Question about no contacts.

[SJFriesen]

I just turned off no contact map update. I have a question about early game play when playing without it.

A good amount of your contact reports that come in are just a bearing with no distance. So how do you usually approach this early in the war? Do you just turn into the mentioned bearing or is there a better method?

Since you some times do receive reports of locations with distance do you just have to use a ruler to the bearing. You dont have surface sonar tell a few months into the war so I cant ping for range and all that. Unless im using my sonar station wrong.

Thanks for any suggestions. Oh and im playing TMO 2.2

[SJFriesen]

Surface Radar sorry when I read through it I realized I put the wrong thing.

[SJFriesen]

Another thing I guess I could ask is are there any mods I should run with TMO? Ive only had the game for about 4 days now.

[I'm goin' down]

With TMO, you can use sonar readings to plot range and course (sonar only attack) or the 3D TDC and Radar Range mod.

If map contacts are disabled and you have not activated TMO, I suggest using CapnScury's Optical Targeting Correction Mod. It will take you a while to figure it out, but it a great tool. CapnScury is working on making it compatible with TMO.

Right now, I am playing stock with various mods including RSRDC and his Optical Training Correction with real scopes and the appropriate aspect ratio correction. It is a great sim, but it is not for beginners and it will bust your chops. I just spend over 4 hours on a failed attack. You will be using radar, sonar, plotting and the Optical Training method to fix the Aob and enter data to the TDC., so the PK can set up a good firing solution. Plan on spending A LOT OF TIME plotting a successful attack and tell you girlfriend you will catch up to her later (like next week!)

[SJFriesen]

Haha yea I actually have a really good idea of sub tactics and stuff since I have a friends grandfather who was a Sub Commander in real life. Made it to patrol 6 playing like a real sub commander, no risky attacks unless it was a capital ship (which I ended up dying for) I play with my own IRL setting too, No saves unless its cause im done playing for the day and if I die I start over in my career.

I do really good if contacts are not turned off and everything else on. I never run under 85 realism.

No Contacts it just a big change early game since you dont have surface radar or good sonar so Im trying to figure out a good intercept action. Half the time you dont receive a range to the ship early game so you cant plot a course to intercept cause.

I told the gf to give me a few months in TimeCompression so maybe like 2 weeks hhaha.

[Bubblehead1980]

Wee an advantage you have is even the early radar gives you a PPI scope even though it was no around until later in war so it's easy to see their position in relation to yours.

Another suggestion is finding a better smoke mod that vickers put out, this gives merchants the big black plumes of smoke majority of them had, it was visible for many miles in RL and is visibile for a decent distance in the game when using the mod so as in RL, you can visually track a target or targets to get data combined with radar etc. Tracking is a bit of a pain without contacts but it's fun and when you do sink your target you spent a while plotting, its worth it.

[TBear]

well im no ace of the deep and i just do things my way. When i get message about ship spottet i dive engines of head to sonar. There i plot bearing every 30 secs, mark it on map. Then i have the direction. Then i look through scope, checking again, using the lines in the scoope and the stop watch, that gives me s0ome speed details. Combining those two i head to the map, create the intercept. Wait to the ship is almost out of distance in the scope, surace, racing to the intercept.

I dont use all the fancy math, im a janitor, not a professor

my stats in hitting are about suuuux % hits. For some reson n9o matter what i do i need to fire 3 torps to get one hit. This have not changed in 4-5 years, i can hit i just need 3 shots ..and i have been reading, practecing etc, but it never fails. Manual TDC = 3 shots for a kill..(moving ships)..

So i kinda just do it on the experience since my janitor brain simply cant figure out 1 shot one kill

[Armistead]

TMO 2.2 has the radar mod, learn to use it, you get get perfect distance, take markings and get course, etc.

[SJFriesen]

@ Bubble and Armi - thanks I will have to check into how the radar is manually run. I was having a issue with running sonar manually because I was trying to adjust bearing with the mouse and then figured out its done with the mouse wheel. Guess I need to go around to the stations and figure out how everything works in the game better.

@ Bubble I will have to experiment with the smoke mod. The maker of TMO states that the only compatable mod not built in is the RSRD mod. Any suggestions on a smoke mod to try?

@ Bear - I may try that thanks for the suggestion

[I'm goin' down]

Originally Posted by Armistead

TMO 2.2 has the radar mod, learn to use it, you get get perfect distance, take markings and get course, etc.

Correct me if I am wrong, but 2.2 uses the 3D TDC radar range mod. To date 2.2 does not use or is compatible with the Optical Training Correction, the later which is compatible with RSRDC's latest version.

[Armistead]

Originally Posted by I'm goin' down

Correct me if I am wrong, but 2.2 uses the 3D TDC radar range mod. To date 2.2 does not use or is compatible with the Optical Training Correction, the later which is compatible with RSRDC's latest version.

Isn't that what I said, the radar mod, gives me accurate ranges.

[SJFriesen]

I just got the RSRD mod and installed it in JSGME with the TMO mod it loads up fine but I have had the game crash on me twice once I go to run low with a destroyer coming over head. Im just wondering if RSRD isnt compatible with TMO 2.2 yet. When in JSGME the mod is listed as RSRDC TMO V502. Did I get the wrong update of RSRD?

Edit: Just realized the patch didnt upload to the mod folder trying it again.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by SJFriesen

@ Bubble and Armi - thanks I will have to check into how the radar is manually run. I was having a issue with running sonar manually because I was trying to adjust bearing with the mouse and then figured out its done with the mouse wheel. Guess I need to go around to the stations and figure out how everything works in the game better.

@ Bubble I will have to experiment with the smoke mod. The maker of TMO states that the only compatable mod not built in is the RSRD mod. Any suggestions on a smoke mod to try?

@ Bear - I may try that thanks for the suggestion

The smoke mod by vickers works just fine with TMO, it overwrites TMO's files dealing with smoke though but vickers made a version to work with TMO,I've used it for quite a while, works fine.I refuse to play without it because although a small mod, it really adds to the game.

An example would be a patrol I was on not long ago in a Porpoise class out of Pearl Harbor in March 1942.I was in the East China Sea at 100 feet.I came up to scope depth to look around.A sonar sweep(manually by me and by my crewman picked up nothing) while I was making a slow sweep before dropping the scope for a few, I noticed a very faint whisp of smoke at bearing 270 while in magnified view, I turned sonar to 270 and picked up nothing but I could tell it was smoke, I changed the heading and closed at Ahed Full.Before long I had a merchant on sonar, went to GQ, closed, the smoke developed from a thin whisp in a thick black vertical plume above the horizon.I soon had a large freighter in site, closed to 1000 yards off his trick, fired four torpedos, three of which prematurely exploded but one hit him dead center, splitting the large ship in two.

Now, being able to spot the smoke that far depends on weather etc but without it, I would not have bagged that freighter.Also as mentioned it helps with tracking from distance with contacts on and off.

Better smoke mod by vickers should be in the downloads area.

[YukonJack_AK]

I have a question kind of in line with the OP...

I just recently (like Monday) made the switch to SH4 from SH3 after several years and currently just playing with Webster's GFO mod & RSRDC (figured I'd work my up to RFB & TMO)... my problem is I'm just not finding anything. Not counting IJN aircraft of which there seems to be plenty of... I spent the better part of a week wandering around the Marshall Islands with nothing to show but empty fuel tanks... Any ideas on how to improve my contact finding skills? (Other than the Smoke Mod which I'm DL'ing right now)