A primary source can be just as unreliable as a secondary one. BTW I would probably class Thunder Below as a secondary source, its the patrol logs that are the primary source. Fluckey's account is not given validity because he 'was there' but because it draws on corroborating evidence. The fact that Fluckey was the captain of the USS Barb might go some way to determinding how much validity his account should be given but its not definative.

But I am talking generally here. I'm not picking on Fluckey and saying his work is unreliable or incorrect (actually it sounds pretty good, will have to look it up on Amazon;)).

Perhaps I could have worded my post better:hmm: but I'm not implying that fact is a matter of counting opinions. It is indeed a case of evaluating sources.

howler93, thanks for the info I always wondered where the term comes from also:up: And don't worrry about the patrol reports, its not geeeky, just creative:yep:

A bit of perspective, I hope.

First, on the question of valid proof, I agree with Dantenoc: one actual report is valid proof...that it happened once.

Second, 71 planes were sighted in 60 days. That's slightly more than one per day. Given transit times, during which there were amost certainly no sightings, there might have been as many as three per day. That's a lot, but hardly what I'm led to understand the game throws at you.

As for the Cod patrols, #6 records 170 aircraft sightings over a similar period. That's a whole lot! But, given that sightings probably include radar contacts as well as long-distance unverified sightings, what are the odds that in mid-1945 a large number of those are friendly?

As the statisticians say: "Once is not a trend". It was mentioned earlier that a true analysis has to include the logs of every patrol, or else the results will always be skewed.

I'd like to add that I included O'Kane's comments as another example of "someone who was there" with experiences significantly different from those initially posted.

As has been noted, neither is "right". They are simply examples. A proper analysis of contacts, locations, dates etc would need to be done in order to get apicture of what was within norms for aircraft contacts in any given area at any given time. The initial post suggests that, because 1 submarine encountered large numbers of air contacts, the simulation is accurate in its portrayals of aircraft contacts. This is flawed reasoning, for all the good reasons stated by others.

I DO believe that knowing you will encounter aircraft within 'x' hours of being on the surface in daylight is wrong. Their should be a chance, tempered by location, date and weather. At the moment that chance seems to be 100% over large stretches of the Pacific, even when there is no reason for the Japanese to 'know' you are about (the fact that contacts are affected by your previous 'sighting' is a good feature I think!). This I find hard to accept as valid.

Cheers

I haven't encountered this. Is this from stock SH4 or were you running any mods?

If you read the actual patrol reports, they do corrospond.

Both stock 1.3 and modded.

I've not d/l 1.4 as it fails to address the real bummers for me about SH4 - AI, SD radar and sub physics (mainly depth chnging characteristics).

Cheers

Well, the system basically works like that, and its even more complex. Its not perfect. But tuning it is hell.