Reporting life rafts??
 

I've sank a few ships and afterwards the deck crew starts reporting "ship spotted, bearing XXX". They are calling out the life rafts. Unless we can capture them, I don't see the point. For fun, I tried to blow the rafts out of the water with the deck gun. :D
(Yeah, I know it's a war crime)

Anyone else find this annoying?

I find that annoying and also when pilots ditch (from parachutes) you get the same or similiar results.

I think the icons are the same aswell on the world map.
Would be nice if the pilots and rafts were a different icon.
When you zoom right in they are.

Not only do they call "Ship Spotted" for a life boat. BUT Your sonar guy picks up upturned life boats as slow merchants. (These are row boats BTW) :doh:.


The life rafts actually drift. That part I like.:up:

Can you ram the rafts/lifeboats?:hmm:

I hate to say this but I used to be on the NOT shooting life rafts banwaggon but something changed when I started playing this game...

My Grandfather served in WW2 in the pacific and saw a lot of action. This Christmas my mom sent me his service watch that he engraved all the islands he went to on a steel cuff type band... Anyway, when a plane or ship was shooting at me and I deal with them something personal happens to me, and I "finish" the job, for my gamps... :arrgh!: But never merchants. I guess I know a thing or two you won't be seeing on the history channel any time soon...

Thank god I don't feel that way in the real world :o

How often did submarine crews attempt to save/capture people? It seems like the combat is so personal and sneaky that they probably wouldn't want to do it if at all.

There have been incidents I know of with U-Boats saving crews early in the war, I forget the specific examples, but one U-Boat stayed with the passengers of a ship it sank, radioing their position to Allied forces. Unfortunately the allies reponded by sending a plane to attack the U-Boat, and it was forced to escape. The passengers were later rescued, though.

Another funny incident I have heard of (again, I forget the specifics), but it happened very early in the war when two Allied Suka dive bombers tried to attack a surfaced U-Boat... their bombs skipped off the surface of the water, came up short, and exploded in the air, downing both planes. The U-Boat crew then rescued the pilots.:lol:

I know from playing the original Silent Hunter that some US submarines picked up survivors and brought them aboard. Remember the interview with Buddy Gruner? Although from what I know of the Japanese military, I doubt we ever tried to rescue IJN sailors. They didn't believe in surrendering.

I could see them picking up pilots (Japanese) but with merchants? I mean, it's a tiny metal tube, not a lot of room to have company over for dinner...

Let 'em drift.