have all contact reports made solely by U-boats..?

[sergbuto]

CB,

Note that this way of scripting (as in Col's example) can be used for the campign SCR layer. The RND layer scripting is different in style.

[CB..]

Originally Posted by sergbuto

CB,

Note that this way of scripting (as in Col's example) can be used for the campign SCR layer. The RND layer scripting is different in style.

Cheers Serg' i think i'll just add on to the end of the stock convoys in the RND like this

[RndGroup 1720.RndUnit 2]
Name=Type VIIA#1
Class=SSTypeVIIA
Type=200
Origin=German
Side=2
Commander=0
CargoExt=-1
CargoInt=-1
CfgDate=19390101
No=2
Escort=false
SpawnProbability=10
CrewRating=4

[CB..]

here's the sort of information that can be built up over the length of a patrol by noting the reports from the subs as they come in---sadly i couldn't re-locate that convoy --so it slipped by --i'm running into bother with the coastal DD's and am low on fuel so no luck this patrol--




more subs more information --all very "high brow" stuff--apparantly

this can simulate the increase/decrease in u-boot activity as the war progressed--the move to france etc--
and makes finding a lone merchant a more worth-while event especaily if you haven't located a convoy--

there are plenty of ways to ease the difficulty of this--allowing very rare contact reports from the convoys them selves (the red squares) would instantly show you which sub was closest to a convoy and allow you to choose that route to concentrate on--

tho most times where ever you see a sub report icon--a convoy will not be far away--travelling the same or very similar route (some of this is random of course as per normal) and at much the same speed--both sub and convoy having spawned into the game at more or less the same time---so it's not as scary as it sounds--and of course gets easier as you adapt to it--
a very VERY nice feel can be built up and the balance/difficulty/realism/gameplay is completely customisable to the individuals preferences--

one of things which i have added to my own game is air-support for the convoy escorts----so if i start to get hammered by air attacks more frequently than usual then i know a convoy is probably close by---another sort of realism again-aircraft would have covered the convoy routes specifically--rather than randomly

adding lone merchants use-ing the same method along the convoy routes- would simulate merchants who broke away from the convoy--either due to engine problems or getting nervous--and then finding a lone merchant might very well mean you are close to a convoy---another genuine head scratching moment--same with serg's life boats (as mentioned before- i dunno if the life boats work ok serg'?)
by reducing the number and frequency of the normal lone merchants this would add depth to finding one- especailly if it coincided with a sub report and was on a similar route--and so on--endless really--

genuine u-boot commander brain aches!!--or at least summat like 'em--

you could if you wanted too write a campaign with far less shipping than stock even (never mind the super mod campaigns) but with more depth when it came to the actual coal-face of gameplay--that's my thought anyway--and why i still more than satisfied with the stock number of convoys..this something i would consider releasing if i can work it thru--if as some folks have said they have more than one SH3 installation on their PC's then this version might hold some appeal to enough people to make it worth writting up as a seperate alternative mod--

[Myxale]

****!
I makes my heart beat faster thinkin' of those possibilities.

[Stiebler]

As an experiment, I added one AI U-boat to the HX and SC convoys crossing the North Atlantic in 1940. This was in the NYGM TW 2.0 campaign_RND.mis file.

It is evident from the structure of the _RND files that the AI U-boats cannot make radio reports at all; it is the convoy as a whole that makes them. This was seen in practice, so no benefit in that respect at all. Neither can the speed of the AI sub be set. It has to keep up with the convoy.

After attacking these convoys with 'god's-eye view' enabled, it was evident each time (three attacks/three convoys) that there had been some pretty serious action behind each convoy. I never did get to see the AI sub (presumably sunk each time before I reached it), but one or two of the escorts showed battle damage each time, something I have never seen before when closing with a convoy. On one occasion, two escorts had suffered such damage that they could not keep up with the convoy, which was then making 10 kts. This meant that the convoy was virtually unguarded.

This will be less of a problem with later convoys, with larger escorts. I'm undecided about the benefit of this - maybe other people will have views.

However, if the idea is to provide U-boat radio messages on the map, it will be necessary to add them to the campaign_SCR.mis file on fixed paths that criss-cross the convoy routes and hope that convoys and AI U-boats reach the same spot at the same time. Even then, you will get only very rare reports (since intersections will be rare), which is unlikely to replace the more frequent radio reports from the convoy. These can be made as frequent as you wish, in the _RND.mis file.

What happened to the weather mod, by the way?

Stiebler.

[sergbuto]

Originally Posted by Stiebler

It is evident from the structure of the _RND files that the AI U-boats cannot make radio reports at all; it is the convoy as a whole that makes them. This was seen in practice, so no benefit in that respect at all. Neither can the speed of the AI sub be set. It has to keep up with the convoy.

I guess CB.. can answer that since he was experimenting. But one can think of some tricks, such as f.e. having German AI U-boat as a leading vessel of the Allied convoy in the RND layer, which should produce contact reports with the blue sub icon.

Originally Posted by Stiebler

After attacking these convoys with 'god's-eye view' enabled, it was evident each time (three attacks/three convoys) that there had been some pretty serious action behind each convoy. I never did get to see the AI sub (presumably sunk each time before I reached it), but one or two of the escorts showed battle damage each time, something I have never seen before when closing with a convoy. On one occasion, two escorts had suffered such damage that they could not keep up with the convoy, which was then making 10 kts. This meant that the convoy was virtually unguarded.

The action and its result will greatly depend on where the AI sub will be positioned in the convoy. I would guess, the effect will be the greatest for the sub being in the middle column and a bit more towards the front of the convoy. When the convoy is 3D-rendered, the speed of the sub will be about 3 knots slower than the speed of the convoy (I did not find out the reason why SH3 does that for my AI subs). For fast convoys the speed difference might be even greater due to limited submerged speed of the sub. The slower sub should introduce some sort of khaos in the convoy order due to ship-collision-avoidance routine and at the same time attack the ships directly in front of the sub.

EDIT: it is also necessary to make sure that the right SIM or EQP file is used for the AI-sub to attack (see the wolfpack-mod thread).

[CB..]

Originally Posted by Stiebler

As an experiment, I added one AI U-boat to the HX and SC convoys crossing the North Atlantic in 1940. This was in the NYGM TW 2.0 campaign_RND.mis file.

It is evident from the structure of the _RND files that the AI U-boats cannot make radio reports at all; it is the convoy as a whole that makes them. This was seen in practice, so no benefit in that respect at all. Neither can the speed of the AI sub be set. It has to keep up with the convoy.

read the thread please --the subs attached to the convoys are NOT there to make contact reports ---thought that would have been pretty obvious --- it's this sort of useless back and forth that makes modding such a pain in the back side--the reason why you implemented it incorrectly is best left to your own judgement--granted doing it properly is a lot of work so perhaps it is understandable why you didn't do the job as illustrated in the thread--sides who cares? this is the modding forum..or at least it used to be ..i'm not entirely sure what it is now...a shop window i dunno...?

these cows are small ..those cows are far away..

what you are doing is the modding eqiuvilent of "heckling"..

sigh i'm not wasting my breath with that stuff any more--getting too old..your now on my ever growing ignore list..

[CB..]

step 1/ Serg's U-Boots help you build up your intelligence regarding current convoy routes--




step two/ be patient and patrol your chosen route ...and wait




step three...my Flottilla buddys have been attacking this convoy all night-





...

Thanks Serg' and Col7777...

[Stiebler]

I tried Sergbuto's suggestion of making the lead ship of a convoy instead an AI U-boat (actually convoy HX41; two convoy attacks, excluding attempts foiled by thick fog).

This indeed caused position reports on the map to be shown as blue (for German), but using the player's submarine icon (in my case, the default SH3 circle). The familiar square red marker had been temporarily replaced.

When my U-boat was close enough to force 3-D rendering of the convoy, in less than a minute (real time, at 128x tc) the blue circle was replaced with the square red convoy marker. Presumably this meant that the AI U-boat had been sunk.

Arriving closer with my U-boat (god's eye turned on), it became apparent that the front of the convoy was in slight disarray (as postulated by Sergbuto), and the escorts were again behind the convoy. One or more of the merchant ships had suffered damage, with flames/smoke on the merchants seen from the U-boat. However, again it was rather easy easy to attack the convoys, with the escorts departed from the convoy front.

This is certainly an interesting result, and it is not unrealistic for a U-boat to find a convoy temporarily unprotected while the escorts chase a different U-boat. I think this is probably worth following up as a permanent addition for convoys between July 1942 and May 1943.

It also proves that convoys do not attack enemy ships within their ranks until rendered in 3-D. This has often been stated, including in this thread, but I prefer proof to hearsay.

Stiebler.

[sergbuto]

Originally Posted by CB..

step three...my Flottilla buddys have been attacking this convoy all night-

How did you do that?

[sergbuto]

Originally Posted by Stiebler

it is not unrealistic for a U-boat to find a convoy temporarily unprotected while the escorts chase a different U-boat.

The main idea behind the wolfpack creation/operation was getting rid of escorts which would go after one U-boat while other U-boats would attack unprotected convoy.

Extending CB's idea, one can have a wolfpack in the RND layer using convoy's waypoints in reverse order so that the wolfpack starts in Europe and moves towards the convoy until they meet each other half way or so. A player can be informed by means of some message about the start of the wolfpack operation and can keep an eye on the wolpack route due to contact reports. If the player decides to joint the wolfpack on its way to the convoy, he would not see wolfpack's subs because they are realisticaly submerged during daytime and not much can be seen at night anyway.

[CB..]

Originally Posted by sergbuto

How did you do that?

he he!! was using my imagination a bit there--tho when i reached the convoy at least 5 ships had been damaged and were on fire (none had sunk tho) so it must have been a bit of a fight--i think the convoy had lost perhaps two escorts in the fight--

i suppose the actual battle didn't last more than 15 minutes real time tho i dunno it all happened before it got there--got to enjoy your self a bit with this stuff tho or what's the point!


course this has another side effect --it might mean that the escorts are in alert mode when you start your attack which makes up for some of the damage or loss they suffer during the wolf pack attack---i have added extra escorts to all my convoys so even the loss of two or three doesn't leave the convoy undefended--

this is with the two subs placed at the rear of the convoy--allowing them to fire immediately on the ships in front of them as it goes live--you could disadvantage them and give the escorts a better chance at them by positioning them as escort=true..which would place them at a distance from the convoy--you might be able to have more susb this way and the possibility of one or two being still active when you reach the convoy (if your quick)...

like the idea of having the wolfpack start at opposite ends of the convoy route and working out where the convoy and pack might meet--as you say you could then choose to rendevous with them on route and actually get involved in the wolfpack your self--all attacking at once--

lots of quite complex ways to use this--be nice to stumble across an AI sub attacking a lone merchant--sooner or later with them prowling the shipping lanes this is going to happen ---

the previous patrol i found the convoy -and the subs i think had lagged behind and were still being attacked by a couple of escorts--right on the horizon i could see star shells being launched tho i couldn't see the subs on the ship camera----no convoy vessels had been damaged -- so it is fairly unpredictable--- once you start to add the subs the whole thing begins to take on a life of it's own--which i like --

playing with the probability ratios for inclusion in the convoys--numbers and frequency of contact reports etc etc allows for a nice balance to be built up--tho getting it "just so" would take a lot of practice--

you could edit all the patrol zone allocations to co-incide with your wolfpack routes to provide the correct set up for the patrols--

i'm only using three shadowing subs one one each of the most regular cross atlantic routes and one on the med route and the map is crammed full of information--- cover all 8 or 9 of the main routes and a few of the lone merchant routes and pretty soon you have a map that is alive with genuine feedback from german subs--the potentail is endless--

[gouldjg]

CB,

I love the fact that there may be a more alert DD/DE as a side effect. I can imagine when people start to use Long repair times and then hit one of these convoys knowing that the DD/DE are peed off already, some may just chicken out :rotfl: tucking their tails between their legs.

The D.I.D. players will surely have to think twice.

It seems like there is a lot of new stuff being found lately and new methods of exploiting the existing game.

It is all starting to look very promising.

Thanks for putting the hours in on this

Now here is a quicky question for you or serb,

Is there anyway to get a short timed decoys/anumbolds attached to the front or sides of other convoys that is set to just awaken the DD/DE a little as they come into 3d view and it makes the DD look like they are thinking instead of just plodding along.

They only need to last long enough to wake them into seeking mode.

A mixture of the two will just be fantastic if possible.

[CB..]

i reckon it might be possible to have something launch a bold but bit technical getting that to work--i dont know if serg could replace the gun on some of the wolfpack subs with a bold launcher--that would be interesting if do-able--then the subs might create lots of unpredictable scenarios--or use a couple of wolfpack subs with no weapons on them and low hit points so they can easily be sunk--just to wake the escorts up

in the patrol i showed in the screenshots the escorts had their search lights on when i arrived so even as t is is it works well--you'd never know during the day time of course so you would be very un certain as to what sort of situation you were walking into--
i like the idea of a wolfpack sub that launches a bold especailly if a special bold can be made with a 15 minute life span--

[gouldjg]

It is too technical for me but I just thought of it as a option for other convoys that are not wolfpacked.

Maybe its a no no or infact there is a easier method with similar results is right under our noses. I just thought I would throw an idea in.

I have 0% experience of editing convoys etc so I will leave that to the pro's. What I do know is that a alert DD is far harder to slip past than a docile DD.

Just reading your thread and the idea of subs with no weapons and low hitpoints would probably produce the same result