Oxigen level vs CO2 level

[Dantenoc]

Something's been bugging me for a while, and I did a quick search on these key words but nothing came up... perhaps nobody has mentioned this since it isn't THAT important, but I wish to report that the game mistakenly reports Oxigen level and CO2 level as one same balancing thing, where high O2 and no CO2 are in one extreme, and high CO2 and no Oxigen is in the other extreme. This is evidenced every time that CO2 level dial rises to a certain level (0, 2, or 4 for example), an officer will report Oxigen reserve as 100%, 75% and 50% accordingly. This misleads the player into beleiving that CO2 levels and O2 levels are counterbalancing each other, and it is NOT representative of real life.

Imagine yourself trapped inside a small room with good quality air. You'll breath in the oxigen and breath out carbon dioxide, and if nothing is done to fix this you'll soon asfixiate because of insuficient oxigen... but here's the tricky part: if someone gave you a canister of oxigen to open inside said room, you could bring the oxigen level back up to a good value, but still die of carbon dioxide poisoning!. So it's realy two separate issues that the game seems to handle as just one:
1) maintain proper oxigen levels inside the sub (easily done by using reserves inside canisters)
2) keep the sub free from high levels of carbon dioxide (which is where air scrubbers come into play)

This is how it should be, when you surface to take fresh air:
* CO2 levels should be taken care of quickly (just vent out the bad air)
* O2 reserve levels should be replenished at a slower pace (it should take time fill the reserve canisters back up)

This is not how it appears to be in the game for me... at any rate, it's not such a big deal for game play, but it does ilustrate that the game takes an over-simplified approach to key features of life in a sub.... what do YOU think?... Am I not understanding something? :hmm:

[Badger Finn]

i dont know but off topic... thanks for the nav and plotting tutorials...it all makes sense now...:up:

[Dantenoc]

i dont know but off topic... thanks for the nav and plotting tutorials...it all makes sense now...:up:

Well then give them a bump so that other people can see them :yep:

[Jimbuna]

Something's been bugging me for a while, and I did a quick search on these key words but nothing came up... perhaps nobody has mentioned this since it isn't THAT important, but I wish to report that the game mistakenly reports Oxigen level and CO2 level as one same balancing thing, where high O2 and no CO2 are in one extreme, and high CO2 and no Oxigen is in the other extreme. This is evidenced every time that CO2 level dial rises to a certain level (0, 2, or 4 for example), an officer will report Oxigen reserve as 100%, 75% and 50% accordingly. This misleads the player into beleiving that CO2 levels and O2 levels are counterbalancing each other, and it is NOT representative of real life.

Imagine yourself trapped inside a small room with good quality air. You'll breath in the oxigen and breath out carbon dioxide, and if nothing is done to fix this you'll soon asfixiate because of insuficient oxigen... but here's the tricky part: if someone gave you a canister of oxigen to open inside said room, you could bring the oxigen level back up to a good value, but still die of carbon dioxide poisoning!. So it's realy two separate issues that the game seems to handle as just one:
1) maintain proper oxigen levels inside the sub (easily done by using reserves inside canisters)
2) keep the sub free from high levels of carbon dioxide (which is where air scrubbers come into play)

This is how it should be, when you surface to take fresh air:
* CO2 levels should be taken care of quickly (just vent out the bad air)
* O2 reserve levels should be replenished at a slower pace (it should take time fill the reserve canisters back up)

This is not how it appears to be in the game for me... at any rate, it's not such a big deal for game play, but it does ilustrate that the game takes an over-simplified approach to key features of life in a sub.... what do YOU think?... Am I not understanding something? :hmm:

To be honest I never really noticed :hmm:

[Respenus]

Something's been bugging me for a while, and I did a quick search on these key words but nothing came up... perhaps nobody has mentioned this since it isn't THAT important, but I wish to report that the game mistakenly reports Oxigen level and CO2 level as one same balancing thing, where high O2 and no CO2 are in one extreme, and high CO2 and no Oxigen is in the other extreme. This is evidenced every time that CO2 level dial rises to a certain level (0, 2, or 4 for example), an officer will report Oxigen reserve as 100%, 75% and 50% accordingly. This misleads the player into beleiving that CO2 levels and O2 levels are counterbalancing each other, and it is NOT representative of real life.

Imagine yourself trapped inside a small room with good quality air. You'll breath in the oxigen and breath out carbon dioxide, and if nothing is done to fix this you'll soon asfixiate because of insuficient oxigen... but here's the tricky part: if someone gave you a canister of oxigen to open inside said room, you could bring the oxigen level back up to a good value, but still die of carbon dioxide poisoning!. So it's realy two separate issues that the game seems to handle as just one:
1) maintain proper oxigen levels inside the sub (easily done by using reserves inside canisters)
2) keep the sub free from high levels of carbon dioxide (which is where air scrubbers come into play)

This is how it should be, when you surface to take fresh air:
* CO2 levels should be taken care of quickly (just vent out the bad air)
* O2 reserve levels should be replenished at a slower pace (it should take time fill the reserve canisters back up)

This is not how it appears to be in the game for me... at any rate, it's not such a big deal for game play, but it does ilustrate that the game takes an over-simplified approach to key features of life in a sub.... what do YOU think?... Am I not understanding something? :hmm:

It's true! :know:

I totally agree with you! But the makers probably simplified this to make CO2 and O2 levels the same so it would be easier to "make" the game. Programming such a thing is probably hard and many people wouldn't even notice (you did:up:). It's just something we'll have to life with, untill someone sometime manages to make a "realistic" O2/CO2 usage mod.

[Dantenoc]

Remeber the Das Boot movie, when they're stuck in the bottom near Gibraltar. The officer reports that CO2 levels are low, hence they will not be a problem, but that the oxigen reserve will NOT be sufficient. That's one movie example where CO2 is not a problem but low oxigen is.

Another movie example, but now a different situation where there is sufficient oxigen but too much CO2 is in the movie Apollo 11 with Tom Hanks, when the "air scrubbers" were damaged (and hence couldn't clean the CO2 from the air) and they had to adapt a smaller one from another module to the bigger system by using a lot of duct tape.

CO2 poisoning is really facinating and weird, specialy because it is invisible and odorless. CO2 is also heavier than "common" air, so it tends to pool in the bottom part of a room. There are even some places in the world, where volcanoes vent out their CO2 through auxiliary vents (i.e.: miles away from the main crater) where you can see strange patches of earth were the grass doesn't grow and animals seem to die without any aparent reason. I even saw a documentary about that were a giant lizard was drawn to a crater in the ground by the sight of a dead animal (free lunch I guess is what the lizzard thought), but as soon as the lizzard started climbing down the crater it started having a hard time breathing. Not realy understanding what was happening, and severely debilitated and dizzy, the lizzard managed to crawl back up just enough to poke its head beyond the crater lip, where it could finaly draw in fresh air (CO2 stays inside the crater because it is heavy to float out of it). The lizzard stood there for a minute or so just gulping down the fresh air and recuperating its strength until it was finaly strong enough to climb out of the crater. It wisely decided not to try and go for the dead animal at the bottom anymore.... That's got to be one of the craziest things I've ever seen!:o

P.S.: I don't remember what type of lizzard it was, but I think it was a Komodo dragon or something similar

[Sniper_1]

AFAIK a CO2 level of above 5% concentration is regarded as fatal for humans. I'm in work right now so i cannot check this, but this link sheds some light on CO2: http://www.labour.gov.sk.ca/safety/mine-rescue-manual/chapter-1/mine-gases-2.htm

Rgrds,

Sniper_1

[Tikigod]

I agree...there should be a difference between managing and monitoring oxygen and c02.....its been discussed before on older forums....I just cant find them offhand....alot of the previosu forum content I think is in limbo. But, its nice to see people still interested in this sort of functionality.

My deal has always been with the gauges (aside from the bugged compressed air that was finally fixed by capt america ) was that co2 drops way to fast when you surface. almost immediately as if there was a vaccum.....to me the co2 should bleed away slowly when you are venting...similar to the movement of a battery draining where it requires you to stay surfaced longer instead of bobbing up and down like a dolphin or whale (which in the current sim state you can do to solve a co2 problem). The bleed times I think should be different rates based on boat size. So the larger the boat, the longer it has to bleed and cycle the outside air. This I think they could assign a bleed rate to co2 based on uboat length. The other feature I thought would be nice is to apply fatigue penalties to the crew on both high c02 levels (make repairs and reactions to your orders slower...this is already present base don crew experience and amount of crew in a compartment) or low o2 levels start killing off crew slowly one by one randomly....the only thing is I am not sure if this would accelerate the deeper you go. In scuba diving your body absorbs gases at different rates based on depth. Im not sure if this is the case in a uboat or not. So Im not sure if running shallower would reduce a death rate or not.

Also things like measuring water temperature, tides, and having a navigator that would get lost based on time submerged and overcast would also be neat.

But, you explained the balance of o2/co2 problem pretty well. I don't think it would be too hard to add to the sim considering there have been more advanced features placed in flight sims and other products. I don't think the developers focused on the actual sub management features as they did the combat dynamics of the sim. The gauges I think were mostly for decoration rather than to be used with german precision. The air compressor gauge for instance was always off and was never patched...It was later fixed by captain america. Many of the gauges were incorrect in the intial release of the game (compartment readings didnt match, etc.) So, I think its safe to say they werent really concerned with how accurate the internal instruments were and is the reason for the simplification of the "CO2 is your only problem dial".