, I'm new. I'm not sure what ATRs are. Also not all the veterans start in ATL and if they did, they should already be fighting with others to flight routes. Not really sure what your point is.
And just because inactive routes are regularly freed doesn't mean there's no competition for it. At least not on worlds with over 200 players. Maybe it's just the open worlds or servers that have a lot of people that's like this. But so far, any route that has more than 50 demand, has someone flying that route. I've tried starting from Toronto (YYZ) and Tokyo - Haneda (HND) so far. Unless there are a lot of details not being said, there's been competition to go pretty much anywhere.

Personally, I would never fly to small little airports with low demand. I want my airlines to be realistic so I fly to bigger airports, expecting competition. In reality there is always competition on routes and as long as keep competitive prices, and don't fill up the whole daily demand (not one airline is going to serve the entire daily demand in reality), you should be fine.

yeah ok.

I see how quality your airlines are.

Anyway... just fly to airports that nobody flies to. medium ones. that helps.

Perhaps this is only in non-open worlds, but unless I'm flying from ATL, there will always be at least 5 routes with more than 200 demand and none to very little competition. YYZ and HND are among the biggest airports in their countries, so you can expect to meet competition. Flying between secondary european airports I can connect a least 50 airports using daily+ E-Jets without ever meeting competition.
ATR are quite efficient and cheap turboprops in the 50 - 78 passenger range. You'll find them where it says 'ATR'. Shorter flights make more money than longer ones.

I'm going to be trying this approach whenever I get onto a new server next. Aim is to see how much I can make with smaller planes and smaller locations.

Best way to grow. Cheap but medium demand hub (abu Dhabi, Karachi etc) and bunch of old 747s or the largest plane you can find. And medium to long haul routes. i swear you will shoot. I did it with PIA, AirBlue and AirOne. My airlines.

I think it's time we keep a centralized repository of suggestions for new AE players. Feel free to add your own

My 3 main ones for a new airline (until you have > $100M in cash)

1) fewer aircraft types (keep to 1-2 families in the first few months) - each additional family adds huge maintenance costs that are uneconomical if you only have 1-2 aircraft in the family
2) more flight hours, higher aircraft utilization (especially in the startup phase)
3) spend money on leasing more aircraft, don't waste it on IFE/IFS

IFS is great for increasing your airlines profitability. Depending on what aircraft you operate, it really can save your bacon to make a 2 star IFS early on. I do agree however, that IFE is really just a cash cow. Unless you're aiming for increased route reputation with profitable IFS, IFE really isn't required. As a guide, only use IFE on planes you plan to use past the 3000 mile price break. I've found longer routes extremely profitable in some of my airlines, so get onto these as fast as possible. But make sure your aircraft's CASM isn't ridiculous like the Ilyushin IL 96 which is absolutely useless. As a guide, use the following formula to find the fuel efficiency of your planes.

Fuel flow/max economy passengers.

Then divide the aircraft speed by the result of the above equation. Optimally, you should look for a result above 8 when searching for turboprops of around the 70 seat or above 5.5 when looking for mainline jets, and above 6 when looking for 50 seat turboprops, however, until 2009, the Dash 8-300 is great as it exceeds this mark easily with a score of 8.6. The ATR-42-600 only gets 6, because it's far slower and therefore less economical. However, it's also cheaper. As a guide, look for planes that are cheap and economical, rather than just cheap. Also, don't fly to major airports with sub 70 seat aircraft. If you have any questions, please reply to this post. 

How do you know when an aircraft is getting too old? Is there any metric for deciding when to retire an old aircraft? And how does the game 'punish' you for using a very old aircraft? Any info is appreciated. Thanks!

How do you know when an aircraft is getting too old? Is there any metric for deciding when to retire an old aircraft? And how does the game 'punish' you for using a very old aircraft? Any info is appreciated. Thanks!

Generally, 10-20 years is best for buying replacements. Every month, the maintenance cost of a plane slightly increases, so when a plane hits 40 generally, it is no longer profitable. I do know certain aircraft like the Bristol Brittania, Canadair Cl-44 and Tupolev Tu-114 can virtually go on forever if you want them to, but the 707, 757 and any other replacement (Il-62 for Eastern Bloc) are more profitable over time.

Thanks!

Uhm, I just like returned from hiding (lol), and I really need a good tip for starting an airline, haven't played since March. wow so yes. any good tip to start in a server where everyone's rich and every route you wish to have a flight on has competition?

LCCs are spamlines! Beware!

No they aren't. The definition of a spamline is a carrier that has Scam IFS, tightest configs, unrealistic destinations(serving all 5 destinations in london) and unrealistic fleets.

No they aren't. The definition of a spamline is a carrier that has Scam IFS, tightest configs, unrealistic destinations(serving all 5 destinations in london) and unrealistic fleets.

There is no definition of a spamline, per se. It's a matter of opinion, although the consensus is that spamlines have 18+ hour configs, fly to unrealistic destinations, don't replace aircraft, have 3 class configs on all aircraft regardless of capacity, scam IFS is optional (A quality airline can have 3* Scam or 4* Scam), using Russian aircraft with a western European, American, southern Asian or Australasian airline, as well as several other factors that don't spring to mind.

3 class configs on all aircraft regardless of capacity

Hardcore spamlines don't configure their fleets, they stay with the config when the used planes were bought.