Banned
In Multiplay playing online with Teamspeak Is Fun,
I say let the players decide,be it a Clan,Flotilla,Or Whatever they decide,
Most of all We can make make Silent Hunter A Community For All to Enjoy Online,
Wolfpacks,Multiplayer,Its All Fun,
Together We have Fun,
Online,Fun Is No 1,
& Will Sell SH5 Multiplay Worldwide.
Senior Member
Glad to see eveyone is in agreement, don't think I've ever seen such a one sided pole.
I remember in Aces of the Dep, the excitement I felt when i first saw other uboats on the map,(big strain on TC though) and when i saw destroyers tackling them, chasing them in the distance.
I also enjoyed the 'shadow and report the convoys direction' role in silen hunter 2, although there were no other subs, so it made it kind of pointless. Radio contact,and LOTS of it is vital, it was also one of the main weaknessess of the uboats.
I have no problem if they steal my kill
Banned
I agree: ....As long as that Radio traffic is to and from the B.d.U.; ......Which is the only historically supportable scenario.Radio contact,and LOTS of it is vital, it was also one of the main weaknessess of the uboats.
Realistic radio traffic to and from the B.d.U. regarding the gathering and co-ordination of a "Convoy Intercept" would increase the "Immersion Factor" immensely!
....But on the other hand, creating a game environment where there is extensive tactical level radio communications between individual boats would create a historically unsupportable "Fantasy World": .....And I would have NO interest in participating in that sort of "Charlie Foxtrot"!!
klcarroll
Senior Member
Banned
Junior Member
Junior Member
Following the posts on Wolfpacks, I have been checking the B.d.U. KTB to see what I might find in relation to the formation of packs.
There are a few points I would like to mention.
1) When a pack was planned, B.d.U. decided which boats would take part and where they would patrol.
2) All boats would receive a common message outlining which boats were to participate, and each boat's particular patrol zone, often in an extended line abreast, proceding in a particular direction.
3) None of the boats would communicate with any other boat, (except as in 4)), but acknowledge to B.d.U. receipt of the message.
4) When one of the boats sighted a convoy, it would transmit a homing beacon signal for the other boats to converge, until transmitting these signals was a death sentence.
5) It was not uncommon for B.d.U. to allocate a boat that had recently been lost due to B.d.U. not being aware of that loss.
6) Initially, boats making contact with a convoy would advise B.d.U. of that fact, until that also became a death sentence.
7) On occasion, B.d.U. would hold back an attack until it had heard that sufficient boats were on station, or that the convoy may be without its escort for a period, etc., to optimise the attack. As the war progressed, B.d.U. had to rely on the boats to be where they were needed when they were needed as any transmissions from the boats were easily DF'd.
Now the secret, ancient, arcane mysteries of programming are way beyond my understanding, but from what I have picked up in the Forums, the AI might be able to handle these possibilities within SH V. To me, the AI puts the convoy into the sim, it could then create a generic type message to several boats, including the player's. It would need to monitor which boats are at sea, but this info is available.
Hope that makes sense to those who understand programming, or modders who might like to add it in later.
Junior Member
Hi klcaroll,Originally posted by klcarroll:
I don’t think that the addition of “Wolfpack” type attacks would be all that difficult. The required AI is already pretty much in place, as evidenced by the fact that we have active Luftwaffe units in the game right now. (The tonnage stealing S.O.B.s!!!!!!)
The problem as I see it would be one of “customer disappointment”: …….Because if the in-game Wolfpacks are modeled to be historically accurate, there would be virtually NO Uboat-to-Uboat interaction.
In actual practice, once the position of the convoy was broadcast, and the boats had assembled, …..the individual boats comprising a “Wolfpack” were all essentially conducting individual attacks. There was basically no tactical level communication. (It simply wasn’t practical.)
In gameplay, this would mean that your intended target might suddenly blow up right in front of you, …because some AI controlled boat was “quicker on the trigger” than you were!! (Much the same problem we have with the Luftwaffe units right now!)
Personally, I think that I would tend to view the whole thing as more of an irritation than a feature!
klcarroll
I do not think so at all. Two or more u-boats attacking the same target happened also in reality and is quit acceptable.
Moreover Wolfpacks are important for the game as they provided a temporary answer in 42/43 for the improved convoy system.
By executing a concerted attack at a predefined moment confusion will increase the chances of survival as there are multiple u-boats attacking a convoy. A convoy will be more vulnerable as the destroyers start searching for example at one side of the convoy so you can sneak in from the other side etc, destroyers are busy attacking one u-boat and have no atttention for the other boats.
The AI of the U-Boat will require functionality to avoid destroyers and maybe to help attacking destroyers who are busy chasing another u-boat.
It will be very immersive to be part of a convoy attack with communication to and from BDU. Think of the tension as you have to hurry to position your boat in time for the upcoming night attack.
Junior Member
What about this for a wolf pack option. Instead of having MP be just quick missions, make a co-op version of a campaign. granted yes i know the time required to do this would be MASSIVE. But for those that are hard core and rarely use time compression would be cool. Or maybe a like a join in progress campaign online. Which would almost require a dedicated server. but say for instance Capt "Billy" has been at sea in his campaign for a week (gametime)and capt "joe" signs on he could start his patrol. both players could recieve the same radio messages about enemy shipping wether it be convoys or task forces. It would allow both players to form a wolf pack and allow other subsimers to join on the hunt as well.
Granted there really was no sub to sub communication once they were submerged but if u hyrdophone operator is good enough he could tell who's fishes where aimed at what targets. Or just set up a small teamspeak server and communicate that way.
Just a thought
Senior Member
Thanks everyone for the feedback and the suggestions. It seems there are alot of different ideas about implementation but the support for AI controlled wolfpacks, convoy reporting and regular radio reports from BdU seems unanimous.
Is there any chance this could be stickied or brought to the developers attention, the poll really speaks for itself.
