[yamaneko]

Dears,

long-time lurker, first-time poster reporting in.

Been playing submarine sims for some 20 years or so. Seen them all for SH4: TMO, RFB, RSRD, you name it.

Recently started a new career with FOTRSU 0.71 Public Beta. They gave me a Salmon class in December ‘41, Manilla. Head out to this area (13N 119E) they said. We give you new orders then they said. Alright. So I went.

Went to the bridge to navigate out of Manilla Harbor. Have never seen it sprawling with so much life. Submarines tucked in right next to me. Tugs casually cruising around. Airplanes patrolling right over my head. A trawler coming in.

Never seen a harbor as immersive as this. Just so much going on, so much to watch. For the first time in SH4, I really felt that the game world was alive. Well done.

So I went to my designation and got orders to engage and sink enemy shipping. Nothing new under the sun, I guess.

Japanese air cover was quite dense. Out of the ten days I was out, I only had one or two days without detecting airplanes. Out on the ocean, I had found one or two doing their rounds. Near Luzon, however, I had more, three or even four, circling, searching. They are easy to avoid or evade. But still, that’s quite much, don’t you think?

Didn’t find any shipping at first, apart from the occasional US vessel. But then one night I got lucky.

Had two merchants on the sonar. Crossing me slowly from starboard to port. No escort.

It was pitch-black, overcast with strong winds of 15m/s, heavy rain, and fog. Didn’t see s**t.

Closed in at full speed on the surface. Hard time to get a visual of course. But damn, I knew I had a good bearing on them, wouldn’t let that chance go away!

Finally saw them. Close and directly head. Very close! 700 yards and closing in fast. Immediately hit emergency back and gave them a full salvo from all four tubes. Got two hits on the first merchant, and one the second. No idea about my last fish, though. Maybe a dud. Or maybe a miss. Didn’t have much time for proper calculations.

The second merchant had some guns and gave me all she had. To no avail, given the storm and the darkness. I lost contact with her after few seconds, so I guessed her position and range and just shot some shells in the night. That was Modern Hansa Freighter. I think she had a texture problem, as she was painted in some standard gray from bow to stern and looked like a model kit.

The first merchant went down immediately after two torpedo hits. The second had one hit and maybe five or six shells until she gave up as well. Both merchants had something between 5000 to 6000t, if I remember correctly.

That’s quite a fast sinking, don’t you think? From RFB, I like the sinking mechanics best. Sometimes it takes long for a ship to go down (sometimes too long, granted). But there is always uncertainty. You don’t know for sure whether she had enough. Will she go down or does she need another fish in the belly? There is another strategic layer added by the sinking mechanics of RFB, don’t you think?

Anyway, went home to Manilla after that, and that would be my very first war patrol with FOTRSU. And what a great experience that was. Found it very immersive, and didn’t have any issues, except for the missing texture.

I look forward getting back to my boat for my second mission. Many thanks for your work on this great mod.

Best,
Yama