Pilot_76
02-07-16, 03:21 PM
Hello.
I've been asked by my friends why I do play Sub games and yet, why I do not use the so called time compression (or TC for short). For the second question I have a very good explanation so I'd like to share that here on the forum.
I guess that 99.9 percent of the people playing SH series or DW/SC/688i from Sonalyst use TC a lot. Why would anyone wait 3 hours for the convoy to show up when TC is there? Very handy for the regular parent or for the soon-to-be-married guy which has a very impatient woman waiting for him to "get this game over and come to bed".
I am not among those because I consider TC a blasphemy (regardless of marital status). Sort of cheating. It kinds of takes out all of the expectation that real sub-skippers experienced in their patrols. I remember reading the SUBSIM's book (I believe there are only 2 editions available) which are depicted in details patrols, funny stuff, events, making of games and everything related to Submarine Warfare. One of those articles was about a guy in Europe which worked as a courier during the day and he had plenty of time back home so he decided to play SH3 without TC. As far as I remember. I enjoyed so much his tales about his patrols and methods of conducting a real-time patrol which lasted for weeks and months. At night he would leave the game running and sometimes wake up in the middle of the night with some DDs after his sub. Now that was hardcore sub simming...
So if you decide to run a patrol without TC at all here are some things that I have been thinking which would help endure this long (very very long) patrol.
First is that I am assuming that you are not a complete noob into SH or DW. Let's say you did play all SH and DW for some time and that you are comfortable with the game itself and with proper mods installed and knowing its enhancements and limitations or bugs. If you are a complete rookie you can still play without any TC but I doubt that will happen. Anxiety searching for juicy targets comes to mind but please bear with me...
Yes there are still some good things in not becoming alienated and actually conducting a patrol in real-time in SH or DW. When on patrol I understand that all the crew when not eating or sleeping are studying and preparing themselves for any event and getting their dolphins earned after a lot of hard work and dedication. So why not apply that same thinking while patrolling in these games? Get yourself busy. While conducting the main patrol have a second laptop or desktop running up a copy of any other SH. This is a list that I intend to do while patrolling. The second PC/Laptop will be used to:
-Study and practice Torpedo setups using any SH mission editor. (SH 1-5). Here TC will be used of course. It is training after all.
-Run the utilities found on Subsim/downloads section for torpedo practice and target interceptions. (MoBo for instance).
-Celestial Navigation calculations (Stellarium+Python).
-Real Navigation. Google Earth with some NAV add-ons I found on the net (protractor, ruler for example). Dead Reckoning. Be aware that the map in SH3 and 4 (Don't know about the others) is flat. So there will be errors in distances and true headings for Great Circle navigation. Check the readme file for SH3 Grey Wolves mod for a better explanation. I will test this error and check if navigation through GE is a possible thing.
Reading material while on patrol:
-Submarine Warfare.
-Any other pocket book.
-Celestial Navigation.
-WWII History.
-Chess.
-Some magazines.
-Any work related material as well. It is a bit unrealistic but actually reading work-related stuff and having an Ocean in front of you riding a Sub is less boring for sure.
Typical Day:
Check in the message box as to what happened in my absence. Did a contact pass by? Did Sonar pick up anything? If I chose not to be disturbed while sleeping in the real World this is the drawback of real-time patrols. Unless I am on vacations I'd be happy to wake in the middle of the night and engage a convoy. If Sonar reported a merchant I would see if I could intercept it. Check the navigation status. Where am I? How far have I gone off course from my nav fix? Fuel is OK? How much fuel have I spent here? What is the status of the crew. When is noon so I can do a Run-Sun-Run fix with a sextant. Check for radio messages, reports on convoys and task forces. Do a radar search. Dive for a hydrophone check every X minutes. Practiced some torpedo shootings on the second PC. Read a lot about tactics. Also took a closer look in the recognition manual. Examined and studied real photos of the Destroyers and Escorts depicted in the game. Did some reading on work related material. Updated my logbook entries. Wow. There is a lot to do on a shift.
Practicing torpedo shots is all what we want so that is why I advise in doing that in a second PC with TC on in a single mission designed in any SH Mission Editor. I strongly advise to leave the PC on only when going to bed. Leaving home with the game running is socially counter-productive. Anxiety will build slowly and ruin your day.
In my experience in the past I have completed a patrol in SH4 for 70+ in game days. Real-time...about 6 months. Yes. it took that long. Every time I arrived home I would fire up the PC and load SH4 instantly. Doing house chores and all I would leave the volume a bit up in case aircraft spotted my boat and had to crash dive immediately. Playing poker as well got in the way. Having to fold in order to check what the lookouts were shouting or what the sonar operator found. When leaving home for a couple of hours I would submerge and leave the boat on ahead 1/3rd. Of course saving the game and loading again I would cover the same distance or more surfaced with the boat speeding up but I wanted to leave home with the game running so I would simulate going to my cabin and sleeping for some time. Anyway it was worse than Whats Up message beeping interruptions. So at the end it wasn't as pleasant as I thought it would be. Nor that realistic. It did not allow me to live my life in a regular pace. Social events were postponed or canceled and so other things were left undone. It was a Super What's Up distraction app in my opinion. Speaking of Whats Up; I do leave notifications in OFF all the time. I access it ONCE per day and that is together with e-mail. No peeking during the day. Especially business hours on my day off. I have become more social and started to pay more attention to real things such as rain falling, people on the bus stop etc. Noticing little details of this World which I think only writers and poets do have a good sense to capture the moment. Just my thoughts here. Cheers.
:rock::rock:
I've been asked by my friends why I do play Sub games and yet, why I do not use the so called time compression (or TC for short). For the second question I have a very good explanation so I'd like to share that here on the forum.
I guess that 99.9 percent of the people playing SH series or DW/SC/688i from Sonalyst use TC a lot. Why would anyone wait 3 hours for the convoy to show up when TC is there? Very handy for the regular parent or for the soon-to-be-married guy which has a very impatient woman waiting for him to "get this game over and come to bed".
I am not among those because I consider TC a blasphemy (regardless of marital status). Sort of cheating. It kinds of takes out all of the expectation that real sub-skippers experienced in their patrols. I remember reading the SUBSIM's book (I believe there are only 2 editions available) which are depicted in details patrols, funny stuff, events, making of games and everything related to Submarine Warfare. One of those articles was about a guy in Europe which worked as a courier during the day and he had plenty of time back home so he decided to play SH3 without TC. As far as I remember. I enjoyed so much his tales about his patrols and methods of conducting a real-time patrol which lasted for weeks and months. At night he would leave the game running and sometimes wake up in the middle of the night with some DDs after his sub. Now that was hardcore sub simming...
So if you decide to run a patrol without TC at all here are some things that I have been thinking which would help endure this long (very very long) patrol.
First is that I am assuming that you are not a complete noob into SH or DW. Let's say you did play all SH and DW for some time and that you are comfortable with the game itself and with proper mods installed and knowing its enhancements and limitations or bugs. If you are a complete rookie you can still play without any TC but I doubt that will happen. Anxiety searching for juicy targets comes to mind but please bear with me...
Yes there are still some good things in not becoming alienated and actually conducting a patrol in real-time in SH or DW. When on patrol I understand that all the crew when not eating or sleeping are studying and preparing themselves for any event and getting their dolphins earned after a lot of hard work and dedication. So why not apply that same thinking while patrolling in these games? Get yourself busy. While conducting the main patrol have a second laptop or desktop running up a copy of any other SH. This is a list that I intend to do while patrolling. The second PC/Laptop will be used to:
-Study and practice Torpedo setups using any SH mission editor. (SH 1-5). Here TC will be used of course. It is training after all.
-Run the utilities found on Subsim/downloads section for torpedo practice and target interceptions. (MoBo for instance).
-Celestial Navigation calculations (Stellarium+Python).
-Real Navigation. Google Earth with some NAV add-ons I found on the net (protractor, ruler for example). Dead Reckoning. Be aware that the map in SH3 and 4 (Don't know about the others) is flat. So there will be errors in distances and true headings for Great Circle navigation. Check the readme file for SH3 Grey Wolves mod for a better explanation. I will test this error and check if navigation through GE is a possible thing.
Reading material while on patrol:
-Submarine Warfare.
-Any other pocket book.
-Celestial Navigation.
-WWII History.
-Chess.
-Some magazines.
-Any work related material as well. It is a bit unrealistic but actually reading work-related stuff and having an Ocean in front of you riding a Sub is less boring for sure.
Typical Day:
Check in the message box as to what happened in my absence. Did a contact pass by? Did Sonar pick up anything? If I chose not to be disturbed while sleeping in the real World this is the drawback of real-time patrols. Unless I am on vacations I'd be happy to wake in the middle of the night and engage a convoy. If Sonar reported a merchant I would see if I could intercept it. Check the navigation status. Where am I? How far have I gone off course from my nav fix? Fuel is OK? How much fuel have I spent here? What is the status of the crew. When is noon so I can do a Run-Sun-Run fix with a sextant. Check for radio messages, reports on convoys and task forces. Do a radar search. Dive for a hydrophone check every X minutes. Practiced some torpedo shootings on the second PC. Read a lot about tactics. Also took a closer look in the recognition manual. Examined and studied real photos of the Destroyers and Escorts depicted in the game. Did some reading on work related material. Updated my logbook entries. Wow. There is a lot to do on a shift.
Practicing torpedo shots is all what we want so that is why I advise in doing that in a second PC with TC on in a single mission designed in any SH Mission Editor. I strongly advise to leave the PC on only when going to bed. Leaving home with the game running is socially counter-productive. Anxiety will build slowly and ruin your day.
In my experience in the past I have completed a patrol in SH4 for 70+ in game days. Real-time...about 6 months. Yes. it took that long. Every time I arrived home I would fire up the PC and load SH4 instantly. Doing house chores and all I would leave the volume a bit up in case aircraft spotted my boat and had to crash dive immediately. Playing poker as well got in the way. Having to fold in order to check what the lookouts were shouting or what the sonar operator found. When leaving home for a couple of hours I would submerge and leave the boat on ahead 1/3rd. Of course saving the game and loading again I would cover the same distance or more surfaced with the boat speeding up but I wanted to leave home with the game running so I would simulate going to my cabin and sleeping for some time. Anyway it was worse than Whats Up message beeping interruptions. So at the end it wasn't as pleasant as I thought it would be. Nor that realistic. It did not allow me to live my life in a regular pace. Social events were postponed or canceled and so other things were left undone. It was a Super What's Up distraction app in my opinion. Speaking of Whats Up; I do leave notifications in OFF all the time. I access it ONCE per day and that is together with e-mail. No peeking during the day. Especially business hours on my day off. I have become more social and started to pay more attention to real things such as rain falling, people on the bus stop etc. Noticing little details of this World which I think only writers and poets do have a good sense to capture the moment. Just my thoughts here. Cheers.
:rock::rock: