First Patrol, August 1939
 

Hello everyone,

I'm just about to reach my patrol sector on my very first patrol in SH3. I selected the 2nd flotilla if I recall correctly so I start patrolling on august '39.

As the war has not started yet, we are not officially in war with any country so what am I supposed to do exactly? Just patrol and come back? Or am I supposed to (try to) sink warships ?

Sorry if this has been asked already, can't find the answer.

No sinking till the war starts, so just hang around and conserve fuel till the war does start then have fun.

Pretty much yes. If you sink a neutral you will be penalised for it.
Your crew are getting valuable experience though and when the war kicks off you'll be in better shape.

Thanks

Also, this forum showing posts in reverse order is driving me crazy.

theres an option to change the order somewhere around here :hmmm:

User CP, Edit Options, Edit Thread Options... :03:

How is it possible, I checked like a hundred times :damn:
Now it works thanks :yeah:

In the same way I always check I've flooded my tubes (oo-er missus!) before firing, and then wait and watch them miss by a couple of seconds! :wah:

Now I have another question.

I'm supposed to patrol the area for 24 hours, thats part of my mission objectives, but just as I arribed to the area, I received a message:

"To: U-46(me) All U-Boats in konigsberg (my port) - You are ordered to return to konigsberg. Upon docking transfer to either the 1st or 2nd flotilla. Good Hunting"

So am I supposed to return inmediately or shall I finish my objectives first ?

Return to port immediately via 'teleport' (Esc) and then apply for a transfer to 1st or 2nd Flotilla.

Your next patrol should commence shortly before the outbreak of hostilities (I use SH3 Commander and have it set to 21 days in port between patrols) which means I leave port on Aug 25th allowing me time to sail to my intended patrol gris....which is what happened in RL.

http://www.psionguild.org/forums/ima...es/welcome.gif

I don't remember Herbert Werner mentioning the Escape button? :haha:

I completely ignore the 7th Flotilla instructions. I also run simultaneous careers, one out of each available commmand.

2nd Flotilla - Wilhelmshaven: I do a 'false patrol' on August 1 - sail out into the harbor, turn around and dock again. Then I use SH3 Commander to set my crew the way I want, and set 'Days In Base' to 18. This is because on August 19th fourteed u-boats were sent out to the North Atlantic to wait. Wait for what, they weren't told right away.

1st Flotilla - Type II, Kiel: I set my start date for September 1st, do a false patrol, and then set 'Days In Base' to Random.

7th Flotilla: Same thing. That way I'm starting from Kiel, not Konigsberg, and being sent to the Atlantic.

LOL :DL

Herbert Werner? Are there TWO of us??!! :haha:

One question for the veteran kaleuns, usually how many days did the uboats spend in base between patrols? I want my career to be as realistic as possible so I was wondering what value should I set in SH3 Commander for the number of days spent at base between patrols..:hmmm:

Do you guys leave it at random or what?

I leave it at random. Shore time was typically two to three weeks, allowing time for both boat and crew to be overhauled. It could take longer if major upgrades were installed; as well, sabotage or "work slow" was enacted by French shipyard workers, but I'm not quite sure how much access non-German workers had to U-boats.

For a definitive amount of detail go to uboat.net and go to the U-boat finder section at the bottom left.

I chose 586 and picked the obvious WWII boat which brings up this page:

http://uboat.net/boats/u586.htm

Now halfway down on the right hand side choose the view war patrols link and you will see all the info on time at sea and in port etc.

http://uboat.net/boats/patrols/u586.html

That's a very interesting read, Jimbuna. Sometimes she was in port for a handful of days, other times she was in port for over a month. I'd imagine that some of that was due to damage or crew sent for training. There seems to be a correlation between duration of patrol and time of shore leave, which seems logical. One of her patrols was only 2 days! Hard to imagine BdU would give the crew two weeks leave after a patrol of only two days.

For the most accurate figure, select the random days in port option, unless you are in SE Asia (10 Flotilla), in which case set it to 55 days.

The random option is based on actual data, thus it varies year-by-year. I haven't looked at the code for a while, but I'm sure that SH3Cmdr also takes some other factors into consideration as well (patrol length, u-boat type, that kinda stuff).

Sometimes, however, you will just have to expect the unexpected. ;)

JScones, thank you for your great work. I heavily rely upon JSGME and SH3 Commander to add life to my game.