SUGGESTION: Force Vectors to help with Manual Sailing

[Skylane]

What would the team think about putting force vectors on the fore and aft masts in the "general boat UI" that show the direction and amplitude of force applied to those masts from their current angles relevant to the wind. This would be an excellent way to visually show how the sails are reacting which I think would greatly help in manual operation of those sails. I think this would make it more intuitive.  

 

Here's my mock-up of what I'm referring to - clearly the blue arrows should be pointing more toward 225, but I'm not the best artist

 

I believe the arrows should grow or shrink in length depending on how strong the force is.

 

Thoughts?

Edited February 17, 2015 by Skylane

[Leviathan]

This is only my opinion but I think that would provide too much information regarding how well you are using manual sails and take some of the 'feel' out of it. Once you get used to the ships they will tell you if you are using manual sails properly. It would also add a lot of visual clutter.

[Johny Reb]

I'm with Leviathan. The more artificial information you give, the less skill is required to master it. I believe the idea of manual sailing is to bring in a skill set that other age of sail games don't represent. I think a section in the manual that eventually come out could have this included to give players an idea on how sailing works.

[maturin]

Force vectors raise more questions than they answer, since the force vectors on the sail are useless unless they have the resistance of a keel to counteract them. On a beam reach, for example, the force vectors are just pushing you downwind.

[Prater]

Agreed, too much information.

[Skylane]

Then what do you use in real life as feedback that the sails are at the correct angle?

[maturin]

Then what do you use in real life as feedback that the sails are at the correct angle?

Same way you know you've found the G-spot.

 

 

 

But in all seriousness, it's both very simple and very complex.

 

For sailing fast in a straight line, you should just use auto-skipper. The game knows perfectly how to trim the sails to make them most efficient on a given course. After all, the game just simplifies reality here, standardizing yard control across different vessels. The most experienced seamen can't do better than the auto-skipper, because the auto-skipper follows its own internal rules and is perfect.

 

I, like pretty much all other experienced players, use auto-skipper for sailing fast in a straight line, and only use manual yard control when I want to turn.

 

And here is where everything is rather simple. A square sail is most powerful and efficient when it is perpendicular, or at right angles to the wind. A square sail is least powerful when it is parallel to the wind. So if you want to turn fast, you put the sails one one end of the ship at right angles to the wind, and the other sails parallel with the wind. If you can't quite achieve those angles, get as close as possible.

 

So you don't actually need force vectors. You just need to strive for two ideal angles: 90 degrees and 0 degrees.

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

Then what do you use in real life as feedback that the sails are at the correct angle?

 

You watch the sail(s) very carefully, and pay attention to how the rudder feels, whether or not it's fighting you and in what direction.

 

The below apply to Marconi/Gaff Rigged Vessels:

 

In modern sails, we also have little plastic telltale streamers at key points on the sails that can tell us how the air is flowing over the sail in that area.

 

Minus the telltales, you effectively let the sail out until the luff stalls a tad, then you sheet it in just a hair and you're good - that's assuming you don't have too much sail up for the conditions.  If you're sailing as close to the wind as possible, you "luff up and touch her", you pull the bow up into the wind until the luff starts to stall, and then let the bow fall back off a tad.  The exact, fastest spot for the sails at any given moment is dependent on a ton of different factors, including wind speed, how much canvas you have spread, boat speed, sail trim, sail condition, shroud/stay tension, rigging setup (very closely related to sail trim), etc.

[Tom Pullings]

Force vectors raise more questions than they answer, since the force vectors on the sail are useless unless they have the resistance of a keel to counteract them. On a beam reach, for example, the force vectors are just pushing you downwind.

 

Actually, you can model the force vectors to show what you want them to, which could be direct force of the wind on the sails or the translated vector of the ship through the water as a result of the force of the wind and the resistance of the keel (and even apparent versus real wind).  Still, Sail Simulator 5 has a widget that will show your ship and the force vectors, but I never found it to be of any real use.  And I agree with the general consensus that it's probably both more information than we want and perhaps too much clutter.

 

I would like the wind indicator we have now to be a bit more intuitive though, along the lines suggested in several other threads.  I'd prefer for any shading of the compass rose, for instance, to indicate the no go zone rather than, as it is now, a shading of a random area directly downwind that doesn't indicate anything relevant to sailing.