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Coyote21 07-13-19 09:42 PM

Less Frustrated TWoS Player
 
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Thanks all for your advice and hints, after a reload and lots of research I think I've finally got a handle on manual TDC.

Just have a few more questions if anyone knows?

What does the Combat Support Units pencil map tool do? I can't seem to get it to do anything, no marks on chart. Not sure if bug or lack of understanding of what it does.

Being half blind, I've changed the lat-long lines in the map to a blue colour so I can see them slightly better, is there anyway to make the numbers bigger?

Now that I know how to change map colours, does anyone have any recommended map tool colours?

In an effort to make my game look more arcade-y (I'm a sucker for eye candy) I'm trying to make the water clearer, I've tried the DynEnv v2.9 Enhanced Visibility and Clear Water Surface mods. Now when the camera goes underwater it is obscured by ugly blocky pale green squares so I can't see 90% of the screen. Anyone else experience this? Any ideas? (See Screenshot attached)

How do you show/hide the map tools ribbon on the left above the depth meter in Map view? I've seen many videos where they are not present, and they seem redundant given that you have the same tools located in the bottom left.

Coyote21 07-14-19 12:02 AM

Update for others:

Testing shows that the underwater corruption was caused by DynEnv v2.9 Enhanced Visibility (High) Mod, if I use DynEnv v2.9 Enhanced Visibility (Med) its fine.

More Questions:

Are the Set Intercept Course and Set Parallel Course buttons supposed to do anything? Because even if I lock a contact then use these button, nothing seems to happen.

Fidgety 07-14-19 10:29 AM

I can answer a few of these but not all.



What does the Combat Support Units pencil map tool do? - I think it is just a different varient of the super mark map tool. I have never used it. As an extra consideration, if you plan to use any of these super marks or nav mark pencils, you MUST use them by accessing the map with your M key. accessing the map from any other way stops them working correctly. This is what I read when looking them up as they wouldnt work for me.



is there anyway to make the numbers bigger? - there is but I cant tell you how to do it, I have seen youtube videos with people having there maps completely changed like this.


does anyone have any recommended map tool colours? - If your asking how, you can right click the tools above the depth buttons when the map is visable and choose from the pop up. I guess its down to personal preference if your asking what colours though.


How do you show/hide the map tools ribbon on the left above the depth meter in Map view? - theres a little round button above the depth / control buttons on the left. its the same as the small buttons on the bottom toolbar that turns one of your engines on or off. It has a little symbol of a protractor next to it.

Coyote21 07-14-19 10:48 AM

More questions if anyone can answer them.

I still don't know if these are bugs or are caused because I just don't know what I'm doing.

Sometimes I can't increase TC above 64. It goes to 128 for a fraction of a sec and then drops back to TC1. I worked out that this happens if there is a contact near you, but it was happening for me even when there are no contacts on my NavMap. Seems to fix itself after a short while (2-3 mins).

My TC also wont drop back to TC1 when aircraft are spotted. I've been sunk a few times now because at TC64+ any aircraft that finds me, sinks me immediately before I can switch back to TC1 (forget about even thinking of taking evasive action). I should mention that it correctly drops to TC1 on any other contact, only aircraft are a problem. Obviously, his makes patrolling the english coast very slow.

I can't use binoculars when running decks awash. I think this may be because the game thinks I'm technically underwater (Not Surfaced) when at decks awash, but realistically this does not make sense.

I'm currently doing the British Coastal Waters mission but I can't seem to find any shipping. I'm patrolling up and down the eastern coast but all I find are lone destroyers. Out of desperation I have on occasion gone into the ports (I know this is not recommended but I get frustrated patrolling for hours encountering nothing) but even doing this "Cheat" I can find no ships.

I also can't dive if I'm at TC64+. It puts the order into the queue, i.e. I see the dive icon on the right with in-progress border, but then nothing happens, my boat just continues following its waypoints on the surface even after I drop back to TC1. I have to drop to TC1 and then re-issue the dive order.

Like I said, I don't know if these are expected behavior, caused by some misconfiguration I've done, are fixable or are bugs.

Even if someone can at least confirm that they experience the same behavior this would help me out.

Thanks

Coyote21 07-14-19 10:58 AM

Thanks for the info Fidgety :Kaleun_Cheers:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618474)
you MUST use them by accessing the map with your M key.

I always use the M key to get to the map

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618474)
This is what I read when looking them up as they wouldnt work for me.

Do they work if you use the M key? Because they don't for me even when I use the M key.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618474)
If your asking how, you can right click the tools above the depth buttons when the map is visable and choose from the pop up.

Cool! Not what I meant, I was talking about using TDW Generic Patcher, but I can't wait to try this out instead, thanks.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618474)
theres a little round button above the depth / control buttons on the left.

Yeah found this, but it hides the depth control bar as well, I was hoping to only hide the map tools, and only when viewing the navigation map. But with the tool color trick you mentioned above it makes it worth keeping them.

Thanks for your reply, big help.

Fidgety 07-14-19 11:11 AM

Sometimes I can't increase TC above 64. It goes to 128 for a fraction of a sec and then drops back to TC1. I worked out that this happens if there is a contact near you, but it was happening for me even when there are no contacts on my NavMap. Seems to fix itself after a short while (2-3 mins).


This isnt a bug its part of the game. It restrics you to 64 when the game feels you are in danger. Problem is, it will do it when there is a friendly contact or neutral in range also. Sometimes, and this is what is happening when you cant even see a contact, it restricts you when a friendly sub is in your vacinity. It will also restric you when there is a contact nearby, but your watchmen cant see it due to weather conditions.


My TC also wont drop back to TC1 when aircraft are spotted. I've been sunk a few times now because at TC64+ any aircraft that finds me, sinks me immediately before I can switch back to TC1 (forget about even thinking of taking evasive action). I should mention that it correctly drops to TC1 on any other contact, only aircraft are a problem. Obviously, his makes patrolling the english coast very slow.


I was going to mention this in the above question but I will say it here because its linked together. If you go into options file editor viewer, and go to the tab time compression. You will find the first option in the list is set to 128. This is the value that the game will drop TC to x1. It will ignore dropping TC to x1 if your running at 64 or below. I had the same problem as you. I was get destroyed by aircraft because when time compression was at 128 or above, by the time it dropped to tc1, the plane was allready dropping a bomb. What I did was lower the setting from 128 to 32. At this setting, the game will drop tc to tcx1 if you are running at 32 or higher. You have to be aware though, that when you run into a friendly or your trying to get closer to a enemy you will only be able to increase tc to 16. This can make it a bit annoying. When this happens you can enable TRAVEL mode. you can find the button for this in top right corner. its on by default when game starts and after leaving port you should disable it so you cant run aground when tc is on. I dont ever turn this back on unless im near port though, I just use tcx16.


I can't use binoculars when running decks awash. I think this may be because the game thinks I'm technically underwater (Not Surfaced) when at decks awash, but realistically this does not make sense.


This is a game limitation and annoys me to. your restricted as some code is triggered that makes the game think you are about the submerge. As far as I know, it cant be solved. What I do is use the Attack periscope when decks awash.



I'm currently doing the British Coastal Waters mission but I can't seem to find any shipping. I'm patrolling up and down the eastern coast but all I find are lone destroyers. Out of desperation I have on occasion gone into the ports (I know this is not recommended but I get frustrated patrolling for hours encountering nothing) but even doing this "Cheat" I can find no ships.


Have no idea why you aren't finding shipping its a high traffic area. Are you patrolling the grid that you are told to go to? In the top right corner of the screen theres a little greyed out button that when pressed will open a slider up with some extra buttons on. One of them tells you which grid you are supposed to patrol for 24 hours. After 24 hours patroling (24 hours straighht no game reloading allowed) you are given a new grid location and awarded 1 upgrade point for your crew. When you are at the grid location, you need to set up a search pattern. travel on surface for 2 hours, then submerge and use hydrophone for 15 mins. 90% of time I find merchants at 30km away with hydrophone but 100km away if its a convoy. Your watchmen can see much less distance due to weather etc.


I also can't dive if I'm at TC64+. It puts the order into the queue, i.e. I see the dive icon on the right with in-progress border, but then nothing happens, my boat just continues following its waypoints on the surface even after I drop back to TC1. I have to drop to TC1 and then re-issue the dive order.


This doesnt happen to me but when you are in shallow waters near british coast, its a bad idea diving when tc is high, you will overshoot chosen depth and smash into seabed or large rocks. Have messed up patrol a few times doing this myself. There is a delay for diving to replicate your watchmen going back into the sub. maybe the game is doing this countdown in the background but ignoring tc im not sure.


edit ---------


Do they work if you use the M key? Because they don't for me even when I use the M key. - They started working but it seemed like they would only place when it felt like it. In the end I decided I didnt really even need them so just used the standard tools. I might check later when I get some free time to play. I use real navigation but havent found a good tutorial for using the star charts and sextant. At the moment im using the navigator for placing nav marks. In the future when I switch to 100% nav by me, I will have to figure this problem out as I would like to place my own nav marks.


Yeah found this, but it hides the depth control bar as well - It doesnt hide my depth controls when I open the map tools bar. This isnt standard behaviour I dont think.

Coyote21 07-14-19 11:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618482)
This isnt a bug its part of the game. It restrics you to 64 when the game feels you are in danger.

Thank you, makes perfect sense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618482)
If you go into options file editor viewer, and go to the tab time compression.

:faceplam: Found it immediately, can't believe I missed it so many times.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618482)
Are you patrolling the grid that you are told to go to? In the top right corner of the screen theres a little greyed out button that when pressed will open a slider up with some extra buttons on.

Huh!? Never seen anything about patrol grids, I usually just cruise up and down the coast. I'm gonna load up and check this out right away.

Thanks again for all your help.

Fidgety 07-14-19 11:56 AM

Huh!? Never seen anything about patrol grids, I usually just cruise up and down the coast. I'm gonna load up and check this out right away.


If I remember rightly, the button is called player guidance, think its second on the right. I think the grid location should be written in the captains log also. I usually get them through radio messages.


You just said you usually just cruise up and down, you need to take advantage of the hydrophones range for detecting ships. This will be your problem, not the area you are patroling.

I will tell you this aswell, for some reason the hydrophone operator can miss sound signatures some times. I am in the habit of checking the hydrophone myself when I can be bothered. I can sometimes faintly hear a ship and the hrophone operator just sits there not reporting anything. After heading towards the sound contact and submerging 15ms later at full spead, the hydrophone operator then jumps into action as normal. Seems like the watchmen can out perform the captains old eyes, but the captains old ears beat the young hydrophone operators ears.



On my last run to the british east coast, I sunk one medium sized merchant randomly on the way north of amsterdamn, I found this merchant from the hydrophen and it was massively out of sight range. Not long after this, I was given a radio contact report for a small enemy convoy heading south east. This was 3 small merchants heading to a port real close by. I sunk 2 with torps and missed the 3rd, which I sank with deck gun as it was zig zaging.
As you can see I actually got to the patrol area with 4 torps missing.


HYDROPHONE and pay attention for radio CONTACT REPORTS


When you start doing this correctly, you will next get fed up of the amount of neutral ships you will run into. Last night I intercepted 4 neutral ships before my 5th before ending the session was an actual enemy. (This was off the east coast same as you)

Fidgety 07-14-19 05:19 PM

Sorry, I just loaded my game up now I have a chance to play today and I just realized that the travel mode button only works for shallow water and land proximity, it does NOT work for any contact time compression changes.

Coyote21 07-15-19 03:43 AM

OK, I found the extra buttons, including the player guidance button and tried enabling it, but still couldn't see any changes or new markers on the map. Checked my Captains Journal and the radio messages and also couldn't see anything about patrol grids.

But it's late so maybe I'm just not seeing the bleeding obvious again. I'm too busy to try again tonight, but hopefully playing again tomorrow night might show something I missed.

Changed the TC options in OFEV so now I get TC1 for aircraft. Thanks for that.

Also found the button that hides/displays the map tools. Thanks for that, Works exactly like you described (not how I remembered it) so either just a temporary bug or I just screwed it up somehow.

Of course now that I know I can change pen colours I don't want to hide them anymore (maybe hide the other tools in the bottom left corner seeing as I still can't get the combat support units pen to do anything?) but not really fussed.

Now I just need to work out how to make the Long/Lat numbers bigger so my tired old eyes can see them.

Does anyone know the filenames involved? maybe I can tweak the image files myself?

Fidgety 07-15-19 10:28 AM

OK, I found the extra buttons, including the player guidance button and tried enabling it, but still couldn't see any changes or new markers on the map. Checked my Captains Journal and the radio messages and also couldn't see anything about patrol grids.


OK, so, I made a mistake when I told you it was player guidence button. It was actually the first button on the right. When you click it on, a black and white square should appear on the top center of the screen. When you put your cursor over it you should get a tooltip that says "new objective". Anyway after clicking new objective a box should open up with your current orders in and that should tell you which grid to patrol.
When you click captains log, the window is split into three cloumns, on the left column it gives you your primary and ongoing objectives. The grid you are supposed to patrol is listed there in coloured writing.
When you complete a grid you will recieve a radio message giving new grid to patrol. when this happens you then have it recorded also in the ships journal / log. After you complete your first grid you should then get the "ONGOING" mission in the left hand column of captains log. If you are not getting any of the things I have just mentioned, then I think you have modded it out. The captains log that I mentioned is trhe most obvious place it is listed and I should have pointed you there to start with but I always use the other method. Only time i check captains log is sometimes to see what I sunk.


There is no markers that appear on the map. At least not for me with real nav turned on. Maybe you will get them but for me no.


BTW, have you told game to do time compression x1 when you recieve a new radio message? You can do this by clicking the radio button on the right had side, in the window that p[ops up there is a button on the bottom right that lists some time compresssion options. Theres also a option to recieve radio messages that you intercept when a enemy spots you or your persiscope. Just thought I would let you know as I have missed radio reports when this is turned off. When you arrive at your designated grid for the fist time, you should also recieve a radio message that tells you to patrol for 24 hours in a 120km radius.


Of course now that I know I can change pen colours I don't want to hide them anymore (maybe hide the other tools in the bottom left corner seeing as I still can't get the combat support units pen to do anything?) but not really fussed.
There is a tab in options file viewer called map. In this there is a option for default state of map tools. I have no idea what it does but maybe it hides the tools like you want? I'm not messing with it though. I dont use the pictured tools in bottom left either but they look kinda nice so I wouldn't want to remove them.










edit, I'm afraid that button I told you to press to show / hide the map tools was incorrect info. It actually shows hides the strategic map. Sorry about that,hope I didnt confuse you, but from the sounds of it you are good on that front anyway.

Fidgety 07-16-19 01:13 PM

Do they work if you use the M key? Because they don't for me even when I use the M key.


Just a little update on this for you. Talking with you earlier about real nav pushed me to get going learning to do real nav properly. I can tell you the super marks and nav marks are working fully for me now. They seem a bit tricky when I first load a game up and sometimes refuse to place. I have figured out that when I zoom the map out enough, they will eventually place as normal. Once I have placed one of these map markers, I dont have any problems after the first. Try adjustiung your zoom level untill it kicks in.

vdr1981 07-16-19 04:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fidgety (Post 2618796)

I have figured out that when I zoom the map out enough, they will eventually place as normal. Once I have placed one of these map markers, I dont have any problems after the first. Try adjustiung your zoom level untill it kicks in.

Correct...You have to unzoom the map just enough to have in frame at least one navigation mark/supermark, or your position, or something like that...:yep: Then you can fine tune the position of your supermark by zooming in ect...


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