[Tessa]

Originally Posted by frau kaleun

As the thread title indicates I need a little help with understanding how some sections of the basic.cfg file work, in terms of how medals, badges, and promotions are awarded. F'rinstance:

[PLAYER_RENOWN]
AcademyBonus=1000
RankLevel0=0; SCORE
RankLevel1=1499; SCORE
RankLevel2=7999; SCORE
RankLevel3=14999; SCORE
MedalSettings0=0.25
MedalSettings1=0.5
MedalSettings2=1
MedalScore0=3000;2 class, SCORE
MedalScore1=7000;1 class, SCORE
MedalScore2=15000; knight, SCORE
MedalScore3=25000; oak leaves, SCORE
MedalScore4=37000;swords, SCORE
MedalScore5=50000;diamonds, SCORE
MedalScore6=80000;all, SCORE

In the MedalScore lines, I thought the number after = was how much renown you had to have to get that particular medal. When I finished my first combat patrol I know I had just over 3000 renown and I got the IC 2nd class. But I just finished another patrol with a renown of 4995 and got the IC 1st class... so what does the 7000 in MedalScore1=7000;1 class, SCORE refer to if not total renown earned so far in one's career?

Sorry Frau, I've been without a working computer for a few days and then you post a question on something I'm intimately familiar with. I've been working on publishing my mods for that (there is one posted in the mods section, though is only useful if you're using straight GWX (No SHC), and a second one with info on how what additional things you need to add in SHC so it makes the proper modifications.

I've racked my brain for hours over this section until I finally mastered its cryptic ways. I believe that part of this program was written in LISP, a specialized language used for certain types of AI programming. SH acts exactly like a LISP program does in regards to its setting (trying to duplicate these same functions in C or C++ is extremely difficult and messy; you have to use large arrays, linked lists and a lot of recursive conditional statements to accomplish what 3 lines in LISP does) though the game itself is probably largely in C.

Score refers to your total amount of renown that you have achieved in your career. So if you bought an upgrade that's why you would have gotten the EK1 early. Since you were only 5 short I think if you'd gotten the improved hydrophones or if your game is set to charge 100 renown for a tower emblem that's why it appears you got it early. With renown is double faced, you can get a medal seemingly early, but if your renown drops below a threshold for rank you get demoted; but you can't loose any of your medals once you've been awarded them even if you sink a convoy of hospital ships (score wise, in reality you'd have the Kriegsmarine after you as well as the allies hunting you down to sink you after doing something like that).

FYI, you're getting into stuff that can drive you crazy and while it works, frequently the changes aren't made until you complete the next patrol (bug I have no idea on what's going on there): you get into port with say 66,000 renown and just enough to get the Kapitan Z. s. promotion.

When you get into port your rank doesn't change, but when arrive back home from your next patrol it changes. It's easy to manually change it if you have a desire for precise documentation, otherwise the game's automic triggers are fubar'd; without the source code thers A LOT of cool stuff that could be fixed, added/removed and also make sure rank/awards get given at the correct times. I have personally collected original u-boat militaria at a very you age (I loved history and was facinated but submarines and airplanes) and have compiled quite a large collection, many of which are the same awards you get in game. As a collector and someone that appreciates the history behind them it burns me that thed did a half ass job on the implementation.

Originally Posted by frau kaleun

Actually I think renown by itself is fine for awarding medals, since historically it was not necessary to complete X number of patrols to earn them if what you accomplished during your patrols (or even only one patrol) was deemed worthy of a decoration.

But I was just thinking today that using # of patrols completed (which would bring in more of a "passage of time" variable) in conjunction with renown for successes while on patrol would be a cool way of giving out promotions.

For the crew the formal criteria that Raeder put down was, "The badge can be presented to all officers, NCO's, and crew members who serve on submarine, and who prove themselves in two or more sorties against the enemy. In case of a wound sustained during a sortie, the number of sorties requirement is waved. The decision arriving at the determination for the award of the badge rests with the submarine commander."

In order to earn the badge with diamonds you needed a RK with Oak Leaves in order to be eligible.

P.S. To change the rate of the crew medals you need to modify the next section, which can make the crew awards a lot more realistic. When it says SCORE that refers to the renown you receive for that particular patrol. So if you wanted to make the submarine badge more prestigous change the value to something high like 400 or 500, that way you'll only get a couple or more per partol to hand out (and can use SHC to augment if you feel other's deserve an award but you didn't have enough in game).

To solve the problem of the front clasp getting awarded pre-1944 (it is bassed on tonnage sunk on patrol) to 250,000 to ensure that it never gets awarded. Likewise with the RK, only a handful of crewmen (maybe a dozen or so) were awarded it so I set it high to 100,000-125,000 (sinking a couple warships and some large merchants can easily get you over 100k, a patrol that most likely had an individual that performed to the level to earn one). Likewise you can change the values to whatever suits your needs. Finally there is the promotions, that is how much renown (on that patrol) that is needed to earn each promotion (up to 4). If you wanted to have the crew's ranks to increase slower raise that number to 650,750, or 1000 or more so that you only get 1 or 2 (occasionally more) promotions per patrol.