Its a consistency issue with the AI.
Went back and repeated my tactic on Junks on Parade.
obliterated their surface group and this time they never knew what hit them
never even put a torpedo within miles of me.
doubt they could have detected salt in the water.
i did nothing differently than i did in the first run. so what gives?
why is it that in two virtually identical engagements, the enemy AI is flawless and super-saturates my area with torpedoes and depth charges, and in the next i take out their entire fleet without so much as a glance in my direction?
EDIT:
i understand that AI is probably the hardest thing to simulate and get ironed out in any game, its just hard to replicate human behavior in a simulator, let alone the human behavior of a whole crew