[WIP] - The TM Torpedo mod

[Ducimus]

One thing that im sure has been noticeably absent from TMaru, was any sort of torpeod modifications. I think everyone can agree, they are entirely too reliable. I havent included any torpedo mods, not because i dont think they important, but because i havent had the time to dedicate to creating one that gave me the results i desire. Its been a case of "do it right, or don't do it at all".

My definition of "doing it right":
In short, im looking for a happy medium where it would be borerline acceptable to even the most contentious rivet counter, and yet not at a level of frustration that would push the "not quite so hardcore" user over the edge. I realize this is entirely subjective. But to give a rough idea of what im looking for, i think:

- 1 out of every 3 torpedos fired should be a dud.

- Every 2 out of 5 should explode prematurely, even in a calm sea.

- even with a depth of 5 feet, a fish should have a chance of being a deep runner and go under the target argubly every 2 out of 5 torpedos.


The file im using is a bit more robust then stock, as im sure you'll notice:
http://www.ducimus.net/sh4/torp_properties_01.jpg
http://www.ducimus.net/sh4/torp_properties_02.jpg

I do have a question, anyone know dud reduction speed, and dud reduction rate do?

[tater]

Dunno about those 2 values.

A few observations. The arming distance should be 450 yards for mk14s. Mk10s can be shorter.

As for duds... Can dud chances be pistol specific? Contact fuses broke except on shallow angle hits in RL. Ideally, if there was an angle range for contact duds, it would be a fairly high %, but only at certain angles.

The magnetic prematures... tough call on a number.

Depth errors: instead of them being all over the place, they simply need to run 10-12 feet deep 100% of the time for early mk 14s. If you want to be mean, up the max from 12 to a value guaranteed to put them well below a merchant hull. That would take into account that SH4 skippers will likely always set the fish as shallow as possible—unlike RL where they set the fish 10 feet below the hull as they read the draft from ONI 208-J. I'd be willing to bet that a very large % of the mk14 failures were probably in part due to doctrine. They looked up the target, saw the draft was 15 feet, and had the fish set for 25 feet. The fish then ran at 35-37 feet due to the miscalibrated depth keeping. Even if they aimed the fish 1 ft below the hill, it would run 11-13 feet below. Since players know this, you'd need to do something "nasty" to make them run deep even set shallow.

tater

[fireship4]

tater did you say contact fuses used to break on early mk14s unless they were at a shallow angle? So a 90deg shot should be impossible for contacts? Wow that's rubbish. Those engineers should have been shot or something. I'm all for it if its what they had to deal with (because ill stick with the sugar boats :). Is it possible to simulate the angle thing?

In regards to the +10 foot that they gave for magnetic shots, is there any way of reflecting that this is still an effective (when the torpedo works) shot, because (ive heard) its not the explosion but the cavity in the water which causes a ship to buckle etc. Currently I would imagine a torpedo does less damage in game depending on how far i explodes from the ship.

[tater]

Yes, the contact pistol broke at 90 degree impacts, only grazing angles were unlikely to break the contact exploder. They never live fired any mk14s to test them, they didn't want to waste the money, lol.

The faster torpedo speed smashed the pin. On slow speed, they should actually be OK.

For a while there was a standing order to set up shots so the fish would impact at an angle.

[Ducimus]

I see we've both been reading "Silent Running".

[Peto]

Yes, the contact pistol broke at 90 degree impacts, only grazing angles were unlikely to break the contact exploder. They never live fired any mk14s to test them, they didn't want to waste the money, lol.

The faster torpedo speed smashed the pin. On slow speed, they should actually be OK.

For a while there was a standing order to set up shots so the fish would impact at an angle.

Ironically, when they discovered that they needed a different metal to make the firing pins out of, they had right there at Pearl Harbor. They used the propellers from the Japanese aircraft that had been shot down as it was a strong alloy.

Prematures: One of the big reasons magnetic pistols prematured was because the torpedo moving at 46 knots created it's own magnetic field. If a skipper was lucky and in the right area, all the factors cancelled each other out and he sank ships. But that was by far the exception...

Also--if it's possible to model--the submarines opertating out of Pearl were the first to deactivate the magnetic exploder. Adm Christie in Australia refused to do so. Why? He had helped develope the Mark VI Exploder. :shifty:

[jazman]

Is it possible to change values based on date? Some of the problems were debugged a bit over time.

[Ducimus]

Is it possible to change values based on date? Some of the problems were debugged a bit over time.

Well ya, in short, theres two types of catagories here, "torpedo problem era" and "post torpedo problem era". The sim file has specifics for both. I plan on making the torpedo problem era, and then making *some* failures occur after that era, but not many. Right now they'll run flawelessly after, i think 19430601, nevermind the pracitcaly run flawlessly before that date.

[jazman]

Is it possible to change values based on date? Some of the problems were debugged a bit over time.

Well ya, in short, theres two types of catagories here, "torpedo problem era" and "post torpedo problem era". The sim file has specifics for both. I plan on making the torpedo problem era, and then making *some* failures occur after that era, but not many. Right now they'll run flawelessly after, i think 19430601, nevermind the pracitcaly run flawlessly before that date.
Great. I've played with the NSM harcore torpedo mod, and it drives me crazy...bring all those fish all that way for *nothin'*. The torpedo problems were such a big part of the Pacific sub war.

[Ducimus]

I have to say this is frustrating, because consistant results are near impossible to obtain.

[TDK1044]

- 1 out of every 3 torpedos fired should be a dud.

- Every 2 out of 5 should explode prematurely, even in a calm sea.

- even with a depth of 5 feet, a fish should have a chance of being a deep runner and go under the target argubly every 2 out of 5 torpedos.


I hope this will be an option and not forced into the mod. Even though your data is accurate, I don't believe the US sub Captains assumed that one out of every three torpedos they fired would be a dud.....nor that two out of every five would explode prematurely. Was it a possibility? Sure, but they could equally fire ten torps with no problems at all and then fire five and have two duds.

This is a can of worms not worth opening in my view.

[tater]

Well, if there is a 3:5 failure rate (60%), then there is no reason why you might not fire 30 in a row with no problems. just like you can flip a coin 100 times and get the same result. The last result has no bearing on the next.

[TDK1044]

I'll bet there are sub captains who never had a dud torpedo, or at least were not aware of it because they may have classified a dud as a miss in the heat of battle. Other captains may have had many duds.

The real point to me is that you can't create a mathematical formula within the game to represent a historical perception regarding dud torpedoes. We know there were duds, and we can estimate approximately how many.....but the key word is approximately.

If this is to be included in TM, please make it an Add On. :D

[tater]

The dud chances for contact pistols on mk14s at the right angles (right angles, basically, lol) were very very high.

Run depth errors should also be 100%. Their run depth was calibrated wrong, so they always ran deep. The only way they'd run at the right depth was if they had a mistake and ran shallow as an error. Because player know this, I'd make the magnitude higher than RL. I bet the majority of mk14 "duds" were deep runners since they ALL ran 10-12 feet deep. The skippers used pre-war doctrine and set the depth below the keel, then you subtract another 10-12 feet and every fish misses unless it fails and runs SHALLOW, lol.

One thing regarding the mag pistol, ducimus: I can't recall the radius it functions at. 1.5m? USN doctrine was to put the fish 10+ feet below the keel. One way to get this in game would be to increase the radius that the detonator is effective to maybe 3.5m, then increase the failure rate. It'd be a reason to shoot them under the keel, but it would be hard given the depth errors.

tater

[Ducimus]

TDK1044, i think im looking for like a 65% so success rate on the torpedos. Im not trying to produce a hardcore torpedo mod here. I think the fish are entirely too reliable (seems like they're 90% relaible), but i dont want to drive you or i nuts with the constant thud of a dud..

Im trying to find the middle ground between what some would feel is a historically correct malfunction rate, and a rate that is not too frustrating to people who don't want a historically correct malfunction rate. Trust me, i dont want to go and find all my fish dudding on me just as much as you don't.

[Wilcke]

Having used the Hardcore Torp Mod in 1.3, that is one frustrating and unerviving piece of reality.......DUD.....DUD.... DUD....Deep Runner.....Circle Runner(aaaaaaaaH) DUD....DUD.....PREMATURE>>>>>>KaBoom(a hit):lol:

Wow, but sometimes you would get a whole load of good ones. I don't know I guess that play balance is the way to go...65% will keep it interesting to say the least.:up:

Wilcke

[Misfit138]

Having used the Hardcore Torp Mod in 1.3, that is one frustrating and unerviving piece of reality.......DUD.....DUD.... DUD....Deep Runner.....Circle Runner(aaaaaaaaH) DUD....DUD.....PREMATURE>>>>>>KaBoom(a hit):lol:

In the next version the Mark 10 torpedoes are more realiable than now. The downside is that Mark 14 will be even worse :p

[Ducimus]

but sometimes you would get a whole load of good ones.


Thats what makes this hard to mod. Even with an unmodifed stock torpedo sim file, you'll occasionally have a batch of badfish.

Thats the behavior really, in stock, you'll have no duds, then once in a blue moon when all the stars are aligned and the fat lady is singing, every fish you shoot is a dud.

Simiarly, when modding this, ill find that im not getting enough duds, and then BAAM, that fat lady starts singing again, and dud.. dud. dud. dud. Or, impact, impact impact impact. Once you find a setting you *think* is working, the game will go one way or the other. Its very hard to nail down.

[Misfit138]

Simiarly, when modding this, ill find that im not getting enough duds, and then BAAM, that fat lady starts singing again, and dud.. dud. dud. dud. Or, impact, impact impact impact. Once you find a setting you *think* is working, the game will go one way or the other. Its very hard to nail down.

Out of curiosity, does this happen with certain torpedoes only or with all of them?

Based on all the tweaking I've been doing, this seems to be a big pain in the ass only with Mark 14 torpedoes...

[Ducimus]

Mark 14's are the sole focus of my attention :88)

[Galanti]

I can't look at the files right now, but I'm almost certain there was a random seed variable defined somewhere in the My Documents/SH4 folder.

Maybe this gets reset every patrol, and thus accounts for wild fluctuation in matters of chance in SH4.

[tater]

On reason I bring up the couple of known, nearly 100% (if not actually 100%) mk 14 failures is that in modding those in, you should really get the vast majority of the RL malfunctions.

The problem is that the error rate in stock SH4 assumes that the fish were basically OK, but then had a random chance of various and sundry failues that combined create the mk14 problem. In RL, there are 2 issues: Failures (real duds), and design errors. The bulk of the mk14 problems were fundamental to the design. They in fact functioned exactly as they were designed to. They were badly designed.

Design failures (the bulk of RL mk14 problems):
1. Deep runners should be 100% until the date they fixed them, this was not a random failure, they were built to run 10-12 feet below their set value. NO skippers had them run at the right depth, not ever. The magnitude of the depth error should be ~10-12 feet, though perhaps it might go 9 to 15 or something like that to take into account everyone setting them at min depth.

2. The contact exploder is another. The failure rate should be very very high at high speed within a range of impact angles. 90 to 70-80 degrees, perhaps, with a large % like 80-90%. At slow speed ideally it would be 0%, or very very low to represent actual duds instead of a design error.

3. The magnetic pistol. This one is the blend between design failures, and real "duds." The design was such that the results were actually unpredictable, and varied with the target hull, magnetic field in the target area, etc, ad naseum. The plus in game is that a random number actually works for this one accurately.

Real duds:
4. Failures of maintenance, material failures (bad batch of explosive in the pistol, flawed internal parts, etc), etc. This would be the circle runner %, and some of the "dud" problems.

I'm not sure what a realistic value for #3 should be, frankly. I think 1 and 2 should be 100% and 80-90% in the right angle range respectively. #4 will be a very small number.

That's for a historical baseline. For gameplay, perhaps lower on 3 by a bunch, but I think 1 and 2 should be realistic since the player can control them entirely (within reason). Perhaps for TM set the deep runners to 10-12, no slop. The player will set them shallow, so no effect. #2 they have to plan attacks not to T-bone the target with fast fish. 3 and 4 become the random element, but the %s should be very small for 4, and 3 is the big question mark.



tater

[Ducimus]

RE depth errors.
Remember, i have two possible settings for depth errors for the first era pistol.

Im expermenting with a 60% chance of a depth devation of 1.5 to 5 meters for the first one

and for the second one, a 40% chance of a deviation of 9 meters, to 10 meters. This particuarl one, im aiming at folks like myself, who always shoot shallow, and never bother with magnetic pistols. Idea being, *occasionally*, you get a real deep runner that thwarts even your (my) own smartassedness :rotfl:

[tater]

I'd say that the minimum depth deviation should be 3m. X% at 3m-4m, and 100-X% at 3.5 to 6-7m.

With X maybe 60-70%.

I can see the point of really deep though, since they'd set for a CA plus 10 feet, for example, then the fish runs another 10 deep and it gos 20ft under.

tater

[Ducimus]

Im having trouble with the chance percentages.


Are they independant checks, or do they have to be a summation of 100%?

For instance

60% chance for 1 error, 40% chance for the other- thats 100%.

But.. 100% torpedo depth error is not what im getting.

It seems to be handleing each error seperatly.

Error number 1, 40% chance to pass?

error number to, 60% chance to pass?

What would happen if i set error number 1 to 99% and error number 2 to 40 or 50 percent? Would error number 2 even occur then?
.

[fireship4]

Well I would guess that in the one out of 100 times that error 1 does not happen, error 2 would have a 40 or 50% chance of happening. So in effect error 2 has a 1 in 200 chance of happening.

That is unless they are compound, ie more than one error can happen at the same time and they add on to each other.

BTW may I ask does anybody know what range a magnetic exploder torpedo explodes at from a ship in-game? Is this moddable?

[Ducimus]

2 meters, and yes its moddable.

[Ducimus]

Think i almost have a decent test version going now.

[Ducimus]

Ok first, let me reiterate the stated goal in MS paint:

http://www.ducimus.net/sh4/release/torp_goal.jpg
My intent, is to get somewhere in the shade of grey. It's also not my intent to make another hardcore torpedo mod. There is already one out there, there is no need for me to reinvent the wheel. However, stock game, after reaping in 20,000 tons and not even trying, i decided that i have to do SOMETHING about these super reliable stock torpedo's.


So here's the file. Let me know your findings if you try it out.
http://www.ducimus.net/sh4/release/WIP_TM_Torpedo_1.0.7z

[Ducimus]

Can someone else playtest this for me, before i do something rash and stick in a mod revision in the not to distant future?

[Misfit138]

I took a quick look into this and it seems you have the same problem with Mark 14 torpedoes as I do. They are too reliable when using magnetic pistol. Did 2 tests and every single one of them detonated ok

Also did 2 tests using a contact pistol and high speed. 8 torpedoes, one deep runner, one hit on a target. All the rest bounced off from the hull

[swdw]

I hope this will be an option and not forced into the mod. Even though your data is accurate, I don't believe the US sub Captains assumed that one out of every three torpedos they fired would be a dud.....nor that two out of every five would explode prematurely. Was it a possibility? Sure, but they could equally fire ten torps with no problems at all and then fire five and have two duds.

Actually, in the evaluation of the Wahoo's 6th patrol, one of the criticism's of Morton's tactics was only firing a single fish at a target. The higher ups considered a 2 torpedo spread a minimum and a spread of 3 the recommended practice . Part of this was to compensate for an calculation errors, and the other part was because they new problems could arise with the torpedoes.

And on Peto's comment- some enterprising torpedo men would pull the pin's and machine their own instead of waiting for them to be supplied to the boat. Bubbleheads have always been an enterprising bunch.:)

One thing that I haven't seen in the game yet is a fish broaching. When that happend and they dove back into the water ANYTHING could happen. circles, veering off, diving down at a steep angle and so on. This was not as common a problem, but occasionally the cause of a fish going to deep, was because it actually started too shallow. Especially in rougher seas.

[LukeFF]

One thing that I haven't seen in the game yet is a fish broaching. When that happend and they dove back into the water ANYTHING could happen. circles, veering off, diving down at a steep angle and so on. This was not as common a problem, but occasionally the cause of a fish going to deep, was because it actually started too shallow. Especially in rougher seas.

On at least one occasion of a circle-runner hitting a submarine (Wahoo, I believe), one of the eyewitnesses to the event said the torpedo jumped out of the water before circling back around. So yes, a torpedo breaching the water was no bueno all around.

[AVGWarhawk]

Duci, I'm giving this a try. Will let you know what I find:up:

Edit:
I did the torpedo the bad guy tutorial (of sorts) and I found the mix to be pretty good. Basically 1 out of every four was a under runner or the magnetic pistol did not function. I had one that ran to fast. Don't as me how. This first of the four past the bow by a good margin. The remaining 3 were on target. With the solution the same for each torpedo the firsts fast should have been a hit. I did not experience any duds. On a second try I had a premie (calm seas). Two worked fine with magnetic exploder. The other was just contact and worked fine. Third attempt I had 1 under runner and the rest worked fine. My personal opinion, tweak the torpedoes just a hair worse than what you have here.