St Nazaire - Hell

[Walruss]

Has anyone else noticed how TINY St Nazaire is? ESPECIALLY if you're driving a type-IX? 3 point bloody turns, slow loch gates, no room... ugh.

Am I alone in disliking this port? is it actually done to appropriate specs in terms of size?
I'm using the gwx 3 wilhelmshaven, st naz and schluese pack... but... ugh.

[Gerald]

Switch to another port / flotilla

[Tessa]

Do you have St. Nazaire mixed up with Lorient? St. Nazaire imo is one of the easiest harbor to get out of, just a slight turn and you almost sail straight out into the open sea. Only port that is easier is La Spezia, which you pretty much sail straight out into the sea after adjusting course to avoid hitting the pennisula. Lorient and Brest are both shallow draft harbors, iirc the XXI can't even dock in one of those 2 due to its draft and tight corners.

[frau kaleun]

is it actually done to appropriate specs in terms of size?

Some aerial views of the area, for comparison:





This purports to be a photo of the mockup model made for use in the planning of a commando raid on the base, now in the Imperial War Museum in London:



This is from the Wiki page on the raid itself (Operation Chariot):



More info about Operation Chariot here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Nazaire_Raid

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by frau kaleun

Some aerial views of the area, for comparison:





This purports to be a photo of the mockup model made for use in the planning of a commando raid on the base, now in the Imperial War Museum in London:



This is from the Wiki page on the raid itself (Operation Chariot):



More info about Operation Chariot here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Nazaire_Raid

Thanks for posting frau, interesting

[Walruss]

I can barely make it outat full rudder and ahead slow...

IX boat and 3 tight turns?
That would be Lorient.
(Two rights from the berth, and one left well after passing the light house, which woud be on your right outbound?)

The bad news is that it's a hard Sea & Anchor.
The good news is that it has about the shortest distance to deep water.
That port gets much easier once you've learned the lay of things.

[STEED]

Sounds like Lorient to me as well.

[frau kaleun]

I agree, I only started from St Naz a couple times when I was testing stuff... but I don't remember it being that bad. OTOH I've been in and out of Lorient more frequently on regular career patrols and I have a hard enough time doing that in a VIIB without denting a fender or two.

[Tessa]

Originally Posted by frau kaleun

I agree, I only started from St Naz a couple times when I was testing stuff... but I don't remember it being that bad. OTOH I've been in and out of Lorient more frequently on regular career patrols and I have a hard enough time doing that in a VIIB without denting a fender or two.

St. Nazaire (w/o the moving docks mod) you pretty much just sail straight out once you start. There's a minefield directly in front of you, long as you alter your heading 10 or 15 degrees you'll be safe (or just follow the minesweeper/e-boat). I couldn't imagine trying to maneuver a IX in or out of Lorient, the turns are harshly sharp for any large boat.

[frau kaleun]

Originally Posted by Tessa

St. Nazaire (w/o the moving docks mod) you pretty much just sail straight out once you start. There's a minefield directly in front of you, long as you alter your heading 10 or 15 degrees you'll be safe (or just follow the minesweeper/e-boat). I couldn't imagine trying to maneuver a IX in or out of Lorient, the turns are harshly sharp for any large boat.

The first time I sailed into Lorient (which was the first time I saw it at all) was before I switched to 64-bit Windows, and I didn't have any of the patches or switches that would let the game or Win32 use any extra RAM at all.

As a result of that (I assume) plus all the other mods I was trying to use, once I got into Lorient proper I *really* regretted not opting to teleport back to the pen instead, because my framerate dropped like a brick through hot butter and there were whole minutes and longer where I was just frozen in place. Then all of a sudden everything would start moving... but by the time I'd react and try to alter the heading or speed, I'd be frozen up again.

I hadn't bothered to plot a course in, figured I'd just eyeball it. Well, it's kinda hard to eyeball it when the game is stuttering and freezing so bad that you keep getting jolted in and out like that, can't switch back and forth from different stations at ease, and haven't had a chance to get a good feel for what's where and how to get there. I think I did finally manage to get back into the Navmap during one unfrozen moment and saw where I was at, which was very close to grounding the boat.

Started to plot a proper course into the pen and then just said screw it and hit ESC.

[Rhodes]

And in St. Nazaire, at least in the game, we have only type VIIs during the war.

[Tessa]

Originally Posted by frau kaleun

I hadn't bothered to plot a course in, figured I'd just eyeball it. Well, it's kinda hard to eyeball it when the game is stuttering and freezing so bad that you keep getting jolted in and out like that, can't switch back and forth from different stations at ease, and haven't had a chance to get a good feel for what's where and how to get there. I think I did finally manage to get back into the Navmap during one unfrozen moment and saw where I was at, which was very close to grounding the boat.

Started to plot a proper course into the pen and then just said screw it and hit ESC.

To actually get into the harbor it likely wouldn't work unless you plotted a course on the nav map. With the slowdown you'd need to be concerned about overshooting your parking and raming into the dock. Making it up to 1 km of your port is good enough for government work

[Tessa]

Originally Posted by Rhodes

And in St. Nazaire, at least in the game, we have only type VIIs during the war.

Picking up the phone and transfering to Bordeaux to get a IX, do 3 patrols and go back to St. Nazaire (or wherever else) is easy enough. 23/27th flotilla are the only ones that would be a pain if you wanted to switch to a IX and the year is 43' or later.

[Brag]

Sorry to hear about stutters. Even with my old rig I never had problems in Lorient (my favorite hoochie woochie port) were I enter in RT without using the chart screen.