Ship won't sink?!

[cardician]

Alright, so I'm on my second patrol of this career. Going on my merry way to the assigned sector. One sector east a contact suddenly appears on my map. Well while I'm talking about it, why don't I ask this too, though this is not my main question. Why do contacts sometimes just suddenly appear on the map. It wasn't identified in any way by my sub and is still like 30km out. I'm assuming this represents something like some random ship told HQ and its being relayed to me or something?

Anyway, the ship is heading for me, so I move to intercept. I manage to work it out perfectly so that I'm waiting at periscope depth at a perfect 90° angle at about 650 meters. Torpedo is ready, tube is open, as soon as he's dead ahead I let loose. Perfect hit right below the smoke stacks, dead center of the ship. This was a British small freighter or something. Anyway, it was travelling at 10 knots and it immediately drops to 6 and then slowly falls the rest of the way to 0. Unlike some ships that just seem to keep going after you hit it, I knew this was a one hit kill. So I sit and wait so that I get confirmation of it sinking and credit for the kill. I don't know how far I can move off and still get credit, plus I like watching the ships sink. Anyway, a couple hours pass and the water level is now even with the deck of the ship all the way across. Four hours, five, six....same level. So it sinks this far, water is literally washing over the top of it with waves...and yet that's it? What the heck? So is it not going to sink any further? I *really* don't want to waste another torpedo on this ship which is definitely sunk, though the game doesn't seem to realize it. Being in a IIA I only have 5 torpedoes and I want to make them all count. Am I going to have to use another one? What the heck is the deal? This cannot be normal behavior. Any thoughts?

[GoldenRivet]

im not sure if AI damage models work this way but in all probability you destroyed the engines and gave the poor bastard heavy flooding. his crew couldnt fix the engines but they probably got the flooding controlled in the nick of time.

question: Is the merchant Armed?

if NO

surface next to him, man the flak gun and shoot all the cargo off of his decks, perhaps you will start a fire or kick off an explosion that will be too much for the crippled ship to handle.

but before you spend another torpedo or shoot his cargo up, just watch him for a few more hours, he might slip under. I have read reports of merchants staying afloat for days just burning and slowly sinking.

keep an eye on him for at least another 5 or 6 hours, if still nothing just shoot all the cargo and life boats and anything you think you can shoot off of the ship just shoot it.

[Morts]

if what GoldenRivet posted doesnt work, fire another torpedo at another part of the ship

[cardician]

Yes obviously using another torpedo would work. Clearly I was asking if that was avoidable. Hence my saying:

I *really* don't want to waste another torpedo on this ship which is definitely sunk, though the game doesn't seem to realize it.

Anyway, its too bad I don't have a deck gun because I *know* that would finish the ship off. Alas my IIA has only a flak gun. I did try that actually. Came right up along side her and unloaded at least 200 rounds all over the ship. Blew up all cargo on the ship, all the "posts" or whatever else explodes. Even tried just filling the hull with holes near and under the waterline hopin that would help. Nothing, though I'm not surprised I suppose. I've literally waited for a total of almost 12 hours now and the ship is not going down. There are times where one half will literally be covered by water due to waves, but yet it still seems to maintain its current depth.

But yes, you're right I definitely took the engines out when I hit it. I may wait a bit longer since I'm not really wasting anything in doing so. But I guess I'm going to have to just waste a torpedo to finish the job for good. Really sucks as that will only leave me with three. Looks like this will be a light tonnage patrol. :cry:

Though I have to say, if this is representing that the crew manage to seal off the flooded area in time, that is pretty neat. But still, the ship is sunk so I should get credit for it.

[xlbob]

It happened to me several times when I attacked small to medium merchant. The ships just wouldn't go down, but I didn't want to wait for long so what I did was I surface the boat and finished the ship with deck gun.

For small-medium ships, whenever weather allows, I always use one torp and when they refuse to sink I finish them with deck gun.

OTOH, I have sunk large ships (large cargos and merchants) with only one torp. I fire two torps and after the first hit, the ship just sink.. waste the second one :D

[cardician]

Well that'd be fine, but I have no deck gun. Otherwise this wouldn't be a problem. A couple of HE shells below the waterline would definitely sink her the rest of the way.

Also, does anyone know how far away you can be from a ship and still get credit when it finally sinks? Like a boat that takes six hours to sink, can I shoot the torpedo, then sail off and be hundreds of nm away when it sinks and get credit?

[Morts]

i belive you have to stay somewhere around visual range

[Foghladh_mhara]

Think my record for sticking around waiting for one to sink is about 12 hours. Wind speed was too high so I couldnt use the deck gun. Got pissed off in the end and fired my stern torp into her. A right sickener when your low on fish

[cardician]

*sigh* I guess I'm going to just have to unload one more on her to put her down for good. That'll leave me with only 3 more fish and I haven't even gotten to my patrol sector yet. Bah!

Oh well, I think after one more patrol I'll have enough renown to upgrade to the VIIB or whatever the new ship model is.

[Canovaro]

How about a little push?

[cardician]

You know, I actually tried that too. I backed up a full km at a 90 degree angle, set it to ahead flank and rammed right into her. I hit her in the front, nothing, just a lot of scraping. Then I tried again and rammed her mid hull. This time about 1/4 of my u-boat went onto the deck of the ship. So much so that it actually damaged torpedo bay 2. So I threw her into full reverse backed up. Repaired the damage and that was it. I mean you'd think with the weight of my boat on top of her she'd at least sink a bit more. Nothing. Something is screwy.

Oddly too though I suffered no hull damage. You'd think ramming full on into a ship would at least dent the hull? ;)

[GoldenRivet]

with limited torps in the Type II you might just have to let the small ones go at least until you either reach or finish patrolling your assigned grid.

sometimes limited torpedos means waiting for the bigger catch.

you could always risk ramming the ship. or just mark its position with a 20 mile radius and go away to the patrol area and just swing back by when your heading home.

[cardician]

Yeah. Will the ship still be here if I go a couple hundred km west and then pass this way on my way home? I mean, it clearly won't sink, but will the game keep it here or will it unload it from memory or something?

[GoldenRivet]

hmm not sure. hahaha i had one low in the water like that and i just went at him flank speed at a 90 degree angle and beached myself on his bow. took a lot of damage but nothing i couldnt manage to get fixed but he sank... of course you should save the game before attempting this!!!

[cardician]

Well as I mentioned I tried it and got the boat at least 1/4 up ontop of him. Nothing though. I guess I could try it again, but that brings me to something else.

If you save the game, how do you load it? From what I've seen, whenever you load a game, it deletes all the saves...or at least it says something like that. And there is no load option from within a mission...if you exit the patrol doesn't it overwrite your saves? Yet I see mention of it on here. How are you people doing it?!? :hmm:

[danlisa]

Do NOT save while close to shipping. You open yourself up to a nasty bug.:yep:

Just give up on this one & move on. Put it down to experience. Besides who's to say that you won't come across a larger vessel.

[cardician]

Yeah, I've heard mention of that bug. That's why I'm leary of saving at all in missions. Yet I see talk of people saving and reloading all the time and I'm not sure how. I must just not understand how SH3 is handling saving and loading since its clearly not normal.

As I said, when you exit a patrol I thought it auto-saved over your last save. I dunno, I'll have to play around with it more tonight. Since I'm only on the second patrol of my career I won't mind if I screw it up and have to start over yet again :-?

[Alexdk]

The saves work like this:

It deletes all the saves AFTER the one you load. I.e you make 3 saves.

1st : Save 1
2nd : Save 2
3rd : Save 3

So if you load Save 2, Save 3 is deleted but Save 1 is not.

If you load Save 1, both Save 2 and Save 3 are lost.

If you load save 3, nothing is lost.

So, any saves infront of the one you are loading is lost but the ones before it are not.

Hope this helps.

Alex

[Zero Niner]

Also, does anyone know how far away you can be from a ship and still get credit when it finally sinks? Like a boat that takes six hours to sink, can I shoot the torpedo, then sail off and be hundreds of nm away when it sinks and get credit?
My last patrol I encountered a convoy. I sank the lead DD, then targeted 2 merchants using bow & stern tubes. As the other escorts were approaching, I then dived to evade, not bothering to stay up to see whether the eels would hit or miss.

Whilst the other DD's and corvettes were giving me a pasting, the 2 merchants I had earlier torpedoed sank. The funny thing is, and the point of this post, is that:

a. No red icon appeared on the nav map (the DD's icon did, but I was at PD when it sank, so no surprise there).
b. I was submeregd, so I didn't see it go down, nor was there a message indicating it sank (which one would normally get from the navigator), nor did the sinking event cam trigger (I have event cam on).
c. This is the most important bit - I *still* got credit for the 2 merchants - I checked my log book and it was listed.

[gord96]

with a large cargo ship or a tanker how many torpedoes to you fire into them at first? 2? 3? right now I have a juicy convoy all sighted up, escorts are no where near. I am thinking of putting 2 in the tanker and 2 in the large cargo. then i will have to dive as the two DD's will be all over me.

Sometimes as says above the ships won't sink for a long time. Do those wounded ships usually fall behind so you can finish them off later? Or should they sink on their own with the two fish.

Silly questions i know but this is my first career with GWX. I played stock before and the ships always sunk quick. Not used to them sticking around (not a complaint I love GWX) so was just wondering. :know:

[Gedscho]

just one lil ... cheat ... for you guys that have external view enabled:

set the camera on the wounded ship, and move on with your travel.
if YOU see it sink, and its outside the crews viewrange, you still get credit for sinking it.

at least im 90% sure about this.

[Enigma]

If its a coastal merchant, I would have rammed him.

[sba55]

I'm outside New Yory in January 1942. Have already sunk a 14,000 ton Ceramic class liner in shallow water. A few days later another one comes by. I hit it with three torpedoes, it settles to the bottom but won't sink because of water depth. The funny thing is while I can see it, my crew doesn't. It also does not show up on the nav map. In the periscope it can be seen but it has no readings. I don't get credit for it either. It's a ghost ship!

[Sailor Steve]

Welcome Aboard! :sunny:

That's an old and well-known flaw with SH3. If the water's too shallow the ship won't sink and you can't get credit for it.