Ah, okay. I don't think it's worth the extra escort to add a Somers with a rating of Poor. I'd rather have another Veteran Flower or something, unless there should really be a Somers.

Right.

Are there any specific North Alantic popular escorts that should appear in 1941+? Were any DEs of particular popularity? Which DDs would appear?

I noticed you also did the name change to the C3 for UK


[UnitClass]
ClassName=C3Cargo
UnitType=102
AppearanceDate=19390101
DisappearanceDate=19470101
DisplayName=BR C3 Cargo

[Unit 1]
Name=C3 Cargo
DOC=19400101
DOD=19470101

Better if it was ; Name=BR C3 Cargo

Any reason why it has a 19390101 appearance date
and then DOC=19400101 ????

Not sure I would have eliminated all the names as the SCR.mis file ask for exact ships. Not sure it ask for any Brit C3s but if it did this may cause a problem. Don't really know.

The Somers were USA so you would use a Fletcher or Clemson, I would suppose. More to let you know it was not a good choice in reality. Sometimes model makers just pick one they like and ignore the game's more pressing needs.

By 1941 we have the Hunt class which were good escorts as well as the Flowers and sloops. The Hunt were copied as US DEs but we did not make as good a ship. Funny considering the Hunt started out as questionable being top heavy and needing conversion before they could be used.

Note that the Flamingo in SH3 has a late 39 date. this is odd as the launch date was April 18 1939 so they went with a completed date for the sloop.
The Flamingo was given to Germany in 1959 and renamed Graf Spee!!!
Low have the mighty fallen!!!

I will stick with letting the game pick from the number 4 group so it is unpredictable. One might be able to judge a convoy by the lead escort and with random selection it varies things a bit more.
By 1941 a 4 could be a Hunt, V&W, C or J Class or Tribal and since I do 100% I don't get to see much more than the first escort meaning I will have little clue which convoy or how many escorts In 42 the Yanks will start to show adding many new possibilities.

Ojne more thing. The line drawings I have of Black Swan don't look like the model in SH3. It looks more like the Egret. Not sure if that just means the BS was modified later or they just used the wrong name on the ship like with the River class.
Wulfmann

Yeah, I didn't think the roster dates really mattered for anything, unless you're moving entries forward, which would hurt SCR. Moving them back didn't seem to be a problem. I can correct it, but I believe it's cosmetic.

Okay, then I'll probably not add the feature for selecting specific escort classes in addition to types. It's not worth the effort for a few '39 convoys to be more accurate.

Instead I can move on to KX/OG/HG and tuning the escort crew efficiency settings and contact reports.

i dont quite understand what this mod.. if it is a mod. really does? It just adds certain ships to countries that were neglecteD? Is that all? Or does it at more?

Check the README in the other thread or my signature.

It explains the point in full detail.

I noticed some of the tankers (NE and NO)use the US entry date and I believe you meant to have them earlier than Aug 1942????

Sanv.,
That is a small part of what Jason is doing but that part helps to add more various nationality ships to the enlarged convoys. He is trying to make the convoys larger and more realistic both in content and, as we keep hashing around, the best escorts to simulate the defense a U-boat might encounter.

It will change convoys attcking to a much higher and better level, IMO.

J, here is what I changed in the Black Swan class:

[UnitClass]
ClassName=FFBlackSwan
UnitType=2
AppearanceDate=19390101
DisappearanceDate=19460101
DisplayName=BR FF Black Swan

[Unit 1]
Name=HMS Flamingo
DOC=19390101
DOD=19460101

Then I added to the bottom:

[Unit 32]
Name=HMS Egret
DOC=19380816
DOD=19460101

[Unit 33]
Name=HMS Auckland
DOC=19380816
DOD=19460101

[Unit 34]
Name=HMS Pelican
DOC=19380816
DOD=19460101

These are not in the SCR at all so will not have any negative effective by adding them, only allow for 4 ships at the war's beginning.

Wulfmann

What readme? Link?

k
i started a carrer and took a deep look iinto the layer via miss editor.

first of i think that the dynamc campaign system is very well done, and gives us endless possibilities. the stock layers, especialy the rnd layer, are rather simplistic imho. the period covered by every single merchant group is way too long, and almost all of the different versions are simple copy and paste jobs.

to my understanding single merchant traffic around the british isles died down to a near zero, somewhere around turn of the year 40/41. cept for straglers or very fast ships, who where better of alone. unescorted single merchant traffic continued to be rather heavy in more remote waters, like the carribean well into 43, and in the southern atlanic and the indian ocean, all the way to the end of the war.

this is neither reflected in the stock rnd layer, or in the 20/20 reduction mod, which simply reduces spawn probailties over the whle range.
the germans went to great length to reach out into these waters, but ingame going with the current layers, its simply of no use. encountering easy prey in 1942 in BE or CF is as likely as finding them in ET, GR or in EF.

over at the german ubi forums, someone posted links to a pdf from scans of the original KTB from u178. a very good read btw, which is now sadly offline :(. it gave a pretty good picture on how u178 and some other boats in the same area wrecked havoc in the south african waters in the end of 42.
also pretty inetersting is thisone: http://www.regiamarina.net/subs/subm...davinci_us.htm
it illustrates pretty well how succesful the long ranging italian boat leonardo da vinci was, while striking the southern atlantic in two missions, in 42 and 43. sometimes scoring kills within a few days.

imho, your layer needs additional heavy tweaking in terms of lowering or even eliminating single merchant traffic around gb and in the north atlantic, early on, and keeping a good traffic in the remote waters.
for example check the carribean_xx002 lane. it makes its way across the atlantic starting from trinidad.

Sigh.

http://www.subsim.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=39445

In my SIG?

If this patrol report can be of any interest...

Type VIIC, late November 41, assigned area DH. Mostly fair weather. On the outward bound route, two single C2s sighted with a three-hour difference, grid BE69 (well-known high-traffic point), both sunk by torpedo and gunfire. Then, three unsuccessful weeks patrolling all around DH, only enemy activity a faint submerged sonar contact, lost through gross incompetence on part of the U-boat commander. :nope:
On the homeward-bound route, a single C2 found and sunk by torpedo in BE93.
Results for a four-week patrol in a mostly aircraft-free area, late 1941: three ships of 15,480 grt sunk. For me, a most reasonable and realistic outcome. :up:

I would imagine so. The developers used some magic meta editor that they have not released. I imagine they'll be using it on the expansion and SH4 as well, so I doubt I'll ever see it or get to use it.

Not especially a problem if someone wants to use the ME to tell me which routes, by Rnd Group Name, go where. It's clear from the name where a RndGroup will be, but not necessarily where it's going. I imagine the ones that mention coastal traffic in their name are staying costal.

I can control spawn probabilities down to the inidividual group name level. It's just too much hassle to specifically define the properties of each and every single group for single ship traffic.

You'd have to define 'gb' for me. Gibraltar? You'd have to define the 'remote waters' in terms of the RndGroup names used in the RND layer for me to tweak them specifically.

It's useful to note that while I mention 20/20 because it's familiar to people, that's not actually what I did. Perhaps I should call it Single Ship Reduction instead. I have custom traffic levels based entirely on the name of the RndGroup entry. I can be as specific as group by group, but I chose not to as there are over 1,500 of them.

If someone supplies reasonable values, I can plug them in.

What about my convoys?

;)

Yeah, I just copied and pasted them from the U.S. originally. Since I don't mess with the SCR layer I didn't think the actual roster entries would matter, just the class entry date. I think I corrected the dates to 1939 or so for NL and NO.

Okay.

Here we go. Two patrols ago, August 41' area BE. Heavy seas but no storm. Single C3 found and sunk in BE93. One week later, convoy on Southwards course reported, speed 6; attacked at BE56, two ships hit by torpedoes, but they don't sink! Forced deep by two aggressive Flower-class, long depth-charging but not very accurate. Periscope depth after two hours, no screws noise in hydrophone... Pleasantly surprised to find stopped C2 with stern low on the water, finished off with a torpedo.
Surfaced, was preparing for a long stern chase when... Another convoy reported in opposite NNE direction, grid BE61. Unfortunately I didn't record convoy speed, I think it was 9 knots. Made a text-book approach from port side, only to have my periscope detected by a Flower-class just seconds after firing torpedoes. Two solid hits sink a C2 but I'm still at 50 metres when the depth-charges explode destroying the gun-deck and causing other minor damage. Hunt by two escorts lasts well over an hour, when I surface with only two torpedoes left and without a deck gun I head for home.
Results for a three-week patrol in the most populated convoy area, 3 ships of 18,258 grt sunk and one close call.

And don't tell me it's unrealistic to find a lone C3 in North Atlantic in August 41... Some people seems to forget that one prime source for U-boat successes were convoy stragglers, which for all effects were single ships. You suffer a engine break-down, gradually fall astern of your convoy, or you miss a order for emergency turning... and unless you're a extremely valuable ship, you're on your own from that moment. And if there is a storm, you can bet that after reforming, one or two ships are unaccounted for and will trail the convoy for days and days. An even stranger kind of single ship was the 'romper', usually a non-British captain that when his convoy was under severe attack, and if the escort did not seem too competent, felt that his ship was fast enough to run for it and be more safe than amid the main herd. Sometimes this paid off, other times it resulted in a premature death.

I really like your convoys!

Dize, you are leaving out the most important factor preventing the duplication you (and the rest of us) would need to facilitate total reality; Wolf packs

We do not have them and to structure everything to simulate the convoys as they were attacked by wolfpacks when we are all alone might make it more unreasonable than unreal action that is limited.
I do agree with your general approach. I have made my own RND file and use most of Jason's convoys in that. I have reduced the traffic around GB (That is the UK Jason) and have left it alone in the IO, SA and Car but reduced the sighting reports for those over what they were.
In 1941 I am getting 2-3 sighting reports out of France to Iceland and back but my my objective is to find convoys, which would be what BDU would really want, IMO. The game lacks range to go to the far reaches and that should be addressed but I do wonder if a simple increase in fuel that is unrealistic to simulate Milche Cows might do it. So for now I am a NA convoy hunter. Putting the escorts as all verteran or elite makes it all more challenging.
I sink an average of 1 ship not in a convoy per patrol and make 2 convoy attacks per patrol so my average is 4-5 ships 30-45K per patrol in 41.
In 42 the big change for me is less single traffic and the damn air patrols but those avoided I still get at least a good convoy attack and a single every other patrol. I averaged about 30K per until patrol number seven where I made the mistake of trying to find out what kind of plane was reported before making a dive. I will miss that boat and crew!!!
Wulfmann

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y15...rdy-sunset.jpg