Hello, hello!

[Umfuld]

Just thought I’d make a thread to say hello, hope you don’t mind.


Not a Sim game enthusiast by any stretch. Just bought SSIII by what I saw on the box in the store and have been very pleased with the game over the year I’ve been playing.
Wish I’d known of this place then, as it would have saved me a lot of trial and error. Oh well.
About a month ago I downloaded my first patch for any PC game (the latest one, 1.4 or whatever) and that has made it all the more enjoyable.


I play campaigns only, and have never played online. Just thought I’d talk about some aspects and try and get some feedback if I can.


First off, deck guns. I find it odd that they say in the manual not to get too caught up in the deck gun. I am all about the deck gun, at least early in the war.

A couple of missions ago (April, 1941 / VIIB) I had over 50,000 tons sunk before I fired my first torpedo. I’m not kidding. This was on 92% difficulty (ship sink time, and auto targeting the only aides I use). I ended up with 78,031 tons that patrol, I’d have to guess my best on a higher difficulty.
Normally the weather turns bad before too long, so I make a habit of speeding around busy parts of the ocean right at the start of a patrol.
Also, I will sometimes target the escorts of a convoy with torpedoes and if I knock them all out I pop up and take out 6 or 7 of the largest ships with the deck gun. More so early in the war as taking out three Destroyers at once can be a bit tricky.
I’ve never lost a gun fight with a Corvette or Armed Trawler before.

So just wondering if any of you use the deck gun as much?

Have you ever taken on a Destroyer with the deck gun? (I have not.)




Secondly, I pretty much only use the T1 (G7a) type torpedoes. I’d imagine that’s not very common. But I just have come to love the flexibility of speed changes, and most of all the long distance. I am starting to use magnetic a bit more (on larger ships) but feel much more confident running at about 2 meters/Impact detonation. And I’d say about 95% of the time one impact torpedo will sink any Small Merch, Coastal Merch, Destroyer, Small Tanker, or smaller warships.

The two times I’ve made it later in the war when more advanced torpedoes are available I made the idiotic blunder of not realizing that they cost renown, and both times ended up blowing thousands fiddling with different armaments. A mistake I don’t think I’ll make again. :-?

Anyway, what’s your preference with torpedoes?



Well, this is getting long for a hello thread so I’ll stop there and come back with some more at another time.
Sorry if you’ve discussed all of this over and over on other threads. I’d rather spend my time sinking tankers than searching. (Okay, so I’m kind of a jerk.)


But I’d really appreciate any thoughts you have, mates!

[Dowly]

Welcome to SubSim! :up:

I myself dont use the deckgun almost never. First of all, it was hardly ever used in real life to sink anything bigger than a 1000 ton vessel. For me it spoils the whole game if I use it. In the stock game, the deckgun is too powerfull and the ships sink even if you shoot long enough to the middle finger of the ships captain.

I highly recommend for you to download one of the big mods out there. That´s where the enjoyment begins. :)

[Umfuld]

Yeah, I figured it was unrealistic. But I like to set the realism high and then play the game as is.

I'm pretty ignorant about downloads and stuff, and I'd like to finish the game I'm doing at the moment. But I'll ask what those MODs are all about later on. Thanks.

[Scorpius]

Bah i love my deck gun. One of the flaws of GW was that it got nerfed. I guess they never heard of happy times at the start of the war. It has really become a pea shooter now. More of a decoration than a weapon.

Personally i beleive that a sub captain uses all weapons at his disposal. If that means a deck gun, then that deck gun better not be neutralised.

So in the end i ripped that part out of the mod and kept the rest. (well a few others got accidently on purpose misplaced into the recycle bin)

But on all 80% of the super mods are like this. A majority of good stuff but a few bad things.

But of course try them all out and make your own mind up on what you like and dont like.

[Khayman]

U-109 took 200 10.5cm and 100 3.7cm shells to sink the 3531 ton ship Halcyon. So sinking a ship in SH3 within a minute or two is highly unrealistic - happy times or not. It is a game though, so as you say if you don't like something then don't use it. I personally have the stock deck gun damage as well :oops: :D

Umfuld, you're not alone in preferring the G7a torps. I set them all to fast since I'm never more than 5000m away. There's not much problem with the wake if you're closer than 1000m. They may spot the torps but they don't have time to evade. Later in the war some T5's are handy for warships. I watched one underwater and it was impressive the way it homed in on the Destroyer then blew it sky high :)

[Umfuld]

Yeah, I usually use fast as well. But it's good to have the range if you need it. (A desperation shot at a Battleship speeding by, for example.)


Question: When using the magnetic detonation, do you think it improves your chances to use the slow speed?
I figure the faster the better for Impact detonation, but have started using slowest for magnetic, just in case.

[Threadfin]

Personally I use G7a until summer 1940, then use electrics the rest of the war. The advantage isn't in the sense of the target not seeing the wakes, but electrics significantly reduce the ability of counterattacking escorts to find the player's boat. To me that's the advantage of electric torpedos.

[U-Bones]

I never leave port with wake makers if I can help it.

[Umfuld]

Yeah, good point. I still remember when I first started playing I heard an odd sound on the hydro. Took me awhile to figure out it was my own torpedo. :P



Another thing I'm intersted in is how you guys feel about firing salvos.
I myself have not gotten into this much at all. Except if I have a Destroyer bearing down on me and I want to be sure I hit it.

I guess I just can't bring myself to fire three or four torpedoes knowing that at best, two or three are going to miss.

[Khayman]

I like the long range patrols of the type IX's. The vast majority of targets I come across are lone ships, so counterattacks don't come into the equation for me. If I was doing a lot of convoy attacks then I'd certainly prefer electrics.

[Threadfin]

I use salvos, especially against fast moving ships, since by the time the first torpedo hits the angle will have worsened considerably for any follow up shots.

Mostly I use manual spreads, that is, I fire the fish individually in a spread (not TDC directed fan), which allows me to precisely target and spread the fish. Using the fan setting on the TDC is a lot of guess work. Firing at bows, sterns, masts, stacks etc, is more precise IMO.

Only against the fast moving ships will I use a TDC-set spread salvo.

In the conning tower are switches to open/close tubes, and when firing the 'manual spreads' I'll open all the doors so I don't have to wait for the door to open on each new shot.

I use manual targeting and TDC.

[Umfuld]

I'm starting to get pretty good at adjusting the auto angle by a point or two for a close, zig zagging ship. Anticipating its evasion.

Okay. Not that good. But I've done it once or twice, so it's a start.

[SeeStark]

Welcome! I personally use the deck gun as much as possible on merchant ships and save torps for something that can fire back/chase me. The only problem comes after '41 when the C2's and others gain some fat deck guns! Of course ive been very unlucky with the weather lately so Ive been forced underwater for many attacks.

As for torpedo choice, I love the G7A's, there is nothing more annoying than watching an E crawl along to a target at snails pace, then die because its run out of juice :down: My tactic= set them on fast, get a perfect angle and set up the attack on the next boat.

[Scorpius]

I only use salvos if i need to fire more than 2 fish. Which is really rare. So far in my previous career that went until the end of 1940, i only did it once on a passenger liner. Nuetral yes, but juicy nonetheless.

[andy_311]

Am at the point where my deck gun is vertually useless am in 43 playing GWv1.0 single contacts are virtually none and convoys yeah but since I've stopped takeing out the escorts and consentrating on merchants to me that deck gun is just for show.

[Keelbuster]

I use salvos, especially against fast moving ships, since by the time the first torpedo hits the angle will have worsened considerably for any follow up shots.

Mostly I use manual spreads, that is, I fire the fish individually in a spread (not TDC directed fan), which allows me to precisely target and spread the fish. Using the fan setting on the TDC is a lot of guess work. Firing at bows, sterns, masts, stacks etc, is more precise IMO.

Only against the fast moving ships will I use a TDC-set spread salvo.

In the conning tower are switches to open/close tubes, and when firing the 'manual spreads' I'll open all the doors so I don't have to wait for the door to open on each new shot.

I use manual targeting and TDC.

I agree in a major way. You basically have one optimal time window, and you want to make sure you score a crippling hit. I estimate %50 duds, which is high, but it protects me from the C3 that lists but continues with the convoy nonetheless. As threadfin said, it's guesswork firing salvos - i'm never quite sure what angle is best - i do it by eye - open all the tubes and fire at specific points through the Peri. The beauty of manual targetting is that you don't have to have your reticule over the target to fire a shot. And, TDC salvo firing doesn't save you any ttime - the shots fire in sequence . I'm not sure why this is, apart from the possibiliyt of mag, or acoustic homing torpedoes from exploding or tracking each other.


For crippled ships, I deck gun the hell out of them. I can bring 1 or 2 ships to sinking with the deck gun, and save the torps for another ship. NYGM TW 1.1.

Kb

[tbarak]

The deck gun is additional fire power and extends tonnage sunk/renown earned beyond what the torpedoes yield. The major drawback is of course its weather dependent nature, and often its use is limited by your fuel or when your patients runs out. You can spend a week shadowing a wounded tanker if you're out of eels with no good weather in sight to employ your gun.

Engaging a convoy in mid-war and later with the guns is suicide unless of course its used as a coup de gras on a straggler merchant say you've disabled with a torp. But you can chill around the single ship lanes and catch lots of C2s and up with sometimes a small or coastal merchant in tow. You can pop up near the target on the opposite side of its gun and easily sink it without it getting a single shot off. :)

I prefer the electric torpedo and usually load a couple of the acoustic homing ones for novelty effect - love to watch the later do full circles before they finally take out a rudder and propellers. Interestingly enough - on the topic of guns on subs - Germany's sub development moved away from guns and the whole notion of surface attacks. Rightly so. You'll see some of the bigger boats like the IX are starting to carry a considerable amount of torps, with the XXI dispensing with the deck gun all together. Still I'll take the additional bullets the guns provide on the IX and rack up more victims.

I'm not sure why you fellow Kaleuns insist on shooting all those little duckies. For me its T2s or greater in tonnage or renown that get my ordinance. :ahoy:

[Umfuld]

I just remembered that one of the reasons I use gas torps so much is that I just dowloaded my first patch a month or two ago.

I played the game for 10 months where the electrics only went 1800m.

Lame.

[U-Dog]

In the conning tower are switches to open/close tubes, and when firing the 'manual spreads' I'll open all the doors so I don't have to wait for the door to open on each new shot.

I use manual targeting and TDC.

AH ha, i saw those switches the other day in the command room F2 but wasn't sure if they worked. Can't wait to try it out. i am hoping the switches mean they dont automatically close after a few seconds? I'd assume they close automatically after firing ?

[Umfuld]

Okay. I just died. I guess I should load up a mod or two or whatever.


Thing is, I have no idea what this junk is all about really.

Most PC stuff (got this one, my first, about a year ago) I just figure out myself. And I don't mind doing that at all.
But reading some of your posts on here I can tell you are speaking a language I am not familiar with.

Anywho, like I said, I'm don't mind just figuring it out for myself. But I don't know where said MODs are.

So a link or a point in the direction would be great. Any other help you care to give would be welcome as well.

But again, reading the stuff here, I think you guys have ruined the stock game for me now. :P And you owe it to me to help a noob out.

Heehee.

[Sailor Steve]

www.u-boot.realsimulation.com

Best place to start. Download whatever looks good to you and experiment. I've been playing almost since day one and I still start and restart careers trying new mods.

[Umfuld]

Danke!

[Umfuld]

Well,


well, well, well, well.

Wow!


Downloaded the GW thingy last night and installed it this morn.

LOOKS GREAT!


Thanks to all you peeps who put time into junk like this. It's really quite cool.
As I said, my first time with this sort of thing, and I'll resist the urge to comment here every five minutes when I have a question or observation until I've played a bit more.


Though I just got a message (I love the radio messages, btw. After watching Das Boot a few weeks ago I felt this was a major part of the sub life that was lacking in the stock game) that said to 'Save Survivors?' And gave what look like Long and Lat cords. Not sure what that's all about, so I'm gonna ignore it until I figure it out.


But yeah, thanks again for all the work you guys did. I know you probably do it for your own enjoyment, and I think you're all a bit mad, but I'm most happy to benifit from your maddness.

:up: :up: :up:

[rogerbo]

I still have my nuke file for the DG in case i get to frustrated (cause i get hunted by DDs' or my torpedoes where blind or just for fun )
so i load up my "fun" Profile and kill all with a single hit LOL I think my bigest score that way was over 300K but that's just for fun.
Mostly i just use the gun for finishing up a wounded ship.

[Umfuld]

About the deck gun, I know the stock game's was way too powerful and I've yet to use the GW one. But aren't those the same 88s that were used as field art. (converted from AA guns)?

Those can't really be called pea shooters, can they?

Maybe it's not the same weapon. Not sure.

[Sailor Steve]

No, they're not exactly the same, but similar enough. What's powerful against men in the field, or even tanks, isn't necessarily powerful against ships. You can make a lot of holes, or even sink them with enough shells, but even an unarmored cargo ship weighs easily a hundred times as much as the strongest tank.