Settings are a personal thing, depending on how much importance you place on realism, what realism means to you and how you decide to balance this against 'fun', which is highly subjective. Years ago I did an AAR over at SimHQ for a career I played in Op Monsum, and I gave my thoughts on the matter of settings. Again, just my viewpoint, and play however you get the most enjoyment out of the sim.
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I'm a bit obsessive about this in submarine sims, it's sort of sacred ground. Which settings a player chooses have far-reaching consequences. Placing, or not, a checkmark in a box can fundamentally transform the experience. For me, my aim is to simulate the role of the skipper. I've read dozens of sub books, and hundreds of patrol reports over the years. And of course I have watched Das Boot
. So I know what I am shooting for. To achieve this in SH 4, all realism settings are checked, aside from map contact updates. The most important one to give the proper perspective is turning off external cameras. This simple setting completely transforms the game. When everything you see and know comes from the boat's viewpoint it adds a level of challenge and authenticity you cannot get by watching from afar. No evading destroyers by watching from above. No far-range recon to identify a ship. No event cameras showing your miss or dud. Once submerged all you have is a periscope and a soundman. For me, this is the right way to play. I'm usually not elitist when it comes to these sorts of things. But something about submarine sims is different.
The second important thing about these settings of course is manual torpedo targeting. It's up to the skipper to achieve results. No simple lock and los. There are as many methods as players I think. Over the years I have developed my own method which I call steady-wire firing technique, which even comes with an acronym, SWiFT. Clever, eh? I'll describe it in detail later, but the idea is that I predict ahead of time the firing bearing, and after inputting all relevant data in to the TDC, I place the scope on that bearing and fire torpedoes as the target crosses the steady persicope wire. No math is used. It's simple and very effective. From my view, successfully torpedoing ships in sub sims is primarily a matter of positioning. By placing the boat in the best position, the rest becomes academic. Having a simple, reliable way to fire fish accurately means a high hit percentage. And then it's down to fate and dud rate.
The third point I want to make is about the concession I allow, map contact updates. I've seen many debates, especially on Subsim.com, about this setting over the years. For me though, it's a necessary evil. The truth of the matter is that a fleet submarine in WW 2 had a tracking party. A group of men whose job it was to run the plot during an approach or attack. Since I wish to simulate the role of the skipper, and not every man on board, I feel it necessary to leave this setting unchecked. The plain problem with this is that MCU has unfailing accuracy. It eliminates the error possible with a plot run by humans. For me though, not having this on is far LESS realistic than having it on, at least from the skipper's point of view. I can see the other side of the argument, and I wish there was some sort of variance possible here, maybe according to the accuracy of the skipper's observations or the experience and ratings of the tracking party. But if my choice is between having it or not, it seems simple, and I allow it. As will be seen, my targeting method does take advantage of this map accuracy. There is no doubt my shooting would suffer without it. In Operation Monsun the direction 'tail' is absent, the contact is simply a square. No color revealing friend or foe is used either. it simply shows position.
And along those same lines, simulating the role of the skipper, I don't man the guns. The crew is left to do all of the shooting, under my direction. It can be pretty frustrating as the crew shoots like it's their first time on the seat, but I'm the skipper, not the trainer and pointer. I can understand some wild ranging, but it's when the crew suddenly shoots 30 degrees off azimuth that I despair and regret lack of training haha. Gun actions are rare for me anyway, but it's all part of how I approach the sim, and again, the role of the skipper.
The AAR can be read here, if anyone is looking for some sub-related light reading haha
War Patrols of U-46 @ SimHQ