So I was thinking...

[Fishie]

... as I strolled across the deck of my shiny new Gato class sub (SS-215, the Growler) for my 5th reincarnation in the great Pacific theater, that "This thing could do better."

I've paid my dues, right? 5 complete war tours (approx 25 years in game), over 1,000,000 tons of merchant and war shipping sunk including 2 carriers on the Midway attack fleet during my last tour. All between 90 and 100% realism. The qualifications are there.

So a quick call to Lockheed Martin, Ford, and several other facilities while my new sub was being built would lead to some startling developments of this fine piece of military equipment.

To start off- speed. The normal speed on a glass smooth surface at flank was between 17 and 20. With the new superchargers and transmission in, it now does between 30 and 35.

Underwater was where she really suffered- 8 knots, max. And if you were going that fast, you could stick your head underwater in Pearl and hear me all the way from Hiroshima bay. It's that loud. According to the constant onslaught of destroyers that seem to accompany me every time I do that, anyway.

With the new Energizer model 1943-a1 battery I put in, and with the Slot-sub5000GT electrical motors, the new Growler does about 17 knots when you make dishes in Tokyo shake. When absolutely quiet, my speed has increased from a paltry 2 knots to about 6. Not bad.

Next up- dealing with those steenking depth charges. Max depth was in the 200-300 range. I can now do more then 600 should I need to. Thanks to the Cobahm armor industry for their valiant time travelling efforts in toughening up the ol' gal to modern standard. Oh, and armor. Yeah. About the same as a light or aux cruiser. Multiplied hit points times 10. More surface fun.

More surface fun brought me to a whole new level of fun- the GUNS! Deck gun was promptly upgraded to an 8" cannon, capable of 20 rounds a minute, with new AP shells that hurled along at a cool 1,000 m/s. When they hit, they rip anywhere from a 2' to a 8' hole in the side of the target. Don't even get me started on the HE rounds. Deck clearers. Awesome

And since I've been running the Trigger Maru and Run Silent Run Deep mods, I've had to deal with an exponential increase in aircraft patrols. Bettys, zeroes, vals, kates, you name it, they're up there, and they're damn good at their job. More then once I've had to cut a patrol short due to a well placed hit from a surprise visitor.

Well, we can deal with them easily enough. Upgrade both AA batteries to 40mm Bofors. A quick call to Remington mini-guns upgraded their rate of fire into the 6,000 rds/min category. A slight increase in ammunition storage configuration- 1200 rounds in a drum, 3 drumds available, 3 second time to swich drums. These guys are good, right? A call out to the best gunners in the Navy gave me CPOs Smith and Wellings.

So I now have an 8" deck gun with auto-reloading, and 2 40mm miniguns manned by two of the best gunners in the Navy. Surface action handled.

Now for the torpedoes.

A quick call to Union Pacific yielded a more efficient steam/gear ratio, increasing the torpedo speed to 66 on the high speed, 42 on the low. Ranges remain unchanged, no sense getting carried away, right? Black-cat fireworks agreed to beef up the explosive package, and was able to squeeze an additional 1,500 lbs of explosive force into 'em. Now keel shots break the backs of all but the largest merchants, and anything under a cruiser is a guranteed kill. Battleships are still a handful, but hey- that's all part of the fun, right?

So that about wraps it up.

"Ahead 2/3rds" We're going to Japan. Will return with the results. Stay tuned.

[Segwin]

Good stuff!