Realism- and gameplay-related hardcode fixes for SH3.EXE

[Sepp von Ch.]

OK, thank you for reply h.sie!

[h.sie]

@Jaeger: Good idea, but too much effort for me. Sorry. And it's not even necessary IMHO.

As Hitman said, it's a question of how we interpret "Flank" or in german "3 x Wahnsinnige". The german text shows very well that the LI is ordered to push the engines to their absolute maximum limit - and not to the factory guaranteed save speed limit.

Look into the Uboats cfg files where I also added the resulting speed in knots (kt) for VIIB in calm sea:

AllStop=0.00 (0 kt)
AheadSlow=0.26 (4 kt)
AheadOneThird=0.57 (10 kt)
AheadStandard=0.80 (14 kt)
AheadFull=0.94 (16 kt)
AheadFlank=1.00 (17 kt)

While there are significant differences (0.14 ... 0.26) between these Speed levels, there is only a little difference of 0.06 between FULL and FLANK. The resulting speed difference in knots between FULL and FLANK is small = 1 kt. Thus, FLANK cannot be intended as a new speed level for common use. It's a special reserve that should only be activated in very special situations. The small difference of 1 kt are these extra knots you (Jeager) are talking about.

[SquareSteelBar]

Herzlichen Glückwunsch zur Beförderung, Herr Admiral.

[Leitender]

All 5 Steps from "Ahead slow" ("Kleine Fahrt") to "Ahead flank" ("AK voraus") are regular manoeuvring orders. All this manoeuvres should work without fearing a permanent damage, if you ask me.

What hitman means is an emergency order called "3x Wahnsinnige", literally: "3x lunatic" This is not the same like "Ahead flank"! "3x lunetic" means ahead flank diesels (1.) + coupled electric engines running ahead flank (2.) + power beyond safety limits (3.!). In this case it could surely come to serious damage after a short time, but not in normal status. So I had the same idea like Jaeger creating a new emergency order: "3x lunatic". Diesels flank, electrics flank, large fuel consumption, battery consumption, some 1 or two knots higher speed, but overheating damage coming soon.

The other points mentioned by hitman, e.g. misuse, wrong settings etc. surely happened, but they didn´t happen time- or powerdependant. They occured randomly, like other malfunctions. This is well simulated by Jaeson Jones´ SH3-Commander.

While there are significant differences (0.14 ... 0.26) between these Speed levels, there is only a little difference of 0.06 between FULL and FLANK.

h.sie

The differences are decreasing because of the water resistance is increasing by square.

[Leitender]

Oh, I see I did a heavy mistake. I mixed power and force (wrong translation). What I´m talking about is force, not power, sorry for that.

If you give a manoeuvring order to your engine compartment, you make the machinist change force, not power. "Power" ist a fix engine value which cannot be changed.

[h.sie]

@Leitender: These small damages applied with a certain probability should be interpreted as WARNING (engines running hot, we must be careful!), not as real damage.

Too much effort to add new GUI elements and code infrastructure for an additional maneuvring order.

What about enlarging the max. speed of the Uboats about 5%, so that it then drives 17kt at FULL speed instead of FLANK. And 18kt at FLANK. Only disadvantage: One regular speed order lost.

I understand your point and will think about it. Will take some time.

[Hitman]

The other points mentioned by hitman, e.g. misuse, wrong settings etc. surely happened, but they didn´t happen time- or powerdependant. They occured randomly, like other malfunctions.

They happened randomly but specially when overloading the engine. Any engine that is stressed beyond the ordinary limits will increase the failiure rate, that's why almost all automakers test them in the racingsport before and use the experience gained to develop their engines.

As I already said and H.Sie also agrees, the main problem is that we lack an extra button or telegraph order slot above flank to engage that "get-absolute-everything-out-of-this-chief-or-we-are-toast" status. So it's reasonable to use the flank speed as substitute, even at the price of losing one slot.

[Jaeger]

hitman, i agree and i can live with the status quo, BUT remember

you dont only lose one slot, you also lose, as leitender stated, one tactical point: the supplyconsumption. 3x wahnsinnige should consume fuel AND batterypower, flankspeed should only consume fuel. if you want to escape on surface by 3x wahnsinnige (and take that extra knot) and after some time you have to dive, your batterystatus should be low. atm, it is not. so this new slot will bring us a new tactical level. the question still stays: is this worth the high amount of work?

The one extra knot IMO would be useless anyway and the cost of it - engine failure. none of the commanders or the u-boat crew ever wanted to make more troubles than there already was, if was any. Knowing that without engines the boat is doomed.

[Leitender]

The crewmembers and especially the machinists knew that with damaged propulsion they were lost at sea, so they certainly avoided overrevving or overloading the engines besides they were in an absolute devastating situation. I think we all agree about this.
We can argue about when and how often damage occured, but in my humble opinion the engines were very reliable. Remember that, though 70 years ago, even then the engineers had about 25 years or more of experience with developing u-boats and their propulsion. As they know, that survival of the crew, and, much more important, military value only maintained when in action-ready status, all efforts were te be done to gain reliable and secure propulsion engines.

In my personal archive i own photographs on which there are seen crankshafts of military engines wich were tested at a laboratory and on which tension lines were made visible. This was done to understand how the forces flew through the crankshaft and thus was a help for further development process. It was mid-30s. What I like to say is: Don´t underestimate the technological level of that time. The then engineers controled engine behaviour and i´m sure, permanent damage was not a significant item at all unless someone shows historical sources.

h.sie

I don´t want to force you to work, but your mod made me think about this item and doing some research. Long ago, there was a mod called "integrated orders" by a member called conus, IIRC. He changed some graphical orders belonging to the officer´s panel at the bottom in the left corner. Later it was integretad into GWX, I think 2.0, and here is a helpful description:

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=103524

Maybe someone is able to add a further command for "3x lunatic" to the chief engineer´s emergency orders, or maybe replace a less used order, as stiebler did it with his surrender mod? In the commands.cfg-file there are some commands which perharps have no funktion yet, but they seem to refer to the sh3sim.act. And here ist the end of my experience.

So if i had to choose between "normal" Ahead flank without damage what I use very often and a replaced order for emergency, I would prefer to leave the commands as they are. But this is only my unauthoritative opinion.

greetings

[don1reed]

An interesting discussion, gentlemen.
Over at Uboat.net I discovered this nugget of info regarding US subs vs. German Uboats. Perhaps it may aid in your pro/con engine burnout arguments:

http://www.uboat.net/forums/read.php...,59248,quote=1

I second Leitender. Seems the man knows what he's talking about.

[Hitman]

The crewmembers and especially the machinists knew that with damaged propulsion they were lost at sea, so they certainly avoided overrevving or overloading the engines besides they were in an absolute devastating situation. I think we all agree about this.

In operation drumbeat and based on an interview with Hardegen, the author tells that in one ocasion the uboat was spotted by a merchant who turned to ram, and due to the very low depth of the shore and the short distance, they had to run away. They spent a long time just running ahead of the merchant until they made enough distance to avoid being rammed when starting to submerge (As the uboat slows down a lot) and until reaching safe depth. The uboat was only marginally quicker than the merchant and thus it took a long time before the distance had opened enough.

You bet the machinists and chief engineer did all tricks they knew to pull away faster, from raising the sub even more by blowing extra air in the buoyancy tanks (When it sits higher in the water it has less drag), to put the electrics online, to row with their hands.

There are simply situations of desperation where you need that extra surface speed and a single knot can make the difference -in this case it did.

I'm affraid if I gonna use that extra knot, I will trick my death, and death doesn't like to be cheated! Sounds like Final Destination 6 to me

[Leitender]

PapaKilo

I regret, i´m not an expert in subs at all. I just read some few things in books or the net. Regarding subs, i´m a theoreticician. My experience in sailing and shipping is limited more ore less to a ferry travel crossing lake Constance (But don´t mix it with "Riding the Lake Constance" ). I have some skills in technical engineering, but not especially in naval propulsion engines, so I have to adjust what I know about land-based propulsion engines to what we have here.

Hitman

This is what I read about evasive manoeuvres against corvette escorts. They run at about 15-16 Knots and the U-Boats were only slightly faster, so it took a long time to get a safe distance. During all this this time they were engaged by the corvette´s weapons, and though they didn´t dive (Werner, Iron coffins). But I didn´t read anything about engine damage. Did Hardegen talk about that?

don1reed

thank you, just started to read.