[WIP] Historical Guns Specs

[gap]

Originally Posted by volodya61

Finally returned to testing our existing project .. I'm still trying to remember all the nuances .. three months have passed..

[volodya61]

Completely forgot everything ..
Forgot to change ammo amount to 0 for other guns when testing any gun ..
Just lost time in vain ..

[volodya61]

Gap, remind me please what is Vierling patch?
Also, maybe it's time to ask TDW what's wrong with the M42 Twin GR2-model.. I can't get it work with human player too.. AI gunners are able to use only..

[gap]

Originally Posted by volodya61

Gap, remind me please what is Vierling patch?

It is the patch making Flakvierling to switch from four-guns fire to two-guns fire

Originally Posted by volodya61

Also, maybe it's time to ask TDW what's wrong with the M42 Twin GR2-model.. I can't get it work with human player too.. AI gunners are able to use only..

yes, AI handles the gun normally, but as soon as I move my avatr towards the gun, everything but game clock gets stuck. I suspect it has to do with some camera setting or with gun tooltip.

Unfortunately, every time I asked TDW on it, he cordially ignored my questions...

[volodya61]

Originally Posted by gap

It is the patch making Flakvierling to switch from four-guns fire to two-guns fire

Ah.. now I remember..

Originally Posted by gap

yes, AI handles the gun normally, but as soon as I move my avatr towards the gun, everything but game clock gets stuck. I suspect it has to do with some camera setting or with gun tooltip.

There is one trick .. teleport.. but after that I can't even rise to the bridge ..

Originally Posted by gap

Unfortunately, every time I asked TDW on it, he cordially ignored my questions...

it happens with our requests to him..

[volodya61]

Forgot to say.. change animation time (start, end indexes) was a bad idea ..
If not change your elevation values back then I will have to re-configure all indexes ..

[gap]

Originally Posted by volodya61

There is one trick .. teleport.. but after that I can't even rise to the bridge ..

Originally Posted by volodya61

it happens with our requests to him..

sometimes we are like little kids in a pastry shop

Originally Posted by volodya61

Forgot to say.. change animation time (start, end indexes) was a bad idea ..
If not change your elevation values back then I will have to re-configure all indexes ..

These are the least changes I have done, you can retrieve your current settings if you want. Anyway the settings I have applied are not casual: every time I changed elevation values I recalculated animation time settings accordingly. I have tested my new settings with a couple of guns, and aiming accuracy was still okay, so my method should be correcr, but I could have done some mistakes in other cases. Let me know which guns are eventually "misaligned" and I will recheck them

[volodya61]

Originally Posted by gap

sometimes we are like little kids in a pastry shop

Yep.. we are

Originally Posted by gap

I have tested my new settings with a couple of guns, and aiming accuracy was still okay, so my method should be correcr, but I could have done some mistakes in other cases. Let me know which guns are eventually "misaligned" and I will recheck them

Which guns ? even C30 need 250-300 shots to down the plane.. in calm sea..

[gap]

Originally Posted by volodya61

Which guns ? even C30 need 250-300 shots to down the plane.. in calm sea..

Weird, the single C30 was aiming correctly during my tests. Tried several times

Are you testing with our test mission? If so, try playing it again. Sometimes gun gun perfomances get worse than usual, no matter how good are teir settings, for several abort/reload mission cycles. Dunno why it happens

[volodya61]

Originally Posted by gap

Are you testing with our test mission? If so, try playing it again. Sometimes gun gun perfomances get worse than usual, no matter how good are teir settings, for several abort/reload mission cycles. Dunno why it happens

No, I tested it using Trevally's test campaign (thanks).. never mind, I now know how it works and I'll set it all over again if needed

[gap]

Originally Posted by volodya61

No, I tested it using Trevally's test campaign (thanks).. never mind, I now know how it works and I'll set it all over again if needed

Okay, but don't waste too much of your time on it.

If you see that some of my elevation/animation settings are wrong, and you just can't fix them in 5 minutes, just retrieve your previous ones.

Why, you may ask? Well, I am almost sure that gun elevation is limited anyway to what is allowed by their animation, so setting their elevation beyond stock min/max ranges (as I did) might make little or no sense, at least until when we won't be able to edit GR2 animations...

[volodya61]

Originally Posted by gap

Why, you may ask? Well, I am almost sure that gun elevation is limited anyway to what is allowed by their animation, so setting their elevation beyond stock min/max ranges (as I did) might make little or no sense, at least until when we won't be able to edit GR2 animations...

As I remember, I too have changed some elevation values.. perhaps for C38, don't remember exactly.. I did it because otherwise it was impossible to achieve even the minimum accuracy..

[keysersoze]

gap,

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, you asked me to set renown costs for the reworked flak guns. On account of my laziness and being distracted by other things, I started but never finished that project Volodya's recent posts reminded me to finish compiling the sources. I'm sorry for the long delay, but here are some preliminary cost suggestions with accompanying citations to explain my rationale:


Flak Guns
C/38
December 1942: 1500 [1]
15 January 1943: 1000
15 February 1943: 750
15 April 1943: 500
15 May 1943: 250
15 June 1943: 100 [2]
15 July 1943: 0

C/38 Zwilling (unshielded)
15 July 1943: 1000 [3]
15 August 1943: 750
15 September 1943: 500
15 October 1943: 100 [4]
30 October 1943: 0

C/38 Zwilling (shielded)
30 October 1943: 500 [5]
15 November 1943: 250
30 November 1943: 0

C/38 Flakvierling
1 May 1943: 3000 [6]
15 June 1943: 2000 [7]
15 July 1943: 1000 [8]
15 August 1943: 500 [9]
15 September 1943: 250
15 October 1943: 100 [10]
15 November 1943: 0

37mm SK C/30U
15 October 1943: 2000 [11]

37mm M42
15 October 1943: 3000 [12]
1 December 1943: 2500 [13]
15 December 1943: 2000
1 January 1944: 1750
15 January 1944: 1500
1 February 1944: 1000
20 February 1944: 500 [14]

37mm M42 Zwilling
1 November 1944: 3000 [15]

Notes on Deck Guns
27 April 1943: removal of all deck guns authorized; Polar and Med. boats can apply to keep gun; some large (IX?) boats retained 10.5 cm gun or exchanged it for another 3.7 cm C/30U [16]

Summer 1944: some VIICs have deck gun refitted for operations in Gulf of Finland [17]

Citations
[1] Fitting begins but encounters technical problems until mid January (Rossler, 188; Stern 108)

[2] no boat allowed into action without at least two 2 cm; 72 boats converted to Turm II/III, 57 under construction, accounting for 60% of U-boatwaffe (BdU KTB 16.6.43)

[3] first forty C/38 Zwillings begin to be installed (Stern, 108; BdU KTB 1.12.1943)

[4] C/38 installation begins on all boats, so that “practically no boats without twin mountings were putting out for operations as from October 1943” (Rossler, 188; Stern 108; BdU KTB, 1.12.1943)

[5] October 1943: BdU ordered fitting of armored shield to all C/38 Zwillings, which “involved an extensive revision of the mount (Stern, 108)

[6] Flakvierling trials begin (BdU KTB, 16.6.1943)
[7] Turm IV reconversions begin, 50 Flakvierlings available under accelerated delivery program (BdU KTB 1.12.1943)

[8] 150 additional Flakvierlings delivered (BdU KTB 1.12.1943)

[9] no boat allowed on patrol without Turm IV, even if it meant long delays in port; 150 more Flakvierlings delivered (Rossler, 188; Stern, 108; BdU KTB 1.12.1943)

[10] all boats have Flakvierling installed or are being converted (Stern 108-109)

[11] some Turm IVs converted to 3.7cm C/30U; because of delivery problems with M42, “some U-boats (approximately 20 percent) remained equipped with either the 2cm quadruple or a single 3.7cm quick firing C/30” (Rossler, 193, BdU KTB 20.2.1944)

[12] Four boats have 3.7cm M42 installed; delivery problems encountered (Rossler, 193)

[13] standard installation of M42 begins, with 18 boats equipped by 1 Dec. 1943 (BdU KTB, 1.12.1943; BdU KTB, 20.2.1944)

[14] 80% of boats have M42 installed (BdU KTB, 20.2.1944)

[15] M42 Zwilling introduced on U-870, whose first and only patrol began on 15 Nov. 1944 (Skwiot, 329; uboat.net)

[16] (Rossler, 188; BdU KTB 27.4.1943)

[17] (Rossler, 188)

Additional Notes
I have intentionally not decreased the M42’s cost below 500 renown, to simulate delivery problems and the fact that 20% of the U-boatwaffe was still equipped with the Flakvierling and 3.7cm C/30U in 1944.

I’ve had trouble finding much information for the 3.7 cm C/30U’s availability. Since it was available long before the 3.7 cm M42 (and was installed on Type IXs fairly early), it seems to have been a stopgap measure to cover the dearth of M42s during the Turm IV reconstruction. Do you have any information?

Similarly, I don’t have much about the M42 Zwilling, other than its date of introduction and several references to its being “rare.”


Again, sorry for the long delay in getting this to you.

[gap]

Originally Posted by volodya61

As I remember, I too have changed some elevation values.. perhaps for C38, don't remember exactly.. I did it because otherwise it was impossible to achieve even the minimum accuracy..

I had taken into account your new elevation settings, when adding my tweaks

Originally Posted by keysersoze

gap,

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, you asked me to set renown costs for the reworked flak guns...

Excellent work you have done on those reward cost settings. It will take me a while to look into them with the deserved attenction, but I promise I will do it as soon as possible.

At this moment I have just one remark: I have seen you have deviced costs only
for the fitting of one of each gun model. Nonetheless looking into UpgradePacks.upc, I have noticed that there are also options for fitting a second gun of each type, or two guns of each type at once. How should we apply your suggested costs to these upgrade options?

[keysersoze]

Originally Posted by gap

I had taken into account your new elevation settings, when adding my tweaks



Excellent work you have done on those reward cost settings. It will take me a while to look into them with the deserved attenction, but I promise I will do it as soon as possible.

At this moment I have just one remark: I have seen you have deviced costs only
for the fitting of one of each gun model. Nonetheless looking into UpgradePacks.upc, I have noticed that there are also options for fitting a second gun of each type, or two guns of each type at once. How should we apply your suggested costs to these upgrade options?

Do the options for for fitting multiple guns represent Turm upgrades? A while ago, I looked into the relationship between tower and flak gun upgrades based on our discussion in posts #731 and #733. As we discussed, the best way to simulate changes in AA armament would be to merge flak guns with the turm upgrades, since, in most cases, the only purpose of a tower upgrade was to increase AA capability.

When upgrading from Turm 0 to Turm II in the campaign, my U-boat was outfitted with two C/30s, instead of the historically accurate two C/38s. I looked through the UpgradePacks code to try to determine whether there is a place where the game defines the default flak loadout for each tower, but I couldn't find one (I have a pretty limited grasp of code, so it's quite possible that I overlooked something obvious).

If we could define the default flak armament of each turm, we could simply ignore individual flak upgrades and instead set the cost of the towers themselves. This might get a little tricky with Turm IV, since there are so many variations, but there's no reason we can't have Turm IVa, IVb, IVc, etc. I have already mapped out the default loadouts and cost progression for combined tower/flak upgrades in case we were able to use this method. I am away from my main computer right now, but I'll check UpgradePacks.upc later tonight and get back to you.