Question about firing torpedoes.

[Steves762]

Hi, relatively new Command player here, though I played the heck out of Harpoon over the years. I am working my way through the tutorials to learn the new game, and I ran into a weird situation while playing the scenario "Uncle Mark's Tutorial - 4, - Boston Guards the Denmark Strait". When I launch torpedoes manually from the sub, they will track on the target, miss the target, appear to keep circling, yet never seem to hit the target. I was able to manually keep giving them a new course back to the target, and they would cruise right back past the target but never engage. The log would not show any type of attack on the target. I could adjust the speed of the torpedoes, but not the depth, though the torps seemed to always run at a depth of 33ft. I could launch missiles at the target and hit with no issues. Experimenting a bit, I highlighted some of the target ships and created an anti-surface attack mission, assigned the sub to it, and let it do the attacking. It immediately launched torpedoes and these torpedoes had no problem hitting the target ships.

Is there some trick I am missing when I try to target the ships myself instead of letting the AI handle things?

Thanks for any info, and I'm really liking this update to Harpoon.

Steve

[Gunner98]

First thing that pops to mind is depth. Is the Torp on the opposite side of the layer? Has it acquired the target?

Save game might help

B

[Steves762]

The torpedoes are running at a depth of 33ft, against surface ships. The scenario has the sub attacking merchant ships, so no counter measures. I can see the arc indicating that the torpedoes are running active, and they do pass back and forth by the target ships. It just seems they never acquire the ships for some reason. But when I let the AI run the attack, no problems at all, torpedoes acquire and sink the easy targets. I am using the shift+f1 to open the attack window and select the weapons and targets, thought maybe there was something I was overlooking. I don't have a save game, I'll have to try the scenario again and see if I can duplicate the problem.

On a side note, looking through the log file of the game, I noticed that my nuclear subroc, that I used to destroy a Soviet sub, also managed to heavily damage two merchant ships and a Soviet cruiser ;^)

[Rory Noonan]

Hey Steves762 if it's as you describe it sounds like a possible bug; reproduce it in a save and make a post on the tech support forum [:)]

[JCM3000]

I've noticed this odd behavior sometimes as well if you manually set a waypoint or manually BOL fire the torpedo. It will go to the point that you select regardless of whether it detects a target and ignore any targets it detects until it reaches the waypoint, then circle around that waypoint indefinitely.

The solutions I've found is either to:
a) use automatic targeting and firing (F1) and let the computer do everything once the target is in range (don't touch the torpedo after it launches), or
b) Manually allocate (Shift+F1) then don't touch the torpedo after it's launched (under methods a and b, if you try to redirect it at anytime after launch, the torpedo will follow your orders explicitly regardless of what the target is doing and will go to that waypoint and circle even if it detects a target before reaching the waypoint), or
c) BOL fire the torpedo (Ctrl+F1) set a waypoint near the target, then once the target is in the sensor cone, hit F1 and select the target unit to tell the torpedo to attack that unit. If you don't it will go to the waypoint then circle forever. You have to hit F1 and then select the target to get it to actually attack.

BOL fire is actually kinda useful because ADCAPs actually have a range of 20nm+ but b/c the computer logic knows that a target will turn and run as soon as the torpedo is detected the "assumed kinematic range" is more like 8nm to account for the additional distance required to chase down a fast running ship such as a destroyer or frigate. So automatic launch using F1 or Shift+F1 limits firing range to 8nm. But against slow moving targets your kinematic range increases so against merchants you can BOL fire the torpedo in the direction of the merchants using a BOL point in the direction of the target but less than 8nm away, then after launch set a waypoint near the target, then when the target is in the torpedoe's sensor cone, use F1 to get it to automatically attack the detected target. just my 2 cents.

[wild_Willie2]

I have also noticed this odd torpedo behavior lately, miss a target and reengage. Did not much think of it then, but could possibly be a bug as I have never seen this before.

[Steves762]

ORIGINAL: JCM3000

c) BOL fire the torpedo (Ctrl+F1) set a waypoint near the target, then once the target is in the sensor cone, hit F1 and select the target unit to tell the torpedo to attack that unit. If you don't it will go to the waypoint then circle forever. You have to hit F1 and then select the target to get it to actually attack.

You know, when I was changing the course of the torpedo back and forth, trying to get it to attack the ships, I never actually did the shift+F1 thing again and actually tell it to attack the ship. I wonder if that was my mistake? Now I'll have to go set up a quick scenario with a sub and easy targets and see if that was the problem.

Thanks for the info, I may have just figured out what the problem was.

Steve

[JCM3000]

Ideally you would think that if the torpedo detects a target in it's sensor cone it would then ignore the waypoint and attack automatically but from my experience, that's not what happens. It will ignore the target and continue to the waypoint unless you hit F1 (not shift+F1) and then click on the target.

[Steves762]

ORIGINAL: JCM3000

Ideally you would think that if the torpedo detects a target in it's sensor cone it would then ignore the waypoint and attack automatically but from my experience, that's not what happens. It will ignore the target and continue to the waypoint unless you hit F1 (not shift+F1) and then click on the target.

This was the trick. I created a small scenario and launched torpedoes in a variety of ways at some targets. The torpedoes that I was manually handling would still pass by a target on their way to the waypoint (if I had selected a BOL), even with sensors active. When I turned the torpedo around and then did the F1 thing, it had no problems attacking. I guess this is a useful way to get a torpedo pass by a frigate and make it concentrate on a carrier [:)] So I learned something new about the game. Thanks for the help guys!

Steve