Stationary Merchant

[bill clarke]

I am in the middle of a great patrol, anyway my lookouts spot a merchant, at long range and ahead of me, so I pick up speed and increase time compression a bit. So when i get closer and have a look, I find the merchant is not moving at all, I continue for a while longer she is still dead in the water, so I put a fish in to her.
What could have caused this AI behaviour ?

[joea]

Damage from a storm is one possibility. Imagine she had engine problems or damage and lost contact with her convoy.

[Twelvefield]

Strictly speaking, it's quite possibly a glitch in the code. But in keeping with the reality of the game, you can pretend that it could be engine trouble, it could have been hit by an airplane or another sub , it could be storm damage, a man overboard, etc.

Take the gifts when you can get them!

[Floater]

I've found they're never actually stationary, even though they're reported as doing 0kts. They actually doing a fraction of a knot, and this is rounded down to 0 (or "Stationary" in contact reports). It's worth bearing that in mind if you follow up a contact to a "stationary" vessel some distance away.

[capt_frank]

tea time...

[Von Scheerbach]

I'm not so sure they are AI glitches....I actually came across a C2 that was listing and had a fire going on one of aft cargo piles....it was doing 1 knot.....I assumed it was a victim of an air attack, and put it out of it's misery!