GWX questions

[Bosje]

Hello, gang

I got killed and was determined to adhere to DiD so I thought this might be a good time to try running GWX 2.0

my computer seems to manage just fine and I have been checking it out all night, what a glorious piece of work!

First of all: I prostrate myself humbly before the team, you are gods
second: I have some questions (after reading almost the entire manual)

-what is that round rotating antenna on the bridge doing? is that the radio?
-is it even at all possible to complete the academy exams in gwx? (mainly the gunnery exam)
-I find the observation scope kind of annoying, right in my view as I try to communicate with my LI and as I want to climb through the hatch to the radio room. do you guys advise using shiftF2 while the boat is rocking about or while depthcharged or is that prone to game instability?
-Is there a tutorial for learning to interpret hydrophone noises correctly? would be good to be able to hear some examples of merchants moving away and closing, slowing down and speeding up, warships dito, biologicals, torpedoes etc.

[danlisa]

1) That's the RDF (Radio Direction Finder) Loop.
2) Possible, but hard, esp the Flak exam. It can be done though. It's not a requirement to complete them.
3) Shift+F2 (or free cam) will work and no known issues exist to date. Just don't go out of bounds.
4) GWX Hydropone sounds are distinctive. You'll know them when you hear them. There is no current GWX sound tutorial however, the easiest way is to determine the differences while in game. You only need to worry about the difference between Warships & Merchants, the rest are very easy to classify.

[Bosje]

thanks

ok so i have a radio detection finder in 1939...
will that give me bearings on radio messages like sss etc from nearby contacts?

oh and I received several SSS radio messages from steamships (SS rights?) with lat/long specifications, my old atlas tells me those coordinates should be somewhere in the Bay of Biscay. are those ships actually there under attack? hmmm no wait its more fun to find that out for myself

final question at this time: i have my torpedo crew sorted in 2 shifts of 6 men each, one shift in the bow room, the other in the bow quarters. why are they now all completely exhausted??? will it help if i use left/right click to just put 'on duty' torps in the unused motor room while cruising to minimise fatigue? the manual hinted at that but i'd like to think they have some maintenance and greasing to do while we are merrily sailing to the horizon

greets,
bosje

(7th day at sea in GWX and I just want to say again that I absolutely love what you guys have done, completely different game (hence a lot of questions))

[Graf Paper]

My two cents...

For the Flak and Gunnery exams, you can simply let the qualified officers man those stations for you. Their aim and eyesight tends to be better than yours, for some reason. This leaves you free to maneuver the u-boat out of harm's way from the airplanes in the Flak Exam

You'll earn a score of "Excellent" every time.

Some talented soul did indeed create a standalone Hydrophone Trainer. I do not recall if it is compatible with the propeller sounds in GWX, but it was on a spanish-speaking SH3 website. I'll see if I can dig it out of my folders and upload it to my FileFront account for you.

Welcome aboard the GWX 2 flotilla, Bosje!

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Bosje

ok so i have a radio detection finder in 1939...
will that give me bearings on radio messages like sss etc from nearby contacts?

No, and no. The antenna is there in the stock game, it's just retracted into its housing. The GWX team activated the antenna, but it just looks cool; there's nothing there to pick up.

oh and I received several SSS radio messages from steamships (SS rights?) with lat/long specifications, my old atlas tells me those coordinates should be somewhere in the Bay of Biscay. are those ships actually there under attack? hmmm no wait its more fun to find that out for myself

Here is a link to a quick and easy converter that will tell you precisely where the messages are from:
http://files.filefront.com/MQK+Conve.../fileinfo.html

I'd love to tell you whether they're there or not, but you asked us not to.

final question at this time: i have my torpedo crew sorted in 2 shifts of 6 men each, one shift in the bow room, the other in the bow quarters. why are they now all completely exhausted??? will it help if i use left/right click to just put 'on duty' torps in the unused motor room while cruising to minimise fatigue? the manual hinted at that but i'd like to think they have some maintenance and greasing to do while we are merrily sailing to the horizon

Even in the stock game, there are no bunks in the torpedo room. These are represented by the forward crew bunks, but of course there aren't enough. Yes, putting them in the empty engine room will help.

[Bosje]

ok cheers

the manual said i need to tell the gun crew to load HE first time they man the gun but in the exam they just started firing. also in the exam, i have no gunners on the crew and they insisted on hitting the hull, in blatent disregard of my specific order to aim below the waterline. After half an hour of watching ships sailing merrily away while they were being peppered without visible results other than fires and exploding bits of ship, i could no longer be bothered but then I found I had 1500 renown at the start of my career anyway so what the hell

also i notice an important difference with stock: kleine fahrt voraus puts the rpm under 100 but gives a speed of 2 kts. in stock i had to set speed at 1 to get rpm under 100 and thus being unheard by listening DDs. the simple 'z + 1' will now make as quiet as can be, short of completely shutting off the engines?

[Laufen zum Ziel]

You can find Canovaro's Hydrophone tutorial at the below link under "Canovaros Document Collection" index + a lot of other SHIII (GWX) good stuff.



http://silent-hunter-addict.com

[Bosje]

that kept me off the streets for a bit, excellent!

i dont suppose i can run on electrics while surfaced, right?

[Umfuld]

Originally Posted by Bosje

the simple 'z + 1' will now make as quiet as can be, short of completely shutting off the engines?

Actually just 'z'. It will set you at 1 by itself

[Bosje]

so it does

i once got picked up by a frigate in the stock version for going TO silent mode, as i was running at 1 knots and going to silent running made it go to langsame fahrt, thus stopping the torpedo loading etc but instead putting me over 100 rpm

my basic question was: schleichfahrt in GWX will make me as silent as can be, including keeping her under 100rpm (which gives me 2 kts)

correct?

[Brag]

In the game no electric motors available when surfaced

[Umfuld]

Bosje, GW does make it so 1 (slow) on electric power will be under 100RPM.

Not sure what you mean by schleichfahrt, been awhile since I used the German speech setting.

[Gezoes]

The same m8, z a.k.a. silent running.

I think it literally means 'crawling and/or sneaking speed' :hmm:

[Bosje]

yeah there is no direct translation which covers the semantics exactly but the basic meaning is 'sneak, steal, slink, slip' that kind of thing, with a heavy connotation of being stealthy, secret and likely illegal

but thats a bit too much, lol

sneak speed, then

[Bosje]

Hey people,

sorry to bother you again but I have an issue and I can't find the details in the manuals, on this forum or in the The Submarine Commander's Handbook, so here it goes.

I'm trying to run my crew somewhat close to historically accurate

All I know (or at least seem to have deducted) is what I've seen in Das Boot, really.
-1.WO calls the TDC settings from the Uzo, calling out target speed and distance etc when they finish off that burning tanker from the surface (weapons officer below in the control room actually setting the values into the TDC?)
-LI is the one who takes care of fixing the boat when they are in serious trouble
-Always the same guys at the helm controls?

so,given what you can do and what you have to do in the game, that leaves me with a couple of questions:

1) Is the 1.WO usually the most senior officer after the Kaleun? And is he the one who should be the ship ID and solution when you have 'weapon officer assistance'?
2) Who is the officer most qualified to have torpedo specs, 'the officer in charge of the house of lords' when there is some work to do there?
3) Did they have an officer in the engine rooms, in charge of the machines? (in game, the officer with machinist specs who can greatly improve efficiency there)
4) Did the navigator have any other duties?
5) Who is the 2.WO and what are his duties? And how did they rotate the watchcrews?

6) Did any Kaleun EVER reload torpedoes during an attack? (great tactic which I picked up from the forums, launch 2-4 eels from range, get closer while reloading and get off 2 more from inside the convoy in the next 15 minutes while the escorts search the original launch spot. This works well in game but seems horribly unrealistic)

Everyone will agree, as the handbook also states, that having an efficient lookout is vital, so you always need an officer of the watch and a fresh watchcrew. how did they sort this out? Would EVERY officer spend some time on the bridge or was the LI never ever out there, for example?

I know it may be a bit fussy, most of you may say something like 'whatever works for your playing style' but I like to get immersed and do things realistically. (apart from doing the solutions manually in difficult conditions with multiple targets, I'm mathematically challenged )

My current system:
Surface attack -1.WO on the bridge, me on the Uzo, weapons officer below doing solutions. LI at helm, navigator on duty, machinist in engine room. If we get damage, the LI joins the damage control and the machinist takes over at the bridge. weapons officer joins reloading crew and as we have now dived, the 1.WO does the solutions for any subsequent attacks. This works well but I don't like doing it, if you catch my drift.

I assume they would only start reloading long after the enemy was out of range, thus making that a job for the weapons officer who no longer has a job. Historic gameplay means launch 5 torpedoes and getting out of there, right?

Any thoughts?

thanks and greetings,
Bosje