Questions, Flames, Gripes?

[ancient46]

Would you be able to compare your game with Jutland by Software Sorcery released in 1993? I liked the game but it had a steep learning curve.
Do they still own the copyright to the name?

[Bullethead]

Originally Posted by ancient46

Would you be able to compare your game with Jutland by Software Sorcery released in 1993? I liked the game but it had a steep learning curve.

Never had that game so can't compare.

Do they still own the copyright to the name?

Jutland is a place on the map so you can't copyright that. There have been many games for miniatures, boardgames, and computers games named that. What you copyright is what you put out under that name: the guts of your game . But just to be clear, the full name of our product is "Distant Guns: Jutland", which nobody but SES ever uses.

[CCIP]

Originally Posted by Bullethead

But just to be clear, the full name of our product is "Distant Guns: Jutland", which nobody but SES ever uses.

Which is mostly the first DG's fault. Noone calls it "Distant Guns: The Russo-Japanese War At Sea", or even just Russo-Japanese War At Sea. So "Distant Guns" ended up firmly stuck with the original RJW title!

[Vainglory]

Uh, newbie here...

I do hope Bullethead checks in now and then. I've had the game for maybe a month now and I think it's great. Well worth what I paid, but there are a few issues I've had with it.

Firstly, I've had ships that seemed to sink after I left a battle. In my first campaign SMS Seydlitz took heavy damage (pumping exceeded flooding, however, and there were no out of control fires) engaging the channel monitors. She vanished from my orbat once the battle ended. Because she was so badly damaged I could understand it, annoying though it is.

But recently I lost SMS Grosser Kurfurst... she had suffered moderate damage, but there were no uncontrolled fires and pumping exceeded flooding. I'd engaged Beatty's battlecruisers in the dark so she'd taken out HMS Tiger and Queen Mary. I'd dropped her out of the line when damage became moderate to ensure she survived. I saved with her well out of harm's way, no uncontrolled fires, and pumping exceeded flooding.

The battle ended and another one began with her in it. I quit without saving, but when I reloaded from the save (with Grosser Kurfurst seemingly okay), the battle finished, and a new one began, she was gone.

It's perplexing that she would disappear when previously, in identical circumstances, she hadn't. Surely if fires are under control, and flooding is under control, your ships shouldn't sink? And if she didn't sink, where did she go? The manual has no clues.

Secondly, chasing the merchants. I understand that this is a feature, but personally I find it annoying. I know a game can't be tailored to everyone's tastes, but I just thought it was worth saying. Most times the merchant can do nothing to escape, or if it can escape then the pursuit vessels can do nothing to prevent it. Seems like a tedious distraction either running the game at 20x or resolving via end battle.

[Bullethead]

Originally Posted by Vainglory

Uh, newbie here...

Welcome aboard! New guy buys the drinks

But recently I lost SMS Grosser Kurfurst... The battle ended and another one began with her in it. I quit without saving, but when I reloaded from the save (with Grosser Kurfurst seemingly okay), the battle finished, and a new one began, she was gone.

It's perplexing that she would disappear when previously, in identical circumstances, she hadn't. Surely if fires are under control, and flooding is under control, your ships shouldn't sink? And if she didn't sink, where did she go? The manual has no clues.

There are several possible explanations:

First off, it depends on where you saved the 1st time. She might have ended up taking fatal damage later in that battle if it continued to run.

Second, perhaps her damage proved fatal the 2nd go-round. All damage control resolution, whether in a battle or afterwards, has a random element in it. It's thus possible, from the same starting point, to end up at different results. For example, suppose she was on fire at the end of the 1st battle. That fire might have been enough to damage the propulsion or crew to the point that the rest of the damage became fatal. Same with flooding damage to some extent.

Third, she might have hit a mine or been torpedoed by a sub in between battles. Such encounters also have a random element so might not always happen.

[Vainglory]

Thanks for the timely reply, it's much appreciated. Many games have awful support.

As far as your suggestions... well what makes it perplexing is that when I saved Grosser Kurfurst was well out of the line of fire, with no uncontrolled fires, and pumping exceeding flooding.

The battle ran for about another ten minutes as Tiger and Queen Mary sank, then it ended because there were no HM Ships in view.

Another battle started a few hours later (somewhere between midnight, but before dawn) a hundred KM or so away, again with Beatty bumping into the HSF.

Grosser Kurfurst was there, but I got slightly miffed when Kaiserin didn't turn to starboard (she was avoiding a torpedo) and instead turned to port. The turn to port put her about a kilometer closer to Princess Royal. Eight x 1,250lb shells at point blank range saw the end of Kaiserin...

I was rather frustrated with myself (I let my priceless Kaiser class ships get way too close to the pair of British BCs) so I quit without saving.

When I restarted from the aforementioned save point, played out the sinking of Tiger and Queen Mary, then stumbled into Beatty once more (the BCF is southeast of the HSF which is heading home so it seems to cause another clash every time) Grosser Kurfurst was gone.

What makes it perplexing is that GK has no uncontrolled fires, flooding exceeds pumping, and the general damage level is moderate. She doesn't take any more damage between when I saved and when the next battle starts (only enemy ships visible are Tiger and Queen Mary because Beatty's scattering), but she appears to sink anyway. I've tried it a few times and GK seems to survive less frequently than she sinks.

I guess it's the randomness in the damage control? A submarine or mine taking down Grosser Kurfurst specifically, several times in a row, seems unlikely to me.

My problem is just that I'd expect a German battleship with moderate damage to make it home... is that wrong? I'd not be surprised if ships with Very Heavy damage are always adjudicated as "sunk" after the battle ends. Even with heavy damage, if there are uncontrolled fires, or uncontrolled flooding, I'd expect them to sink. But if it's only moderate damage with flooding and fires in hand (and well over 3/4 of the crew alive) I'd expect that ship to make it home.

It occurs to me that I've seen two British "Inflexibles" sink in the same fashion. They had heavy damage though.

[Bullethead]

Originally Posted by Vainglory

My problem is just that I'd expect a German battleship with moderate damage to make it home... is that wrong? I'd not be surprised if ships with Very Heavy damage are always adjudicated as "sunk" after the battle ends. Even with heavy damage, if there are uncontrolled fires, or uncontrolled flooding, I'd expect them to sink. But if it's only moderate damage with flooding and fires in hand (and well over 3/4 of the crew alive) I'd expect that ship to make it home.

I'd expect a ship as you describe GK to survive, too. I'm quite curious as to what's happening to her.

If you would, please open a ticket with our support system. If you've never done that before, look in START/All Programs/Storm Eagle Studios/Jutland. The tech support and "report a bug" shortcuts there both open your browser to our support page. Scroll down past all the stock FAQ troubleshooting stuff and at the bottom there's a place to log in. Type in your customer ID number (which is different from your license number) and you'll go to where you can open a ticket. The tickets are like emails and you can attach files to them. So type in your observations and attach the saved game so we can take a look at it. Thanks.

[Vainglory]

I may have found what the issue is. When I've looked at GK she's been moderately damaged, with flooding and fire controlled.

I bothered to watch her from the save to the conclusion of the battle; the save point has her at 25% fire level (my mistake, I should have made 100% certain before posting anything, sorry). Watching her, the fires were put out, but flooding periodically went out of control until that was done.

Given that she's on fire, but with the fires being brought under control, is it still unusual for a moderately damaged ship to sink?

I would have thought that a moderately damaged ship should make it home, whereas heavy damage would be where it starts to get dicey - but I'm only new to the game and I could simply be misinterpreting what "moderate" damage means.

[Bullethead]

Originally Posted by Vainglory

I would have thought that a moderately damaged ship should make it home, whereas heavy damage would be where it starts to get dicey - but I'm only new to the game and I could simply be misinterpreting what "moderate" damage means.

The various named damage states shouldn't be taken as absolute status definitions. They should instead be considered as general indicators of how bad the situation is AT THAT MOMENT. This takes a bit of getting used to.

Ships in our games don't have "hit points", as in take some fixed amount of damage and sink. Instead, they have a number of systems that affect the ship's ability to control various forms of damage, and each of these systems can be damaged and repaired at least some. Ships eventually sink because water is coming in faster than the pumps can throw it back out, and is spreading throughout the ship usually due to shell holes in key bulkheads.

As a result, 2 ships in the same battle rarely have the same exact damage from the same type and number of hits. Usually, they'll be hit in different places so will have damage to different systems, different rates of flooding, etc. Thus, the only way to give an overall status like "moderate damage" is add and average the amounts of damage to all the individual components. The amount of flooding in a ship, however, carries more weight than other things.

The pump capacity of a ship is largely a function of propulsion system damage, plus crew casualties. Both of these can be damaged by the spread of flooding and ongoing fires, as well as further hits. It can therefore happen that a ship be right on the edge of its pump capacity at a relatively low overall damage state due to not having shipped too much water yet. But a fairly large fire is raging, which kills some crew and/or damages the propulsion a bit, and that suddenly makes flooding exceed pump capacity.

When a ship exceeds its pumping capacity, it's probably going to sink unless the propulsion gets repaired, the fire goes out, or whatever, which allows an increase in pump capacity back to safe levels. But such a ship might still show as "moderate" because it hasn't shipped significant water yet. The only place to notice this is on the ship info screen where "flooding exceeds pumping capacity" will appear in red.

Anyway, I'm guessing this is what happened to your ship. She was right at the limit of her pump capacity, then the fire took out a few more guys and/or hurt the engines a bit, and that put her over the line. But because fire damage is somewhat random, this wouldn't happen every time you restarted the game.

[crackaces]

I have noticed that a ship determined to sink, continues pouring accurate fire until about 2 minutes left and then decides to abandon ship. Is there an historic reference that a sinking ship's crew should act like the French Foreign Legion ? I would think once the fate is known that crew would be thinking about survival?

I have also noted that accuracy does not increase as much as I would think at less than 5K meters. (Given the ship is not sinking ) At this point the guns are simply bore sighted as the danger area is rather large. Has SES looked at this?

Thanks! Great game as I cannot find players for AH Jutland...

[Bullethead]

Originally Posted by crackaces

I have noticed that a ship determined to sink, continues pouring accurate fire until about 2 minutes left and then decides to abandon ship. Is there an historic reference that a sinking ship's crew should act like the French Foreign Legion ? I would think once the fate is known that crew would be thinking about survival?

There are many cases of ships going down with guns still firing, if they had any left in operation. It was probably a matter of folks not getting the word, or not realizing something was seriously wrong.

In moments of great stress, such as combat, folks tend to get tunnel vision. They fixate totally on the task at hand, such as shoveling coal, humping ammo, or aiming guns, until forcibly reminded that things are badly haywire, such as by water coming up their legs. Remember, in a ship, very few folks can see beyond the bulkheads of the compartments they are in, and only a few of those folks have any contact with other compartments. And if the ship's communications are damaged, nobody near the bow will know the stern no longer exists until the ships stands on end.

There's also the difference between what the game notes as "sinking" and what people in the ship would comprehend. The game marks ships as sinking when they've been "mathematically eliminated", as in flooding exceeding pumping beyond hope of recovery. But real captains live in eternal fear of being remembered for abaondoning their ships too quickly, and don't have anywhere near as accurate a "death clock" for their ships as the game provides. Hence, when the game says a ship will sink in 20-odd minutes, in real life the captain would still probably think he could do something to save her, and most of the rest of the crew would know they'd been hit but wouldn't have given up the ship yet.

I have also noted that accuracy does not increase as much as I would think at less than 5K meters. (Given the ship is not sinking ) At this point the guns are simply bore sighted as the danger area is rather large. Has SES looked at this?

The hit rates in Jutland with default accuracy were tested extensively and give the same values, over the long run, as historical data provides. Even at pretty short ranges, hit rates seldom exceeded 10% in real life combat. This of course was rather less than obtained in practice, but this is a game about combat, not practice.

BTW, I haven't properly welcomed you yet. New guy buys the drinks

[crackaces]

I have just crossed the 100 hour mark of playing SES Jutland. I am a 'veteran' of AH Jutland and TSR Cordite and Steel-- both games primarly designed for WWI ship to ship combat and Jutland having some strategic componet. However, SES Jutland IMHO combines a nice blend of strategic (What is the goal of the Navy? How should forces be distributed?); Operational considerations (Which fleet goes where and how do they get to the targets?) and Tatical (How do I position ships in the place places and maneuver to inflict the most damage while saving my ships?), 50 bucks for a 100 hours enjoyment and I am still playing is a great value! I pay $100 to play golf or see an NHL game, and sometimes it is not as enjoyable!

More so -- this game is playable and does not require a living room or a gym floor to play!

Here is another big plus -- at least on my platform I have never encoutered a single crash to desktop. I beleive that is fantastic for a game that uses such complex graphics. Heck the Total War series 10 years later still has users complaining about CTD's!

I am a former geek by trade and so I am not one to assume 'X' is a bug, because I do not have the Functional Specification to say behavior 'X' is a defect, but the following software behaviors are annoying to me:

* I have observed the behavior that if ships break contact within the tatical map because of visablity (thus the visibility is far less than a 'hex') the ships are placed at the center of the hex(?) as a united task force for the next contact. The situation was that a division of a TS squadron made to to zeebrugue while the other divsion was about 20000 meters away when contact broke. A force finds the other divsion and the force at zeebrugee is teleported out. Forcing me to maneuver the forces once again for safety. I think I understand that reforming task forces after battles would be a nightmare for users, but maybe an option to "reform task force after the battle," or make that the default and have a button to "leave ships in current location"

* I still think a point should be reached where the AI abandons the guns to save the ship rather than make a last ditch stand. But at least I know the philosophy of SES and will adjust my play to assume that a sinking ship still requires attention to keep down accurate fire.

* I set area patrol for my Zep's and I have found the balloons taking a Sunday stroll over France. Let the Army use Albatros planes to patrol the front lines ! Maybe allow the user to select an area or enter vectors (between X to Y degrees for Z thousand meters). I like allowing a mouse select over an area to patrol.

* When I click on a ship and it zooms in -- the screen always turns toward a profile of the ship, which always involves readjusing the screen to make a change of course possible. It is very annoying

Ok back to fighting the war ...

[crackaces]

I realize double posting is bad etiquette but I think the battle recentering issue this is worthy of seperate attention because now its a problem.

I have a flotilla of Torpedo boats ordered to "Return to Base" and after successive battles of maneuvering back to Zeebrugee and then reenaging because another ship is in sight -- the game proceeds to teleport the forces out about 15K meters to do this again. Right now the game is stuck in a loop where as a CL and 4 destoyers sail within range realize they are outgunned by batteries and retreat. Game goes in strategic mode and then battle mode starts as a continous loop. Over and over again. I sail back toward port and wash rinse and repeat. I will try some things like keeping my ships say 1K Meters out and let the brits face my guns or something to get out of this loop.

Maybe a way to prevent this is to equate division leader in port (over that anchor) as division in port and division leader(s) in port as task force in port for stratigic purposes. Thus stop the endless loop of stratigic map to battle map.

[CCIP]

Originally Posted by crackaces

I realize double posting is bad etiquette but I think the battle recentering issue this is worthy of seperate attention because now its a problem.

I have a flotilla of Torpedo boats ordered to "Return to Base" and after successive battles of maneuvering back to Zeebrugee and then reenaging because another ship is in sight -- the game proceeds to teleport the forces out about 15K meters to do this again. Right now the game is stuck in a loop where as a CL and 4 destoyers sail within range realize they are outgunned by batteries and retreat. Game goes in strategic mode and then battle mode starts as a continous loop. Over and over again. I sail back toward port and wash rinse and repeat. I will try some things like keeping my ships say 1K Meters out and let the brits face my guns or something to get out of this loop.

Maybe a way to prevent this is to equate division leader in port (over that anchor) as division in port and division leader(s) in port as task force in port for stratigic purposes. Thus stop the endless loop of stratigic map to battle map.

Yeah, I agree, there's still a lot of oddities with "bouncing" forces right now. I hope something is eventually done with them. I think one solution would be to give one, probably larger, force the "right of way" to continue moving forward no matter what, while the other one can be repositioned relative to it. The problem right now is that both forces "bounce" back from each other after a battle. If they were on opposing courses before the battle, it indeed does cause a very silly loop - one that can sometimes cause a puny destroyer flotilla to force the whole High Seas Fleet to get stuck for many hours in a dangerous place while the Grand Fleet closes in on it...

[crackaces]

Originally Posted by CCIP

Yeah, I agree, there's still a lot of oddities with "bouncing" forces right now. I hope something is eventually done with them. I think one solution would be to give one, probably larger, force the "right of way" to continue moving forward no matter what, while the other one can be repositioned relative to it. The problem right now is that both forces "bounce" back from each other after a battle. If they were on opposing courses before the battle, it indeed does cause a very silly loop - one that can sometimes cause a puny destroyer flotilla to force the whole High Seas Fleet to get stuck for many hours in a dangerous place while the Grand Fleet closes in on it...

Oh this problem is far more complex than I thought So the fact that the logic recenters task forces after a battle has lots of ramifications beyond just the one I described. My thought is the option of leaving ships in place and an option of reforming the fleet but this problem seems deeper. But I do think if the battle continues to move in a direction that is the forces are not recentered unless requested, and if forces are allowed to port in tatitical mode carried over to the stratgic map .. the problem would be solved ....