Playing at full realism settings

[Armistead]

Easiest and perfect way to get AOB is to get the course and set it on the AOB wheel if you use the TDC.

[TorpX]

Originally Posted by Sniper297

Personally I ignore AOB and set it to 80.
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You really wanna use the TDC to keep track you can measure the angle between your sub's heading and the target's course from his current position, that will give you the most accurate AOB.

Originally Posted by Armistead

Easiest and perfect way to get AOB is to get the course and set it on the AOB wheel if you use the TDC.

OK, at the risk of making myself unpopular, I have to address this misconception.

If we are talking about realistic methods here, then you can't get Aob from course, period. No matter how many books you read, or how many patrol reports you go through, you will not find a single skipper who said he obtained the Aob from plotting the course. If RL captains could have simply drawn a line through the first two points of a plot and thereby disposed of the Aob matter, don't you think they would have done so? Look in the training manuals. You won't find this method there, either.

Why do I say this? The reason they needed to estimate the Aob is to determine the course. Simply put, they obtained course from Aob, not Aob from course. Apart from estimates of Aob, they really had no good way of determining the course. Even if they were making a RADAR plot, all they could rely upon knowing is the base course. To get torpedoes to the target, they would still need to estimate the Aob to know what the course of the present leg was. Knowing the base course only, would not be sufficient.

The only reason why we can obtain the Aob from drawing a couple lines in the game plot, is that the whole map-contacts/plot aspect of this sim is poorly designed. It is very unrealistic. You can only obtain the Aob from course, if the plotted points are precise and accurate. In real-life, this was not the case. Furthermore, game ships don't zig-zag. Targets in RL usually did. Some of the tactics that work well in SHIV, would be useless to real-life sub captains.

This is one reason why gamers can easily obtain near 100% success in their attacks, but in WWII, many attacks failed. Skippers had to rely on imprecise data, and this made torpedo attacks an uncertain business.

[bybyx]

Thanks for the input!
I have Werner Sobe's tutorials from way back when they were released and any time I return to SH4 i watch them again and again. I also downloaded the tutorials that CapnScurvy mentions. Now i am at my first patrol with full realism settings in the game options and while an route to southern Formosa i was making a hydrophone sweep and picked up some contacts. By the way sometimes the game lags when a convoy is close so you know you found something. I think i read about this some time long ago.
How to proceed now that i have those contacts on hydrophone?
I will list my activated mods in the hopes that if i put them wrong it could be corrected:
1. TMO 2.5
2. TMO small patch
3. Convoy routes TMO+RFB
4. TMO Sub textures FooSkin
5. RSRD
6. RSRD Patch1
7. OTC
8. OTC Realistic scopes
9. OTC Tokko's revenge
10.ISE v3 TMO&RFB
11. ISE Realistic colors

One more thing, has anyone tried to make a mod that simulates what Toprx was saying about real life situations?

[CapnScurvy]

Your mod order seems just fine bybyx.

Originally Posted by TorpX

If we are talking about realistic methods here, then you can't get Aob from course, period. No matter how many books you read, or how many patrol reports you go through, you will not find a single skipper who said he obtained the Aob from plotting the course.......... Look in the training manuals. You won't find this method there, either.

Well, I can't exactly address why the Captain's that wrote about their war stories did not explain the whole story about their achievements (I doubt any of them shared the royalties from their books with their subordinates either!), but there's plenty of instructions about what a Captain should do with a Navigational plot.

Using the "Submarine Torpedo Fire Control Manual" I draw your attention to Chapter 4, where it talks about the makeup of the "Torpedo Fire Control Party". Page 3:

405. NAVIGATIONAL PLOTTER: The Navigational Plotter is an officer whose station is in the conning tower at the DRT. His primary duty is to maintain a navigational plot of the target or targets designated by the Approach Officer. He furnishes the TDC Operator and the Approach Officer the values of target course and speed obtained from the plot. In addition he furnishes predicted data regarding the target's position based on best known target course and speed, if requested.

This man is only one of 15 listed as participants in the "Torpedo Fire Control" group (in-game we have to do the work of 15!!), yet his duty is to provide a map plot for the exact reason of providing the Captain (Approach Officer) with target course and speed.

Further reading, Chapter 5, Page 32:

540. THE NAVIGATION PLOTTER: The Navigational Plot is one of the most important stations in the submarine fire control party. It is the only source from which a picture of the entire approach can be obtained. The Navigational Plot furnishes valuable information on target speed, target course, times of target zigs, average length of zig legs, and predicted target range when the submarine is below periscope depth. In order to furnish the Fire Control Party with this valuable information the Navigational Plotter must strive for accuracy, neatness, and speed.

...."one of the most important stations in the submarine fire control party"?

The training manuals speak for themselves. If a Captain/Author wanted to slight specific aspects for expedience in writing, or just take sole credit for his accomplishments over giving details of who/what may have helped in it......well, you be the judge.

[TorpX]

Originally Posted by CapnScurvy

...."one of the most important stations in the submarine fire control party"?

The training manuals speak for themselves. If a Captain/Author wanted to slight specific aspects for expedience in writing, or just take sole credit for his accomplishments over giving details of who/what may have helped in it......well, you be the judge.

None of the excerpts contradict my assertion. I didn't say the plot was unimportant - quite the contrary. What I'm saying is that the Aob was used to develop the plot. If the method of connecting two points and deducing the Aob, the skill of estimating the Aob by observation, would not have been taught or practiced. There would be little need for it.

This diagram (from the training manuals) illustrates what I mean:

There's a considerable amount of information here.

First, in the little table at near the top, there is the information from each of the six observations, arranged in 4 columns. TIME, BEARING, RANGE, AOB (they use the abbreviation Ab). Notice that the time and bearing value are precise, but the ranges and Aob's are in round numbers.

Second see that every point plotted has a small arrow drawn that shows the observed Aob. Nowhere is the Aob surmised from a line drawn through two nearby points. If you try to deduce the Aob or course by simply drawing a line between any two plotted points, you will not obtain an accurate value in most cases. The error in the range estimates precludes this method.

Note also the target ship course lines are not actually drawn through the plotted points. The plot had to be 'faired' and this required further observations and judgment by the people involved.

Plotting the targets course was not just a matter of making 2 or 3 observations, drawing a line, and having the matter over and done.

[BigWalleye]

Cap'n Scurvy and TorpX, I believe you are BOTH correct. Based on my reading over the years, here is how I believe that fire control was executed: The Approach Officer estimated the range, AoB, and speed, and called these out for entry into the TDC. TDC then calculated the target course. The Plotting Party kept updating the attack plot with target range-and-bearing as called out by the Approach Officer. (And AoB, as TorpX points out.) Plotting Party and TDC independently developed a firing solution, based on the two different sets of data. The solutions were checked against each other. Both solutions had to agree, or the boat commander (who usually was, but might not be, the Approach Officer) would not clear to fire. Torpedoes were not supposed to be wasted in snap shots.

IIRC, both O'Kane and Fluckey describe situations were the Plot and TDC solutions disagreed. "Check fire." There was tension and fuming while the discrepancies were resolved. (Beggin' yer pardon, but this early on a Sattidy, I am not up to finding the references.)

Range and bearing do give course, heading, and speed, but AoB immediately identifies target course changes (like zigzags).

Of course, the target range and bearing were determined mechanically, from the bearing ring and stadimeter. The AoB was judged by the Approach Officer, using the Mark I Human Eyeball. It's probably not surprising if former Approach Officers, in their post-war memoirs, sometimes emphasized the parts of their job that called for the most skill on their part.

Another observation from TorpX's excellent illustration: range and AoB data begin at 10000 yds. How hard is it for us to make any kind of range or AoB estimate at 10000? Those first long-range observations were probably easier in the R/L analog periscope view, but not a lot easier. They didn't wait until the target image was clear enough for accurate estimates, because then they would wind up basing their solution on 2 or 3 observations, like we often do. If we want to play "realistically" (in a historically appropriate manner), then we need to train ourselves to make and use good estimates at long range.

[Sniper297]

Even if they're zigzagging 30 degrees either side of the base course it's pretty difficult to get closer than "20 to 40 degrees port" from 10000 yards. Coming along without zigzagging can you really tell the difference between AOB port 5 and AOB port 10? Even at close range you can tell if it's not zero when you can see part of one side or the other and not just bow on, but anything more accurate than "less than 30" or "more than 30" or "about 60" would take psychic powers. You can get a GENERAL course from AOB and tweak it later by making a second mark and drawing a line through it, but when it comes to shooting at close range you simply don't have time to do anything other than preset the AOB to 70 or 80 and leave it alone.

[Armistead]

Originally Posted by TorpX

OK, at the risk of making myself unpopular, I have to address this misconception.

I'm speaking regarding the game. If you look where you set the AOB to the left, the wheel has where you can spin it to to course. Just mark two points and get heading/course and set that and you'll see what your AOB is. So basically the enemies course relative to your sub becomes the perfect AOB. The EZ AOB mod lets you free spin the AOB will so it's faster, but you can easily set it as well with a click.

Course if you play with contacts off it's more difficult.