Attacking convoy in stormy weather

[overandout]

Can anyone offer suggestions on approaching/attacking a convoy during poor weather conditions (rain, wind, choppy waves, etc). The red silhouettes of enemy merchant's disappear. How can I see them to set up an attack? All I see are the black lines.

Cheers,

Lee

[raymond6751]

Visability is the reason your red marks vanish. The crew are losing sight of the enemy.

You didn't say if you are submerged, but I'm guessing you are surfaced.

If visibility is bad for you, it is too for them. You can approach closer.

You will likely want to fire salvo in bad seas. Single shots would have lower chances to hit a bouncy target.

You can use the pencil tool to put marks on the plot where you do spot ships. You can also put marks at the end of those black lines, which represent the sound contacts. (weird on the surface in stormy seas to hear them!)

[Diopos]

If you feel you have a good estimate of convoy's course and speed I would suggest a "0-gyro-angle" torp shooting technique ("Dick O'Kane" and relative techniques here (http://http//www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=146795)) maybe combined with a "sonar only" approach.
Bad weather in fact is a good thing. You can get closer "in" easily. Closer shots will compensate for inaccurate estimates (to some degree eh! :DL).



.

[sergei]

And once you get surface search radar, attacking in bad weather become fun :DL

[WernherVonTrapp]

Yes, bad weather is your friend. Makes it harder for the enemy to spot you visually and more difficult to pick you up with sonar (in rough seas). I was setting up an ambush on a lone merchant when all of a sudden, it went from blue skies to torrential downpours with 0 visibility. I surfaced, manned the deck gun and was firing blind with about 500yds distance between my boat and the enemy ship. Though my shells were hitting the vessel, we still never made visual contact. I got a gray "ship sunk" icon after the attack.

[JoeCorrado]

If you are able to make a visual contact in a bad storm, it probably means you are too close for a torpedo shot- best option is to lock TDC and move far enough away to take your shot.

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WernherVonTrapp (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=247432) "... a gray "ship sunk" icon after the attack. "

I think the gray signifies that while a ship was sunk, you do not actually get credit for the ship. On stormy nights, and in a panicked convoy- collisions occur- I have also had ships sink from bad weather alone with no assistance from me at all.

One time, two airplanes collided in their haste to attack me... I should have gotten an assist on THAT one! :rotfl2:

[WernherVonTrapp]

If you are able to make a visual contact in a bad storm, it probably means you are too close for a torpedo shot- best option is to lock TDC and move far enough away to take your shot.

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WernherVonTrapp (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/member.php?u=247432) "... a gray "ship sunk" icon after the attack. "

I think the gray signifies that while a ship was sunk, you do not actually get credit for the ship. On stormy nights, and in a panicked convoy- collisions occur- I have also had ships sink from bad weather alone with no assistance from me at all.

One time, two airplanes collided in their haste to attack me... I should have gotten an assist on THAT one! :rotfl2: I got credit for the sinking. The gray "ship sunk" icon simply means there wasn't any visual confirmation of the sinking.

[Armistead]

Can't remember stock or other mods, but you get credit for any ship you sink you can't see with TMO as long as you hit it. Only thing that stinks is when ships explode and take out nearby ships, no credit. I've sunk four ships with one torp, hit one and the explosion took out three nearby. In reality you would get credit, not in game, but still fun to see how many you can take out.

Using the deckgun is easy in the storm, just use radar or sonar and get to about 500 yards from the ship, keep asking for bearings to nearest ship, look at the range and fire down the bearing. Once you set it on fire it's easy to shoot at.

I often use the sonar only method by RR, works great. However once they know you're around they usually start flasing lights, but you can see this light, giving you a bearing to shoot at with the deckgun or torps. Just get close, but not so close that an exploding ship takes you out.:haha:

Just be careful later war, many escorts have radar and capital ships with radar will direct those that don't to you. Nothing worse than having 3 escorts run right up your stern in a storm. If you run radar they will also home in on that, so I leave mine off except a few seconds to set up, but I change directions a lot to clear my baffles and ask sonar for nearest warships. Course I never run submerged in a storm.

[JoeCorrado]

I got credit for the sinking. The gray "ship sunk" icon simply means there wasn't any visual confirmation of the sinking.

And so you are right.

On my last patrol, I was first assigned to deliver an agent. Then to patrol the area just south of the entrance to the straight formed between the main island of Honshu and Shikoku to the West. One of my all time favorite patrol areas due the the combination of military and merchant traffic through the narrows.

The weather was terrible upon my arrival on station, and terrible it STAYED. For the entire patrol... which lasted till I ran out of torpedoes.

http://webpages.charter.net/joecorrado1/SH4Img_1.jpg

It was November 1942, and my Gato class submarine has just recently been upgraded with surface radar. The horrible weather and use of radar, made it a snap to deliver the agent, and then for fantastically fun hunting afterward. By the end of the patrol, I had sunk 15 ships for over 92k tons. The tally included a fleet class carrier and a heavy cruiser as well as an entire 8 ship convoy consisting 3 dd escorts and 5 large merchantmen, the prizes were the two large tankers included in this convoy! The icing on the cake was casually taking out the escorts one by one afterward.

The only time that I felt like I was in any real danger at all, was after getting a tip on a task force nearly on top of me. I circled back and within just a few hours they began showing up on my radar. I was feeling pretty invincible by then... but I quickly realized that the escorts had radar as well. Once I realized that, my feeling of invincibility was quickly dashed aside- and I went to a more involved strategy.

I was able to lure the lead and near side escorts (3 dds) out of position by showing myself on their radar till they all charged toward me like angry bulls seeing red- once they began their charge, I went emergency dive into the stormy seas, and kept descending to 400 feet as I changed course and continued at speed to cut off the capital ships on their now unprotected flank. The escorts charged right on to the place where I had been detected on their radar, and searched dutifully, if haphazardly... but I was long gone. In well under an hour of their charge, I was back at periscope depth running slow and quiet, ready to pop up to radar depth at the last possible moment for my final attack. Setting up to use my now most beloved piece of equipment... my radar, and the Dick O'kane method of attack as the heavies crossed my bow at slightly over 2000 yards.

Sank one carrier and a cruiser- all others escaped, happily- so did I.

Except for the task force escorts equipped with radar of their own- sinking the others was like taking candy from a babe. Even got to make use of the deck gun quite a bit since the merchants show up very well even through the storm once you get them burning.

One other thing I discovered... the escorts without radar are as blind as bats and their use of search lights and signals after my initial attack, was a great assist for my gun crew in sighting in on them... usually managed to sink the destroyers before they ever had a chance to locate me in the storm or fire a shot in reply. I felt obligated since they were there after all.

All in all, I have learned to LOVE the stormy weather and poor visibility. So long as I have radar and they don't. It isn't even a fair fight.

I got credit for every ship that I sank even though every ship showed up gray on the map.

http://webpages.charter.net/joecorrado1/SH4Img_2.jpg

Using TMO 1.9

[Armistead]

Tis fun, just be careful later war, you'll run into more escorts with elite status. If you're not careful, out of nowhere they'll come running up your arse.