Doubt this can be done without the source code, but . . .

[Albrecht Von Hesse]

I've always been of two minds about autotargeting versus manual targeting.

One the one hand I feel that, as the Captain, the reason I have Officers and crew is to have them perform the duties they were trained and assigned to do. And one of those duties is, as weapon officer, is to take the bearing, range, etc. measurements I take at the periscope/UZO and calculate firing solutions.

On the other hand, I do enjoy the challenge of having to actually take visual readings and come up with those measurements in order to enter them into the TDC. (OLC, I can't wait to finish my current patrol and get started practicing and using your GUI!)

Problem is, when I'm doing manual targeting there is no one to assist me, nor is their anyone taking over the duty as Captain. No one requesting updated sound checks, or scanning the area between calculations, etc.

I could wish there was a compromise of sorts though. I have an idea but, alas, I highly doubt it could be done without the source code. But it would be nice if, when using autotargeting, the WO wasn't physcic and was instantaly coming up with ranges, speeds, etc. If there was some sort of time delay between locking onto a target and getting that information . . .

Say, 5 - 15 seconds to get a target ID then, after that, another 15 - 30 seconds to calculate the range, AoB and speed. With various times depending on weather conditions, day versus moon/moonless nights and WO experience.

Anyone have any idea of this is possible as things stand now?

[Pisces]

Just the other day I read someone write (in response to OLC iirc, don't know where) that he added a silent space at the end of some WO related soundfile. I think it delayed the message line appearing with the targetsolution.

[Albrecht Von Hesse]

Just the other day I read someone write (in response to OLC iirc, don't know where) that he added a silent space at the end of some WO related soundfile. I think it delayed the message line appearing with the targetsolution.

Well, that sounds promising. :D

Now if there is/was some way to delay the information from appearing on the notepad, and thus to the TDC . . .

[onelifecrisis]

I didn't see that reply :-? but...

Now if there is/was some way to delay the information from appearing on the notepad, and thus to the TDC . . .

Silent space on the end of the sound file would do exactly that. :yep:

It would still be perfect every time though. :nope:

[Samwolf]

IIRC it was the original Silent Hunter that had a system that worked by making you have to keep your scope on target for a while to get a 100% solution. I remember watching the % go up the longer you followed the target. Too bad they didn't go with that system in SH3.

[Pisces]

That particular post I meant is the following (on page 45 of the main OLC gui mod thread; OLC: next time, read slower. ;)):


http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showpost.php?p=768282&postcount=895

[onelifecrisis]

read slower

Umm, yeah, good advice! :oops: :rotfl:

[joegrundman]

Also Albrecht von Hesse, it appears that you may be confusing the protocol on the surface and when submerged. On the surface, the weapon officer did the firing solution, but when submerged it was the Kaleun. As only the attack scope was up when close, that meant only one person was looking, and that was the kaleun, played in this game by you.

The only real assistance you would have had was having someone looking up the ship in the recognition manuals according to the description of the target you provided, and then someone else would have prgrammed the TDC, and possibly played with sliderules. The AOB finder tool would have been done by you, however. This is simulated by the notepad function albeit poorly, and in the case of attack scope TDC mods, is hardly more convenient than putting it in the TDC yourself.

So I think that doing it yourself while submerged is, after all is considered, the only "most realistic" option available.

[Tomcattwo]

I am currently working on a conversion of SH4Speech by Minsc_tdp to SH3. Part of the functionality included in this conversion is the ability for you to do periscope observations very similarly to what is done in real life. While it won't "give" you solutions, it will help automate the way you provide solution input to the simulation and is very near to what you'd do in real life to generate a solution from periscope observations.

In periscope (or UZO if surfaced) you speak into your microphone the words "Ship ID" or "ID Ship" or "Janes" or "Recognition Manual" or "Erkemmungs hand book" and your recognition book will pop open automatically. Look up your target and click on the checkmark, then say "Close book" and your book will be automagically put away for you.

For instance, when you are doing a periscope (or UZO) observation on your target, Master-1, you will lock onto the target (either using the button or by saying "Lock target" into your microphone). Then you can say "Range" and the mouse will automagically move to your notepad and will automatically press the Range "button" and then press your stadimeter callup button automatically for you...You adjust the stadimeter and click the left mouse button, and say "Range Mark!" and the range will be updated in notepad (mouse will automatically press the checkmark). You say "Target Angle" or "Angle on the Bow" and the mouse will move and press Angle on the Bow, calling up the AOB notrepad) You say "Starboard nine five" or "Right ninety five" and the mouse will click on the appropriate Angle on the bow and set it for you on the notepad. You say "Update" and the mouse will press the checkmark, updating the angle on the bow into the notepad. You say "Calculate speed" and the mouse will automatically press the Speed button. You say "Start" and the chronometer will start. You click the mouse to stop it. You say "Update" and the checkmark is clicked by your mouse automatically and the speed calculated is updated in your notepad. You say "Update solution" and your solution is sent to the TDC (the mouse automagically clicks your checkmark). Don't want to enter it? Just say "delete" or "cancel" or "scratch that" or "don't enter that" and the X will be automatically pressed by your mouse, deleting your last entry. So you are basically telling your crew what information to pass into the TDC and they are doing it - on your voice commands, in real time. It took me a lot longer to describe it than it takes to actually do it. With practice, your periscope observations for bearing, range and angle on the bow can be on the order of 10 seconds or less (more if you do speed calculations, of course). If you want to go look at the plot, just say "Attack map" or "TDC" and you'll be there. You can direct updates to torpedo settings and solution parameters there also by voice (planned functionality - programmed in, but not tested yet).

SH3Speech (conversion from SH4Speech) will allow you to basically give every order that you as Kaleun would give to your crew in this simulation, with very little need to use the mouse or keyboard. It really provides excelent in-game immersion and is as close as you'll come to really being the CO. There are over 3500 orders you can give in SH3Speech that the game will recognize and act upon, including course orders ("Come right 30 degrees" will cause your mouse to move to the course dial, and click on a course 30 degrees to the right of your present course), rudder orders ("Right 15 dgrees rudder" will cause the rudder dial to be activated by the mouse at right 15), speed orders in a variety of ways ("All ahead Full" or "Ahead Full" or "Helm Ahead Full" or "Both Engines Full Ahead" or "Both Engines full ahead together" will all cause the Engine order telegraph to order up ahead full; order "Both 70 revolutions ahead" and your knotmeter dial will be clicked for 7 knots), depth orders (on either shallow or deep depth gauges, for instance, "Chief make your depth seventy meters" or "Dive make your depth one three meters" or even "Watch Officer, run decks awash" to get you to 7 meters on the surface). If you can order it, the program will understand it, and will carry out your order (if it is a legal order in the game, that is). This program does more than just generate keypresses by voice command - it actually moves the mouse and clicks the right place on the screen to do what you just told it to do using your voice and microphone. That is something that other voice recognition programs (such as SHOOT - as good as it is) can't do. The default program is set up so that you press and hold a keyboard key (~) to "key" the microphone, but you can also set it up so that anything you say will be parsed by the program (if you are in a quiet environment).

I am working with the author of SH4Speech, Minsc_tdp, on the conversion for SH3 and am about 60-70% completed, testing an "alpha" version of the program/files now. Do not ask when I will be done - it will be released when it is done and when I am satisfied with it that it works the way I want it to. The above descriptions have already been tested and they work in SH3 GWX2. To use it, you'll need to Microsoft Speech SAPI 5.1 Voice Recognizer installed. You can download that for free from Microsoft.com. You'll also need a microphone and a sound card that allows you to use the microphone. You may also need a patient family who don't think you are nuts for talking to your submarine game on your computer :)

This conversion is being written to support GWX2 and "stock" SH3 with patch 1.4 It will not work completely correctly with other GUI mods such as OLCGUI (because the dials are not in the same locations as they are in GWX - depending on how long it takes to get the GWX2 version out, I may or may not do another revision to support other GUIs such as OLCGUI)

This may help somewhat with your desire to get closer to what it is really like commanding a U-Boat without having to do all the work yourself.
R/
TC2

[Albrecht Von Hesse]

:o :o :o :o

That sounds awesome Tomcattwo! Forgive me for saying so, but now I'm eagerly waiting for this!