Blue Water Development Diary

[Julhelm]

I cannot remember any submarine sim that allowed for one-click salvo fire, so CW is hardly unique in this regard. CW's weapons are modelled on Red Storm Rising, simply because Red Storm Rising is my favorite sub sim.

[AzureSkies]

Originally Posted by johnnyrey

I apologize if this is already been discussed, but will this game have a broadband/narrowband waterfall? Or is detection (other than esm as stated above) essentially automatic?

Thank you!

It's automatic - even ESM. It's just that seeing the bearing lines allows you to try to correct the solution manually (override) if the situation calls for it. Having to manage the sensors of every unit under your command - especially when weapons are flying - would be far too much.

Originally Posted by Herman

Good to see that much of the TMA work can be automated.

I hope that BW does not force players to over-manage weapons, the way CW does. In case you did not know, CW forces players to act as Weapons Operator by forcing micro-management of each and every torpedo launch. For example, it is impossible to fire "a torpedo salvo on bearing XXX with 3 degree spread between them" in CW without a zillion clicks.

Even the original Red Storm Rising game required players to control individual torpedoes in order to achieve success.

It's an interesting conundrum. I want to simulate things like SARH guidance (ie, a need for a director to be radio-illuminating a target for most SAMs to work), but that could lead to some troublesome situations where the player gets frustrated/can't see why the ship appears to be ignoring their orders.

I'm thinking of solving it by not having it be something you have to manage, but something you can see with visual cues on the map (such as a cone for the illuminated area). That would also probably prove useful for managing situations and for important situational awareness. But details of extra optional management options will be interesting and tricky to figure out. I'm looking at possible additional UI elements for optional management commands.

A good tutorial will be very crucial so the player knows why a SAM they fired at a target due south completely fails to intercept after they fired a second SAM due west (since the radar illuminator is now painting the new target to the west). Or even implementing a system where the illuminator switches targets intelligently based on time to intercept.

There's a lot of design decisions to be made.

[Herman]

Originally Posted by Julhelm

I cannot remember any submarine sim that allowed for one-click salvo fire, so CW is hardly unique in this regard.

There may be no submarine game that allows such ease for launching a torpedo salvo, but Cmdr. Zimm's WW2 "Action Stations" allowed ships to fire torpedo salvoes with just a bearing and spread angle.

[Herman]

Originally Posted by AzureSkies

It's an interesting conundrum. I want to simulate things like SARH guidance (ie, a need for a director to be radio-illuminating a target for most SAMs to work), but that could lead to some troublesome situations where the player gets frustrated/can't see why the ship appears to be ignoring their orders.

I'm thinking of solving it by not having it be something you have to manage, but something you can see with visual cues on the map (such as a cone for the illuminated area). That would also probably prove useful for managing situations and for important situational awareness. But details of extra optional management options will be interesting and tricky to figure out. I'm looking at possible additional UI elements for optional management commands.

Harpoon3 had a few game options that were helpful. You could activate or disable them at the start of any game session. For example:

ExtraVerbosePointDefense.opt
ShowPointDefense.opt
VerboseWeaponDetection.opt

They would give different levels of text to the player showing values such as detection calculations, firing probabilities of hits, die rolls, results, etc. The options were, I think, originally meant as an aid for database managers in testing and de-bugging their datbase weaponry and entries. I found them useful in some instances. (They could have been even more detailed.)

Such options for BW could help in overall game testing and de-bugging, too. Should BW decide to allow this as an option, I encourage as much detailed information be given as possible, even if some game designers are afraid of disclosing 'secret' formulae and revealing game operations. IMHO, within the realm of de-bugging, there is no such thing as 'too much information.'

[AzureSkies]

This week's weekly update will be moved to tomorrow, since there's something I'm hoping will be ready to show off by then.

Originally Posted by Herman

IMHO, within the realm of de-bugging, there is no such thing as 'too much information.'

I also think it's usually best, when in doubt, to leave it as an option if possible.

[torpedolov]

Hello!Tell me please, this game will be something like Dangerous Waters?
This game will have a mission editor?
How many controlled units will there be?
The detection of underwater targets will be implemented as in DW?

[AzureSkies]

Originally Posted by torpedolov

Hello!Tell me please, this game will be something like Dangerous Waters?
This game will have a mission editor?
How many controlled units will there be?
The detection of underwater targets will be implemented as in DW?

1. It depends on what you mean by that. It will be a naval sim, but it won't be about a single player vessel so much as the player controlling anywhere from one to a good number of vessels, primarily surface ships but including rotor and fixed-wing aircraft as well as submarines and even land installations.

2. The implementation of such things is still a ways out, but probably.

3. See #1. Partially depends on how well it can get optimized.

4. If there are submarines, then of course there'll be a system to detect them, but it won't involve the player actually looking at sensor feeds as DW did it, since that would be impractical for a game where you're controlling a large number of ships. Nonetheless, I do hope to implement some advanced logic on vessel detection, even including things like ducts and layers.

[AzureSkies]

Hello again, everyone.

Firstly, dynamic water interaction is back, and the ocean has received some visual improvements once more, with things like how it handles reflections and subsurface light scattering.













Setting the sea to an extraordinary calm, the dynamic water interaction becomes much more apparent.





And while there's a lot of improvement and optimization to be done...

Soon.





Not a lot of text for this week, but that's all for now. Thanks for joining us.

[AzureSkies]

Hello again, everyone.

Work continues on the environmental aesthetics, and I'm glad to say the clouds have drastically improved since last week, both in quality and optimization.





Just to make it clear there's lots of possible cloud coverage levels, just most of these screenshots have more to show off the new graphics.







Also, like the sun, the moon is now correctly positioned for the date, time, longitude and latitude, and also has the correct phase for the date.

A full moon can look almost as bright as daylight.



But of course, at a different phase, it's far less bright.



And of course, given the environment of the game, being fully 3d/fly-through is a must.

6,000 feet:



15,000 feet:



30,000 feet:



And... 90,000 feet. This is actually higher than the S-300F Fort was rated to be able to engage targets, but I brought it up this high just to showcase the sky appearance from A-12/SR-71-type altitudes:



Like the ocean, the cloud system is subject to constant tweaking and improvement, especially with regards to its very high-altitude aesthetic.

Environmental details and aesthetics like this are one of those things that are easy to take for granted when done well, but very apparent when they're not.

But another reason I'm putting so much work into this particular aesthetic is so that at some point, dynamic weather and weather zones can be implemented, which will effect things like sonar, radar, aircraft flight, flight deck operations, missiles, ship speed, etc.

It's particularly worth noting to that end that the Juliett-class submarine, showcased early in this thread and a submarine built around firing anti-ship cruise missiles, can only fire its missiles in conditions up to sea state 6. This, as an example of a significant way weather effects play aside from the more obvious ways like reducing sonar range/sensitivity.

I will note, though, that as soon as the high-altitude appearance is done being set up, work will resume on more mechanical/gameplay-oriented code.

That's all for now, thanks for joining us.

[EnjoyableSTIG]

Man, this game just looks better and better! Sign me up for the beta!

[Sung]

Excellent!

[FPSchazly]

Game is looking nice, I'm enjoying following this.

Originally Posted by Herman

You have described some very complex fragmentation behaviour.

IIRC, one of the big concerns regarding point defence weaponry such as Phalanx intercepting Soviet high-speed missiles, like Kitchen and Sunburn, is the fact that fragmentation and ballistic effects of destroyed missiles. Will those effects be simulated within the game?

If I may, I think what Herman was asking here is that if a Kitchen, for example, is "destroyed" by a Phalanx, i.e., no longer works as a missile anymore but was blown up close enough to the ship such that its fragments still have a large amount of kinetic energy and could still impact the ship, would the effect of a destroyed missile's fragments impacting the ship be modeled?

[AzureSkies]

Originally Posted by FPSchazly

Game is looking nice, I'm enjoying following this.

If I may, I think what Herman was asking here is that if a Kitchen, for example, is "destroyed" by a Phalanx, i.e., no longer works as a missile anymore but was blown up close enough to the ship such that its fragments still have a large amount of kinetic energy and could still impact the ship, would the effect of a destroyed missile's fragments impacting the ship be modeled?

Thanks!

Given this has been requested twice now, I'll definitely have to bump up the priority. As it is, a system of complex missile damage is already partly modeled - to the extent that bullets will sometimes (or oftentimes, depending on the missile) merely damage the missile instead of destroying it altogether.

I think I have some ideas on how to implement it more fully. Could also even incorporate the frag model to make even small pieces capable of causing damage to crew or stored helos if they retain enough energy after penetrating the hangar.

Weekly update to come momentarily.

[AzureSkies]

Hello again, everyone!



To start with, a new ship - sort of. The Azov is a modified Kara, so we finally have another Kara-class without the S-300F Fort (NATO name: SA-N-6 "Grumble") modification.





Here we see in the aft, instead of the battery of 5V55R missiles and a 3R41 Volna (NATO name: TOP DOME) radar, it's a dual rail M-11 Shtorm (SA-N-3 "Goblet") with a 4R60 Grom (Head Lights) radar director.

Also note the quintuple torpedo racks (PTA-53).



On the Azov, besides replacing the rear SAM system, the direct torpedo capability was also reduced due to reduced deck space, replacing the two quintuple launchers with two dual launchers.



A side-by-side view makes the Azov's (top) unique modifications more apparent.



Other changes: high-altitude appearance. Seen here is the view from about 90,000 feet:



With slightly more cloudy weather:



And a view from the altitude of a low-passing spy satellite altitude at around 220 km:



And finally... For missions especially far north such as in the Barents Sea, or near the Bering Strait or Alaska, sometimes the sun's weather reaches across the 98 million miles of space to touch the Earth's Thermosphere:



That's all for now. Thanks for joining us. Until next time, clear sailing.

[longface]

Great work, looks wonderful! One thing to add: at low earth orbit, I believe that the lower atmospheric limb becomes visible as a sort of blue haze climbing into space. It would be wonderful to see that modeled!

Edit: I see that it's already there to some extent, but it's not all that apparent.