Shallow Dive Maneuver (some thoughts and alternatives)

[Gallo Rojo]

Cheers,

Long story short. The guys in my WoW 'Club' (actually just four guys) are one of those people who who think that a Dive should be longer than a Straight -- yes, we know that Dives are longer than a Straight since the plane is moving through the hypotenuse of a triangle, but yet the Dive card should be longer anyway and I can "prove" it.
So last Saturday, after flying a few missions we come up with two ideas (and a half) for a House Rule to add yet another maneuver. This would be a shallow-dive, or I should say a shallower-dive.

The general idea is that planes can make a dive that is narrower to the horizontal, loosing less altitude but moving longer away (in the horizontal).

We discussed two alternatives, but we haven't tested them yet.
I'm giving a brief description below. Comments, thoughts, criticisms, stand-up ovations, or feedback of any type will be greatly appreciated



Alternative A: "One" Card Maneuver Shallow-Dive
When playing a Dive, 'hide' a Straight Card maneuver underneath the Dive Card in your maneuver board.
When you play the Dive maneuver reveal the second card and play both together at the same time. The second card is played as if it were a Plane Card (i.e. make blue line signaling the beginning of the maneuver at the bottom of the second card overlap with the arrow of the Dive Card), then place your Plane at the end of the second card (see pic).



Planes diving this way loose one altitude level but keep any altitude mark (chip) they had previously.
(so the extra length is because the plane is diving on a narrower angle from the horizontal than in a normal dive).

example: If the SE5a in the pic above is flying at a Level 3 altitude and has 1 altitude marking chip, after the shallow-dive it ends up at level 2 but keeps its 1 altitude marking chip it had.
If it had played a normal dive, it had ended up at Level 2 but had lost its altitude chip too.
Note this is kind of cool for planes with higher climb rates. Example: if a SPADXIII is at altitude level 3 and has 2 altitude chips, plays a shallow-dive it ends up at Level 2 but keeps its 2 chips, so it can climb to level 3 again rather faster.

Note: We have been discussing about that the second-hidden card after the Dive card could be a 60 degrees turn; or maybe any other non-stall card.

Alternative B: Two Cards Maneuver Shallow-Dive

1st Maneuver: Climb Card (gain one climb)
2nd Maneuver: Dive (loose one altitude level, keep all climb markings you previously had minus one -- the one you had before the climb).

Again, during the second maneuver you add a Straight Card after the Dive Card.

The pros of this alternative are that it comes as a new distinctive two-cards maneuver, and you don't have to hide any card under the Dive card.
The cons are that some of use see no point in 'slowing down' (with the Climb Card) before 'speeding up' with the 'slow dive' two-cards-in-a-single-maneuver move. In other words, since one of the benefits of the slow-dive is gaining speed it seems counter intuitive that one has to play a short Climb Card before.
Advocates for this alternative pointed out that a plane playing the Climb-Dive+Straight combo of the slow-dive move longer than a plane playing two straight cards. So you still gain some speed with the maneuver.
Secondly, they argue that making the plane to 'climb' made sense since the play may have to 'slow down' before committing to a slow dive -- instead of a regular one. Nobody in my group is a pilot, so this 'reason' is purely speculative.


feedback?
thanks!


ps: another thing we've been discussing is that the two last cards in a Double-Dive maneuver (stall-dive-straight) could be just one maneuver (i.e.: played at the same time loosing two altitude levels all together in the second maneuver). Thoughts?

[Linz]

In relation to a long straight being played with a dive card you are effectively doubling the speed of the aircraft in a shallow dive this to me seems excessive I think use a stall card in place of the long straight. And do the hide second card thingy as it is simple and easy to play.
Linz