Currents and depth charts a possibility?

[WH4K]

It's quite possible both of these things have been addressed, but I just missed it, since I'm 5+ years late to the party. But since I started playing SHIII and using various mods (GWX 3.0, OLC GUI Mk II, etc.), a couple of things have occurred to me:

1) Is it possible for currents to be modeled in any way in SHIII? While these were likely of little consequence out in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, currents could have been a very big deal in coastal waters. Likewise tides, although I don't think SHIII has any way to model tides.

2) I've read that the ocean bottom in SHIII does not necessarily follow real-world contours, so real-world charts are of little use in the game. Would it be possible to create a set of charts that follow the game's "terrain?" This would be really useful information when infiltrating a harbor, for example. Using the active sonar device to check depth under keel risks giving oneself away. Also it would be nice to know when I'm about to go into the shallows, rather than only find out after the fact.

[Tessa]

Even if someone went through all the troubles of getting an accurate mapping of the ocean floor modeled in SH3 it would be of little value to the player. Since escorts have sniper precision accuracy with their depth charges hiding in an underwater canyon or the bottom actually works against you; where even today it is still a sounds tactic.

If you bottomed your boat at say 240m the escort above may toss a few more salvos down but would only have your last known position as a good fix. Once on the bottom the sonar of that day couldn't distinguish between a submarine on the bottom or a giant rock. Granted if you made noise to give yourself away you are now a stationary target with a big bullseye. Regardless, the moment you stop moving and become stationary with active sonar you're as good as dead. The dc attacks will become deadly accurate and may only take 1 or 2 more salvo's before you're hull collapses.

[Gryffon300]

Sorry to have to disagree, but I also would really like more acurate depth charts, and not for the reason you seem to assume above.
You are absolutely correct that trying to go possum on the bottom when active sonar is pinging away is not a reasonable tactic. No argument there.
However, and here is my beef. I've just successfully put two into an Ammo Ship, 2 into a large tanker, and 2 (rear) into a medium merchant. I am running silent, in the middle of the convoy, parrallelling their path, heading for 100m, where I intend to go all stop and wait for the convoy to pass overhead to the horizon (its early in the war, I'm in my 2nd flotilla IXb, and the escorts still haven't got onto active pinging yet (why not?)). All of a sudden, at 85 m there's a sound louder than 2 whales humping as I bottom out, do some moderate damage, and alert every escort within 10k as to my location! Not happy, Jan!
So, yes. A man's got to know his limitations.

[WH4K]

The only underwater evasion I'm interested in is avoiding the ocean floor. I'm aware that SH3 is not sophisticated enough to model use of underwater features to hide from ASW threats. I merely want to avoid running my U-boat aground. As I'm doing patrols with a Type II, I am pretty much limited to littoral operations. So running aground is a pretty big concern.

It's irritating to constantly have to use the active depth finder. Not only would it tell me too late if I were about to smash into a watery mountainside, it could give me away during a harbor infiltration.

At least I assume it could. Does SH3 actually let AI ships hear your use of the Atlas Echolot, or is that another thing that wasn't modeled realistically?

There is probably some way to extract the values for the underwater "terrain" used in SH3. Given SH3's age & the hardware it was intended for, I would guess that the data is not very dense. I would be surprised if the contour interval (e.g. smallest distance between two data points, or the "granularity" of the underwater terrain) were smaller than 100m. Real navigation charts are probably a bit better than that, particularly in high-traffic areas.

But that would be plenty useful, certainly enough to help avoid running aground while snooping around the British coast.

Then it would be a matter of replacing the in-game charts, perhaps putting depth numbers on them like real-world charts.

I'm not saying it would be easy to produce, but a slightly realistic navigation chart would make life easier for us coastal action types.

[Delareon]

OLC Gui has an fantastic tool for that reasons.
A little dragable item where u can at least figure out if the water is 100 meters or just 85 meters. Not as accurate as a real depth chart could be, but the maps of that time wherent that accurately anyways.
MaGui has also a tool but that damned thing is useless at night because of the lights at the Nav screen.

[frau kaleun]

Originally Posted by WH4K

At least I assume it could. Does SH3 actually let AI ships hear your use of the Atlas Echolot

Nope, the AI doesn't hear it and doesn't react to it.

[Gryffon300]

WH4K, above. Yeh, wot he said!

But Valk, you saucy Piratical wench!, what to do with your information? I'm between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. On the one hand, I'm NOT running at full realism - although I never have an officer in the WO slot, I do use the AI to calculate firing solutions, so I currently run at 90% realism. So, you might think that being able to shout at the top of your lungs by active pinging the bottom while running silent trying to evade Tin Cans would be a good thing.

Nah. This is disappointing. On the one hand my nav officer SHOULD be able to give me OK depth info 90% of the time (appart from the occasional uncharted seamount), so being able to ping without penalty could be seen as a fair compensation. But it sure will present a moral dillema. To rationalise that pinging is OK, or to take the moral high ground and run into it (the high ground, that is).

By the way, Valk, maybe I'm dense and don't get the reference, but, as much as I like wombats (piratical or otherwise), the joke seems to work better with a Beaver (something about peg legs and wood?). Or is that too nauti(cal)?

[frau kaleun]

Originally Posted by Gryffon300

Nah. This is disappointing. On the one hand my nav officer SHOULD be able to give me OK depth info 90% of the time (appart from the occasional uncharted seamount), so being able to ping without penalty could be seen as a fair compensation. But it sure will present a moral dillema. To rationalise that pinging is OK, or to take the moral high ground and run into it (the high ground, that is).

I feel your pain, I try not to use the echolot as an easy out when I'm in a tricky situation with the enemy nearby. But it's very tempting. I usually just solve the problem by not attacking in the presence (or likely presence) of warships unless I know I've got plenty of depth beneath my keel, i.e., not anywhere near enough the shore to be worried about hitting 'D' or 'C' and running into the seabed unexpectedly.

By the way, Valk, maybe I'm dense and don't get the reference, but, as much as I like wombats (piratical or otherwise), the joke seems to work better with a Beaver (something about peg legs and wood?). Or is that too nauti(cal)?

It had its origins (mostly) in this thread, which was a response to things that were going on at the time in the General Topics forum. You kinda had to be there, lol. I may change it if something else strikes my fancy, or get rid of it entirely, or just leave it the way it is. Haven't really decided.

[flakmonkey]

dont know about currents but i think having depth values displayed on the chart would be a real help, especially if youre using a real navigation mod, i usually have little clue where i am if i havent seen the sun/stars for a bit, being able to look on my chart and see the depth values would be another useful aid to fixing my position just as in rl.

Would be a heck of a lot of work though, you would essentially have to do an entire sonar survey of coastal waters with youre echolot taking a reading every 1km or so and then adding the number to the chart image.

[Gryffon300]

Hey, Frau Kaleun, I sort of hear what you are saying about only engaging in pelagic waters, but what do you do if you encounter something juicy in transit? The other issue is that palagic doesn't necessarily help. Forget even the Rockall Banks or something, have a think about, say, grid BF18. over 300 km from Ireland and over 400km from England and France - hardly "coastal" waters, yet, see that little whitish area in the top right? 18m. That's right, worse than Dover Harbour!

I sort of get what you are saying FlakeyMonkey:
"dont know about currents but i think having depth values displayed on the chart would be a real help, especially if youre using a real navigation mod, i usually have little clue where i am if i havent seen the sun/stars for a bit, being able to look on my chart and see the depth values would be another useful aid to fixing my position just as in rl.

Would be a heck of a lot of work though, you would essentially have to do an entire sonar survey of coastal waters with youre echolot taking a reading every 1km or so and then adding the number to the chart image."

The above is sort of what I did all over BF18 to just get a handle on the scope of the issue. I would think though, that from a Mod point of view, the information is already IN the game files, as the map gradations of Blue/white are meant to vaguely reflect depths. I would hope that contour lines would be possible (as the colour 'gradates'). Best of all possible worlds would be every 20m to 200m or some such, or even more defined colours with a legend, as is common on many maps.

As I recall, SHI was much more accurate in this respect(?) (Still trying to load it after many years away - I'll get there once I get Dosbox etc sorted).

[WH4K]

Originally Posted by Gryffon300

I would think though, that from a Mod point of view, the information is already IN the game files, as the map gradations of Blue/white are meant to vaguely reflect depths. I would hope that contour lines would be possible (as the colour 'gradates'). Best of all possible worlds would be every 20m to 200m or some such, or even more defined colours with a legend, as is common on many maps.

That's what I'm thinking. Mod makers have been successful at extracting other info from the game files; why not the underwater geography? But, as I said, easier said than done. The data could easily be in some format that's a real pain in the keister to figure out.

Given SH3's age and the lack of underwater terrain masking, I have a hunch that there isn't a lot going on with the underwater contour. It wouldn't surprise me if the ocean floor were pretty much shaped like a frying pan, missing such things as channels going in & out of harbors, and shoals (Diamond Shoals being an infamous example).

[Schwieger]

Originally Posted by WH4K

Given SH3's age and the lack of underwater terrain masking, I have a hunch that there isn't a lot going on with the underwater contour.

What is terrain masking?

[WH4K]

Originally Posted by Schwieger

What is terrain masking?

Being able to hide behind or between terrain features. It works for aircraft over dry land, and should work for submarines near the ocean floor (where it's possible to dive that deep). But as far as I know, this isn't modeled in SHIII.

Real subs would have been able to hide from active sonar near the bottom, looking about the same to sonar as any other rocks. But we can't do this in SHIII. Trying to do so just gets your boat killed, so I've read. I've only played with a Type II so far, and it's only mid-1940, so I'm mostly able to avoid ASW threats completely.

[Hartmann]

I think that in WWII technology don´t was enough accurate to allow the use of charts and underwater terrain to hide from scorts , only a rough estimation of depth

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Hartmann

I think that in WWII technology don´t was enough accurate to allow the use of charts and underwater terrain to hide from scorts , only a rough estimation of depth

Exactly true. They hid from active sonar by sitting on the bottom, where the sand (not the rocks) absorbed both the beams and the depth charge blasts, making it somewhat safer. It wasn't perfect - we don't know how many tried and failed, because they aren't here to tell us.

It was impossible with the technology of the day to "see" anything underwater, so the sub couldn't know where rocks or ships were that they could hide behind, and they ran just as much risk of hitting those objects as they did using them for cover.