Officer specialities
 

Hi all,

I am just wondering what the point is of having an officer with a Flak Gunner, Deck Gunner or Sonarman speciality, since you cannot actually get an officer to man the flak/deck guns or the sonar station.

Am I right?

Hi! As far as I know you cannot give the Sonar qualification to officers.

The flak and gunner qualification is useful when you have inexperienced gun crews. Add normal soldiers to the gun and you will see that the efficiency - the green bar - isn´t very high. When you then add a specialised officer to the bridge he influences the crew and the efficiency of the deck gun or flak goes up.

Thanks, will give that a try.

Give the sonar qualification to a warrant officer (just the one, as you don't need another for the radio) as only he can be posted to the sonar
To your watch officer give flak and deck gun quals, as well as a promotion, your watch and deck gun crews will improve by a fair degree.
A warrant officer with deck gun quals, is good for the first couple of years, but by 1942 you will want a couple of warrant officers trained in flak.
A warrant officer with damage control is a plus as well

He's asking about real officers, not warrant officers, but I think his question was answered. He didn't know that officers with a Deck or Flak gun qualification actually influenced the efficiency of those stations, since he can't go there himself.

I notice there is no radio qualification. Does having a sonar qualified man in the sonar/radio room increase efficiency of the radio (and radar) operations?

Also I notice I have been on several patrols in at least two (short) campaigns and nobody has ever received a promotion on my crew. What do I have to do to earn them? Is it worth spending my Renown as soon as I get it, or should I hoard it in the hopes of getting promotions that way?

Thanks

The promotions will come. You will probably notice the green "experience" bar in the men's stats. If that is not completely full then you will not be able to promote that man to the next rank. Likewise, if none of your men have enough experience for the next rank then the computer will not give you an option to promote any crew.
________
SLAVELATINA4U

Yes and no. The crew efficiency is important for the radar warning receiver, but not for radar and radio.

Okay so when the green bar fills up, a seaman for example can be promoted to a Warrant officer, or Warrant officer to an Officer? I thought that promotions would only take place WITHIN the class of crewmember that the crewman is, eg. Warrant officer to Chief Warrant Officer, or Lieutenant Junior to Lieutenant Senior.

Well first they have to be promoted a few times before they get to that point. There are 3 seamen ratings and 3 petty officer ratings.
________
CherryBabe

While we are on the subject, when you say Petty Officer do you mean Warrant Officer? Haven't come across any Petty Officers per se in the sim, only seamen, Warrant Officers and full officers.

Yes, Petty Officer and Warrant Officer mean the same thing in this game. (In real life they are different, of course, but the ranking system in the game is only approximate to real life.)

Ah I suspected that. Thanks.

CAn the player get promoted as well? The title screen still has me as a Lt. Junior, and I have medals up the wazoo.

Yeah, your character gets promoted too, just not that often. Not sure if it's based on tonnage, renown, or a combination of both. I'm on patrol 13 and have been promoted once, back around patrol 6 or so.