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

[Magic1111]

Originally Posted by h.sie

@Magic: It's for the periscopes blur effect to simulate vibrations for higher speeds

Aaah, okay ! Thanks h.sie !

[h.sie]

I am slightly optimistic that in the near future the lazy 1WO will move automatically on the bridge when boat surfaces.

[SquareSteelBar]

What did you do - did you threaten him with demotion?

[Magic1111]

Originally Posted by h.sie

I am slightly optimistic that the lazy 1WO will move automatically on the bridge when boat surfaces.

WOW , I can´t believe that´s eventually possible....!

Best regards,
Magic

[Stiebler]

H.sie said:

maybe Stiebler is willing to include the 4GB patch into his configurator program. Should not be hard, since it's a single bit somewhere in the exe. easy to locate using fc /b .

I've done it.

H.sie has the revised test version.

I have also worked out a complete code solution to the slow-sinking when silent-running problem. (Applies to ALL U-boats and ALL super-mods.) So you cannot just go rushing into a convoy with silent-running on from the moment you see it. It takes some management instead. Especially when you are being depth-charged by three escorts at 200m.

Again, H.sie now has the code. It affects SH3Sim.act.

Stiebler.

[LGN1]

Originally Posted by Stiebler

H.sie said:
I have also worked out a complete code solution to the slow-sinking when silent-running problem. (Applies to ALL U-boats and ALL super-mods.) So you cannot just go rushing into a convoy with silent-running on from the moment you see it. It takes some management instead. Especially when you are being depth-charged by three escorts at 200m.

Stiebler.

Hi Stiebler,

I have no idea about this, but wouldn't be the problem of slowly sinking easily solved in real-life by trimming the boat upwards? I understand that you don't want to do this close to the surface, but as soon as you are a few meters deeper? I would guess that re-trimming the boat just took a few seconds

Anyway, you mentioned that there are numerous accounts of this problem. Do you know why back then the boat was not re-trimmed?

Cheers, LGN1

[Stiebler]

@LGN1:

you mentioned that there are numerous accounts of this problem. Do you know why back then the boat was not re-trimmed?

Too much noise, if close to the enemy. (Water has to be pumped in and out of tanks, or compressed air has to be used to expel water.)
Also, when in the presence of the enemy, you need to be able to dive fast, which is not aided if you are trimmed up.
You can also control depth with the hydroplanes, but they require sufficient forward speed, depending on buoyancy.

Herbert Werner reported, in his well known book 'Iron Coffins', that his U-boat was trimmed up when it reached deep depth, but the depth was too deep to pump out bilge water caused by slow leaks, which resulted in a slow sinking anyway.

That was why I proposed originally that this slow-sinking problem should be mimicked by resetting the mass of the U-boat slowly upwards, when silent-running. Unfortunately, both H.sie and I found that the SH3 model ignores this simple solution.

Stiebler.

[LGN1]

Hi Stiebler,

thanks for the reply! After thinking more about it, I realize that there is one thing I did not consider: the water pressure at great depth might be just too high to pump any water out IIRC, in the original U-Boot handbook it's written at which depths the pumps are still working. I have to check it.

So, when you dive deeper, the pressure compresses the boat, you loose buoyancy, then you start to sink, and because of the high pressure you cannot compensate this by trimming. Sounds reasonable.

Cheers, LGN1

[Tessa]

hi h.sie

Have noticed an unusual bug/feature since using your mod (now that I've had some decent amoung of time playing with the mod itself active), it seems (ime) to produce extremely unstable savegames - but only if you exit the game; conversely as long as you don't exit it produces rock solid saves under circumstance that would normally ctd.

As I play SH3 on my laptop if I find myself in a position where I need to leave or go to bed (when I'm not going to on my machine for 12+ hours and have a game still in progress I usually turn it off; rather than letting it sit there taxing the cpu and cooling fans needlessly) and exit the game to turn my laptop off. When I go back to play the game and try to resume via my last save 95% of the time the savegame gets corrupted even if I'm in the middle of the Atlantic, 100's of miles from any ship, plane or piece of land. Usual result is having to start the entire patrol over

On the other hand, as long as I have the game on and running the saves that are produced can successfully save in condition that would almost always result in a ctd. Several times I've had to temporarily suspend my game for a few hours and say I'm in the middle of a convoy attack, am submerged and in firing position. I save the game and exit, but still leave SH3 running. When I come back my save works much to my surprise as saving a game while underwater tradtionally has always resulted in a ctd, made even worse with the close proximity to other ships. Normally that would instantly ctd, instead I've been able to resume saves inside harbors, in convoy attacks, inside the convoy lanes, under other ships or even when being actively hunted!

When I exit the game itself (so I can shut my laptop down) no matter where my last save was under any conditions they fail. While the ability to finally save your game in virtually any situation is a miracle in itself, it seems isolated to only while you have SH3 running. Have you/anyone else had problems (same, similar or something different) with loading saved games?

[h.sie]

@Tessa: I never had any problems regarding savegames, and I also did not change anything that is related to save/restore.

Is the save/restore behaviour BETTER or WORSE now with the patch??

Anyway, I have no explaination for that, but if it's worse, I'll have to look into it more in detail.

Any others having these save/load problems???

If you have an CTD on WinXP/32Bit, please post the contents of the CTD window (module/offset and so on). It contains information which code segments caused the CTD. this will help me to determine weather my code is responsible for the CTD or not.

[h.sie]

@Tessa: Additionally: Since I didn't change the savegame's filestructure or game objects, savegames are compatible to either patched and unpatched sh3.exe. So you can create a savegame with unpatched sh3.exe and load it with patched sh3.exe - and the other way around. This could help to isolate the cause of the problem.

Isolating the cause of the problem and making a reliable conclusion additionally requires a clean, unmodded sh3+GWX/NYGM. Only under these circumstances the influence of other factors can be eliminated and thus a reliable conclusion is possible.

[Stiebler]

@Tessa:

SH3 has always possessed an unreliable game-save system.

It is widely recognised that it is unsafe to save any game when any other unit is within spawning distance, or within 30km of land or a base.

Two convoys spawning together close to your U-boat also result in long-term problems for saving games, even if you do not make the game-save until you are well away from the convoys.

Some people recommend also that you never save a game when submerged. I have not had this problem myself (unless one of the other problems was also present).

The game-saves you mentioned above break at least two of the above rules.

And finally there is always the difficulty that one of your installed mods may be interfering with another. But changes that H.sie has made should have no effect at all on game-saves, as H.sie has explained above.

Stiebler.

[h.sie]

Originally Posted by SquareSteelBar

What did you do - did you threaten him with demotion?

No, I did threaten him with demolition.

[fitzcarraldo]

No problems with saved games (for now).

Regards.

Fitzcarraldo

[SquareSteelBar]

Originally Posted by h.sie

No, I did threaten him with demolition.

Ah...I understand, Cpt. Bligh.