Wolfpack Campaign: A journey through the U-boat War

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by PL_Andrev

Yeap, no open world.
To avoid boring time of "patrol time" for non-captain players the campaign is planned as set of scenarios. Each scenario will be randomly generated mission based at scenario conditions (available weapons, escort efficiency, wolfpack activity, "surprises" like Q-boats or HK groups).

It looks not so good in first view, but randomly generated missions have sense here (generally at Silent Hunter you met the contact and engine randomly decides what kind of ship / convoy it was). Not sure what happened if "captain" decides to avoid targets / escape mission.
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Proposed missionsHope the night surface attack will be more easy / safe / usefull than submerged attack how it is at Silent Hunter series...

Agreed, the night surface attack is a critical tactical element of U-boat warfare. In the early part of the war before British ships had good radar, the Aces would slip into a convoy on the surface and wreak havoc. Kretscmher was known for this, as was Mohr and others. The trick is to factor in weather, night, and distance into the detection model. I propose that you will have success in early war surface night attacks, but it will always be risky, because just like the real men who did this, you will never know for sure when you will be detected. And if you are detected 2000m away from a hard charging destroyer, you will have problems. In our game, with 4 players, where 3 of them are at the mercy of one player's command decisions...you see where there could be tension? It won't be a simple feat for 4 players to successfully complete a long historical campaign.

I am definitely thinking of adding an Iron Man option where if your crew is sunk, the campaign will end and you will only be able to start with a fresh campaign.

Originally Posted by tonyj

For open world could you not set a course, real life players go about their real daily routine, with automated crew picking up hydrophone/radar/radio contacts and then notify all real players via email/sms when contact made. The boat then shadows automatically from safe distance, players agree to come online at certain time to take over controls and then treat as normal scenario. Would be pretty exciting to know your boat is traveling in real time and not knowing what/when you would encounter the enemy. Also you can retreat and back into automated mode. Something like that anyway.

That's a very exciting concept. I like it, but it is too ambitious for our small team. Who knows, if this game is a smash success, I would love to shoot for the stars with a project like this

Originally Posted by Penguin

This brings me to the idea of some morale- or ethics-based decisions, similar to This War Of Mine.
It doesn't have to be as dramatic as civilian-saving missions inspired by the Laconia, but also smaller stuff, such as:
- Do you want to boost crew morale by playing enemy music while also risking to be scoulded by upper command?
- Do you want to risk to search an abandoned enemy ship for intelligence or even something trivial as fresh food? The latter could also boost crew morale, the former give you a better standing with your superiors, maybe resulting in better equipment or a more experienced crew-
- An enemy plane is sighted, you plan for a crash dive, however your rookie crewmember somehow is tangeled up his harness in the winter garden...

I think this could be a quite interesting addition and an additional immersion factor, especially in multiplayer, when 4 folks have to agree to a decision.

Hey, have you been peeking in my game journal?

Of course, with 4 human players, the radio player could put on a record, and his Captain may decide that is inappropriate, but who knows if that will affect morale of the real guys.... This War of Mine (great game, btw) has AI characters who are affected by events and actions. Our game is guys like you and me.

One thing I am sure that will affect morale of the real human players, is missions that are scripted, where everything happens the same way--same ships appear in the same place, going the same speed and course...I really want to eliminate that morale killer. Oscar assures me he can add a great deal of variability to ship placement, inclusion, and orders. That is really exciting. When you replay a mission, you will be in the same time period and the tech boundaries will remain the same (of course), but you will still be sailing into the unknown. You will have a reasonable chance of engaging the enemy (it will vary), but you will still need to locate him, determine what he is (convoy, single merchant, hunter/killer group, ???) and plot a smart intercept course to set up a firing solution.

Hey, don't laugh but we did decide that when the boat crash dives, the Captain MUST close the conning tower hatch or the boat will flood.

[Aktungbby]

Originally Posted by Onkel Neal

Hey, don't laugh but we did decide that when the boat crash dives, the Captain MUST close the conning tower hatch or the boat will flood.

OH I wonder where that came from! http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?p=2421625#post2421625

56. The Commander is personally responsible for opening and closing the conning tower hatch. After opening or closing the Commander notifies the boat: Commander: "Conning tower hatch is open or closed".

http://www.uboatarchive.net/Diving/DivingRegulations.htm

[PL_Andrev]

Originally Posted by Onkel Neal

Hey, don't laugh but we did decide that when the boat crash dives, the Captain MUST close the conning tower hatch or the boat will flood.

The closing hatch is good idea, but l'm not sure 'captain responsibily' is the best idea.
What happened if someone else is on the deck? What happened when mission is failed due engineer did not dive on time (because hatch was still opened)?

The better idea is flooding effect when open hatch is under water level (after that sub cannot be easy trimmed due additional weight of water inside) plus each player on the deck when sub is diving is kicked-off from mission.

[Sailor Steve]

A simple fact on the hatch question: What the Americans called the "Christmas Tree", due to US lights being red and green. On U-boats the portal lights are red and white, but the point is that there is a light for the conning tower hatch, as well as engine intake ports and some others, and the LI (Chief) will not give the order to dive until all the lights are white.

The Watch Duty Officer will always be the last man down, and he will close the hatch behind him. If the captain is on the bridge then he will take that responsibility.

One of the problems with SH5 was the requirement for the player to go down the hatch manually and close it behind him, which didn't always work properly. My solution for this would be a simple visual routine. When you click "Dive" or "Crash Dive" you would see the watch crew go down the hatch, then see yourself go down and see the hatch close behind you. No extra tasks to do what you would do automatically.