TMO + RSRD 1943 and yet to see a convoy?

[Piggy]

Not sure if this is normal but Ive done 7 war patrols out of Pearl/Midway all of which (except 1) have been in Japanese home waters or the Japan Truk/palua supply routes but Ive yet to come across a convoy.

All my sinkings are against lone merchants and Ive only ever been DC'd once (that happened on my first patrol near the bungo straights)...

Not that Im complaining about the lack of DC's but a little excitement is needed...

My next patrol has me going off Palua again... maybe this time?

[AVGWarhawk]

I get a convoy every now and then. Japanese were not big on the convoy like was seen in the Atlantic. You will find them though. :03:

[Ducimus]

The Japs ran convoys, they just weren't as big as allied convoys, and they didn't start running them in earnest until a bit later in the war. Nor did they have the industry to replace their losses.

As for convoys in RSRD, you just have to be in the right place at the right time.

[Armistead]

You can look for my thread "Convoy SS", shows where many are and I've only listed a few of those I've been in. I can spend each patrol fighting large battles or attacking one large convoy after the other. It helps to know history, where invasion forces landed, shipping lanes, ect. All the large battles are scripted and it's just knowing where to be at the right time.

[Piggy]

Aye, thanks for the hint there armistead, I'll keep that thread for the future :up:

I know its hit or miss sometimes, I tried to get into the battle of the coral sea last night using historical maps, I thought I was in the right position but never saw a thing.

I'll just keep running my original career and hope the brass sends me decent areas.

[Armistead]

Coral Sea can be hard to find, but I'm sure I have a shot of it..

I assume you understand PC lag also means a ship,s are near. So it you notice lag, check you're sonar, you can hear further than your sonarman early war...too long to explain, but it works.

Some battles are easy to find. You certainly want to try the large battle of the Philippine Sea...I have some SS in that thread. The battle of Leyte is easy, just sit in one of the straits of Surigao or San Bern and they'll come to you. I prefer the Surigao, cuz several US TF attack and you can sink a bunch of wounded leftovers.

The patrol star usually just puts you in a shipping lane where you'll mostly get singles or small convoys.

Another thing you can do is take SS of flash messages for convoy movement for later use. That way you'll know where to be. For instance I know 3 large convoys are coming through Formosa august of 44, so I can always be there if I want to fight 12 dd's and 20 merchants in 70ft of water...fun way to die.

You'll learn. The best convoy is probably the Java invasion force...50 plus ships, plus 2 other large convoys near it...

[Piggy]

Yepp Im up to speed on the lag = Lots of ships thing... for once lag is good :DL

Also found a bunch of links in another thread to study, its a big ocean the pacific but I'll find a TF once of these days.

Cheers

[jerm138]

The best convoy is probably the Java invasion force...50 plus ships, plus 2 other large convoys near it... I believe I just attacked this one (or a similar one). Late February, 1942, about 100 miles NE of Singapore.

I thought my hydrophone was screwed up because I had a green light over about 90 degrees of area, but couldn't see anything. I closed in on it and it turned out the convoy was just that big! :o At least 50 ships. I took out 2 merchants and damaged one the first night, and sunk 2 more the 2nd night:arrgh!:, then I was out of torpedoes so I slipped away and headed for home. I picked up another large convoy on sonar shortly after but couldn't do anything. Finished the patrol with 5 merchant kills, and 1 Jap Sub kill... not too shabby.

In hindsight, I should have run deep and silent to position myself directly under the convoy, then come up in the middle of it and wreak havoc from both fore and aft tubes at the same time at close range. That would have given me better cover from the escorts too. Live and learn, I guess.

[Armistead]

I think the java convoy comes from the other direction, I caught it near Jolo, near Tawi Tawi and chased it to Java, where it turns and basically heads back. But there is two other larger convoys near and that is the right time, Feb 42.

[Bubblehead1980]

That's RSRD for you.Not being negative because I like RSRD but the down side of the realism is there are only so many convoys and they are only spawned once.Although I think the lack of them in certain areas does not follow history.

Places like Marianas, Carolines and Palaus are rather dead in 44 and should be booming from everything i've read.

[Gilbou]

I just installed TMO and its patch
And well. Three patrols. Nothing.
I just did shoot down a fishing ship and that's it.
No merchant, no convoy, nothing.

I could always find ships or convoys before TMO and it's cool but since it's installed I don't see nor hear any ships.

[Armistead]

The main thing with RSRD is to know some history. There isn't one patrol that I go out on that I can't find a large convoy. Sometimes I get skunked looking for something new. I got one pattern down to the point it was one large convoy after the other, but got boring, so found other groups.

Almost every Island or nation the JP's took over, there were large invasion forces, almost all of these are perfectly scripted. If you start at Manila, all you got do is head North and you're gonna find a large invasion force. There are several that surround the philippines as the war starts, one near the San Bern S8's with 4 nice Chitose's. and about 20 ships...fun to sink. I still haven't took on most invasion forces.

If you go sit on your patrol star and hang around there, you're not gonna find much.

Every large battle and many medium to small battles are well done. With some major surface battles you can get in. Stock sucks.

Palaus aren't dead early 44, but was correct for no heavy traffic about summer on, but you can find some large convoys coming in from the NW. After the large battle of Philippine Sea in June of 44, there was no real traffic left in Palau.


If you want large convoys, they travel from Shanghai to Hong Kong through Formosa all the time. Just don't waste your torps on the singles, they will come.

Another good thing is the TF traffic, like the late war ISE leaving Singy. The Shinano coming out. You can catch the Midway battle group in the bungo at the right time.

I simply wouldn't play without RSRD. Obvious you play it a lot, you learn all the patterns, ect, but you can always find other things. I finally found the Carrier group raiding the Indain ocean early war near Christmas Island, one I've been trying to find forever.

[lurker_hlb3]

That's RSRD for you.Not being negative because I like RSRD but the down side of the realism is there are only so many convoys and they are only spawned once.Although I think the lack of them in certain areas does not follow history.

Places like Marianas, Carolines and Palaus are rather dead in 44 and should be booming from everything i've read.

I guess you didn't bother to read the "readme" in the first post of the RSRDC Thread. You "need" to re-read item 2

[Gilbou]

But where do you find information about where the ships are ?
Inside the game I looked at the map that shows commercial routes, and I have been around those several hours and I didnt see any ship except one Sampan in three patrols :(

The mod is great but I play the game to have fun. Spending several patrols and hours just looking for ships, after a few hours of gameplay it's no fun at all, I just bored myself to death.

I guess this mod is not for me. It looks good, it adds a lot of good things especially the buttons for weather and such, but I am not very interested in stuyding history in detail just to find ships. I just wanna spend 2, 3 hours to play and not 10 minutes of gameplay hunting a ship or convoy over a 3 hours game session (I am more on the side of the game albeit not arcade type than the ubber simulation). I just wanna be on my boat, go around and find some ships and not have to search for historic details to know where to go. While I can accept this if I want to participate in big naval battles, for simple commercial convoys it's not very interesting to me (where's the fun in going where I know something is going to happen and what I'm going to find there ? I want to find a ship or convoy by surprise, and have to shadow it until I can attack... To carefully plan how and when I'm going to attack and then evade the destroyers).

It's sad. I'm gonna have to play without the mod to have fun, and I liked the mod for all the good things it provided. But clearly I'm having no fun with it spending hours going around without finding anything and I am not really interested in pre-planning that would just ruin the fun of finding something.

[Piggy]

Well Patrol 8 was quite different!

After being sent off Guam for a while I decided to refuel at Darwin and head up the makasar straights for the south China Sea. Sunk 7 ships in those straights alone, headed for convoy college and downed 5 more.

No convoys sighted but this was a lot more action then any of my other patrols. Seems things are picking up... this was early 43.

My next patrol has me going to the north of the home islands...:down: I dont expect to find much up there but it is a quick run down to Tokyo bay and/or Bungo, which should bring some targets.

Pitty though, I keep getting the heads up intel messages about convoys and Im always in the wrong place or too far away.... :damn:

Edit: @Gilbou, dont give up on the mod, vanilla is just silly really. I suggest adding RSRD for TMO... Its much more fun when its realistic. There are always spots that will have ships, sit outside the bungo straights and you'll eventually get run over by one. Or, as per my last patrol in the Makassar straights, the gap between formosa and the Phillipines is always busy as well.

[Armistead]

TMO convoy traffic before was based on stock or the same as. I believe with 1.9 he reworked some traffic layers, less ships, but bigger convoys, but still RSRD is the way to go.

Maybe I've just been playing so long I know where to look, but knowing your history is a must if you're gonna be good with RSRD. Still, we have hindsight.

I found another large convoy last night running the shallows of Formosa.
Nice mix of merchants, CA's and many Type AB's...They finally got me bad and I just came up and went down fighting...got 4 before they sunk me.
http://i651.photobucket.com/albums/uu235/Armistead1424/SH4Img2010-01-27_050959_203.jpg

[Ducimus]

TMO convoy traffic before was based on stock or the same as. I believe with 1.9 he reworked some traffic layers, less ships, but bigger convoys


I've acutally put alot of work into what i refer to as "The default campaign". (Default for TMO at any rate). About the only semblance it has to stock, is the convoy lanes. EVERYTHING else has changed. I don't talk about it much because it's just one more thing in TMO i've worked on, and i don't talk about every damn thing ive changed in it. (too much typing, and i hate documentation)

The traffic was reworked to be more historical, but in a generalized way as far as composition, escorts, and frequency. (and Yes they zig zag accross a base course ) Personally, i don't think people give it enough credit, although it is not the simulation within a simulation that i understand RSRD to be. People have a choice, and I think that is awesome If your unhappy with one, try the other.

[Armistead]

If you come back...Are you saying with TMO alone convoys are in a zig pattern as they travel....be awesome, something really lacking. I assume your changes still show up regardless of RSRD when you run into so called TMO stock traffic..or doe's RSRD override everything you did.

Almost finished, I'll give it a try without RSRD..sounds interesting.

One thing I wish is we could get more patrols in campaigns that were more like single missions. Get a flash message that so and so admiral is on such and such ship and that's one you need to get at and have a high point score.. Just attacking convoys is fun, but some drama would be cool. Options would be endless.

[Ducimus]

>>Are you saying with TMO alone convoys are in a zig pattern as they travel.

Yes. I don't remember the exact numbers, but there's about a 20 to 30KM leg for each zig or zag, with each waypoint having a 10KM random radius. So you never know EXACTLY when it will change course, but have an idea when it might. Assuming you've been tracking the convoy long enough to pick when it's last zig was. If your curious, open one of the convoys in the TMO mod directory with the mission editor.

>>I assume your changes still show up regardless of RSRD

I haven't looked at RSRD anytime recently, but last i looked at it, the answer to this question is No. One campaign completely overwrites the other. Essentially, this is an A Or B choice. There is no option C for "all of the above".


>>One thing I wish is we could get more patrols in campaigns that were more like single missions.

Right now i have one, "Gamey" alternative in TMO. I have two flotillas in the default campaign that are assigned special operation missions every other patrol. I haven't recieved alot of feedback on that, so its probably going to go away next update. Nobody seems to use it, and neither do i. I just started redoing standard patrol assignments this morning, and i'll probably end up rewriting the entire flotilla file along with it.

At any rate, if your happy with RSRD, there's no need to switch. If you want to try something new out, by all means, go for it. I've done campaign work mainly because ive always followed my own vision in things, and even if nobody else uses the default campaign, I will. I'm really sort of making it for myself, but everyone else bennfits by having another choice.

[Armistead]

Sounds great, will give it a try next career.

[Bubblehead1980]

I agree ducimus, people dont give enough credit to TMO default traffic....good stuff:salute:

[sergei]

The traffic was reworked to be more historical, but in a generalized way as far as composition, escorts, and frequency. (and Yes they zig zag accross a base course ) Personally, i don't think people give it enough credit

Hear Hear. I have been running TMO in its various iterations for 2 years, and really enjoy the TMO traffic. A very nice mix of singles and small to medium convoys, with a few large ones thrown in every now and again.
Nice work on the campaign layer Ducimus :up:

[Freebird]

I'm running RSRD and 1.5 and you can't swing a dead cat without running into something. There are damn few quiet nights.

Formosa area and Tokyo harbor have LOADS of traffic. The corridor going past Guam that feeds Bismark Sea is usually full(pre-US occupation). Bismark Sea is awesome in the 2nd yr of the war.

I was trying to be in place for the Palawan/Leyte Gulf Battle and missed the Palawan sub ambush so, I booked for Suriago Strait. Lo and behold, I found the retreating forces. Sank 2 cruisers, missed a great opportunity to get a Fuso(did get ONE hit!) or two and got to see our flyboys attacking them. Picked up 2 downed pilots on the way out. Next time I restart the career, I will be trying to find more major engagements.

Gary

[Piggy]

Well Patrol 8 went well, only one small convoy and I was driven off before I could get a shot off... must be more carefull!

Lots of singles though.

One thing that Ive noticed, sunk ships are giving me sonar readings. I get the green light whenever I sweep across a sunken ship? Gets a little annoying when you've sunk a bunch, whats with that?

Patrol 9 has me going into the northen sea of Japan, with a warning about mines... :o

[Armistead]

I'm running RSRD and 1.5 and you can't swing a dead cat without running into something. There are damn few quiet nights.

Formosa area and Tokyo harbor have LOADS of traffic. The corridor going past Guam that feeds Bismark Sea is usually full(pre-US occupation). Bismark Sea is awesome in the 2nd yr of the war.

I was trying to be in place for the Palawan/Leyte Gulf Battle and missed the Palawan sub ambush so, I booked for Suriago Strait. Lo and behold, I found the retreating forces. Sank 2 cruisers, missed a great opportunity to get a Fuso(did get ONE hit!) or two and got to see our flyboys attacking them. Picked up 2 downed pilots on the way out. Next time I restart the career, I will be trying to find more major engagements.

Gary

Battle of Leyte is great. Just sit in the Surigao s8's night of Oct 24 and it's an easy ambush. 3 different US TF's come and do battle and do a lot of damage and you can finish them off. Doe's get noisy with all the surface guns, but you can really do some damage.

If you hurry out you can head to San Bern morning of 25. Usually you'll pick up the large US jeep carrier force and Kurita's Center force gunning at it, but it will turn around. If you have any torps left, plenty of ships. Planes may damage some ships and give you some easy pickens.