Has his been tried before?
 

Having read again about japanese merchant vessels dropping a couple depth charges on US submarines, just wondering about implementing "defensive depth charges" some freighters carried to deter submarine attack, at minimum provided chance to keep a submerged sub busy so could escape into the sim. Some merchants already have hydrophones in the sim, so a lone dc rack for them to drop a couple charges could prove interesting. Wondering if anyone has tried it? Have not heard of it so asking.

I know merchants behave differently than say a DD or Corvette would but they have guns and will fire if they spot you, some even try to ram player sub, which I believe depends on the skill level, had a Conte Verde PL try to ram me during night surface attack, had just torpedoed two of his fellow convoy members, he did a 180 ,accelerated to full speed and came at my boat, which I failed to see immediately and when tried to avoid he changed to avoid, passed about 200 yards off bow. Happened before with other ships.

My thinking is a merchant that hears a submerged sub and happens to be close would drop a DC or two and sail on.

Of course would not equip every merchant but would be a nice variable for players to have to consider as real life captains did. Merchant above? no worries, oh wait, he dropped at depth charge.

Someone did that (lurker?? Traveler?? Ducimus??), and they would occasionally drop them, but they definitely did not come chase you...

Nice. They were defensive weapons so would not want them to pursue like a DD lol but would be a tool to make them not such easy targets in some circumstances. Example would be a lone freighter was approaching submerged off Kii Suido in 1942. I was taking final observation before firing from 900 yards when a patrol plane flew over, spotting me in the calm seas, the ship was alerted and turned toward scope, firing guns at the scope just as released torpedoes.. both prematurely exploded and may have missed anyways since ship slowed as hit the firing plunger (love hitting the big red button in conning tower lol) on the torpedo panel.

As I went "deep" to 250 ft in Porpoise Class boat, the merchant passed overhead at "high" speed . Thinking if it had a dc rack, would have been more of deterrent. Ended up chashing it down and setting on fire that night with deck gun, but was out of torpedoes, left it burning but did not sink. 3 inch guns just don't do well on the larger merchants lol.