[REL] No magic skills

[avee]

I encountered a strange problem creating new active skills.
They work correctly only when I start a new career or historical mission. If I try to use them in old career, all skills work correctly but their duration is wrong - for example, 10 minutes instead of 2 hours. And whatever I do, duration stays the same.
Should I continue my work on this mod if it only works correctly for new campaigns?

[Hyfrydle]

Is this due to points already been used on the game? If this mod makes the game more realistic I for one would be tempted to start a new campaign with all the mods and knowledge I now have.

so my vote is to keep working on it.

[avee]

Version 1.3 is released - see original post for details.

[sergei]

I just finished my first patrol, I'll give this a go tomorrow thanks

[avee]

Originally Posted by sergei

I just finished my first patrol, I'll give this a go tomorrow thanks

I hope you`ll like it.
BTW, I want some feedback!

[sergei]

Well my first patrol today was using 1.2.
Made it back to base and now I have some promotion points to spend.
I saved it in base, hadn't spent any points.
So tomorrow I'll uninstall 1.2 and install 1.3, and go spend those points!
Feedback in a few days

[Highbury]

Thanks for working on this stuff avee, I don't mind the RP elements if they are kept believable so this is certainly a step in the right direction.

[ReallyDedPoet]

Nice

[avee]

A small update - 3 new abilities:
- faster repair
- better watch crew
- better radio contact chance
All 3 passive.

I`m running out of ideas and need advice. What other abilities would you like to see?

[Chromius]

I suppose it is not possible to have Overcharge Diesels / Overcharge Elec be usable on diesels or elec and have some chance per time passing that you could 100% destroy an engine or cause serious damage with a small semi realistic boost like pushing rpms into the red.

Great mod, thanks.

[Vandecker]

Give the Chief engineer the passive ability to get a little bit more out of the engines with experience. Say a knot or two more speed (at flank speed) and 5% greater fuel efficiency, including the Electrical engines.

A good Engineer will be able to tune the engines and keep them in peak working condition allowing for such things to happen. Anyone who has tuned a car by hand should know that this sort of thing would be possible.

Also the passive ability to keep the engines just that little bit more quiet at silent running say 2-3%. A good engineer would know exactly where the engine needs to be oiled, rags to be tied to stop two parts knocking into each other and how to keep his own noises to a minimum as he moves around the engine room making tweaks here and there.

[Arclight]

More power and more efficiency? Not sure that's even possible, the 2 seem mutually exclusive.

Great mod, was getting sick of those torpedo-speed-buffs screwing the trigonometry.

[gouldjg]

Avee, I am working on a crew mod also but wanted to share some findings with you due to long load times e.g. 2 minds better than one etc.

Did you know you can use the onoff command on your active abilities e.g. you can potentially set the engines on overcharge but rather than wait for it to time out, you can now just switch it off again if you edit the command as shown below.

[SpecialAbility 9]
ID=Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel
NameDisplayable=Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel-Name
Description=Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel-Description, Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel-Description, Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel-Description
Levels= 3
AbilityType=SurfaceSpeed, FuelConsume ;increases engine speed (in percents) but gives a higher fuel consumption (in percents)
AbilityValue= 2, 10, 3, 12, 4, 14
AbilityInternalValue= 37, 20, 74, 30, 111, 50 ; factor1: 3.7, factor2: 1.0
RunOnActivate= IfIsSurfaced, SpeedAheadFlank

PointsRequirement= 0, 0, 0
AbilityRequirements= 0, 1, Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel, 1, 1, Ability-Active-Overcharge-Diesel, 2
LevelUpTree= 2, 3, 0
MoraleCost= 1, 1, 1,
PointsCost= 0, 1, 2

AbylityActsIn= ALL

Activation=OnOff
Duration=600, 900, 1440
Cooldown=4320, 2880, 1440


Now that I just sussed that out I am thinking of what it can come in useful for e.g. manually controlling things rather than timers?

My question for you is are you able to edit and add extra passive abilities in addition to the ones already listed?

I ideally want some long term manipulated passive abilities clicking away in the background that can contain a few lets say malfunction / rapair problems. Just not completly sussed it out yet.

There is of course coming a time where the text will need editing and the ui interface and icons but I am sure once the basics are formed and a good mod is created, someone with those skills can be called upon to assist.

[Vandecker]

Originally Posted by Arclight

More power and more efficiency? Not sure that's even possible, the 2 seem mutually exclusive.

I'm judging by experience with 1940's Motorcycle engines here but....certainly you can. Clean the air filters, tune the engine timing, Make sure all surfaces in moving contact are well oiled, modify the richness of the fuel/air mixture, change the gear ratio, etc....

All of these can mean that the engine is running cleaner and more smoothly, improving fuel efficiency at cruising speeds and allowing for better Revs and subsequently speed when the engine is pushed to her limits.

I'm not saying you should get both at the same time but with proper maintenance you could certainly get a knot or two extra out of the engines at Maximum Revs and slightly better fuel efficiency at cruising speeds.

Since this would require constant high quality maintenance I would definitely include it as a passive ability of the Chief Mechanic.

You could also have this ability decrease the chance of the U-Boat being spotted at long range since the visibility of the exhaust gasses would greatly depend on the richness of the fuel/air mixture that the Chief Engineer tunes the engine for and how well maintained the Diesel Engine is. Anyone noticed the black crud most diesel trucks throw out? This is because the engines are in poor tune and failing to burn all the fuel in the cylinders, throwing out carbon particulates (soot) as exhaust instead, imagine if a U-boats engine was as badly tuned as that!

[Mraah]

Originally Posted by avee

Yes, experienced crew repairs faster. BUT! These skills are active.

Here`s what they so in stock version:

Repair Items
Allows to repair destroyed equipment. It`s totally unrealistic.

Increase Repair
Increases repair speed for 10 minutes. Is it real? I`m going to make a passive skill that improves repair times.

Reduce Flooding Times
Reduces flooding for 10 minutes. I thought that pumping capacity depends on equipment and (less) on general crew abilities, but not on the engineer`s temporary boost.


In my opinion, active skills have to be something like crew focus - slightly increase one ability and decrease others.

Avee,

Some suggestions/ideas ....

Repair Items - Not totally unrealistic, however, returning the item to full operation capability would be. Perhaps you can compromise on this. If a player's boat has an item that's totally destroyed then it's safe to assume his boat took a pretty good whack. You could take all the effects of the boat and apply a negative modifier to it with a 2 week cooldown. In other words, if the port diesel is broke you can fix it but the caveat is that everything else in the boat will have diminished effects including 1/2 surface speed, and weaker batteries, sound gear, torpedo accuracy, etc. Basically the whole boat is in shambles and needs to be nursed home.

Reduced Flooding Times - Sure, why not ... Yeah, the pump can only pump so fast but there's a difference when you leave the pump unmonitored by itself and when you leave someone there to ensure it's doing the job properly. Heck, someones dicarded cigartette butt's or small metal shaving's may reduce pump flow. If someone attends to the pumping it can do it's job. Perhaps you could lower the pump's base rate and when you use the "Reduce Flooding Time" ability it actually pumps at the manufactured rating values?

Morale Ideas ....

1. Each officer can boost morale by 1-point ... Call it "Reassurance". Nothing like the skipper walking around to personaly reassure the other officers that life is good and we'll be home soon.

2. Anti-Propaganda .... To counter act the Bosun's bug that permantly add's delay time to the abilities.

For the most part, the term "morale" in this game is wrong ... It should be called "fatigue". It's probably going to take some time to balance everything out .... Appreciate your work Avee!!



Rob