How to keep a Captain on a ship

[Cavalry Corp]

I have U boats in my mod, went to the trouble to give them all Captains but when they disband they get given a Japanese Captain. How do I make sure a ship does not change Captain...

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Cav

[pnzrgnral]

I'm just guessing here - I assume that you're drawing your Kaleu's from the Japanese sub captains list? Anyone chip in if I'm wrong but the commanders lists are nationality-based. I think you'd need to make a German commanders list to populate German ships.

[Cavalry Corp]

Thanks for helping

I created the leaders ( Took ages) and can assign to a ship and have and some are on the map but when they disband the PC gives them a new leader - does not happen with Japanese ships?

The are IJN nationality as there are no other axis nationalities to choose from?

Any further ideas. Thanks again.

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[Platoonist]

I've noticed in the past that when I've used the editor to try and set a certain named captain for a submarine, he'll end up being the task force commander (of the one sub task force) instead of the actual submarine captain. Which means he automatically disappears into the officer pool when the TF is disbanded. The sub's actual captain in these instances is a generic one picked by the game code. You would think they would one and the same but they're often not. Not sure how you get around it either.

So, check to see if your kaleuns are being set as submarine TF commanders instead of actual sub commanders.

[Cavalry Corp]

Yes you are correct thats what is happening to me. Does it only affect SS??

Cav

[LargeSlowTarget]

Maybe the game replaces those who have no longer been available for duty in the Pacific and those who did not exist ? Otto Kretschmer for example became a POW im March 1941. Endrass went down with his boat in december 41, and his first name was Engelbert and not V.V.. Topp should just be Erich Topp, not V. von Topp, Oehrn should be Victor and not G., while Schewe should be Georg and not Victor. Is this mix-up of names done on purpose? Are these skippers of the historic monsson boats or for "what if" additions in your mod? For the monsoon boats I can send you the real names of their historic commanders.

[Cavalry Corp]

LST thanks indeed.
I took the names from the U boat Captains from Wiki I think ( a few I made up probably it was a while ago...) . As I recall I used as many of the historic boats as possible( with the names from Wiki). And as this is hypothetical ( advanced tech arriving on both sides mid44 onwards) we also have some type XXI boats as well and see how they play out as they are tricky to mod ( they may get modified - we will see ) .

Only too happy to accept name corrections from you its most welcome and it should be done. Happy to do the leg work if you advise. But the issue is the game does not retain them on the boats it changes them out.

[Platoonist]

The only editor workaround I can think of for this issue would be when assigning the name you want to be captain, to also assign some placeholder name to be sub task force commander. (Cpt. Doe, John?) That way when the TF has to disband, the name you wanted becomes the sole submarine captain and Captain John Doe takes a hike. Of course, that would probably only work if the TF starts the game on the map.

Otherwise, about all you can do is manually keep an eye on who was the sub's original TF commander and try to get him immediately reinstated as the captain after the TF disbands. There goes a political point or two.

[Platoonist]

I took the names from the U boat Captains from Wiki I think ( a few I made up probably it was a while ago...) . As I recall I used as many of the historic boats as possible( with the names from Wiki). And as this is hypothetical ( advanced tech arriving on both sides mid44 onwards) we also have some type XXI boats as well and see how they play out as they are tricky to mod ( they may get modified - we will see ) .

A handy-dandy source for quickly matching U-Boats to their historical captains would be the listings at U-Boat.net. Just click on a boat name and there should be commander(s) listed in the time period you need.

https://uboat.net/boats/listing.html

[LargeSlowTarget]

I wanted to recommend Uboat.net and https://uboat.net/men/commanders/ but Platoonist has been faster.

I have made a test in my mod, setting the start date to Dec 7 1944 and running a few turns with uboats assigned to TFs at start which I then disbanded, some manually and some via auto-disband.

In the editor I have assigned leaders only to each sub and left the TF leader blank ("Random").

In the game, the boat skipper is always the TF leader, and no switching of skippers observed after the disband and no switching either when creating a new TF.

I have set the PP costs for the German leaders to 250 to discourage replacement by better Japanese leaders - maybe that is a factor?

[Cavalry Corp]

Thanks guys - great help I will try this and see what happens.

U boat .net , yes I think I took some of the info from there

actually most of my U boat commanders are better than the Japanese SS commanders which I felt was realistic anyway. I did make some of the PP higher to swap out as well. But maybe it needs a touch more.

thanks again. I will let you know how it goes.

[Cavalry Corp]

"In the editor I have assigned leaders only to each sub and left the TF leader blank ("Random")."


I think I did do this - I need to check.

[Cavalry Corp]

LST ( before I change them all to random) when you look at the actual game it does list the TF commander as the ship commander - are you saying actually this does not matter and that if I leave the TF commander as blank that will make the TF commander always the commander of the ship?

From what you are saying using your settings the game is already swapping out Japanese commanders and I assume allied??
A bug?

This issue only applies to TF appearing or starting on the map I assume not ships that arrive via production? My U boats all appear as TF.

Cav

[Cavalry Corp]

screen

[Cavalry Corp]

ahhh you are quite right - I just checked my Italian subs and the are fine and TF does not have commander given - tks.

[Cavalry Corp]

May I ask again - does this mean that standard TF Japanese ( and I suppose allied) of SS in stock will also change the captain on disbanding to a random one as I see in the standard game the TF does have a nominated commander - same as our sub but your example says that will not work?

Should I take out all TF commanders where its a single ship in a TF that starts or deploys direct to the map? Or leave as is accepting my U boats are fixed.

Cav

[LargeSlowTarget]

If you leave the TF leader blank, the flagship captain will become the TF leader. There are many TFs which start on map without a designated TF leader. It should not be a problem to do the same for your sub TFs - the sub skipper will become TF leader. I have never seen an automatic replacement of a ship captain upon disbanding a TF.

[Cavalry Corp]

Ok thanks so Japanese starting Subs in starting TF should also be changed to random. That means there is then a bug in the original game?

Cav