warships on horizon with blinking lights

[Bilge_Rat]

Have been playing SH4 for 10 years, have seen this off and on.

In my campaign, (TMO + RSRDC), just had a wild night of action, just missed a TF at dusk, ran into another one during the night (sank a CA) and now at dawn, there may be another one heading my way.

While escaping from TF2, I spotted several warships on the horizon with blinking lights. Now at dawn, there is another DD at the horizon, also with blinking lights. None of them appear to have detected me or are taking aggressive action.

Does this behavior mean anything in game terms?

[propbeanie]

Is it maybe comm lights? In other words "... 1200 meters, convoy turn port 12 degrees, on my mark..." ?? simulating that?... :lol:

... or maybe they're saying "Suni, how is your mother, young lad?"...

[Jeff-Groves]

Aldis Lamps for emersion only.

Change the hour in the Battle off Samar mission to 23 and you'll see them real quick.

Now here's something interesting.
If you change the hour in the Museum's .mis file to 23?
You won't see the lights. Could there be a detection factor at work also?
One could try creating a mission with only one ship to see if it's blinking then another with several ships to see if they blink.

[Bilge_Rat]

I would guess there is something that triggers the action since usually a TF at night is blacked out and hard to spot. I used to think it was tied to "search" mode, but I have been out of contact with TF2 for at least 2 hours.

[Jeff-Groves]

I deleted all Allied surface units in the Samar mission and the Japs do sail with no blinking lights.
Once I surfaced? They went all ape **** and lights started blinking so it is a detection factor.