Yet another topic about slots

English Boards Suggestions and Ideas
1

Hello,

While I really like playing AirlineSim, I tend to find one aspect particularly frustrating. I find the current slot rule annoying, and sometimes it removes all the fun. That makes me wonder each time I have to do it, if it's a good idea to buy some more credits, even though I love my airline.

IRL, not all airports have slot rules. In the US there are only 2 “Level 3 coordinated airports” (EWR, JFK) plus DCA and LGA according to Wikipedia. The rest has limited, if no rule at all, which enables airlines to operate flights as they like (provided they take congestion into account).

The consequences of the strict slot rules of AirlineSim, is that in older server it becomes really time consuming to plan flights, and it is nearly impossible to cleverly schedule the said flights.

Once you’ve got the trick, you never lose money any more in the game, and I think the slot rule acts like a safety net for the established airlines, which don’t have to worry about the newcomers any more. I consider my own airline as an established one, and sometimes I’m disappointed that all I can do is to contemplate my nine figure bank account without knowing what to do, because when I try to plan something, all I get is red crosses everywhere.

Since a delay feature is not yet implemented in the game, I know that the slot system remains necessary to maintain a minimum level of realism regarding the airports capacity. Nevertheless, the current system could perhaps be lightened to avoid quasi-locked situations as we have on older servers. For example, only the departure slots could be retained, while the landing slots could be dropped altogether. This way, one could smoothly schedule new flights, as the available slots would be easy to spot, and focus on what really makes this game interesting, like organizing a well-planned network or find new ways to do better than the opponents.

I’m sure that many of you have better ideas regarding the slots rules, but I find that the current situation is not truly satisfying.

Please excuse me for my poor English, but it’s not my native language. 

2

There have been so many threads about this, so I’m not giving my opinion on it.

The reason why the US only has very limited slot-regulated airports is not because the government doesn’t like that, but because these are the only airports where demand exceeds slots, so at these airports, slots are limited. All other airports in the US have enough slots available and are therefore not slot-coordinated. And that’s the difference to the game, where more major airports are slot constrained.

3

As voeni has written - it is a matter of available slots and requested. All not coordinated airports do also have a natural limitation, but in the most cases this isn't relevant as there is a possibility to make another holding prior landing. But the technical slot restriction (as we use it in AirlineSim) is given at any airport in the world - if it's coordinated or not. The coordinated slot number in reality are below the technical (possible) slots as we use them.

4

I think there should be some system of trading slots.

Perhaps when new slots become available at the major congested airports, they go up for auction?

At very least there should be some sort of rent system that goes up depending how busy the airport is.

5

Hi,

the slot system has also turned Kunming into a "dead" airport.

Since the airport was relocated to a new position, it is not possible to change any existing flight schedule that has a flight to Kunming because the difference in flight time is more than 5 minutes. Even if you only try to change another flight, the flight to Kunming becomes "impossible".

I have managed to change/adapt a few flight schedules to the new location of KMG, by also changing a few other flights, but I have given up.

I would suggest not to change the location of airports anymore on existing servers as long as current slot system is not changed. Or allow planes to fly a holding pattern  ;-)

Thanks,

Jan

6

I had the same issue with KMG. Changing from winglets to no-winglets and vice versa did sometime help. But anyway, changing locations are a bit of a pain. Especially, if they are not really relevant. So, if there is a major closure in RL and the new airport is really hundreds of miles away, it might be a nice idea, but not just for a short distance.