SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - View Single Post - Who knows about making AI ships fire torpedoes? your services are needed!

polyfiller · 10-21-13, 02:17 PM

Jhapprich - thanks - just downloaded your files ... if I read the files correctly the approach is similar to what Darkfish originally released - a hidden gun turret with hidden turret / barrels (to help with tracking target ?) and the fire effect in the the .sim file for torplauncher93 in guns_radars.sim is - 0x38e9700135eb5250 which calls the node $Torp_Spawner_PG in torpspawngunfx.dat - which spawns 0x8f346dcc43bfbcb2 as a single particle - which I presume is a torpedo ( your zip file doesn't include torpedoes_us.dat .. but in my that corresponds too a US MK14 torpedo) ?

So the difference I can see betwen your files and Darkfish is that you call the ID of $Torp_Spawner_PG as the fire effect whereas darkfish calls the ID of it's parent node - $Torp_Spawner (0x6d21707950f0ac3c). Does this affect how the torpeo aims / fires ? I also note that you try to limit the range of the launcher by specifying 1000m as the range in the guns_radars.sim file. I did extensive testing of this and found the range specification has no effect whatsoever - I have a test mission with AI subs hunting a convoy at ranges varying from 1000M out to 6000m. The subs at 6000m fire just as soon as they can "see" a target and certainly take no notice of the range value in the .sim file. The range of the wepon (applies to all weapons according to my testing) is the shell speed - and you have this set to 2000 m/s. I have multiple launchers for submarines set to different shell speeds to try and force the AI to "lead" a moving target adequatley. I have a range of launchers with shell speeds from 10 m/s 12 m/s, 14 m/s and 16 m/s. I found this gave some sort of spread to the launch of torpedoes (4 forward launching launchers on a sub, one for each speed) ... however the AI's ability to use this to lead the target provded problematic and the values for the parent invisible turret had a bearing on how this works - for example I also set a .sim file entry for the hidden turret - and that's where I specify the 10 m/s shell speed.... this affects how the main launcher mount rotates / tracks the target, I then set a .sim entry fo the actual torp launcher barrel mounted on the turret with a shell speed of 1000000000000 (lots). This seemed to actually make the AI track a moving target at anything other than short (1000m or less) range.

I can understand that setting the torp speed to something unrealistically high would improve accuracy - but are your launchers actually leading the targets to try and aim a slow projectile, or is the fast torpedo speed compensating for almost no target leading by the AI ?

I'll load up and run your test missions.

The good news is we are all using the same sorts of approach and looks like we are all trying to compensate for the AI's inability to launch a torpedo / lead a target at realistic ranges.

Will post more later.

Thanks again for the upload / sharing :-)

10-21-13, 02:17 PM	#31
polyfiller Weps Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 356 Downloads: 40 Uploads: 0	Jhapprich - thanks - just downloaded your files ... if I read the files correctly the approach is similar to what Darkfish originally released - a hidden gun turret with hidden turret / barrels (to help with tracking target ?) and the fire effect in the the .sim file for torplauncher93 in guns_radars.sim is - 0x38e9700135eb5250 which calls the node $Torp_Spawner_PG in torpspawngunfx.dat - which spawns 0x8f346dcc43bfbcb2 as a single particle - which I presume is a torpedo ( your zip file doesn't include torpedoes_us.dat .. but in my that corresponds too a US MK14 torpedo) ? So the difference I can see betwen your files and Darkfish is that you call the ID of $Torp_Spawner_PG as the fire effect whereas darkfish calls the ID of it's parent node - $Torp_Spawner (0x6d21707950f0ac3c). Does this affect how the torpeo aims / fires ? I also note that you try to limit the range of the launcher by specifying 1000m as the range in the guns_radars.sim file. I did extensive testing of this and found the range specification has no effect whatsoever - I have a test mission with AI subs hunting a convoy at ranges varying from 1000M out to 6000m. The subs at 6000m fire just as soon as they can "see" a target and certainly take no notice of the range value in the .sim file. The range of the wepon (applies to all weapons according to my testing) is the shell speed - and you have this set to 2000 m/s. I have multiple launchers for submarines set to different shell speeds to try and force the AI to "lead" a moving target adequatley. I have a range of launchers with shell speeds from 10 m/s 12 m/s, 14 m/s and 16 m/s. I found this gave some sort of spread to the launch of torpedoes (4 forward launching launchers on a sub, one for each speed) ... however the AI's ability to use this to lead the target provded problematic and the values for the parent invisible turret had a bearing on how this works - for example I also set a .sim file entry for the hidden turret - and that's where I specify the 10 m/s shell speed.... this affects how the main launcher mount rotates / tracks the target, I then set a .sim entry fo the actual torp launcher barrel mounted on the turret with a shell speed of 1000000000000 (lots). This seemed to actually make the AI track a moving target at anything other than short (1000m or less) range. I can understand that setting the torp speed to something unrealistically high would improve accuracy - but are your launchers actually leading the targets to try and aim a slow projectile, or is the fast torpedo speed compensating for almost no target leading by the AI ? I'll load up and run your test missions. The good news is we are all using the same sorts of approach and looks like we are all trying to compensate for the AI's inability to launch a torpedo / lead a target at realistic ranges. Will post more later. Thanks again for the upload / sharing :-)