Is this fatigue model capable of being modded and incorporated?
 

Fatigue, and how it works, seems to be one of the 'hot button' issues most of us have with the game itself and the various supermods. I've no idea if any of the following is 'doable', but here are some ideas I have for how I'd like to see fatigue handled.

1) Presettable --and saveable-- duty stations, that automatically rotate at standard 8 hour intervals.

2) Having TC drop to 1 when crew efficiency is a factor (there is a setting, after all, for just that: CrewEfficiency)

3) Action stations (surface attack, torpedo; surface attack, deck gun; damage control; etc.) that are presettable.

4) Enhanced extended fatigue.

For #1 you'd be able to assign crew to their duty stations before leaving on patrol, and however you'd set them up would be automatically saved and implemented throughout that patrol, and all subsequent ones until you elected to make changes. You'd still be able to individually move (and so override) that if needed; say, for instance, in the event of an extended attack or evasion, where your action station profile was in effect and you needed to rotate the ones on duty there for rest or first aid. So I envision a clickable box setting that enabled/disabled automatic crew rotation for ease of use. Otherwise, when simply traveling (for instance, to your patrol area) your crew would automatically rotate as you'd preset their duty hours. No longer would you have engines coming to a complete stop because the engine compartment crew became fatigued.

I'm not sure if #2 can be modded; that's likely to be something that's hardcoded in the game engine itself. And if the above #1 can be modded then #2 would stop being an issue I would think.

For #3 you'd be able to assign specific action stations for various crewmen. SHIII does that to some degree, but it fixes on its own what stations exist and doesn't give you many options as to that, nor does it permit assigning just which crewmen you want at those stations. As one example, I really don't want to have crew assigned as damage control when I go to 'battle stations, submerged', for a singleton merchie.

As for #4 . . . . How about this as an idea? As fatigue increases, the time it takes to perform duties also increases (which some mods already do) but . . .

Once a crewman reaches 'full' fatigue, then passes that (i.e. forced due to circumstances to continue working), things start happening.

For instance, my idea would be that, once reaching full (100%) fatigue level, a crewman could be 'pushed' past that. Doing so would not only continue to increase the time needed to perform a task, but would add a chance of something being overlooked, or done wrong. Things like torpedo depths and pistols set wrong, or not at all. Engines being damaged because an oil leak was missed and it cracked a rod. Breaching the surface when meaning to go to periscope depth.

You could 'push' a crewman until 150% of max fatigue, at which point they would 'grey ghost' and stop functioning; effectively passing out on their feet. It would take as long to recover back to full fatigue (go from 150% to 100%) as it normally does to completely recover (100% to 0%). So a passed out crewman would take twice as long to recover than just an exhausted one.

You'd get warnings that your crew was exhausted, but they'd still keep working (at least, until they 'passed out'), alleviating the abrupt engine stops and the like, which in turn gives you time to rotate them before things stop working.

Comments and opinions are greatly appreciated!

If it's not too much trouble, I'd appreciate comments and opinions from the community.

Wow! You definitely put some thought into that. I'm not a coder so I cannot speak to whether this can be done with the current SH3 engine but, I must say that I really like all of you concepts. If we could even start to approach something of this nature it would certainly make me rethink using fatigue models. Currently I just turn it off as it is too much of a distraction.

Great ideas!

I think you might want to consider posting that in the Silent Hunter 4 Suggestions thread;) (though note that the game should, if things go as planned, already have automatic crew rotations).

I think its a good idea. It gets things a little more realistic. But i also agree that this maybe have to be in SHIV, if not an excellent modder makes this happend in SHIII..! :up:

Great ideas mate but I'm not sure SHIII has the capability to handle it all.:hmm: Certainly not the shift system. That would take a bit of doing from what I understand. I agree with Seth that the SHIV desires section is the way to go.

Hey guys, thanks heaps for your input and comments. I really appreciate it, and they mean a lot to me!

I'll go ahead and repost this over at the SH4 forum, too. I guess that'll be ok to do; I know they usually frown upon multiple posting but hopefully this'll be ok.

Thanks again! :)