Replace time compression with "Jump to"

[ckyidr]

My CPU seems to struggle with time compression set at anything over 1000, which makes the game run very slow, therefore making time compression useless. So the fastest I can go is 1000, or 1024, whichever it is.

Would it be possible to make a mod which allows you to "jump to" the next engagement or event?

There seems to be too much going on in the game engine for time compression to be set at max, for me (Athlon 3200+ 1Gb RAM). So with a "jump to" feature, it could randomly generate an event or engagement as you travel along to your destination. Maybe it could have a "sensitivity level", high for a lot of action, low for very few.

What ya think? Would this be possible? Bypass the logic the game struggles to calculate at high time compression with a simple randomly generated sequence of events?

[SteamWake]

Dont really think so.

The reason the CPU "struggles" is there is so many things going on.

If you want just a random event perhaps a quick mission is your cup of tea.

Besides you might miss that big juicy convoy when your warping.

[heartc]

I remember in the earlier stages of SHIV developement, the devs stated there would be some "14 maps" covering the PTO. When that got out, there was a *HUGE* (as in *FECKIN' HUGE*) uproar going through the forums. "WAAHH, but we want the WHOLE WORLD as in SHIII, and we want to sail from PH to Japan!" And in real time, too, some even said. They wouldn't buy the game if it came with seperate maps.
So, a few weeks later, the devs withdrew that statement, saying it was a translation error. Now, I don't know whether it was or not, but I sure wouldn't have minded having seperate maps where you started out in the general area of interest similar to SHI. Now, who doesn't just zip accross the map from PH to a good way west of Midway until the first plane shows up. And back. And even with time compression, this can take quite a while.

Now, I wonder if it would be possible to mod the game in a way to have the patrol starting somewhere near or in enemy territory, similar to how we can choose whether we want to start inside the harbor our outside of it. In theory it should work by just moving this "spawn point" further out, the problem however will probably be to set up a connection between this spawn point and the assigned patrol area in the briefing. Maybe an external application that allows you to minimize SHIV once you've read the briefing and then select the corresponding "area of interest", like "Patrol Area: Honshu", minus an appropriate amount of fuel.

Now, I don't mean to be beamed right into the briefed patrol spot, but into enemy territory in the general vicinity of "Patrol Area: Honshu" for example, say 1000 miles East, as 2/3 of the route from Pearl is just like watching paint dry.

[darkfin]

I just wish we had the option to end the patrol like in SH3. Surface, nothing around, hit escape and end patrol. If I get an hour to spend on SH4 it gripes me to use it TC'ing my way back to port. This way if someone wanted to use it they could, and if not, happy sailing.

[heartc]

I just wish we had the option to end the patrol like in SH3. Surface, nothing around, hit escape and end patrol. If I get an hour to spend on SH4 it gripes me to use it TC'ing my way back to port. This way if someone wanted to use it they could, and if not, happy sailing.

Yep, that would help, too. I just don't have so much time on my hands everyday, so I often find myself not firing up SHIV at all, cause I know to get some enjoyment and have a somewhat meaningful session I would have to invest a maybe inappropriate amount of time. The load times don't help either, though I'm low on RAM, so that is partly my own fault, partly I've read from other people with better setups that they also have close to 10 minutes load times in longer patrols though.

[Egan]

I probably wouldn't have bought it if the campaign had been limited to a set of maps and random encounters - this was fine for SH1 but one of the things that has struck me quite often from reading about the PTO sub war (and the U-Boat campaign as well infact) was the actual risk involved in getting to a lot of the patrol areas in the first place - Squeezing through choke points like the Lombok straight and so on.

Hopefully, once the Ops-Mod thing we are working on just now is finished the whole patrol will be a challenge rather than just the objectives which i've always looked on as being the middle of a good story rather than the whole thing.

Anyways, I think what you are wanting is probably doable to a certain extent by altering the coords at which you start out of harbour but a external program in the SHcommander mould would probably be needed so that those coords could be specifically tied to the various objectives. Afterall, there is little point in doing this if your start point was going to be Honshu whilst tasked with a recon mission in the South China sea. As for ending the patrol at sea and being teleported home, that I don't know but I imagine the code for this from Sh3 is buried in there somewhere.

[heartc]

Anyways, I think what you are wanting is probably doable to a certain extent by altering the coords at which you start out of harbour but a external program in the SHcommander mould would probably be needed so that those coords could be specifically tied to the various objectives. Afterall, there is little point in doing this if your start point was going to be Honshu whilst tasked with a recon mission in the South China sea. As for ending the patrol at sea and being teleported home, that I don't know but I imagine the code for this from Sh3 is buried in there somewhere.

Yeah. I've just about figured out now what I'll do and try. Ducimus has found out how to alter those coordinates for his International Dateline Torpedo track fix some time ago. They are in upcdata/upccampaigndata/flotillas.upc.

So what I will do for now is once I know my assigned patrol area, I will alt-tab out of the game, open the SHIV mission editor (I hope this program can run parallel to SHIV lol - if not I need to preplan and write out starting coords for all patrol areas), decide on where I want to start by moving the mouse over the point, noting the coords, open the shortcut to flotillas.upc on my desktop, and change the "outside harbor" coords accordingly. This should work. Maybe I have to revert to the main menue before alt-tabing out of SHIV, in case this file is already loaded as soon as you enter a career game.
I haven't tested this yet but will try as soon as I return from my current patrol.

[heartc]

Important: To anyone who is reading this and also wants to try that approach, you need to note down the coordinates shown in the most left corner in the bottom of the SHIV mission editor window. The coordinates further to the right are in degrees, as you would expect them on maps, but flotillas.upc works with the left ones.

[Sailor Steve]

I there was a *HUGE* (as in *FECKIN' HUGE*) uproar going through the forums. "WAAHH, but we want the WHOLE WORLD as in SHIII, and we want to sail from PH to Japan!" And in real time, too, some even said. They wouldn't buy the game if it came with seperate maps.
SH1 automatically took you straight from home base to your patrol zone. When SH3 was under development they actually asked what people preferred, and the majority concensus was for sailing all the way there. When SH4 was in the works there was some concern over the transit time involved, and we were told there was a remote chance there might be both. I personally like sailing the boat around, so of course I like things the way they are, but that doesn't mean I don't like having options.

On the other hand, you're hardly going to win much sympathy by virtually calling everyone who disagrees with you a crybaby. That's just sour grapes, and rude to boot.

[ckyidr]

I was looking through the "main.cfg" in the SH4 folder in My Documents, and turned off the "Development" options, ie, minidump etc.

This improved the time compression considerably. I can now zip across the Pacific with the max compression and pretty good performance.

But it would still be nice to have the starting position for patrols alot closer to the target area

[heartc]

When SH3 was under development they actually asked what people preferred, and the majority concensus was for sailing all the way there. Yeah. But the Atlantic, or at least the main area of operations west of the English coast, where people would sail most of the time, is a lot smaller than the Pacific. Also, with allied air cover from right out the sub pen it would be more of a "cheat" than in the PTO.[/quote]

On the other hand, you're hardly going to win much sympathy by virtually calling everyone who disagrees with you a crybaby. That's just sour grapes, and rude to boot.
Did I do? Wasn't really my intention, I just found the huge uproar over this - that people might not be able to watch their sub pointlessly time-compress 2/3rds of the way from Pearl - somewhat hyperbolical and pretty funny back then, and still do. I didn't say a word back then, I just remembered it now and got a giggle out of it. And else, I don't really mind. People are often touchy these days over irrelevant drek while not noticing the elephant in the room, and there are more important things than winning a sympathy contest on some internet forum.

[otto69]

Perhaps the following can be modded. I am a flight simmer and use MS Flight simm. In the map page, I am able to click on the icon of the aircraft and move it to where ever i wish. This is used manly when I fly a jet across the ocean as flying this distance would put most of the simmers to sleep. a cross ocean flight takes 8 hrs. or more at 30K feet and at 500 Kts. PH. Using this method I could move to the area where IJN ships are most likely to be found. As traveling 4000 miles even in plus mode takes time. I for one play this game for fun. I started with the first SH and was hooked. I enjoy chasing ships and firing torps to see if I can sink them not traveling hours to get to my objective. nuf said.

otto69