Depth Charges are limited to 300 meters.

[Ducimus]

just remembered why i wasnt a fan of the 400 depth guage mod.


Part of the problem is AI sensors are limited to 300 meters. But thats fixable.

Another part of the problem is The player sensors are also limited to 300 meters, but this too is fixable.


However, try as i might, i havent been able to get Depth Charges to exceed 300 meters. Ok.. maybe 310, tops, but i think thats because of the random detonation factor. At any rate, at 300 meters, all Depth charges either detonate, or slide down a bit deepr, only to vanish into thin air.

Testing this, i took an VII boat to 312 meters in the U505 mission and just sat there making no great effort to hide or evade.

Depth charges were dead on. I had a few that would have landed right onto the conning tower hatch, and another that was about to bump against the the port saddle tank.

Know what happened? The three depth charges that should have landed right on the bridge detionated at 300 meters, and the other one which should have ripped the side of the boat open, vanished into thin air.

So unless this is fixable, if your diving deeper then 300 meters, your kinda sorta cheating :D Cause ya you can make escorts be able to detect you that deep, but that can't hit you. Although i think hedge hogs can go that deep, but i know for a fact Depth charges cant.

Anyone manage to fix this yet?

[Kpt. Lehmann]

Great find Ducimus. Thank you for posting your results. :know:

[ref]

... Testing this, i took an VII boat to 312 meters in...


Are you using any mod to get that deep?, I thought the crush deep was around 220 mts.

[Ducimus]

... Testing this, i took an VII boat to 312 meters in...


Are you using any mod to get that deep?, I thought the crush deep was around 220 mts.

Yeah, my own. Not hard, just D/L one of Time travellers tools. Either the crush depth tool, , SH3 inspector, or SH3 mini tweaker.

[Sailor Steve]

You might be surprised. Take a look at the following stats, and you'll see that except for one British depth charge (Mk X**) none of them could even reach 200 meters. http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WAMBR_ASW.htm

This page will show that the US didn't have a depth charge that would go any deeper in service until a year after the war was over.
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WAMUS_ASW.htm

They shouldn't go deeper, they should be shallower!

[Ducimus]

From my perspective im trying to balance realism with gameplay fun.

The most obvious (and realistic) solution is to not allow any sub your play with dive past 300 meters. But just for the sake of fun i like to push the boat deeper. (VII/41 or VII/42)

However, knowing full well that im virtualy invulnerable and cannot be killed by doing so takes all the fun out of it!

So by pushing Depthcharges deeper, yes its unrealstic, but being invulnerable just isnt any fun either.

[Jungman]

Try setting DepthCharge.sim to greater than 300m? That controls the depth maybe?

[Ducimus]

Try setting DepthCharge.sim to greater than 300m? That controls the depth maybe?

yeah i tried that, as it was the most obvious thing to tinker with. no dice.

EDIT:
I beleive the variable is listed as "detonation depth"? Stock is 25. I tried 500 and 1500.

Another one is "depth precision" But i beleive that has more to do with how accurately DC's explode when "set" to explode at a given depth by the AI. Stock i beleive is 5.

[Jungman]

Yep, your right. The detenate_depth is set for 25m. I thought it may be it. :( Mininum to explode I think.

Precision is just the accuracy as you say.

Nothing in that file is set for 300m. Sorry.

[Ducimus]

. The detenate_depth is set for 25m. Mininum to explode I think.



You'd think that wouldnt you? I tried giving it the value assigned to hedge hogs (2500 i think? or was it 1500? something like that), and DC's still exploded like normal. So i dont think its a minimum depth setting.

[redbrow]

DCs were barrels, not diving-bells stuffed with TNT. Nor were u-boats the Alvin. http://www.uboatarchive.net/U-1229INT.htm - see max depth.

I personally never go lower than 140. Usually go no lower than 90. No need to - I'm not interested in searching for giant squid.

[Ducimus]

Ill bet you just wish you could smell diesal fumes eminating from your monitor. :rotfl:

[redbrow]

and this brings up a subject no one ever speaks much about but that newbies should learn: Tricks in Battle Maneuvering. If one just follows the usual routine it takes forever to bring a sub to battle depth (Periscope depth) from below 70 meters and some may find it dangerous to use the 'crash dive' in 30 meters of water.

Type VII

Fast maneuver to reach periscope depth from 70+ meters =
1. blow tanks - even twice
2. AHEAD FLANK speed forward
3. reverse engines to BACK EMERGENCY at 38 meters and
immediately reset the depth level command to 12 meters
4. set speed to AHEAD 1/3 forward at about 23 meters

Safe crash dive in 25 meters water =
1. Crash dive
2. reverse engines to BACK EMERGENCY just as the tower goes under
3. as forward speed slows to about 4, reset new depth command to 22 meters
4. then immediately reset forward speed to AHEAD 1/3

Quick crash dive to periscope depth =
1. Crash dive
2. reverse engines to BACK EMERGENCY just as the tower go awash
3. as forward speed slows to about 2 reset new depth command to 15 meters
4. set forward speed to SLOW
5. blow tanks once or twice IF NEEDED
6. use both forward and reverse engine commands as needed
7. once stable at 15 meters, go to faster forward speeds (as per needed) and come up to 11 meters.

These actions take a little practice and are a bit different from one sub type to another.

Using these Battle Maneuvers has allowed me to get away with murder in convoys heavily protected by DDs

[Ducimus]

Using these Battle Maneuvers has allowed me to get away with murder in convoys heavily protected by DDs

Hate to burst your bubble but DD's through 80% of the game are incredibly stupid. Game changes around june 1943 if your using improved convoys as they'll be more elite escorts then. Up until you run into an elite DE with their super sensitve equipment, theres only two ways ive found that acutally get me in trouble.

1.) if i get ahead of the convoy and the lead escort gets me broadside... even if at a dead stop. Sometimes he sees me, sometimes he doesnt.

2.) I deliberatly make noise. I remember quite fondly TRYING to get depth charged and in january of 43 put my engine to flank speed, ONLY THEN did i get their attention.


On top of that, escorts by default dont have a minimum range on their active sonar. So they can ping you and maintain contact throughout their entire run. Exploding depth charges doesnt appear to disable their passive sonar either. on top of that depth charges are accurate to within 5 meters, and by default of an explosion radius of 40 meters. Probably to make up for their crappy AI. So when you do finally meet an elite DE, welcome to the world of pin point accuracy depth charging. So until that point, the rest of the game, its just a pretty screen saver or a nice game of "dunk the boat" when you see a plane. (assuming you install the air power mod, cause naturally, planes are lame too)


So its a continul cycle of development with some folks. Did you see the 30+ page thread on getting rid of Pinpoint DC drops? a good portion of that thread address the lame escort AI. Given all these unrealistic inaccuracies to the game, trying to get DC's to go past 300 meters is hardly reason to jump down my back with the realism bat in hand.

[redbrow]

your bubble instead of mine - I wasn't talking about Career!!

I only play single mission with dds set to max elite

[Ducimus]

My point stands:

Given all these unrealistic inaccuracies to the game, trying to get DC's to go past 300 meters is hardly reason to jump down my back with the realism bat in hand.

[redbrow]

Well if you play missions with the DDs set to elite your troubles will be over - oh, and don't make your sub a deep diving bathyscaph. I usually play in waters that are only 80 meters deep at max anyway - as in 'DDs Arenas' set in the Irish sea.

the careers are just so boring with convoys that all look the same and that have few DDs. In fact that is what I am wondering, what mod should I load to make career worth even playing?

I didn't mean to give you the idea that i was on your case - sorry if i came across that way. ;)

[Ducimus]

>>Well if you play missions with the DDs set to elite your troubles will be over


I usually use the U505 mission as a test bed for any modifications im working on. In SH3, Escorts are either full on uber, or dumb as rocksl. Ive tried to work on both. I think Cp made some acutal progress on dumb escorts, the most i managed to accomplish was make the users subs easier to detect accustically.

FYI the biggest factors in your detection by passive sonar is how rough the seas are, and how many RPMs your engines are doing. In rough seas Escorts are nearly deaf. ( Ive ran alot of tests on this). even in moderate seas with 7kt winds they can't hear a whole lot. The smaller the waves (the calmer the seas), the better they can hear you. Which acutally makes sense. problem is, the game is usualy 15 kt winds :D


>> oh, and don't make your sub a deep diving bathyscaph

I like having a deep diving boat. It puts additional factors into play.

1.) the deeper you are the more fatal a nearby explosion can be

2.) it just ads more suspense, i like walking that thin line between saftey and being crushed.

3.) You end up having to fight the boat. In an IX boat (and the type 7 to a lesser degree) the deeper you go the faster you have to turn the screws to maintain depth. Doing 1 or 2 kts, you'll slowly sink. But the faster you turn your screws the louder you get. The whole idea is put some distance between you and the DC before it reaches you.

In some of my more memorable game sessions i was at a point where i couldnt manuver or i would lose depth, and i was on the edge of being crushed. Lots of equiipment destroyed, hanging on a thread with your bow at a 30 degree incline, your stern dropping behind you, just barely able to maintain depth. Dogpaddling at 2 knts at silent speed trying to keep quiet. In such situations ive acutally had to blow ballest to surface because the boat wouldnt respond. That was damn fun.

[redbrow]

Yes, now that you mention it that's one reason I avoid depths. It really is impossible to stop flooding easily below 30 meters. My favorite is to have a sub so banged up that its laying on the bottom in 70 meters of water - while I try to make repairs, which means I make noise, and as 5 DDs dump on me over and over. Then trying to fight the sub back to battle depth with compressed air to help the badly damamged engines that only work at 1/3 power.