Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Take command of air and naval assets from post-WW2 to the near future in tactical and operational scale, complete with historical and hypothetical scenarios and an integrated scenario editor.

Moderator: MOD_Command

Post Reply
User avatar
Der Zeitgeist
Posts: 279
Joined: Thu Sep 05, 2013 6:19 am

Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by Der Zeitgeist »

I was just trying out the new formation editor, and while I'm able to set patrol stations for ships within a formation, I can't seem to find a way to make them mission-specific. In Harpoon 2/3, there was a way to create specific ASW patrol stations for ships, where they would then adjust their speed at regular intervals to optimise sonar performance (sprint-drift).

How do I set this up in CMANO?
User avatar
Der Zeitgeist
Posts: 279
Joined: Thu Sep 05, 2013 6:19 am

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by Der Zeitgeist »

I actually found a way to do this myself. [8D]

One has to remove the dedicated ASW picket ship from the formation, then define a patrol area using reference points, setting them up as bearing relative to the formation, and finally use these reference points to set up an ASW patrol for the separate ship. As far as I can see, it seems to use sprint-drift tactics to look for subs.
mikmykWS
Posts: 7185
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2005 4:34 pm

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by mikmykWS »

[:)]
User avatar
NefariousKoel
Posts: 1741
Joined: Tue Jul 23, 2002 3:48 am
Location: Murderous Missouri Scum

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by NefariousKoel »

ORIGINAL: Der Zeitgeist

I actually found a way to do this myself. [8D]

One has to remove the dedicated ASW picket ship from the formation, then define a patrol area using reference points, setting them up as bearing relative to the formation, and finally use these reference points to set up an ASW patrol for the separate ship. As far as I can see, it seems to use sprint-drift tactics to look for subs.

Does that move with the formation?

Also, exactly how do you go about selecting the ref points as the station? I thought it only gave you a single-click pointer for placing stations?
mikmykWS
Posts: 7185
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2005 4:34 pm

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by mikmykWS »

Is outside the formation editor.

You can actually create a mission using reference points that are anchored to a unit so they move along with the group.

We think this better and only use the formation editor for ships.
User avatar
NefariousKoel
Posts: 1741
Joined: Tue Jul 23, 2002 3:48 am
Location: Murderous Missouri Scum

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by NefariousKoel »

ORIGINAL: mikmyk

Is outside the formation editor.

You can actually create a mission using reference points that are anchored to a unit so they move along with the group.

We think this better and only use the formation editor for ships.

Okay. Just saw the same mentioned in another thread. Will finger it out. [:)]
User avatar
Der Zeitgeist
Posts: 279
Joined: Thu Sep 05, 2013 6:19 am

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by Der Zeitgeist »

It seems to work pretty well. One issue may be formation speed. In my test, I used a carrier doing 20 knots as my "formation", and a Perry class frigate in front of it working the ASW patrol zone. The frigate had a lot of trouble keeping up, it didn't really manage to drift at a slow speed, because the patrol zone moved "under" it and it had to race ahead to keep up again. It might work better with a longer patrol zone, so the patrolling ship stays in the zone for a longer time. I'll run some further tests next time, with a live submarine hunting the formation to test sonar performances.
User avatar
NefariousKoel
Posts: 1741
Joined: Tue Jul 23, 2002 3:48 am
Location: Murderous Missouri Scum

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by NefariousKoel »

ORIGINAL: Der Zeitgeist

It seems to work pretty well. One issue may be formation speed. In my test, I used a carrier doing 20 knots as my "formation", and a Perry class frigate in front of it working the ASW patrol zone. The frigate had a lot of trouble keeping up, it didn't really manage to drift at a slow speed, because the patrol zone moved "under" it and it had to race ahead to keep up again. It might work better with a longer patrol zone, so the patrolling ship stays in the zone for a longer time. I'll run some further tests next time, with a live submarine hunting the formation to test sonar performances.

I also had such a problem running a SAG at the default Cruise speed, with some adjustments made to the formation stations. They were all running at 20kts IIRC, and the ones attempting to make their new stations were doing the same speed, so weren't getting there.

Had to manually lower the speed slider down to about 15kts and that seemed to do the trick. The off-station vessels started doing 20kts while the ones in position were at 15. I suppose that since 15kts was still classified as "Cruise" speed, it was gtg. However, they must not go over the ordered preset speed (Cruise) to make their stations.

In other words since 20kts is the maximum speed for the "Cruise" setting, the vessels trying to catch up aren't going to push their speed into Full or Flank speed territory. Which is fine - it's an extra way to make sure individual ships in your formation aren't putting it to the stops. But we'll have to manually lower the speed setting down to a specific number within the same preset range. I'd suggest maybe having the devs add a condition that reduces the formation's numeric speed value, within the same preset, until all stations have been reached but this could cause other issues such as your formations regularly slowing down when you don't want them to.
polo199
Posts: 21
Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2016 7:56 pm

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by polo199 »

This whole thread is super old but I have some questions about exactly the same topics.

What should be the right way to set up a SAG formation with some ships on ASW duty (with sprint&drift behavior) with the latest "Formation Editor"/CMANO versions?

My experience (in the "Building a Cage" scenario) is the following:
- Formations and positions both work fine as long as lead's speed is not too fast (faster than the slower ships in the group).
- If I add sprint&drift to some ships, I'm getting same ships to lag behind their defined positions a lot. I've not run the scenario for too long. How far can they lag behind? Do these ships drop their sprint&drift behavior at some point to get back in their relative positions (and then resume sprint&drift)?
- If I add "group lead can slow down..." to that, the whole formation stops, because all the sprint&drift ships are totally out of position. Should that option not be used when setting some ships to sprint&drift?

How are we supposed to set up a SAG working as described above? Can anybody do a quick tutorial (even written in a short post)? Pretty please. [&o]

Thanks in advance for any help. [:)]

PS: this "game" is just grand! [:)]
magi
Posts: 1533
Joined: Sat Feb 01, 2014 1:06 am

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by magi »

polo.... i believe this is the issue....

in the nail Amph group.... the lead ship is a oh perry class ffg the mubarak (of which you have two.. f916 tabe)... it has a flank speed of 33kts and a cruise speed of 20kts..... none of the other ships have that level of performance... this is a very hermaphrodite group of ships.... some of the other ships only have a cruise speed of 12-13kts... with the groups current structure when you chose cruise speed it will desire to do the perrys speed of 20 kts.... the other ships will not be able to maintain that and will fall behind.... therefor... if you make the f946 abu Qir the group lead it will cruise at 12kts and everybody will stay together... at 12kts you should be able to make ao in about 32 hours...

there are a few things i don't like in this scenario.... one is the absence of land based radar for blue force.... also the Amph group formation is really bad... the mission critical units are the 3 bartal class lpd's.. they should be in group center and well protected....

here is an example of what i did to the group... in the attached file... hope it helps...

Attachments
Buildinga..5magia.zip
(236.82 KiB) Downloaded 13 times
polo199
Posts: 21
Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2016 7:56 pm

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by polo199 »

Hi Magi,

Thanks a lot for picking my bottle left in the ocean.[:D]

I kind if agree with you. However, I manage to get around that different-cruise-speed issue by manually setting up the group lead spead to 13-14kts. That way it works.
My main issue then is the sprint&drift option which totally messes up the formation and I'm wondering whether this is some by-design behavior or whether I'm doing smth wrong (ticking the sprint&drift box in the formation editor).

Regarding the scenario, I like it. I like the fact you have to make do with somewhat outdated Russian hardware (Mig25+SU22). I also like the fact you're playing the "dark side" (no politics there). Most of the scenari are made to be played on the NATO side.
I'm not military-litterate. So as long as the naval groups look relevant, I cannot tell whether things are unrealistic or not.
I beat that one when I managed to destroy their 2 Perry class destroyers. I don't know whether this is a bug but I got the score popup right after sinking the second destroyer with around 650pts.

I'm gonna try you save. Thank again !
User avatar
Primarchx
Posts: 1954
Joined: Sun Jan 20, 2013 9:29 pm

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by Primarchx »

I've seen sprint-n-drift work just fine and other times it was a complete disaster. There are usually two factors at play - frequent & significant formation course changes involving ships with relative positioning and ships that are initially placed a long way from the their established station. Both require a ship to move a long way to get back to station, which can be tricky in the best of circumstances but seems exacerbated if on sprint-n-drift.

The quickest fix is to establish fixed stations right on top of the offending ship(s) so the formation is 'at rest' with respect to its' formation. If your formation speed is reasonable sprint-n-drift should work just fine, especially on long, straight courses.
magi
Posts: 1533
Joined: Sat Feb 01, 2014 1:06 am

RE: Patrol Stations: Sprint-drift?

Post by magi »

I've not had problem with sprint and drift....... but I have often have problems establishing group speed.... even typing in a speed value doesn't often work.... kind of a hassle.....
Post Reply

Return to “Command: Modern Operations series”