[CaptBones]

First…let me assure you I’m trying to help you succeed in this specific training exercise and get a good score; I hope you don’t mind a long message with some constructive criticism.

I watched the video and noticed that you are consistently violating the most important principal of submarine warfare, “Real World” or simulated…BE INVISIBLE…use your stealth to maximum advantage, don’t needlessly give away your position. But, the very first thing you should do when this training scenario starts is get moving, slowly, and get down to periscope depth, your motors are stopped and you’re too shallow…and get that scope down, at least so it’s barely out of the water. You’re starting off with three feet or more of periscope sticking out of the water and you leave the scope up far too long; once they see it, it tells them exactly where you are. The AI shares its information, if one ship knows where you are, they all know where you are and that’s where the Trawler will head towards. The Trawler doesn’t have active SONAR/ASDIC…all he’s got is passive hydrophone listening ability. It doesn’t matter what your heading is relative to him, that’s only relevant to active sonar detection; you’ll need to remember that advice when dealing with multiple escorts in convoy battles later on.

I think you’re wasting a lot of time clicking back and forth between the scope and the attack map, especially if you’re leaving the scope sticking way up the whole time. The “TDC” will do a perfectly good job of computing your solution. Until you have more experience, I recommend you let the Weapons Officer and “TDC” do the work; you really only need to use the attack map to select the torpedoes and set speed, depth, pistol, and the spread angle for the salvo shot.

Don’t wait until you hit the DD before setting up your shots at the C-2 cargo ship. BTW, before firing at the C-2 you can send a single torpedo at the tramp steamer on the far side of the convoy. Set it for magnetic pistol and 2m below the keel; it’ll run just ahead of and under the C-2. You should be able to get off all four forward torpedoes at three separate targets before they even know you’re there. Don’t forget to open the tube doors before you shoot, it’ll cause a delay otherwise and the torpedo might miss.

If they don’t spot your scope at first, the wake of the G7a T1 torpedoes will point right at you; they’ll definitely see that as soon as the first torpedo hits, if not before. You need to get moving away from the point from where you launched your attacks; that’s where the Trawler is going, that’s where they know you were when you fired at the DD and C-2 cargo ship…and get that scope down! Otherwise they’ll just track your every movement.

Siege00 is right-on…don’t use waypoints to change course. In fact, get the Navigator out of the control room, put him in the aft torpedo room to help them reload faster (you also need to get the forward torpedo room fully manned).

But OK…in your video you’ve sunk the DD and hit the C-2…why are you turning way off to starboard and running at Flank speed? That’s just giving away your position to the Trawler and taking you out of the path of the rest of the convoy. Don’t do that…stay at slow speed, dive to no more than 20m while you reload. Maintain your original course or change no more than 30deg to starboard to get away from your initial firing position and get into a good position for attacking the rest of the convoy (they aren’t racing away somewhere, just more or less “zig-zagging” along their original base course).

The Trawler can’t hear you if you’re not making a lot of noise; he doesn’t have active SONAR/ASDIC. All he can do is listen for the noise you make and it appears that he's not that good at picking up the sound from reloading the torpedo tubes. He’ll initially go to the position where you fired from and were last seen (get that scope down!) and he’ll bang away with a few depth charges there. He typically sets his depth charges too deep (probably assumes you’re going to dive to evade his attack). If you give him lots of propeller noise to detect and track you, he’ll know exactly where you are and where you’re going.

But, if you behave like a “hole in the water” and keep moving toward the convoy (course 000 or 030) for a couple of minutes, you’ll be almost in the middle between the remaining ships. Then put the scope up (just barely above the surface, not all the way up) and plot the positions of the ships. You should be able to set up to attack one of the tramp steamers with a stern tube shot…but get that scope down again as soon as you’ve identified your target. You’ll also be likely to see that the Trawler is hopelessly running around at your initial firing position looking for you and dropping random depth charges…let him, all he knows is that’s where you used to be. Work out the solution and open the stern tube before you make your final observation and shoot.

Then get out of there again…now’s the time to increase your speed briefly, get down to 20m or so and move away from your firing position…turn to parallel the convoy’s course while the forward tubes are still reloading. Remember, the torpedo wakes will point right at the location where you fired from; that’s where the Trawler is going to head for now.

If the Trawler is giving you a hard time, you’ll do well if you speed up and make a slight course change (30deg or so) when you hear the Trawler making his attack run. Making a radical course change slows you down too much…speed is your friend at that time. Also be sure you get down to only 20m or so; I’ve found it takes too long to get back to periscope depth when you’re ready to shoot again and if you’re somewhere near periscope depth when he starts his attack run, he seems to typically set his depth charges too deep as well. Sure, it’s a little nerve wracking to play that game with depth charges going off nearby, but it’ll keep you hot on the convoy’s trail and ready to shoot again as soon as the tubes get reloaded.

Keep at it, practice makes perfect.