[REQ] Gorch Fock class sailing ships

[Woof1701]

Hey there.

Just had a wild idea ...
As you might know, Germany owned three tall ships for training purposes in WW2. And a fourth one was built for Romania and even one more was built in 1957. All of those ships still exist today! "Gorch Fock (I)" after a long eventful life has come back to Germany and now is a museum ship, "Gorch Fock (II)" from 1957 is the German Navy's school ship, "Albert Leo Schlageter" today is the Portuguese Navy's "Sagres (II)" school ship, "Mircea" still is the Romanian school ship and "Horst Wessel" sails as the US Coast Guard Cutter "Eagle"). Therefore I believe it would be appropriate to have those ships around in SH3.
Although I know it must be a tremendous effort to create those ships, and I have no idea how to do it or even help, I just wanted to toss the idea around. Maybe some model of a three-masted bark is around and could be adapted.

BTW: In addition to those four ships, five of the famous German P-Liners ("Padua", "Peking", "Pommern", "Passat" and "Pamir") which were built before the first World War, survived until after WW2 and all except "Pamir", which sank in the Atlantic in 1957, still exist today too. "Padua" still sails as the Russian training ship "Krusenstern".

[Alex]

http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/7339/sanstitremd1.png

:88)

Very good idea, mate, though it's going to be a big amount of job... :huh:
I find very sarcastic from the US navy to have this ship sailing as a US coast guard. :roll:

[Kaleu. Jochen Mohr]

would be nice to see them indeed :)

[Paul.Saenger]

Very good idea, mate, though it's going to be a big amount of job... :huh:
I find very sarcastic from the US navy to have this ship sailing as a US coast guard. :roll:

Why? They are fine ships and using prizes is nothing new in maritime history. Every nation did this.

[swuboo]

Yeah, I'm not sure precisely what you're objecting to with regard to the Eagle, Alex. For reference though, the United States Coast Guard is not part of the United States Navy. It's an entirely separate and independent branch of the military, just as the Navy itself is.

With regard to the actual topic of the thread, I would absolutely love to see these ships in SH3, but I have some reservations. As far as I know, sails are static objects like any other, and I doubt there's any way to make AI ships respect wind gages. (Please correct me if I'm wrong---I'm basing that off of my observations of sloops and junks in GWX.)

I think seeing a barquentine proceeding directly into the wind with full canvas in 15m/s wind would destroy immersion like nothing else.

That said... they'd make great harbor decoration, no? Seems like they'd be a lot less work if they were never meant to go anywhere, and cluttering up the German recognition manual doesn't strike me as particularly problematic.

[Alex]

:-?
Do a simple search through wiki, guys, I find quite weird to have the ex-Horst Wessel (named for the well known member of the Nazi partei to the bone :roll:), as a part of the US coast guard, even if it can be considered as a simple prize. That's all.

[/off-topic]

[Woof1701]

Well, I think the fact that the ships were used as prizes was the reason they still exist, and that three of them are still sailing and serving their purpose, so we should be glad.

What I find strange enough was that "Gorch Fock (I)" became the Soviet training ship "Tovarsihsch", while Horst Wessel became the American training ship "Eagle". So you can say for almost 50 years the two opposing super powers used more or less identical ships to train their crews and even today they still both use German sailing ships. Although the Gorch Fock (I) returned to Germany, the ex-"Padua" now "Krusenstern" is still a Russian training vessel. :)
Let's hope this fact will keep these ships at sea for a long time so that they might one day become as famous as the HMS Victory and the USS Constitution.

As to the problem with sailing against the wind: You're right of course, but in my opinion without a weather report it's not easy to know were the wind is coming from in SH3, so to me the immersion killer is not a problem.

[Madox58]

Sails?
Static objects?
:rotfl:
;)

[Paul.Saenger]

:-?
Do a simple search through wiki, guys, I find quite weird to have the ex-Horst Wessel (named for the well known member of the Nazi partei to the bone :roll:), as a part of the US coast guard, even if it can be considered as a simple prize. That's all.

[/off-topic]

Please, I think everyone knows who Horst Wessel was. Three guesses why they renamed it after all.