[propbeanie]

Originally Posted by Bubblehead1980

I have yet to experience a kamikaze in FOTRS. I am interested in seeing this and incorporating it in my TMO traffic update and using it FOTRS as well. Just curious how you guys got it to work? these planes actually crash into ships? how effective? Will really make for some danger and especially make battles of leyte okinawa etc intense. 've written campaign missions supporting the big invasions in late 44 and 45.

Years ago i saw a an ai betty crash int a troopship off okinawa after the AA guns damaged it. Counted it as a fluke.

They are there, and available occasionally, but we kept the incidence low, since we don't want to take a player's sub out. They are on an AirBase or two also, so be mindful after October 1944, that in certain areas, you will see them. Look in their Air folder, and see if you can "see" what they are...

Originally Posted by Mios 4Me

Sometimes the bow planes on the Balao work; other times they're retracted vertically and embedded in the hull. I'd assumed this was a sign of a corrupted save but the last patrol showed it not to be the case. It happened sporadically before returning to normal.

IIRC, this has happened occasionally since my first FotRSU career.

Shelling out to Windows will do that (as usual), and if you are using Windows 10, it will do it for you at times. Also, if you are low on system RAM for the game, it will happen - and you could have 64gig of RAM, and the game still run out of memory if LAA isn't doing what it should, or Windows decides you don't need that much... A limping cpu or vid card could do similar. Anything that affects the game, will affect those little things first.

Originally Posted by torpedobait

Perhaps this is better posted to the Patrols and Screenshots section, but I wanted to see what would happen if I made an entire war career on just one boat. For the sake of honesty, I play with auto-targeting and map contacts on, and with the external cameras available, but no event camera. With duds on, the realism factor is 74%, if I remember correctly.

Started a career out of Midway on Dec. 8, 1941. My one and only boat was a Tambor class, USS Tuna (SS-203). Stayed with that home port and boat through a career that ended on August 8, 1945 after arriving from my 22nd patrol. Without a single harbor raid we amassed over 1.7 million tons, mostly because I found a few of the places where Propbeanie routed some large ships/tankers/whalers and a few convoys (Thanks, Props!). In those 22 patrols, I was awarded 15 Navy Crosses, 4 Navy Commendation Medals, 3 Bronze Stars, and 1 Purple Heart.

The interesting part was that because so many patrols were successful, including the first four, I was offered no less than 7 new subs, each of which I turned down to see what would happen. The offers came after the 4th patrol, and then regularly after each group of 3 patrols, if that makes sense. Apparently the accumulated renown was sufficient to get the upgrades on a timely basis.

Actually, nothing much else happened in the way of upgrades. There was no refit of the conning tower, the only upgrade in the AA gun was from a .50 Cal to a 20mm and then to a twin 20mm. Was never offered a 40mm or a twin 40mm. Did get the expected upgrades to radars and the deck gun on a reasonable schedule. It was surprising that I was not able to upgrade the AA armament. That twin 20mm is virtually useless even in the hands of a gunner rated at 107% effective, hence the Purple Heart.

Either the radar is less effective than it should be, or the sonar is way too effective, especially when surfaced. Although it was a nuisance to have to turn the radar off every time the boat surfaced from a dive, I found the sonar was equal to it for detecting even surface targets, without giving away my position. Would be nice to be able to turn it off completely, as we can with the Air Search Radar.

Anyway, I had never taken a single boat through the entire was, and thought it worth reporting on the upgrade activity. Next time I think I'll start at Pearl in the oldest boat they have, but I'll take all the upgrades Comsubpac will offer.

Glad you made it through. We are attempting to go back close to Stock in the next release for the boat upgrades, so hopefully, next time you play all of the way through, you will get all of the conning tower updates. You cannot get the 40mm until you have the cut-down conning tower. Some of the boats require them for their newer radars. Also, be aware that the ST radar, while nice to have to use with the Observation periscope at PD, is a shorter-ranged device than the SJ-I, and in the current state of the mod, should probably be avoided. Mine did work rather well sometimes, but sometimes not. We drew circles on the NavMap now, similar to what Traveller did, only ours are just a reminder for you to take your deck gun crews off the guns and to Save the game before coming into port, so that you have a few options when an "upgrade" goes wrong next time out...

Originally Posted by WH4K

Dirty secret? I also use assisted targeting ("lock-on" mode) and map contacts.

No external cams though. You can move the regular views with the arrow keys enough to satisfy me.

All this brings me down to a realism rating of about 85%.

Yes, I know I'm a terrible person for not inputting everything into the TDC manually based on onscreen measurements and/or external paper plots, but I justify it as having a crackerjack crew backing me up.

Also, it's still possible to miss even with the "auto" solution.

I can manage to miss on full-auto... I have a career going now with map contacts only. Another with "help" like you, but I use the Event Camera, because that shows the torpedo launches, and doesn't cost any points in FotRSU... to each of us, our own way!