[peabody]

Originally Posted by fvd

Hi Peabody,

Yesterday i tried your mission.
Here are some things i noticed (don't take this as criticisme please, i mean well because i know how hard it is to make a good mission, not to mention how much work).
-In Pearl there are some wrecks, i think they are "part" of Pearl harbor and not possible to remove but they are a bit disturbing because the actual attack which destroys and sink these ships is yet to happen.

I love comment and criticism, it helps fix the things I don't see. I wrote the thing so I know where I am suppose to be and what is suppose to happen. I want to know what happens when someone plays it that doesn't know. And I found out from you and Nisgeis that there are problems!
You are right the wrecks can't be removed, I tried. That is why I started the sub at the entrance, but the mission message takes so long to come up, people are looking around. Stop it.

Originally Posted by fvd

-The first battleship (Nevada-class) on the right is stuck in the sand and makes some "crash noizes".

If you mean the one just sitting there, that is another 'in game' boat, it is there sometimes and sometimes it isn't, not part of my mission. But if you mean one that is leaving port, I will have to check that out, didn't get any noises. Is it the one on the right facing into the harbor?

Originally Posted by fvd

-The first objective which is to the left in the harbor remains yellow and unaccomplished once you get the message to leave Pearl as soon as possible, isn't it supposed to get gray then?

That's a 'fine tuning' issue, that is where the mission is suppose to end and the star shouldn't be there at least not yet, but I think I am going to change the ending anyway. Part of the confusion and the looking around was that star and I never saw it because I wasn't looking over there at the beginning. Needs to be fixed. And Nisgeis brought up a good point too, some people's computers don't do very well in ports, so I may even change the beginning.

Originally Posted by fvd

-I reached the new position on the chart to attack the task force and was able to sink one Shokaku fleet carrier and one Ise battleship (and not get any damage by destroyers ) but the second objective remains unaccomplished too so i wonder what tonnage i should sink to be succesfull?

I started with a tonnage and took it out (at least I thought I took it out. better check it out.) and made your mission to return safely. I just figured in this type of mission, amount didn't matter. Maybe I should put something back in? At the time I didn't have an "end game" and the completed mission window popped up in the middle of the battle. Like we talked about before. By the way, I like the way you ended your mission. I was about to write to you, finally sunk the Yamato. I sunk it first time I played then you changed the ending and I couldn't sink it again until last night. That thing doesn't want to go down!! So i finally got to see how you ended the mission.

Originally Posted by fvd

-The task force 7 which is mentioned in the radio message and which should back me up remained a mistery for me cause i never saw it...

Hmmmm....That's strange it should have shown up just about the time you finished sinking the ships. Were you near the Star or did you leave the area, because they attack close to the star, a little south but close enough to destroy the Japanese fleet that you don't sink. Close enough so you can see there are ships in the distance. In fact when they show up, it distracts the DDs and I was sinking more ships, instead of trying to get away. But, if you were going north to evade that probably took you and the DDs out of the attack. I used the "cross the T" method. Don't know if you're familiar with that but the BBs like to attack in front of the enemy like the top of the T, that way they can fire all their guns but the enemy can only use the forward guns. Sound crazy being boadside but getting the distance right for a shot is more difficult than the aim. And the ship is obviously a lot longer than it is wide so it works. You are fireing all your guns at a long target while they are shooting only the front guns at a very narrow target. Depending on the ship you can be a couple hundred feet off on the distance and still hit them. But if they are off by half that they miss completely.

Originally Posted by fvd

So i returned to Pearl to witness what incredible damage the japanese task force caused but to my surprise there was only one building on fire and no ships were harmed except for the wrecks which already were there when i left. (in that case America would not have taken part in WWII i think ).
Maybe you can fix this?

Well, we probably wouldn't have a war because we sank almost all their carriers. Six were on the Invasion and they only had 8 or 9. And the times I played it, I took out the BBs and the task force could then take out the carriers a lot easier. You can get both BBs if you time it right and they don't spot your scope going up and down. The center ship in front (heavy cruiser I think) gets just far enough ahead of the Ise in time to fire. Not planned, just happened. Then down scope and wait for the one on the near side (Kongo).
Any damage at Pearl is just because the campaign put up planes, I assume because there are six carriers, I didn't put any planes up except the patrol planes that take off at the beginning of the mission, if you even saw them. I finished the attack part of the mission and surfaced to sail back with the fleet a bit and 27 planes showed up. So they must have been from the carriers, all in one big group.
Maybe I should send some planes into Pearl? I wonder if they will attack anything other than ships? Never tried it. And part of the mission, in one of the messages, is that Pearl was going to be protected by fighter cover. Problem with the game is that the planes won't attack each other so I didn't actually put them in.

Originally Posted by fvd

So all together it was an interesting mission, i liked the idea of the mission but maybe it needs some finetuning?
Anyway: thanks for the mission peabody and "keep up the good work" like they always said in SH3.

I totally agree it needs some work. Your comments and Nisgeis comments were a big help. I didn't see a lot of the problems you did, because I knew what was happening and what was going to happen. Kind of like having blinders on.
One thing that I really didn't like is most of the time there is a Carrier sitting right in front of the sub at the start and there weren't suppose to be any in port at that time. That is one reason the Enterprise is arriving as you leave port. It is a bit too far out and you are looking into the sun so you may not have noticed it, I was going to change that too.
Question: Did you check your map after the attack? Wondered if the Invasion force was destroyed? If there were a bunch of sunken ships on your map then the task force showed up, but maybe while you were evading the DDs. There were 4 grey ones the last time I played it and it turns out they were USA. But one time there was also a blue one, so I guess the red (obviously) is enemy and the blue and grey are Allied. Oh, darn there's the problem. Blue and Grey, I'm still in the Civil War.

I haven't given up on this mission yet. I think I can fix it and may even add to it, like a carrier that gets damaged or has engine problems and slithers away unnoticed (maybe before the attack begins?) a patrol plane spots it and you have to go get it, maybe with a refit at Midway. What do you think?
One thing I noticed that you didn't comment on, but it created a problem for Nisgeis, I allowed too much time to get to where you were suppose to be. I started on the first and the Invasion wasn't until the fourth and the planes took off at 0600. I gave extra time in case you ran into something and had to make the trip submerged or ran into an enemy vessel and had to go around, but I left way too much time for that. And that left Nisgeis wondering what to do, because nothing was happening.
So the long wait for the Mission message at the beginning and the long wait for the Invasion need to be changed too.

Thanks for all the comments and ideas, it gives me the information I need to make it better or at least playable.
And I really like the way you fixed the couple of bugs in your mission, perfect!

Peabody