A bit frustrated.
 

After my first career was ended by a destroyer task force that caught me snooping around Dunkirk harbour, I stuck to DiD and started a fresh one in May 1940 with 7/13th flotilla.

Since then I've had FIVE one-patrol careers, starting with the same parameters as above. Every single time I've left port, I've been sunk. Every time, this has been because of a single destroyer that sees me from 12-15km and has infallible sonar. It happens all over the place: sometimes near Scotland, sometimes off the coast of Northern France, sometimes in the Irish Sea.

I've tried everything I've read about on here - changes of depth, changes of course, even grounding the boat. I even set the default action on spotting a warship as "periscope depth" and hit silent running the moment my bows were under water. All that happens is this magical destroyer singles me out and depth charges me to pieces.

I know I'm ranting, but it's really annoying to be sunk five consecutive times so early on in the war...

Practice makes perfect.. do you use your decoys?

And now the usual question asked.

Are you using vanilla or a super mod like GWX and which version?

why were you in the english channel?

GWX, latest version, and SH3 Commander.

Strange, I never have trouble with them in 1940. Have all these sinking's happen in shallow water?

In 1940 you should be able to go to about 240 depth with a 100% hull with no troubles and avoid escorts.

Steve

to quote the old adage: "Run silent, run deep"

As soon as you send the torpedos on their way change direction and dive, get as deep as you can as fast as you can. Once you are nice and deep then go to silent.

Silent running setting is not always enough....you need to drop your speed to 1 knot.

Grounding your boat is useless too....sonar can 'see' through land masses even....stooopid game engine :doh:

Can't answer for him, but BDU in their infinite wisdom sent me and my type VIIB to AN87 in June 1940. Probably wanted us to stop the Dunkirk escape. No help that it was over long before we even reached the grid.

Mighty shallow in those parts! I was lucky to have a meter or two beneath us at periscope depth. Did our 24 hours and got the heck out of there.

not that I'm an expert but common theme seems to be proximity to land and that tends to mean shallow water, if you can't get deep, you will struggle to evade destroyers.

Spot on CherryHarbey.
Shallow waters is bad ju-ju. Stay away if you want to live. :yep:

Allies sonar is infallible, they could find a IIA 800 meters down (pretending it could successfully survive the depth) on the bottom, in a underwater canyon; they'll still drop charges on you with sniper precision (though the charge would explode short, if it could deeper you'd end up dead fast). Escaping from ships once they have you targeted is difficult and enormously time consuming.

Shallow water can be dooable if there's at least 25-30 meters or total depth. If you're lucky enough to be in a storm it raises your chances. Once the boat accelarates punch to flank and hard port/starboard to get clear of them like you normally would. Cut the engines short of the last one or two charges going off them move ahead slow, if you're perpendicular and lucky you might make enough distance if he circles away from you. Try to be as close to underneath the ship as possible so charges generally won't explode close enough to cause major damage.

If you're lucky enough to be close to shore or a wall and the total strip of land only leaves a small amount of water to maneuver in you can sometimes get the destroyer to blow itself up. Doing so is really tricky, you need to get the escort to start its run on the short piece of land where it doesn't have room to accellerate after its dropped its charges, once it does its still to close and blows itself to pieces.

Betreten der kanal verboten!

it is death for u-boats.