For those of you who enjoyed the thread "Silent Hunter 3 - Night of the Wolves" there is another small FREE MOD you should check into.

Its called "SH3 Commander" by JoneSoft


JoneSoft SH3 Commander is an application that runs in the background "behind" SH3 heres how it works.

Fire up SH3 Commander and you are greeted with a window which provides multiple options. You can create a new career for SH3 and a random (and changeable) black and white photo of your sub's skipper will appear next to his name.

from this window you can review your crew list, summarize each crewman's abilities, medals, awards etc. You can award them medals and upgrade their abilities (all of this is reflected in the game) and it is based on your recommendation for a medal or special ability - just as in real life - it is no longer based on "RENOWN" so instead of waiting to gain enough medals to go around all you have to do is make the recommendation that the man gets it and he will. the mod will also eventually make recommendations like "Your chief engineer is very experienced, high command needs new submarine commanders, you might consider releasing him to captains training soon."

your skipper is provided an entire back story, given a realistic career length (no more joining the Kriegsmarine in 1939 and playing 100 missions all the way to 1945)... now you will more realistically "retire" after 10 or 12 patrols, doing your best to rack up tonnage under a time constraint.  try this at various stages of the war - you will find that sinking ships is nearly impossible after 1944 due to advances in anti submarine technology and increased air patrols.

The back story includes date and place of birth, when he joined the kriegs marine, what ranks he achieved and when, when he was awarded medals and promotions, a complete list of his patrols INCLUDING THE NAMES OF THE SHIPS HE HAS SUNK. an example:

Sunk the SS. National Eagle on 09 September 1941 for XXX tons
Sunk the Motor Vessel San Miguel on 15 September 1941 for XXX tons

upon retirement or upon reaching his demise the back story continues:

"... after retiring from the Kriegsmarine after 12 patrols he was assigned to various staff duties under Admiral Doenitz and eventually placed in command of the 7th Flotilla. After the war he moved to Hanover and started what would become one of the most successful undersea oil drilling equipment manufacturing businesses in all of Germany. He died in his sleep on 16 August 1990."

or

"Contact with his U-boat was lost in deep waters near grid square AK66 on 9 April 1944, presumed lost to aircraft attack, never seen nor heard from again."


there is even a Das Boot based night club feature - basically when activated you see a random still image of the Das Boot night club scene, there is a chat window where your fellow sub commanders will fill you in on the latest tactics, hints, rumors, news and world events.

when your done making modifications to your crew, or reviewing the success of your latest patrol all you have to do is click "Launch SH3" and the application launches the game for you.

but the fun doesnt stop there, each time you run Silent Hunter 3 from within SH3 commander various CFG-s are modified ever so slightly so that the range and effectiveness of the destroyers sonar pings will sometimes be deadly accurate, or sometimes aimless - basically simulating "thermal layers".

the best part is that if you have downloaded the Gray Wolves Mod expansion pack as the other thread suggests - SH3 commander is engineered to work with GWX and other similar mods. i have been running the two of them together for 3 weeks trouble free.

Search for "JoneSoft SH3 Commander"

have fun!