rossmum
11-10-12, 02:48 AM
Hello everybody! First post here, it's something I felt had to be shared. I would kill for screenshots or video of the event, but SH3 hasn't been playing nice with Fraps of late, so you'll have to take my word for it. I've had the game on Steam for some time but only recently got around to installing and playing it, and am completely hooked so far.
So, story time:
I am four (technically five according to the game, but that was due to a pitstop) patrols into my first campaign, in a 1st Flotilla Type II. My first patrol was pretty ordinary, since it was still peacetime. My second patrol began just before the war did and was basically one long storm. I couldn't have sunk anything even if I wanted to. Third saw me ordered to interdict shipping at Le Havre, gee thanks BdU. I got to a point just NNW of Dunkirk and spotted a French cargo ship of decent tonnage, but four of my five torpedoes were duds. The fifth was just badly-aimed, but the rest all looked like they would've been good hits. He evidently called for help, because before I knew what had hit me I was being chased by a ship.
I thought it was a gunboat so I crash dived and planned to just slink away. Unfortunately there was a very sudden change in depth (from 15m under keel to OH GOD WHAT IS THAT SCRAPING NOISE) and I was damaged a bit. I repaired it, popped up to periscope depth, turned the scope 180 and found myself staring at the bow of a destroyer so close it was filling the scope. I crash dived but the attack scope was rammed off and the conning tower badly damaged, we were then depth charged and our crash dive was augmented by all the seawater pouring into our new ballast tanks (also known as "the diesel engine room" and "the command room"). We hit the bottom at 37m and were bombed again while the damage control team frantically worked. By some miracle, we got the leaks stopped, the water out, the boat off the bottom, and the destroyer confused. It continued to search behind us, and we eventually slipped away and headed home for Kiel.
So now we have my current patrol.
This time, I am told to report weather in sector AN between the 3rd-6th of October. Okay, that sounds easy. My assigned grid is AN44. Intel says there is a convoy just north and a task force to the west of the Orkneys, but intel also tells me with alarming regularity that there are icebergs floating up the Thames and also in the Aegean Sea, so I don't take too much confidence in it.
I patrol around for a while. The weather is perfect until the morning of the 7th. After a few days of terrible seas and no traffic, I decide to go recce Scapa Flow. I figure it's a bad idea but hey, why not?
11:00 on the 10th I am just off the eastern approaches. I spot a destroyer, quickly identify it as a V&W, and stupidly take three shots at it thinking that I'll just bag something, anything, and run home. All three shots miss astern because I am terrible at firing solutions. After a few moments of terror, the destroyer continues on its merry way, apparently unperturbed. It begins searching around behind me. I count my blessings and continue, slipping by another V&W an hour and a half later. This time I don't shoot.
I need to pick my approach at this point, and go with the southernmost of the two eastern passages, since the northern one would force me past the destroyers at a distance I am not comfortable with. Things go fine until 14:00 when I discover the British have blocked this passage with wrecks. I spend the next half hour (I am crawling along underwater at 2kts on silent running) wringing my hands over what to do, and finally decide it's worth a shot. Using the periscope I steer the boat through what appears to be a workable gap. I get through with about 3-5 metres of clearance either side, and continue on ahead.
An hour later at 15:34 I spot a small vessel, a coal tender. I swing around it and continue, soon after this I spot another V&W, this one with its bow under the waves and its stern lifted high out of the water. I have no idea, I guess it bugged out somehow, it wouldn't be the first time I've seen this happen.
By 20:00 I am sitting 2,800m off the Royal Oak, 90 degrees to its starboard side. 'Haha, time to beat Prien by 4 days, and in a coastal boat!' I think to myself, blissfully unaware that I accidentally stuffed up my firing solution. Both of my remaining torpedoes miss by 1/3 her length off the bow. Soul-crushing disappointment takes over from tension as I turn the boat around and plot a course out of the southern passage...
...Only to hear an explosion four minutes later, and my hydrophone operator telling me he hears a ship breaking up. :huh:
Intel said there was a tanker about 2-3km beyond the Royal Oak on the same general bearing I fired at; did I hit that? I normally wouldn't use the external camera for evil like this, but I have to know: what did I hit?
I get towards the tanker and see smoke. I get a bit closer before realising the smoke is not coming from the tanker, but from a chunk of metal between myself and it.
It's a destroyer.
It must've been anchored right beside the tanker, because the torpedo slammed into the middle of it and broke her keel. The tanker was untouched, I guess the 1 degree spread angle was enough to make it miss by a long way at that distance.
I am now about halfway to the southern approaches and I will be damned if any British ship will catch me. You win this time, Prien, but at least I finally have my revenge on those infernal destroyers.
edit: Escaped Scapa Flow unharmed via the south entrance. Had a close encounter with something underwater but surmised it to be a sub net, surfaced and floated past, sure enough I got out okay. Home to Kiel!
So, story time:
I am four (technically five according to the game, but that was due to a pitstop) patrols into my first campaign, in a 1st Flotilla Type II. My first patrol was pretty ordinary, since it was still peacetime. My second patrol began just before the war did and was basically one long storm. I couldn't have sunk anything even if I wanted to. Third saw me ordered to interdict shipping at Le Havre, gee thanks BdU. I got to a point just NNW of Dunkirk and spotted a French cargo ship of decent tonnage, but four of my five torpedoes were duds. The fifth was just badly-aimed, but the rest all looked like they would've been good hits. He evidently called for help, because before I knew what had hit me I was being chased by a ship.
I thought it was a gunboat so I crash dived and planned to just slink away. Unfortunately there was a very sudden change in depth (from 15m under keel to OH GOD WHAT IS THAT SCRAPING NOISE) and I was damaged a bit. I repaired it, popped up to periscope depth, turned the scope 180 and found myself staring at the bow of a destroyer so close it was filling the scope. I crash dived but the attack scope was rammed off and the conning tower badly damaged, we were then depth charged and our crash dive was augmented by all the seawater pouring into our new ballast tanks (also known as "the diesel engine room" and "the command room"). We hit the bottom at 37m and were bombed again while the damage control team frantically worked. By some miracle, we got the leaks stopped, the water out, the boat off the bottom, and the destroyer confused. It continued to search behind us, and we eventually slipped away and headed home for Kiel.
So now we have my current patrol.
This time, I am told to report weather in sector AN between the 3rd-6th of October. Okay, that sounds easy. My assigned grid is AN44. Intel says there is a convoy just north and a task force to the west of the Orkneys, but intel also tells me with alarming regularity that there are icebergs floating up the Thames and also in the Aegean Sea, so I don't take too much confidence in it.
I patrol around for a while. The weather is perfect until the morning of the 7th. After a few days of terrible seas and no traffic, I decide to go recce Scapa Flow. I figure it's a bad idea but hey, why not?
11:00 on the 10th I am just off the eastern approaches. I spot a destroyer, quickly identify it as a V&W, and stupidly take three shots at it thinking that I'll just bag something, anything, and run home. All three shots miss astern because I am terrible at firing solutions. After a few moments of terror, the destroyer continues on its merry way, apparently unperturbed. It begins searching around behind me. I count my blessings and continue, slipping by another V&W an hour and a half later. This time I don't shoot.
I need to pick my approach at this point, and go with the southernmost of the two eastern passages, since the northern one would force me past the destroyers at a distance I am not comfortable with. Things go fine until 14:00 when I discover the British have blocked this passage with wrecks. I spend the next half hour (I am crawling along underwater at 2kts on silent running) wringing my hands over what to do, and finally decide it's worth a shot. Using the periscope I steer the boat through what appears to be a workable gap. I get through with about 3-5 metres of clearance either side, and continue on ahead.
An hour later at 15:34 I spot a small vessel, a coal tender. I swing around it and continue, soon after this I spot another V&W, this one with its bow under the waves and its stern lifted high out of the water. I have no idea, I guess it bugged out somehow, it wouldn't be the first time I've seen this happen.
By 20:00 I am sitting 2,800m off the Royal Oak, 90 degrees to its starboard side. 'Haha, time to beat Prien by 4 days, and in a coastal boat!' I think to myself, blissfully unaware that I accidentally stuffed up my firing solution. Both of my remaining torpedoes miss by 1/3 her length off the bow. Soul-crushing disappointment takes over from tension as I turn the boat around and plot a course out of the southern passage...
...Only to hear an explosion four minutes later, and my hydrophone operator telling me he hears a ship breaking up. :huh:
Intel said there was a tanker about 2-3km beyond the Royal Oak on the same general bearing I fired at; did I hit that? I normally wouldn't use the external camera for evil like this, but I have to know: what did I hit?
I get towards the tanker and see smoke. I get a bit closer before realising the smoke is not coming from the tanker, but from a chunk of metal between myself and it.
It's a destroyer.
It must've been anchored right beside the tanker, because the torpedo slammed into the middle of it and broke her keel. The tanker was untouched, I guess the 1 degree spread angle was enough to make it miss by a long way at that distance.
I am now about halfway to the southern approaches and I will be damned if any British ship will catch me. You win this time, Prien, but at least I finally have my revenge on those infernal destroyers.
edit: Escaped Scapa Flow unharmed via the south entrance. Had a close encounter with something underwater but surmised it to be a sub net, surfaced and floated past, sure enough I got out okay. Home to Kiel!