I seem to remember....
 

....in stock game that characters would disappear during TC. I'm usually in the nav map during TC but on the odd occasion I've cranked up TC while in the control room, certain characters have disappeared and reappeared once dropping out of warp.

I've seen the same thing.

This is a setting in one of the cfg's.

[TIME COMPRESSION]
...
CharacterAnim=4
Particles=8
...


No characters/anims, and particles is things like fires, funnel smoke etc.

Ships will remain visible though...


[edit] I almost forgot: cool find, Ducimus!

Consider cloning the bridge watch crew nodes and moving them to the conning tower or control room as appropriate for when the boat is submerged. I've not played with this to know how/if it is possible, but it could have an important application for something I have in mind related to the damage models, specifically the deck watch crew getting injured during a depth charge attack when the bridge zone takes damage. I have a few ideas on how to address this this injury problem, but moving the crew to a different compartment when submerged might be the better solution.

Thats a good idea observer, except that 3d nodes are handled differently from where the crew resides. Or so is my working presumption.

I could for instance, (and have in current publsih of TM), take a crewman from the engine room. Make him APPEAR in a 3d node by assigning it to him when on watch. His effeciency ratings and such will only effect the compartment hes acutally assigned to, even though he appears elsewhere. For example the helmsmen in current TM is acutaly in the engine room. If the CT takes massive damage, he will (im quite sure) recieve no injuries because hes still assigned to the engine room.

Thats my guess anyway, ive never ran a test to prove it. 3d nodes, are in my rather rusty knowledge of OOP, Global in scope to the submarine object.

For instance the Helmsman node, you would think can only be accessed by crewman in the compartment that contains the node. Not true, you can take any crewman, from anywhere in the boat, and have him appear there. Where the node resides only dictates where it appears, what you fill it with, is global in scope to the submarine object.

I have for example, taken a member of the CT, and sat him on the bow in a commando node (MCO1), but since hes still in the CT as assigned by the subs UPC file, he stays right where he is when on watch. Even if the boat submerges. (i should have taken a screenshot of that, it was halarious)

Having said all that.. what i dont remember is what the game will do when it has two nodes of the same thing.

You have to use exact node names. For exmaple "PL_dummy" will always work. "PL_dummy2" will not. Now i don't remember (and im sure ive tried it at least once late night :roll:) is what the game will do when it has two "PL_dummy" nodes. I think It will either pick one over the other, or use both. Certainly an experiment worth trying.

It occurs to me that while an interesting idea, SH4 differs fundamentally from SH3 because the crewmember slots are compartment specific. In the case of the bridge watch, the compartment state changes when surfaced and submerged, so while it might be possible to move the 3D object crew members to other compartments by relocating, or moving the node, it does not have a real impact because the crew member is still located in the assigned compartment. In fact, in the case of the bridge crew, I suspect they would not show either because the compartment state changes when submerged. At least I think it's a case of the compartment state change...I've seen no other setting that could be used to regulate whether the compartment is active or inactive.

Further, I bet that only these functional types have state changes between surface and submerged - this might be useful later.

I guess in the end, the crew model is an abstraction (ironically just like Dan said in after SH4 was released...or maybe in development, I forget...and similar to several other areas of SH4), rather than a true-to-life representation.

I might suggest, however, instead of moving crewmembers from other compartments (e.g. the nodes), simply add the necessary crew to the compartment, and remove them from the other compartment in the CrewMemberSlot portion of the applicable UPC file (and adjusting the EffciencyDenominator and EffciencyDenominatorBS). I wouldn't be opposed to making the DC team smaller while adding additional crew members to the CT compartment. Or, additional crew members can just be added to the CT compartment (though I think it might run into problems with the availble screen space).

I think it ends up being the same problem we had back in SH3 with the sensors, or the problem I've recently had with propulsion zones: SH4 isn't coded to handle duplicates of the same node. I tried long ago to add two hydrophones and/or two ASDIC sensors (the latter for improved beam geometry) and it didn't work. I think the same will be true here.

Ive been doing just that if im reading your post correctly. The "borrowing" of crewmembers from other compartments is something im trying to move away from.

As per this screenshot:
http://www.ducimus.net/sh4/preview/int_test_06.jpg

I added two crewman to the CT. I did not remove any crewman from the engineroom (which is where truncation will happen first is suspect). I tested this prototype mod in the lowest resolution (1024 X 768) and it isnt truncating the crewman, however the absolute maximum is now represented in that screenshot before truncation or overlap occurs in the crew display.


I do question if i need to cut down the size of the crew in the prototype. Various sources (which seem to vary) cite the crew compliment being 10 officers and 70 to 80 men. That number is *roughly* represented now, but again, sources vary. At any rate, I defnatly would not add anymore crewman. Two additinal columns (if one looks at the crew config as a spread sheet), is about all the game resolution will support.


Very true. For some reason i totally forgot about that in relation to crew nodes. This limitation is what really hurts the game in the long run. It limits our sonar choices (both active and passive) as well as radar. Some of the coolest technological features of fleet boats, i dont think the game can support.

Your screenshot shows exactly what I had in mind. Having gone down the path of adding compartments, once you exceed the screen width, the right hand compartment (deck watch) will move to the same area as the current DC team and the DC, DG, and AA will all move down. This works since the aft DG slot has not been used (or vice verse as the case may be). This looks like it's a default layout inherent to the menu_1024_768.ini. I've taken a look through here, but that file is not easy for me to work with to see if it's a hard code or something that can be tweaked.

I also notice that you've added an extra compartment to the UnitParts1Gato.upc. What do you have in mind for this compartment? I've had some ideas for this type of arrangement, but I've never really gotten it to work out quite the way I want. One thing I've thought about doing is turning it into an Aux Diesel room, or maybe a crew quarters, or maybe even the galley. BTW, the Aux Diesel room idea won't work because of a special zone problem (one to many zone reference can't be handled by SH4 without conflict).

Two other questions:
1. Have you ever gotten the signal ejector to work? I notice a valid load is flares, but it doesn't seem to work regardless of the loadout, including the "bubblegenerator".

2. Do you have any use for a non-repairable bulkhead once it has been "destroyed"(I call it the "pressure hull" since that's what it's supposed to be, but it's quite possible to correct the text to be whatever for each and every compartment)?

I've got a few other things I've cooked up that could be of use, but still require much more testing before any type of release.

I did? :-? I don't recall intentionally trying to create new compartments. Ive created new conning towers and the unitpart entries to support them, but i dont recall creating new compartments.

Anything in the way of "decoys" i havent looked at yet. I've been so focused on other things, i simply haven't had the time.


Now that, is an interesting concept. I do like it, but im unsure how it will fit in the overall scheme of things in TM. What im thinkiing about here is my aircraft adjustments, the adjustments ive made to bombs, and other such erata. It could make the game entirely "too" deadly. So unrepairable bulkheads (pressurehull, and i really like this idea btw) is a design consideration id have to think long and hard about, and how i could better mesh it in to the overall design of the mod given the threats presented.

Just FYI, i figured out why crewman on the new nodes would disappear.

(To recreate this, all you have to do, is call GQ, crash dive, and advance TC to X32, then go back to X1 TC when submerged)

I forgot to set the Visibility tag on the crew instantiantion nodes from 0 to 1. :88)

Looking at your screenshot, when I've added compartments, they usually appear between the DG compartment and the AA gun compartment when I add them to the submarine UPC file (last compartment in the file). If I add them to the unitparts UPC then they will appear adjacent to the AA gun compartment similar to what is shown in your screenshot here:

http://www.ducimus.net/sh4/preview/int_test_06.jpg

This may just be a conning tower configuration I've not played with to date especially since all of my time and testing has been with the early and middle conning tower configurations. If this is just something associated with the CT configuration then that means adding a compartment may not be practical given the screen layout limitations (or at least presumed screen layout limitations). It's a shame because I wanted to try to add a small compartment for something like a crews mess or crews quarters. I guess I'll have to think on this some more.

its the CT configuration. The extra box you see is a result of changes made in the uboat add on.

Observer,

The StatusActive lines determine whether or not a compartment is active by default. When set to No for any compartment other than the guns and the damage control team, any crewmen in that compartment will only perform maintenance duties and sleep.

The functional types tell the game what type of compartment it is. If we could somehow reverse-engineer this, we could tell the game to place men at the dive planes only when the boat is submerged, though that might be something only a code change could work out.