Mechanical Failure

keysersoze · 02-04-13, 08:38 PM

Recently, I've been reading Clay Blair's excellent Hitler's U-boat War and have been struck by the constant mechanical problems and malfunctions plaguing the U-boat fleet. To briefly illustrate the point, Blair writes that during the late fall of 1939, "hard Atlantic patrolling and combat had uncovered some severe design flaws and weaknesses in the existing oceangoing boats....until these (and other) flaws were corrected, the nine surviving boats of the Salzwedel Flotilla, comprising one-third of the Atlantic force, were unsafe for combat" (102).

I personally think the introduction of mechanical failures, due to simple malfunctions or sabotage, would add greatly to the realism of SH5. In my experience with SH3, h.sie's hardcore fix, which introduced mechanical failure when the diesels were run at flank speed for long periods of time, and SH3 Commander's inclusion of random sabotage after rebasing to French ports did exactly this.

Now, I am certainly no modder and have no real experience to justify attempting something like this, but I'm still curious. How would one go about adding malfunctions for SH5? Has it been attempted? I was looking through the Equipment file and noticed the "chancefactor" heading for one of the malfunction columns, but since all these values are set to 1, it can't mean much. Any advice would be most welcome.

Thanks.

V13dweller · 02-05-13, 04:42 AM

I do believe that we should have mechanical failure, I once ran my diesels for a whole patrol (this was obviously a short patrol) on Flank speed, and I never got the "Fair chance something will break" when using flank speed.

Fifi · 02-05-13, 05:12 AM

Just because Johann is an awesome mechanic!

spydar1959 · 02-05-13, 05:43 AM

So what about,instead of having to go to port,an option on resupply? Throw the engine or mechanical breakdown into patrol. But have a 50/50 chance on a resupply that they have parts. Or meeting with another U-boat. Many U-boats had breakdowns and did not have to return to home port for repairs. Limiting top speed or dive depth for the duration of no parts would be nice.

keysersoze · 02-05-13, 12:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spydar1959

So what about,instead of having to go to port,an option on resupply? Throw the engine or mechanical breakdown into patrol. But have a 50/50 chance on a resupply that they have parts. Or meeting with another U-boat. Many U-boats had breakdowns and did not have to return to home port for repairs. Limiting top speed or dive depth for the duration of no parts would be nice.

This is exactly what I had in mind! I've been going through my U-boat books recently and writing down all the special missions and additional tasks U-boats were assigned, aside from simply patrolling and sinking merchants. One mission that appears again and again is the order to either deliver spare parts to a damaged U-boat, or to meet with another boat (often a milk cow) to receive parts.

If mechanical failure was implemented, would it be possible for BdU to direct a friendly U-boat to our position to deliver components? Seeing as TDW has already put wolfpacks in the game, perhaps we could use the same system to spawn a friendly U-boat that would try to meet us at a pre-determined point. Better yet—but probably harder to code—would be if BdU would also occasionally order us to help a "damaged" U-boat.

finchOU · 02-05-13, 01:13 PM

Begging for this since SH3. Not a big fan of the Sabotage aspect (thinking it would be a rare occasion). But the mechanical failure side should have been implemented a long long time ago. I've deployed twice on ships........even having to land on a ship dragging a screw. Stuff is broken ALL THE TIME. Constant upkeep and maintenance was required everyday to make sure things work...and things still break.

I like the idea of tactical decisions being limited because of things breaking... aka I can't make top speed while we need to take a couple of hours to repair one of the engines. At least give me a Daily report of repairs/maintenance from the chief. I do think running the engines hard should impact probability of breakdown (I want Scotty to yell at me when I'm pushing the boat too hard...and want him to be right when it breaks)

02-04-13, 08:38 PM	#1
keysersoze Ensign Join Date: Feb 2012 Location: USA Posts: 226 Downloads: 346 Uploads: 0	Mechanical Failure Recently, I've been reading Clay Blair's excellent Hitler's U-boat War and have been struck by the constant mechanical problems and malfunctions plaguing the U-boat fleet. To briefly illustrate the point, Blair writes that during the late fall of 1939, "hard Atlantic patrolling and combat had uncovered some severe design flaws and weaknesses in the existing oceangoing boats....until these (and other) flaws were corrected, the nine surviving boats of the Salzwedel Flotilla, comprising one-third of the Atlantic force, were unsafe for combat" (102). I personally think the introduction of mechanical failures, due to simple malfunctions or sabotage, would add greatly to the realism of SH5. In my experience with SH3, h.sie's hardcore fix, which introduced mechanical failure when the diesels were run at flank speed for long periods of time, and SH3 Commander's inclusion of random sabotage after rebasing to French ports did exactly this. Now, I am certainly no modder and have no real experience to justify attempting something like this, but I'm still curious. How would one go about adding malfunctions for SH5? Has it been attempted? I was looking through the Equipment file and noticed the "chancefactor" heading for one of the malfunction columns, but since all these values are set to 1, it can't mean much. Any advice would be most welcome. Thanks. Last edited by keysersoze; 02-05-13 at 12:22 PM.

02-05-13, 05:43 AM	#4
spydar1959 Seaman Join Date: Jan 2013 Location: Directly above the center of the earth Posts: 36 Downloads: 126 Uploads: 0	But even the best mechanic has to have parts..... So what about,instead of having to go to port,an option on resupply? Throw the engine or mechanical breakdown into patrol. But have a 50/50 chance on a resupply that they have parts. Or meeting with another U-boat. Many U-boats had breakdowns and did not have to return to home port for repairs. Limiting top speed or dive depth for the duration of no parts would be nice. __________________ Women are like an Enigma machine, you try and figure one out.....

02-05-13, 01:13 PM	#6
finchOU Samurai Navy Join Date: Jan 2004 Posts: 571 Downloads: 77 Uploads: 0	Begging for this since SH3. Not a big fan of the Sabotage aspect (thinking it would be a rare occasion). But the mechanical failure side should have been implemented a long long time ago. I've deployed twice on ships........even having to land on a ship dragging a screw. Stuff is broken ALL THE TIME. Constant upkeep and maintenance was required everyday to make sure things work...and things still break. I like the idea of tactical decisions being limited because of things breaking... aka I can't make top speed while we need to take a couple of hours to repair one of the engines. At least give me a Daily report of repairs/maintenance from the chief. I do think running the engines hard should impact probability of breakdown (I want Scotty to yell at me when I'm pushing the boat too hard...and want him to be right when it breaks) __________________ Intel i7-2700K-3.50GHz, 16 GB RAM, 2 xGTX 560,2GB,SLI,2 TB HD The Wolves of Steel 1.06 The Wolves of Steel 1.06 Update 05c

02-05-13, 04:42 AM	#2
V13dweller Grey Wolf Join Date: Dec 2012 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 768 Downloads: 101 Uploads: 2	I do believe that we should have mechanical failure, I once ran my diesels for a whole patrol (this was obviously a short patrol) on Flank speed, and I never got the "Fair chance something will break" when using flank speed.

02-05-13, 05:12 AM	#3
Fifi Navy Seal Join Date: Dec 2012 Location: France Posts: 6,100 Downloads: 467 Uploads: 0	Just because Johann is an awesome mechanic!