Well, I just finished that patrol. A grand total of EIGHT air attacks on my boat! This isn't supposed to happen until 1944!
Fortunately, my tough IXB made it back with 35% hull integrity. Unfortunately, when I attacked a convoy, my computer crashed (which sucked hard because it had a Southhampton-class cruiser that I was
itching for).
The good news is that I reloaded from a save, attacked the same convoy (that now was missing the cruiser?), and ended up with 49.9K on my way home. I spotted a coastal merchant heading across the Atlantic (
) and with two stern torps left, I pressed the attack. Now here's the strange thing. I'm about 200 km from the Straight of Gibraltar. Earlier in the day, I had been attacked by an airplane (09:30). After running West all day at 4-5 knts submerged, I encountered this ship at 15:30. Immediately upon surfacing, I was attacked by single-engine airplane! I looked around with my observation scope, but saw nothing. Fortunately, I got down just in time to take relatively minor damage to my rear from the second bomb. I then followed the boat underwater until night when I surfaced, got in front of it, and sank it. Has anyone experienced a boat being escorted by a plane? Was this just really bad luck? Do coastal merchants warrant an escort in Jan 1941?!?
Very strange. On the plus side, that put me over 50K, and on the way home, I ran into an unescorted large merchant. On the plus side, I managed to get in front of her, then land a point-blank hit on her bow with my final stern torp. On the downside, it had a hidden gun midships and scored yet another hit on my poor ship while I was waiting for her to sink. On the plus side again, I submerged, tracked her, watched her slow right down (from 9 to 2 kts), and then sink. Any tips for detecting hidden gun emplacements? Should I just assume that all enemy ships are armed now? And does having a skilled gunner make any difference when I do the aiming myself?
Now it's May 1941 and I'm seriously considering "cheating" by looking up the Hood vs. Bismark battle and adding my two torps.:p