Real Nav: Dealing with Navigator's faulty estimates

[Drakken]

Bear in mind, I am still a newbie with Real Navigation in TWOS. For now, I use Automation. I understand that there are error margins when the Navigator makes its Dead Reckoning or Celestial readings. However, even when I am on calm seas and the heading is constant, the results can vary wildly and, sometimes, cannot be right at all.

So how do experienced Kaleuns deal with it (without going into the files and removing any risk factor to 0)? What I do for now is:

a) If a Celestial reading is wildly off the route I had charted and I have time, I order the Navigator to make a new Celestial reading.
b) However, it's gonna take another 40-60 minutes. If I do not have the time, I ask for Dead Reckoning instead.
c) If slightly off but remains within the general area of my charted route, I go with it and consider he might be right until proven otherwise. So I'll make the slight course correction.

Eventually I'll become comfortable enough to attempt to do some readings myself... but I am not there just yet.

[bstanko6]

I use my stop watch and do my own dead reckoning along with the navigator for several points to compare. I then record the wild readings to get a general average so I can make hypothetical corrections on the fly.

[les green01]

thing is he suppose to be a retread from ww1 and serve on merchants has a navigator suppose to be excellent but can't find the mens room if sign pointed the way if a reading seem off to me have him redo it and lso check it for myself no more 500 miles off course and end up slamming into land for me

[Drakken]

Originally Posted by les green01

thing is he suppose to be a retread from ww1 and serve on merchants has a navigator suppose to be excellent but can't find the mens room if sign pointed the way if a reading seem off to me have him redo it and lso check it for myself no more 500 miles off course and end up slamming into land for me

However, we as players were spoiled for a long time; past SH games always gave us a 21st-century GPS-perfect position. Real Navigation removes that certainty. It takes a while to accept that, unless you have visible landmarks as reference points, any and all readings in the middle of a body of water have a margin of error and are, at best, informed guestimates.

That is why I tend to go with what the Navigator gives me unless it is patently obvious his readings are erroneous. In theory my calculations tell me I should be there, but boats drift even when going on a straight course and constant speed for a long time. As long as I do not find myself in the Bermuda Triangle but in the vicinity of where I calculated I should be, this would be good.