Questions about Battlestations/Silent Running

[Hylander_1314]

I always call the crew to battlestations before attacking, but while submerged, I always go to silent running, and have not had any issues with detection from the enemy.

Using TMO 2.1

[Stealhead]

Originally Posted by Hylander_1314

I always call the crew to battlestations before attacking, but while submerged, I always go to silent running, and have not had any issues with detection from the enemy.

Using TMO 2.1

Do you mean to say that you remove your crew from BS when you go to SR or that you go to SR after submerging but at BS; I do the later when I feel that I am in sound range. So far as I can tell being at BS while also at SR seems to make no difference for me noise wise.A few times in fact just messing around I have been well evading enemy escorts and turned SR off and they spotted me very fast verses not spotting me before at all even though they where very near(this was with the Damage control crew off duty).

Also I put my damage control crew in hogans alley unless I need them.Have not jumped to 2.1 yet so I guess that will be different.

As others are saying I can not turn on/off the damage control team while in SR. Sooner or later someone who knows the answer to this here topic will post a reply....What was his name again?...............

[Hylander_1314]

Originally Posted by Stealhead

Do you mean to say that you remove your crew from BS when you go to SR or that you go to SR after submerging but at BS; I do the later when I feel that I am in sound range. So far as I can tell being at BS while also at SR seems to make no difference for me noise wise.A few times in fact just messing around I have been well evading enemy escorts and turned SR off and they spotted me very fast verses not spotting me before at all even though they where very near(this was with the Damage control crew off duty).

Also I put my damage control crew in hogans alley unless I need them.Have not jumped to 2.1 yet so I guess that will be different.

As others are saying I can not turn on/off the damage control team while in SR. Sooner or later someone who knows the answer to this here topic will post a reply....What was his name again?...............

I put them at battlestations, go to silent running. It's easier if we take damage to go off silent running that way, and have the crew fixing stuff especially if there's more than 2 escorts working us over.

Since I mainly use TMO, the boats can go deeper than their redline marks for test depth, so I usually try to take the boat as deep as possible. Had a Balao down over 700ft more than once. So I rarely worry about battle damage.

Thing is, try to knock out the immediate escorts, either convoy, or task force, and then let the other ships have it.

[Stealhead]

Oh wasnt sure on your first post makes sense.We have totally different strategies though I never bother with the escorts I just stalk past em and kill the big fish.Honestly I usually dont have much trouble with escorts in TMO (not to say that they are easy to evade) I guess I just slink in and slink out. I dont go as deep either I go to about 200 stay there if they start pining I go deeper if needed.Also I am a "live to fight another day" type so I slink in go for one or two ships and as soon as I fire all my fish I begin my slink away that I am already escaping by the time the shots hit.If I miss/want to kill more I just come back and make a big 20-30 mile half circle and do it again.

I must be pretty good because for me roughly 1 in every 5 attacks the escorts will be completely in the dark as to my location sometimes even searching on the other side of the convoy
from my location I prefer night attacks.Another useful thing I like to do a quick dive each morning to find out the depth of the thermal layer("passing thermal layer sir") in the area of ocean I am in useful info.

not to go too off topic though.

[Ducimus]

RR got me thinking when he said the enemy can hear you better when at BS.

To the best of my knowledge, all BS does is increase compartment efficiency.

Do you actually suffer a value hearing loss when the crew is in BS mode?

Long time ago i heard BS increases your sonarmans effectiveness, but ive never seen anything to back that up. Again, all BS seems to effect is compartment efficiency.

IF SR is engaged, torps won't load, but seems other repair functions take place.

I noticed that ages ago and i never liked it. I don't think that should be, but id be lying if i said i wasn't taking advantage of it when i was playing. This is a code level issue. Can't fix this by modding.

I assume by looking at values that are still complex to me, that SR values only lower the enemies hearing values.

It's a boolean value that dampens your noise output at a fixed rate. It doesn't really lower enemy hearing values. Enemy hearing values just have to be set at a rate where they cannot hear the player with SR engaged and with the throttle set at an acceptable RPM level with a wind speed of zero.. (IE 1 to 2 knots)

The issue I see is even if you have SR engaged, your crew repairs.

Ahh, the crux of the matter. You know, I haven't really noticed or paid attention to this. Thinking back... I don't think this has effected me. Offhand, I don't think this is a factor that effects play other then getting some repairs in when you shouldn't be.

Also, what happens if you have SR engaged, but you crank up speed, do you still get values in your favor?

Depends on what speed you select and wind conditions. If say, Ahead standard, in 15 knot winds.. yeah, away you go most likely. In a 5 knot wind? Not so much.

Any values gain or loss by just engaging damage crew and not go on BS?

Just compartment effeciency rating. Gun and torp reloads slower. I don't remember offhand, but ill wager slower repairs too.

Still seems that crew in a damaged compartment have some effect on repair times because we have that guy with repair ability. Also seems a compartment with all men in it on repair status would repair.

If a compartment is crewed, the men in it maintain that compartment. Every now and then you can actually see that if you move the mouse over it to display their status.

For an example, look a damaged deck or AA gun. It won't be fixed until there is a man in it. Although i dont remember if the "auto fix" was reliant on BS or not. Someone should test this. My hunch is he'll fix the gun over time, BS or not, but i could be wrong.

The same with blowing tanks..I wonder if a value exist for this seperate noise, I haven't found one, but wouldn't even know where to look.

Game is not that complex. Blow tanks all you want, use your depth sounder all you want, use your active sonar all you want, Use your radar all you want. I'm pretty sure you will not be detected by the usage of these items.

In SH3 there was no Battle Stations function, but when Silent Running was engaged everything stopped, which was as it should be.

Since BS is a new function, my hunch is they forgot to code it correctly when in conjunction with silent running. Then again, it could just be broken. Look at rough weather gear. Rain conditions for the crew to put it on work, wind conditions don't and they should. Or even, "depth charges in the water!" from the sonar man, remember that?

[Armistead]

Thanks Duci, pretty much what I figured and how the game seems to react.