Target "Lock" Range?

[treblesum81]

What are the factors that affect lock range? I've found that sometimes at night, I have to wait until the targets are almost on me for me to be able to lock them, causing my solutions to be rushed and inaccurate, while other times I can lock them from a huge distance away, leaving me plenty of time to create a proper firing solution.

Also, I'd like to know if there is a way to override the need to "lock" a target before you can identify it. I've run into a situation where I've already attacked a convoy, so I know its composition, but I can't lock the ship I want to fire on until its very close. Is there a way for me to identify it manually, then create my solution without having to wait for the computer to decide that it can "see" the target?

Thanks

[Admiral8Q]

I notice this from time to time, although it doesn't happen often. I found if you point your scope directly at the target and hit the "L" key it will temporarily lock on for a few seconds. You can quickly gather range, speed, and even fire if your playing with automatic tdc on.;)

Otherwise you can flip through the recognition manual and try to identify it yourself.

[treblesum81]

It won't let me identify it on my own... when I look it up in the recognition manual and try to hit the checkmark to set the ship into the TDC, it doesn't do anything unless the ship is locked, and since I can't lock it until is practically running over me, I'm sol...

[Admiral8Q]

You'll probably have to set up a manual shot then. I may just line up the torpedo path on the attack map and take my best guess that way after figuring out it's speed using the 3 minute rule. But that's just me, there are better (more accurate) ways to set up the shot using sonar, trigonometry, etc, but I'll let one of the experts explain that...

[Munchausen]

:cool: Your tactics will depend on your game settings. With map contacts ON, it's pretty simple to use the O'Kane method without ever bothering to ID the target.

[treblesum81]

:cool: Your tactics will depend on your game settings. With map contacts ON, it's pretty simple to use the O'Kane method without ever bothering to ID the target.

Isn't range an important part of the solution? From what I can see, it dictates how far ahead of the ship the torpedo needs to be fired.... If I'm shooting into a convoy with several columns of ships, I need to be able to hit the right place. Or am I completely wrong here?

[BillBam]

Isn't range an important part of the solution? From what I can see, it dictates how far ahead of the ship the torpedo needs to be fired.... If I'm shooting into a convoy with several columns of ships, I need to be able to hit the right place. Or am I completely wrong here?

NO...range is irrelevant in a constant bearing attack. If you draw it on paper your will see that the farther the distance the greater the gap between the target and the impact spot at the time of firing.

However the correctness of your speed and lead angle are more important the further the distance since errors have a much greater affect the further out the target is.

[magic452]

If you know which ship you want to hit and where is in the convoy a vector analysis or O'Kane shot should work. Range won't matter as your lead angle takes care of this. The weather is obviously bad so you should be able to get in close. If you can see good enough to sight the particular ship should be able to hit it. Track the ship on the nav. map and as it gets close put the scope up and see if it is visible. If not shoot off the sound bearing but shoot a little bit early as there is a delay in sound bearings. It's more art than science. Sound sweeps are every 30 seconds so take that into consideration.

For any constant bearing method target speed is most important!

Magic

[Rockin Robbins]

Target lock range is related to your latitude. The closer you are to the equator, the longer it is. I made up a U-Boat Fast-90 mission in the Baltic Sea, but found that at 1000 yards, you couldn't maintain a target lock for 10 seconds.

I moved it to the Med and instant fix! Now some bright person can jump in and tell us why the game would be hard-coded that way...

[bratwurstdimsum]

Yep - I moved my mission to Malaysia from the English channel and the lock sticks ... so much for their test teams LOL

[Diopos]

....
Now some bright person can jump in and tell us why the game would be hard-coded that way...

I asked Ubisoft and I'm waiting ... waiting ... waiting ... waiting ,,, waiting ...

:D

(Kidding on the "asking" as I'm certain on the endless "waiting").

.