[NFunky]

I've played a lot of training scenarios and have gotten pretty comfortable operating without any autocrew (except active intercept). So I figured I'd start trying to play some real scenarios and immediately I discovered that mission startup is almost always the hardest part. In almost every scenario I played, I start out within sonar range of at least four contacts. I know four isn't really that many, but it means 8 contacts on the towed array which is a lot to sort out all at once. I just can't seem to organize all the initial contacts fast enough and it's extremely tedious. I think this is mostly because I don't have a 'mission start' procedure, so I end up just frantically marking contacts on all sensors and then laboring over merging, classifying and just generally getting a grip on them.

So this is yet another call for help. Are there some basic procedures I can use to make this initial phase of gameplay less cumbersome? And how should I change my approach when, for instance, I start out with my TA retracted? Would the procedures be drastically different in the Kilo? Any advice would be much appreciated.