True. But I also like to shoot the deckgun and AA manually, so... :DL

Atm I changed sides and am controlling a Type IX in the OM mod, that KiUB interface.... well let's say it this way: The american TDC seems dead-simple now! :DL

It took me three days before I could FULLY understand and use the new german AOBF.... I think when I gonna return to the american campaign I will no longer have ANY problems with the TDC at all!

There are no style points in war. Whether you shot from 3,000 yards or "your nose up the target's butt" nobody cares. They care about whether your torpedoes put enemy boats on the bottom and how efficiently that was done. No matter how it's done, the long range shot is less likely to succeed.

It's not as "skillful." Tough toenails! If I have to put my nose up the target's butt to make sure they're dead and I'm above room temperature, I don't care about how skillful it is to miss 'em from 3,000 and then get killed. I'll take the unfair shot every time. This is war, not a freakin' square dance.

If I have my way every single shot will be from so close my grand-ma-ma couldn't miss and she's dead. If I ever find myself in a fair fight I'll run away because I screwed the pooch by not planning that one right. Chivalry my achin' butt...:D
http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/a...as-pirates.gif

I musta missed the 'chivalry' part of the discussion. I see two different skill sets represented and admire them both. One is the skill it takes to get that close without detection and the other is the skill to set up a sniper shot that hits it's mark. I've gotten to within 1k of a juicy TF flagship twice and virtually survived (midnight and choppy seas). The whole dang Japanese navy out to get me. But then, I've had them swarm me from a shot made at 6k (on a calm sunny day).

Don't mind me, I'm just rattlin' me sabre!:arrgh!:

Too right.. took me ages to get the hang of the US TDC, and I still fluff those shots occasionally. Loaded up OM with OMEGU last night, took a look at the KiUB interface instructions....

no way in hell am I doing all that! Shame really as it loses something not targeting yourself, but it took long enough to get the hang of the US TDC. The OM one is just too much!:haha:

RADAR
 

If radar was that indispensable, how do we explain the high rate of success experimented by the germans all through the war, since uboats were not equiped with such devices (except towards the end where some uboats started using radars)?

Radar is a tool useful for finding and screening targets at long distances. Since in most situations you have to be underwater to be close enough to fire, obviously the visual method has to be the first choice. Now, there is no question that it is hard and imprecise sometimes, but it is the best tool available. Regarding AOB, from what I read here, a purely visual guessing was the method of choice! So it's all about refining your analogic techiniques...

Daneil, I would dispute the fact Germans had high rates of success through the whole war. Early war, yes for sure, mid-war, a lot less. 43 on they often didn't even get close as they were kept down by .... radar equipped Allied ships and aircraft.

Early was neither side in the Atlantic was equipped with radar, except some capital ships. Definately no air assets had it either. So the u-boats could do quite well with visual tracking.

First of all, the Germans did not have a high rate of success. They just had a lot of U-Boats out there, most of which never sank a single target. Only 10 percent of them had the lion's share of the tonnage sunk. The statistics on the number of U-Boats sunk having never fired a torpedo in action is just astounding.

What success they had was due to their numbers and the lack of any coordinated anti-submarine tactics early in the war. Once the British perfected how destroyers and planes were to be handled, the sub war was just about over. Then Admiral Daniel Gallery came on the scene with his jeep carrier hunter-killer groups and the nails were all in the coffins. Predictably, the U-Boats were unable to be a decisive influence on the war, aside from the colossal waste of men and resources the Germans flushed down the drain to use a weapon unable to help their cause.

For better or worse, the Germans were entirely dependent on their land-based warfare for any success they were going to have. Anything (read Navy) that subtracted from their land based assets hurt their war effort. The U-Boats did worse than that, sucking the US into the war and guaranteeing complete German defeat.

Once the American boats had radar, THEN deducing AoB from radar plot was more accurate than visual estimate and they used that number. With visual targeting, the AoB estimate was the MOST reliable number they had. When you are analyzing, you always deduce more doubtful numbers based on your most reliable ones. That is what many of the targeting gurus on Subsim have forgotten and why their methods were not used during the war.

These guys in the war were as smart as we are. There's nothing we've thought of that they didn't. If they didn't time ship length by the wire to obtain speed, and they did not, there is a good reason. That is that target identification and actual target lengths were among the least reliable of their information. It would have been foolishness to try to calculate anything based on defective data. So they didn't.

Back after a spell.

Hey Rockin', how goes it?

I use the Dick O'Kane method because the TDC range estimating/AOB is so fiddy.

DO gives you a method that works and works well - w/ an accurate AOB and no range needed. It's simple, elegant, realistic and it works.

Obtaining AOB from radar plot works well provided your target is not zigging. We don't have to worry too much about that, but the USN had thinking opponents to contend with. O'Kane made full use of radar AND made visual estimates of AOB. Why? Because, using radar alone, one can obtain the base course of the target, and the general nature and form of past zig-zags, but not the timing or heading of next one. Good estimation of the AOB allows one to see quickly that the target is starting (or has already started) another leg, and what the new course is.

I can't argue with you there. :)

Thanks, i will look at the difference between them and see which one i like better!

TG

Thanks... been looking there, used the search function... couldn't find it. I know i've seen somebody talk about that somewhere...


TG

not sure but my best guess would be
speed/aob/range then quickly turn on the PK

And a whole lot better trained. I went through 12 weeks of school just to learn how to operate the fraggin' radios. The officers did a lot more than that before they were ready to be officers, and a whole lot more than that before they were ready to be submarine officers.

Excellent point; they didn't exactly:
- Buy the game
- Have trouble w/ W7 UAC
- Finally get the game to work
- Ask questions in the forum
- Get answers, view stickied threads and watch some YouTube videos

...then; "Look at me, I'm a World War II sub commander!"