Coach

+1 Would also encourage pilots to fly lower giving players a more fair chance of hearing/seeing them. As long as it’s not overused I think it’s be a good addition

I think you completely missed the point...

Educate yourself. IRL the cameras are infinitely better ESPECIALLY at night (FLIR for example). So please argue realism cause that’ll only make our equipment better 😂 On a more serious note though, the realism argument is silly. People could all go back and forth all day about it and get no where. There’s a counter argument to every argument on both sides when it comes to realism. It’s about finding the right balance. And you should if you feel a rule break has happened. As should anyone else. That’s what it’s there for.

Agree with this 100%. I personally play as a one lifer. If I die, it’s a CK. No matter what. I think it helps that “my safety first” mentality. Cause it’s so easy to lose sight of that on a video game, even though we’re supposed to be portraying real life. I agree there are times in which cops should be forced to CK as well.

Yup. Very much so agreed. It sucks you had those bad interactions prior because it's super demotivating, but I do agree it's important to keep in mind that generalizing isn't the right approach. "A few bad apples" is a good way to some it up on both sides, for sure. I have seen this so many times and it's extremely frustrating. So I can only imagine how you feel when it's being done to you. I don't really understand it, I think just some people know if they ask you to step out it will lead to a pursuit/shootout/whatever. Which obviously isn't good. While there are some cases where I think Officers actions should remain IC (like demanding IDs even though it's not lawful to do so, this happens all the time IRL), it happens way too much and I 100% see the frustration in that. It's just one of those things where, in the context of this server, yes a four deep car (especially in JT or Davis) is EXTREMELY sus, but IRL you wouldn't bat an eye at it. It all comes back to using your judgement on an OOC level and doing your best to remain objective and not need to "win" every interaction. I don't have any answers for how to fix it besides just trying to weed out those "bad apples" or doing a better job at educating people on this sort of thing, but I fully see the issues with minor traffic offenses or four deep cars being escalated unnecessarily.

It’s the same thing as PD parking a cruiser in the faction garage and immediately spawning a helicopter and taking off. In fact worse cause /changechar you can do anywhere. But I digress. It is YOUR opinion. You made a blanket statement about a very large group of people that isn’t correct. Not everyone comments on the forums, believe it or not. So that point is moot. As to your comment about reports, are you referring to the ones that no action was taken because the pilots did nothing wrong? Please go check. There has been one report that resulted in anything. Why? Because of what Kari said, many of those reports come from personal dismay and are baseless. Hence why no action was taken. I’ll leave it at that since I don’t doubt you will continue to try to stir the pot and get a rise out of people. This isn’t the first time you’ve been called out for spreading misinformation.

I’ve been involved with aviation RP for a long time and have never heard that. I’m curious how you feel that isn’t PGing for a char to appear at an airfield after /changechar when a deployment comes about and how it is a good thing to have a character on a heavy RP server that has 0 development. There are absolutely people who agree/disagree with both ways things are run. But you are spreading hate and misinformation when you speak for an entire community. “Universally agreed upon by everyone but PD”. Simply not true. I didn’t make a blanket statement about people thinking LSSD air doesn’t work well even though that’s 99% of what I’ve heard, from those in and out of PD. There are many many opinions out there. So I’d tread carefully when trying to speak for a large group of people. EDIT: I’d also like to add I don’t care how LSSD, Park Rangers, and the many other agencies run their air divisions. They run it how they feel works best and things should be different. LSSD and LSPD shouldn’t and aren’t run the same. Never will be. It’s up to the judgment of those in charge. They’re are pros and cons to both options, as with everything. So to each their own.

Totally fine if you feel it's relevant I don't mind discussing here. But the fact is what LSPD and LSSD portray are two very different things. Our air division shouldn't be on the same page. LAPD ASD is very unique and requires officers to spend at least 5 years on the ground before even applying, and that's the minimum. They do this because they want Police Officers in the sky, not just pilots or random people. They want people in the helicopter who understand what it's like to be on the ground, what those officers are feeling, what they need, etc. LASD for example, has the Sky Knight program where they literally hire non-sworn pilots to fly their helicopters. That would never fly with LAPD. So with that in mind, it isn't a stretch at all to have someone from Gangs, Traffic, Patrol, Community Engagement, etc. to be in ASD. A detective or high ranking officer in a another division? That's a stretch. However we do not have any detectives and high ranking officers join with an alt. IRL LAPD ASD members actually partner on ground patrols regularly so they stay up to date with how things operate down there. I would argue it's actually worse to force alts on pilots because there is absolutely ZERO development that goes into those characters. From what I have heard and seen, they exist solely in a helicopter. People /changechar, appear at the heliport, jump in the helicopter, do their thing, get out, /changechar. That's terrible and such a waste of what this server is supposed to be about. Not only that but it's arguably PGing to just /changechar when you're needed for a deployment. If you don't have a dedicated alt you need to go back to station, park up, swap your callsign, change into your pilot uniform, then head to the helicopter and do your preflight before taking off. I do agree with Kari in the second two paragraphs. A lot of it does have to do with personal judgement and, especially in the past, that judgement wasn't the best. I won't even pretend there weren't some P2W/PG mentalities going on. I saw it myself and it frustrated the crap out of me. There were also some things being done that weren't intentionally harmful, but were having a really negative impact on RP as a whole. Just because the Pilot saw an infraction fairly harmless doesn't mean a helicopter unit shouldn't be initiating anything on it (like a minor traffic offense/misdemeanor/etc). While I do not doubt it still happens from time-to-time like in any branch of RP on this server, it does not happen at the rate people claim it to. It seems to me the anger and resentment of what was happening over a year ago is skewing current opinions.

I’m curious why you feel that way. I don’t know if it really has anything to do with this thread, so if you’d rather PM that’s fine.

It goes both ways. I'm not saying that's how it should be, I'm saying that's what it would be. But it's a game. So we can't always harp on realism when it benefits us and then ignore it when it doesn't. This happens both ways, don't get me wrong. There are things that can and in my opinion should be done to help balance helicopters. Why do you think we implemented our own internal rules without any direction from LFM to do so? I see things that frustrate me from Pilots and I garnered a ton of great feedback from the illegal community in the other helicopter thread and used it to create some of those rules. But it is extremely frustrating to see the overreactions from some people about helicopters on this server. I've seen it for two years now. Two years ago I could understand because I agreed with a lot of what people were complaining about. But all I've seen since is finding yet another thing to complain about. "It was a bug" when we physically see a weapon in someones hand in a car. So we tell pilots they can't act on that. So then the complaint turned into "omg they saw the /ame /me in the camera that's so OP". People still complain about helicopters "camping" yet there is exactly 0 evidence that it's happening. You can legitimately monitor it with the radar system, it doesn't happen. It's gotten to the point where it's hard to take some of these complaints seriously because they are so trivial. There are bigger issues that need to be balanced, like the render distance/sound. That should be the focus.

If the amount of crime in LA was even remotely close to what it is in LS? Absolutely. That’s why the realism argument here is so silly. LS would be in martial law at this point with how out of control it is. I remind you all that the original post and linked report is what started the realism argument. When those misinformed or hyper realistic complaints about realism were countered with the facts or more hyper realism the other way everyone all of the sudden argues “it’s a game”. I don’t believe the game should be 1:1 nor is it even close to 1:1 as is right now. But the hypocrisy is shocking to me.

I don’t disagree. But that doesn’t mean we can’t take SOME portions of realism to counter the arguments being thrown at us that are solely based on realism. You can’t tell one they can’t say something about realism when the other is the one that brought it up to begin with. I’ve said what I need to say anyways. I’ll refrain.

I'm not really sure what you're saying here. I'm saying the "evidence" provided as to quality of cameras etc IRL is super crappy has been from terrible sources such as news helicopters with cameras 1/1000th as good as what LEO aircraft would have or from helicopters flying 4x+ higher. Meaning they would need to zoom more, meaning the image would be worse. There is a ride along video from 2 months ago on YouTube and while it doesn't show any images from the camera, it clearly shows them patrolling at just above 400 feet. Combine that with footage from the exact model of camera that LAPD ASD has on their helicopters and then you'll understand just how much pilots can see with their camera. They have and will continue to complain even when that's the case. As I've stated, there have been 0 cases of a pilot being found guilty of "turf camping" since our internal implementation of rules over a year ago. I'm not sure what your quoting small portions of the manual is supposed to be doing, especially since you stated yourself it "doesn't really mean anything", but it can be interpreted in many ways regardless. I mean the literal mission of the division is: "The mission is the same, only the vehicle has changed." Another one: "ASTRO can be thought of as a patrol car in flight." For good measure: "The aircrew monitors citywide police radio frequencies, they respond to calls for service and make aerial observations based on their experience as police officers." So yes, they would and do police proactively. This includes things like hanging out over high crime rate areas in an effort to suppress such crime.

Absolutely false that air units are only support. They are very proactive, not simply reactive. I would greatly agree that evidence is needed in arguments, something I don't see in anything being said against helicopters. For example: "all they do is camp and wait for stuff to happen". Every single case of this was disproven. Immediately. "The camera quality is not that good." *Uploaded screenshot of a video taken from a news helicopter from 4x the height and much further away from the scene an LEO aircraft would be*. We have an entire folder of stuff directly requested from the LAPD for our reference. I will PM it to you. You will have to do further research on the equipment or whatever else you want to know about. But it's out there and easy to find, I have. There isn't footage of this because LEO aircraft don't fly 4000ft they fly much lower, as I've said, so I'm not sure I get your point.

Do your research. All I gotta say. I'll even give you the exact camera model if you want it. At 4000 feet it could see a driver. We (and our LAPD ASD counterpart) operate at 500-1000. Don't want you getting more heated than you already clearly are, but no one is insulting anyones intelligence here. You are either misinformed or just have never bothered to see what these cameras can actually do.

The driver roleplayed the weapon in his lap. The pilot has screenshots of a clear and unobstructed view of the driver's lap. If someone wants to say it was too dark, that same screenshot shows the vehicle parked directly across from a street light. So despite camera quality when it's dark it would've been seen. Saying he acted on an emote without "physically" seeing it is sort of confusing. I'm assuming you mean it would've been unrealistic for him to see it (even though it wasn't as stated above). But if you mean that he needs to actually see the firearm in his hand in game then that's simply wrong. Especially since when pilots act on that intel the claim is "it was a bug". But I digress, the report isn't really the focus of the topic.

And that very same argument can be thrown right back at illegals who rob people in Mirror Park, at the beach, on the pier, or a number of other places on the map that would realistically be high traffic. You can't have it both ways. liq said it best: Talk about realism, traffic, population, helicopter ratio in comparison to population (even though I clearly said that 99% of the time we only have one helicopter up at a time) etc etc etc all you want when it benefits you, but conveniently ignore it when it doesn't. I said it in my previous post, I don't disagree the render distance and sound emitted from the helicopter when at higher altitudes is extremely unfair. I proposed limiting pilots to 800 feet to help counter that. We also asked and encouraged devs to find a way to fix that. Help by coming up with ideas for solutions not just complaining about it. EDIT: I also want to add that there are some usages that we saw in the past that we are trying to crack down on. For example, a pilot seeing a car 3-4 deep and following it because it's suspicious. While yes, on this server that is basically guaranteed to lead to something illegal, IRL you wouldn't think twice about seeing a car with people in it. So I do see your point on usage to an extent.

I will preface this all by saying I have no ill will towards those in this community who want to make a change. My responses are simply to provide you with another perspective as it's an area of RP I've been involved with for years now. So please do not read into this thinking I'm being passive aggressive or anything of the like. I understand people want changes made. There's already been an entire thread about helicopters and I made internal changes without direction from LFM based on that thread. I want balance as well. But there is a line. So with that: This is a dangerous statement that further spreads disinformation that is toxic as can be. This blanket statement has absolutely 0 basis. There is 1 report linked that supports the statement and a mention of many others. What isn't noted? The many others had no action taken. AKA no rules were broken and pilots were acting well within the rules of the game. It has happened, absolutely, but to phrase it like this is very harmful to the entire community who take what they see at face value and do no research themselves. In fact, every single accusation of a pilot “camping” over an area has been disproven (at least on the PD side, I can’t speak for other agencies). So how does this continually get brought up? If we want to talk about our IRL counterpart, they have FLIR. Something that allows them to see MUCH more than we can currently see. But that aside, we (nor our IRL counterpart) would patrol at thousands of feet. IRL they patrol at around 500-800 feet. Yes. You read that right. Research the cameras they have installed. They are MORE than capable of zooming in and identifying clear as day people/firearms/etc on the ground, even at night in a majority of cases. No. Not always like when it’s pitch black. But I once again encourage you to look at the facts of the report being mentioned in this post and see what was presented as evidence. A vehicle parked directly across from a street light, lap clearly visible as shown in a screenshot where the player RPed having the firearm. FLIR or not it would’ve been seen. No doubt about it. The common thing I hear all the time is to research what LAPD ASD has IRL and how it actually works/looks/etc. The ironic part is the ones who say that haven’t done so themselves or they send "proof" using examples from San Diego, San Jose, or even news helicopters. LAPD ASD is unlike any LEO air support division in the entire world. You can't compare it with others. We’ve done our research. We know exactly what helicopters they have in their fleet, exactly what equipment are in those helicopters, exactly what that equipment is capable of, exactly what their patrol duties and capabilities are, all of it. We requested their manuals, pre-flight checks, uniforms and equipment, FAA exemptions, anything they had to give us for us to know what we are RPing. With that said, I don’t disagree there needs to be a balance and that things can’t be 1:1 nor should they be. But most of the things people are complaining about with helicopters now is just ludicrous. We don’t have FLIR (and likely never will) and we already have many internal rules that we enforce by choice even though LFM never told us we need to. Seeing /mes and /ames is the best thing that could’ve happened for pilots and those on the ground alike. Prior to this implementation, every time a gun was spotted by a pilot the player defaulted to the “game bug” excuse. Sure, that may have been the case a few of the times. But not the amount of times we saw it used. With the new camera /me and /ame system we can ignore the “bug” and focus solely on what is being RPed. Though, to no ones surprise, people are still complaining about it. We all agree the render thing is unfair and last I knew devs were working on a way to fix it. Whether that is to make helicopters louder or make text appear when one is closeby similar to gun shots through a door. I would even be happy to add a rule into the PD ASD manual that we cannot patrol higher than 800 feet. To my knowledge it is easy to hear/see at that altitude. IRL there are two air units almost 24/7 in LAPD ASD alone, not even including other agencies. That is rarely the case in this game, but just saying. Recently you may have seen it more often since we have been training new members. But a vast majority of the time it's just one on the server. I already said it above in my response to Helm, so I won't repeat. But do some research and you'll understand how wrong that is. From what I've seen speaking strictly about the reports against pilots it's because the pilot wasn't doing anything wrong and the reports were baseless. We discuss internally every time a report is made against someone in ASD and a few of them we have completely agreed with the reporting party and others we see misinformed reporting parties making false statements to what they believe is "realistic". But talking about realism is such a slippery slope because there has to be balance. If we want to talk about realism helicopters would be 10000000x more powerful than they are now. There have been steps taken (again, I can only speak for PD) to balance the power of helicopters. That is completely at our own volition, not even LFM telling us it needs to be done. I would be happy to discuss with you in PMs or Discord why the situation shouldn't have even been voided, no less a warning given. No hate or ill will, just to inform. Different cultures OOCly and ICly as well, as LSPD ASD portrays LAPD ASD which is the largest municipal airborne law enforcement organization in the country and has a helicopter up 24/7 (two a majority of the time). That is all, thank you for attending my TED Talk.

There are a lot of people who currently feel SAAA is far too much on the “flight sim” side. I don’t think anyone is saying these factions shouldn’t exist, but the requirements for aviation RP shouldn’t be what they are right now. That’s all. Everything on this server is dumbed down a little bit as I mentioned in my last post. It has to be that way. Pilots should be no different. Yes, there is a base knowledge of what everyone who wants to be a pilot needs to know and RP, no one is saying otherwise. Right now, that “base knowledge” to many is far too high and I tend to agree. I think aviation RP right now is over complicated for no apparent reason besides those in charge are enthusiasts or even pilots IRL. This great to an extent, but imo they need to find ways to make aviation RP more accessible to the common person, not less. This suggestion is one way to do that. Again, nobody is disagreeing that I’ve seen that there shouldn’t be some sort of IC evaluation conducted by another player before officially/scriptly getting their license. I’m 100% with you that the way the suggestion was presented and some of the responses early on were putting blame on BA is unfair. I urge you to read what a majority of responses since have actually suggested to make aviation RP better and grow. I understand getting defensive at people who unfairly attack BA, but don’t let it cloud your judgement of some solid tweaks to the original suggestion that was made. That’s all. From what I can tell the point of the suggestion is it’s clearly not that simple/easy. So, no.

I won't dive into this too much since I think @Supernova said it well above. But a few things I wanted to add: If this were 1:1 realism martial law would have come a LONG time ago to Los Santos. There is no arguing that. The amount of murders, cop killings, etc. on a daily basis. Don't get me wrong, that's fine because it's a game and people want to RP criminals. But the same goes for other avenues of RP as well. If you want to play the realism card and say things like: then you are simply picking and choosing when you want to play the realism card when it suits you. Law Enforcement Officers, Lawyers, Guards, CCW, PF, Driver's License, Taxi License, Bartender, the list goes on and on of things on this server that do not mirror real life 1:1 because it shouldn't. The pilot license should be no different. A middle ground can and should be found. Nobody is saying this should be a "Oh I have $80k in my bank account may as well go spend 20 mins to get that script pilot license" is what we should do. But allowing an option to get the training to acquire the license through IC means WITHOUT the OOC barrier that currently exist is needed. I'm not exactly sure where you're getting your information when it comes to cost, but you can get a PPL for around $15k (dependent on a lot of factors, but average). So I'm all for making it cost $150k in game to mirror that. Again, money isn't the issue here. No one is complaining it costs too much/too little. This is solely about allowing aviation RP to be open to anyone who wants to join while keeping the quality of RP high. This can be achieved with what was suggested.

I think making it a tutorial as fast/easy as the driver's license is a mistake, but having it be a tutorial that is slightly more extensive is the right way to go. I don't think the original suggestion went much into it, but I doubt he meant to have it be something that takes 10 minutes to get. The "realism" or "heavy RP" server argument simply isn't valid. If it's a portrayal issue, RPQM exists. We live in a city that has more crime than would ever realistically happen IRL. But we allow it and suspend reality for it because it's, as you said, just a game. People are here to RP and and have fun, if they want to do it as a pilot, there shouldn't be OOC blockades hindering them. I don't think any of us are arguing that licenses shouldn't expire, the issue is (I speak for PD only) we never even scriptly get a license, hence ICly technically we don't. Yet we're OOCly allowed to fly? It makes 0 sense and is mixing to the extreme. Your char joins PD ASD and goes through all of the training and then leaves after X amount of time and now all of the sudden magically they don't have a license anymore. I don't understand it at all. I don't think anyone here is arguing that licenses shouldn't expire, but the fact that agencies who are ICly allowed to train pilots only receive... OOC permission to fly, ICly? I see this as a perfect starting point for a tutorial that teaches what you currently teach. It's split into those three sections you just laid out and is much more in depth than the current driver's license tutorial and actually takes time to complete. The obtain the actual license you can ICly do the evaluation, keep that part exactly how it is currently. Do the tutorials, once you feel confident you can pass the evaluation you can take it. Simple as that. I don't even care if it's "sponsored" or "roleplayed" as Blaine Aviation giving the lesson and the payment to do the tutorial goes to you all. I think that's a perfectly fair thing. But OOC hurdles aren't fair to anyone. Again, I understand this isn't Blaine's fault. You can only do so much with those applying and those who are currently around. We all have lives outside of GTAW. But that is exactly why there needs to be another way to obtain a pilot license. There isn't enough interest in joining as an instructor (or availability) and the demand is too high. So something has to be done. 100% agree with this. There needs to be a middle ground between "just a game" and flight simulator. In my opinion, aviation RP has started to tip far too heavily towards flight simulator in the last year or so.

This isn't a valid argument if you look at the server as a whole. The amount of crime etc. that goes on is extremely unrealistic. We all come here to have fun and play a game. If it's a problem with portrayal of that individual character, then report it to RPQM. But in terms of the suggestion, not really an argument in the slightest.

I think having a system similar to the drivers license tutorial would be beneficial, yes. It should not be as simple or quick to get, but potentially splitting the "tutorial" into 3-4 sections to cover different parts of aviation RP on our server and making it so you can only do one section every 24 hours minimum or something to prevent people speed running it. There still should absolutely be instructors or evaluators of some sort that give the final green light for quality control.

Regardless of the number of students it should not be OOC scheduling that impedes someone's RP. Imagine if Drivers Licenses had to be obtained fully IC? It would be terrible. This is definitely different since aviation RP requires more knowledge that isn't necessarily "common" to most, but the suggestion even says to have SAAA or someone give a final evaluation of some sort so people aren't taking advantage of the script and deteriorating the aviation RP. I'm not sure what you are told but this is false. Our "flight schools" are essentially OOC (which makes no sense to me). Let's say a PD Pilot passes our training program, they do not scriptly get a license because they are not allowed one per SAAA. If they leave PD or ASD they do not have a pilot license. It makes 0 sense. I know this isn't your fault, but just informing of you of how it works. They are OOCly allowed to fly without a license basically, even though ICly they'd have one. This has been a huge question mark for me for a long time and I don't really understand it at all. Mixing IC and OOC completely.

+1 to the suggestion and agreed with this. There’s such an amazing opportunity for aviation RP to expand on this server and be extremely fun, but that will never happen with the current level of entry (both required process to get a license and required knowledge to obtain it).