I just want to be the captain...

[gap]

Yes, that's true: the navigator becomes sort of useless after enabling real navigation. Would be cool if we could simply mark a point on map, letting the nav officer to do the rest (with the due approximation indeed).
I think that the main factor preventing it, is the need to avoid land masses. Real navigation could take advantage of the campaign nodes (the ones followed by AI shipping), but if it was that easy I believe that TDW would have done it already.

[Staniol]

Originally Posted by gap

Yes, that's true: the navigator becomes sort of useless after enabling real navigation. Would be cool if we could simply mark a point on map, letting the nav officer to do the rest (with the due approximation indeed).
I think that the main factor preventing it, is the need to avoid land masses. Real navigation could take advantage of the campaign nodes (the ones followed by AI shipping), but if it was that easy I believe that TDW would have done it already.

Hmmm.
I have no problems to plot a course to avoid landmassess, I do not expect such an extraordinary clever behaviour from an AI to navigate around an island (honestly, how complex this can be? ), so I am ok as long as someone is knocking on my door in these cases, telling me that we are in shallow waters, and only you can solve it herr captain.
No problem to do some manual work, but if I plot safely, this would be rare.


Oh, and its just navigation... I assume my dream will get torpedoed as soon as we get to the fighting part...

[THE_MASK]

Anytime I am about to run aground the game drops to 1TC and I reverse out .

[Staniol]

Originally Posted by sober

Anytime I am about to run aground the game drops to 1TC and I reverse out .

Thanks, at least that looks good.

I have 2 questions regarding to this,
1, Do you guys think that its feasable to create a mod which enables the navigator to use real navigation to follow a plotted course?
2, is there a channel to ask for new mods?
(I don't know how hard to make these kind of mods so forgive me if I ask for something complex. I promise to read some modding tutorial...)

Once again, thank you for the answers, this is a helpful community.

[gap]

Originally Posted by Staniol

...I do not expect such an extraordinary clever behaviour from an AI to navigate around an island (honestly, how complex this can be? )

making the navigator to follow a set of waypoints in a straight line (as in stock game): very easy;
setting him to behave as a blindfolded man trying to avoid obstacles: probably easy, but buggy and unrealistic;
coding a world-aware navigator: I am neither a programmer nor an expert of cybernetics, but I think it would be a very complex task...

[plj]

Originally Posted by gap

making the navigator to follow a set of waypoints in a straight line (as in stock game): very easy;

If you add to that "based on where he thinks he is now", that would suffice and be a hell of a lot more realistic over having a navigator that is unable to plot any course whatsoever.

[Staniol]

Originally Posted by plj

If you add to that "based on where he thinks he is now", that would suffice and be a hell of a lot more realistic over having a navigator that is unable to plot any course whatsoever.

This sounds good and (dare I say) simple.

[gap]

Originally Posted by plj

If you add to that "based on where he thinks he is now", that would suffice and be a hell of a lot more realistic over having a navigator that is unable to plot any course whatsoever.

Let's put it like this: we are at waypoint A (last position fix), and we want the navigator to reach the waypoint C following a route which will pass through B (B and C: user inputs on map).

The navigator will calculate a course from A to B. Since A is only an estimation of where we are, we will never join B, but a waypoint more or less close to it, depending on the accuracy of the starting position fix and on the lenght of the first leg. If needed, we can introduce some randomness to the calculated course (simulating human errors and the effect of random ocean drifts), and we can make the navigator to adjust the route based on intermediate position fixes. This way, we would never travel in a straight line. When the navigator believes that we are at B, he can calculate a new position fix (let's call it B'), and plot from there the next leg (from A' to B). Again his plotting will be affected by random errors, and he will calculate several position fixes to compensate them, until we reach B'.

What do you think guys?
This should be feasible and it would be fairly realistic, but until someone codes it, it is just theory. I only wish TDW was here

[plj]

Maybe I'm too simple, but cant we mix and merge ? We have what we need ?

Regular game has plotting, realnav has posfix. Me thinks all I need is a regular game with the ability to ask my navigator for a fix, and plotting to use the calculated fix ?

>..a navigation fix!<

[Staniol]

All in all, this means that there is no instant solution, so from my roleplaying point of view, I am doing better currently without RealNav.
Ok, I will continue my testing tonight, and surely will have tons of questions.