FAREWELL TO SILENT HUNTER

[ColonelSandersLite]

So, I watched RRs video and thought I could swing a fairly realistic test of TorpX's Improved Ship Physics for TMO.

I set up a convoy of 9 merchants in 3X3 formation with 3 escorts, spaced 700m apart (this is what tmo uses).

Results:
They had some trouble holding formation before they detected me.

I fired a torpedo in their general direction from 6000 yards or so to alert them, didn't hit anything but they did go evasive.

They never regained formation.

The wind wipped up a few hours after I surfaced and sank every enemy ship more effectively than I ever could. Some of those ships where pretty large.


I'm sorry TorpX, but that's not a mod I could recommend to anybody.

[merc4ulfate]

... and then there is reality.

"Task Force 38 (TF 38) had been operating about 300 mi (260 nmi; 480 km) east of Luzon in the Philippine Sea conducting air raids against Japanese airfields in the Philippines. The fleet was attempting to refuel its ships, especially the lighter destroyers, which had limited fuel carrying capacity. As the weather worsened it became increasingly difficult to refuel, and the attempts had to be discontinued. Despite warning signs of worsening conditions, the ships of the fleet remained in their stations. Worse, the information given to Halsey about the location and direction of the typhoon was inaccurate. On December 17, Admiral Halsey unwittingly sailed Third Fleet into the heart of the typhoon.

Because of 100 mph (87 kn; 160 km/h) winds, very high seas and torrential rain, three destroyers capsized and sank, and a total of 790 lives were lost. Nine other warships were damaged, and over 100 aircraft were wrecked or washed overboard; the aircraft carrier Monterey was forced to battle a serious fire that was caused by a plane hitting a bulkhead.

USS Tabberer—a small John C. Butler-class destroyer escort—lost her mast and radio antennas. Though damaged and unable to radio for help, she took the initiative to remain on the scene to recover 55 of the 93 total that were rescued. Captain Henry Lee Plage earned the Legion of Merit, while the entire crew earned the Navy's Unit Commendation Ribbon, which was presented to them by Admiral Halsey."

Typhoon Cobra



USS MADDOX - SURVIVED COBRA STRIKE



USS SATA FE ROLLS DURING TYPHOON COBRA


[BREAK]

"USS Truxtun (DD-229) and USS Pollux (AKS-2) ran aground during a storm in Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, and broke up in surf. 204 killed. 18 Feb. 1942.

USS Warrington (DD-383) sank during hurricane off Florida. 248 drowned. 13 Sep. 1944.

Task Force 38 struck by typhoon off the Philippines. Destroyers USS Hull (DD-350), USS Spence (DD-512), and USS Monaghan (DD-354) capsized and sank, at least 28 other vessels damaged. About 790 killed and 80 injured. 18 Dec. 1944.

Task Force 38 struck by typhoon in Okinawa area. 36 ships damaged. At least 6 killed and 4 injured. 5 Jun. 1945.

Typhoon passes within 15 miles of Okinawa, severely damaging ships in Buckner Bay anchorage. 12 small ships and landing craft sunk, 222 others beached. 36 killed, 47 missing, 100 seriously injured. 11 Oct. 1945."

US NAVY READING ROOM

[BREAK]

In reality storms at sea are nothing to trifle over. I was aboard a Mine Sweeper in rough seas during my time in the Navy and we had boards ripped off the sides by the wind and wave actions. Even some of the smallest Naval ships are more than sea worthy but in the right conditions and with a storm anything can happen.

In the above sites over 1,325 sailors lost their lives to weather. That is just on the side of the Americans. That is almost the same number of Marines and Army soldiers that died taking Peleliu Island in 1944.

The ships listed above especially those of Task Force 38 were built to handle the seas better than merchant shipping. They had to be because they had to withstand not only the wind and waves of nature but the shelling of the enemy. They still lost to the weather however.

ISP brings a weather related reality to the game that no other mod does. The ship physics and weather related conditions it creates are more realistic than you might think.

What is unrealistic is that I can take out the Musashi and Yamato with 6-8 fish when it took 19 fish and 17 bombs for the Musashi and 11 fish and 6 bombs on the Yamato.

Yes I know people want nice game play and to make it fun so putting things to hard can be a challenge for some, but to others there is more gamesmanship to the challenge so making it harder and more realistic is the well played game they choose.

[ColonelSandersLite]

This wasn't a typhoon. Just a windy day.

Further, just as an example, in typhoon cobra, 3 of about 50 destroyers where sunk. In that test, 3 of 3 where sunk. There's a world of difference between 6% and 100%. Especially when no storm is present.

Even ignoring that, I could not recommend the mod on the basis that convoys are unable to hold formation. Just no...

[TorpX]

Originally Posted by ColonelSandersLite

So, I watched RRs video and thought I could swing a fairly realistic test of TorpX's Improved Ship Physics for TMO.

.....

The wind wipped up a few hours after I surfaced and sank every enemy ship more effectively than I ever could. Some of those ships where pretty large.


I'm sorry TorpX, but that's not a mod I could recommend to anybody.

Ok, I understand it won't be everybody's cup of tea. I'll just give a quick rundown of the concepts and 'physics' involved.

Also, I must ask did you install and deploy the later 'patch' for the weather? In the patch, you get 2 scene.dat files. One is for 'normal' weather, it will produce what I would call rough, but not really stormy waves. The other is for stormy waves. The idea is that alternating use of these, gives you a more sensible variety of weather, instead of having mostly nice, or mostly bad.

In any case, the weather will be very bad at times. My view is that if winds are at the game's maximum, you shouldn't be able to conduct operations. You should be hanging on, hoping it will subside. Yes, ships will sink with the severest weather. The waves have to be pretty severe in order to have a meaningful effect on your boat. In RL, subs were slowed greatly by bad weather. I wanted to reproduce this.

I did not change the damage/structure of the ships, but did test them to make sure that they could survive 13 m/s winds for 24 hrs. This applies to all of the larger ships, anything like a DD or larger and most merchants. Small ships will be more vulnerable, of course.

I didn't do much in the way of battle testing convoys. I consider it likely they will break up, once shooting starts. But, wouldn't we expect this?

[Joe S]

I have been "playing" with subsims since Sub Battle Simulator, and I agree that it is hard to understand why the latest sub sims lack many of the features found in earlier programs. Sub Battle Simulator had the best overall gameplay, crappy graphics, no sound effects, but the best gameplay. Aces of the deep had the sound of depth charges in the water and a sound man who would announce "Wasserbomben"
SH 1, if I remember right, had the ability to write notes on the map. I do not have the time to list all of the useful features that are missing in SH 3 and 4 which were found in earlier products, but the list is quite lengthy, I assure you. It seems the trend with Sub Sims and flight sims is to put out a half-baked product with flashy graphics and then expect the consumer to either like it or finish it with mods. In the case of SH 3 and 4, you cannot even create mods to fix many of the shortcomings. SH 3 and 4 are good products with carefully selected mods, it just sucks that the consumer has to finish the product. Thank YOU to all the people who have created the mods to make these programs viable.
Joe S

[ColonelSandersLite]

Originally Posted by Joe S

SH 1, if I remember right, had the ability to write notes on the map.

Oh man, I would almost be willing to kill to get this ability in sh 3&4. Anyone who has seen my lp series knows that I'm always using the protractor tool to make notes on target speed and course and other important numbers like that. Without being able to actually label my numbers, I sometimes mix them up and forget what something was though. Not to mention that it's a pain in the ass to label course 325 when the protractor tool only goes up to 180.

One feature I remember from silent service that I miss is that the game would tell you times for sunrise and sunset along with visibility a report. Check out 5:15 to 5:30 here:

That being said, I do understand the reasons for the lack of features, but I'm not going to get into it right now.

[merc4ulfate]

"Anyone who has seen my lp series knows that I'm always using the protractor tool to make notes on target speed and course and other important numbers like that. Without being able to actually label my numbers"

I'd say use a pencil and paper.

By the way convoys hold formation with ISP. I have seen it with Task Force and with convoys and none ever break formation not even once. Since people frequently do not list their mods when commenting no one knows what is what with what people are saying.

Convoys do not break formation with ISP. If they flounder yes some ships will have to manuver around the sticken vessle. A normal maritime procedure and if you do not wish to die a very good procedure.

They will also break formation for one other cause.

DETECTING YOU!



Generic Mod Enabler - v2.6.0.157
1_TriggerMaru_Overhaul_2-5
1_TMO_25_small_patch
RSRDC_TMO_V502
RSRDC_V5xx_Patch1
Improved Ship Physics 2.6_TMO_RSRDC
FTMO_Visuals_for_RSRDC
GFJB_Navigation_Maps
HFJB Color Navigation Map
IGyoraitei
J11 New Ships + Yamato AA Fix by Miner1436
KShip pack 1
LSMALLER SEA PLANTS SMALL
MSMALLER SEABED ROCKS
N#5 Depthcharge Sound
O#2 Other Clouds
QAircraft_reflections
RHull_Numbers
STMO Smoke Mod
TTMO+RSRDC missions pack
UTABLE MAP 1,3
VClasse_Balao_CamoTri

[Rockin Robbins]

Originally Posted by ColonelSandersLite

So, I watched RRs video and thought I could swing a fairly realistic test of TorpX's Improved Ship Physics for TMO.

I set up a convoy of 9 merchants in 3X3 formation with 3 escorts, spaced 700m apart (this is what tmo uses).

Results:
They had some trouble holding formation before they detected me.

I fired a torpedo in their general direction from 6000 yards or so to alert them, didn't hit anything but they did go evasive.

They never regained formation.

The wind wipped up a few hours after I surfaced and sank every enemy ship more effectively than I ever could. Some of those ships where pretty large.


I'm sorry TorpX, but that's not a mod I could recommend to anybody.

Oops. Thanks for the test. I'll run one sometime soon. Sounds very similar to the other two. I still look forward to playing with it myself. Great job Colonel.

And not to be too hard on the modders. They didn't even think of convoy behavior when developing and testing their mods. It's just a perfect case of the law of unintended consequences: for every intended change there will be two unintended changes. One of them will be bad.

[BaronDeKalb]

cheers mate it's been kind of quiet in this simulation group for a while now.

[ColonelSandersLite]

@merc4ulfate
Pencil and paper is possible, but that's not the point. The idea is that all the tools you need to plot targets should actually be available in the game. Especially something so basic as being able to write.

The convoys *did* have trouble holding formation before they detected me. The result looked a lot like RRs video above in the portion before contact was made. I could make you a video to prove it, but frankly it's a lot of work and I'm busy with other stuff. Take my word for it or not, I don't actually care.

Further, I don't have a problem with them breaking formation on detection. That's fine. I do have a problem with the fact that they are completely unable to regain a cohesive formation afterwards.

The only conflicting mod listed in jsgme is TMO, which was loaded first and is meant to work together. All improved ship physics changes stood on their own merits with no conflicts.

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

It's just a perfect case of the law of unintended consequences: for every intended change there will be two unintended changes. One of them will be bad.

Exactly this. IMHO, attacking convoys is the second most interesting tactical scenario in the game. I would say that this particular area of the simulation is very critical. To that end, from my point of view, broken convoy behavior is a substantial problem and a deal breaker.

[20000 Leagues]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

Its atmosphere is incomparable, every feature of the game contributing as one to the emotional backdrop. SH4 just doesn't compare with the atmosphere of SH3. But it's a great game, I'd argue the best subsim ever made by just a shade over SH3. But who cares? If you don't own both you're missing something big.

I think that's the real reason I just can't get into SH4. The whole time I skippered U-boats I felt a certain realistic atmosphere. I loved my IXB, it was my boat, my crew and they were all that mattered. Knowing Germany was going to lose didn't matter and was never thought of. It was all about my boat and crew. I would even come to know almost every crew member on board. No small task on an IXB!

Every mission started in port so I could stand on the bridge as we sailed out to sea, wondering if I'd see port again. Then there was the immense relief as I stood on the bridge sailing into port after a (usually) hard patrol. Sometimes we sailed in happy and the boat in mint condition. Other times I had dead on board and the boat was so battered going to periscope depth would've killed us.

SH3 stumbled onto an intangible atmosphere that hasn't (to my knowledge) been duplicated. Although SH4 is a great game, I just can't get that same immersive feeling.

[Rockin Robbins]

Originally Posted by 20000 Leagues

I think that's the real reason I just can't get into SH4. The whole time I skippered U-boats I felt a certain realistic atmosphere. I loved my IXB, it was my boat, my crew and they were all that mattered. Knowing Germany was going to lose didn't matter and was never thought of. It was all about my boat and crew. I would even come to know almost every crew member on board. No small task on an IXB!

Every mission started in port so I could stand on the bridge as we sailed out to sea, wondering if I'd see port again. Then there was the immense relief as I stood on the bridge sailing into port after a (usually) hard patrol. Sometimes we sailed in happy and the boat in mint condition. Other times I had dead on board and the boat was so battered going to periscope depth would've killed us.

SH3 stumbled onto an intangible atmosphere that hasn't (to my knowledge) been duplicated. Although SH4 is a great game, I just can't get that same immersive feeling.

Brotherhood is forged in shared tribulation.

[TorpX]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

Okay all and Webster, I've reshot the test of Webster's Ship Maneuvering Fix and this is as incorporated into GFO. The short story is that formations didn't stay together when I wasn't detected but convoy behavior after contact was exemplary. , meant to duplicate the one on Jrex's mod as closely as possible.

Please keep in mind that this is probably NOT something either modder had in mind when making the mod. Webster, any thoughts?

I just viewed the videos in the links.

While I enjoyed the drama, I wouldn't consider either a fair test of a physics mod.

I'll explain what I mean. First off, we only see the convoys for moments before the action starts. This simply isn't enough time for any judgments to be made. I could be wrong, but it seemed to me that detection occurred very early on, with the sub either being sighted on surface or heard as it dove. Alarms sounded and a few ships started to turn.

Of course, when you start shooting, the convoy gets messy, but this doesn't tell us much we don't already know. There was no attempt made to observe a post attack phase, so we have no idea whether they would rally or split up.

Where were the escorts? The DD's looked to be 'in convoy' rather than escorting the convoy.







If there is a genuine desire to test convoys for this purpose (i.e. convoy station keeping), one needs to observe them for a period of time (perhaps in bad weather), without hostile detection.

Using a stock convoy as a control might be worthwhile.

Then, to test their reactions to attack, I would suggest a surprise torpedo salvo. It would probably be good if only one or two torps are fired to hit. We could then observe evasion and see what the turning, acceleration, deceleration looked like. I wouldn't rely too much on one test, though. It is unlikely you would always see the same results.

After the attack, there should be a fair period of observation (without further attacks) to see rally behavior. This should probably be at least 30 or 45 minutes. I don't see how you could tell much with less than that.


I agree about the mods not being designed with convoys in mind. In fact, if they are judged as precision convoy mods, no physics mod is likely to come out well. The ships are way too maneuverable in stock form, so any realistic physics mod will inevitably "handicap" them to some degree. Saying we want realistic ships physics, and elegant and tight convoys, makes no sense. RL ships would have to fall out or fall behind when bad weather hampered them, propulsion failed, or they suffered attack.



I made a few tests with ISP convoys, where I followed them for 24 hrs. game time, at 32x, pausing now and them to look over the convoy. I had to be on the surface, of course. I set the date to 1940, so I was not hostile, and could follow them closely. The weather was what I would say was at the threshold of being 'severe'. The convoy was about a dozen ships; a good representative sample of merchants, or capitol ships and escorts. They all could maintain station and propulsion, except the small minesweeper, which fell behind after some hours.

There were no collisions or inexplicable behavior. The IJN DD's did seem to nose around me and go wander about (as we would expect escorts to do). One did come very close and almost hit me. I kept the sub on it's predetermined course, and the escort had to reverse engines to keep from plowing into me. Keep in mind that the weather was rough, and this hampered both them and us. I didn't test the convoys turning ability, this was only to test sea-keeping.

[Rockin Robbins]

Originally Posted by TorpX

I just viewed the videos in the links.

While I enjoyed the drama, I wouldn't consider either a fair test of a physics mod.

I'll explain what I mean. First off, we only see the convoys for moments before the action starts. This simply isn't enough time for any judgments to be made. I could be wrong, but it seemed to me that detection occurred very early on, with the sub either being sighted on surface or heard as it dove. Alarms sounded and a few ships started to turn.

Of course, when you start shooting, the convoy gets messy, but this doesn't tell us much we don't already know. There was no attempt made to observe a post attack phase, so we have no idea whether they would rally or split up.

Where were the escorts? The DD's looked to be 'in convoy' rather than escorting the convoy.

I should have explained. This is a mission, Rockin Robbins Convoy from Hell. That formation spawned in place seconds before we see it and is starting to fall apart by the time we can fly a camera to it. We can't observe it before that time because it didn't exist then. It spawns in perfict alignment.

It would be a decent project to observe it for an hour while it was undetected but the pattern is there. Alignment deteriorates immediately with either of the mods I tested.

Now this is a convoy of armed merchants accompanied by one Asashio DD and a river gunboat. If you play with them you'll find out that the DD and gunboat are not your biggest problem, it's deadeye merchant gunners that will get you usually. The Asashio and gunboat start out at the rear of the convoy.

If there is a genuine desire to test convoys for this purpose (i.e. convoy station keeping), one needs to observe them for a period of time (perhaps in bad weather), without hostile detection.

Using a stock convoy as a control might be worthwhile.

Let's do it, with the proviso that none of the physics mods were developed with convoy behavior being one of the effects even dreamed of at the time. I'm sure nobody said "Let's make ships accelerate slower and while we're at it we'll test convoy behavior." I just found it out by accident and thought it was interesting. Then I thought what the ramifications would be.

I propose we make up a more conventional convoy with two colums, three rows of merchies, DDs ahead, behind and two abreast of the convoy. Then we do the tests you propose, undetected behavior for an hour. Should be interesting and I'll start with stock ships.

Then, to test their reactions to attack, I would suggest a surprise torpedo salvo. It would probably be good if only one or two torps are fired to hit. We could then observe evasion and see what the turning, acceleration, deceleration looked like. I wouldn't rely too much on one test, though. It is unlikely you would always see the same results.

After the attack, there should be a fair period of observation (without further attacks) to see rally behavior. This should probably be at least 30 or 45 minutes. I don't see how you could tell much with less than that.

Sounds like a battle plan to me! I propose dividing it into two tests, one purely for undetected convoy behavior and another for launching a couple torpedoes and watching the convoy, both tests to last one hour.

I agree about the mods not being designed with convoys in mind. In fact, if they are judged as precision convoy mods, no physics mod is likely to come out well. The ships are way too maneuverable in stock form, so any realistic physics mod will inevitably "handicap" them to some degree. Saying we want realistic ships physics, and elegant and tight convoys, makes no sense. RL ships would have to fall out or fall behind when bad weather hampered them, propulsion failed, or they suffered attack.



I made a few tests with ISP convoys, where I followed them for 24 hrs. game time, at 32x, pausing now and them to look over the convoy. I had to be on the surface, of course. I set the date to 1940, so I was not hostile, and could follow them closely. The weather was what I would say was at the threshold of being 'severe'. The convoy was about a dozen ships; a good representative sample of merchants, or capitol ships and escorts. They all could maintain station and propulsion, except the small minesweeper, which fell behind after some hours.

There were no collisions or inexplicable behavior. The IJN DD's did seem to nose around me and go wander about (as we would expect escorts to do). One did come very close and almost hit me. I kept the sub on it's predetermined course, and the escort had to reverse engines to keep from plowing into me. Keep in mind that the weather was rough, and this hampered both them and us. I didn't test the convoys turning ability, this was only to test sea-keeping.

And I agree. There will be a point where we have to say "that's all we can do" and be satisfied with the balance we can achieve. It won't be perfect. I personally would say that acceleration is a more important problem to solve than strict position keeping in a convoy.

Still, it's a fun test and gives us something to keep us off the streets.

[TCD]

I've just started last week SHIV v1.4.

Look's really cool to me.

To avoid unending and boring transits across the Pacific ocean, don't be based in places like Pearl-Harbor. Start at Manila (Philippine) then relocate to asiatic fleet.

I love sailing in those south-east Asia seas. Having so much islands and shallow waters is just exciting and challenging. Moreover, you got plenty of japs airfields around and a lot of animation and action, along your missions to fullfil.

When I want oceanic Submarine game play, I go to the battle of Atlantic on my SHIII U-boat (I will soon experiment SHV to see how it's looking).

And US WWII subs are so highly developed (lots of torpedoes, cool efficient air and radar systems to be used from the start of the war in 1941, decoys etc...!) with lots of upgrades during the war that it compensates their huge sizes and consequently their very slow diving speed.

And to finish, at any time, when you have completed an obligatory mission the HQ send you (or just simply your initial start patrol mission), DO NOT send a "statut report" radio message, otherwhise the HQ will send you a new mission (sometime cool, sometine boring because, for instance, it's located on the other side of the Pacific). So you can from now on just live your life with your sub and do a lots of your own cool stuff. SHIV is so detailed that it looks to me they're hundreds of cool stuff to do. I've already tons of ideas .

An when you want, just return to your Submarine base and dock in, medals, promotions, upgrades stuff, to get a new patrol and carry on with your cool SHIV Submarine commander career.