Aspect ratio is not a legitimate targeting tool, especially for fleet boats. Not once in the entire war can I find a single instance of using aspect ratio or timing the length of the target by the wire. Both of these techniques enjoy a peculiar popularity here at Subsim and both are illegitimate techniques when applied to World War II submarines. As I said earlier, very rarely, U-Boats used aspect ratio as a last resort tool.
After-war analysis of targets sunk and not sunk by American submarines revealed that most of the time targets were misidentified. That means that if they had Capn Scurvy's perfect list of hull lengths, heights of all features and Hitman's aspect ratios, they still couldn't have hit the broad side of a barn.
The fact is that we had very little information of the true dimensions of any non-warship in the Japanese fleet. We routinely misguesstimated lengths by a factor of 2, misidentified tonnage by as much as a factor of 3, failed to identify the identity of most targets and in general made a mockery of any ONI manual that we had. Given all that, using methods that increase periscope magnification, provide perfect dimensions of every target on the ocean, eliminate all errors in the database, are illegitimate targeting tools if you care anything about realism.
These tools stand directly between you and understanding the thoughts and feelings of World War II submariners. Now if you wish to play an arcade game, have at it. That's not why I play Silent Hunter.
I firmly believe that it wasn't the captain's fault when many torpedoes failed to explode against the hull of his target. I don't believe they were in complete control of success or failure every time they mashed the fire button. I think our insistence that we should be makes a mockery of the simulation.
Many submariners died for reasons they were not responsible for. Many had spectacular successes for the same reason. War ain't fair. People die when they do everything right. Only failure can be guaranteed. Success is always a crapshoot. The resulting frustration is a central and necessary part of anything with any pretention of being a simulation.
That is why MaxOptics, SCAF, aspect ratio AoB determination or LOA timing past the wire speed determination will never be endorsed or taught by me. The most important ingredient in simulation is the unknown gotcha.
|