A question for APL v2 users

[vonduck 99]

I didn't know you could increase the sim rate and not get punished! Is there a limit?

[pommy80 83]

19 minutes ago, KL Oo said:

Thanks for the quick reply. Seems like a nice function to add. I'll see if I can find an email address for the Dev (I can't see any support forum or Discord??) and suggest it.

They have a discord channel, link below;

https://discord.gg/ZvBKTuMu

[Fiorentoni 4,362]

48 minutes ago, vonduck said:

I didn't know you could increase the sim rate and not get punished! Is there a limit?

Nope. But you only get paid the real life hours, so I guess that's a fair compromise. Don't have much time but want to do a long haul? Alright, but you will only get paid for the actual 2 hours it took you in real life.

[Fiorentoni 4,362]

52 minutes ago, KL Oo said:

Thanks for the quick reply. Seems like a nice function to add. I'll see if I can find an email address for the Dev (I can't see any support forum or Discord??) and suggest it.

This has been suggested a bazillion times, but the dev says it's part of the core concept of APL that you cannot choose your schedule or the airports you want to fly to. Like a pilot can't. So this won't be added.
But by now there are a couple of ways to "influence" your schedule, e.g. by choosing between short, medium or long-haul (or all of it), by limiting the schedule to certain aircraft of the airline (e.g. A319 only), by skipping flights (you can skip 5 flights per month for free, more by paying with your virtual salary) or - newest addition - by manually selecting the very first departure airport of your schedule. The latter has been introduced to make continous schedules possible (e.g. last schedule finished at one airport and you want to continue from that airport on your next schedule, for immersion), but you can actually also use it as a sort of wildcard to get one desired airport.
Of course you can regenerate your schedule as many times as possible before accepting it, so if you're patient you'll eventually end up with a very nice schedule.

But apart from that, you have to accept that APL wants you to have the "oh no, not that boring airport again" feeling at least every once in a while. APL wants you to feel like an airline pilot. Therefore the dev (Ovidiu) has categorically denied every suggestion that touches that core concept. I kind of understand that, to be honest, and it is what let's APL stand out from other virtual airlines.

[KL Oo 706]

7 minutes ago, Fiorentoni said:

This has been suggested a bazillion times, but the dev says it's part of the core concept of APL that you cannot choose your schedule or the airports you want to fly to. Like a pilot can't. So this won't be added.

Thanks for the update mate - Good to know. Dev seems a little stubborn. But, it is his trainset so I guess he can move the trains anyway he likes

[Bobsk8 12,853]

3 hours ago, KL Oo said:

Thanks for the quick reply. Seems like a nice function to add. I'll see if I can find an email address for the Dev (I can't see any support forum or Discord??) and suggest it.

The program is trying to simulate flying for a real airline pilot. I doubt if an Airline Pilot can tell the airline which airports he wants to fly to. 

[Dutch1 24]

I have a question about small companies, like NetJets. Right now I am flying the Longitude a lot. Is something like this included?

 

[Bobsk8 12,853]

1 hour ago, Dutch1 said:

I have a question about small companies, like NetJets. Right now I am flying the Longitude a lot. Is something like this included?

 

NetJets from what I understand is a corporate jet leasing company, not really an airline, so it is not listed. 

[El Diablito 330]

5 hours ago, Fiorentoni said:

so if you're patient you'll eventually end up with a very nice schedule.

I don't know about this, in my experience it just regurgitates the same airports over and over again (with BA out of EGLL with A320). Patience is one thing, regenerating a schedule up to 15-20 times with no real changes is a broken system if you ask me. Sometimes giving the same route 3 times in a row on the schedule at roughly the same times. This can defo be improved surely.

One new issue I've noticed. I wanted to do some flights with JetBlue for a change, maybe out of JFK so I applied for a job - it gets rejected (I'm a captain coming from BA with a flight rating of 98.82). On the next job cycle I get offered a job with JetBlue but I've already gone to Swiss Air. Little things like this have a big impact on the overall enjoyment of this app. I doubt that's how it works for real pilots.

Edited March 30 by El Diablito

[Room112 29]

They're on Discord.

[reecemj 152]

6 hours ago, vonduck said:

I didn't know you could increase the sim rate and not get punished! Is there a limit?

You get paid for time flown. Thats the penalty. Example 3 hr flight increase 2x you get paid for 1 and a half hr.

I use this app.

 https://flightsim.to/file/176/fs-simrate-bandit It talks to me. LOL 

[Bobsk8 12,853]

53 minutes ago, El Diablito said:

I don't know about this, in my experience it just regurgitates the same airports over and over again (with BA out of EGLL with A320). Patience is one thing, regenerating a schedule up to 15-20 times with no real changes is a broken system if you ask me. Sometimes giving the same route 3 times in a row on the schedule at roughly the same times. This can defo be improved surely.

One new issue I've noticed. I wanted to do some flights with JetBlue for a change, maybe out of JFK so I applied for a job - it gets rejected (I'm a captain coming from BA with a flight rating of 98.82). On the next job cycle I get offered a job with JetBlue but I've already gone to Swiss Air. Little things like this have a big impact on the overall enjoyment of this app. I doubt that's how it works for real pilots.

A few times like in New Zealand, I kept seeing  the same airports over and over, because I specified short flights.  So I just changed airlines, which you can do every week. 

[El Diablito 330]

15 hours ago, Bobsk8 said:

A few times like in New Zealand, I kept seeing  the same airports over and over, because I specified short flights.  So I just changed airlines, which you can do every week. 

There aren't a whole load of destination choices for a 320 in New Zealand to be fair so I could imagine a lot of repeat airports but out of Heathrow with British Airways??

I'd rather they just improved their system, after all it's a premium priced product with a new fancy promotional video!

[environmental_ice 242]

On 3/30/2024 at 4:34 AM, Bobsk8 said:

The program is trying to simulate flying for a real airline pilot. I doubt if an Airline Pilot can tell the airline which airports he wants to fly to. 

Actually high Senior ranking Pilots do choose what routes they want to fly. A lot of airlines have a preferential bidding system (PBS) that pilots tell the system a ton of things they prefer or want to avoid. I won't bother going into all of them as it doesn't really matter to us virtual pilots but the short stick is the system will attempt to generate a schedule for you with your preferences as long as you can hold seniority wise what you entered into the bid. For example a new hire pilot asking for a long layover in Cancun can enter that preference but he/she most likely won't get anything close to that.

 

Senior pilots bids are alot less complicated. They don't need to enter generic requests like a long layover in Cancun. A senior pilot can simply look at every single trip in the bid package and just enter the exact rotation number/trip they want to fly. 
 

Which is why it never made sense to me why senior captain L1 or higher cannot pick their own routes. Aren't I a Senior Captain? It's a hobby and we are all here for fun so I'm not saying a seniority system is what we need but the compromise would be senior pilot levels being able to pick their own routes to build their schedule how they want. Now it can be up to the dev if that level needs to be L1 or L5 or L10 which I don't even think anyone is at right now but to say pilots have literally no choice as a senior captain on their flying is completely false. The ability is already there with the flight tickets. We just don't want to pay for the flights and instead get paid to work them as long as it's the airline we currently work for. In my opinion  Junior Pilots should be the ones paying for flight tickets. This change would at least give a perk to making senior captain as well as there really isn't any right now to be honest. 

Edited April 1 by environmental_ice

[Alti 68]

Requests to the developer can be entered on the Discord server. If enough fellow pilots upvote, such a request could be realized.