Engines inoperative on first supply drop mission
 

I'm at a point 850 meters from the drop zone star but can't get any closer, or leave, for that matter. The engines suddenly won't engage in forward or reverse, although the rudder operates normally. I've stayed on site over a week but there's nothing to activate the unloading. I've tried submerging, then surfacing; I've tried keeping the crew at GQ for a couple days; there's nothing on shore to lock on to; nada.

Any ideas?

When the crew is called to battle stations, after an extended period they are too tired to run the boat and will not respond to requests for engine/motor power... When they are removed from battle stations, operation returns to normal...

Good point, but in this case, they were off duty for days before and the rest of the week after the 2-day general quarters experiment.

Could be wrong, but this doesn't feel like a glitch but rather an intentional feature I'm missing. I would simply restart the game but I've done a lot of CM work that would be lost (again) if I do.

Strange... At the risk of asking the obvious, does the boat have fuel?

Yes, straight run up to New Guinea from Brisbane, no patrolling.

I'm stumped, but perhaps the resident SUBRON admirals can shed some light... :hmmm:

Stock game? Version? Mods?

One of the bugs I experienced during the short time I had 1.5 installed was crash to desktop with the "Ready to launch boat" pop up. Didn't matter whether I clicked launch boat or postpone, in fact half the time I'd be running at high speed chasing a convoy and wasn't even on that type of mission, CTD. Never had that exact type of bug, but I suspect you're looking at just dumping that patrol and going back to an earlier save. Or skip the actual mission, you don't get that many points from completing a mission anyway.

Have you submerged the boat after the engines quit working, and see if the electrics will move you? What is the CO2 level in your boat? That can get "stuck" and your crew expire (like the engine room), even though you're on the surface. If it's starting to rise in the boat, you'll see a little icon in the upper right of the screen. Check in the upper right of the screen for a Launch boat icon also. Sometimes, if when the game goes to bring up the pop-up for that, you happen to hit another key right then, the game will put it in "Pause", but will put an icon in the upper right.

"Sound" for the bottom though, and see how much depth you have under your keel before you dive, then see if you can't get a bit below periscope depth, then surface and see if the "Launch boat" comes up, or at least the little icon in the upper right does... If you do have high CO2 levels in your boat, Save the game, exit the game. Re-start the game, and then load your Save. :salute:

I had 5-10 meters left under the keel when at periscope depth, CO2 was normal, and the electric engines didn't engage either. I finally decided it was a glitch and bit the bullet. The next attempt was successful, leading me to realize the launch dialog box had never displayed. It's quite possible I overlooked the icon you mentioned though.



The system is becoming increasingly unstable, so I may have to make some unpleasant choices on mods soon. I just wish I knew how to modify the program myself.

I do not recall reading your version and mods you are running. Was this from a clean install?

get in line, pal.:salute:

Answer what merc4ulfate mentions above with his version & mods question.

What you say though sounds like you have a bad save. You also mention "meters" for distance, so I wouldn't be surprised to find that you have a v1.3 of the game - or you're EU... :salute:

American, actually, imagining a world where BuOrd and BuShips got it right by running 1.5 with:


Berbster's Mega Mod
Cheap & Early Torpedoes (for the Mark 16)
Balao Midway mod


Bad save? Would that affect ongoing stability after a patrol ends? If so, do I simply go back to an earlier patrol and start from there?

An earlier Save might help, but I doubt it. Something is usually wrong with the game though, when a player says this:
When you make mod changes to the game, you should have the Save folder emptied each time, to clear the data of previous Saves. This does wipe-out the current career and re-sets all game play options. You've rolled back from v1.5 to v1.3, which is a drastic change. That might be part of the "stability" issue. But also, the mods are written for v1.5 of the game, and may very well be encountering issues with that. Version 1.3 of the game, while better than the original, or v1.2, is still sadly lacking, and has other issues broken as compared to v1.2. Ubisoft generally speaking, for every three "fixed" issues, broke another new one, with each of their updates back then. (Figures of "broke" supplied by propbeanie and may or may not be accurate... :roll: ) :salute:

To clarify:



I had 1.3 on an older laptop but could not upgrade it.



On a new laptop I installed 1.5 and ran one patrol. Then I deleted and reinstalled 1.5 and the mods.



The system ran well enough for ~8 patrols, the only glitches noted being related to torpedo damage display. Then it started getting goofy with ship displays (hundreds of destroyers off the Ryukyus on two occasions; other destroyers spinning on their keels, etc) before moving on to severe lags at compression above 1500 deep into each patrol and eventually several crashes.



I wish there were a GFO mod that offered the full range of sub classes and torpedoes from the start. Historical accuracy elsewhere might be nice though (TWO Taihos - not just in the same career but in the same encounter? Seriously?) and the crew abilities could go too.