Greece to Saudi

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1

This is not a OMG I can't get any bookings question but why is it impossible to get any bookings between Greece and Saudi? I mean none. None at all. I checked other game worlds... no direct flights so they obviously learnt the lesson already.

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I know there seems to be little in real world between the two but Google doesn't give me the answer why as relations between the two countries seem very good. I understand restricted routes but this isn't one and there surely isn't zero demand between two large airports fairly close together on AS?

My understanding was that you don't have to fly 'real' routes in AS so why a zero passenger load?

Thanks

2

You don’t have to fly real routes in AS but the traffic data is based on real routes. No real routes = 0 demand

3

Sorry you have been around a lot longer than I have but with respect I don't see how that is true.

My understanding is that AS generates pax wanting to go from A to B. It then allocates those pax to airlines according to price, service, etc. Jeddah and Athens are two 7/8 bar airports. At the moment the main connection is that they fly all the way across Saudi to Doha and then double back on themselves to Athens. That makes no sense. There surely is a high demand for direct traffic.

Are you saying you can only fly direct routes from an airport where those direct routes only exist in real life? I saw on a game world the other day a guy operating flights out of Manston in the UK. This is an ex RAF base that doesn't operate as an airport so it can't be about real life routes.

4

Sorry you have been around a lot longer than I have but with respect I don't see how that is true.

My understanding is that AS generates pax wanting to go from A to B. It then allocates those pax to airlines according to price, service, etc. Jeddah and Athens are two 7/8 bar airports. At the moment the main connection is that they fly all the way across Saudi to Doha and then double back on themselves to Athens. That makes no sense. There surely is a high demand for direct traffic.

Are you saying you can only fly direct routes from an airport where those direct routes only exist in real life? I saw on a game world the other day a guy operating flights out of Manston in the UK. This is an ex RAF base that doesn't operate as an airport so it can't be about real life routes.

It's all about connections. If the schedule is right it is possible to connect half of mainland europe via  Manston to the UK and Ireland.

Unfortunately this system has a downside. Airports like DXB or AMS have insane demand in the game because they have great airlines in as their hub in real life. A flight from DXB to BKK will most likely be very profitable in AS, even without connections. Simply because their are 8 daily flights between the cities (4x A380, 1x B777, 1x A330 and 2x B737) in real life. In AS they appear as passengers wanting to travel from DXB to BKK. But in reality, probably only 5-10% want to travel from DXB to BKK. All these 8 flights are feeded with passengers from Europe/Africa/North America. 

Now we're coming back to your route between Saudi and ATH. Because the're no flights in real life between the cities their is no demand for your direct flight. If your ORS-ratings are good you will be able to feed the flight to ATH a bit by making sure the flight is feeded with flights from AUH, DXB, and DOH. But then again, you have probably competition from direct flights between all those airports. My peace of advice, just forget about ATH for now. Look in Wikipedia/Skyscanner what cities have a lot of daily flights.  Concentrate on local flights in the Gulf- and Maghrebregio. You can also experiment with flights to SE-Asia

5

It's all about connections. If the schedule is right it is possible to connect half of mainland europe via  Manston to the UK and Ireland.

Unfortunately this system has a downside. Airports like DXB or AMS have insane demand in the game because they have great airlines in as their hub in real life. A flight from DXB to BKK will most likely be very profitable in AS, even without connections. Simply because their are 8 daily flights between the cities (4x A380, 1x B777, 1x A330 and 2x B737) in real life. In AS they appear as passengers wanting to travel from DXB to BKK. But in reality, probably only 5-10% want to travel from DXB to BKK. All these 8 flights are feeded with passengers from Europe/Africa/North America. 

Now we're coming back to your route between Saudi and ATH. Because the're no flights in real life between the cities their is no demand for your direct flight. If your ORS-ratings are good you will be able to feed the flight to ATH a bit by making sure the flight is feeded with flights from AUH, DXB, and DOH. But then again, you have probably competition from direct flights between all those airports. My peace of advice, just forget about ATH for now. Look in Wikipedia/Skyscanner what cities have a lot of daily flights.  Concentrate on local flights in the Gulf- and Maghrebregio. You can also experiment with flights to SE-Asia

This explains why I get no flights from my 7-bar airport to a 10-bar airport that is only a hour or two flight away; maybe because they have no flights in real life, and I do not have any connections at this time.

But on a different server, I have flights form secondary and tertiary Chinese cities to Tokyo-Haneda that fly full, full, full! In real life, no such flights exist, and I have ZERO connection traffic on this flight/server pairing.

:wacko:  :wacko:  :wacko:

6

The point I was making, probably not so well. You say AS generates passengers wanting to go from A-B, correct. HOW does AS know this is what I was getting at. Before a game world is launched a database of passenger traffic has to be loaded so it knows. So whenever the data was created, it is based on real life numbers. When that database is created, only one or two people know.

So yes it would be a good idea to fly real routes to start, do your research. Then it becomes a game of connections. Say your based in Greece, and launch a route to Saudi Arabia. If there was no direct route in real life then the load should be very low or close to zero.

Then you add in connections, so from ground networks, and then connections from other flights. So if you have a possibility of LHR-ATH-JED, then you will still gain passengers. The passengers LHR-JED will distribute across every possibility, in a favouritism bias towards the higher ORS ratings.

Just because you operate from a 10 bar to a 7 bar you cannot expect passengers

7

This explains why I get no flights from my 7-bar airport to a 10-bar airport that is only a hour or two flight away; maybe because they have no flights in real life, and I do not have any connections at this time.

But on a different server, I have flights form secondary and tertiary Chinese cities to Tokyo-Haneda that fly full, full, full! In real life, no such flights exist, and I have ZERO connection traffic on this flight/server pairing.

:wacko:  :wacko:  :wacko:

The AS-world is also devided into invissible 'regions'. These regions are only known to the AS-developers. If their is 1 airport in this region with demand to HND the other airports will generate some demand as well. For example, SJW is most likely to be in the same region as PEK. PEK has demand to HND. As a result, SJW will generate some demand to HND as well.  That explaines why you get demand from secondairy Chinese cities to ton HND. I guess that is the way how AS implemented passengers. in real life, passengers do not necceairly travel from airport to aiport but from city to city. People in real life would travel (by car or public transport) to the airport which gives them the best connection.  

I hope my explanation makes sort of sense. I have a link to video where one of the developers is explaining how the demand calculation in AS works. It is however only avaiable German. The part with regions is starting at 6:45. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a75Jk2O0loQ

8

A very large airline based in Jeddah on Idlewild flies to Athens only 3 times per week, and that is with all the connections it generates. Just forget about that route for now.

9

The AS-world is also devided into invissible 'regions'. These regions are only known to the AS-developers. If their is 1 airport in this region with demand to HND the other airports will generate some demand as well. For example, SJW is most likely to be in the same region as PEK. PEK has demand to HND. As a result, SJW will generate some demand to HND as well.  That explaines why you get demand from secondairy Chinese cities to ton HND. I guess that is the way how AS implemented passengers. in real life, passengers do not necceairly travel from airport to aiport but from city to city. People in real life would travel (by car or public transport) to the airport which gives them the best connection.  

I hope my explanation makes sort of sense. I have a link to video where one of the developers is explaining how the demand calculation in AS works. It is however only avaiable German. The part with regions is starting at 6:45. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a75Jk2O0loQ

You mention that "some" demand gets filtered out to other airports in the same region. Does this mean that while it would be possible to "steal" some LAX traffic and filter it towards Burbank, Long Beach, and Ontario, it would be impossible to capture all of LAX traffic?

10

Just to bring this up again since it seems real life statistics are supposed to go a long way to generating pax demand in AS.

Jeddah JED -> Dubai DBX is the third busiest route out of JED in real life. I put one daily flight on the route and am struggling to get a 20% load. There are NO other passenger flights at all on this route just cargo. I am using a A320neo aircraft with a 97 ORS rating. That just isn't right.

On the other hand I have a competitor flying Jeddah JED -> Kuwait KWI a route which isn't even in the top 10 in real life. He is flying over six HUNDRED flights each way each week on this route and pretty much fully booking them.

There is definitely something wrong here. 

11

There is nothing wrong I guess.

I don’t know the server and your airline (would always help to know this) but I assume that you opened your airline a few days ago and that the other carrier operates the 600 flights already long time. His connections will be much higher (and better) than yours.

Be patient and wait a couple of days for your flight to fill.

12

Just to bring this up again since it seems real life statistics are supposed to go a long way to generating pax demand in AS.

Jeddah JED -> Dubai DBX is the third busiest route out of JED in real life. I put one daily flight on the route and am struggling to get a 20% load. There are NO other passenger flights at all on this route just cargo. I am using a A320neo aircraft with a 97 ORS rating. That just isn’t right.

On the other hand I have a competitor flying Jeddah JED -> Kuwait KWI a route which isn’t even in the top 10 in real life. He is flying over six HUNDRED flights each way each week on this route and pretty much fully booking them.

There is definitely something wrong here. 

How many of those real pax travel TO DXB, not VIA DXB?

I can’t see much wrong here.

You may lack connections to fill the flights, while the competitor fills his with KWI conections.

Real life has a strong hub in DXB, your server obviousely has it in KWI.

13

There is nothing wrong I guess.

I don’t know the server and your airline (would always help to know this) but I assume that you opened your airline a few days ago and that the other carrier operates the 600 flights already long time. His connections will be much higher (and better) than yours.

Be patient and wait a couple of days for your flight to fill.

Nothing wrong? I'm not complaining, just seems odd.

I have almost 600 flights from JED each day and I did wait the 3 days for the flights to book.

Even forgetting about connections surely there should be SOME direct traffic between JED and DXB, the third busiest route out of JED in real life? Surely enough to fill a single A320 per day and much more on top?

Nearly 100 flights a day between JED and KWI most on 737s is simply insane. I understand connections but surely there is finite pax demand on a route that has just 4 flights a day in real life? That's about a quarter of the real life flights between JED and DXB.

The only reason I keep on about this is because I keep reading that pax traffic in AS is based on real world data. If it isn't then it's pointless doing any research, may aswell just schedule flights at random to anywhere and hope the dice rolls the right number when the traffic is allocated.

14

If you feel there’s there lack of correct information, between real life demand and AS, please submit a mail to support@airlinesim.aero

Please attach valid information :slight_smile:

15

Nothing wrong? I'm not complaining, just seems odd.

I have almost 600 flights from JED each day and I did wait the 3 days for the flights to book.

Even forgetting about connections surely there should be SOME direct traffic between JED and DXB, the third busiest route out of JED in real life? Surely enough to fill a single A320 per day and much more on top?

Nearly 100 flights a day between JED and KWI most on 737s is simply insane. I understand connections but surely there is finite pax demand on a route that has just 4 flights a day in real life? That's about a quarter of the real life flights between JED and DXB.

The only reason I keep on about this is because I keep reading that pax traffic in AS is based on real world data. If it isn't then it's pointless doing any research, may aswell just schedule flights at random to anywhere and hope the dice rolls the right number when the traffic is allocated.

Idlewild, JED- DXB., Jetcity, 300 weekly departures on mostly 739s. There is no problem about JED-DXB.

16

Well I appreciate everyone telling me there is no problem but I'm just trying to understand why. So here are my bookings for the next flights after 3 days of bookings on Templehof:

  SUM 181 Jeddah, JED 10.09. 01:40 HT Dubai, DXB 10.09. 04:06 HT

11 / 95 (12%)
3 / 20 (15%)
5 / 5 (100%)
3 / 14 (21%)

booked     SUM 182 Dubai, DXB 10.09. 05:10 HT Jeddah, JED 10.09. 07:36 HT

5 / 95 (5%)
2 / 20 (10%)
2 / 5 (40%)
2 / 14 (14%)

booked

I know the game is all about connections, I get that. But there must be some direct traffic on the third busiest route out of JED even if I had no connections at all. Remember this is the ONLY direct pax flight on this route on this server. As I say, I am not whining I'm just trying to understand it...... Thanks for any help in that. 

EDIT: sorry it didn't format very well but I hope you can read it

17

You need to understand how pax distribution works in AS.

Your flights are top in ORS and so get more pax than the other

one-stops.

Though the others get their share of pax too. And here’s where those 100 daily via KWI come into play, among others…

Your flight may get 20 times as many pax as the best one-stop connection. But with - say- 500 competing one-stop connections, and 520 pax a day, there will only be 20 left for you.

Doesn’t make much sense, but that’s how it roughly works.

Btw, looking at your airline I barely see any routes that could get you connecting pax for JED-DXB.

18

Yes you are quite right it doesn't make much sense. But the 100 daily flights via KWI to DXB can't get a better ORS rating than a direct flight from JED -> DXB. So I should get the direct traffic at least as the only flight?

My point is this is not about me or my airline, it's just a general query about whether it is actually worth looking at real life traffic which AS claims is the basis for the 'simulation'.

I'm really starting to get disillusioned as to the accuracy of the traffic allocation which really makes it all pointless.

I like the game so I really want to be persuaded it even remotely resembles the real world.

19

The data is based on real life demand, but as with many things, it’s simplified. It’s not a one to one relationship as the real life data is not available to that extent.

From what I understand the traffic is more region based than city based. Or at least it gets distributed to some regions, which helps to give smaller airports also have some demand. So most likely you will find some O/D demand in airports nearby, although in real life there’s no direct flight.

If you then have a bad ORS rating, and a competitor has a very good one, coupled with barely any connections offered, then he’s sucking all the traffic away from under your feet.

20

Yes you are quite right it doesn't make much sense. But the 100 daily flights via KWI to DXB can't get a better ORS rating than a direct flight from JED -> DXB. So I should get the direct traffic at least as the only flight?

My point is this is not about me or my airline, it’s just a general query about whether it is actually worth looking at real life traffic which AS claims is the basis for the ‘simulation’.

I’m really starting to get disillusioned as to the accuracy of the traffic allocation which really makes it all pointless.

I like the game so I really want to be persuaded it even remotely resembles the real world.

AS demand data is - as Matth already said - based on real traffic data, spread over regions etc…

However, real traffic data is supply, not demand.

Take cargo to make it obvious:

If I want to ship something from Da Nang to Milwaukee, it very very likely is processed through ANC. So while taffic data tells me ANC is big, it tells me nothing about demand.

Still, AS managed to model it to a playable extend - pax demand at least.

The accuracy of the traffic allocation you query is my major gripe since long.

Like I said in my example above. On top of the ORS you get the biggest share of pax allocated, but that share decreases with number of ORS entries increasing. Allocation is based on frequencies.

So even if there are hundreds of pax demand for JED-DXB, you wouldn’t fill your 320 when someone else floods the ORS with hundred daily flights - no matter how much better your ORS score is.

Of course, in real life you could expect to get most of the bookings on your 320. Only few would really book via KWI. That’s where the game is different, killing it for newbies to some extend.