What can we change and what can we not? DAMAGE/Repair/Death

[Fidd2]

I'm no computer programmer, but I just had an idea, which may be wildly impractical. Lets see.

What if: Before starting up SH3 you started mod that ran throughout your play, and "watched" your hull integrity state. As you accumulate damage, it would overwrite tga files for the sub interior (or even the outside skin as well) with "damaged" ones.

[CCIP]

Hmm, the issue is, of course, how to get it to invisibly output a hull integrity value into an external program :hmm:

I have my doubts, but if anyone can figure that out - it would be of great help.







One thing I've been thinking about in regards is bringing SH3 commander into the equation. How about, for example, randomising the vulnerabilities of certain systems to some extent? That could result in some unexpected twists :hmm:

[Fidd2]

doesn't it write the hull integrity to a cfg file - else how would it know to start your play-session with the damage state of your previous one? Presumeably it does that either at the moment of saving, or at the instant the damage is inflicted.

Originally Posted by CCIP

Hmm, the issue is, of course, how to get it to invisibly output a hull integrity value into an external program :hmm:

I have my doubts, but if anyone can figure that out - it would be of great help.







One thing I've been thinking about in regards is bringing SH3 commander into the equation. How about, for example, randomising the vulnerabilities of certain systems to some extent? That could result in some unexpected twists :hmm:

[HEMISENT]

Gouldjg, one of the things that's bothered me is the ridiculously fast repair times. Everytime I take damage the compartment repair times are measured in mere minutes. What about damaged areas taking hours to repair. Hard to believe a diesel engine knocked off the mounts can be brought back online in 3-4 minutes.
Anyway just my two cents worth. Random mechanical breakdowns sure would be nice to experience also.

Glad your back.

ps. Now that there is a screaming crew mod "BRING BACK THE FLYING CREWMEN"

[Beery]

On the hull integrity thing, it writes to a file only if you exit the game. When hull integrity accumulates during the game, it's virtually impossible to find where that gets recorded. I would say that the proposal of changing graphics on the fly based on the hull integrity is so hard to implement that I seriously doubt that it will ever be done.
On the other question of randomizing system vulnerabilities, this definitely could be done, but would it be apparent in the game? In my experience it's very unusual to get significant system failures unless the boat is already in the last seconds before it gets destroyed.

[gouldjg]

I can prolong repairs to a certain degree but the minutes thing seems to be hardcoded or undiscovered as yet.

Read the past couple of fatigue threads concerning me and Kaa and you will get the idea that I will be making a instant penalty to anyone who gets sent to repair so player has to choose carefully how many people he devotes to damage control.

This penalty will drop their usefulnes but not negate their skill. When this is in action, floods will take longer to get under control and maybe, just maybe so will subsystem damage. I just hated the fact that repairs get done in seconds and skilled repair men fix a flood in 30 seconds flat. No not more they will.

You may be intersted to know that I discovered a way to send crewmen to bed for rest and that they will actually simulate sleeping.

I am just figuring out whats best for combat situations i.e. the approach, torp reloading, damage and recovery.

[CCIP]

I did already prolong repair times to some extent - by giving compartments more HP and making them lose more through damage - but I'd like to know where the repair rate data is stored. It may not be hardcoded, but then again, maybe it is :hmm:

[gouldjg]

Well CCIP not only can we prolong as you have done so, but by reducing the efficiency of the crew in the repair department, we can prolong further and hopefully to a good gameplay effect.

I will hardly need to adjust the damage mod in RUB except the flooding figures cos as you know flooding is either instantly repaired in seconds on the current system or it floods too fast.

I want to restrict this mass varying flooding repair and force the player to think first before sending 8 men to repair a minor problem.

How will I do it?, Well it is done by reducing the crews overall effects in that single deprtment but yet they should have some effect i.e. qualifications rank etc. If I have control of what exactly my highest effectivness peak on the repair bar will be, then I can adjust flooding to fit closer to repair times.

That part is what I need to field test next after I have finnished with these crew tweek capabilites available with Kaas discovery.

I am confident this will be good way to look at battles.

TRUST ME :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

[Beery]

Interesting. I didn't consider the 'fatigue on entering the compartment' thing. That's a nice idea.

[gouldjg]

Beery

Like Kaa, I am using most of your RUB 1x settings i.e. the 0.0001 is great but I may just adjust to account for the fact I can place when in recoup mode,

As we now have the capability to fatigue in higher time compression, I feel this is the way to go, for me it is anyway.

Kaa wants to set his similar to your mod, where battle fatigue takes weeks etc.

I want to use this system but also recover as I wanted to have penalty set for choosing man to enter repair compartment and energy loss when in battle stations.

I Accidently come accross this putting men to bed i.e. if I decide to put a man in the rest compartment, he will become useless untill he has had at least a few hours sleep. Clever gues by adding same line above compartment 6&7 that the rest have.

Now I need to set this so people cannot cheat the system by hoping men in and out of compartments. This is currently being tested and tweaked.

I have just had a encounter where a plane supried me out at sea.

He dropped two bombs before I could dive so I was damaged with flooding.

Two floods went under control in a few minutes or so whilst the other took at least 3 min to get under control. Damage did take longer to get back to normal as I now have it set that men work at low energy levels to simulate problems, minor injuries and just plain over working in abnormal circumstances.

I am thinking this can only get better as more tests and tweaks are done.

I am playing with a fatigue model that though does not have any dramatic effects every couple of game hours when in cruise mode, it will change performance levels over time i.e. every week.

It is then upto the player to decide if he wants to just run and run to the destination or stop and maybe rest a few crew so they are in peak condition should they be supried in the next few days or they are close to shipping lane or destination.

As well as this, I think we can get good variation when in battle station mode as well i.e. weapon departments are manned or submerged sailing.

I will post my findings and the mod on the Hollywood thread,

[iambecomelife]

Originally Posted by CCIP

I did already prolong repair times to some extent - by giving compartments more HP and making them lose more through damage - but I'd like to know where the repair rate data is stored. It may not be hardcoded, but then again, maybe it is :hmm:

I hope you find it; unfortunately this isn't my area of expertise. I agree that the repair crews' superhuman abilities make the game seem arcadish. As a whole we probably abort a lot fewer patrols due to damage than was the case historically.

[Hellcat]

Originally Posted by iambecomelife

As a whole we probably abort a lot fewer patrols due to damage than was the case historically.

One of my gripes as well, remmber how silent hunter (I) actually allowed the damaging of say one of your primary diesel's. Reducing speed and taking away one of the boat's most important characteristics. (and I have never had situations where I could not fire a tube, aotd had jammed outer doors if i recall correctly)

Can the damage model be further complicated by adding addtional subsystems to the players ship? Is there a list of current componets that can be damaged? Along that tangent what can be done to further enhance surface ship damage models? Right now it seems that I can throw 5 fish into a Queen Elizibeth BB and she is still other than reduced speed, fully operational and loaded for bear...

[ICBM]

Let's not forget the visuals here gentlemen,

Another issue that came to my mind after seeing Das Boot's DC atacks again and compared it to SH3's ones;
Sure, the game simply doesn't have the animations or violent camera shakes to throw people around the sub like Das Boot but I think we can at least improve the current visual damage effects.
I mean, all you get is the camera shakes (wich look not very convincing when the crew themselves remain statues), frequent pipe burst and very very rarely electric sparks and blackouts.

The last two effects have my attention, they add a lot to the game but you rarely see them since that would require massive amounts of sustained damage...and we all now that the line between much damage and the cursed black screen o' death is >way< to thin.

To compensate for the lack of visual damage effects I propose to drastically lower the amount of sustained damage needed for the electric sparks and the blackout effects to apear. (and perhaps make the blackout remain longer, a few minutes for example) That way we can have a much more violent DC atacks like Das Boot. And we can finally start to respect DC's, a.t.m I'm not scared or anything, perhaps slightly worried but miles away from breaking a sweat..

Good/bad idea?

[Beery]

On a bit of a tangent here, but I'm not at all sure that the Das Boot scenes of the crew being thrown around by depth charges were at all realistic. As I understand it, when a depth charge goes off in proximity to a submerged U-boat it has a compressive effect on the boat, but the boat wouldn't move all that much spatially. It's not at all like air turbulence, where a person could easily find himself thrown to the ceiling by a low pressure air pocket. As I understand the physics of it, in a U-boat the water around you is not compressible like air is - water carries a pressure wave but it's not distorted much by it. This is why U-boats are so affected by sudden variations in pressure whereas aircraft, which are structurally much weaker, tend to be able to withstand pressure variations better.

Although the boat is being seriously compressed by the effect of the depth charges, I don't see how such a force could throw people around very much because the boat cannot easily be moved through the water by the pressure.

[CCIP]

Originally Posted by Beery

Although the boat is being seriously compressed by the effect of the depth charges, I don't see how such a force could throw people around very much because the boat cannot easily be moved through the water by the pressure.

I posted an account of a real U-boat officer a couple of months ago which related exactly that (in a comment on Das Boot, no less). As it said, a depth charge attack felt like

A blow with a giant hammer against an immovable object. Gauges would break, leaks would appear, but the boat would not move an inch.

Ideally, the DC effects should be revised a bit to feel that way. I do agree that more flashing lights would be a nice indicator.

I earlier suggested reducing the DC "impulse" value (the amount of shaking/'rolling' effect caused by DC explosions, but pretty much everyone here shrugged it off (and I gave up on that too, heh) :hmm: