Observations on Realistic Realism and gameplay

[Bosje]

So you're bored and you start writing something which you think may be worth writing, for consideration by the community.

Why, what?


This is not a comparison of various mods, it is not a set of rules by which to play the game, it is neither a gripe on the stock game nor a celebration of any mod. It is simply what the title suggests: an observation on realistic gameplay in so far as the game engine realistically allows it. These observations are the result of playing Silent Hunter 1 through 4, reading much of what is written on these excellent forums, watching a fair amount of movies and documentaries and reading a modest collection of relevant books. I hope to provide the veterans with an interesting read while providing a number of gameplay suggestions to those newcomers who were looking for ways to enhance their gaming experience by taking submarine warfare seriously. In the course of writing, it inevitably focused on the Atlantic side of things, since that is where most of my own knowledge and gaming experience is based, but I do feel that the basic principles hold true for both operational theatres and as such I feel that this forum is the best place for it. Much of this will apply to SH3 as well but SH4 UBM is simply the latest thing.


As my join date suggests I am a relative newcomer myself. Even if I have been learning much about submarine warfare in WWII, I am likely to be incorrect in some of my comments and observations. In addition to that, historical sources are notoriously one-sided (I have three books myself, each of which contradicts the others on many 'facts'). Fortunately, this community is known to correct itself where needed so I invite (and expect) you all to add your own thoughts and to point out any serious errors. I don't presume much, despite what you may think, lol.


So much for the introduction, let's get cracking.


-
Realistic Realism? Reality check please...


It is a computer game, of course, which means that one is limited to sitting on a deskchair, watching a screen and hitting certain keys on the keyboard. Realistic Realism therefore means the amount of realism you can realistically throw into your approach of the game, if you still follow me. If you get your spouse/girlfriend/offspring/pet/roommate/partner to throw a bucket of water over your head as the boat crashes into an Atlantic roller, you may well wreck some of your hardware. Bad weather resulting in faulty equipment is quite realistic, but perhaps not quite desirable from a gameplay point of view. A childish example but the same applies to many issues that have to do with the much discussed concept of Realism. The Atlantic Ocean towards the end of 1940 featured some severely terrible weather and only one convoy was ever engaged during the whole month of december. Some further sinkings were accomplished due to chance encounters with lone merchants but that was about it (David Mason, U-boat - the secret menace, 1968). These forums, however, are rife with gripes about 3 week rainstorms and not being able to attack anything for a month. A usual comment in such gripes is: 'Having a hard time is fine, but this is just ridiculous!'


So, we don't want a month of bad weather, because we'd spend that month on high time compression waiting for the weather to clear up. I do not expect to find many players who would sit there, looking at the rain, listening to the rain, sulking, reading mildew ridden books, wearing damp clothing and generally being miserable. All the while actually swelling with happiness inside: 'This is fantastic!' Yah, unlikely. So we don't want that kind of realism. We are happy to contend with bad weather for a bit and then we are very happy to find the weather clearing up while we shadow that convoy, setting up for a night attack. That, of course, also happened often enough during the real thing, and we'll all say: 'This is fantastic!' But even if we look for enjoyment from playing our game, most of those who read this will want to live through the fear, horror, excitement and boredom which the real skippers lived through in real life. Immersion is the word.


Realism is in the mind of the beholder. Or somesuch.


“And what the heck is realism anyway? Tater observed that in Trigger Maru, unrealistic enemy behavior results in extremely realistic player behavior. You are properly operating in fear for your life. Wow! How authentic! Therefore you do not take stupid chances. You cannot just duck below the thermal layer, put it on silent running and go eat lunch. You will be dead when you return. When being depth charged, you MUST evade. They will kill you. Be afraid. Very afraid. It's wonderful”


Rockin Robbins nails it down in the above quote. Tigone adds:


“...Accuracy is objective; either the height of this ship's mast in the game is correct or it's not. Realism, though -- the feel, the affective domain in which the game connects with the player -- is much more subjective, and arguably harder to attain. While both accuracy and realism are criticial in an historical game like SH4, the realism factor remains even when there's no real-life counterpart to measure accuracy by (think of almost any science fiction game title)...”


These quotes are taken from a discussion which took place on these forums. Originally titled 'RFB vs TMO', it developed into a very illuminating read about perceived realism. ( http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=140918 )


Realism, then, does not exist anywhere except in the imagination of the player. You are not on a submarine, you are sitting on a deskchair in front of a computer. Possibly smoking a cigarette and drinking a glass of beer as a convoy heaves into view. The curtains are closed because otherwise the monitor would just reflect the interior of your study, rather than reveal the enemy against a star lit sky at night. The lower right corner says it's 1.00 am, December 12th ,1942. But it is also just after dinner on a late summer's evening, 2008. What we are talking about is the illusion of realism, measured by what your imagination expects it to be. As such, each individual's perception will be slightly different. Some will surround themselves with trinkets and memorabilia and gadgets from the era, using authentic sliderules and chronometers to assist with plotting and keeping a written log as the war patrol goes on. Some will park the camera on the pillow of the captain's bed, whisper 'good night, boys' to the radio room crew and go to bed in 2008, hoping their Type VIIB will still be there in 1943 as they wake up. Some will do their own manual targeting, others will allow their crew to take care of that while still attempting realistic gameplay. Whatever floats your boat, as they say. Relative Realism is perhaps a more accurate description and it's largely a matter of taste.


What, then, is the purpose of this post?


As stated in the introduction, I intend to provide the veterans with a hopefully interesting read while providing suggestions to those newcomers who were looking for a proper Submarine Simulator, rather than the arcade game which they got when they bought the thing from the shops. Having said that, the dev team does of course deserve due credit for making the games in the first place. Popular opinion holds that they created the stock games to appeal to the casual gamer while leaving it up to the community to modify it for those who are looking for a more serious and historically accurate approach. Much information can be found on these forums even if it requires much browsing and searching. This post hopefully serves as a decent summary of ways to play the game realistically\historically accurately, leaving it up to the individual to determine what they consider to be real.



From here, I shall attempt to provide thoughts on the various aspects of submarine warfare as you encounter them during play, possibly coming up with the odd dogma or truism.



Should I stay or should I go? Engage or evade aircraft and escorts.


The main factor in all of this is the behaviour of you, the player, the Commander of the boat. Do you dive to safety, do you run away, do you engage or do you do nothing at all? At this stage I am tempted to leave the stock game for what it is but the fact is that you are perfectly free to dive from aircraft, even if the stock game allows you to shoot it out with a good chance of killing the bomber without your boat getting a scratch. Likewise, you are free to either engage a destroyer with your deckgun or to attempt a submerged getaway. You can leave the gun alone, even if the stock game allows surviving a gunfight. Many players will have experience with mods like GWX, TMO and RFB, where one quickly learns to fear aircraft and one no longer even considers using the deckgun for anything other than finishing off a crippled freighter. That is exactly the kind of behaviour displayed by the real skippers and as such, those mods are celebrated as highly realistic, but there is a catch. A German account from the 1950s mentions many surface encounters where the Uboat ran at full speed on the surface, passing destroyers at ranges as close as 200 meters, slipping inside the convoy lanes and picking out the juiciest of targets from within before slipping away in the darkness (Harald Busch, So war der U-Boot Krieg, 1955). This is an impossibility with any game setup I ever tried. Either the game makes them kill you, or the game makes them incompetent boy scouts. Randomness and luck is hard to script. I could be wrong here, of course, since I know little about coding. But even GWX which models the progressive Allied skill as the war drags on, does not allow me to actually go inside the convoy lanes, fire torpedoes and get away on the surface in 1939 (except in rainstorms before radar is available and from my sources, attacking under such conditions was not commonplace). In the end, the stock game is not all that bad for serving our purpose, even if I stay away from it myself. What matters is your decision as the skipper, do you run or do you fight?


So then we can ignore any difference between stock and all the available mods, we can simply take the official submarine manuals of the day and say: The Aircraft is the biggest enemy of The Submarine. Even if you have a pea-shooter and even if you have shot them down in the game before, history tells us that Coastal Command is responsible for the majority of U-boat kills (I don't know about Pacific records but I assume the real skippers were quite afraid of the real Japanese aircraft). You are to be afraid of aircraft and you are to crash dive immediately upon sighting them. Radar, radar warning receivers and an experienced lookout are all aids to increase your survivability, in that you get to dive sooner. Period. (For German crews, during the summer of 1943 it was briefly fashionable to attempt a gunfight, as ordered by BdU since the air patrols were so dense that it became almost impossible to even reach the open ocean from the French ports. However, after losing many boats for only limited successes this order was soon reversed.)


And so we are afraid of aircraft and we dive on sight, sweating and hoping that we survive their initial bombing run.


As for surface ships: warships have a harder time spotting us than we have spotting them (radar aside), so it is possible to evade them on the surface at night or in other low visibility conditions. Radar upsets the balance but it should be noted that your radar is not guaranteed to pick up on them, and vice versa. Your boat is after all a small thing. It is even possible to engage a warship (either capital or escort) from the surface, getting quite close at night, even late in the war, even with supermods. Submarines did engage warships in both theatres, and with success, with their main weapon: the torpedo. Such attacks were made both from the surface and from periscope depth. With some skill and experience, the game allows exciting and rewarding torpedo attacks on warships and there is no reason to shy away from those (more on torpedo attacks later). But for our purpose of realistic behaviour, a gunfight is of course out of the question. Speaking of guns, there is a further observation to be made:


Did submarines never fire their guns at destroyers? Yes they sure did. Just before the destroyer lived up to its name by destroying the submarine. You see, the escorts did not really engage the submarine with their guns, historically. That only happened at long ranges, where the main battery of the destroyer could actually be trained to hit the sub's hull and the sub would (and should) be quick to dive under such conditions. You lose, try again later but thank you for playing. Of course, you will not usually find yourself under fire from long range because you do not usually steam into the enemy's visual range in daylight, right? (more on surface operations later). You approach the enemy at night and they only spot you at close range and that's where trouble starts.


Typically, the destroyer would race straight towards the submarine in an attempt to ram, while the sub was still on the surface or while it was attempting to dive. If successful, this resulted in a severely crumbled bow on the destroyer and a severely wrecked hull on the submarine. The destroyer could take such damage, even if it did require a hasty return to port for extensive repairs. It was considered to be worth it: one damaged escort for one wrecked sub. (There are even some records of escorts going down with the submarine, both hulls completely devastated by the collision.) The submarine would be in serious trouble at this stage and was forced to blow all ballast . If lucky enough, it popped up, no longer operational, and it would either be abandoned by the crew before sinking back down, or it would sometimes attempt a desperate fight. Those are the recorded occasions where submarines engaged destroyers with their deckgun. And the destroyers typically won, charging in for another collision while the sub's decks were peppered with small arms fire, machine guns and things like Oerlikons and Bofors (20mm and 40mm AA). Or with the main guns from range. (This is from what I presume to know, I lack sufficient sources about the Pacific Theatre so if anyone has more details on that, I'd appreciate it.)


Interestingly, in the game with any mod they always engage you with their main guns at close range though my sources insist that a destroyer's main battery could not be trained down low enough to shoot at submarines from close ranges. History suggests that, on sighting you, they charged straight at you, crushing you with their mass unless you made like a bakery truck and hauled buns. There is the famous account of a German Kaleun who died a rather gruesome death getting pinned between his own conning tower and the bows of an escort. This does not happen in the game (not to me, anyway), although you will find yourself rammed at periscope depth by an escort which charges straight over you on it's depth charge run. So...


By all means attempt your torpedo attack from the surface, evading and avoiding escorts as you go, or even engaging the escorts themselves in an effort to remove your target's protection! (This also actually happened during the war.) But if they catch you on the surface (and they will, sooner or later), get out of there asap. To put it another way: leave the gun alone and either run away on the surface or seek refuge in the deep. The fact that they will hurt you bad with gunfire, rather than actually ramming you is just something you have to contend with but it amounts to the same thing, whatever your setup:


If the escorts catch us on the surface we can expect to be in trouble and we should be afraid. If we do not want to risk our boat, then we shouldn't come close. Being daring can have both great rewards and severe consequences. If we DO go in on the surface, we should be prepared to pay the price.


This thing is getting much longer than I thought it was going to be, I'll just post this now and see if anyone is actually interested before proceeding onto evasion, engaging and the matter of general surface operations from a historical point of view.

[SteamWake]

Did submarines never fire their guns at destroyers?

Pretty long post, but this sentance jumped out at me.

"Fire guns at destroyers?!" What are you nuts? If your in that kind of range your focus should be on evasion. Even exchanging rounds with a merchant can be deadly. Not to mention the DD turning your way and flat out running you over.

No... not on my boat we dont 'fire at destoyers'.

[Fincuan]

Did submarines never fire their guns at destroyers?

Pretty long post, but this sentance jumped out at me.

"Fire guns at destroyers?!"

You should have continued reading, it goes on like this: "Yes they sure did. Just before the destroyer lived up to its name by destroying the submarine.":dead:

[SteamWake]

Did submarines never fire their guns at destroyers?

Pretty long post, but this sentance jumped out at me.

"Fire guns at destroyers?!"

You should have continued reading, it goes on like this: "Yes they sure did. Just before the destroyer lived up to its name by destroying the submarine.":dead:

I did, I cannot remember any instances where a sub was foolish enough to conduct a running gun battle with a destoyer. Prove me wrong Id love to read about it.

[tomoose]

Bosje;
you're touching on all the points that generally cause debate etc but as you state "realism is in the eye of the beholder". That's the luxury of this game, some guys like to rack up the kills and be completely brazen with their tactics while others love the sneak and shoot technique.

I, for one, like to think I play "realistically" (i.e. 100%) in that there's no external cam, everything is manual and underestimating the enemy can be deadly. This results in, maybe, one or two kills per patrol but the satisfaction of manouevering, stalking and lining up those kills is immense.

Other players don't have that kind of patience or simply don't get enjoyment out of that style of play and can adjust the game to suit them, that's the beauty of the game itself (and the mods).

[Rockin Robbins]

A fine post! Please continue with your observations. Having been quoted while I myself was quoting tater, I'll consider myself in the sights of a destroyer's main batteries.
http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa293/RockinRobbins13/smileys/what.gif

Carry on sir, I'll observe from radar depth.:arrgh!:

[Sailor Steve]

Prove me wrong Id love to read about it.
This started as a fantastic thread about realism being in our heads. Why is it suddenly an argument on what's 'realistic'?

Excellent job, Bosje. I particularly like the distinction between the way we play ourselves and the way we want the game to make us play. I'm looking forward to more.

[Webster]

i found the part about DD guns not going low enough to shoot at close range to be quite interesting.

what would be the minimum realistic range they could fire low enough to hit you?

[Lexandro]

Thats simple a matter of declination. Ship deck guns were not really designed to angle downwards beyond horizontal. They were capable of a few degrees but nothing major. It would be a case of researching the ships weapons station and finding the maximum angle of declination and working from there.

[Sailor Steve]

-7 degrees on the standard destroyer gun, and the forward freeboard was 6-8 feet, with the aft freeboard being probably 4-6 feet.
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNJAP_5-50_3ns.htm

[vanjast]

Mann that is a long story.. you must be bored..:lol:.

As mentioned, 100% 'realism' makes the game more immersive and more dangerous for you 'and your crew'. It forces you to develop tactics, instead of being Gung-Ho.

As an example with SH3. As times got harder in the later years. I would pick off stragglers, by creating them by long shots into a convoy (To get hit's like this you could only fire at certain angles to be guaranteed a hit). It amounted to about 0-2 ships per convoy, as the ASW just loved you for hours on end.

In the end I was looking at about a 80% torp strike percentage, and was doing ok, by being very very...very cautious.

You yep... this was my realism at 100%

[Bosje]

Before I continue, some clarification may be in order. Steamwake, I tried to explain that there are records of gunfights with escorts but only as a last desperate measure after the boat was forced to the surface. The game allows it, as it should allow it, but the player should not attempt it except as a last measure in a hopeless situation. Many mods will support this behaviour (you'll die) while the stock game does not (you may survive), the point of this thread is to provide thoughts on historic happenings as my sources describe them, compared to various approaches to the game. From my sources it seems that the escorts DID pound the subs with the main guns but only AFTER it was forced to the surface, to finish them off.

I am writing this because I myself had many many questions as I started to play both SH3 and SH4 on higher 'realism'. I was blown away by the level of immersion which I got from playing with supermods on 100% (90% ext.cam.) and I found myself wanting to know just exactly how things happened for real, and how I could implement that knowledge in my gameplay to enhance the experience. Basically this thread attempts to summarize the many lessons I learned and am still learning.


This may turn into a longwinded manual but I hope it doesn't, lol. Carrying on:


Submarine of submersible torpedo boat? Surface operations.


Most of you will be familiar with the notion that these WWII subs are nothing like the modern day nuclear hunter-killers and boomers, not even anything like the modern day diesel-electric subs although they work in much the same way. Your basic method of propulsion is the diesel engine and your usual condition is 'surfaced'. Free after the German Uboat handbook: The boat is designed to operate on the surface, being a fast and highly maneuverable torpedo attack boat. During daylight attacks and for purposes of remaining undetected and evading the enemy, the boat has the capability to fully submerge. It should be noted that, while submerged, your boat is restricted in it's ability to move and to detect the enemy.


It is that last sentence that struck me, when I read that handbook. The SH series has always invited me to dive and do a hydrophone check to see if any ships had entered my area of operations. Any data on the technology insists on ranges of up to 20 or even 30 kilometers (throw me a bone on the nautical miles). But from what I'm reading they considered the watch crew's eyes a much more important sensor than any bit of kit on the boat. There you have it and it is actually confirmed by 'Das Boot', the official Kriegsmarine Manual and some books on Dutch submarine warfare in my possession. They relied on their lookouts to spot the enemy and even when they spent the day submerged for fear of enemy attack, there was a watch on the periscope to look out for smoke on the horizon (and aircraft). In 'Das Boot' they only dive to listen for contacts when the weather is so bad that nothing can be expected to be seen. The translation goes something like: 'In this [crappy] weather we can hear more down here than we can see up there.' On US fleet boats you have the benefit or SD radar (aircraft detection) and if you stick your conning tower up a bit, even SJ radar (surface contact detection) to help you with getting contacts, but all the same, the submarine was mainly a surface vessel. What to do with this bit of information? Well, it seems that the 'crappy sonar guy' is in fact quite true to history. Anyone who does not do his own manual hydrophone checks is rather 'realistic'.

But it's still a sub, yeah? No worries, you are indeed in command of a sub. A typical procedure was to spot a ship or group of ships (convoy), get an initial idea on their speed and course and then outflank the contact on the surface. After gaining an edge on the target by setting up ahead of it, doctrine stated that you submerged to close in for the kill. During daylight this is common sense but even during the night, this was the standard procedure. Accounts from early operations mention a sense of 'great daring and cool-headed thinking' on the part of those U-boat commanders who ignored the rules and went in for the kill by attacking on the surface under the cover of darkness. Later, this became the standard but it was 'invented' by the early aces. Whatever else can be said about your boat, it is a very small thing indeed, even if it is a comparatively huge US fleet boat, and a lazy lookout is quite unlikely to spot it. Another interesting observation is that the target was looked at from low angles, against the background of the horizon and the night sky, while the sub was looked at from the much higher positions on a tanker or freighter, as such blending in with the murky darkness (and ever shifting shapes of the waves) of the sea itself. At this stage I personally feel unhappy with the stock game and most mods which tend to take away the ability to call 'smoke on the horizon'. I've been confronted with merchants on evasive maneuvers long before my watch crew actually yelled 'ship spotted' but that is just a personal gripe. The more important thing is: how do we deal with surface operations?


Range: your boat has no range on electric propulsion. Even if the batteries support a speed of 1 or 2 knots for a day, it doesn't get you anywhere. You cover your ground on the surface and you keep a sharp lookout. Diving is something you do several times a day. At least once. This is the 'trim dive' and it serves to check on the boat's submerged handling and depth changing/keeping. (Technical information on how submarines actually worked is extremely interesting and I learned a fair bit during the past months but I know that many people out here will be able to explain it much better than I possibly could.) Either way, while you are down there it does not hurt to do a hydrophone check, of course. Getting anywhere at all is still done on the surface, with your diesels. And you dive on contact with surface ships and aircraft, determine whether you are going to intercept or not and you move on.


Each his own, of course, and this applies to the real deal as well: Kretschmer (greatest German ace) had a standing order on his boat that the officer of the watch was NOT allowed to initiate a crash dive upon visual sighting of a ship, especially at night. Kretschmer, then, went against the rules by realizing that his boat was unlikely to be spotted, even by a warship, at the time when his watch crew spotted that (war)ship. He tended to get more information on his target while on the surface and he usually went through the entire engagement without ever diving. Only if he was found out, as proven by a destroyer's bow charging straight at him, did they crash down into the deep. In fact, there is an account which describes his capture in the spring of 1941. It says that his watch officer made the mistake of crash diving on sighting a ship, before waking up the commander. The destroyer heard the noise made by the diving boat and before anything could be done, Kretschmer found himself in a boat wrecked by depthcharges, blew ballast and abandoned ship.

So for a realistic approach to gameplay there are many options: spend most of your time on the surface if you want, or spend any daylight hours submerged for safety. Attack with bravado from the surface, at night, or do all your sinkings from periscope depth. Run with decks awash to lessen your profile or rely on hydrophones to keep an ear on situational awareness. Surface operations give you range and good eyes (depending on the game setup) and you can go looking for targets. Submerged running will keep you safe but you'll have to wait for the targets to come to you. Again, radar tends to unbalance this later in the war and the commanders had to re-invent their tactics. This is also where you find a real difference between German and US operations. It seems that eyes were considered the primary sensor on the boat, but if hydrophone checks get you your beloved targets then by all means go for it. This is where things get interesting, referring to the fact that realism is in the mind of the beholder:


Even if the real guys did not get those lone merchants by hydrophone checks, it feels like a very professional and 'ace' thing to do in the game. Killing those ships after hunting them down from that initial far-away whisper on the hydrophone is one of the main perks of the game (in my opinion). Who cares that I don't really have any accounts of that happening historically? (Even I find it hard to believe, if anyone HAS got numerous accounts of subs hunting mainly by hydrophone, please share.)


Pull the plug! Submerged operations.


'Pulling the plug' is a lovely bit of vernacular, mainly from the US subs, I believe. It means to dive the boat. Diving quite literally involved pulling the plug on the main ballast tanks: big containers on the outside of the pressure hull which had vents on the top- and down sides. When the boat was surfaced, these tanks contained air. When all vents were opened, water was allowed to flow into the tanks from below as the air was expelled on the top. Basic physics tell us that this decreased buoyancy and it caused the boat to sink (in a controllable fashion). Inside the boat are stored reserves of compressed air. If you close the top valves but keep the low valves open and then force this compressed air into the ballast tanks, this will force (some of) that water out again. That will increase buoyancy and the boat goes up. By messing around with the buoyancy you can make the boat go up and down a bit and that is how you reach your desired depth. From there, the depth keeping is mainly handled by the diveplanes which work much the same way as ailerons on aircraft wings, water flowing past the diveplanes will make the planes have an effect on the boat's angle, allowing you to propel yourself upwards or downwards or to level out and maintain your depth. Steep diving (crash diving) means you allow the tanks to fill completely with water while moving at top speed in a downward angle. That will make the needle on the depthgauge shoot down quite rapidly. Blowing for surface means the opposite: Forcing all water out of the tanks with compressed air while moving at full speed on an upward angle, causing the boat to pop up to the surface like a cork. If you run out of compressed air, you are in trouble. If you run out of submerged propulsion, you are in trouble. If you run out of both, you are lost. (Correct me if I'm wrong about any of the above here, please.)


The game does not model this to my own satisfaction. You can spend all day submerged, changing depth casually, you can sit still at 85,5 meters depth all day without moving an inch, etc etc etc. That is not how it worked but hey, let's work with what we've got. For purposes of immersion you should always maintain some speed while submerged, to cause the diveplanes to have an effect. One knot does the trick without causing you to make too much noise or to run out of juice any time soon. 'Surface the boat' would historically involve using some of that compressed air to empty the tanks which is not featured in the game. (You can spend all day at any depth at 0 knots, order the boat to surface and it will zoom up there without any trouble, compressed air still at 100%. This could only have happened if the crew were manually pumping all that water out of the tanks.) Ah well, I just order a 'blow ballast' when I want to surface.


Free from the 1950s US submarine manual: When the boat does not respond during a dive and keeps on going down there are several steps that can be taken to arrest that seemingly uncontrollable dive. In order of severity:
-Cut the engines. This will cause the boat to stop propelling itself down while the boat is at a downward angle and should slow or completely halt the descent. If it fails, the next measure is to:
-Order a full speed reverse. If the boat is still at a downward angle, this will cause the boat to pull itself back up, quite literally. If this, too, fails:
-Blow all ballast, use compressed air to drastically increase buoyancy.


This actually worked in SH3 (at least it worked in GWX 2.1) and I fail to understand why SH4 does not feature such basic principles on submerged operations, but either way I hope this gives you some idea on how the boats actually got out and about in the cellar. The hulls were built to maintain a constant pressure (equal to that on the surface) for the crew and at depth, this means that the sea is exercising an incredible pressure on the hull. The boats were built quite well and could withstand quite a lot but one should always be aware of the dangers of going deep. (The yard guarantees 90 meters but we can also go deeper.) Many Skippers/Kaleuns have gone to great depths in order to evade depthcharge attacks, both for real and in the game. Personally I find this aspect of the game among the most interesting and appealing features. There is nothing like it. The hunter hunted, cat and mouse, a battle of wits, 'Jetzt wird es psychologisch, meine Herren', you spend several hours in real time, inside the control room, listening to the destroyers above you and trying to stay alive, trying to stay one step ahead of them. Brilliant. But I'm drifting a bit now, let us get back to basic operations:


After having lived through a depthcharge attack, or after diving away from that air attack, or after diving for any other reason, sooner or later you will surface again. Oxygen runs out after about 40 hours on most boats, batteries run flat and you're not getting anywhere while you're down there. So you surface. If you want to approach this realistically, here is how they would do it (from the German handbook, also featured in 'Das Boot', after the convoy attack):
Hydrophone check at shallow depth, listen all around you to make sure there are no screws churning around anywhere near you. Then proceed to periscope depth, do a quick scan around without zoom, to make sure you are not being ambushed by a destroyer, sitting there 100 meters off your stern, engines stopped. (I never actually witnessed such a thing but I'm always thinking how cool it would be to actually find your periscope view completely filled by a lurking destroyer, lol.) Then, do a more careful scan of the horizon all around you by zooming in and slowly making a complete turn with the periscope. Then surface, the commander goes out onto the bridge alone or with his first officer (strikes me as odd to risk both senior officers, but anyway) and make sure there is really actually nothing at all anywhere around you. Then call the 'all clear' and proceed to surface operations.

[SteamWake]

Prove me wrong Id love to read about it.
This started as a fantastic thread about realism being in our heads. Why is it suddenly an argument on what's 'realistic'?.

You know what your right, Ill just sit and watch now. :oops:

[Bosje]

lol, actually it is about what's realistic, in the sense that realism is extremely subjective and as such, always worth a discussion from where i'm sitting.

Moving right along because i'm having fun writing this. stop me if i'm boring you guys and girls:


Flooding tubes one through four! Torpedo attacks.


Back in the days of playing SH1 and 2 on easy settings I always used to wonder why they called it the solution. After locking onto the target it said something like solution 60%, 70%, 80%, 85%... good enough, FIRE! I took the solution percentages to be the odds of hitting the target and that's what it basically amounts to. Here is why: your boat probably moves (if only at one knot), the target probably moves and the torpedo most certainly moves. So how do you get the torpedo to meet with the target at a specific time and place? This is the much discussed Torpedo Firing Problem and solving the problem results, logically, in a Solution. It's simply the angle at which you fire the torpedo so that it meets the target as they both move on their own paths. Torpedoes were the 'smart weapons' of their day, even if the early versions could do little else than maintain a certain depth (which they in fact failed to do during the early war years, in both theatres) and travel in a certain direction. For more information on this subject and on the interesting details of early war torpedo problems, please read Ducimus' excellent thread ( http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=128185 ).


How to come up with this solution to the torpedo firing problem? Generally, the idea of realistic gameplay calls for Manual Targeting to be checked ON in the realism options, because that will remove the 'point and shoot' function from the game. Some players are not interested in drawing lines and measuring ranges and speeds and angles on the chart, they choose to let their crew handle this aspect of the game. As with so many aspects of gameplay: each his own. Speaking for myself, I started to do manual targeting several months ago and it's both hard and rewarding. Somewhere halfway through a steep learning curve I started hitting some targets and it feels great to know you got it right, after carefully collecting all the required data. These forums feature many excellent guides, tutorial videos and suggestions on how to master the fine art of manual torpedo attacks and a basic search should give the player many hours worth of material to study.


An interesting compromise is to disable the point and shoot function but to still allow the weapon's officer (SH3) to calculate the solution for you. You can have a go at it yourself and then have the officer check it for you, if you will. Of interest in this widely discussed topic is the following notion from the documentary on US fleet boat attack strategies (Link Referral in Ducimus' thread):


Each individual skipper had his own style of attack, the necessary data was gathered by a team of crewmembers using all the different sensors and equipment at their disposal. Each commander had his own team organized to his own personal taste. Some commanders took charge of the attack from the periscope view, others had their XO take care of target data acquisition while the commander himself oversaw the whole team's efforts from the conning tower.


Interestingly, then, the skipper was not solely responsible for getting the data all by himself. If you watch 'Das Boot' there are two interesting scenes involving torpedo attacks. First they engage a destroyer from periscope depth where the commander has his eye on the periscope, calling out the values to the XO who is with him in the conning tower and then the XO transfers those values down to the crew who put them into the TDC (or German equivalent thereof). The other attack is a nightly surface run at a convoy where the commander does nothing except keeping an eye on the convoy and calling out which targets are to be engaged, the XO is on the UZO (German equivalent of the TBT) and calls the bearings, ranges, speeds and AoBs. ('Lage 60' translates as 'Angle on Bow 60', unless I am much mistaken).


So neither scene in 'Das Boot' features the commander having to go to the attack map and twisting all the dials and inputting all the settings, after calculating all those values in the first place from the navigation plot, after manually observing all the values from the periscope or UZO views to begin with... all of which needs to be done in a short space of time while the boat is in extremely close range of a heavily guarded convoy...but it's a game and in the end, it is the commander who decides which speeds and depths and triggers are to be used. It's just that the game requires you to set those values yourself, as well as all the other values if you go for manual targeting. (And to be honest, I wouldnt trust any AI to decide on torpedo depth and speed settings for me.) Tough.


But then, nobody said it had to be easy. Using the assistance of your crew when engaging a target with torpedoes is both historically accurate and realistic, if you want it to be. Doing it all yourself is equally real. Remember, it's all in your head.


Keeping this in mind, there is also a remark on the previously mentioned 'TMO vs RFB' thread which says: TMO with 'realistic map updates' OFF is actually more realistic than the stock game with 'realistic map updates' turned ON. For those who have no idea what I'm talking about here: 100% realism in the stock game results in contacts not being shown on your plotting map. Thus, you have to do draw every line on the plot by personally marking the bearing and the range at certain intervals in order to get the necessary data to hit the target. This is indeed a challenge but it's actually more of a challenge than that which faced the skippers of the day. Historically, the commander (you) would not have to do it all by himself, he had a navigator who plotted the target on the charts, based on the details given by the officers and crew on the bridge, or by the hydrophone operator, or by the radar operator, or by any officer who was looking through the periscope or UZO/TBT. Getting the exact speed and heading of the target was a process which involved time, multiple marks of bearing and range estimates, and more time to confirm if the estimated values were correct. So then TMO's dot on the charts with a basic mention of 'generally heading north east at slow speed' is a lot more 'realistic' than having to do that all on your own. Here we reach the weird conclusion that the stock game at 100% realism is not realistic at all, it is simply a very hard (and very satisfying, if you like that kind of thing) way of playing the game.


My roommate is very happy to play the game on low realism settings without mods, he zips through an entire war patrol in around 2 hours of real time, sinking at least 60k tons of shipping, he hates duds and yet, of course, he loves the game as he plays it, who am I to judge? He fails to see what possesses me to sit there for an hour, looking at a stopwatch, drawing lines, muttering numbers and punching on my pocket calculator, finally firing one torpedo and then cursing like a dockworker when the thing misses or fails to explode. Then going through another half hour of drawing lines because the target now takes evasive action and requires a new session of data collection. But I love the game as I play it, who is he to judge? I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but: Each his own.


Having said all that, here is my take on torpedo attacks: For those who want to have a taste of the problems, the careful collection of data, the anticipation of setting up for the attack, the excitement of hitting the target and the frustration of missing the target...in other words for getting the most out of an emotionally realistic approach to the game: I recommend getting familiar with manual targeting and all the different methods and styles which are available for it. Dick O Kane and Fast 90 appear to be the most famous but there are many ways to catch a monkey. Even shooting from the hip is possible, when you realize that one knot roughly equals one degree for fast torpedoes, provided that the target steams more or less at a 90 degree angle across your sights. I am by no means a crack shot myself but I have sometimes hit destroyers by aiming 15 degrees ahead of them as they made their turn around me: lucky shots, educated guesses, instincts developed after firing so many shots. And of course reading any relevant threads on these forums. There are the famous historical accounts of commanders using a protruding bit of metal as an improvised aiming device, of commanders using their instincts and experience to set their torpedoes loose on seemingly random guesses and hitting their targets, to the amazement and reverence of their crews. Experience will come to you too, in due time, and you will find yourself more and more confident about your aim. Personally, I think it's worth the time and frustration it takes to learn. But is point and shoot Unrealistic? Is using map updates Cheating? No. Developing your own style and having your team tasked and set up to personal taste is exactly what they did in real life.

The End

It got a bit out of hand but these are, for now, my observations on realistic gameplay, as they came to mind. If anyone finds this helpful in getting more enjoyment out of the game, then I consider the mission successful. (forgot all about external camera usage while under depthcharge attack etc, maybe some other time ;) )

[Sailor Steve]

Another outstanding analysis!:rock:

I loved your description of you and your roommate's different styles.

I still use Weapons Officer Assistance. I do consider it cheating for myself, but only because information gathering is immediate and perfect. If it took several sightings for a good solution and was capable of mistakes I would be perfectly happy. What I do to offset the speed and accuracy is to take at least three sightings, just as if I really was doing the calculations, and do it again when I switch targets.

Again, a great summation, and not long or boring at all.

[Rockin Robbins]

A fine job! Your section on the ballast tanks' function relating to fleet boats needs refinement. Basically, the main ballast tanks (MBTs) were completely flooded to dive. The sub had trim tanks for fore and aft bouyancy and a negative tank to achieve neutral buoyancy.

So your description of trim dives is wrong in detail. To dive the MBTs were completely flooded by opening top and bottom. Then the boat was "flown" under with the diving planes. Upon reaching target depth, they would slow the boat down and neutralize the dive planes and adjust the negative tank until they optimized neutral buoyancy, also moving ballast fore and aft in the trim tanks to make the boat sit level. They would mark the negative tank to know where to flood it for neutral buoyancy. Fuller and the boat sank. Pumping it out would make the boat light. After they were happy it was up to the surface for the day's run.

During the run the MBTs were empty. Usually for quick diving, they would have the bottom vents open and the top vents closed. This was called "riding the vents." Just open the top and you're on the way down. While they were surfaced they would flood the negative tank above the neutral line, so the boat would sink when they pulled the plug on the top vents of the MBTs. Exactly how much water was in the negative tank was up to the preferences of the individual captains. Some preferred to run with the thing pretty full so as to lower the surfaced freeboard of the sub. Of course this came with a speed penalty, so the devil was in the details.

This is off the top of my head without reference to any source materials that could expose idiocies contained herein. The main points will stand scrutiny but the details might be slightly mangled.

The ballast system was one area of the American boats that was much more advanced than the WWI technology of the U-Boats. No "all hands forward" for American submarines! Trim tanks took care of that exercise.:ping:

[Bosje]

thank you for clearing that up, Rockin Robbins :D

that's the kind of information which I was missing. For the main idea of the post this would mean that although the game doesn't seem to care, realistic player behaviour would involve a daily dive to balance the trim, correct?

i have found that you can greatly improve the crash dive times by putting the fleet boat just a few feet lower than normal surfaced condition, this does seem to simulate running with the negative tanks flooded, perhaps?
I know for certain that you can run with decks awash ingame (ordering 31 feet gives me a depth of 26, which floods most of the upper decks), and you can crash dive in under 10 seconds from there, but i'm not sure if it will work when you set the boat at, say, 22 or 23 feet.

as soon as they fire up the RFB update, i'll get stuck in and pull some plugs ingame (that makes it sound dirty :huh: )

(currently experimenting with multi-sh4 and an opmon setup while keeping a clean one for RFB, you see)

[SteamWake]

During the run the MBTs were empty. Usually for quick diving, they would have the bottom vents open and the top vents closed. This was called "riding the vents."

Here is a laymans question...

Why wold they do this? Sure it would decrease the 'dive time' but by how much? How long did it take to open those valves? How much time was actually gained?

What if a top valve should accidently open or fail?

Seems to me like the risks would out weigh the reward.

The only scenario I can see is if the boat 'knew' it have to dive quickly as in a convoy approach or in an area thick with air patrols.

I simulate this "realistically" by approaching a convoy with decks awash on occassion.

[Ivan Putski]

Bosje, nice read I also liked the part about your roomate, and your different styles of play. Myself I play DiD, to me it adds another level of realism to the sim. Over the years I`ve developed my own style of gameplay, which gives me the most out of my simming experience. One should be happy whether he takes his gaming lightly, or full blown.

I like DiD, it allows me to get more out of this sim, makes one plan out his moves more thoroughly. IMHO your first directive is to sink enemy shipping, directive 2 is to get your boat and crew back to fight another day. It`s hard to lose a boat, and crew after a long career, but thats as in real life. I keep a notepad of my missions, and different tactics the boat, and crew have handled over my career, comes in handy for reviewing similar circumstances. Like has been mentioned this method of play is not eveyones cup of tea, but I enjoy it. Puts:D

[Bosje]

good point, I realise I failed to mention DiD as well as other important aspects of dense gameplay

I may add another section, thanks :)

[Sailor Steve]

I too always play DiD, but mainly out of habit. Every flight and naval sim I've ever played either didn't have a reload option or I just didn't know to look for it.

[Falkirion]

Great thread, and great analysis. Very interesting read.

[Nisgeis]

Why wold they do this? Sure it would decrease the 'dive time' but by how much? How long did it take to open those valves? How much time was actually gained?

Any time saved, is good. Absolutely everyone did it. The previous system was to leave the vents open and ride the flood valves in the older subs. On surfacing, the tanks were pumped dry. After seeing a few captured WW I U-Boats, which had no flood valves at all, the newer boats were designed with low pressure blowers, but still had flood valves.

During WW II, as everyone rode the vents, the flood valves were removed as they were made from very scarce materials and any savings were good. The flood valves were removed from Main ballast tanks 1, 2A, 2B, 2C, 2D, 6A, 6B, 6C, 6D and 7. No.s 2 to 6 are used for list control. MBTs 3 - 5 have flood valves, as they are sealed when used as Fuel Ballast Tanks (fuel oil floats on water, but they are not open to the water).



What if a top valve should accidently open or fail?


There are many tanks and the failure or opening of a vent on one would only mean that if surfaced, it would flood to the waterlevel, which would be below the deck. Not much buoyancy would be lost. Overall, if all MBTs are flooded, there would still be about 2 feet of freeboard.

If the vent failed closed, when you were trying to dive, there were hand controls inside the compartments, through the pressure hull direct to the valves. If you can't get the vent open, you can't dive easily - not exactly sure on how much positive or nagative buoyancy the planes can overcome. With every tank flooded, the boat had a negative buoyancy of about 9 tons and the smallest Main Ballast Tanks are 2A - 2D, which hold about 32 tons of sea water.


Seems to me like the risks would out weigh the reward.

The only scenario I can see is if the boat 'knew' it have to dive quickly as in a convoy approach or in an area thick with air patrols.

I simulate this "realistically" by approaching a convoy with decks awash on occassion.
Low pressure blowers, usually used to blow most of the water from the tanks to save high pressure air, after an initial shot to start you up. One advantage to leaving the vents closed and having the flood valves open, was the blowers could be run even if the tanks were dry. This would make air blow up between the sea and the hull and would reduce friction. This enabled the boats to go about 2 knots faster. There's a couple of patrol report entries that say something like 'Time XX:00 Gave all tanks a 5 minute blow. XX:05 Pulling clear of escort'. Dick O'Kane talks about it being used with Wahoo, Tang and also Ben Jarvis did this with Baya to clear an escort whose top speed was 21 knots.

[Lexandro]

Personally I think some of the realism modifictaions remove some of the games fun aspect. I should still be remembered that its a game not real life. Its all down to preference of course, although some leeway should be given when considering gameplay changes and how they affect the overall playability of a game. Its fine for old hands who played SH3, but newer skippers (like myself) are inclined to play it in a more "arcade" style of play.

Things like not getting radio reports because in RL they maintained radio silence can drastically change the feel of a game. I want it to feel like im in a vast warzone where convoys and task forces steam around constantly. At times with some of the realism mods I find myself yawning and getting very bored just sitting here looking at an empty ocean when I know that in Stock, there would be a hoard of contact reports in the general vicinity. Of course I should not be able to know every convoy or task forces general location, but I should be able to tell when some are close.

It should feel like were in a war, where any moment you can meet your end. But it can feel like your simply steaming around in a big empty area with no-one else in the world. I never ever see friendly units in an engagement with the IJN, nor am I ever asked to "help out" during some of the big engagements. I never feel like I have made an impact on the enemy fleets, or tactics no matter how or where I attack.

Some of the other Captains here no doubt have strong feelings about "realism" and how it pertains to SH3/SHIV. I dont, I frankly dont care if a ship is not 100% accurate or that its crews skill are not the same as its RL counterpart. I just play because I find the game fun.

What I dont like however is that the realism settings are infact the difficulty settings. I have played a couple of flight sims where the realism settings change how you can play the game but not how the computer opponent plays. AI behaviour should be the difficulty setting. Making the AI smarter and/or tougher should control how difficult a prospect it should be to take on combat.

With SH using the same tactics in easy, works exactly the same as hard. The only difference is in your ability to implement them. IMHO it should be like old school Doom settings for difficulty, something along the lines of; Cake walk/Challenge/Hard as nails/Glutton for punishement/You WILL NOT survive. The realism settings should simply be used as player preference as to how they handle the task in hand, not what the difficulty of the task is.

[Rockin Robbins]

The "all hands forward" was only used as an help in case of emergency, but u-boote naturally had "trim tanks" too. Imagine if the skipper had no other mean to control depth other than moving part of his crew every time he wanted to dive or surface, and every 30 seconds when trying to maintain depth when the boat had to travel submerged. All the boats would have ended down the bottom all by themselves.
Even WWI u-boote had trim tanks :yep:
I had read what I wrote in a book about the American subs (I think my book about the Manitowoc Subs). If you apply a couple of spare brain cells, you have to be right though. How much does a torpedo weigh? Let's say 1000 lbs. Launch that eel and suddenly your bow is 1000 lbs light. With no trim tanks, what are you going to do, run 6 guys to the after torpedo room?:rotfl:OOPS! Now run 12 guys back forward, like real quick because you just compensated the wrong way! :rotfl::rotfl:

Now that you've emptied the after torpedo room how do you fire an aft torpedo?:shifty: Naw! Had to have some kind of trim tanks.:up:

I told you the details could contain some idiocies! Thanks for the correction Mikhayl.

You know, that brings up a caution flag on taking Das Boot too seriously as a source of accuracy about running a U-Boat or a submarine in general. Das Boot was a movie, not an authorative source of information. Many U-Boat vets didn't like it much.

[Bosje]

learning something every day
:know:

if you guys keep going on like this for a while, i'll implement the lessons in the posts :smug:

[Orion2012]

I had read what I wrote in a book about the American subs (I think my book about the Manitowoc Subs).

You wrote a book about submarines...this I would love to read!

[Bosje]

from memory: the scene where the LI has trouble keeping her level, they use the diveplanes (vorne oben 10, hinten oben 15) forward up 10, aft up 15 etc?

you'll also hear things like: lose 200 litres and in the deep dive off Gibraltar they are screaming to pump x litres from the forward to aft tanks, iirc

the fact that the gibraltar scene didnt really happen does not mean that the entire film is fiction, from what i've heard the sub's operations are quite real

[Rip]

During the run the MBTs were empty. Usually for quick diving, they would have the bottom vents open and the top vents closed. This was called "riding the vents."
Here is a laymans question...

Why wold they do this? Sure it would decrease the 'dive time' but by how much? How long did it take to open those valves? How much time was actually gained?

What if a top valve should accidently open or fail?

Seems to me like the risks would out weigh the reward.

The only scenario I can see is if the boat 'knew' it have to dive quickly as in a convoy approach or in an area thick with air patrols.

I simulate this "realistically" by approaching a convoy with decks awash on occasion.

Modern boats don't even have valves on the bottom. Just grates to keep out the large debris. The vents don't have a history of failing much as they aren't really holding back much pressure and just one or two failing wouldn't have a huge effect anyways.

[Hartmann]

Did submarines never fire their guns at destroyers?
Pretty long post, but this sentance jumped out at me.

"Fire guns at destroyers?!"
You should have continued reading, it goes on like this: "Yes they sure did. Just before the destroyer lived up to its name by destroying the submarine.":dead:
I did, I cannot remember any instances where a sub was foolish enough to conduct a running gun battle with a destoyer. Prove me wrong Id love to read about it.

HMCS Assiniboine vs U-210 during a 30 minutes fight.

u-boat lost and survivors rescued, destroyer with gun damage and one death

[Rockin Robbins]

I had read what I wrote in a book about the American subs (I think my book about the Manitowoc Subs).
You wrote a book about submarines...this I would love to read!

Oops I just caught this. No I never wrote a book on submarines. I wrote about something I read in a book. I think the book was my book on Manitowoc submarines, Freshwater Submarines-the Manitowoc story, by Admiral William T Nelson.

[Orion2012]

I had read what I wrote in a book about the American subs (I think my book about the Manitowoc Subs).
You wrote a book about submarines...this I would love to read!
Oops I just caught this. No I never wrote a book on submarines. I wrote about something I read in a book. I think the book was my book on Manitowoc submarines, Freshwater Submarines-the Manitowoc story, by Admiral William T Nelson.

:rotfl:/Either way I'm always looking for something to read, especially involving submarines.

[DaveyJ576]

Here is a laymans question...

Why wold they do this? Sure it would decrease the 'dive time' but by how much? How long did it take to open those valves? How much time was actually gained?

What if a top valve should accidently open or fail?

Seems to me like the risks would out weigh the reward.

The only scenario I can see is if the boat 'knew' it have to dive quickly as in a convoy approach or in an area thick with air patrols.

I simulate this "realistically" by approaching a convoy with decks awash on occassion.

I was asked by Bosje to make some comments on this subject. All hands involved in this thread have made some very cogent observations and comments. Most of the historical aspects of this discussion are dead on with just minor quibbles.

I personally play at 58% realism and that suits my game play style just fine. I have tried to walk a line between moving things along and realism, and I think this is the devil that any sim developer must face. I see the beauty of SHIV is the ability of individuals to mod it as they see fit. Two major things that have been missed: 1. A random equipment malfunction feature (always the bane of a sub CO). 2. The above mentioned process of refining your solution to a high degree in assisted mode. (as in SHI)

Now to answer Steamwake's questions above:

The flood valves on the bottom of the MBT's were known in the USN as "Kingston" valves. Their only function was to close off the flood port and act as a backup to the vents at the top of the MBT. In operation the Kingstons were always opened first. They opened inward, against the air pressure in the tank and thus were difficult to operate quickly and in the days before hydraulics the complex linkages required a healthy amount of Armstrong Engineering (get it? :D ) to move. If you opened the vents first, you could unintentionally flood the tank through the vents (especially in heavy seas). The operating mechanisms and linkages for the Kingstons were inside the tank and therefore virtually impossible to maintain short of an drydock overhaul. The linkages for the vents were in the superstructure and thus readily accessible. There were a set of Kingstons for each MBT (port and starboard) and that equated to a lot of valves that had to be opened for the boat to dive.

As a higher level of mechanical confidence was gained in the ability of the vents to hold air in the MBT's, the Kingstons came to be viewed as a unnecessary redundancy, and indeed a liability due to their difficult and time consuming operation. During the 1930's the Kingstons were usually left open all the time and by the late 30's they had been deleted from the boats altogether.

The vents also operated inward against air pressure, so having one open accidentally was a very rare occurance. Even if one did open unintentionally, enough buoyancy would be retained by the other tanks to hold the boat on the surface. On the Darter, we did this once alongside the pier. We opened one vent to do maintenance on the mechanism. The boat listed to one side a little, but it didn't sink.

Running with decks awash provided both advantages and disadvantages. It did reduce the boat's silhouette in calm seas or if the moon was behind the boat. You could still use radar and have the lookouts stationed. But there was a huge disadvantage to this tactic. With the decks awash, the mufflers and overboards for the main engine exhausts were submerged. The engines were not designed to continuously push water out of the exhaust pipes, it produced too much back pressure. It would blow out the exhaust manifolds on the engines or even worse flood them. So if you are going to run decks awash you would secure the mains and run on the battery, and if you are going to do this you might as well run submerged. Your speed would be the same. I haven't tried this in the game yet, so I don't know if the speed issue is modeled correctly.

If anyone has any more questions, please surf over to the Real Submarine Technology and History Q&A thread:

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=147577

There have been some great questions asked there. I try to check it as often as I can.

Dave

www.pigboats.com (http://www.pigboats.com)

[Bosje]

cheers!
:rock:

[Wilcke]

DaveyJ,

Excellent information, I need to drop by more often to read your stuff.

Thanks!

[ReFaN]

Very good read. Some interesting facts :)

[THE_MASK]

I found the two best things to enhance realism was not to use any external cameras . And the other thing was to play on a max of 128x time compression . That way i could play a patrol over a few weeks rather than a few days and it added to the excitement when you found something . It really annoyed me that the game wouldnt go to 1x when non enemy contacts were spotted and i think that this is the spoiler .

[ReallyDedPoet]

Nice post Davey, thanks :up:


RDP

[Red Devil]

For the first time since I installed SH4 (RSRD) I was in a position to respond to a PAC message. I had just past Midway on my way to drop an agent "near Tokyo" when a message came in that IJN were about to attack Midway. Knowing the actual history of the Battle, I turned and went to where I knew, historically, there was a Task Force and lo and behold - there it was!!

I got a Kongo and a carrier before they knew I was there and another carrier which ran past behind me and a Cruiser which also passed nearby. Finally I got 2 destroyers before running out of torps!! Then I went deep in my USS Drum and got the hell out of there!!

[AVGWarhawk]

Running with decks awash provided both advantages and disadvantages. It did reduce the boat's silhouette in calm seas or if the moon was behind the boat. You could still use radar and have the lookouts stationed. But there was a huge disadvantage to this tactic. With the decks awash, the mufflers and overboards for the main engine exhausts were submerged. The engines were not designed to continuously push water out of the exhaust pipes, it produced too much back pressure. It would blow out the exhaust manifolds on the engines or even worse flood them. So if you are going to run decks awash you would secure the mains and run on the battery, and if you are going to do this you might as well run submerged. Your speed would be the same. I haven't tried this in the game yet, so I don't know if the speed issue is modeled correctly.
You can run decks awash in the game but the diesels will still be working. You can get the submarine to a point were the electric motors will kick in. At this point, you are pretty much submerged. So, yes, one might as well just submerge fully as you suggested. As far as speed while in game, your speed drops to about 10 knots when at decks awash and full ahead. It is a very fine line in the game when running decks awash on diesels or electric. Unfortunate we can not switch in game. No maneuvering room:-?

[tater]

My biggest gripe with the basic gameplay paradigm of SH4 (and presumably 3 as well, dunno, never played it), is that the game only allows a completely unrealistic "auto targeting" and an almost equally unrealistic "100% realism." I'd prefer to play the role of the skipper, and have my firing party do some of the "100% realism" tasks, but using my observations, not 100% accurate, magical, real time plotting, etc.

I shoot a bearing, and the plotter should mark it on the map. I take a range, same thing. They can automatically work up AOB, speed, etc, based on MY observations, and when I see the map view, I get straight lines plotted between my observations, with notes "written" on the map with AOB/speed, etc. This is a middle road between "auto targeting on" and "100%" in game, and is in fact more realistic than "100%" while at the same time being easier for the player.

[Red Devil]

I agree about the targetting, it is something that the "skipper" simply would not do. There should be a "lock" on the periscope that sends bearing and speed to the TDC at least, so that the "skipper" is not running a one man boat. Take a bearing, (then press "L") give it time for a speed fix, watch for a "green light" and click lock - then fire, on a second green, after a realistically suitable delay.

[Rockin Robbins]

I will give up my external camera when they pry my cold, dead fingers from around my mouse!:arrgh!:

If the replay feature worked better I might have a different opinion.

[Armistead]

I play at 100%, cams off. Before when I played with contacts on it was easy to get speed using the 3 minute marking rule from far away. I could get a perfect set and would seldom raise the periscope, just shoot when they were in range.

Figuring track and speed without contacts, cams has become a job, moreso for fast TF.

Using Radar, it's fairly easy to get a track. Still I'm having a problem using sonar to figure track and speed. Is there a method here I'm missing. With merchants, I will ping them, mark bearing and distance on the map. Then I repeat until I figure a track. Obvious, you see nothing on the map, but the marks get you close, then I'll draw a line between the marks and get a base track.

Is there away to get speed using sonar. Can you ping, get distance, wait three minutes, ping again..distance...and with those two ranges somehow figure speed with some formula.

[Munchausen]

Is there away to get speed using sonar. Can you ping, get distance, wait three minutes, ping again..distance...and with those two ranges somehow figure speed with some formula.

If you plot those two points on the map, yeah. Ping, note range and bearing, plot it. Wait three minutes. Ping, note range and bearing, plot it. Measure the distance between the two points, same as if you were doing it with map contancts "on," and then calculate the speed.

[Webster]

pinging would work in theory but as soon as you ping they will start zig zagging and any escort nearby will race in on your position so its not a good tactic to use.

[Rockin Robbins]

I will inject my normal observation that map updates on with TMO or TMOplot (works with any game configuration) is much more realistic than map updates off.

[Bosje]

indeed, as per the first post :)
i would love the thing which Tater describes but well, you know...

the whole point of this thread is how to play the game (as allowed by the engine) so that you get as close as possible to the real thing
For me, that is still a weird combination of cheating/using exploits/ignoring certain given info

as long as you sometimes miss, you are getting close. weird, huh

[tater]

^^^I actually agree. I keep contact reports on, but only use them for speeds, etc, when I am making radar observations. If I have to use the scope, I use only the scope, and plot myself.

I don't make sound-only attacks.

[NEON DEON]

Sometimes reality will come up and bite you on the arse.

Case in point: The Mark 14 torpedo.

Plain Jane SH IV did a good job modeling the Mk 14.

Fire the torpedo the way it was intended and you will pull your hair out in frustration as you miss over and over again. However. Know the history of this infamous torpedo and you will change your dud rate from 70 % or more to 10 %* or less.


The terrible triad:

Bad magnetic exploder/weak firing pin/improperly positioned depth meter.

All of these things are factored in to the game.

What is not factored in is the knowledge of the SH IV operator.

Know that the firing pin bends at high speed so you set at low speed.

Know magnetic exploder is garbage. Turn it off and set to contact only.

Know the torpedoes run deep. Set them shallow.

Bing bada boom.

Infamous Mk 14 turns into a reliable old friend.

Of course, you could start your career in July 1943 and avoid the torpedo drama altogether.:cool:

* Assuming you fire all shots at 90 degrees and about 500 m.

[ichso]

indeed, as per the first post :)
i would love the thing which Tater describes but well, you know...

the whole point of this thread is how to play the game (as allowed by the engine) so that you get as close as possible to the real thing
For me, that is still a weird combination of cheating/using exploits/ignoring certain given info

as long as you sometimes miss, you are getting close. weird, huh

How close the game gets to the real thing depends on what the real thing is for you.

In part 3 (the last one) of your observations, you wrote that TMO with _no_ map contact updates is more realistic than the stock version _with_ map contact updates.
But even that depends. If you want to play the game fully from a commander's point of view, then some of the 'realism' options are in deed unnecessary. But the stock version _with_ map contacts (for example) just simulates you being the whole crew of this sub and not only it's captain. Because you're also doing all the needed work in estimating the right course for intercepting some vessel.

[AVGWarhawk]

How close the game gets to the real thing depends on what the real thing is for you.

In part 3 (the last one) of your observations, you wrote that TMO with _no_ map contact updates is more realistic than the stock version _with_ map contact updates.
But even that depends. If you want to play the game fully from a commander's point of view, then some of the 'realism' options are in deed unnecessary. But the stock version _with_ map contacts (for example) just simulates you being the whole crew of this sub and not only it's captain. Because you're also doing all the needed work in estimating the right course for intercepting some vessel.

I would have to agree here. I keep map updates on. Come on, I got a man for plot...he needs to be plotting. I go look at what he's got on the plot. I make plans for attack. Look, I have enough on my hands just setting up the attack, setting up torpedoes and keeping from being detected. What next, do I need to start making the bisquits in the galley also:har:

[MonTana_Prussian]

I would have to agree here. I keep map updates on. Come on, I got a man for plot...he needs to be plotting. I go look at what he's got on the plot. I make plans for attack. Look, I have enough on my hands just setting up the attack, setting up torpedoes and keeping from being detected. What next, do I need to start making the bisquits in the galley also:har:

I agree as well. I used to play with contacts off,but came to the same conclusion,there is a quartermaster who is supposede to keep the plot,and I CAN walk over and look,soooo....I do:DL

[XLjedi]

I will inject my normal observation that map updates on with TMO or TMOplot (works with any game configuration) is much more realistic than map updates off.

And I will add my usual rebuttle... :03:

That's only true from the captains perspective... and if you argue that map updates are more realistic from the captains perspective because there's a tracking party working on it, then it would also be more realistic to have your XO automatically feeding you the firing solutions.

A blank map is far more realistic for manual tracking than knowing perfect target position just as manual targeting is far more realistic than a perfect XO solution.

[gimpy117]

somebody's gotta build a bridge to play this game on...like a big projector and all

[Rockin Robbins]

And I will add my usual rebuttle... :03:

That's only true from the captains perspective... and if you argue that map updates are more realistic from the captains perspective because there's a tracking party working on it, then it would also be more realistic to have your XO automatically feeding you the firing solutions.

A blank map is far more realistic for manual tracking than knowing perfect target position just as manual targeting is far more realistic than a perfect XO solution.

And that's why the game has options. Some people LIKE to drive the plane with a paper bag over their head... Others are happy being normal old VFR pilots. They would be really happy if IFR meant "I follow roads.":ping:

[Armistead]

I will inject my normal observation that map updates on with TMO or TMOplot (works with any game configuration) is much more realistic than map updates off.

This has been a complex issue for me...map updates and realism. I don't want everything laid out for me, but at the same time I can hardly pull off an attack with updates off against a fast TF. Usually my tracking is off, takes forever to figure course. I've gotten better using the nomo. Then getting speed down...the ping thing doesn't work. Just no way to get the ping to hit on the 3 minute mark or I'm just stupid..and then the dd's are alerted.

Sure, single merchants or small convoys are not much or a problem, but get a fast TF, it's almost impossible to have to do every job in the sub.

Also when attacking you're limited to needed info without updates. Basically you get info on the closest target, but no crew member will let you know 3 other dd's are coming from different angles. You can't watch several ships, there directions, ect, by yourself. It would be great while attacking if each watchman updated you about his sector, but that ain't gonna happen.

At first I thought updates gave too much info, but now I play with updates on most the time. Most of the info updates give is info the equipment and crew would have on hand. Still, there is a thrill when you have them off and get it right. I now alter patrols with updates on or off, depending on how much time I have. I think updates on and cams off make a decent game.

If there is a better way to determine course with updates off, I would play that way. I find I can only do it with pinging or radar and then I'm off 20 degrees. I can't do it eyeballing. What am I missing?

I would prefer a balance. No tails anywhere and within say 3000 yards, no blobs or anything. I would prefer planes not show up at all, just the crew info...and another dozen things. If I just got a message giving me the course and general speed I would be happy.

[DaveyJ576]

Here is one of my takes on "realistic realism" (I love that term!).

SHIV is actually harder to play in one aspect than real life! That is the concept of "spatial vision" during an attack, i.e. being able to maintain a mental picture of what is going on above you.

While in the conning tower, especially while using the periscope, you have many visual, aural, and physical cues to tell you which direction you are looking, and in which direction the enemy is in relation to you. For instance, if you are looking out of the scope and the helmsman is to your left, then you know you are looking to starboard. If you are on #1 scope and while turning it your butt hits #2 scope, you know you are looking ahead. Once you become finely tuned to the environment around you, you can even make a fairly accurate guess as to the actual bearing you are pointed to, even without looking at the bearing ring above your head. Even after you have lowered the scope, all of these cues, when combined with what you saw allows you to develop a three dimensional picture in your head of the tactical situation on the surface. This greatly aids in effectively maneuvering your boat either for attack or evasion, especially when things go south and you have to make a snap decision on how to maneuver.

SHIV is two dimensional and is utterly lacking in all of these cues. If you are using the scope and spinning it around, the only way to know which direction you are looking is to glance at the bearing display, but to do that you have to take your eyes off of the scope picture! And then for a nub who may not know right away that 000 means dead ahead, 270 is on your beam to the left, 180 is astern, etc. it is even more confusing.

I think that the game adequately makes up for this situation by providing you with the map updates with the boat and ship cursors.

Correct me if I am wrong, but didn't SH1 use true bearings instead of relative bearings used in SHIV? That makes it even more difficult because you have to constantly convert true to relative and vice versa.

Interestingly, the brand new Virginia class SSN's no longer have a traditional periscope. They use a "photonics mast", which is essentially a sophisticated TV camera on an extendable mast. The image from the camera is displayed on a computer screen in the attack center. The mast can be turned left and right and the camera rotated up and down. The true bearing to which the camera is pointed is displayed on the screen with the image. This puts our modern day submarine warriors in the exact same situation as we are in with SHIV! I am obviously simplifying the situation a little and our modern submariners have other tools to work with, but I can see it providing some problems with spatial vision and the mental picture of the battlefield.

[ichso]

This is a very good point.

This phenomenom you mentioned, usually comes into effect in simulators of aircraft for example. There you have much less 'feel' for the control over your vessel, even with a very good force feedback joystick, pedals, many monitors, ...
What is lacking, is that just every input like from centrifugal force and gravity are missing. And controlling a plane just from visual inputs makes it like ten times harder than to do it in real life. You react slower and less reliable. (At least I imagine it this way when comparing it to driving a car in real life).

Your explanation sounds like a nice way to find the same kind of effects in a submarine simulation to. How they effect situational awareness and orientation in space. Which is just much harder when sitting in front of a flat screen.

[Morpheus]

i like this thread :yeah:

You have to think in Layers.

Shrek: NO. Layers. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. Onions have layers. You get it? We both have layers.

Donkey: Oh, you both have layers. Oh. You know, not everybody like onions

kr morph :D