Rescue missions - aargh

[smm]

Is there a cheat or something to get those d-med downed airmen in?
I managed to do it exactly once, and never since..


I get close to the life raft, and can even keep the binoculars on the raft, but the crosshairs never turns red, and the life belt doesn't turn on (and, helpfully - not - it has no hotkey).



That's pretty much no matter how close/far I'm - I literally run them over once, but still wasn't able to pick them up.


A good intention, but the mission was clearly never tested by the devs.. Not that complaining now, 15 or what years later makes a difference


-smm

[les green01]

how fast are you going

[propbeanie]

Originally Posted by smm

Is there a cheat or something to get those d-med downed airmen in?
I managed to do it exactly once, and never since..

I get close to the life raft, and can even keep the binoculars on the raft, but the crosshairs never turns red, and the life belt doesn't turn on (and, helpfully - not - it has no hotkey).

That's pretty much no matter how close/far I'm - I literally run them over once, but still wasn't able to pick them up.

A good intention, but the mission was clearly never tested by the devs.. Not that complaining now, 15 or what years later makes a difference

-smm

Originally Posted by les green01

how fast are you going

les green01 makes an excellent point. You cannot be going very fast at all. Similar to the drop-off missions (Supplies, Spies and Commandoes), except with those missions, you have to call for All Stop, at which point the "Launch Raft" dialog comes up, even if you're doing 10knots... ( ). It is best to be roughly 450-500 yards away from the Rescue Pilot or Raft, and be under 2 knots, with an All Stop called for. You also need to have had a text and audio prompt from your crew for "Ship spotted", or "Rescue Raft spotted" or "Rescue Target sighted". That can at times be difficult in rough seas. Also, it is easier to pick-up the pilots and rafts from your port side, since you as the skipper are positioned on that side. The closer to bow-on that you are, the slower the boat 'skews' is the water, and your binoc cross-hair time over the raft or pilot is longer and slower, helping ease the situation. With rough seas, you might have to make more than one or two approaches. Another thing to remember is that the "rescue targets" are not real people, of course, and you can get just as many renown points sinking one small ship... If you have FotRSU, look in the Game / Support / ExtraInfo folder for "SS05 InsertionRescueTraining.pdf" for some help on accomplishing drop-offs and pick-ups. The same applies similarly in all mods and Stock.

[KaleunMarco]

Originally Posted by smm

Is there a cheat or something to get those d-med downed airmen in?
I managed to do it exactly once, and never since..


I get close to the life raft, and can even keep the binoculars on the raft, but the crosshairs never turns red, and the life belt doesn't turn on (and, helpfully - not - it has no hotkey).



That's pretty much no matter how close/far I'm - I literally run them over once, but still wasn't able to pick them up.


A good intention, but the mission was clearly never tested by the devs.. Not that complaining now, 15 or what years later makes a difference


-smm

PB makes some good points in his response.

the only comments i can add are to slow down as you approach the dye marker.
by the time you get within 3000 yds, you should not be making more than 4 kts headway.
head directly for the red dye marker and use your binocs (F4) to spot the aviator bobbing up and down.
when you close to under 1000 yds, slow to between 1 & 2 kts till the distance is less than 500 yds then aim the pipper of the binocs on the aviator and start banging away on the rescue key.

it helps tremendously if you program a key to rescue the survivors.
my 0 (zero) key was unused so i made that my rescue key.
you can use jimimadrid's excellent SH_Keymapper or use a plain, text editor just as Notepad to make the adjustment.

[Cmd352]
Name=Rescue_Survivors
Ctxt=1
Key0=0x30,,"0"

good luck!

[smm]

Thanks all.


For the reference, I had rescued crews before, after reading the PDF you mention, in much rougher seas than what I have now.


So I know I have to be all stop, close etc.. but didn't make it obvious in my previous comment.



The problem is that even with that (and when I run over that lifeboat, I wasn't moving, the liferaft was), I can't get the red cross.



Now that I think about it, I don't believe I ever got the message about life raft spotted - I got ship spotted (there was an IJN destroyer nearby), but nothing specific about the liferaft.


That could well be it, that the game didn't register it. The blue mark on the map is way away from the orange smoke as well. I'll try to run around a bit, and see before giving up.


@KaleunMarco - thanks!, mapping will help (once the game recognises them as survivors..)


edit: @PB re port side approach - you can move with arrow keys around the boat, so it doesn't matter where you are . I didn't test whether when on the hull it moves less (it should) than on the conning tower though.

[smm]

I'm trying to upload the screenshot, but not much luck.. so we'll see.



As an aside, the mission background was really cool, as it wasn't just "save the crews and here they are" - there was an actual attack by the US planes on an IJN task force, with a few planes being shot down, thus the survivors.. I of course took some revenge on the TF (will have to edit the final patrol 4 video for that, will post the link once done).


-smm

[smm]

Ok, I believe I wasn't meant to rescue these particular crews from the battle. Doh. I found the crews I could rescue at an entirely different place.


Weird, as I had rescued random crews before, maybe the mission is interfering.


-smm

[KaleunMarco]

Originally Posted by smm

Ok, I believe I wasn't meant to rescue these particular crews from the battle. Doh. I found the crews I could rescue at an entirely different place.


Weird, as I had rescued random crews before, maybe the mission is interfering.


-smm

yes, there are some missions where you will encounter aircraft casualties and you can rescue downed aviators. there is very little renown value when you effect a rescue, 5 pts i believe, so, only do it if rescue is an objective for the mission or you want to do it.