Brand spankin nooby can't find his own butt

Sniper297 · 02-01-16, 11:22 AM

Two questions.

First, when you resupply with empty tubes, you need to change to the torpedo loading screen and slide one of the torpedoes into a tube to "prime" the loading process, then click the resupply anchor icon again to get a full load of torpedoes.

Second question is more complicated. Ordinary engineering uses a design safety factor of 150%. What that means is if they want a car trailer that will carry a load of 1000 pounds, they design it so it will carry 1500 pounds before something breaks.

The pressure hull of a sub is the same way, but most are engineered beyond the 150% factor. The "test depth" is the depth that the builders guarantee, each sub is taken out by civilian workers and dived to the test depth before delivering the sub to the Navy. The design depth is deeper than that, the crush depth is estimated since you obviously can't test it in real life since nobody can come back and tell you what it was. Most WWII subs were designed with a safety factor of 200% or more, if the specified design depth was 300 feet the engineers would design something they were sure would survive to at least 600 feet.

In game it's different from real life since the programmers didn't really understand what they were doing, plus it had to be translated into English and some terms were translated wrong. "Crash depth" for example is used for both the depth at which the sub will level off if a "crash dive" is ordered, and also used for crush depth in a different file.

The red needle on the gauge is different depending on if you have the shallow or deep gauge selected, for the shallow gauge it's periscope depth, for the deep one it's "MaxDepth" as defined in the CFG file for the sub. The actual crush depth (mis translated as "crash depth") is in the ZON file for the sub, much deeper than the needle. Stock game GATO for example, MaxDepth (red needle) is 100 meters, crush depth is 190 meters. There's also a "crash speed" in the ZON file, that defines how many "hit points" the sub loses per second when below crush depth.

Then there's the damage factor - if you look at the damage control screen in the upper left corner there's a "hull damage" percentage, if it's anything other than 0% then the crush depth will be shallower than the default. For example if the hull damage says 20%, you'll start taking crush damage at 150 meters instead of 190. And of course as the "hit points" accumulate the hull damage percentage will increase and the crush depth will decrease, so you're between the devil and the deep blue sea if there are destroyers overhead.

woodenboat · 02-01-16, 02:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sniper297

...safety factor of 150%.

The pressure hull ... a safety factor of 200% or more, if the specified design depth was 300 feet the engineers would design something they were sure would survive to at least 600 feet..

YES! That's exactly what I thought. I don't really understand all the info about how the programmers wrote their code and such. I'm not a computer geeky sort of guy. But I gather that you're saying the programmers plugged ... say ... 350 ft into the game as a "crush" depth and that does NOT mean 351 ft. Right? Actually, that's good to know. In the future I will know to be happy getting below the thermocline and not much deeper. So far, I've found the thermoclines to vary from around 160 ft to 210 ft depending on the mission and the sea.

Also, I didn't know about the "wrench" icon. Now I'll know to look at that in the future. But that makes sense. I didn't realize that I had even taken on any damage but in retrospect, I know I did. When this is all brand new to you, there is a lot that gets by in the chaos of battle.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Florida Sailor

Bad weather hinders the escort's abilities to detect you.

This is also very good to know. I suppose that this would include running on the surface, but I hate to risk it. Early on, when I had JUST gotten the game, I was patrolling along at night, on the surface because I foolishly thought that the darkness would be my friend when SUDDENLY AND WITHOUT WARNING, I was lit up by two destroyers with huge spotlights.

Oh yea, that's when I learned to do a lot of game saves.

Sniper297 · 02-01-16, 05:27 PM

That's the problem, at extreme ends of the spectrum-

BALAO class crush depth - 240 meters (792 feet)

S-class crush depth - 122 meters (402 feet)

If you're at 403 feet in an S-class you start taking 2 points of damage every second, and the S boat has a total of 500 hit points. If you stay down there 2 minutes you lose 240 hit points, or about half the total, so now your hull is damaged about 50%. With the damage your NEW crush depth is half what it was, about 200 feet, so moving up to 350 won't do you any good - in fact you're still taking 2 hit points per second the whole time you're below crush depth, so if it takes you 2 minutes to get up to 200 feet, by the time you get there your new crush depth is up to less than 50 feet so you need to surface.

Not the way it works in real life, but that's how the game is programmed, so it's best to know what the undamaged crush depth is, check your total hull damage and estimate the new crush depth before going deep. In real life I suspect you would want to move out of the way and avoid contact rather than attacking with a damaged sub, but in a game it's different.

What I did before finding Silent 3ditor so I could read the files directly, was to start a new career, save game, dive down slowly in increments until I started taking crush damage, made a note of what that depth was for that particular sub class. Then reload the save game with an undamaged sub, but now I know how deep I can go without damaging myself.

Thread Tools
Show Printable Version Email this Page
Display Modes
Switch to Linear Mode Hybrid Mode Switch to Threaded Mode

02-01-16, 11:22 AM	#1
Sniper297 The Old Man Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Philadelphia Shipyard Brig Posts: 1,386 Downloads: 160 Uploads: 19	Two questions. First, when you resupply with empty tubes, you need to change to the torpedo loading screen and slide one of the torpedoes into a tube to "prime" the loading process, then click the resupply anchor icon again to get a full load of torpedoes. Second question is more complicated. Ordinary engineering uses a design safety factor of 150%. What that means is if they want a car trailer that will carry a load of 1000 pounds, they design it so it will carry 1500 pounds before something breaks. The pressure hull of a sub is the same way, but most are engineered beyond the 150% factor. The "test depth" is the depth that the builders guarantee, each sub is taken out by civilian workers and dived to the test depth before delivering the sub to the Navy. The design depth is deeper than that, the crush depth is estimated since you obviously can't test it in real life since nobody can come back and tell you what it was. Most WWII subs were designed with a safety factor of 200% or more, if the specified design depth was 300 feet the engineers would design something they were sure would survive to at least 600 feet. In game it's different from real life since the programmers didn't really understand what they were doing, plus it had to be translated into English and some terms were translated wrong. "Crash depth" for example is used for both the depth at which the sub will level off if a "crash dive" is ordered, and also used for crush depth in a different file. The red needle on the gauge is different depending on if you have the shallow or deep gauge selected, for the shallow gauge it's periscope depth, for the deep one it's "MaxDepth" as defined in the CFG file for the sub. The actual crush depth (mis translated as "crash depth") is in the ZON file for the sub, much deeper than the needle. Stock game GATO for example, MaxDepth (red needle) is 100 meters, crush depth is 190 meters. There's also a "crash speed" in the ZON file, that defines how many "hit points" the sub loses per second when below crush depth. Then there's the damage factor - if you look at the damage control screen in the upper left corner there's a "hull damage" percentage, if it's anything other than 0% then the crush depth will be shallower than the default. For example if the hull damage says 20%, you'll start taking crush damage at 150 meters instead of 190. And of course as the "hit points" accumulate the hull damage percentage will increase and the crush depth will decrease, so you're between the devil and the deep blue sea if there are destroyers overhead.

02-01-16, 05:27 PM	#3
Sniper297 The Old Man Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Philadelphia Shipyard Brig Posts: 1,386 Downloads: 160 Uploads: 19	That's the problem, at extreme ends of the spectrum- BALAO class crush depth - 240 meters (792 feet) S-class crush depth - 122 meters (402 feet) If you're at 403 feet in an S-class you start taking 2 points of damage every second, and the S boat has a total of 500 hit points. If you stay down there 2 minutes you lose 240 hit points, or about half the total, so now your hull is damaged about 50%. With the damage your NEW crush depth is half what it was, about 200 feet, so moving up to 350 won't do you any good - in fact you're still taking 2 hit points per second the whole time you're below crush depth, so if it takes you 2 minutes to get up to 200 feet, by the time you get there your new crush depth is up to less than 50 feet so you need to surface. Not the way it works in real life, but that's how the game is programmed, so it's best to know what the undamaged crush depth is, check your total hull damage and estimate the new crush depth before going deep. In real life I suspect you would want to move out of the way and avoid contact rather than attacking with a damaged sub, but in a game it's different. What I did before finding Silent 3ditor so I could read the files directly, was to start a new career, save game, dive down slowly in increments until I started taking crush damage, made a note of what that depth was for that particular sub class. Then reload the save game with an undamaged sub, but now I know how deep I can go without damaging myself.