A Campaign Multiplayer

[FAdmiral]

This is what I would really like to see after doing 8 patrols in
an ocean with me as the only sub !! The campaign game done
in multiplayer on a server that might allow 50 players at one time.
So then we have 50 player-controlled subs leaving different ports on patrol on different dates. You play as long as you want to or can and then hand your sub off to aonother player waiting in reserve. Then maybe 24 hrs. later, you come back in and wait
in reserve for another player to quit & hand a sub back to you.
Messages coming & going to real sub captains about contact
reports. Getting together and using wolfpack tactics on convoys.
Just knowing that there are always 49 other guys like you out
looking for targets. THEN, we would have a fantastic simulation.


JIM

[Hackett]

Nice idea, and one almost all us hardcore players wanted from the get-go, but pure fantasy at this point in time, with this particular software product.

As for the handing over our boats after spending however many hours on an online patrol is one HUGE no-no.
You want to use my boat....Wait until my crew and I are back in port. Not after i log off, and come back with no torps, dead crew, or worse, at the hands of another player...

[Cdre Gibs]

The ideal situation would have been the creation of a Proper Dedicated Server Program to start with and not this host server crap.

Then a Server could say Run 1 of the years out of the war - like lets say 1942. This could indeed be run for a Full Year even, if the Server was up to it. Now all that we as players need to do is Log into BDU, get a mission update of the war so far then select our Boat, crew, weapon load out and set sail (launch game). Then we can sail to our patrol area and get Real Time updates From those already In Game as to whats where.

But how to solve the long distance issue, a player will either need to just let the game run or log back out to only have to start all over again. OR if it was a proper Dedicated Server, maybe the server could be made to remember ur last know fix and advance u no more than say 12hours in a straight line ahead of that last fix (baring land mass) at last known speed and depth.

This of course could result in u missing entire convoys an such but I atm see no other way. I cant see a player just handing over a fully armed top of the line sub to some 1 else for at least 12hours, and then to be given back a bloody wreak when they log back in, would realy cut the mustard.

So the end result is the Multiplay we have now, small instant missions that are over in a matter of minutes with no real gain. So basicaly they are just for laughs. In all honesty I cant take Multiplay seriously because the game its self does not lend its self well to that type of game mode.

However I much prefer Multiplay to campain because of the fact that myself and others I know can have a good old blast an a laugh .

If SH3 was redone so that the Multiplayer side had more substance with players able to control more than just Subs (Ships, Planes, whatever) we might have actually had something of worth (for multilay that is). The biggest killer is the real time issue on so huge a play area. But then again its that huge play area ( the whole globe) that I luv about SH3 more than anything else.