Aaron

[Analogy to a Car]
An object changes direction due to external forces acting upon it. A car for example changes direction because of the interactions at the contact patch of the tire and road surface. When a slip angle is introduced between the tire direction and facing a force is generated which changes the path of the car. This slip angle is initiated in the front tires via the steering wheel. As a secondary reaction the car yaws causing the rear tires to also generate a slip angle ...

[Background]
This is my 3rd blog in a series about computer modeling an 18th century ship for support of the world sailing mode of a game currently in development. I've covered hull resistances and now I am going over how I plan to model the sails. What I've learned about sails is from my reading of resources online and a few nuggets of info collected from several books. In fact I've only being on on a sailing ship once some 25 years ago in ...

[Background]
This is the second post in a series of blogs which is basically me stumbling through ideas and seeing how they hold up to coding implementation with reasonable results that I have in mind. I'm interested in sailing speeds as this was a major characteristic that dictated if a chase ended in an action. Example, when the Royal Navy started using copper bottoms (major advantage) before others, they basically became masters of the sea, able to initiate or deny the enemy an engagement. ...

[Background]
I'm a lone programer slowly building up my dream game centered around the age of sail. Currently I have a working tactical game play model using Sails of Glory rules to dictate the outcome. The tactical play will grow beyond Sails as more features are added but it was a good place to start. To build beyond this I am creating a world map where ships will sail about on missions and patrols. It will be "MMO" like in that forum members here and elsewhere can all sail ...