Can you get everyone below deck when under aircraft attack?-without decks awash

[PappyCain]

Couple of comments:

Not sure why you do not have sufficient radar or watch warning - either way just crash dive and the men are off the sail in a nano second.

Are you caught when transiting in TC? if so never go above 128. You will have plenty of time to crash dive.

You may lose speed zigging about - I prefer to go hard starboard when the aircraft commit but not before. I get both screws turning and get off battery charge when warned about incoming.

My gunners are the best, very experienced - but when I have more than 3 aircraft I crash dive and at 30m I go hard to starboard u/w. It works through every year. When they toss ahead of you in '44 you are already out of the path.

I also always level off at 50m. I never go deeper.

Hope this helps a tat.

And yes, they will locate you at night so be prepared ... there is a air coverage map which will show you progressive overlapping coverage though the war years. At some point you will always be a potential target of day and night attacks and they will get brutal.

[RoaldLarsen]

Originally Posted by PappyCain

Couple of comments:

Not sure why you do not have sufficient radar or watch warning - either way just crash dive and the men are off the sail in a nano second.

Are you caught when transiting in TC? if so never go above 128. You will have plenty of time to crash dive.

Paul is effectively playing stock, and in stock you often don't get enough warning. I created the following mini-mod through SH3 Commander to tweak the reaction times a bit. Just add it to the end of SH3 Commander's Cfg\Static settings.cfg file, unless you have already modified Sensors.cfg in that file, in which case you should add these modifictions somewhere in the existing [data\Cfg\Sensors.cfg] section

;This section attempts to deal with overly powerful air forces
;by adjusting submarine visual detection parameters
;to make fast moving targets easier to see and reducing the effect of range
;but makes visual detection use crew efficiency,
[data\Cfg\Sensors.cfg]
SensorParameters|Visual range factor=0.4 ;was 0.5
SensorParameters|Visual enemy speed=0.3 ;[>0.0] ;was 0.2
SensorParameters|Visual uses crew efficiency=true ;was false

[Paul Riley]

Roald you are right,I dont get much warning,the only good warnings I get are on absolutely crystal clear days,even the slightest cloud can leave me losing vital seconds getting under.Also,my biscay cross is practically useless,it rarely if EVER gives me a warning.The only time I detected signals with it was a while ago,at night,heavy fog,a destroyer was heading our way,obviously locating us with his radar.It was fairly useful then in that case.

Sorry to be naive here,but what exactly does that hack do?,and is it safe to apply in mid patrol?I must warn you that I have never modified any of the Commander files,and the only hack I have attempted so far is with the man flak guns hotkey,which didnt work by the way,unless when applied after my patrol.

Cheers mate

[Paul Riley]

Just looking at them hacks,I actually dont mind overly powerful air forces,after all,they were the most dangerous threat to a surfaced UBoat,and lowering it might remove some of the realism.

I AM however interested in improving the visual awareness of the watch,and improving the sensitivity of the biscay cross,and any other warning reciever (if this is possible) .I mention the biscay cross because in Iron Coffins Werner mentioned that sometimes the biscay cross went crazy,with radar 'chirps' coming in from all directions.

[RoaldLarsen]

Originally Posted by Paul Riley

... Also,my biscay cross is practically useless,it rarely if EVER gives me a warning.The only time I detected signals with it was a while ago,at night,heavy fog,a destroyer was heading our way,obviously locating us with his radar.It was fairly useful then in that case.

At least you know it is working, then.

The Biscay cross will do nothing if the plane has no radar, or has radar with a shorter wavelength than the cross can detect. Its effectiveness in the game is proportional to the effectiveness of your crew.

IRL, the Brits also sometimes turned of their radar. I don't think the game models this.

Originally Posted by Paul Riley

Sorry to be naive here,but what exactly does that hack do?,and is it safe to apply in mid patrol?I must warn you that I have never modified any of the Commander files,and the only hack I have attempted so far is with the man flak guns hotkey,which didnt work by the way,unless when applied after my patrol.

The mod changes the probabllty that your crrew will detect a target visually. It makes it slightly more likely to see things farther away, and it makes it slightly easier to see things that are moving quickly, like an aircraft. It also makes tired watch crews less likely to detect targets. I designed and tested it in order to make the likelyhood of detecting an aircraft in time to dive closer to the historical norm, as determined very loosely from reading patrol logs.

Originally Posted by Paul Riley

Just looking at them hacks,I actually dont mind overly powerful air forces,after all,they were the most dangerous threat to a surfaced UBoat,and lowering it might remove some of the realism.

I AM however interested in improving the visual awareness of the watch,and improving the sensitivity of the biscay cross,and any other warning reciever (if this is possible) .I mention the biscay cross because in Iron Coffins Werner mentioned that sometimes the biscay cross went crazy,with radar 'chirps' coming in from all directions.

Well, don't be misled by the comment. I was referring to the net effectiveness of the air force as a function of both their capabilities and the sub's capabilities. This mod does not affect the aircraft at all. It does what you want as far as visual awareness of the watch. It doesn't change the effectiveness of the Biscay Cross.

You may be missing out on warnings from your Biscay Cross if the crew in the radio room is not fully effective. Judging from the Sensor config file, radio room efficiency seems to affect the sensitivity of radar warning detectors (RWDs).

I haven't made a mod to improve RWD sensitivity because I don't have any data that shows that the game has tuned it wrong.

[Paul Riley]

Some useful stuff there Roald,cheers
Actually,my radio room is only run by untrained personnel at the moment,after losing my experienced crew in my previous sinking,which you are only too aware of now
Having said that,even with skilled personnel from my last crew the biscay cross rarely if ever picked much up.I suspect it has something to do with the shorter wavelength as you say,something the cross appears to have serious difficulty with.
I understand the later warning recievers were able to operate in the centimetre band,making them much more sensitive,and can't bloody wait for one!

Thanks.