Ship sinking times

[themrwho]

Hi,

Enjoying my newly learned manual targetting skills, after hours of maneuvering I ended up with a paper full of observation data - times of observation, speed, course etc.

It's so much fun if the "Torpedo impact!" comes after manual labour. :up:

While at it, I also noted down ship sinking times, I knew it always took some time to flood-sink a ship with GWX, but what I didn't knew was it could take so long.

Figures below is what I've recorded in my last patrol with GWX 3.0 Gold.

Do you have any similar records?

I would also like to hear about 'record' long times if you have any off the top of your head.

Thanks



"Granville" Freighter (4650 t)

"Torpedo Impact!" @ 07:22
"She's Going Down!" @ 12:18
Time to Sink = 4 hrs 56 mins
[with a single torpedo, which according to Das Boot, costed DM25.000... no wonder why we lost the war :O:]





another "Granville" Freighter (4650 t)

"Torpedo Impact!" @ 22:45
"She's Going Down!" @ 04:36
Time to Sink = 5 hrs 51 mins

[K-61]

I've waited for hours of game time for a ship to sink. I'd guess that when I see the lifeboats paddling away that she's sinking, but I saw one ship sail on for hours afterwards. In my previous patrol I got credit for a sinking in my logbook and hours later it was still afloat. After I broke off from the convoy and sailed away, she was still sitting there. I fired a few deck gun rounds at it just to put it under. I didn't want the British to "salvage" it. :03:

[frau kaleun]

If you have realistic sinking times selected in your realism options, it will take longer for ships to go down. Especially with only one torpedo hit on a medium or larger ship. A lot also depends on where you hit her and whether you used an impact only or a magnetic fuse.

I think the longest time I ever kept track of was well over two hours, maybe closer to three. That was for an ore carrier IIRC, one torpedo to the bow section in pretty heavy seas. Had the seas been calmer and had I not been in great position and range to choose my desired detonation point pretty much at will, I don't think I would've tried to take her down with only one eel (it was too rough to finish her off with the guns). But blowing a hole out from under her bow, combined with the rough seas, was enough do the job. I just had to wait for nature to finish what I started.

Hitting the bow section seems to help, particularly in rougher seas, as the ship's forward momentum will (in theory) cause even more water to be scooped up and into the hole you made.

And an eel set with a magnetic fuse that runs just deep enough to detonate directly below the keel, or at least much farther below the waterline than would be possible with an impact fuse, will cause far more damage, and more immediately critical damage, than blowing a hole in the side of a ship just below the waterline with an impact torpedo.

Also, hitting the engine room or fuel tanks or ammo holds (if it's an armed ship) should also be more likely to result in fires, explosions, or other nasty things that will sink a target faster.

I think I also remember reading that hitting a ship at the spot where a bulkhead separates two compartments belowdecks may also do more immediate damage and result in a faster sinking, because it can cause flooding in both compartments. I seem to remember that a good rule of thumb for this was aiming for a spot directly below one of the ship's masts? But I could be wrong.

I know there is or was a chart showing the different "hit points" of the various ships in the game, giving an indication of which spots on each vessel were more "valuable" in terms of doing enough damage to actually sink her. I don't have it but I'm sure someone else can provide a link to it.

[Kapt Z]

Honestly I am just too impatient to hang around very long waiting for a ship to sink.

If it's safe I will surface and finish them off with the deck gun. If they're armed or it's in a aircraft zone they'll get another torpedo. I may end up using more torpedoes that way, but I prefer to make sure they're 'down' and get out of the area pronto.

[frau kaleun]

Honestly I am just too impatient to hang around very long waiting for a ship to sink.

If it's safe I will surface and finish them off with the deck gun. If they're armed or it's in a aircraft zone they'll get another torpedo. I may end up using more torpedoes that way, but I prefer to make sure they're 'down' and get out of the area pronto.

Depends on location for me, but I'm pretty much the same way. If I'm anywhere that gives me reason to worry about enemy aircraft or other armed assistance showing up, I'll finish 'em off with another torpedo.

If I'm not in range (AFAIK) of anything too dangerous, I'll wait around for a while - but if I've got gun ammo on hand I'd just as soon get it over with that way if the sea state allows for it.

[Tessa]

I've waited for hours of game time for a ship to sink. I'd guess that when I see the lifeboats paddling away that she's sinking, but I saw one ship sail on for hours afterwards. In my previous patrol I got credit for a sinking in my logbook and hours later it was still afloat. After I broke off from the convoy and sailed away, she was still sitting there. I fired a few deck gun rounds at it just to put it under. I didn't want the British to "salvage" it. :03:

The ships have a AI simulated type of counter-flooding/closing bulkheads that is done when a real ship takes enough damage to be in danger of sinking or listing too heavily. Basic idea being if your torpedo blew a hole in the straight middle of the ship water would start going in both directions through any open hatch (or with enough pressure blow through it, though need a larger ship or harsh weather for that), crew then tries to evacuate as many people towards the stern/forecastle closing all the hatches behing them to create trapped pocked of air enough to keep the ship afloat. Listing is an even more serious problem (though good for the player) that the captain has to order the opposite side of the ship to start a controlled flood to try and either stop the listing or get her back to 0. Obvious danger is they're putting in more water to try while some is still flooding in from the hole and can easily sink itself; or the situation became uncontrollable and the order to abandon ship was given (like in the case of the Lexington when it sank).

End wall of text :O:

Short answer if you want shorter sinking times, use magnetic fuses and aim them about 0.5-1.1 meters below the ships keel (easy to find in the recognition manual, merchant and misc ships are all in an unlabelled section, when you first click on the book go backwards one and you'll see it) depending on where you are (harbor, open sea, shallow water) and adjust the depth accordingly. General rule of thumb the rougher the weather the deeper you should have it run - like aiming at a large merchant in gale I'd put the torpedo to run at just a click past 11 meters (making it like 11.1) and usually get great success rates. Rough weather is your friend (unless you don't have the stabalize scope option clicked, then it can really cause motion sickness just from trying to aim at the ship).

To maximize the damage there are spots on various ships that can cause them (large 10,000+ ton) ships to sink with just 1 eel. Best AOB is 45 degress to maximize the surface area of the keel to the torpedo (a 0 or 180 heading is also ideal if they are steady on the course, running under the entire length of the keel will ensure an explosion somewhere. Can't go into all the details for all ships, but for example on a modern tanker aiming at the forward tank, with the target being just under the cargo boom towers (don't know exactly what they're actually called) and on a good day it'll sink immediately, otherwise wait awhile (usually 20-30 minutes) and it'll have flooded enough to sink; faster if in open water with bad weather. Warships always aim under the turrets, they're the most volatile spot on the ship being where the magazines are. Detonation under both turrets (fore and aft) will generally sink any warship instantly, or will eventually sink very fast; unless its slow moving that's a very difficult shot to make.

K-61, to comment on your approach I've found it to be the best way to get the most ships from a convoy. First shot on any ship use magnetic setting/depth and hope it cripples it enough to either sink, or reduce its speed to 1 or 0 knots. Something not moving amkes no sense wasting an eel on it when the convoy is just going to leave it behind. If still moving at convoy speed or maybe just 1 or 2 knots slower 2nd one use impact. Will usually sink it, or at least slow it down enough so it will also drop out of the convoy. Ships moving at 0 knots generally are about to go down, unless its late in the war and the ship is armed with a decent size cannon (something that will hurt you at 1000+ meters) usually only a couple shots, or even 1 shot will finish them off before any kind of air support can arrive.

[Madox58]

Not every ship sunk in a wham bam thank you mama way during WWII.
After the war many sinkings were found not to be sinkings.
VonHelshing spent MANY months working the damages for GW.
I still think that it's the best damage model out there.
And I try to duplicate his work for any new Unit I create.
Sure there are ways around it.
But I LOVE those slow sinkers!
:rock:

It makes the Game for me.

[K-61]

Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking for shorter sinking times, merely commenting on the wide variety of sinking times when using the longer sinking time mod. It adds a great deal more variety to the game and uncertainty as to when a ship is going to sink. I prefer not to use magnetic pistols early in the war or in very rough weather due to the odds of premature detonations, though I will risk them at short range. They are a great tool when firing from angles where an impact pistol could deflect.

[Kapt Z]

Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking for shorter sinking times, merely commenting on the wide variety of sinking times when using the longer sinking time mod. It adds a great deal more variety to the game and uncertainty as to when a ship is going to sink.

I agree. I'm not complaining either. Too many ships just blew up and sank with one torpedo in stock SH3. That I find myself using 2-3 torpedoes sometimes to confirm a sinking is frustrating, but I feel a very realistic situation.

[Madox58]

On the rare occasions I do play?
I enjoy the fact that I never know if or when a Ship will sink.
Stock SH3 never captured my attention like that.
It only managed to get me to look into Mods and then start modding myself.

[Tessa]

Not every ship sunk in a wham bam thank you mama way during WWII.
After the war many sinkings were found not to be sinkings.
VonHelshing spent MANY months working the damages for GW.
I still think that it's the best damage model out there.
And I try to duplicate his work for any new Unit I create.
Sure there are ways around it.
But I LOVE those slow sinkers!
:rock:

It makes the Game for me.

After the war all the countries eventually got around to exchanging information about ships to find out if they were sunk or not and compare it against what was claimed lost. Though rare, few times captains underestimated and claim less than the actual tonnage. His work is impressive to say the least, compiling all that info would be rough having to deal with so many archives to go through.

There were other factors unique to wwii though that created situations that allowed for sinking freightors with a single eel. When liberty ships were first constructed and used their hulls were weak in the middle, in the cold north atlantic water it made them brittle and with one hit straight in the middle they'd usually crack in half! Eventually they fixed the problem but for awhile they were just about as safe as being in the submarine trying to hunt it!

[Flaxpants]

I love the GWX damage model, you're never really sure what's going to happen when you hit 'em. Once when I was attacking a convoy I hit, amongst other things, an imperial type freighter. It took a hit near the bow, started to list to the left and the front, which was obviously flooded dropped down in the water. But not enough to sink her, and off she went, albeit at a slow speed seemingly injured but still able to continue.

I couldn't finish the job as I was too busy trying to avoid depth charges by this point. That stuck in my mind and made the whole encounter very memorable. Great stuff.

[maillemaker]

wham bam thank you mama

I think you're going it wrong... :)

[frau kaleun]

I think you're going it wrong... :)

FAIL. :O:

[Gerald]

In my patrol (mission), I work with war ships and they have a significantly faster time to go to the bottom,and it is not surprising then they are loaded with quite a lot of ammo and they explode normally,when you hit right

http://imgur.com/DL7f2.jpg

[themrwho]

Thanks for the input. I have realisting sinking times, and I too enjoy the uncertainity.

Next is mastering hits and doing this 'sweetspots' thing veterans speak of.

I got the basic idea, so theory is there - only application is left. I will try to find calm seas and loners to apply my scientific methods now :D

However I notice in '39 Dec it is quite often than not I find the 15m/s winds with heavy rainfall. Perhaps because I go 2048x TC against the general concensus of 128 should be the max TC. At least I am positive that this is not a constant situation, sometimes I get other weather too. Summary = heavy seas OFTEN but not always.

Some other random bits that I would like to share and ask for your comments is below, (I will not thread spam & post 5 threads for 5 random bits)



It's the beginning of the war ('39 Dec) sneaking into harbors in II A is unbelievebly easy. As I know that I am no master of anything, I wonder if I am not playing the same game with some people who say sneaking into harbours is too risky. or maybe they have stock SH3 while I have GWX Gold? But then general idea is stock=easy, GWX=difficult, right? What do you think on this?

What I am doing is this:

Approach to ~30 km of harbour
submerge to 15m
silent mode=ON
set speed=1kn
plot a safe enough course (=always go on an imaginary 'lane' in the middle of the strait/port) if necessary draw ruler lines on two sides of the coast and measure exact center and travel on that.
Even if that hits a mine, with 1 kn speed & 15m deep mine will not damage you more than 20 mins repair times even with LRT=ON
when around 800 m to harbour port, stop and listen, if it's safe enough, raise observation periscope, map visually, pick the targets, mark on map
maneuver to ideal attack location for the best possible target ship
fire and do one of these

slowly go back as you came
stop and reload now or anytime in the next 3 hours plus to 16 hours time frame & repeat the attack
This 3 hours of 'cool down' time frame is just assuming the destroyers/trawlers are 'aware' of enemy presence and would find me (actually in game they cannot - I guess - anyway





I had so many other stuff to ask you but can't remember any now, I will post later on if n when it comes back.

Thanks

[Foggy]

Glad I came across this thread. I ran my first full patrol with a new character earlier (I'm using GWX 3 and the Merchant Fleet Mod, both of which I'm fairly new to) and I was in an area with a couple of sub-5k tonners and I sank one quckly, and the other one took its sweet time sinking. I didn't want to waste another eel on it so I used accelerated time to watch it eventually drop down into the sea, tip up the bow to an 80 degree angle or so and start to drop in. However, with about 30' of the end of the ship left above the water, it stopped sinking. The ship was 90% underwater, but the very front of the ship stuck out of the water, like some kind of monument lol. I waited and waited and it never dropped. I got credit for the kill, so I just left.

On the way back to the base, in a nearly identical area of the map (BF32 or BF33?) I tried to sink another ship and it did the same thing. It left the very tip of the ship sticking out of the water, and wouldn't go under, except I didn't get credit for sinking that one LOL. Weird.

privateer called it though, the slow sinkers really change this game up and add a nice level of anticipation, depth and realism to the experience...

[frau kaleun]

On the way back to the base, in a nearly identical area of the map (BF32 or BF33?) I tried to sink another ship and it did the same thing. It left the very tip of the ship sticking out of the water, and wouldn't go under, except I didn't get credit for sinking that one LOL. Weird.

Given the location the ships may have been in water so shallow that even with one section resting on the bottom another part was still above the surface. Much of the Channel is relatively shallow, at least in the game.

Whether or not you get credit for the kill probably depends on the number of hit points involved for the ship in question rather than how far under the water it is at any given moment. Once it's taken enough damage to be considered a total loss it will register as "sunk" no matter what its apparent condition, and until it takes that much damage it won't. I've had ships show as "sunk" when they're still entirely on the surface (although obviously sitting lower and lower in the water).

I have to say though that I've never had one go almost entirely under and not show up as "sunk" by that point. Did you stick around very long after it got that far down? 'Cause if you get too far away before the game registers a ship as sunk, you won't get credit for it even if the "kill" was inevitable over time given the amount of damage you caused. Once you get beyond a certain range of another vessel, the game stops rendering it - so if it hasn't shown up as sunk by then it never actually sinks in terms of how the game registers such events.

[K-61]

You said it, Foggy. I quickly became jaded from the damage model of stock SH3. The same old, tired sinking effects, the ship predictably breaking in half or going up like a fireworks factory fire, or getting the same result from repeatedly pounding the upper structure of the hull with the deck gun. Ships sink from losing their buoyancy and that results from holes in the hull. Pounding the funnel or upperworks with shells in stock SH3 resulted in the same old "hit points = X and poof, she's gone!"

I love watching my victims sink. It reminds me of my childhood. I had a fleet of plastic boats I used to play with in the bathtub. It could be at bath time, but usually I would not be in the tub with them, I'd fill up the tub and play with my boats. I'd take one of my Mom's kitchen knives and drill a small hole in the keel, then put some of my Mattel or Corgi cars in them to weigh them down and then watch them sink. To vary their sinking patterns I'd drill the holes in different locations or use weights in different locations. My eldest brother used to make home made explosives and demolish his toys, then mine and my youngest brother's.

We were twisted little buggers!

Now, I get to watch lovely sinkings and no water is required! This game was made for me, or I was made for it.

[Gerald]

http://imgur.com/rJHtX.jpg

[Foggy]

Good info, Frau (thanks for the explanation!). I think I hung around for probably what would have been half an hour to an hour in accelerated game time, so it might have possibly sunk had I stuck around longer, and the thought had occurred to me that I needed to fire another eel at the last part of the ship sticking out of the water to make it go all the way down, but I was out of eels (both fore and aft) and the sea was too rough to use the deck gun. Hurling insults at it didn't seem to make it sink either... :O:

[frau kaleun]

Good info, Frau (thanks for the explanation!). I think I hung around for probably what would have been half an hour to an hour in accelerated game time, so it might have possibly sunk had I stuck around longer, and the thought had occurred to me that I needed to fire another eel at the last part of the ship sticking out of the water to make it go all the way down, but I was out of eels (both fore and aft) and the sea was too rough to use the deck gun. Hurling insults at it didn't seem to make it sink either... :O:

IIRC I've read other accounts of players watching a ship "sink" in shallow water only to rest on the bottom with part if it still sticking up through the surface, and the game never designating the ship as a kill they got credit for. Don't know how long they stuck around for it either, or whether or not putting another torpedo into it would've made a difference.

I guess it's possible that a ship sinking in shallow water like that could take its final, fatal damage from the sea floor and not because of any damage done directly by the ammo that hits it. In that case maybe nature gets the kill, and not the kaleun... in much the same way that you can put a torpedo into something and then have the Luftwaffe come along and bomb it, and even if it sinks you don't get the credit because it was the air attack that took care of the final hit point.