[PL_Harpoon]

Originally Posted by Kazuaki Shimazaki II

I don't want to be a party-pooper, but based on this list, I don't think I'll be using your mod. Of course, it is a personal choice to just not use it, but I feel I should list out my reasoning for your consideration (and perhaps the designer's consideration should he feel like incorporating some of them):

That's perfectly fine. This is just a test version so that you can give more feedback.

Originally Posted by Kazuaki Shimazaki II

What you are basically doing here is drastically degrading the torpedo evasion dynamics of the sub. I don't know which behavior is "closer to reality", BUT from a gameplay perspective, you might want to consider that DW is centered around automatic control of your sub while CW is around manual control.

Further, compared to DW, the torpedoes feel much more persistent if you didn't get out of their acquisition cones - you are basically twisting and turning, buying time until they run out of fuel, while in DW once you've decoyed them you are done. You also get infinite decoys in DW at the rate of 2 every 30 or so seconds (you can even set them Deep or Shallow) - few would even bother with knuckles (in essence free noisemakers) in DW even if DW lets the player have them.

Ok, let me explain. From what I've tested unlike diving which has proper momentum, turning of the ship is just linked to rudder angle. So, even at full speed going from full 30 deg turn to straight takes as much time as it takes for the rudder to centre. That I think is wrong. So, I significantly reduced the rudder speed (perhaps too much) and increased turn rate to compensate. In the game it means you need to use lesser angles more and if you do a full rudder turn you have to commit to it (as it will probably mean changing the course of at least 90 degrees). You can still use the same evasion methods as before.
Now, about the knuckles. I nerfed them simply because in vanilla they felt like free noisemakers, especially in LA subs (where all it takes to create a knuckle is to do a hard turn at flank speed). Now, they are still effective but only at close range.

Originally Posted by Kazuaki Shimazaki II

These sound like realistic changes. My concern is whether the AI can adapt to these alterations. I mean, you are a professional ASW flier, and someone just quietly swapped out your kit for degraded versions without informing you, do you think you might for example use the old intervals, leaving huge gaps in your sonobuoy fields and MAD sweeps?

Honestly, this requires some more testing. I know for a fact that helis are still dangerous although it is now possible to shake them off by running deep and silent and changing course.

Originally Posted by Kazuaki Shimazaki II

This may or may not make it more "realistic" overall, but even if it technically is, there's a distinction to be made between the game being technically realistic and its ability to promote "realistic" behavior on the part of the player.

As I understand it, the game started out with values close to your values, but then had its torpedoes nerfed in response to user feedback. Then people started noticing they weren't "one-shotting" cruisers like they used to, and they opened the gamefiles and decided the new warhead value was less than the "realistic" value and we are changing things so we can one-shot cruisers again, justified by the idea that this is the "realistic" result...

OK ... but my thinking is if you are in the real sub, against a cruiser you would use at least two torpedoes considering its value, the need to guarantee a kill ... etc, wouldn't you? The real reason you are even thinking of one torpedo is because this is a game, you are not actually in danger, so if the game lets you get away with it you will use one torpedo. In short, the supposedly less technically accurate value motivates more realistic behavior, and the more accurate one makes people want to game the system and even use "magic" to change reality so they can do gamey things.

And one has to make a choice - if you can't have both which is more important - technical accuracy or substantive accuracy?

I agree with what you're thinking. However currently vessel's hull strength is bases on it's displacement.That means, most destroyers are as strong as subs (Sierra has 8100, Sovremenny 8480). From what I gathered, we want subs to sink after one hit, but large vessels to take more. Well, so far it took me 3 torpedoes to sink Kiev (40000t displacement) but only one to take out Sovremenny, which at least in my opinion should take two. So the question is, what's more important: sinking Sierra with one torpedo, or sinking Sovremenny with two?

Originally Posted by Kazuaki Shimazaki II

From a realism standpoint, you've just said that the Mark 48 with all its new-generation seeker is only an incremental improvement over the Mark 37, plus is only insignificantly better than the TEST-71 which is older and from a less advanced electronics base. The "strongest" torpedo is now the USET-80 with 3000m acquisition. Is that what you want?

What do you mean by "new-generation seeker"? The Mark-48 in the game are not ADCAPs. Based on this data http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WTUS_PostWWII.php they're MOD4s. " Mod 4 added envelope expansion features, including increased speed and deeper diving, and a fire and forget capability." You can interpret that the torpedo can search for targets on it's own (perhaps we should add snake pattern?). Mod4s were issued around 1980, which is around the same time USET-80 came along. Also, reading that page I'm considering making Mk48s more noisy as it states that was their main drawback (currently they're as noisy as other homing torpedoes). Which leads me to this: yes, Mk-48 have comparable detection range to older SET-71, but 71s are much slower and therefore quieter. USETs have longer range (however I couldn't find any data that would prove that so perhaps it is too much) but are also slower than 48s.

Originally Posted by Kazuaki Shimazaki II

Further, from a gameplay perspective I understand the desire to suppress behavior like just firing snapshots immediately on sonar pings with expectation of high kill probability. However, it must be noted that wires in this game break a lot - I think 25-50% of my torps lose their wires. Though it is annoying, it does motivate you to set the torp up properly rather than just flinging it out and counting on fixing things with the wire guidance - another case of CW promoting realistic behavior. On the other hand, the torpedo does not get nearly as much assist from the wire-guidance as it should, so do you want to add another nerf?

Yeah, I agree that wires brake a bit too much (would be great if we could be able to set break angle from ship). But if you're at 5 or 10 knots and roughly face the direction of a torpedo you can easily wire-guide it for at least 10 KYDS. And I don't agree that wire braking motivates you to setup them properly. In vanilla if I wanted a confirmed hit I just fired a torpedo to activate just as it turned on it's course. The only way it could miss is if there was a wreck between it and the target. A lot of times I just broke the wire myself to load another torp.