Using Real Navigation - Where am I?

[MiniSmith]

In Real Navigation, so far as I can understand, the only way to know where you are is to let your navigator calculate it through celestial (if your above water, and have 30 minutes to spare) or have him do it by reckoning, if your underwater. My problem is that when I spot a ship, I seldom do have 30 minutes to spare before diving, and once under water, the dead-reckoning positions seems very uncertain, and at times, way off.

My question is if there is any other way to know your position, or if I just have to trust my navigators reckoning skills? :p

[TheDarkWraith]

Originally Posted by MiniSmith

In Real Navigation, so far as I can understand, the only way to know where you are is to let your navigator calculate it through celestial (if your above water, and have 30 minutes to spare) or have him do it by reckoning, if your underwater. My problem is that when I spot a ship, I seldom do have 30 minutes to spare before diving, and once under water, the dead-reckoning positions seems very uncertain, and at times, way off.

My question is if there is any other way to know your position, or if I just have to trust my navigators reckoning skills? :p

You should know your position at all times, you are Captain aren't you? If you keep track of time travelled since last celestial fix and haven't had any heading changes then you can easily calculate the distance you have travelled. Add this distance to the last celestial fix (on your current heading) and you can plot where you are. If you make heading changes then it gets a little more complicated as you need to record what time you made each heading change and the new heading and previous heading so you can go back and figure out where you are.

[belzebubek]

Hi,

as of my understanding the most important is your relative position to the enemy, it's not so important to know your 100% exact position on the map.

if you have dead reckon position you have everything you need to hunt :-D

1) you have your position
2) you have your bearing *to the target*
3) math do rest

[Trevally.]

Originally Posted by belzebubek

Hi,

as of my understanding the most important is your relative position to the enemy, it's not so important to know your 100% exact position on the map.

if you have dead reckon position you have everything you need to hunt :-D

1) you have your position
2) you have your bearing *to the target*
3) math do rest

Just use marker on the map and plot from there.
It doesn't matter where on the map you place your marker - as above, all bearings are relative

[MiniSmith]

Originally Posted by TheDarkWraith

You should know your position at all times, you are Captain aren't you?

Actually I'm just a cadet who stole a sub. But yes, I guess with real navigation, I just have to use real navigations. Then my next question is, are the celestial fixes 100% correct?

Thanks for quick reply, all of you!

[belzebubek]

Originally Posted by MiniSmith

Then my next question is, are the celestial fixes 100% correct?

What are you asking about?

When you are at open sea, it doesn't matter so much.

On other hand, when you are in tight harbours you still have to use your visuals while moving.

Forget about GPS accuracy - it's not needed ;-)

[kylania]

You can go into the Options editor and change the Real Navigation settings to how you want them. Instead of 30 minutes to get a celestial fix that might be 5km off you can set it to be an instant fix directly on your actual position.

Sure it might be cheating, but going full Real Nav andm as Mini found out, never ever knowing exactly where you are, can be over challenging. So adjust the options to how you want it and you'll enjoy the game a lot more I bet.

If I could ever get the standimeter to work I might use less precise plots, but till that day I'm happy with my current settings.

[TheDarkWraith]

Originally Posted by kylania

If I could ever get the standimeter to work I might use less precise plots, but till that day I'm happy with my current settings.

What's wrong with the stadimeter? It works perfect for me

[Sailor Steve]

Real-life celestial navigation is only accurate to within a few kilometres and can't be used for harbor navigation (which requires the time-tested eyeball method) or attacking enemy ships. Dead-reckoning is also a navigation tool, not an attack tool. If you're worried about navigation while attacking a ship, you're worrying about the wrong thing.