There being basically no orders is frustrating. You have to use imagination there. Decide what to do yourself, or use SH3Gen which generates orders or Wreford-Brown's mod, which you can find here:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/down...o=file&id=1502
That's the GWX version. There is also a non-GWX version. If you like naval history you can also try to figure out, what historically speaking were your boat's actual orders during the war and try to follow them. BdU's war diary helps in figuring out what was happening:
http://www.uboatarchive.net/BDUKTB30248.htm
or U-boat net:
http://www.uboat.net/boats/patrols/patrol_3964.html
That was an example of U-156 route and daily locations in one of it's patrols during the war.
About the torpedoes... Well, I think the practice mission is much harder than the campaign. In the practice mission you have to run after the ships and in the campaign it's more like you wait until they come to range. And forget the instruction about basically just pointing and shooting. You can point and shoot if you have a laser gun. Shooting in SH3 is IMO pretty much like shooting in IL2. The torpedo takes time to reach the target, as well as a 20mm cartridge needs time to hit that airplane 300 meters from you. You have to think about deflection in SH3 too. You maneuver your craft to a position where the enemy has to cross your sights in a nice, slow helpless angle. Then you stay put pretty much motionless and just before the crucial moment you don't touch a control, just wait for him to be in your sights and then blast him. If you do it right the effect is the same. That darn Il-2 Sturmovik or C2 cargo ship pretty much disintegrates.
The practice mission and you locking on to a ship is a bit like you flying a BF-109F2/P-38 against an Il-16/Zero that is jinking and barrel rolling in front of you and you trying to follow his moves. You wouldn't try to follow the moves in IL-2, but anticipate where that bastard will be at a precise moment and then shoot.
You could try the torpedo shooting method that is described in Canovaro's document collection:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/down...o=file&id=1487
That will teach you the most basic thing in torpedo shooting. It's the idea of waiting for the critical moment, of shooting when the target crosses your sights, not you moving your sights towards him.
IMO, the automatic TDC can slow your learning. Move to totally manual TDC, use G7a's and External camera, so that you can see where your torpedoes are going. If you shoot accurately in IL-2, then with a little practice you'll be blasting them ships out of the waters in no time. And then you will be happily smoking a cigar while looking at that tanker burning beautifully in the night, just like in Das Boot
