| > as long as the simulated behaviour is qualitatively similar to the real thing. My point is that I suspect that unless you have a very sophisticated simulation, it won't be. > I’d imagine the important things would be the shape of the sail The shape of a sail is itself a very complex thing to model and simulate. I'm not even a real sailor and I'm already thinking about camber, twist, and luffing. When sailing upwind, the sail is functioning like a wing using lift. When sailing downwind, it's relying on drag. Points in between use a mixture. This implies that turbulence and stall must be simulated at some level of fidelity. If you've got a mainsail and a jib, then you have to worry about the slot effect and one sail blocking the wind of the other. > and the heel of the boat for a given apparent wind Not just heeling, but weather helm, leeway, drag, displacement, and how those interact. |