Bug unveiled: Watching Crew Deaths
 

Hi mates i've found the reason of the watching crew deaths.
Every compartment heals a wounded crewmember of 1 health every few hours or so...
Every compartment but the external tower where the watching crew is. That place, instead of healing, WOUNDS the watching crew of some health every hour.
It must be an error in the config files... and i'm looking for it.

i wonder if its intentional. maybe poorly implemented but perhaps they were trying to simulate something with that?
good discovery though :)

Weird thing is that once someone in the watch tower gets wounded, every unwounded man you move there starts losing health either. Incredible...
By now, once someone get a scratch on watch, i know that ALL OF MY 3 WATCHES ARE SURELY GONNA DIE. Unplayable like that, gotta find the line on the config files.

This has been my experience as well. After an attack I tried moving the injured men to another station, but ever since that point people on deck would randomly get injured. The theory in another thread is that the injuries are being caused by air attacks which, due to high time-compression, the player is never notified of. I'm not 100% sure that that's the case since it doesn't seem to happen until after damage and injuries are sustained.

Which config files are you looking through, out of curiosity?

You are amazing. I've been :damn:ing over this bug. :\ If the basic idea was intentional but just poorly implemented, I wonder what the actual intention of that coding is?

I wonder if this is related to the repeatedly damaged radar/periscope/what-have-you bug as well? After all, internal systems seem to repair fine. Just the ones near the watch crew can't get permanently repaired.

I really don't think this is the case, as why doesn't it happen to me unless I previously took damage? Equiped with Radar I get reports of incomming aircraft 70-80% of the time and those that sneak through always get detected by the watch, why would the radar and watch crew suddenly decide they don't wanna work? Also so far 100% of the aircraft thats attacked me has had bombs why wouldn't they bomb me and fly off like usual and straff me.

This "BUG" sounds almost like the one in SH3 where if the watch tower is damaged before submerging, all is fine until you resurface then everyone seems to drop dead, 1 after the other starting with the crew taking watch.

Anyway this IS a bug. My crew gets killed even in friendly waters, without the possibility of an enemy air attack. And as Ridler said, air attacks are always detected by radar or crew and time compression goes to 1, maybe a little too late (after being hit sometimes), but usually you notice it.

No, they just lose health like the other sailors in the interior places gain health.
I've been looking through many cfg files, but no luck. Not at home now so i dont remember exactly which cfg files i've checked.
Just something like
(sort of...)
[DAMAGE]
external=1
semi external=0.5
internal=0.1

If some of you has time to check you're welcome.

There SHOULD have been a 'clear the bridge' button to clear the watch off the bridge durring aircraft attacks, leaving only the AA gunners and maybe deck gunners if you're using them.

The watch has no reason to be standing there like fools while being straffed in the first place. Now there's this bug that piles on top...

Does anyone know if its only the bridge/watch crew, or is it ALL the men on deck (ie, flak and deck gun?)

Some partols ago something weird happened to my deck gun crew and AA crew... cant remmeber well, but i do not exclude that i had the same problem...

Yep, that's exactly what I experienced; injured crew eventually die, and anyone moved to the deck starts to lose health as well. My deck was damaged and I couldn't repair it either.

Hopefully the devs are aware and it'll be fixed in the next patch, because all it takes is some minor damage for your patrol to be ruined (if you care about returning home without any dead.)

It happened to me too.I just cant understand people who played SH all their life from the first part and are not angry or even asking whats with their crewmembers.I also have a theory about AA gunners and Flak gunner.In my oppinion they too lose health but it seems that they lose it slower then the watch.When my watchmen died i checked and they had about 70HP.Any luck with finding the cfg?

JP above is on the right track.

I do NOT know how to properal forestall the issue of crew being wounded/dying on Watch so they function correctly.

But by setting those files he mentioned regarding Exposure values to 0, they are essentially in God-Mode against any external attack. If your sub starts coming apart, they will still die. But it functions as a tolerable patch for now.

Now if we can get the Save Games to work properly.....

I noticed my guys falling asleep. I replaced the watch deck with others and they promptly fall asleep. (or are dying......they are all hunched over). I tought the game handled crew sleep on it's own?

Either that, or I am seeing the same thing you guys are.

Can you tell me in what cfg is are those lines?

And what EXACTLY do I have to change.Bless you if its true that it works!

This first one is to find ALL the regular compartments.
\Data\Submarine\NSS_GAR.upc (works the same with each different sub file)

[UserPlayerUnit 1.Compartment 1]
CompartmentType= 1
StatusActive= Yes
ID= GarSternTorpedo
NameDisplayable= After Torpedo Room
Type=NULL
FunctionalType= SternTorpedoRoom
MechanicalCoef= 0.5 ;0..1
ElectricsCoef= 0 ;0..1
GunsCoef= 0.5
WatchmanCoef= 0 ;0..1
WatchStandingCoef= 0.048
MaintenanceCoef= 0.0144
RepairsCoef= 0.072
ReloadingweaponCoef= 0.072
SleepCoef= -0.12
LeadersSlots=3
CrewMembersSlots= 15
EffciencyDenominator=1
EffciencyDenominatorBS=2
Hitpoints=999999
CrewExposure=0
EquipmentsExposure=0
WeaponsExposure=0

THIS file and location is for the CONN TOWERS...
\Data\UPCData\UPCUnitsData\UnitParts1Gato.upc

Just go and change the three Exposure values at the bottom to 0 for the Watch tower and the one or two Flak positions. Some sub files have FOUR sections to cover, others only have THREE. This is because each sub has multiple evolutions of different Conn Towers at different points in the war. So be sure to go through and apply the fix to all year levels. While you're there, you can reset the date structures so you can have a later conn tower at the start of the war.

I know it's not perfect, but it has kept my deck crew alive so far.

Thanks!Did it now i'll check tomorrow and i'll post the results.

I'll have to check tonight to be sure, but I remeber coming across what seemed to be Global exposure settings in one of the configs, Main or Basic perhaps.

This might be an easier fix than indiviudal sub files.

There was a post on the Ubi forums where a gentleman said the "bridge death" bug was related to going flank speed on the surface. Have not had a chance to test it myself but he was convinced that was the problem.