Late Night Foolishness: Duking it out on the surface

[SubConscious]

I have to tell someone about this, because it was just so much fun…

I was submerged during the daytime in the Irish Sea early 1940 when a lone C2 cargo ship happened upon me. Being out of torpedoes, I gave it a good battering with my 8.8cm deck gun, to a point where it was listing heavily to starboard with the stern nearly awash.

My sonar operator picked up two more closing contacts: A merchant moving fast and a warship. I make appropriate notes on the map so that I could find the C2 again, and took off after the merchant, hoping that the C2 would eventually sink and that I’d be able to be able to outrun the closing warship.

It soon became apparent that this wasn’t going to work, probably due to the calm sea state and wonderful visibility. I had an armed trawler coming up fast, so I opted for a crash dive.

The merchant turned out to be a T3 Tanker, which as you all know, is a grand prize. The dilemma was that being out of torpedoes, I needed to utilize my deck gun. But with that armed trawler on the surface, there was no way that I could risk it.

Then the idea hit me…

The trawler was coming up fast astern. I didn’t think it had ASW capabilities and knew that it possessed only a single gun on the bow. So I waited for the trawler to pass over the top of me and I ordered an emergency blow and turns for flank speed.

We surfaced aft of the trawler and scrambled to unlimber the deck gun. The trawler immediately turned hard to starboard, but we were able to keep astern through some fast maneuvers.

Four well-placed high-explosive rounds later, and the trawler rolled over on her starboard side and sank, burning fiercely. Her crew fought valiantly, firing even as the ship went under. We got VERY lucky and didn’t sustain a single hit.

We then went on to catch and sink the T3, and managed to save a few rounds for the C2. It was a very successful day!

Has anyone else tried anything this foolhardy?

Oh – one thing to note if you ever try anything like this: Ships may appear to be stationary, even with their screws confirmed as unmoving, but the ship will still move when the time compression is sufficiently advanced. In fact, they’ll move back and forth on the map, in a straight line. It’s obviously a bug (like the fact that some tankers are moving despite their propellers being stationary), but it’s good to note that this aspect of the game isn’t consistent.

One more bug to bear in mind: If you leave a ship for a considerable amount of time (I was submerged under a crippled C3 cargo while being hounded by two Destroyers, a Corvette, and a PT boat (not to mention the aircraft)), I have found that unless the watch crew gives notice that they’ve “seen” the ship again, you will not receive credit for sinking the vessel.

[andy_311]

I have gone head to head with a few Flower corvettes,I normally don't bother with armed trawlers there not worth the hassle and can be easly out runed.

[Safe-Keeper]

The fatal weakness of the Armed Trawler;). Maybe it should be given some really light weapon that can fire at boats behind it? It's historically incorrect, I guess, but still, it'd balance the thing:-?.

[Qairyl]

I once attacked a small convoy sometime in early '40 that was being escorted by four armed trawlers. I noticed they were there one at a time; engaged one, sank it, another appeared; rinse and repeat. Once all four were down, I blew up the seven or so ships in the convoy with torps and the deck gun. I almost didn't get the last one; had to resort to hitting it with star shells until it finally exploded:arrgh!:

Had to shake off a bunch of destroyers on the way home, though; DC'ing ruined all my guns and periscopes...needless to say the repair crews weren't very happy:shifty:

I have not since had any equivalent luck.

-Qairyl

[Safe-Keeper]

I remember how I aced the Convoy Attack academy mission by first sinking the escort ships and then sinking every single merchant by means of deck gun. Good times:arrgh!:!

[TarJak]

Great work SubConcious!

I was on my way back to base with no torps left and a locker 3/4 full of HE rounds when I came across what looked like a completely unescorted convoy slowly steming for England at around 2330, (early 1940 about 200km southwest of the Irish coast).

Had a good look at them from a distance, (not bad visibility but no moon), then decided why not give some fo the bigger prizes a few rounds to see if I could sink a few.:arrgh!:

So I moved in for the kill and was just lining up on a T3 tanker when from out of nowhere I get the "We;ve been spotted sir!" search lights stab out of the darkness and I hear the whizzing of about 5 shells in quck succession going over head and see a few splahes down range of me.

Sure enough there was a verdammt Auxilary Cruiser taking shots at me. :o I swung around the bows of the T3 at flank trying to keep the tanker between me and the cruiser and kept up the firing to see if I could at least get a kill.

Anyway after about half and hour of mad manouvering and trying to keep up a steady fire on the T3 i ran out of ammo, the T3 was still floating but on fire and the crusier was closing fast! so i dived and sat a few km off to see if the T3 would go down whilst the cruiser took off with the rest of teh convoy. hung around for another 2 hours game time with no joy and decided i'd had enough when I got a hydrophone contact on a warship closing fast. :damn:

Assuming it was a destroyer i surfaced and took off at full speed to get some distance between me and the tanker. Very exciting stuff but ultimately quite diappointing because the T3 was still floating there as I disappeared over the horizon.:cry:

[mountainmanUK]

Oh – one thing to note if you ever try anything like this: Ships may appear to be stationary, even with their screws confirmed as unmoving, but the ship will still move when the time compression is sufficiently advanced. In fact, they’ll move back and forth on the map, in a straight line. It’s obviously a bug (like the fact that some tankers are moving despite their propellers being stationary), but it’s good to note that this aspect of the game isn’t consistent.



Makes things a tad more realistic!! Any ship adrift on the sea WILL move, due to the action of winds and tides. That's why bodies etc., eventually get washed up on shore.
It's annoying though, when you have to cut off a convoy attack cos of those pesky escxorts, and find that that crippled T3 has "drifted" miles from where you thought you'd left it!;)

cheers

[HunterICX]

In the IIA Type I had this same problem,

As you all probably know the IIA doesn’t have much Torpedo’s
I was send to a Grid by the Bdu, I was just running TGW so having some problems with the Damage Models.

Now, I reached my grid and had done the 24h patrol, I just set course back home and received an radio contact nearby, I intercepted it.

A Large Cargo!!!! Now sunk that one with 3 Fishes, I just wanted to continue my sonar picked up a Merchant closing….I waited…another Large Cargo!!! 2 Fishes loaded 1 in reserve, I shot them both, and both they hit….Woohoo!!! but the bloody vessel didn’t sink….Mmmrrppff….I surfaced to look the at the bastard…she was leaning heavy on one side a small part of her deck was washed…

Now as soon I asked at my Weapon Officer how long it will take to reload the last one… N/A not enough crew in this compartment…(BLEEP!) crew fatigue at the moment I need my crew…Ah Well…I can wait. She isn’t moving.

While I waited about 20 hours before I could gather enough crew to get my last torpedo loaded
5 other big merchants passed my ship!!!! I saw them all passing slowly my sub, in that time I knew….’’God Hates Me’’ I seemed to be exact in the middle of an Harbour Traffic route….as the hours passed and the last 20 minutes my crew needed to reload the last Fish…It was time for revenge!!! But the ship had leaned to much towards me so I was afraid of hitting her with an Dud , so I moved myself towards the other side and fired my last fish on her ammo stash , BAM!!!!! Torpedo hit….now…well…errr…she was still there!!! WeEeEeEeE it wasn’t fair….I waited another 10 hours to rest my crew to go in the Diesel compartment…and while that time she didn’t lean anymore she sat straight in the water only her hull was deeper in the water then normal…I hated that blasted ship that I could ram it…but I didn’t…the IIA is too small for an large cargo…so I abandoned her leaving her to see another day…and I as an shark without any teeth left went back in silence…:damn: :damn: :stare:

[SubConscious]

Thanks, TarJak! I feel your pain about that T3. I've been so frustrated that I've pulled in very close and peppered the ship with 2cm rounds, but to no avail. My last act of defiance is to blast the cargo on the deck.

According to Jak Mallman's U-Boats under the swastika, Type VIIs should be carrying 250 rounds of 8.8cm deck gun ammo, and the Type IXs should have 200 rounds of 10.5cm. I'm making the necessary adjustments to my config file. ;)



Makes things a tad more realistic!! Any ship adrift on the sea WILL move, due to the action of winds and tides. That's why bodies etc., eventually get washed up on shore.
It's annoying though, when you have to cut off a convoy attack cos of those pesky escxorts, and find that that crippled T3 has "drifted" miles from where you thought you'd left it!;)

cheers

I completely agree - drifting would be fine. The sad fact is that they don't drift: They sail along their original course, then they back up along that same course.

Has anyone noticed that flags are always flapping to the stern of the ship, regardless of the direction of the wind or the ship?

[Eichenlaub]

Has anyone noticed that flags are always flapping to the stern of the ship, regardless of the direction of the wind or the ship?

Nowadays, we prefer to use fabric softener, but in the war years, starch was the big thing! Those flags were stiff as boards I tell ya...:rock:

Kind regards,

Eichenlaub

[SubConscious]

Has anyone noticed that flags are always flapping to the stern of the ship, regardless of the direction of the wind or the ship?

Nowadays, we prefer to use fabric softener, but in the war years, starch was the big thing! Those flags were stiff as boards I tell ya...:rock:

Kind regards,

Eichenlaub

Ah! Thanks for the explanation!! :know:

[P_Funk]

So if even a U-boat and it's sad sack deck gun can easily sink an Armed Trawler without issue why do they even use them? Why not take the steel from their hulls and build a much more useful Destroyer? Those trawlers... useless.

A little suguay... I'm currently shadowing an outbound convoy which I picked up just at the mouth of the English Channel and it's 1940. It only has 3 escorts, one flower class corvette, one destroyer in line with the convoy like a merchant in the middle column (whats with that? anyone?), and an armed trawler taking up the rear. This is gonna be one of those early war massacres, I can see it already!

[bigboywooly]

So if even a U-boat and it's sad sack deck gun can easily sink an Armed Trawler without issue why do they even use them? Why not take the steel from their hulls and build a much more useful Destroyer? Those trawlers... useless.

A little suguay... I'm currently shadowing an outbound convoy which I picked up just at the mouth of the English Channel and it's 1940. It only has 3 escorts, one flower class corvette, one destroyer in line with the convoy like a merchant in the middle column (whats with that? anyone?), and an armed trawler taking up the rear. This is gonna be one of those early war massacres, I can see it already!

Realistically a trawler should be a patrol boat not a convoy escort
They never had the range to go as far as they do in the game and should really be used as harbour patrol and maybe to escort a convoy to within a certain distance then turn for home

The destroyer in the middle of the convoy is not down as an escort true
which is why sailing like a merchant
That sort of convoy make up normally includes a Armed merchant cruiser where the destroyer is - sometimes a light cruiser ; there for protection from surface vessels

Later on in the war that spot could be a catapult aircraft merchant too so the convoy had eyes above and to chase of German scout planes

Make the most of it and sink them all :up: