To be fair the 2 large TFs I attacked were in rough weather. Very rough weather. When I sank Yamato I was little more than a Yamato boat-length away from her---farther than that and I couldn't even see her, lol.

OTOH, the merchants have been in fairly clear weather.

I have noticed in very rough weather the AI just look like they are trying to survive.:yep: Seen two DD get swamped and go under.

My experience is like Tater's.

I've always started campaign on "very hard", then changed the options in the office (such as external cam).

I started in Manilla with a Sargo class I think. 4" stern deck mount, SD radar, twin 20mm.

I have encountered what appear to be transport TFs - they have a few CL and above warships, multiple (usually about 6-8) DDs, and a tail of 8 fast, small transports sailing in double column. When I've attacked them I've usually crippled a heavy cruiser. The entire TF slows to about 4kts. The escorts never find me. In fact, most of them slow to the same speed. Then they all sit around doing nothing much other than spraying searchlights all over the place. I often have time to reload and do another attack. It's pathetic.

I have not been DC once. Not even close. Sure, they've plastered some fish, but usually about 10 at most then they nick off after only about 10-15 mins.

The problem of ships ALL slowing to the speed of the most damaged one is a real issue. Convoys and TFs both do it.

So, I can't at all relate to what some of you have described (wish I could). My experience is that of a turkey shoot. After 3 patrols I have over 100k tonnage.

I've stopped playing until 1.2 comes out and then the modders get stuck into it. Frustrating, but not the end of the world! I play Oblivion in the time I would otherwise use for SH IV (now there is a game that knows how to use graphics capabilities!).

Cheers

Yeah, the convoy AI really exacerbates the problem. The stopping/slowing perhaps needs to be randomized. Not sure in RL exactly hat would happen---I've read accounts of staying to pick up survivors, but clearly it would depend. I think if they were cargo ships, the escorts would try to shellac the sub, and pick up the small number of survivors. If the ship as an AP, OTOH, I think they'd stop to rescue the perhaps many thousands of people in the water.

It's like there needs to be a group parameter that you can set to determine if they will hang around for a slow ship.

tater

From the Dev producer Emil:

Career “difficulty” levels represent different realism settings. Basically the 4 difficulty settings represent the 4 realism settings found in Gameplay Options, with Easy being the 6% realism option and Very Hard being the 100% realism setting

Ah, so there we have it, it has nothing to do with AI levels, they are what they are set at in the missions.

tater

Ok, that clears up that matter.....now, how do we make the DD a little brighter in the tactics department:hmm:

Thanks Neal!

I had to do a completely new install of SH4 and the 1.1 patch before I
got results like I should have. With the first install, the AI was useless.

JIM

This is the second time I heard this. Another player said the AI sucked. He did a reinstall and the AI were aggressive and acting like they should.

Just another mystery of the SH4 program:hmm:

I reinstalled though.

I think AVGWarhawk is on to something here with the Hard settings. I made a new campaign last night and used the hardest setting. Also noticed the missions are a lot different on that setting and a bit more of a nail biter. Its an entirely different game on that setting.

The first contacts I got were only when I was within about 100 miles from the southeast coast of Japan and more once I got into the Sea of Japan ( about twice more than on the Jap East Coast ) and on into the Yellow Sea. I was making about 5 knots at 120 feet down when I herd screws turning that clearly where not mine, ( herd them through the hull not via sonar station ) but my sonar man never reported any contacts. I went to PD to take a little peak, nothing at 0 to 150 and 0 to 250 degrees left and right of heading, but at 170 to about 200 degrees of heading and closing very fast all I could say was :o OMG...Emergency.... DIVE....DIVE....DIVE < insert klaxon sound > I almost got ran over. Was in the front of a very "LARGE" convoy with closest ship only 400 away and on collision course with my little sub and he was low in the water, took damage to both of my scopes ( hello mister kill my watch tower crew bug :damn: ) and my AA Gun. My SO never said a word.:stare: Upon clearing the convoy and finding a safe place to surface again, my SO was found guilty of "Dereliction of Duty" and was summarly executed! :stare:

I usually play on normal but I started a new career out of Pearl, '41, on hard and the pickings are a lot slimmer than on normal. Very few contacts while on normal you get swamped by contact reports.

Yep, there is something to these game play settings. More than meets the eye and then some. Must be something in the hard code we are nor privy too.

Guess thats my next step. Only DD to ever sink me was when I laid in wait (at P-scope depth) for a LARGE task force coming at me. I mis-judged thier course and and went into TC...well needless to say I had put myself right in the MIDDLE of them! Damn DDs rammed me.... lol

But other than that...the DDs have been dumb as a box of rocks...

In the Cgf folder, the Gameplay Settings file:
So, it appears the career start difficulty settings are indeed just preconfigged realism options. Lol, better to check the HQ radio for what you are about to play.