Sh3 rules!:haha:

Very good, now I think I can see where you're going with this.

Your ideas seem to fit quite nicely with your original description of 'true realism' as opposed to typical 'gameplay realism' which generally relies on artificial (AI cheating or spamming type) means to increase difficulty.

Just between you and me I think there would be a real appetite for this type of mod as a lot of people would probably appreciate the enhanced controls for tasks that are currently taken for granted in a one button universe.

Thanks for keeping us up-to-date with your progress. If there's one thing I've learned here it's that this community is a rich storehouse of talent with many members who are willing to help formulate (and implement) new ideas toward greater clarity and eventual realization.

In other words, we're surrounded by good hands so I'd encourage you to stick with it and (if need be) ask for help along the way.

Best of luck and keep up the good work! :up:

From your own link:
Blowing ballast means blowing all ballast. In an emergency you don't have time to play games with "how much" and "when".

ps When you do that trick of replying in bold inside someone else's quote you make it impossible to quote you again. I had to physically retype each of your replies before I could answer them.

You win about a subs non-ability to hover as it seems people are hell bent on this not happening.Not a perfect hover but it can be done with no speed.Can we agree that the negative tanks were blown out after submerging to ensure positive buoyancy.I see alot of people saying that at low speeds the subs sink but thats not what I have been finding online.For safety reasons you want a positive buoyancy,just in case something happens to your compressed air supply.

Yes blowing ballast means all in SH3 since its a simple model of a subs ballast system.It just models one tank.I have to disagree with you that it means blow all tanks in real life.Why would you want to rocket to surface to meet your maker when you can slowly use all the tanks you have at the subs disposal so that doesn't happen giving you time to stop the flooding.

There should be a poll.....should ships sink or surface when at low speeds.

I'm not trying to win anything. It's just a question that has been discussed in these forums for years, and every now and then someone comes along and wants to do it all over.

That is true, to a point. If you lose power you are suddenly faced with the question of sinking until you get crushed or rising to the surface and getting blown to pieces (or captured if you manage to surrender before they kill you). As I said, even if you set for positive buoyancy, sooner or later the boat is going to take on water and the buoyance will change. All of this is controllable, but you're not going to remain silent if you have to change anything, and the whole point of shutting down the motors is to be silent. It's much easier to run at the minimum speed required to maintain depth without having to run the pumps, and any change in any of the tanks will definitely make noise.

Aces Of The Deep modelled this very nicely. Even at slow speed if you set Silent Running sooner or later the LI would inform you "Sir, cannot maintain depth unless we run the pumps."

Blowing ballast is for emergencies. If you just want to change your depth the easiest, most effecient and quietest way is to keep forward momentum and use the dive planes.

There has been, long before you were around. NYGM created the "Anti-Hummingbird Mod", which made the sub slowly sink. GWX, for a time, had the sub rise, but instead of rising to the surface it would only rise two or three meters, which meant the player had to take that into account but not really worry about it.

I long ago advocated a random factor, in which the sub might start rising, might start sinking or might stay where it was, and you would never know. Unfortunately this doesn't seem possible within the game's structure.

lol I'm retarded sorry. You are correct, I was extremely tired and not thinking clearly.

It will never be settled then.:cry:Its probably not possible but having the compressed air move down 1/3 when surfacing would start some realism.Now if we could have a button toggle that will blow and fill the negative tank we can play around with steeper dives for DC evasion and it will also eat away at the CA thats leftover.Maybe even just realistic amount of CA used for surfacing andwhen silent running avery slow reduction of CA to simulate the DO trying to maintain depth.Last night I surfaced right next to a destroyer and freaked and ordered crash dive and felt that if we had realistic CA usage I would be in a bind.

Of course its only a dream.:rotfl2:

Actually it is settled, more or less. I mean, those of us who have been here with these discussions since SH2 :o have along the years got a clear picture of how it all worked. It's just that there is sadly no perfect and easy way to implement that into the game, as you seem to be limited to one effect (negative or positive) whereas in real life this changed depending on the actions of the chief engineer over trim, and other non-controllable factors like flooding, thermal layers (A sub can actually rest hovering in one of them with no noise or movement), water salinity and temperature, depth charges, etc.

Another nice feature that sadly we have been unable to recreate is the depth charges unbalancing the sub and sending it into an uncontrolled dive or rise. Effectively, a sub hovering is in balance in the water, and as anyone who has been near a small ship knows, you can actually move it with a push of your hand, even it weigths a few tons. So imagine what a depth charge exploding and displacing tons of water over/under her keel can do ... there were instances recorded of subs whose tail or nose was hovered above the surface in 45º angle by a depth charge, and the sudden move of all things inside plus the extreme angle, can easily send it in uncontrolled dive.

Hopefully H.Sie finds a way to recreate that :DL

Just found a kool gameplay feature.This is with NYGM and its sinking unless at least ahead standard is used.Kinda too harsh IMO but I think thats because I have put my engine settings to realistic values and so ahead slow gives only one to two knots in calm seas.


Ok,say you are stalking a convoy,keep and eye out on your depth and every time it sinks a full meter blow ballast and instantly press maintain depth.It will blow some air into the main ballast amd youll rise about a meter.Now with realistic CA usage and stalking a convoy will be more realistic and fun:yeah:

I wonder if its possible to go into the commands.cfg and enter in one button press and it will do two things like first hit blow ballast and instantly hit maintain depth???

I will pray:up: Yeah its crazy and I read that smaller subs could handle DC attacks that larger subs couldn't since they would be blown away while the larger ships mass prevented that and so the ship took more damage.:o

Vodkaphile,if your still working on this,can you tell me if you will have realistic damage done?I mean like pumps destroyed,hydroplanes destroyed,air compressor etc?Would love to lose my compressor and have to head back to port under power to keep ship afloat,or lose front hydroplane and have to deal with the trek back to port for repairs.

Also,how different will stalking a convoy be in regards to sensors?Right now it seems like they do not use hydrophones until you attack or they spot the periscope.I would think that a DD would constantly be scanning and for the real distance they could.

If possible.

It'll have to be done by abstract means I believe though. Unless I can reprogram a lot of it from the ground up which would mean it would be for a single sub at least in the beginning, most likely VII mod since it was most common and already has a great nearly full interior model add-on. Also it is my fav sub and I'm working on the mod so..:D

hey vp...what about a progress update? reads very well, what you have been doing in your mod!

is an overview list of done improvements made available?

:hmmm:

Small update:

Added filters for attack and observation periscope. No Icon, only a key command to switch out. Red and Amber. I'll have to research on all filters that were available to uboat captains.

Red is pretty easy, Amber is slightly off. Will post screenshots at a later time, esp for the amber since I'm gonna need some feedback on that.

Partially added ballast system with more fidelity. Causes hydrodynamic cavitation which alerts AI. Currently abstract, eg using a short duration bold to cause the bubbles. Blow ballast command still performs a full blow. Adjusting depth while not using dive planes/moving causes this same effect now and depletes compressed air reserves accordingly.

Working on manual dive plane adjustment.
Still working on individual systems control, pumps etc
Changed default setting of battery recharge when surfaced to off. You will have to switch it on manually. Also at flank speed you cannot recharge batteries as you need both screws/engines to achieve that speed.

Reworking Attack and Observation periscopes to make them more different/useful in realistic ways.

Researching, researching, researching.

EDIT: Also working on a "8 hour crew shift" system. Crews do not fatigue above 256 TC. "Damage Control" does not cause crew stamina loss or regeneration. This is meant to house extra crew, watch crew etc... It can be thought of as crew on break but not sleeping, doing small maintenance, cleaning tasks..etc - I am trying to set this 'station' to cause stamina loss when doing repairs however. Harder to do than it seems. This is very much a WIP and a secondary WIP, as my main goals now are changing 'minor details' to sub operation, giving the user more control over his sub.

I want crew fatigue to be a factor in your head but I don't like babysitting nor do I like no fatigue. I don't even like switching fatigue off @ a certain TC but it is my current work-a-round.

Ideally a clicking an officer and telling him to change crews and having them switch up..keeping the same personnel in the same areas as would be more realistic. Similiar to SHIV.

sounds great!!!

:yeah:

Thanks for the update! :salute:

Sounds great.Love to see less automation and more player interaction.

Some gameplay footage of the mod so far, WIP! Tell me what you think...






























:) HEHE

Rewriting the AI -

starting with escort type ships then merchants then the rest.

I'm talking total reverse engineered re-write. Making the AI really...AI.

I know I am bouncing around a lot on this mod and it will take ages....but as I delve deeper into the workings of SH3 and understanding the little bits, I get ideas and fall into new things.


As a computer scientist/physicist these things interest me. In real life I generally design computer models of theoretical physics, string theory - m-theory and the like. I specialize in trying to create artificial intelligence to react to different physical laws, etc...


Instead of scripted AI, I wish to create a true ai that reacts and makes decisions. I want the AI to know what it is, what it is doing and how to do it but not so much as to always form the perfect equation for your action.

This may not even be possible in SH3. It seems so however. I really need source code though, hacking it as much as possible and reverse engineering it is time consuming and wasteful.

Anyway, just a random spammy update.

Sounds great, hope this can be achieved - any update to the AI would be outstanding. Any chance of getting the AI for subs working, at the moment its totally broken?