Depth under keel
 

Can you use the depth under keel ping anytime you like or will it give your position away to the enemy? I never had the experience that it would change my noise meter to red or a DD rushing to my position but I wanna be sure for obvious reasons ;)

Bad idea!
I think that you risk giving your position away if you ping and a DD is close.
I know i wouldnt!

/VV

As soon as you get a ship sighted message check your depth under keel incase you need to dive. Do it regularly anyway as you go along. Also you can check when the depth charges are exploding as the sound will be disguised as well as of course your e-motor noise.

Good idea! Found that out the hard way. Had to crash dive after torping a Cruiser and forgot It was only 45m deep.

Actually ingame pinging the bottom wont give away your position.It is undetectable by the enemy,also firing torps or blowing ballast wont be detected by enemy.In RL it was detectable.
I dont blow ballast or pingig if enemy is nearby something like honor rule :)

Gwx 1.03 here but i think this thigs are hardcoded and are present in 2.0

Are you sure about that?
IIRC the manual says something about that you have to be carefull
with the pinging when escorts are close, but I could be wrong.

/VV

Well i heard it from around here and tested it with success (havent been detected) i too could be wrong, lets wait someone with greater knowledge to say.

SHIII manual tells you to be careful about it... however, I don't think is moddeled... In fact, you are able to get depth under keel on a non-sonar equipped sub:o .
I might be wrong but... don't you need a sonar to ping? Or is it just Bernard yelling a very high-pitched tone to the sea bottom?

It was a very simple sonar device that sent a signal straight down. You can operate it manually from the navigator's table. They all had it, it did ping, and it could be detected. In the game? Now you've all got me wondering.

AFAIK you'll NOT be detected.
Pretty unrealistic imho but it just isn't modeled in (stock) SHIII

I know, but, is it realistic to have an Atlas Echolot that pings and not to have a sonar? I don't know, just asking.

lol, good to see many share my doubt :p

Like I said, I never got the impression from the AI that pinging the bottom provoked any reaction at all.

I used to worry
 

But of late I just check it even next to DDs - no effect. I also used to think that DDs would come to the aid of a sinking merchant if it was at least in sight. Apparently not. They do come to the aid of a sinking warship you are fighting with. I mean - yes they do come to the aid of a sinking merchant, but only if their distance is somewhere less than 900 meters. When I would play the standard mods or the regular game I would sneak in under the lead DD and start shooting ships when it was behind me. But when I started to build my own convoys I was in the habit of spacing ships at 1100 t0 1500 meters (especially in navy Task Forces). It was after that that i started to notice that I'd start sinking ships but as long as I kept my motor quiet the lead DD (now behind me) would just keep sailing off along the wavepoint line. I have not run tests yet to see if leaving my engines quiet will work at smaller distances - maybe it will.

I will test it some more. Perhaps the only reason I was ever attacked before was because in attacks I tended to ramp up my engines to all ahead full. I hope this all proves false (I will test more) cause if it is true it will mean SH3 is just SH2 all over again!

I'm pretty sure they did have the sounding device long before they had active sonar. Why? I have no idea, unless it's maybe it's that the echelot requires a simple push of a button, and sonar requires a complex system and a highly trained operator.

Fair enough, I'll buy that:up: