advanced navigation

[Mauriarty]

I thought it would be cool and really helpful if we could get some more advanced navigational equipment. such as a sextant and star charts. I think they would be an incredibly useful tool and would add much to the game. 

[Prater]

A sort of sextant would be nice for many people.  However, it is currently possible to develop your own sextant with varying degrees of accuracy.

 

Everything related to navigation that is needed is already currently possible.  You just have to develop the out of game tools yourself.

[ShiverMyTimber]

All that would be done by a ship's navigator. Not sure if they're implemented yet but an option to talk to the ship's navigator would be useful even if it's a barebones "We are nearest the port of x" then it could be built upon to give co-ordinates and let you go to your cabin and check out your charts (probably isometric eyecandy) with your ship representing a having a circle around it (like current mobile GPS when it is having a bit of trouble connecting to the satellites), this circle would shrink as your navigator gains experience from sailing on the open seas.
Whether officers like navigators die in sinking or not is a whole other can of worms.

[Destraex]

This sort of thing is my fondest hope for the game. Sextant and learning how to plot positions with stars and sun.

I would then learn something that may be useful in real life from the game! I mean apart from being able to know the basics of sailing a ship.

Learning about something you are interested in is what makes the game challenging and fun.

[IonAguirre]

I agree with the sextant idea, but it requires a real sky map moving with time.

 

With such a stars map, having a watch and an astronomical ephemeris table is also required. With these tools and the corresponding knowledge is how one of the fixing procedures is performed. It sounds complex, but it isn´t.

 

The Sun is the other key aster for navigation allowing for the fastest and simplest fix procedure. At local midday, from a watch, the observed Sun height angle, and the ephemis of the Sun, longitude and latitude can be resolved very  fast.

 

For those interested, I can develop the whole thing.

 

 

Using astronomy for position fix during coastal navigation, would be appart from a wrong practice,  like killing ants with a canon.

 

I'd like to be able for taking bearings to the coast (in fact, I'm actually using this procedure). Actual OW compass has a very low accuracy, but if we had a better one, location can be accurately obtained from two bearings, and speed and location from three ones.

 

By night, if lighthouses are included the procedure results even easier than by day.

Edited August 26, 2015 by IonAguirre

[Destraex]

It may also require realistic distances!!

[Prater]

I agree with the sextant idea, but it requires a real sky map moving with time.

 

With such a stars map, having a watch and an astronomical ephemeris table is also required. With these tools and the corresponding knowledge is how one of the fixing procedures is performed. It sounds complex, but it isn´t.

 

The Sun is the other key aster for navigation allowing for the fastest and simplest fix procedure. At local midday, from a watch, the observed Sun height angle, and the ephemis of the Sun, longitude and latitude can be resolved very  fast.

 

For those interested, I can develop the whole thing.

 

 

Using astronomy for position fix during coastal navigation, would be appart from a wrong practice,  like killing ants with a canon.

 

I'd like to be able for taking bearings to the coast (in fact, I'm actually using this procedure). Actual OW compass has a very low accuracy, but if we had a better one, location can be accurately obtained from two bearings, and speed and location from three ones.

 

By night, if lighthouses are included the procedure results even easier than by day.

 

How can you develop the whole thing, when Naval action resides in a flat Plane instead of on a Sphere surrounded by stars, other planets, and the moon?  I've told you this multiple times.  It is not possible unless Game Labs makes a sphere and adds in the stars and the moon and the sun to act correctly.  Otherwise it is impossible to make a sextant act real like you want it to.  You can only simulate a sextant's readings.

 

 

Actual OW compass has a very low accuracy, but if we had a better one, location can be accurately obtained from two bearings, and speed and location from three ones.

 

No, it doesn't.  What makes your accuracy low are your charts, not the compass.  A made up compass that is flawless cannot be inaccurate.  The compass in Naval Action is accurate all the time.  What is wrong is that you are trying to use Real World maps that do not correlate to Naval Action.

 

If you want accuracy in the map department for Naval Action, my map is the ONLY known and public map that allows you to do this:

tdamap.com.  Other people have hinted they are making one, but have not yet provided evidence their maps exist.

 

And we don't need anything to calculate speed.  We are already given speed.  We are automatically given our knot value.  Except in Naval Action, the unit that is displayed as knots is actually Kilometers Per Minute.  If you are going 20 knots on the Open World, you are actually going roughly 20 Kilometers Per Minute.

[IonAguirre]

If I say I can, Its that I can. In fact, anybody with just a brieff knowledge about geometric analisys can do it. It does not mind if the world is plannar, spherical or egg shaped.

The shape of a "world" doesnt mind, its even irrelevant if we are speaking about an Euclidian vectorial space or not. Everything is reduced to projections and coordinates conventions, that, if are "consistent" will work and return accurate results, no matter wich kind of projection and/or dimensions could be used.

Astronomical Navigation can be used as far as its a matter of solving a matrix product and finding the director cosines. Once solved, results can be used into any map if the projection is known, and the conversion matrix is found.

In the case of OW, the problem can be approached from an Euclidean R3 or an R4 space, it depends.

 

I'll not keep on this discussion. Studying is a solution that solves most doubts my friend.

 

About the map. In fact we have one, and by the way, a Navigation software that works from NA data giving even the ETA to destination. And .... it works my friend. And ..... the same way we made it, others surely have done it yet.

 

Nature and computers share the same lenguage, MATHS. Thats only a matter of finding the right "words"

Edited August 27, 2015 by IonAguirre

[Siegfried]

Prater, IonAguirre use a map so accurate like yours, not public yet, OK but my map have aprox. 15000 points taken in actual game world. And my map is complete now, including that isle all we know, since 5 days ago I ended it. BTW Louisiana and Bahamas area were a hell to make... lol

 

For stars, I am sure if they make a plain with stars painted and that texture moves, we can measure the angle on inclination in every hour of day and calculate the position or simply making the stars fixed and measuring the angle you can obtain your position I guess. Or maybe I can be wrong. Is now possible know the hour of day for sun position if we could measure the angle the sun forming with horizon??

 

P.D. Paint in black the Isle of Pines area under west of Cuba too, is not accurate in your map

Edited August 27, 2015 by Siegfried

[DazednConfused]

Yeah i dont know why everybody keeps kitts island a secret

[Prater]

If your map is accurate, then the compass is fine. If you are using the compass and getting inaccurate results, then your map is not fine. It might be fine as showing the shape of islands, but you didn't make it with navigation in mind. That or your navigation is wrong. Again, your map is not public so it is impossible to know. But this I do know, before either of you were in the game I had developed a sextant that had a typicall accuracy of 2km perfect, 15km average, 30km in some areas, and at worst 60-100km.

From there I started working on my map, and I and Obi have all the tools we will ever need. The sky is the limit. Accuracy is what you make it to be and you probably know what I am talking about and know what I have if you have this map, because I know what you have because I have my map.

I'm not sure what you guys are complaining about. If you have this map, then surely you have everything.  You have everything you will ever need. Otherwise I'm not sure where you guys are going wrong. I already have everything and it works perfectly. But you are doing something wrong if it isn't working.

Also Siegfried, perhaps you should read my description, I already said it wasn't accurate, because GL changed stuff. But again, if you are running into troubles, you are doing something wrong.

How do you think I figured out the knot value? Again, it is roughly km per minute. You don't need anything for speed, it is already in there. If you have your map, it is insanely easy to make a sextant that works with it. What's the problem? Again, if you are saying the compass is wrong, you are doing something wrong. Before you guys where in the game, I was navigating with perfection, so you can't say the in game items are wrong.

[Prater]

If I say I can, Its that I can. In fact, anybody with just a brieff knowledge about geometric analisys can do it. It does not mind if the world is plannar, spherical or egg shaped.

The shape of a "world" doesnt mind, its even irrelevant if we are speaking about an Euclidian vectorial space or not. Everything is reduced to projections and coordinates conventions, that, if are "consistent" will work and return accurate results, no matter wich kind of projection and/or dimensions could be used.

Astronomical Navigation can be used as far as its a matter of solving a matrix product and finding the director cosines. Once solved, results can be used into any map if the projection is known, and the conversion matrix is found.

In the case of OW, the problem can be approached from an Euclidean R3 or an R4 space, it depends.

 

I'll not keep on this discussion. Studying is a solution that solves most doubts my friend.

 

About the map. In fact we have one, and by the way, a Navigation software that works from NA data giving even the ETA to destination. And .... it works my friend. And ..... the same way we made it, others surely have done it yet.

 

Nature and computers share the same lenguage, MATHS. Thats only a matter of finding the right "words"

Except, if you want a sextant to actually work like a sextant, you need the game world to act like a real world. In Naval Action, the world is flat, and it is the same time everywhere.  At every point on the map, the sun is in the same location, at the same height, at the same angle from the horizon, so it will always place you in the same location no matter where you are.  Also, the stars and the sun do not change their location in the sky. The Earth is not moving or rotating in Naval Action.  Now tell me, if you want Navigation to be realistic and a realistic sextant to work like it does in real life, how are you to do this if the sun and stars don't change location and it is the same time everywhere and the angles for the sun are always the same no matter where you are? You have to simulate. Which is what I have been saying all along.

[hoarmurath]

all you have to do is make it accurate when you look in the sextant.

[Prater]

Then it is a simulation, and Ion cannot develop it on his own.

[jodgi]

Hmmm...

When you say "tools" are you referring to something related to F11? (or some console output or command?)

[Siegfried]

I think all of this is a barrier language. With accurate, I guess, Ion mean the actual compass is little and show few points and only 2 point between the main 8 bearings. And in the point where letters are, then there are not marks. Is impossible put a bearing in compass and reach the exact point in long travels. English is not my native language.

 

It we had a huge compass all screen with many marks in it, using my or your map will be exact travels.

Edited August 27, 2015 by Siegfried

[Prater]

Yes, I agree on that part.  We had a topic someplace about putting in a 360 degree large compass if you push like c on the OW or something.

 

However, by using this, I can pretty much do it perfectly, you just have to eye it:
 

[ObiQuiet]

Mariners of the time didn't have perfect compasses, magnetic precession, local variations, etc.

One technique is to intentionally head to one side or the other of your destination. Then when you reach the coast, you know whether to go left or to go right.

If you sailed straight toward the destination and missed it, you wouldn't know which way the compass error had taken you.

[Siegfried]

If you put that compass only 180º  from the bottom of screen you can have double size.

 

But I think that the compass must be imprecise to see or little and with few marks in it because in game we have not currents, magnetic precession and that stuff. If we had perfect and milimetric navigation in this game it lose some "credibility" of Age of Sails time.

 

I have in project for after wipe make paintings of mountains in my map to know where to go when see land.

[IonAguirre]

Mariners of that time, used the North star for compas deviation calculation. In fact the same procedure is still used. Albeit its compusory for all  ships (SOLAS convention) to be fitted with Gyroscopic compass, the traditional one is also a requirement.

At each navigation watch, the duty officer must calculate the total deviation of the magnetic compass and include his results in the Navigation logbook. At night, the most accurate procedure is by using the North star, during dawn and sunset, the azimuth of the Sun, when its height=0, is another tipical, accurate and very common procedure, as all equations become a lot simpler.

 

Prater, my use of the word accuracy, related to the game compass, was related to the sence explained by Sigfried.

Sphericity is not a geometric requirement. Once again, the shape does not mind, but the correct choice of the mathematical model. All required variables and results are invariants, as they are defined for each geometric structure. Once again, thats only a matter of building the correct tensor.

 

 

As I see this discussion is going nowere, this is my last post into this thread.

Edited August 28, 2015 by IonAguirre

[ulysse77]

SInce all coordinate are in a plane and not a geoid, I`ve imported all known port into Autocad and made a simple map without land mass, it`s really accurate to give bearing, problem is trying to incorporate the lands accurately. I've also made a simple calculation tool with excel that can work with given coordiante in the game to give you a heading. I also caclcuated roughly the speed in knots to map unit of distance ratio and came up with a rough speed calculation.

 

I think the only nice tools they could add on the in game map would be a protractor, a compass and a way to plot our own course. you would never really get your position but you could manually put it and then plot a course. Maybe the map could automaticaclly put your location once you see a port. and maybe a navigator officer could locate you with varying degree of accuarcy. a chronometer of varyting quality could also give you one of the coordinate at noon.

[jodgi]

SInce all coordinate are in a plane and not a geoid, I`ve imported all known port into Autocad and made a simple map without land mass, it`s really accurate to give bearing, problem is trying to incorporate the lands accurately. I've also made a simple calculation tool with excel that can work with given coordiante in the game to give you a heading. I also caclcuated roughly the speed in knots to map unit of distance ratio and came up with a rough speed calculation.

Sounds interesting. Is that something you could share with us, make a google drive spreadsheet and publish and link for us to try out?

[Siegfried]

I want to know if the stars texture is fixed or if it moves with the player eye. If it is fixed to land-sea maybe we can measure the angle between horizont to a star and calculate the position. We need to know the height from sea surface to stars texture. Not real, but it is a way to calculate position without press F11.

 

Imagine that the game world is a box with textures inside. The bottom is the sea and land and the top cover is the stars texture. You can pick a star and calculate the elevation angle you see it and know where you are. We need a tool for know that angle. If the top cover's star texture moves with time like the sun is more difficult calculate but it is possible. But if the top cover moves with every of us, then it is not possible.

 

And for navigation using my map, I grab a pencil or other straight stuff in my desk, and put paralel at one of the lines, then I move the pencil over my screen maintain paralel to one of bearing lines over my position. I don't need program apps for that and it works for game fine. Sometimes the simplyest things are the fastest and most effective lol.

[Prater]

I want to know if the stars texture is fixed or if it moves with the player eye. If it is fixed to land-sea maybe we can measure the angle between horizont to a star and calculate the position. We need to know the height from sea surface to stars texture. Not real, but it is a way to calculate position without press F11.

 

Imagine that the game world is a box with textures inside. The bottom is the sea and land and the top cover is the stars texture. You can pick a star and calculate the elevation angle you see it and know where you are. We need a tool for know that angle. If the top cover's star texture moves with time like the sun is more difficult calculate but it is possible. But if the top cover moves with every of us, then it is not possible.

 

And for navigation using my map, I grab a pencil or other straight stuff in my desk, and put paralel at one of the lines, then I move the pencil over my screen maintain paralel to one of bearing lines over my position. I don't need program apps for that and it works for game fine. Sometimes the simplyest things are the fastest and most effective lol.

 

I have thought of this as well.  Problem is, how do you account for screen position and angle?  You would have to line up your screen exactly right to however the person who took the bearings took them originally to take the bearings.  And the rolling sea might cause issues.  And also, how would you accurately measure it on your screen?

 

 

As for simplicity, does hitting the middle mouse button work on your estimated position (light gray "Mercator" lines are exactly accurate when it comes to coordinates, increments of 100,000)?  http://namap.neocities.org/

[Siegfried]

Had you seen that adhesives or stickers for FPS games you can put fixed in your screen. I am thinking about a transparent plastic with marks in it. Using external camera (for cheating avoid the movement of sea) and align the botton of screen with horizont or some mark. The movement of the sea is the variable that it makes an art of navigation skills and some randomness.

 

Sorry for my mess of ideas, I don't know exactly but I am having a brainstorm. Don't reply me too severely please I only needs a stress pill lol

 

PD, my map has  grid too with 10k increments, but in the version all non RAE people have is censored info