Guilty Secret

[Thrair]

I am a noob when it comes to using the TDC. When I initially tried to get used to it on my first couple playthroughs on realistic, the damn thing kept fouling up and sending torpedos far off target. Hell, one time I damn near torpedo'd myself. I actually saw the torpedo whizz past above my conning tower with my attack periscope (was diving after launching to avoid getting spotted by the soon-to-be-pissed escorts).*EDIT* Btw, it was funny as hell, and I tried to recreate it, to no avail.

Due the this, I largely abandoned the use of it. I typically just get in position as close as possible and eyeball it with a decent spread and torpedos set to high speed. It served me well enough that I never bothered to learn how to use the bloody thing.

However, I'm trying to increase my skill level and actually learn how to play properly, so does anyone have any tips with it?

One problem it particular I have trouble with is later in the game when I try to lie under the thermal layer until the first escorts pass by, by the time I bring the boat up to periscope depth to attack, I usually have very little time to get all the info put into the TDC, and often by the time I do, I no longer have a good shot (or worse, I get spotted and have destroyers breathing down my neck)



Also, a side question: What's a normal amount of tonnage for most of you, per patrol? I can usually sink a few merchants each patrol, even with my half-assed eyeballing. And since I'm assuming most of ya'll are a hell of a lot better than me, I assume you guys get even more on average. And it seems rather high. Were subs that effective in real life?

[Armistead]

The torp you saw was probably a circle runner. These were torp failures causing the torp to circle back on you and run in circles until they died out. Many subs were lost due to this failure.

There are many different shooting methods. Check out this thread, skippers bag of tricks. It gives you about every possible shooting method, most with videos. Not sure what you mean by eyeballing it. There are simple methods such as the OKane 90 attack you would like and complex shooting methods such as 8010 for the insane WW1 skipper....... Using the stad is really very simple, so just watch a tutorial on manual targeting. Post in the thread, RR will make a shooter out of you.
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=146795&page=11

Playing stock I could easily get 100K per patrol. With realistic mods I have patrols with a few ships, 20K ton range, good patrols of 100K tons. If I cut cams and contacts off and play 100% it goes down. Tonnage means nothing. If you play and ignore anything except capital ships, harbor rape you can stack a high score.

[Thrair]

What I mean by eyeballing it is I get very close, look at the angle off the bow, and make a rough guess at the target's speed. I then use the torpedo spread angle to lead the target ship, and fire several torpedos at high speed with very slightly varying spread angles to increase the odds of hitting it. With a big enough ship, or if it's a convoy, I fire all my forward tubes.

Trouble with this approach is that accuracy is hit and miss. Sometimes I guess right and nail it, sometimes I guess wrong. Further, if I can't line my sub up so I'm at least roughly perpendicular, the margin for error isn't large enough for me to hit the target even semi reliably with my rough guess.

One trick I try to use when attacking a convoy to increase my odds of getting a hit is to angle myself so when I fire at the leading ships closest to me, any torpedos that miss the target I'm aiming at will be going in the direction of the trailing ships behind it.

Lone merchant ships I usually try to sink with the Deck gun.


Again, while this method works moderately well, it's sloppy and not very effective in the long run, and I'm trying to improve. The thread ya linked may help; but I will need to look through it. :)

*EDIT* Oh yah, thanks for the help. I apologize. Bit tired and forgot my manners.




As for the latter bit. I'm trying to play on full realism with stock + U-boat missions pack. I thought manual aiming would be the worst thing to get used to, but damn I miss map contact updates. A lot harder to find stuff and predict where it's heading.

Sounds like some of the mods would be hella fun to play and solve some AI problems I've noticed, especially with regard to how the ships behave in harbors (ie, stupidly, and not moving for anything once docked).

Alas, I run the steam version and there seems to be a problem with the u-boat expansion and the stock version corrupting each other's files, requiring you to constantly reverify the game cache, so I'm not sure it'd be a good idea for me to install any modes, considering I already am having problems on that end.

Any case, I was just asking what was normal for patrols for you guys, so I could get a rough estimate. Because, tbh, even with full realism, it seems far easier to sink ships and evade the escorts then it really should be. May be the AI on stock being poor in that regard, but I really have to screw the pooch to get sunk. Most of the times I've been sunk have actually been from planes zooming in before TC drops and buggering my ship with bombs faster than I can say "damn it".

*EDIT 2* God damn, I must be tired. I just read my own OP, and holy crap I am making a mess of punctuation. Especially with the poor comma. I think I'm gonna head to bed and come back to this tommorow. It is 4 in the morning, after all.

[I'm goin' down]

Go to the mods forum and check out Neal Stevens mod list. Read Hitman's manual on manual targeting at 100 percent realism. Practice it. It will teach your about aspect ration and target course.

Then download the Easy Aob mod by nicolas and ddrgn..

[Diopos]

... and complex shooting methods such as 8010 for the insane WW1 skipper.......


If by "8010" you mean the method as presented here (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=173086), it is:
a. not"complex"
b. not about "shooting"
c. not a "method" (again as presented)
d. and yes if you use it, you probably must be "insane" regardless of being a skipper, WW1 or otherwise.

Armistead have you tried the 8010 method? Do you believe that succeding in keeping a target at a constant 80° or 280° bearing it means that target AoB is "automatically" 10°?

:hmmm:

[jldjs]

If u don't like the TDC attack use O'Kane technique or
a Constant Bearing attack. Look in the Skipper Bag of Tricks
thread. I use the TDC after the convoy scatters and on
those "unwelcome" escorts. But, I play 15% realism with TMO 2.0a.
Workin myself up more realism.

[Bothersome]

The steam version is only slightly cantankerous. You need to verify the U-Boat expansion only. Do not re-verify the base game after you get a completed set of files for the U-Boat missions. Once you get them verified, you turn off auto-updates for both.

You can then install the mods. Even though steam turns back on "keep this game updated", it doesn't re-update until and actual update is sent to steam. So you mods stay intact until then.

I'm running TMO 2.0 and all has been fine so far.

Eyeballing the targets has some uses. Especially in a DD fight. Sometimes it's all you have to go on.

For everything else, you really should learn and live that TDC control. It can really fix your guesses.

I'm currently working on a quick and easy solution but have yet to do some more testing.

[Rockin Robbins]

What I mean by eyeballing it is I get very close, look at the angle off the bow, and make a rough guess at the target's speed. I then use the torpedo spread angle to lead the target ship, and fire several torpedos at high speed with very slightly varying spread angles to increase the odds of hitting it. With a big enough ship, or if it's a convoy, I fire all my forward tubes.

You may think this is "sloppy" but it is also a very effective technique from short range! With practice, you can get to the point where you can sink just about anything with two or three "eyeball method" shots.

It also helps you when you graduate to more precise methods. When you've made some kind of mistake and entered numbers that just won't hit the target, your experience with eyeballing will tell you your solution is garbage. Instead of wasting torpedoes you'll rework the solution.

Looks to me that you're doing things just right and just looking to put more tricks in your bag. Stuff that bad to the breaking point and then you'll start pulling out the best trick for every situation.

Please note that in my "Bag of Tricks" thread (link in my siggy below) I don't put up with people who say they're posting instructions and substitute simple brags. My test is that a set of instructions must completely spill the beans so that you can read the instructions and end up shooting just as well as the author. Substitution of simple bragging for pretended instruction is beneath contempt.http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa293/RockinRobbins13/smileys/argggggg.gif I'm afraid that on occasion I've stretched Subsim rules to the breaking point in exposing these frauds. It's not as if they haven't deserved it.

Now if you use one of the methods in the thread and want to post a "brag post" about how great a skipper it made you, then that is totally allowed! We WANT people to encourage each other by bragging on their accomplishments there. Anyone can learn to manually target. It's easy and it lends a whole new dimension and sense of accomplishment to any of the Silent Hunter games.

[Armistead]

If by "8010" you mean the method as presented here (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=173086), it is:
a. not"complex"
b. not about "shooting"
c. not a "method" (again as presented)
d. and yes if you use it, you probably must be "insane" regardless of being a skipper, WW1 or otherwise.

Armistead have you tried the 8010 method? Do you believe that succeding in keeping a target at a constant 80° or 280° bearing it means that target AoB is "automatically" 10°?

:hmmm:

Did you miss the part when I said "used by insane WW1 skippers"....:03:

[Diopos]

Did you miss the part when I said "used by insane WW1 skippers"....:03:

Ok ... Over-reacted maybe. :yep:


.

[tomoose]

.....pulls a pin, yells "8010" and promptly jumps out the nearest window to await the explosion!! :03::lost:

[timmyg00]

I have always wanted to play with manual targeting, but the thing that kills it for me is that when you turn off Map Contact Updates, you lose the range reading of aircraft contacts on the SD. I don’t want to have to pull the plug for every SD contact… some of them never get on an intercept course, or even a course that takes them to within detection range of ownship. Why dive for them?

Also, truth be told, I am TERRIBLE at figuring AOB. The only thing that would save it for me is Hitman’s manual targeting guide, which seems to present a pretty good method for getting AOB, assuming you can make a decent ID of the target. However, all bets are off at long range… it’s much harder to ID targets out at extreme visual range, so then it’s hard to figure a decent intercept course.

So, after all that, I end up leaving map updates on and using the O’Kane method.

If I could just get the SD bug out of the way, I’d turn those pesky updates off… I don’t even want to see where the plane is, I just want to know his range, maybe with a shaded circle around the ownship icon on the map, size of the circle representing the range to the aircraft. If he’s approaching fast, I pull the plug… if he’s just cruising by at long range, I stay on the roof at speed.

Dirty little secrets indeed…

TG

[Diopos]

I have always wanted to play with manual targeting, but the thing that kills it for me is that when you turn off Map Contact Updates, you lose the range reading of aircraft contacts on the SD.…
...


Try manual with map contacts on. Nobody will accuse you of cheating or anything, eh! :DL


.

[John Channing]

I have always wanted to play with manual targeting, but the thing that kills it for me is that when you turn off Map Contact Updates, you lose the range reading of aircraft contacts on the SD. I don’t want to have to pull the plug for every SD contact… some of them never get on an intercept course, or even a course that takes them to within detection range of ownship. Why dive for them?

Also, truth be told, I am TERRIBLE at figuring AOB. The only thing that would save it for me is Hitman’s manual targeting guide, which seems to present a pretty good method for getting AOB, assuming you can make a decent ID of the target. However, all bets are off at long range… it’s much harder to ID targets out at extreme visual range, so then it’s hard to figure a decent intercept course.

So, after all that, I end up leaving map updates on and using the O’Kane method.

If I could just get the SD bug out of the way, I’d turn those pesky updates off… I don’t even want to see where the plane is, I just want to know his range, maybe with a shaded circle around the ownship icon on the map, size of the circle representing the range to the aircraft. If he’s approaching fast, I pull the plug… if he’s just cruising by at long range, I stay on the roof at speed.

Dirty little secrets indeed…

TG

Hey Timmy! Long time!

There is good news on the horizon.

Nisgeis has developed a mod that gives you usable, accurate radar, a working TDC and is (I hope) close to a working SD Radar scope. Check out the mods forum for his thread on 3-D TDC. You can play with map contacts off and still bring home satisfying (if more realistic) tonnage.

I am on my second "Contacts Off" patrol and it is a whole new game.

JCC

[timmyg00]

Thanks John, i will check those out. Right now the only mods i have are the RSRDC... tried RFB but it crashed my laptop. Guess i should be thankful this thing can run SH4 at all!

The mods you listed sound promising!

TG

[Thrair]

I am on my second "Contacts Off" patrol and it is a whole new game.



Oh yeah. As I said, I thought the hardest thing to adjust to when I bumped up to realistic would be the manual aiming. But you're right, with contacts off it totally changes the game. For the better, I've come to believe. It forces you to be more patient. You can't just hit the TC and make course adjustments as you go to follow the contact via the map. You actually have to go in there and look at the hydrophones every so often, which is really immersive. :)


And @ Rockin Robbins, thanks. Seem to be a helpful dude. Were this the Steam Forum, I'd +rep you.

P.S. @ Bothersome, I'm gonna try what you said; and if it works, I may ask you to marry me.

[Armistead]

Have you tried the new radar mod. It's a must for contacts off.