16km Atmosphere advice needed...

[Kpt, Otto]

Need some advice.

I am thinking of using the 16km atmosphere as at the moment using the 8km standard visual range seems to be putting my crew in danger!

They only seem to spot ships at around 5000 meters on a clear day? By then its sometimes too late to get into a proper attack position. :huh:

The only thing is that when I am in harbour the graphics go a little slow. Nothing too much to worry about but just a little slow and that’s what has put me off so far and also I have heard that the 16km atmosphere can be a little troublesome at times with black horizons and difficulties with other mods. :hmm:

So I was just wondering how people are getting along with the 16km Atmosphere and is it possible to enable it mid patrol?

Any advice is much appreciated :up:

I am using:

SH3 Commander
GWX 2.0
And looking at enabling OLC environment mod when I reach port.

Spec are:
AMD 2.6 duel core 5000
EVGA superclocked 7950 GX2
4 GB balistix RAM

I use nhancer to improve graphics.

[melnibonian]

...Nothing too much to worry about but just a little slow and that’s what has put me off so far and also I have heard that the 16km atmosphere can be a little troublesome at times with black horizons and difficulties with other mods. :hmm:

So I was just wondering how people are getting along with the 16km Atmosphere and is it possible to enable it mid patrol?


You do get the black horisons only if you enable mods mid patrol and you don't rollback SH3Cmdr. Other than that the 16K Atm works fine and gives you a far more realistic feeling in your game. With your spacs you should have no problems really but the easier way is to try it and see for yourself. If you have low FPS then just switch back to the 8Km and you should be OK

[filefool]

I started using the 16km mod when i got my new computer about 3 months ago and i must say it's fantastic. You can approach a convoy on the surface in broad daylight and calm seas, because your crew can see the escorts at 12-14 km. And you've still got enough time to dive and plan your attack.

So if your PC can handle it, use it. :up:

[flakmonkey]

Only problem i encountered when trying the 16k atmosphere was that my crew could see ships on the horizon just fine but i couldnt!

A small to medium sized ship 15-16k away (at default 1024x768) is much less than a single pixel so just isnt visible, which kind of bugged me so i switched back to 8k.

[Sailor Steve]

On the other hand I love that part. In Aces of the Deep you would sometimes get the report "Smoke on the horizon, sir!" With 16km I do get "Ship Sighted!" and then what do I see? Columns of smoke!:rock:

[Jimbuna]

I must admit to not knowing precisely what 'nhancer' is, but in addition to what Mel has said........Your game engine is now rendering everything to a radius of 16km which equates to 32km as opposed to the alternative option which is 16km.
That can and usually does have an impact on your fps, unless of course you have a machine with high end specs. http://www.psionguild.org/forums/images/smilies/wolfsmilies/pirate.gif

[Kpt, Otto]

On the other hand I love that part. In Aces of the Deep you would sometimes get the report "Smoke on the horizon, sir!" With 16km I do get "Ship Sighted!" and then what do I see? Columns of smoke!:rock:

This is what I am looking for. At the moment I get "ship spotted sir" and once I am on the conning tower I find the ship at anything from 3500m to 4600m depending on the conditions. This only gives about a 1000m before they spot me!

Sometimes when I am looking through the binoculars I see the ship before the crew does at around 5000m which again is frustrating at times.

Yep im going to give the 16km mod a try and will instsll it once I reach Kiel. :up:

Thanks for all of your help. :rock:


Good hunting!

[Antiacus]

My concern is that it will only worsen the phenomenon of being spotted at incredibly long distances by ai when in heavy weather & fog.

[danurve]

Kpt, Otto; there's very few things I would enable mid-patrol. Especialy something like 16k.

My current rig is a single core 3200 2ghz 939 with 2 gigs ddr & a 256 AGP and it handles 1.03 & 16k ok. With only minor chops in port. About the only other chop is when I'm zoomed in on a burning ship or the blurr in the scope. Your rig sounds like it would have n/p.

TMO SHIII does not take advantage of a dual core.
Not to hijack the thread but if I get a chance to upgrade to dual cores & dual monitors I was thinking it would be cool to have the game on my trusty CRT and a rotated flat screen with operation spinetz rolling or some jazz.

[Konovalov]

I have been using the 16 clicks mod for a long time now and would never consider going back to 8. Your system specs look more than adequate to run the 16km mod. Go for it. :rock:

[Antiacus]

Oh wait. I guess a already am using the 16k. People have me paranoid with reports of being spotted at long long range when their vis is less than 3km.

[Sailor Steve]

I forgot to mention that I used the original 16km mod 2+ years ago, and I've never had a complaint.

[Jimbuna]

You might if you use it in some of the future mod releases ;)

[Tessa]

Oh wait. I guess a already am using the 16k. People have me paranoid with reports of being spotted at long long range when their vis is less than 3km.

Just got into port so am in the position to enable a few mods. The 16k still begs the question is this a double edged mod? Though my crew can spot targets are very long ranges can the escorts or lone merchant ships do the same?

Frequently when submerged will have the SO find a merchant at heading xxx, when I pop up the scope there's nothing there; have to stat mashing the L button at +/- 5 degrees of his estimate until it locks on. Then finally hit the target and its 20km+ away or more. I know that you can hear better underwater, but something so far away isn't very useful most of the time when you factor in the amount of fuel you have to burn to get there (assuming its not on your course).

[jmr]

Is there anyway to squelch your deck crew after they spot a ship? It's pretty annoying when they belt out "ship spotted!" over and over again as I'm working myself into attack position.

[Kpt, Otto]

Oh wait. I guess a already am using the 16k. People have me paranoid with reports of being spotted at long long range when their vis is less than 3km.

Just got into port so am in the position to enable a few mods. The 16k still begs the question is this a double edged mod? Though my crew can spot targets are very long ranges can the escorts or lone merchant ships do the same?

Frequently when submerged will have the SO find a merchant at heading xxx, when I pop up the scope there's nothing there; have to stat mashing the L button at +/- 5 degrees of his estimate until it locks on. Then finally hit the target and its 20km+ away or more. I know that you can hear better underwater, but something so far away isn't very useful most of the time when you factor in the amount of fuel you have to burn to get there (assuming its not on your course).

Most of the ships I sink I find using the hydrophones. I will often have the boat submerged and then I will man the hydrophones station myself and listen. I do this when I have reached a common trade route or are near the coast. If I leave it to the SO then often he we only pick up contacts within about 15km when infact in game you can hear upto 25-30km.

When I find a contact at bearing xxx I then listen to hear how close they sound and track them to get a best guess at their course. Then I go to the Nav map and use the compass to place a marker on that bearing.

I then draw a compass circle around my boat out to a range of 30km and do the same for them. This enables me to see the best search pattern to use and plot an intercept point. Then I draw a compass circle of 5km near the intercept area which gives me a point to aim for for when I should make contact.

When I reach that point if I do not make contact I submerge the boat again and listen again for their latest position, and then plot as needed.

So far 8 times out of 10 I get it right. So using the 16km mod should improve things alot as at the moment when a sighting is made using the standard 8km atmosphere they are at 4500m even on a clear day. In such conditions you should see their smoke on the horizon first and act accordingly to get your boat in the best firing position. That is difficult to do using the standard 8km atmosphere.

In convoy actions this is even more important.


16km mod here I come!! I will enable it when I reach port. As for the merchants im sure they will also be able to see further. But I am confident that being able to set up an attack using shaddowing or over hauling the convoy will be much more posible with the 16km mod enabled.
:up:

[Danelov]

Difficult to say.Certainly the things are more easy with the 16 km, but also the visibility play his role for the other side and is relative easy to be spotted at long range.Sometimes the thing is not so realistic, I have detected with the UZO targets at 21 km in a very dark night, long before the watchman.Yes, that was maybe a little second but that give me a idea of the heading and distance of the target.

[Kpt, Otto]

Is there anyway to squelch your deck crew after they spot a ship? It's pretty annoying when they belt out "ship spotted!" over and over again as I'm working myself into attack position.

Yes, the best way I have found is to remove the watch officer from the bridge/conning tower. The only adverse affect is that if any other ships appear over the horizon then there is a chance you wont be notified of them. However this does not happen often in SH3 and besides it just means you have to be more aware of whats going on around you. :D

[Jimbuna]

Whilst surfaced there must always be one crewman up on the bridge.

The method I use is to submerge and head directly toward the target for a few minutes (gametim), then surface and you should then find yourself within range of the crews visionary range/field.

[Kpt, Otto]

I must admit to not knowing precisely what 'nhancer' is, but in addition to what Mel has said........Your game engine is now rendering everything to a radius of 16km which equates to 32km as opposed to the alternative option which is 16km.
That can and usually does have an impact on your fps, unless of course you have a machine with high end specs. http://www.psionguild.org/forums/images/smilies/wolfsmilies/pirate.gif

Nhancer:

Rubini hooked me up to this application to enhance Nvidia graphics and it works well.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=128516


Ive now installed the GWX 16km Mod that came with GWX 2.0 and tested the frame rates in Kiel harbour.

The results were between 22-30 fps using Combined 2xSS / 4x MS anti alaising (8xS) and 16x Anisotropic filtering. The texture filtering I set to Quality.

For my system it seems there has not been very much of a differance in terms of frames hit then using the standard 8km atmosphere. So I am definately sticking with the 16km atmosphere from now on and look forward to shadowing convoys and over hauling them on the surface before attacking.

:up:


Good hunting!

[Jimbuna]

I must admit to not knowing precisely what 'nhancer' is, but in addition to what Mel has said........Your game engine is now rendering everything to a radius of 16km which equates to 32km as opposed to the alternative option which is 16km.
That can and usually does have an impact on your fps, unless of course you have a machine with high end specs. http://www.psionguild.org/forums/images/smilies/wolfsmilies/pirate.gif

Nhancer:

Rubini hooked me up to this application to enhance Nvidia graphics and it works well.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=128516


Ive now installed the GWX 16km Mod that came with GWX 2.0 and tested the frame rates in Kiel harbour.

The results were between 22-30 fps using Combined 2xSS / 4x MS anti alaising (8xS) and 16x Anisotropic filtering. The texture filtering I set to Quality.

For my system it seems there has not been very much of a differance in terms of frames hit then using the standard 8km atmosphere. So I am definately sticking with the 16km atmosphere from now on and look forward to shadowing convoys and over hauling them on the surface before attacking.

:up:


Good hunting!

Those are good fps figures http://www.psionguild.org/forums/images/smilies/wolfsmilies/thumbsup.gif