Weapons officer and manual firing

[undercovergeek]

Trying to be authentic as possible but scared of manual targeting!

Im looking for some kind of halfway house, so if i choose manual targeting and weapons officer on, can i track the target for speed and AOB and then hand it to the weapons officer and he creates the solution or if he is switched on will he always come up with a laser guided solution?

[Jimbuna]

The WO is either on or off....you can however disable map udates. Some players consider that a kind of 'halfway house'

[kenijaru]

if you disable the auto targeting you wont get 100% certain solutions as soon as your scope touches a ship, so you must use manual BUT, if you didnt disable the WO's asistance you can ask him to do it for you.


Also, if you get AOB and speed you have done most of the job, you just need range (that's the easiest part.... usualy) as soon as you enter those 3 variables on the TDC that magical analog computer will do the nesesary calculations.

[undercovergeek]

cool thanks

[XLjedi]

Personally, I'm better at visualizing or projecting a target path. If you can do that, you can use your scope in SH3 like a whiz-wheel to automatically calculate the AoB for you. :yep:

I most frequently develop my firing solutions ahead of time, while enroute to my attack station and many times without any actual visual observations.

I made note of the technique I use in the following patrol report:
10th Patrol of U-53 - Radio Contact Intercept (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=121786)

[Philipp_Thomsen]

People say that the weapon officer is perfect and very quick... but i dont think so!

Yesterday i was playing manual tdc and weap officer on... i asked for ship identification, he would take about 3 or 4 seconds to find it... sure, a little too fast... about the solution, another 4, 5 seconds... again pretty fast... but the first 3 torpedos i fired (tube open and solution 1 second before firing) missed, and the target didnt changed speed/course... Also i asked a solution on a ship that was moving backwards about 3 or 4 kts, he gave me that it was moving on about 32kts... i knew that was wrong so i asked again, he said again 32kts...

So yes, he misses quite a good number of times (at least for me)

If the ship is big and its moving straight and slowly, he wont miss, and so are you!
If the ship is small and its turning and changing speed, he will miss, and so are you!

So i guess using the weapon officer is quite ok, at least for me...

But about the "no contact map update" i find it very... hm... how should i put it... :hmm: .. its just not right... i mean, someone spot a ship and yell "ship spotted, bering 330, range 3200m... so tell me, its IMPOSSIBLE to draw a gotdammed ship in the map using the tools on its close location? no, its very possible, and very very easy. And the sonar, the sonarman yells "ship bering 276, medium speed, closing, long distance"... again its very very easy to take a ruler and a compass and draw a freaking straight line from the uboat and a small triangle in the end representing the ship. What shouldn't be done is updating this drawings in real-time... if it was in intervals of, lets say, 30 seconds, or more depending on the number of contacts around, that would be perfect...

So i leave the contact update on, coz i think thats closer to reality then off...

[jimmie]

you missed probably because the solution made by WO was already degraded at the time when it was supposed to hit. So, he is accurate.

For the map, it's very unlikely you can update many ships in short time.. And I don't think you can mesure if what you're seeing is at 270 or 275; binos don't have compass built-in. And since the map is always perfectly accurate, in my opinion map update is even more unrealitic than the WO.

[Tobus]

Find and try the most excellent OLC GUI mod in the SH3 mods forum. It is a recreation of what U-boot commanders actually had back in the day. The mod is accompanied by a great manual/video and, while it doesn't look like it at first glance, actually makes manual targetting easier and more accurate. This is thé mod to have, next to GWX2 and SH3commander (naturally).

[joea]

And I don't think you can mesure if what you're seeing is at 270 or 275; binos don't have compass built-in.

I was sure some did, I've seen modern ones that do. :hmm:

[TomcatMVD]

But about the "no contact map update" i find it very... hm... how should i put it... :hmm: .. its just not right... i mean, someone spot a ship and yell "ship spotted, bering 330, range 3200m... so tell me, its IMPOSSIBLE to draw a gotdammed ship in the map using the tools on its close location? no, its very possible, and very very easy.
Not if you're playing stock SHIII

[GoldenRivet]

in my younger days I was studying tarchitecture and design drafting... I found that the quarter inch scale of my old engineering ruler worked well at plotting solutions on paper... 1/4 inch = 100 meters. This method of plotting solutions on paper works well for shots between 500 and 2500 meters range. My old 360 degree protractor works well for determining target heading and AOB. Speed is determined by the time elapsed between the first and last observations when compared to the distance the target covered. This method takes between 2 and 4 minutes per shot and with practice I have developed the ability to obtain about an 85%-95% chance of scoring a hit.

My point... If you have the required tools you don't even need a map screen, only a representation of the TDC and the periscope/UZO view.

[BulSoldier]

Find and try the most excellent OLC GUI mod in the SH3 mods forum. It is a recreation of what U-boot commanders actually had back in the day. The mod is accompanied by a great manual/video and, while it doesn't look like it at first glance, actually makes manual targetting easier and more accurate. This is thé mod to have, next to GWX2 and SH3commander (naturally).

Absolutely true ! :up:

[Tobus]

Absolutely true ! :up:

Hehe, I think that, had the real U-boot skippers had to work with the stock-sh3 manual targetting instead of what OLC has essentialy re-created from reallife, they'd have transferred straight out of the Navy and into the Army!

I can't believe I actually could live with the original manual targetting. Now I have the proper tools and can shoot torps like a sniper. I'm even a decent shot when all goes to sh*t and my only hope of escape is shooting my rear-torp at an approaching escort "from the hip", then crashdiving and crossing my fingers.

[jimmie]

And I don't think you can mesure if what you're seeing is at 270 or 275; binos don't have compass built-in.
I was sure some did, I've seen modern ones that do. :hmm:
I'm talking about typical equipments of U-boat crew at the war, and they had the compass built-in? :hmm: