[TEC] Observation about zones.cfg

[U-Bones]

I was mapping zones.cfg compartments by tagging items with unique Crit Floation values and made an interesting discovery....

It seems that a given sub will get ALL of its compartments criticalfloation values from a single piece of equipment in zones.cfg.

I have to leave for the weekend, and only had time to load and save 4 subs, but if someone else get curious... I am loading a sub, and immediately saving it, then looking at the ActiveUserPlayerUnits.upc file in the new save directory.


-- snip from zones.cfg --
;************************************************* ******
;UBoat Items
;************************************************* ******

[TowerWatch]
Multiplier=1.000000
Flotability=0.000000
HitPoints=200
Destructible=No
Armor Level=15
Critic Flotation=0.231001
Critical=No
FloodingTime=59.999996
CargoType=None

[PeriscopeAttack]
; this maps to the criticalfloatation=0.231002 of all S-class compartments
; this maps to the criticalfloatation=0.231002 of all Porpoise compartments
; this maps to the criticalfloatation=0.231002 of all Salmon compartments
Multiplier=1.000000
Flotability=0.000000
HitPoints=40
Destructible=No
Armor Level=13
Critic Flotation=0.231002
Critical=No
Father=31
FloodingTime=59.999996
CargoType=None

[PeriscopeObservation]
; this maps to the criticalfloatation=0.231003 of all Gato compartments
Multiplier=1.000000
Flotability=0.000000
HitPoints=40
Destructible=No
Armor Level=13
Critic Flotation=0.231003
Critical=No
FloodingTime=59.999996
CargoType=None
Father=31

[Redwine]

I cant understand well, may be my bad english, but please maintain informed us...

It sounds very interesting...

[Ducimus]

HOLY FLURKING SCNITT!

This might explain ALOT of things.

So if im reading you right, and if i remember what the critfloation does (which im not sure i do) since all compartments are mapped to a singular zone then if you Damage one zone, you damage all zones, or they all just share the one universal crit floation? Adjust the one, you adjust for the entire sub?


on question:

I was mapping zones.cfg compartments by tagging items with unique Crit Floation values

Can you explain how you came accross this discovery? I'd like to mess with it myself and see if i can't come up with an adhoc solution if this is indeed the problem.

I'm not sure if I am understanding your post U-Bones. I do know that critical flotation is how much percent damage the compartment or equipment takes before flooding starts. From my understanding, each compartment has it's own critical flotation settings. Each piece of equipment's critical fotation is linked to the compartment it's located in. So are you saying that you discovered that all compartments critical flotations are dependent on a couple of pieces of sub equipment? And if this equipment is destroyed, then the compartments are destroyed in a chain reaction.. meaning the whole sub?

[akdavis]

Perhaps this would explain why may S-Class started an uncontrolled tailslide after only taking damage to the deck gun and decoy launcher? (however, no flooding or subsequent damage was ever indicated or displayed either).

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by nvdrifter

So are you saying that you discovered that all compartments critical flotations are dependent on a couple of pieces of sub equipment? And if this equipment is destroyed, then the compartments are destroyed in a chain reaction.. meaning the whole sub?

That's what i think he means. And here's why i think this:

As an experiment (and its a damn good one too), mod your MK 14 torpedo's to have a 100% chance to run circular. Load up the torpedo practice sub school mission. Allow yourself to be hit. Then salvage your boat.. surface, whateer, and back it up to shallow waters. Then, make sure everythign is 100% repaired, and when you barely have enough water to cover the top of the conning tower allow yourself to submerge.

You'll notice two things:

1.) the damage compartment will have negative boyancy. And whichever area was damaged will be the first one to hit the bottom.

2.) All other compartments in the sub, even thoguh they are undamaged and at 100% tip top shape, will suddenly break and flood. Its like one big domino effect. Boat folds in like a crushed egg, even with only a couple feet of water on top of you.

[U-Bones]

I am using blackberry, pardon terse replies until Monday.

I wanted to figure out what compartment mapped to the deck watch so I tagged each piece of equip (not just compartments) with a diff value. I then saved a sub and looked in the save file. I was shocked that each compartment used the exact same value - and one not even from a compartment. I repeated with 3 more subs and ran out of time.

All I am saying is that all compartments use a single value from zones.cfg for crit float. I was not drawing any conclusions so much as throwing out a million new questions... We are not in Kansas anymore Toto.

I now wonder how everything else is mapped.

As for odd damage, I do not think it is related - the saves I have looked at indicate undisplayed hull damage - it just unfortunately has weird ways of appearing to be heavy without flooding - no other compartments have to be showing unrepaired damage when this happens (of course sometimes it does). Damage Control has several bugs I think, but before we get a good handle on it mapping out the variables is neccessary.

Crit floatation is simply the damage percentage at which compartment flooding started in SH3 - I would hesitate to assume it does the same thing in SH4 until I look at a bunch of saves.

I will not be able to test more until Monday night, but I am pretty sure there is more to come now we know zones.cfg is being used in such an unconventional manner.

[shad43]

Hmmm, me thinks me smell a good fix on the horizon

[U-Bones]

I got home early and had time to poke about a bit more.

I was somewhat wrong. It seems that a given sub is not locked down to the same setting all the time. I have seen Gar and Porpoise change and my current working theory is that every sub load randomly interacts with zones.cfg like this

1. Selects either the Attack or Obs periscope.

2. Get CriticalFloatation from Critic Floatation.

3. Set FloodingSpeed, formula is (1 / FloodingTime)

Interestingly, stock 1.1 had identical data in both periscopes, so they were not using the randomization potiential they build in.... OR the nasty alternative is that none of this is intended and everything is broken and that is the cause of all the spastic damage - but I do not think that is the case.

IF the engine is loading any other Sub data from zones.cfg, I do not think it is coming from the sub section

So basically, I think that the fruit of this excercise is

1. We now know that each compartment no longer has its own flooding threshold or speed - it is set globally on the sub.

2. We now know how to set these global variables.

3. With two known sources for the data, we can introduce a little uncertainty here. Maybe one setting floods slowly at 33% damage, the other much faster at 66%.. or similar scenarios, you get the idea. You would not know which you get on a given patrol unless you peek in your save.

4. The extent of the random selection is yet to be determined - I will have to look at a lot more saves before I can absolutely say there are no other sections looked at besides periscopes (not so far that I have observed). My expectation is that it only looks at the two periscopes.

5. The criteria for the random selection is yet to be determined. I looked for and excluded two sub/type and general early/late patterns. All I have noticed is that it seems to randomise in short runs of 1 to 6. My expectation is that it is purely random in that it does not depend on anything user selectable.

6. A big question that this brings up is - how does this impact other vessels ? aircraft ? do they also use zones.cfg differently than they did in SH3 ? I know that I will not be using ships imported from SH3 until this is understood better... not like there is a shortage anyway.

7. Another question. Why was this hidden so weirdly ? Why didnt these two simply get placed into the new UPC files ? Time crunch ? Oversight ?

8. Starting values set by stock 1.1 zones.cfg are
CriticalFloation = 0.300000 (direct from Critic Floation)
FloodingSpeed = 0.016667 ( from 1 / FloodingTime which was 59.999996)

9. I am still assuming that Crit Floatation means what it did in SH3. I will test that tomrrow night.

This also explains why some of my early testing re flooding was so wacky - I was tweaking stuff that had no effect on the game.

Hope this all makes better sense now.

[FAdmiral]

Bump - This thread may just help fix some of the problems guys are
having with damage control....

JIM

[Redwine]

Wonderful... even when i cant understand very well.. it looks as a preludo of a great discover and new mod...

Medal for U-Bones !

Make it sticky please !

[Ducimus]

[U-Bones]

I don't think this discovery has anything to do with damage issues, but I intend to come out with a Reduced Flooding mod that may help get a handle on the weird damage. Hopefully. I just want to check a couple more things.

I really don't think there is anything profound that will come out of this.

[Redwine]

I made some changes in my Zones.dfg, i rise up all flooding times to 3600, plus i changed the flotability values of the after torp room same as in forward one.

Plus i made my Obs. Periscope more hard to destroy, so if i loss the attack one, almost i have a chance to have another to back home, many times i suffer the destroy of both periscopes at same time due to the same depth charge.

[U-Bones]

Originally Posted by Redwine

I made some changes in my Zones.dfg, i rise up all flooding times to 3600, plus i changed the flotability values of the after torp room same as in forward one.

Plus i made my Obs. Periscope more hard to destroy, so if i loss the attack one, almost i have a chance to have another to back home, many times i suffer the destroy of both periscopes at same time due to the same depth charge.

Redwine I think I have not explained well.

I think there are ONLY 2 things that subs use in zones.cfg.
It reads Crit Floatation for every compartment from the periscope sections
It reads FloodingTime for every compartment from the periscope section.

No hitpoints are used
No Floatations are used
No Parent are used
No Armor are used.
etc

All these other things are now obtained from *.upc files, or hidden elsewhere.

zones.cfg may still be used by surface ships - no idea.