Buccaneers reporting for duty (with a squad name like that, we HAVE to be a part of this
). I'll volunteer as Commodore for the time being (I'll ask my squadies to either ratify me in the position, or pick someone else). This sounds great! I used to play a table-top war game called "Battlewagon," and it'l be interesting to see how close to that very impressive game this virtual re-enactment comes.
I concur with your decision to keep a/c out of this, Ghosth. What you're really simulating here is a Jutland-era naval conflict, and a/c had virtually no role in that grand little yacht race. The PTs will serve admirably as scouts, though I am concerned that only allowinig a max of eight players will make scouting very hard. I'd like to suggest you allow a max of four PT's per fleet, but with the understanding that PT skippers be allowed a second life to man guns once they die the first time. This will make for some suicide runs by the PT's, but hey: they were expendable, right (remember that old John Wayne move, "They Were Expendable?)?
There are some problems with the scenario that we'll have to live with, of course. First, if the cv dies the fleet dies. This is neither reasonable in a fleet-on-fleet exercise, nor realistic. No way to turn this off, unfortunately. Second, it would be great if the TG commander could select between different formations (line astern, line abreast, CV screen, etc). Third, there are some much need visual effects that are missing, such as funnel smoke (making it easier to see if an enemy was over the horizon), haze (conversely making long-range gunnery harder), smoke and fire from damaged ships, and battle damage effects (loss of speed/maneuverablilty/guns/etc), among other things. It would be realy great if the PTs and DDs had their smoke generators, too. This last shouldn't be that hard to implement, but I don't know what it'd do to frame-rate. Ah well, it IS a flight sim after all, not a naval sim. I can dream though, can't I?
Looking forward to it. One of our guys, Eskimo, is a born artillery man. "Form battle line!"
------------------
Sabre, a.k.a. Rojo
(S-2, The Buccaneers)
[This message has been edited by Rojo (edited 01-22-2001).]
