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corsair15 · 10-18-12, 05:24 PM

USS Officer (SSN 688 class submarine)
January 1942
Pacific Ocean
North of Midway
178°E Long. 31°N Lat. (Approximately)

First I want to start out by explaining what the USS Officer was. Basically, I ran a skeleton crew of officers only with no damage control team, or watch officers. After all, running the Los Angeles mod on 13% realism is pretty much the real deal in modern submarines. Contacts on your computers screen, etc. I ran the submarine with as little crew as possible on the first run. Went into Yokosuka Harbor, and sank some cruisers, patrolled my assigned area, and returned to base.

Patrol 2:
This patrol I decided to go ahead and add a full crew to my submarine. Departed base sometime in January (I can't remember the date). My patrol orders were to transport an agent of friendly intelligence and facilitate his insertion into Tsurusaki Harbor. Of course, this was kids stuff and I managed to successfully insert the agent. At the time though, I was aiming to get the Submarine Service Medal, so I was trying to limit my tonnage to about 20,000. (PS, if anyone knows what the criteria is for all of the medals I would really love to read it. I always sink 50,000 tons or more each mission, regardless of the realism setting, so I was limiting my tonnage to gain the other medals.)

So I finish sinking about 24,000 tons of shipping, and I headed back to base. On my way back to pearl, I was just north of Midway, and I picked up a Sonar contact, I went to the surface and switched to surface search radar and picked up a huge task force. At this latitude and longitude and the date being January of 42, I figured it was a Friendly Task Force. I almost let it go, but decided I would go take a look to just to be sure. There was a thunderstorm at the time so I couldn't see anything. I got about 500 yards from a destroyer on the Task Force's port defense screen (Task force heading 285 toward Japan), and much to my dismay, that particular destroyer was Japanese. I took two shells and had about 19% hull damage. I crash dived and got behind the task force. There were three Shokaku carriers in the TF and one Kongo, and I sank each one individually with near zero visibility. After sinking the capital ships, I decided to use my last three torpedoes on the Mogami heavy cruisers that were escorting the TF. It was nearly daybreak and I had decent visibility after having followed the TF all night. I sank the first two successfully without problem. I swung around 180 degrees to sink the trailing Mogami, fired my last torpedo, and sank the ship.

After that I set dive planes for full dive, and increased to Flank Speed (35kts.) Where I screwed up, was traveling underneath the Mogami. I didn't figure it was a big deal. I sank it at about 800yards range, and got the indication "Enemy Unit Destroyed." I thought it was safe to travel underneath, completely un-aware I was about to meet certain death.

I hear explosions above my head from the command room. The Mogami is exploding. "WE'RE TAKING DAMAGE SIR!" "PRESSURE HULL HEAVILY DAMAGED" "RADAR DAMAGED" "COMPRESSOR DAMAGED" "WE HAVE FLOODING SIR!" "F10!" Hull Damage: 78% "Blow Ballast!" I get to the surface and the storm has magically disappeared, and three destroyers are closing on me like angry hornets who just had their nest incinerated. "Dive Dive Dive!" I dove without taking any hits. Unfortunately for me though, the submarine's hull had taken too much damage." "WE HAVE HEAVY FLOODING SIR!" I set depth for periscope depth, but the submarine was out of my control.

I put the engines in Back Emergency, and blew ballast yet again, but the submarine kept sinking and sinking until finally it stopped sinking at 1,656 feet. I was doomed. Oddly enough though, I made it about 20 more minutes. Finally the camera reverted to the Command Room, and everything fell apart. All is doom.

USS Officer is no more.

10-18-12, 05:24 PM	#4241
corsair15 Watch Join Date: Sep 2010 Posts: 21 Downloads: 6 Uploads: 0	USS Officer (The Beginning & End) USS Officer (SSN 688 class submarine) January 1942 Pacific Ocean North of Midway 178°E Long. 31°N Lat. (Approximately) First I want to start out by explaining what the USS Officer was. Basically, I ran a skeleton crew of officers only with no damage control team, or watch officers. After all, running the Los Angeles mod on 13% realism is pretty much the real deal in modern submarines. Contacts on your computers screen, etc. I ran the submarine with as little crew as possible on the first run. Went into Yokosuka Harbor, and sank some cruisers, patrolled my assigned area, and returned to base. Patrol 2: This patrol I decided to go ahead and add a full crew to my submarine. Departed base sometime in January (I can't remember the date). My patrol orders were to transport an agent of friendly intelligence and facilitate his insertion into Tsurusaki Harbor. Of course, this was kids stuff and I managed to successfully insert the agent. At the time though, I was aiming to get the Submarine Service Medal, so I was trying to limit my tonnage to about 20,000. (PS, if anyone knows what the criteria is for all of the medals I would really love to read it. I always sink 50,000 tons or more each mission, regardless of the realism setting, so I was limiting my tonnage to gain the other medals.) So I finish sinking about 24,000 tons of shipping, and I headed back to base. On my way back to pearl, I was just north of Midway, and I picked up a Sonar contact, I went to the surface and switched to surface search radar and picked up a huge task force. At this latitude and longitude and the date being January of 42, I figured it was a Friendly Task Force. I almost let it go, but decided I would go take a look to just to be sure. There was a thunderstorm at the time so I couldn't see anything. I got about 500 yards from a destroyer on the Task Force's port defense screen (Task force heading 285 toward Japan), and much to my dismay, that particular destroyer was Japanese. I took two shells and had about 19% hull damage. I crash dived and got behind the task force. There were three Shokaku carriers in the TF and one Kongo, and I sank each one individually with near zero visibility. After sinking the capital ships, I decided to use my last three torpedoes on the Mogami heavy cruisers that were escorting the TF. It was nearly daybreak and I had decent visibility after having followed the TF all night. I sank the first two successfully without problem. I swung around 180 degrees to sink the trailing Mogami, fired my last torpedo, and sank the ship. After that I set dive planes for full dive, and increased to Flank Speed (35kts.) Where I screwed up, was traveling underneath the Mogami. I didn't figure it was a big deal. I sank it at about 800yards range, and got the indication "Enemy Unit Destroyed." I thought it was safe to travel underneath, completely un-aware I was about to meet certain death. I hear explosions above my head from the command room. The Mogami is exploding. "WE'RE TAKING DAMAGE SIR!" "PRESSURE HULL HEAVILY DAMAGED" "RADAR DAMAGED" "COMPRESSOR DAMAGED" "WE HAVE FLOODING SIR!" "F10!" Hull Damage: 78% "Blow Ballast!" I get to the surface and the storm has magically disappeared, and three destroyers are closing on me like angry hornets who just had their nest incinerated. "Dive Dive Dive!" I dove without taking any hits. Unfortunately for me though, the submarine's hull had taken too much damage." "WE HAVE HEAVY FLOODING SIR!" I set depth for periscope depth, but the submarine was out of my control. I put the engines in Back Emergency, and blew ballast yet again, but the submarine kept sinking and sinking until finally it stopped sinking at 1,656 feet. I was doomed. Oddly enough though, I made it about 20 more minutes. Finally the camera reverted to the Command Room, and everything fell apart. All is doom. USS Officer is no more.