Question about 37mm AA on U-Boats?
 

Hey guys, I've noticed while playing that the Bofors 40mm on American subs can be quite effective against enemy merchants (especially with HE rounds); however the 37mm AA on my U-Boat is virtually useless against merchants save fishing boats :down: (with the Bofors, I could set tankers on fire with a couple bursts). Any mods out there that might possibly remedy this? Has anyone else noticed this?

News to me!
 

I'm new around here (well, not true. I've been lurking for a couple of months), and decided to finally join you folks on the forums here since I've been playing the hell out of this game, U-Boat missions in particular.

This stuff about the AA weaponry doing any damage to anything but aircraft is news to me. I emptied the starting U-boat guns into a fishing trawler on my first sail, and it did no apparent damage--since then, I've assumed they did no damage to anything other then aircraft.

One question, though. Why on earth are you using AA guns on ships? Unless you're floating the Walters-Drive boat that has no deck guns, or you're just burning up remaining lead while on the way back for a refuel/rearm, torpedoes work better.

:salute: <---Benny Hill Salute

I kind of discovered by "trolling around" that 40mm Bofors loaded with HE rounds were quite effective against many Japanese merchants except large stuff like European liners. My thinking was "Hey! If the 40mm works, maybe the 37mm on my U-Boat might too!" Alas, it didn't quite work out that way. :x

I'm playing SH4 Gold Edition (with U-Boat Missions and the stock campaign), so the mechanics might be different if you have some super mod like Trigger Maru :hmmm:

"...so the mechanics might be different if you have some super mod like Trigger Maru"

Yep. TMO.

I've been thinking about it, and now I realize that when I am going in on a bansai surface-run with the deck gun, I've taken quite a bit of damage from enemy AA fire, particularly to the conning tower gear, but nothing close to sinking damage. (you can pause the game in Free-camera mode and go see which guns are firing at you--I often look up close so I can see where my deck gun rounds are landing. That, and I like watching the explosions up close!)

That being said, I think I'll save my AA ammo for the aircraft--preventing hull damage seems to be my biggest priority on long cruises and the best way I've found to keep it down to a minimum is to blast those bugs out of the sky before they get a chance to drop their bombs. I invested heavily into a top-notch gun crew early on and I'd say that only about 50% of dive bombers get a chance to drop their loads--the rest I end up dodging wreckage falling from the sky. I can't seem to reach the Liberators though (too high, I imagine), but fortunately a "Hard Port!" is usually enough to evade their bomb loads.

Your post did get me to try some testing. In the port of Darwin, there are 3 ARCO gunboats moored across the bay from the docks--emptying my AA guns into them set one on fire and left the others intact, while three torpedoes sent one below the surface in a personal record of 8 seconds after impact while the other two were violently thrown out of the water and about 100 meters onto the beach, leaving them flaming wreckage nowhere near water. They were hit hard enough the kill "marker" on my navmap showed the kills in the water.

As far as the aircraft are concerned, my "Best Missed Screenshot" is immediately after blowing the wings off of an incoming dive-bomber and having the carcass miss the heads of my deck crew by about 5 feet while one of the wings clattered off the front deck--If I hadn't remembered to lower my periscope, the thing would have snapped it right off. :o

Gunboat+Torpedo=DOES NOT COMPUTE!!!! :o

All joking aside, I don't think U-Boat AA gets terribly effective unless you have two twin 20mm and a twin 37mm. The U-Boat's default AA config (two single slow-firing 20mm and a SINGLE-SHOT 37mm) IMHO is less effective against planes than a single 20mm Oerlikon on the back of a U.S. fleet boat, but that's my experience. I'm far more willing to fight it out with Japanese planes than with Allied planes, even though I love the IXD2!

I always do this in my Fleet Boats.
The 20mm is my Sampan Killer and Fishing Boat Repellant.
I have no desire to waste real bullets on these, so they get rounds from my AC's. The deck gun is saved for targets that get you tonnage.

Haven't tried this with the U-Boats, but I'm now curious.
Will have to disable RFB and give it a try.

IIRC, the allies developed some sort of "armour" for their merchant ships. Dunno if that's what the game is implying.