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Loaf · 12-05-06, 03:22 PM

I believe that using the "high scope" lookout while surfaced in SHI was supposed to extend your visibilty - or so people on the forums used to think. Don't know why the Germans would not have used this technique, but you never seem to hear of it...

Regarding metric/imperial: Nautical miles are used for navigation regardless of which system you employ. That is because the length of a nautical mile is derived backwards from the size of the globe and the use of 180 degrees east/west of the meridian on charts. To change this to km (or any other unit of measure) would require throwing out all of the traditional charting and navigational systems. In other words, a "nautical mile" does not really belong to any traditional system of weights and measurements - it is a byproduct of the mathematical decision to assign 360 degrees to a circle. Remember that an Imperial "land mile" is NOT the same distance as a nautical mile (NM).

For instance, I am a Canadian who sails on the Great Lakes. A US chart of the lakes will show depths in feet, and a Canadian "metric" one shows depth in meters - but distances on both charts are calculated in nautical miles.

This is why aviators of all countries use knots to talk about airspeed - they need to use NM for navigational purposes, for the same reasons mariners do. (Just to clarify, "knot" = 1 NM/hour).

None of this matters in-game of course (unless SHIV models real-world navigation in some way), but that's the way it is in real life... I was always perplexed by the use of kilometres to measure distance on the chart in SHIII. I suspect it is not historically accurate - you would just be doing conversions to NM all the time. If the German navy really had some oddball "metric" system of navigation (which I highly doubt) they would measure a ship's speed in km/hour, not knots.

However, the Germans could easily have used metres when estimating distance to targets... That has nothing to do with navigation or marine charts. It is strictly speed and distance calculations for the purposes of navigation that require the use of knots and NM - for any other purpose any system of measurement can be used.

12-05-06, 03:22 PM	#34
Loaf Mate Join Date: May 2001 Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada Posts: 58 Downloads: 9 Uploads: 0	I believe that using the "high scope" lookout while surfaced in SHI was supposed to extend your visibilty - or so people on the forums used to think. Don't know why the Germans would not have used this technique, but you never seem to hear of it... Regarding metric/imperial: Nautical miles are used for navigation regardless of which system you employ. That is because the length of a nautical mile is derived backwards from the size of the globe and the use of 180 degrees east/west of the meridian on charts. To change this to km (or any other unit of measure) would require throwing out all of the traditional charting and navigational systems. In other words, a "nautical mile" does not really belong to any traditional system of weights and measurements - it is a byproduct of the mathematical decision to assign 360 degrees to a circle. Remember that an Imperial "land mile" is NOT the same distance as a nautical mile (NM). For instance, I am a Canadian who sails on the Great Lakes. A US chart of the lakes will show depths in feet, and a Canadian "metric" one shows depth in meters - but distances on both charts are calculated in nautical miles. This is why aviators of all countries use knots to talk about airspeed - they need to use NM for navigational purposes, for the same reasons mariners do. (Just to clarify, "knot" = 1 NM/hour). None of this matters in-game of course (unless SHIV models real-world navigation in some way), but that's the way it is in real life... I was always perplexed by the use of kilometres to measure distance on the chart in SHIII. I suspect it is not historically accurate - you would just be doing conversions to NM all the time. If the German navy really had some oddball "metric" system of navigation (which I highly doubt) they would measure a ship's speed in km/hour, not knots. However, the Germans could easily have used metres when estimating distance to targets... That has nothing to do with navigation or marine charts. It is strictly speed and distance calculations for the purposes of navigation that require the use of knots and NM - for any other purpose any system of measurement can be used.