from Elanaiba :
Back to the problem at hand, which Keltos brought to my attention... I don't have more solutions than you guys. I should have thought about this one at some point and have the programmers ad some extra stuff to account for British practice, which was not completely unknown to me
I wonder if the firing button could be blocked when the gyro angle was different from a set of values?
from hitman :
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/newr...eply&p=1556698
It's actually very easy with the US TDC, even if you set the torpedoes to the correct zero degree Gyro Angle. Here's how to do it:
1.- Determine target course, approximately, either by eyeballing AOB (To start) or plotting (Visual or radar). Get on a course that is perpendicular or, at least, something between 45º and 90º of the enemy track (So that the torpedo has enough angel of impact and does not make a dud)
2.- Feed the TDC with all the data, and start the position keeper. Make regular corrections as you see fit, by entering new data (New estimates of speed, distance, AOB, etc, as usual)
3.- Your reference for knowing when to shoot is the Gyro Angle needle on the "own ship" dial (The lower dial in the TDC). When that needle points exactly to the bow of the ship silhouette in the dial, you must shoot the torpedo. Why? Because at that moment the necessary Gyro Angle to hit the target is zero, which is exactly the only thing your torpedo is capable of
That's more or less how the british TDC worked, only that when the GA was zero you also got an audible warning in the form of a bellring or buzz
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hitman
Here's a graphical example:
The red arrow represents the direction your bow is pointing at. A torpedo that follows the same course as you, straight from your bow, is obviously a zero Gyro Angle torpedo, and it will follow the red arrow in its course -same as your ship's course.
Then the moving needle in the dial, highlighted in green represents what Gyro Angle must your torpedo do in order to hit the target that is shown in the upper dial.
Hence, when the needle matches the red arrow, that means that the torpedo must not turn at all to hit the target, i.e. it will be a Zero GA shot, and the moment of shooting has arrived.
Is it all understandable? |
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hitman
Many thanks for taking some time to consider the problem Dan
Locking the fire button could be a solution, even if not a perfect one. If we can make it display the grayed-out graphic normally and highlight in red when the torpedo has a zero GA that would be somehow similar to the original buzzer and burning light in the Fruit Machine. 
But I have no idea how to do that 
Any suggestions on how to link the button graphic to the GA? 
If the own ship dial was stationary, we could maybe solve it by converting the GA pointer into a circular dial with a hole that shows the button and makes it available only when the dial comes to zero. But since the own ship dial also rotates, the pointer shows the zero GA in any part of it, so we would need to have the fire button rotate all around with it, which would be confusing  and probably also impossible to do.
Hmmmmm another alternative, since the own ship must somehow point close to the target line of sight (Top of own ship dial) could be to have the ownship dial be larger and hide the fire button until the own ship dial aims close to the line of sight ... say some 45º either side
But again we would stumble against the same problem, i.e. we would be free to shoot any moment with an instant-GA update on the fly insde those -/+ 45º
Not to mention that I absolutely lack the skills for modifying the menu.ini to do the trick with the dials  |