Sonarman not automatically detecting sounds

[Rockin Robbins]

NightEagle, in response to your PM, here is my present mod list:


I'm running RSRDC right now because I was testing my plotting mods to ensure that they worked for RSRDC ships. GFO Patch for RSRDC partially gets Webster's GFO back from all the gameplay changes RSRDC makes. It doesn't totally succeed. Momi-Matsu fix is because RSRDC doesn't plot either ship on your nav map and that's kinda bad. 3000 yard bearing plotter is Capn Scurvy's, properly plotting for 1152x864 resolution. Optical Targeting Correction has been corrected by removing the spotlessly perfect ship dimensions and identification manual, keeping stock versions of both. I'm not releasing that one without express approval from CapnScurvy. TMOKeys gives me the great TMO Keyboard, before TMO 2.5 changes.

All the rest are missions and skins which have no impact on gameplay at all.

[TorpX]

Originally Posted by xXNightEagleXx

My negative feedback was due to two thing:

1 There was really a bug but it solved as i reinstalled just some mods (specially with TMO).
2 After the reinstall, i immediately jumped to RFB full time (practically for the first time). IMO in TMO all sensors work much better both in theory (specs) and in practice. In TMO both me and the AI can hear from a much bigger distance even higher than the sonar spec.

Installs can get borked, so I can't really say much about that.

Sensor values certainly can be changed; it's just that no one was able to sync them to what we hear. It is like what Cap'nScurvy noticed about how sometimes we cannot hear slow-moving ships, though our crews can. It is just another example of poor game design that we have to live with.

The same thing can occur with visuals. Depending on the sensor values in force, we might be able to see ships before our crew spots them, or vice-versa. Ideally, we would see as well as our crew; no better, and no worse.

[Rockin Robbins]

All Torpx says is true. And it's much easier to swallow when you reflect that Silent Hunter 4 is still the best submarine simulator on the planet after a run of eight years.

Would we like to do better? Of course. Can we? No.

[xXNightEagleXx]

Sir yes sir captains

Btw when i said that sensors work much better in TMO i wasn't strictly meaning better in the sense of realistic or whatever, but just in a matter of performance.

[Spraug]

... since you can set the sonarguy to do different things, could it be that he is simply not sweeping? That should be a default, but maybe it's as simple as that...

[TorpX]

I won't cost anything to try, but I doubt it.

If you order him to sweep, he might report a contact within range, but afterwards, he will likely go back to daydreaming.

[xXNightEagleXx]

UPDATE : skip this post, read my last one


Sorry for bringing this thing up but i'm the kind of guy that just don't accept things without understanding if there is an error or it is the normal procedure. Moreover, in case there is an error i have to try to fix it.


What was the average range for US submarine hydrophones in perfect conditions ?
Searching in the web i've read pretty high numbers, like this one :

- for a destroyer- 5 to 10 nautical miles,
- for a cargo ship- 3.5 to 7.5 nautical miles,
- for a convoy- up to 50 nautical miles.

In case of german hydrophones i've read even higher numbers.

Can someone be so kind to answer this question to me?

That said, supposing that RFB 2.0 is really struggling with sound detection being far below than reality, i've tried to isolate the files creating this weird behavior and start to analyze the situation against the same setup on stock and tmo.

Sensors_sub_US.dat
Sensors_sub_US.sim
Sensors_sub_US.zon

I've run one of the single missions (to have a similar behavior) and the first contact results was :

RFB original no contact
RFB + stock files greater than 18.500 km
RFB + TMO files greater than 15.500 km

(i've run the same test twice and the contact time was about the same)

So i guess i clearly found what files are causing this behavior (maybe just one of them or maybe all of them)

So now my request is to those modders like TorpX, would you be so kind to address me to the best way to analyze and mod those files? Since they are in binary and I don't know if there is already a tool to help modders to deal with them.


Thanks in advance

[xXNightEagleXx]

UPDATE: : Further reading lead me to the conclusion that RFB 2.0 sonar ranges are both right and wrong. In case of active sonar there isn't a noticeable mistake, but in case of passive sonar there are arguments that can be discussed (it seems that the values in rfb 2.0 are for detection and identification at worst conditions). Basically the range for passive are much greater than the 7 km when it is about detection, for target identification the range decreases but still greater. Unfortunately it doesn't seem that sh4 handles this distinct difference.


OLD STUFF:

Nobody answered me about how to edit dat files thus i found out by myself.

That said i see no mystery here on why sensors in RFB works badly, these are the real values :

stock - 15/20 km for hydro and 5 km for sonar
tmo - 10.5/15/16/21 km for hydro and 5k for sonar
rfb - 7/10 km for hydro and sonar 5k

My question is, are these rfb values replicating the reality? I mean currently according to rfb the hydro range not only is low but also had a slight improvement through the war.....is that so? (i mean historically speaking)

Obviously that file shows that i cannot simply overwrite with tmo or stock files, i should clearly work on the original rfb files, which i'll do. But first as i said i would like to have information about real life ww2 us subs hydro, sonar and radar performance.