One more thing to do for LwAmi 4.0

[Amizaur]

I would reccomend one more change that would make torpedo attacks much less trivial - proper torpedo seeker cone settings in elevation. I forget about this very simple but fundamental thing for a long time - that currently torpedo seeker cones are limited only in azimuth or horizontal plane. They are not limited in elevation (vertical) at all - can detect target straight up or down. The non-limited sekers have serious impact on torpedo working and gameplay, especially for air-dropped torpedos. Currently, in regard to torpedo seekers, we are playing effectively a 2D game... :-/

How could I forget about this for so long , this should be changed in LwAmi 2.0 at worst...

So let's add a third dimension to torpedo-target game.
What is needed to do:

In real life, vertical sensor coverage tends to be smaller than horizontal coverage, in older torps much smaller.

For example, for modern ASW torpedo like A-244S it is 80deg in azimuth and 40deg in elevation:

http://www.eurotorp.com/html/popa244.htm

State of the art MU-90 ASW torpedo has coverage of 120deg horizontal and 70deg vertical.

http://www.naval-technology.com/cont...iles/eurotorp/

Seems that vertical coverage is usually (for modern ones) about half of horizontal coverage.

This would mean for playable torps:

torpedo ........... current ConeAngleXY ....... new ConeAngleXY

ADCAP ...................... 45 ........................ 20-25
UGST ........................ 40 ........................ 20
Mk-50 ....................... 35 ........................ 15-20
the rest * .................. 30 ........................ 15

* (playable USET-80, TEST-71, UGMT-1, MPT-1UE)

(edit: also I would set ADCAPs cone angle to 50-55deg with a doctrine snake reduced to small 5-10deg pattern, to get 60deg effective search cone with barely noticeabe snake - just to see if it's searching or homing. Similar mod for UGST, 45-50deg cone and 10-15deg snake pattern. ConeAngleXY then could be 25-30deg for ADCAP and 25deg for UGST. Those two are the only really modern playable HWTs, the rest can be left with more narrow cones and normal snake pattern.
Non playable torps modified this way would be Spearfish (straight running would add a bit of effective speed to it), DM2A4, maybe Tigerfish... and possible future ones like Black Shark.

For bug related to higher torpedos speeds - the current 55kts limit is not neccesary absolute, in fact torpedo speeds up to 57kts are not bugged and it's possible to get little elevated but STABLE torp speed up to 68kts:

db spd..........result speed

55kts..........55kts ok, same as set
56kts..........56kts ok, same as set
57kts..........57kts ok, same as set

58kts..........59kts higher than set but stable
59kts..........61kts higher than set but stable
60kts..........63kts higher than set but stable
61kts..........66kts higher than set but stable
62kts..........68kts higher than set but stable

63kts..........46 - 69kts oscillation, totally bugged
64kts..........49 - 71kts oscillation, totally bugged
65kts..........55 - 73kts oscillation, totally bugged

(and all higher up to 145kts)

So 59-61kts for ADCAP is possible if needed, also up to 68kts stable speed for Spearfish, Type-89 and APR-3 is possible, just we have to remember that actual speed is higher than set when setting torp speeds in doctrine...

(is it true that Type-89 torp is electric one ? with SUCH speed ? then WOW )

(end of edit)


Player launched torps should get realistic seeker cones. Maybe helical search pattern (in place of current snake) could be implemented later... then "circle" switch could select between snake and helical search patterns ?


AI torps could get wide depth bands (wide depth coverage) seekers, or no limits at all (like now) but even AI launched torps should not see targets straight up/down IMO.



Of course it could take a while for us all to get used to this :-). One more thing to remeber while playing. One more factor in torpedo attack/defence.
But reward is once again more realistic and complex gameplay, with more real life tactics and creative tricks for both sides, attacking and defending.

Immediately torpedo depth settings become much more important, just as enable distance, and the best thing is that it would make work of AIR players more difficult - they would detect submarines just as before, but would be much harder to actually kill them, without good plan - just dropping torps on their heads would NOT work everytime :-D. Currently torpedos can detect sub even straight down - if torpedo is circling horizontally at 100ft and a target is
1000ft below - no problem, it sees it and dives. After change, it wouldn't see it as it would be outside it's seeker cone in vertical. To kill it, you'd have to know/guess at what depth it is or launch straight running torp at some distance to cover all depths bands by seeker... or use another tricks. ASW torpedo doctrine could be set to not circle at constant depth, but if target is not detected, slowly go down in a spiral pattern to check greater depths. I believe some ASW torpedo settings in real world does just this - search in a spiral going down. So torpedo dropped with shallow setting would eventually search deep too, but before it gets there spiraling it gives time for sub to get some distance... Or maybe to surface rapidly ABOVE torp search patter while it's turning away... (look at doppler to check this) ? :-) Many new tricks possible.

As a sub driver, you can be much more creative in evading dropped torps - as real life limits are put on torpedos, some real life tactics for getting out of their cone not only in azimuth but also in elevation (vertical) are working.

Killing subs from air platforms was just trivial in stock game. We made it a bit more realistic by setting more realistic parameters to sonobuoys and torpedo seekers. But it's still very easy, no art at all IMO, no skills needed, just drop a torp very close to target, best on it's head, and he's toast and his only defence are randomly working decoys... Now after setting limits to vertical field of view for torpedo seekers, we can bring it once again little closer to reality.


P.S. For people that like sources, here's one that is related:

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITO...-4/joseph.html

"Guidance

Although sound travels very great distances through water, its erratic path makes underwater warfare very difficult. Water is in fact a hostile medium, the surface of the sea acts as a mirror and in shallow water seabed can also reflect sound.
Active Torpedoes seekers operating near the surface or in shallow waters must therefore be designed to counter such effects. As active detection relies on the Doppler effect to distinguish the real target from surrounding clutter, it follows that a hovering submarine may almost be impossible to detect.
A submarine that detects the active "Pinging" of a torpedo seeker will normally try to escape at top speed, but increasing the speed of the torpedo causes noisy water flow over the acoustic head.
One way to get around this is to run a heavyweight torpedo out to the vicinity of the target at high speed (transit speed) and then carry out the final-attack phase at a speed low enough to make the active seeker effective.
This solution was chosen for the US Navy’s Mk 48 and the Royal Navy Spearfish. As these HWT are wire guided the seeker can transmit target data back down the wire to the parents submarine fire control system. In effect it becomes an off board sensor, and incase the wire breaks the torpedo can be programmed to switch to home on seeker-data only.
The maximum speed at which the sonar is usable has improved in recent years as a result of better signal processing and Dome shaping. A Torpedo acquisition range is set largely by its ping rate, while the aspect angle of the seeker defines the band depth which it "sees" at any moment.
Torpedoes with narrow depth-bands usually follows helical search path/patterns whereas those with broader depth bands will seek a greater volume at any fixed depth, usually following a Sinuous (snake like) pattern.
Against surface targets passive seekers can be used, because the ship emit considerable noise from propellers and bow-waves, but is no longer considered good enough to home onto modern diesel-electric submarines (SSK) even when they are snorkeling and therefore making maximum noise.
To improve detection it would be necessary to go to lower frequencies with long wavelengths, too long for torpedoes seeker, This reason led the US navy to believe that active seeking was the only way to counter SSK. Both active and passive seekers are limited to the higher frequencies and so have relative short ranges. Wire guidance is therefore necessary to extend the effective range by providing midcourse guidance.
In its simplest form the wire provides a one way link to allow the torpedo to be corrected, but most modern torpedoes uses a two way wire to allow the torpedo to feed back its own data to the fire control system. This allows the operator to defeat countermeasures such as bubble screens or noisemakers."

by the way, may be interesting read, but I don't have time know to try it:

http://www.its-noesis.com/publicatio...do_defense.pdf

also

http://www.its-noesis.com/publicatio...rwater_aaw.pdf

and maybe the rest?

http://www.its-noesis.com/publications/pdf/