Patrol submerged or surfaced?

[Nachoen]

Hello everybody, im new to this game and was wandering what the best way of patrolling an assigned grid is, surfaced or submerged? Which one will give the highest chance of detecting enemy ships?

[kptn_kaiserhof]

u get a good chance of being spotting by the enemy surfaced

but after 1939 and 1940 u get a better chance of being spotted by a british southerland or catalina flying boat / aircraft
if your on the surface



GOOD LUCK

[Nachoen]

Thanks, really having a hard time finding targets, but i guess its just practice like with everything else:)

[Perilscope]

My advice, every so many kilometers (~20km) dive at periscope dept and slow down to 1 knot. Listen on the hydrophone for any screw sounds in the area. If no sound is present, continue your patrol above the waters and seek smoke trails. Repeat the step all along your patrols, you will find more ships then you whished for… ;)

Good Luck and welcome to subsim!

[slow_n_ez]

I'll add too and didn't know for a long time.... when using the hydrophone ... make sure the volume is turned up all the way .... I am in the year 1943 right now ... have to stay submergred most of the patrol since when first leaving port my flak gunners run out of ammo after splashing about 35 air craft ... Welcome aboard captain .... good hunting :cool:

[U-73]

Stay surfaced as much as possible with the exception of using your hydrophones to hear for enemy contacts far off.

Cons for submerged:
1. Seeing enemy targets limited to your periscope.
2. Waste on your fuel.
3. Batteries drained rapidly. Once low you have to surface and are at the mercy of enemy.
4. Speed is cut down to max of 7 knots, which means huge amount of fuel and battery charge used, and small area of operation covered.

Mind you all this info is for early war patrols, later on you have no choice but to stay submerged for long times.

[Ducimus]

Hello everybody, im new to this game and was wandering what the best way of patrolling an assigned grid is, surfaced or submerged? Which one will give the highest chance of detecting enemy ships?

Regardless of weather, you can hear alot farther then you can see.

Personnaly i tend to patrol submerged during the day, and surfaced at night.
The greater the air threat, the longer i will stay submerged. As an ix boat skipper i tend to only be on the surface about 6 - 7 hours during the night if i feel there is an increased air threat or surface patrols.

The Pro's of submerged:
- Sonar detection has some good range. Espeically with stock radar or no radar at all.

- Less chance of being detected by aircraft or surface ships

- I think You save on fuel. Although this point is debatable. When you recharge, one engine is running at 500 RPMs, and if your putting around you have your other engine at about 100- 200 rpms. Both burn fuel. The question is, does that engine configuration at 3-4 hours, burn more fuel, or less fuel then both engines at 100-200 RPMS running for the same amount of time you were submerged.

- Better on crew fatigue if enabled

Cons:
- if you get caught with a low battery, you might be in a bit of a spot.
- You cover less area in your patrol

[Heibges]

If you just are looking to find and sink the maximum amount of enemy ships, you should patrol submerged. Hydrophones, in every subsim dating back 20yrs to Silent Service, have always made it very easy to find targets. Hydrophones are better at finding targets than surface search radar. You will have twice the tonnage from patrolling submerged as opposed to patrolling surfaced.

But if you want to play historically, Submarines, both German and American patrolled on the surface. Hydrophones were generally only used in periods of poor visibility for safety. I would suggest the following

1939 to 1941 Surfaced as much as possible.
1942 Submerged by day, Surface by night
1943 Surfaced by day, Submerged at night
1944 to 1945 Submerged as much as possible.

The more uboats had to stay submerged the less successful they became. Due to their slow underwater speed, they had to rely on the enemy to practically steam right over them, once they were forced from the surface.

[Keelbuster]

Whether you are surfaced, or submerged, your own eyes and ears are usually superior to that of the AI. Even with a great bridge crew, sometimes they'll spot a PT boat when it's 1500m from your boat when you could have, with a careful turn of the UZO, spotted it at a safe range. You can detect ships via hydrophone at ~2X the distance that the AI (perfectly trained) will. Get the 16km visibility mod. It's essential. Surface visuals are pathetic without it. At 8k visibility (stock game) you might as well always run submerged.

So, every once and a while, drop from time compression, grab the uzo and scan the horizon, then drop to 60m, go to hydrophone, make sure the volume is maxed, _stop_ the engines and do a slow 360 scan. You'll find something. It's amazing how much is out there that the AI misses. I've been in the midst of 3 distant contacts with no report from my sonar man.



Kb

[Dimitrius07]

I totaly agree with Heibges tactics :up: :yep:

[tbarak]

I'm on patrol 19 and I've never seen an enemy ship within my assigned patrol grid. Reaching that grid is usually done simply to get the renown, and I usually just sit in it for 24 hours, submerged and still to conserve fuel. Although you could I suppose patrol it submerged to conserve diesel.

Check the literature that came with the game, it has a map that shows the lanes the enemy ships and convoys take to and from England. It's then a simple matter of lurking near those lanes until the juicy merchants and convoys arrive. Otherwise look at the map, if you know your history then you know supplies moved back and forth from the US and Canada to Europe, and it's not hard to get a sense of where they would travel. There are only a couple of bottlenecks near England where they can travel to the various ports, and those are great hunting grounds.

And yes, the hydrophones are your best means of finding them from afar. GL Kaleun.

[JScones]

I can't recall when I last saw a ship around the alloted patrol grid. I suspect it's due to all the "reduced contact" mods that have made their way into the game. But that's not a complaint.

One thing I recommend though, if you are after immersion and am not adverse to real tactics, grab a copy of the U-boat Commander's Handbook. For instance, it states at para 28 (paraphrased here) that using the hydrophone to help detect surface ships should be restricted to when the submarine is unavoidably compelled to stay below the surface. It further states that the Hydrophone must not lead to inactivity underwater (ie just sitting submerged at periscope depth for 24 hours waiting for the mission objective to change to "Complete"). The Hydrophone is an auxillary instrument and shouldn't be seen as a replacement for surface viewing. As soon as visibility allows, the place of the submarine is on the surface.

Mind you, I'd like to see that paragraph in the 1944/45 edition!

I believe it also comments on when to use the Hydrophone (dawn and dusk?), but I can't locate that para at the moment.

Anyway, I just trawl around the patrol grid at very slow speed, using hydrophone every now and again. After 24 hours I widen my net.

[Heibges]

It's in the preceding paragraph.

In his memoirs Dönitz talks about the tactics they used later in the war.

In 1944 and 1945 the uboats had become what he had warned against: stationary and passive. They had to stay submerged all or at least most of the time. This resulted in most of the time being spent to and from the patrol area, rather than in the patrol area in years prior. They didn't suddenly surface when they got a sound contact, and take off at high speed. They stayed submerged, slowly moved towards the target, and hoped that fortune would smile on them and targets would move towards them.

This would be if the uboat was fortunate enough to have an operational schnorkel.

Also, Dönitz focused his operations in the shallows of the English Coast and had success, and well as in far away areas of the oceans.

If you remember the Erich Topp interview at the beginning of SH2, he says that even in 1944 and 1945 uboats were forced to go to sea without a schnorkel on basically suicide missions.

You have to wonder how many boats were lossed to aircraft because the uboat was forced to surface due to a faulty schnorkel.

[Partsking]

Get the 16km visibility mod. It's essential. Surface visuals are pathetic without it. At 8k visibility (stock game) you might as well always run submerged.


Tried to find that mod, no luck. Got a link?

[Ducimus]

The problem is that in a SH3 context, sonar is better then radar. Regardless of conditions you will always hear farther then you can see. And you have sonar throughout the entire game.

In short, sonar is probably TOO good here. At least thats my thought. Was sonar as effective in RL? Ill wager if it wasn't , if you were to make sonar that good, they'd have spendt more time submerged looking for contacts or doing diving to do ALOT more hydrophone checks.

[Heibges]

The fact was that the hydrophones were that effective in real life, but it only tells half the story. The problem in subsims is that we have too good an idea where the enemy is, whereas in the real world it was a constant game of cat and mouse with the shipping routes.

Visual Viewing Distance: 15 miles
Hydrophone Listening Distance: 50 miles

Surfaced Speed: 6kts (@12mph)
Submerged Speed: 1kts (@ 2mph)

In a 12 hour period:

Surface you would patrol about 159 miles of ocean.
Sumberged you would patrol 74 miles of ocean.

Now multiply this by 100 submarines at sea.

That is why surface search radar was so important on American submarines. They could travel at surfaced speed, and still see what was going on for 30 miles around them.

But the way targets have traditionally spawned in subsims going back to Silent Service, this advantage is not shown.

I think you would need a spawning target system that takes into consideration time at sea and distance travelled to make it realistic. Using "historic convoy routes" is part of the problem. It detracts from realism instead of making the game more realisitic.

This would reward captains who could keep their boats at sea a long time, and covered a lot of territory, while folks who sat still would not see very much.

[Ducimus]

Thats a good point. If you dont know where they are, then youd get better results by covering more ocean. Preferbly with a good radar.

But if you know where they generally are, then i thats a different story. I think this problem is magnfied when you mod your own game and having worked with the RND and SCR layers, have a pretty good idea where everything is :D

[Keelbuster]

Get the 16km visibility mod. It's essential. Surface visuals are pathetic without it. At 8k visibility (stock game) you might as well always run submerged.


Tried to find that mod, no luck. Got a link?

Just get NYGM TW, or GW (if you've got a sweet rig). That will solve all yer problems.

Kb

[Grossies2005]

aNTHONY

[jaxa]

If you just are looking to find and sink the maximum amount of enemy ships, you should patrol submerged. Hydrophones, in every subsim dating back 20yrs to Silent Service, have always made it very easy to find targets. Hydrophones are better at finding targets than surface search radar. You will have twice the tonnage from patrolling submerged as opposed to patrolling surfaced.

But if you want to play historically, Submarines, both German and American patrolled on the surface. Hydrophones were generally only used in periods of poor visibility for safety. I would suggest the following

1939 to 1941 Surfaced as much as possible.
1942 Submerged by day, Surface by night
1943 Surfaced by day, Submerged at night
1944 to 1945 Submerged as much as possible.

The more uboats had to stay submerged the less successful they became. Due to their slow underwater speed, they had to rely on the enemy to practically steam right over them, once they were forced from the surface.

I'm agree with these year suggestions, see "Iron Coffins" for info. During 1944-45 uboots without schnorchel haven't any chances for alive patrolling surfaced.

[Zyco]

When I get a patrol mission I generally set waypoint to furthest corner and set next waypoint to cross the entire grid and I slowly patrol it until I get a contact. I am generally submerged during this period, unless its bad weather or night where I pop up for a bit.

[Umfuld]

I also just sit in the patrol grin for 24 hours, and then move off into known shiipping/convoy lanes.

Don't think that just because they assigned you to a certain grid it means there's some special reason they want you to be there.


I'm just getting into SH3 Comndr, and am thinking about giving myself grid AM19 every patrol.

YAY!