To perform any of its function real ships have numerous devices which directly managed by ship crew or not required crew most of the time. These devices rely on each other and all together allow ship to move, for example. Similar logic but, of course greatly simplified compared to reality, used in Naval Hurricane game. Ship is a group of functional subsystems. Subsystems consists of modules but some of subsystems contains modules which are not present in damage model of the ship i.e. they can't be damaged and player can't see them using X-Ray view. In this article I will call them hidden. Most of modules requires fixed amount of crew to work but there are also few completely unmanned modules. Crew can be located inside of compartments or as separate crew places which are not visible in X-Ray view but can be damaged like other modules. Below is a quick overview of functional subsystems of ships in Naval Hurricane game.
Propulsion subsystem.
Propulsion subsystem obviously one of the most important subsystems of any ship consist of the engines, boilers, propellers and propeller shafts. Propellers and propeller shafts are unmanned while boilers and engines requires crew to work. Steam, produced by boilers shared across all engines and that is why total power of engines will decrease even if they are all serviceable but one of boilers is damaged and not working. Below you can see that 5 boilers of Scharnhorst armored cruiser are not working and that is why its engines can gain only 72% of their maximum power.
The rest of modules creating ‘chains': engine – propeller shaft - propeller. If any element of the chain is not working entire chain considered not working. Of course non serviceable chain not requires steam anymore and steam produced by boilers automatically redistributed across engines of the other chains.
Steering subsystem.
Steering subsystem allows turning of the ship and consist of steering engines, tillers and rudders. Steering engine is the only module of them which requires crew to work. It can be a drive for one or multiple tillers. Tiller – rudder chain works similarly to engine – propeller shaft – propeller chain of propulsion system. This chain requires at least one serviceable steering engine to work. Below you can see modules of steering subsystem of Scharnhorst armored cruiser where main steering engine has been damaged but steering subsystem still works because reserve steering engine exist.
Electricity subsystem.
Electricity subsystem consists only of electricity generators. Electricity generators require crew to work. At this point electricity can be used by fire control system, by hidden modules of pumping system and fire fighting system (depends on ship).
Artillery and torpedo groups.
Each artillery turret consists of a mount and one or multiple guns. Gun serviceability depends on its mount serviceability. So if one of turret gun damaged the second gun of the same turret still can shoot like shown in the screenshot below. Turret displayed in X-Ray view as a single module for convenience.
But if mount damaged and not working the entire turret considered not working. Each artillery turret connected to one or multiple magazines. If all magazines of turret becomes non serviceable turret also becomes non serviceable.
Torpedo turret groups are much simpler. They only contain torpedo turrets. No torpedo magazines at this point.
Of course artillery turrets and torpedo turrets as well as magazines require crew to work.
Fire control system.
Fire control system in the game used to measure distance to target, velocity of target and allows reducing shells scatter. Accuracy of measuring distance and velocity depends on quality and base of optical rangefinders of ship and training level of crew operating these rangefinders. But the heart of fire control system is conning tower and if all conning towers of ship are not working rangefinders becomes useless and naked eyes of crew are used in measurements. Below you can see the measured distance to enemy Majestic battleship and suggested guns elevation based on this distance.
Of course measured distance can't be 100% accurate but it is a good starting point for adjustment fire.
Shells scatter reducing also works only when fire control system has at least one working conning tower.
What makes modules not working?
- Direct damage from shell hits and blast waves from explosives detonation.
- Secondary damage from fire.
- Flooding of modules.
- Insufficient crew. Crew can be injured/killed, can be forced to leave their place because of fire/flooding or module priority can be decreased and crew will go other crew places. Priorities system will be covered in next article.
In real life ship crew can do a lot to restore serviceability of ship devices and the game also provides capabilities to make modules working again. These capabilities will be covered in next article about damage control. Related fire fighting and water pumping systems will also be described there.
Good luck.
