Impossible to hit Subchaser with torps out in ocean?
 

I was sent to patrol the Celebes sea, and while there, I got a warship sound contact. Went to investigate, a destroyer and a subchaser, I was detected by sonar, fired a torp at the destroyer, It cracked in half, fired 3 torps at the subchaser (varying depths and detonation methods) couldn't hit her.
By the time I was sunk, I had fired about 9 torps at the subchaser.
How can I hit a subchaser at sea, in port it's easy, but out at sea, it seems to be higher in the water and even with the torp depth at 3ft (highest I can get it to go) i couldn't hit her.
What happened?

What makes it hard is they constantly change course and speed.

If you really want that prize youd better get real close.

In real life they were not only difficult to hit due to their shallow draft, but they were considered not worth a torpedo.

Dive and evade.

JCC

And on the subchaser, its not the single DC rack on the stern that will
sink you but the 2 DC throwers on each side. I would rather tackle a
full DD with only 2 rear racks than this side thrower. I speak from
definate experience because in the last week, I evaded at least 5 DDs
but the subchaser got me.....

JIM

Yikes, it can toss? Boy thats a whole different beast to slay. Thats good to know..by the way what kinds of guns does it have? If it doesnt have a deck gun I'd consider spraying it 20mms and the deck gun since I assume its light weight and unarmored.

Sub chasers
 

We have encountered three,torped two,& deck gunned the other. set depth to shallow,fast,or slow,depending on range. if undetected,set PK to track,if his course is constant/unchanging.other wise dive to 62ft,& track with sonar,when she comes in-range,blow,deck gun,with HE,took five good shots. You could head for thermal. cover.:yep: BTW,we encountered our first Jap Sub on the surface,she dove,we had set PK,fired at 50 depth,& got a torp impact! splash,Amazing,no confirmed kill.:lol: No it wasn't a circle runner.

hmm, no confirmed kill? 1 torp ought to do it and the game doesnt seem to require visual confirmation.

If you havent docked yet, keep an eye out for decreased reknown...you may have sunk a US sub :)...they all look a like from a distance.

Actually the subchaser is one of the few warships you can tackle on the surface. Less dangerous believe it or not.

That's because its deck gun is bugged and won't fire. Possibly because the AI thinks it will hit its own ship. It's issue 73) in the bug thread :)

ah man...bugged? I guess i wont be engaging it! I can bring myself to exploit AI bugs

Well, it's certainly not because the gun can't fire because I've had it fire on me.
Granted, its method of firing is sorta odd (only fires part of the time) but the
gun definately works and shoots. I just had 3 of them chase me (hence the name)
but only firing part of the time??? I was not near the merchants either so that was
not the case. Their aim was not good and I was never hit (they were VETS too)

JIM

Long reload times possibly?
-Pv-

Nope, they seemed to fire 4 or 5 times then quit. After a minute or 2,
they fired another 4 or 5 times???

JIM

:o What the . . . Is this a joke?

Are you certain that was not their AA gun? They do fire that one, but it doesn't do much (any?) damage to a sub. I ran a lot of tests in a single mission with the subchaser, and in never used its big gun. It would run circles around the surfaced sub, not using the gun, and not daring to ram.

What was the weather like?

Weather was clear with calm sea. I did an external view of the subchaser
as it was firing the forward gun, 3 or 4 inch gun sound, saw the shell arc
over my sub. High wind & large waves will send the subchaser to the
bottom quite a few times. I have seen that happen too....

JIM

Anti Subchaser tactic
 

We neared the surface and basicly blew ur ballast tanks and manned the guns

Swiveling around we lobbed three AP shells into the subchasers from stern to bow at and just below waterline.

Slewing to te side we dumped 4 rounds of HE onto the gun deck and several fires and secondary explosions began. We ran downwind of her allowing her battledamage smoke to obscure us from her gunners. 5 More AP rounds into the waterline evenly spaced and the sub chaser slowly dove to the realm where she could chase subs forever.

These targets are great just swivel and jink and your gunners will do you proud..

:up:

I have a Sub Chaser kill. At first I had a problem also. Fired one off at him and followed the torp with the external view. It went right beneath him. Reset the depth to the shallowest setting, fired another and kaboom!

You are right, I made another test, placing the subchasers farther away, and they did fire their main guns, but stopped once they were within 3000-2000 yards.

So, I think the problem is pathfinding: when they have to lower the gun past a certain point, the AI think it will hit its own ship. As a wild guess, I'll say it's related to the high bow on hull. Maybe the aiming algorithm takes the maximum hull height as a reference.

Oh, and BTW, this test has also shown that emptying a 20mm HE magazine into a subchaser's superstructure kills it every time. No need to spend a torpedo.

Yes, the subchaser is good on DCing but very weak in surface battles.
I find a large gap between the subchaser and the 2 older DDs of Japan.
We have a tonnage difference of from 200 tons (subchaser) to the
smallest DD of around 1200 tons. In between there were a number of
500 to 900 tons ships called Corvettes or Destroyer Escorts. The British
Corvette was 925 tons. I know Japan had some of those too and they
were used in convoy escort duty. Since this game deals in submarine
warfare vs. AI convoys form Japan, I would think those 500 to 900 ton
escorts would be a big asset to the game....

JIM