[CB..]

all of a sudden every convoy i meet seems to have lost it's mind completely...the ships randomly weave in and out of each other stop start sop again change direction -all of which makes the game pretty much un-playable..

i uninstalled and started again with a fresh install to check...same thing...even bit the bullet and patched to 1.4b same thing...

daftest part of all is that the convoys actually seem to stop all together whilst the DD's attack me...only moving again after they have lost contact with me...and then they steam of like ants in a entirely messed up fashion...so much so i can't be bothered trying to attack them as it's just too bizaare to be worth the effort!

i have read that if the lead merchant is faster than the other ships (top speed in the cfg? im assuming here?)
then this creates this issue...but sounds off beat..what i have done is to set all the merchants top speed in the sea/vessel cfg file to 10 knots..in the hope that this will help....what is going on? is this unique to my system (im now running stock SH3 1.4b) or is it a bug?

this game is more frustrating than SH2!!

i can put the occasional glitch of this nature down to me reaching the convoy just as it reachs a looped waypoint --in which case it might double back on it's original course causing some problems--but the percentage chance of this happening four or five times on the run with different convoys at different locations is pretty remote---
:nope:

[Gammel]

Hi CB,


I´ve never seen such convoy behavior, but have to say i´m using the improved convoys mod by jason885 from the beginning.
When i was spotted by a ship travelling in the convoy or manage to hit one, the convoy in general is doing a course change, but in a very ordered and disciplined way.
After some time they´re going back to their general course.
Maybe it´s a problem with the shorter spacing in default game, so the ai is going to "evasive" mode as one ship is coming to close to another one =>chain reaction follows.
In the new RND file by jason the spacing between ships is increased.
Give it a try, you´ll like it.
http://edseek.com/mirror/sh3/ImprovedConvoys-200508211731.7z

[CB..]

Cheers gammel..thanks for the response...i reckon your right that it's probably the convoy spacing ...i allso read somewhere that the top speed of the merchants can cause the same problems if the lead ship is out of synch with the rest...so i've set all merchant top speeds to the same figure (10 knots for the time being)

being an old SH2 modder i'm kinda fond of working these things thru rather than taking on board some one else completed mod...all helps as you slowly get a feel for what makes the game tick..

i've made a few modifications and will see if there's any proper improvement...certainly the last convoy i spotted was behaving itself nicely.. tho it was a large one....it maybe a problem with the smaller convoys as they are likely to have been given a smaller convoy spacing --so it would follow the logic of what your saying

[Gammel]

I tried to write someting more here, but deleted already typed. My language skills are simply not enough. :8
I´m going to try out some of these online translators

Good day to you, CB
Your´re doing just right

[Col7777]

I think you are both right, if you remember as CB says we had problems on SH2 similar to this, caused by certain ships either too close or going the wrong speed etc.
It just could be that you hit a certain ship that caused the others to evade/avoid each other and they couldn't get back to an organised state again, perhaps IF you had hit a different ship it may not have happened as bad as it did.
I've had the odd convoy where I've seen certain ships start to evade and then gone in the opposite direction, I've not waited long enough to see if they ever re-join the convoy again, I've either sank them or got out of there.

(CB do you remember the Treeburst threads on this in SH2?)

[Type941]

[CB..]

yup Col i remember treeburst!! it was Floater who finally nailed it down thru kriegstanz-- rock solid convoys all the time

i reckon gammel's right here and it's the convoy spacing with perhaps the merchant speed being a factor too depending on the lead ship.forcing the others to slow down and speed up in order to keep pace--

co-incidentally all the convoys i've come across with this problem have been small ones (small spacing allso) and been soley escorted by either corvettes and or armed trawlers (both slow escorts) so some where amoungst that lot is the answer--- we'll see how we go on..

the problem doesn't start after you've attacked tho it is there before you attack which makes it a more basic problem with the formation keeping--
:hmm:

large convoys with large spacings and fast escorts seem ok (so far)

so room to mess around with the settings --

[Krieg-Schwein]

I was wondering are you creating a group when you make the convoy? there is a right click setting (ARRANGE GROUP) to make them all stay a certain distance and space from each other.. DD's can be spaced around the group so they have more free roaming

if you already did this sorry for the redundancy

[Hawkers]

Funny you should mention this, because I encountered exactly the same convoy behaviour on my last career patrol.

It was in June 1942, and I attacked a large convoy in one of the AL grids.

It was in broad daylight, late in the afternoon, and having got in very close (between the outer escort and the main body), I let fly with 4 eels, hitting a C2 cargo and a T3 tanker, both of which stopped dead in the water. Immediately, the whole convoy seems to go into panic, tankers and cargoes zig-zagging, stopping and swerving to avoid eachother. To add to the general confusion, the escorts come steaming in amongst their charges to start pinging and depth-charging me. As if that wasn't enough, I also had to endure a pasting from some low-flying catalinas and Liberators which also appeared!!

It was touch-and go, and I took some damage, which forunately my crew were able to control, and after a couple of hours or so, I managed to sneak out of there and the convoy and escorts gradually re-grouped and went on their way. I can only say that their erratic behaviour actually helped me to escape (being a daylight attack as well).

I should add that I'm not using any convoy mods in the game.

Hawkers

Captain, U46 (25 patrols and still going strong!!)

[Spike]

The farther apart the better.

[von Buelow]

Same convoy... 1942... somewhere in AL grid (but eventually picked up closer to England)... ships captains are drunk and paying no attention to standard formation protocol...

It actually made it fun to be in the "beehive" and get some lucky solutions. Plus the escorts were forced to make attack run routes that were usually interrupted and easier kills when they had to stop for that C# that was trying to ram me

[sandbag69]

Can you recommend a realistic pacing distance between ships in convoy.

I am sure I read somewhere that each convoy column was 1000 yards apart and each ship in each column was around 400 yards apart.

I also think the escorts should be around 2.5KM away from the nearest convoy ship. As U-boats wouldnt really fire a torpedo from outside this distance.

What are your thoughts anybody?

[sandbag69]

A convoy of 45-60 ships would steam in nine to twelve columns, with 1,000 yards between columns and 600 yards between ships. A nine column convoy would therefore be four nautical miles wide and one and a half miles deep.



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