1943 Impossible????

[viper771]

I have the World mod and that is alli i have installed.... and i wanted to try a new career in 1943.. first i went to the base which has the IX boats and i put uber flak on it.... within the first day of my patrol, where i just left my base.... i was killed by planes... Those suntherlands (sp?) bombed me dead on, and killed me.. so i tried again.. sAME THING, got bombed to death at NIGHT :(... so i tried another 1943 career and started from norway.... before i got to my grid by scapa flow... my hull was down to 10% and i gave up... the only ships i saw were 2 destroyers by scapa flow...and thats it.... radar sucks for the uboats.. when does the snorkel become available to put on the boat??/? forget using a IX boat that late in the war... you are just a sitting target...

[Tullaian]

Historically Uboats by 1943 were taking huge casualties and heading past 80% loss rates. Suffice to say as the war goes on, it becomes increasingly difficult to survive. By the end of the war something like 95% of all Uboats had been sunk in action.

Without snorkel and radar, uboats took to travelling on the surface in daytime trusting the lookouts to spot planes in time to crash dive to escape and travelling submerged at night where they couldn't see the planes in time. Just give up trying to shoot the enemy planes down, and crash dive as soon as you see one.

But yes, it gets quite hard.

[Nopileo]

Search for a great mod called the 'SensorPak' in the mods forum. It's by Jungman. It increases the range of your radar detector to about 25 km (I think), so you'll get a fair warning when aircraft/warships are approaching you.

[viper771]

THanks for the info guys! Yeah, i usually run outta ammo and the planes still come!!!!!!! The heavy flak (the one shot at a time one) is pretty worthless... yeah usually by the time i know a plane is comming, its wayyyyyyy too late.. that one plane dropped a ton of little bomblettes all over the sub killing everyone ;(
when can i get the snorkel... that would help a GREAT DEAL!!!!!
It must of really sucked for the guys in real life...I salute them :rock:

[Duli]

Historically Uboats by 1943 were taking huge casualties and heading past 80% loss rates. Suffice to say as the war goes on, it becomes increasingly difficult to survive. By the end of the war something like 95% of all Uboats had been sunk in action.

Without snorkel and radar, uboats took to travelling on the surface in daytime trusting the lookouts to spot planes in time to crash dive to escape and travelling submerged at night where they couldn't see the planes in time. Just give up trying to shoot the enemy planes down, and crash dive as soon as you see one.

But yes, it gets quite hard.

No way that 95% of U-Boots were sunk in action. Around 230 were sunk by planes, and some 200 by DC, the rest of them did survive. Germans build 568 VIICs so at least 200 of them survived and were then scuttled.

[Seminole]

i put uber flak on it.... within the first day of my patrol, where i just left my base.... i was killed by planes..

Strangley enough the Germans did precisely the same thing and then sent 3 of the AA enhanced U-Boats out as a combat group hoping to have at least some defense against the maurading British planes.

Two of the three were sunk in the Bay of Biscay with the first attack.No planes were downed. The third escaped by diving to tell the tale.


We asked for realism...we got realism.

Pull the plug before first light. Fighting it out with AC is not a proper function of a U-Boat.

[Duncan Idaho]

I'm with ya there, Seminole. I learned the hard way, I now automatically dive when planes are spotted, and if I know I've depth, I'm mashing the crash dive button while the automatic dive has started.

[Tullaian]

U-boat combat losses 1939-1945

1939 9
1940 24
1941 34
1942 86
1943 237
1944 238
1945 123

Total U-boats lost 751 (as you can see it gets ugly very fast for the uboat commander past 1943).

In addition some approx 400 uboats of varying types and conditions were destroyed or scuttled at the end of the war either by the Germans in Operation Regenbogen or the Allies in Operation Deadlight which accounts for the 1149 total Uboats in the Kriegsmarine. However many of those were older training boats , boats that had not yet made it to combat etc. etc. Iron Coffins and a few other historical account books indicate that by the end of the war very close to 100% of the operational combat effective Uboats had been destroyed in combat.

Interestingly in Iron Coffins if you piece together his account of his personal tonnage sunk from 1943 onwards he basically sinks nothing and is almost destroyed a number of times, many patrols he was forced back to port without having been able to even fire a single shot.

[Damo1977]

Germany: U-boats claimed 14.4 million tons, but Germany lost 821 U-boats (see Map of Lost U-Boats). Allied aircraft were responsible for (or directly involved in) the loss of 433 U-boats; surface ships, 252; accidents, 45; mines, 34; submarines 25 (only one of which happened when both hunter and victim were submerged); unknown, 15; scuttled by their own crews, 14; interned in neutral ports, 2; sunk by shore battery, 1.
comes from "Hitlers Lost Sub" site

Just adding my 2cents............. :up: