Does the game track how much sail you have exposed and behaves differently? Yes. It also cares how MUCH scope you have exposed, how MUCH deck you have exposed and what is the ANGLE of exposure. How fast you are going. What are the weather conditions.
There are three levels of visibility exposure and all three vary by the amount of exposure:
1) Surfaced (it's possible to be surfaced enough to engage the diesels, but you are not fully surfaced or exposed.)
2) Partially submerged (you are deep enough to force battery power, but not deep enough to hide the sail completely.)
3) Periscope depth (Sail is submerged enough you cannot use the bridge view and have to rely on the scope which has varying height.)
Obviously anything lower and you cannot see out the scope nor can any part of your sub be seen by surface ships (although if a plane flies directly over you and the surface is mostly calm, you can still be seen.)
There are several varitions on all three conditions above:
You can have various amounts of sail and and/or scope exposed in combination.
You can be in calm or rough weather, fog etc.
Your speed.
Quality of the enemy crews (which vary widely.)
The aspect angle of your boat to the nearest or most aggressive enemy.
Time of day and lighting.
The type of sub.
The game cares about all this stuff and not in an on-off type of way and after working all these things into the visibility equation, modifies it with random factors.
With so many factors involved, the amount of sail you expose in one circumstance will not produce the same result every time you are in potential view of the enemy.
The point I'm trying to make is if in your own testing you discover a sail exposure that lets you get with 1000 yards of a target and you try that again on another attack, it might fail. So, you might let us know that at wave height x, and speed y, at aspect z to escort whatsit year 1942 with sail exposure 2 feet traveling 4 knots at battle stations, you got within so many yards of the enemy. What good will all this do when in your next attack you are not able to duplicate all these factors?
How close you get at what exposure will be largely determined by your caution, skill, experience and gut feeling while closely observing the enemy.
-Pv-
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