Originally Posted by NZSharkbait
Here's the situation:
I'm in the Celebes Sea cruising at night in calm, clear conditions when my radar pings two enemy ships in staggered formation, sauntering along at 5 knots. They turn out to be a fat, juicy modern tanker, which is behind and to starboard of a small, old engine aft job.
I do a quick end around at flank speed, before dropping unseen to periscope depth and working into position at about a 40° track angle, range = about 800 yards. I cut engines, order silent running. I set the torpedoes: three Mk 14s at high speed and 26', 23' and 20' for the biggun, and two set at 13' and 10' for the small guy, open the tubes, then wait and watch through the attack periscope, saving the game in the meantime, before resuming.
Ten minutes later, Mr Modern is 950 yards away @ 350°, while his buddy is 1,200 yards @ 0°, still mumbling along at 5 knots. I fire 1 torpedo at each of the targets, then fire a second at Mr Modern - all three hit, both ships light up, then blow up.
No "Enemy Unit Destroyed" pops up, even though lifeboats have been launched and both ships have disappeared into the briney depths. Nothing, nada on my tally.
I have repeated this scenario three times, and still no indication that those blasted merchantmen even existed, let alone blundered into my carefully constructed ambush.
I see that this problem has been encountered before, but I am hoping that a solution to the unsunk-even-though-disappeared-beneath-the-waves scenario has been devised.
In the meantime, is it worth continually destroying those tankers, or should I preserve all my torpedoes for ships that sink?
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