torpedo loadout

[stoianm]

Hi guys,

When i started to play this game, in december 2010, i had not clue how to play. I think this ,,subsim radio forum,, is the best

After i readed the posts of the ''old sea mens'' i learned a lot of things: how to hunt in fog, how to intercept a convoy, how to evade from DDs, how to use ,,4 bearing metod,, how to hunt by hydro, how to use RAOFB etc.

Now i am able to play with ,,no map contacts - on,, and i have a lot of joy. The guys that make mods changed the games 100% in beter so many thanks for all your work!(TDW, sober, magnum, reaper7, steelviking, conus, travel, stormfly, trevally and many more)

One thing i did not find on this forum: a good thread about torpedo.
I have a few question in my mind:

1) what i must to chose when i start a patrol - how many gas torpedo and how many electric?

2)when i must to use the gas torpedo and when i must to use the electric ones?

Usually i chose only the gas ones because i have not a clue about ,,torpedos,,?

So the advice from ,,old sea mens,, are very wellcomed - please!

Thanks!

[Zedi]

This is a very important part in preparing your boat for patrol. Choosing the torpedo type depends on your strategy, the major difference between the gas and electric torpedoes is the range vs detections. With a steam torpedo you can have a 12 km long shots but will leave a very visible wake that makes them hard to use at daylight, the electric ones limit the range to 5-7 km but are practically invisible.

So if you plan to attack convoys at night with your boats surfaced, steam torpedoes would be a good choice. This way until the torpedoes reach their targets, you can be far away from the escorts detection range. At daylight, always use electric ones.

There is also the acoustic homing torpedo, that will track down ships even without selecting a target. But is hard and even impossible to control it, soon as it detects noise will start to follow it so is very hard to make it pass the convoy escort shield when using a strategy based on attacking the convoy from outside. So this type is best used for attacks inside the convoy. And make sure your not making the biggest noise once your torpedoes are released.

This is the theory. Practically you need renown point to buy/setup your torpedoes and they cost a lot. On refit outside the base, is no way to control the torpedo type you want and your boat will be loaded with the most used torpedoes your boat had. Sadly, there is no mod made yet that gives you control on refit and will get rid of the renown system.

[stoianm]

Thanks for informations Magnum! Apreciate.

A strange thing - when i reload ,,in bunker,, seems that for me is no need of renow points - i can choose how many and what type of torpedo i want (related of tipe of my Uboat and of the year) - so in this case what you will choose in my place? (half gas and half electric or more the electric ones - i understood you explains with day and night and distance, etc but you can not predicte when you will encounter a convoy - in this case for example if i have the gas ones i will wait the night and after that i will atack the convoy? an so on?)

Best regards!

[Zedi]

Personally, I'm mad about hit and run strategy. Means attacking convoys at night with the boat surfaced and using very long shots, similar to the night raid scene in Das Boot. It was also the favorite strategy used by Otto Kretschmer. Once I track down a convoy, I shadow them until midnight then i get into the position at max distance and unload. Depending on the weather conditions, I use clear targeting or blind salvo then turn the sub and run away. When things calm down, I resume the pursue until I unload all my ammo.

Attacking a convoy from inside with acoustic torpedoes is also great fun. Playing mouse &cat with the mad escorts and sinking merchants at the same time it gives a great adrenaline rush. But once the ammo is depleted...

[stoianm]

Originally Posted by Magnum

Personally, I'm mad about hit and run strategy. Means attacking convoys at night with the boat surfaced and using very long shots, similar to the night raid scene in Das Boot. It was also the favorite strategy used by Otto Kretschmer. Once I track down a convoy, I shadow them until midnight then i get into the position at max distance and unload. Depending on the weather conditions, I use clear targeting or blind salvo then turn the sub and run away. When things calm down, I resume the pursue until I unload all my ammo.

Attacking a convoy from inside with acoustic torpedoes is also great fun. Playing mouse &cat with the mad escorts and sinking merchants at the same time it gives a great adrenaline rush. But once the ammo is depleted...

Sounds cool!

Many thanks!

[Itkovian]

Originally Posted by Magnum

Personally, I'm mad about hit and run strategy. Means attacking convoys at night with the boat surfaced and using very long shots, similar to the night raid scene in Das Boot. It was also the favorite strategy used by Otto Kretschmer. Once I track down a convoy, I shadow them until midnight then i get into the position at max distance and unload. Depending on the weather conditions, I use clear targeting or blind salvo then turn the sub and run away. When things calm down, I resume the pursue until I unload all my ammo.

Attacking a convoy from inside with acoustic torpedoes is also great fun. Playing mouse &cat with the mad escorts and sinking merchants at the same time it gives a great adrenaline rush. But once the ammo is depleted...

See, I just read The Golden Horseshoe, and that book seems to indicate that Otto Kretschmer preferred to get right inside the destroyer screen on the surface, at night. It is described many times how he would just rush through a convoy, unloading torpedoes as he goes.

Now, the good news is that IS possible in SHV. Even with IRAI (set to .85, at least). I've pulled it off twice, though the danger is getting spotted in the middle of the convoy, as IRAI makes even merchant vessels quite enthousiastic with their armament.

Itkovian

[stoianm]

Originally Posted by Itkovian

See, I just read The Golden Horseshoe, and that book seems to indicate that Otto Kretschmer preferred to get right inside the destroyer screen on the surface, at night. It is described many times how he would just rush through a convoy, unloading torpedoes as he goes.

Now, the good news is that IS possible in SHV. Even with IRAI (set to .85, at least). I've pulled it off twice, though the danger is getting spotted in the middle of the convoy, as IRAI makes even merchant vessels quite enthousiastic with their armament.

Itkovian

What this means: in the night, on the surface, you enter in a middle of a convoy, start to sink ships and run after that - all that on surface?

[Zedi]

Originally Posted by Itkovian

See, I just read The Golden Horseshoe, and that book seems to indicate that Otto Kretschmer preferred to get right inside the destroyer screen on the surface, at night. It is described many times how he would just rush through a convoy, unloading torpedoes as he goes.

Now, the good news is that IS possible in SHV. Even with IRAI (set to .85, at least). I've pulled it off twice, though the danger is getting spotted in the middle of the convoy, as IRAI makes even merchant vessels quite enthousiastic with their armament.

Itkovian

True and was a valid strategy at early war when convoys were guarded by noobs. You could even board the enemy ships and have a piss in their wardroom. Is why that time period was called happy times. But later on was more healthy to stay far away and apply the hit and run strategy.

Anyway, this Otto dude had some huge balls, I was read about his actions in operation Leuthen when I built Open Horizons, really amazing. Das Boot 2 should be about this dude.

LE: just did a search for das boot 2 and it is what I found. Wonder when we sill start to make movies like this, we have all the visual setup needed ..

[Catfish]

Hi there,
now that is what i am talking about the whole time !

When you read the books of the commanders or crew (and there are some) you immediately realize how they were able to wreak havoc on convoys in the first years of the war.

1 out of 10 destroyers had radar until 1941 and it was not much better until 1942, a convoy usually had some 3 escorts at all first, maybe one destroyer, a corvette and a derelict vessel pressed into service. If there was a "new" Flower class corvette its top speed was 16 knots, and the boats just outran them - if they were seen at all. They could see their enemy much better from close from the water surface, than vice versa.


Doenitz had told his men again and again :

"Go in surfaced as fast as possible, but also keep the wake as small as possible in moonlit nights, keep your silhouette low (from the front or rear), attack against the moon so the enemy stands out against the light ! [...]
Your low silhouette will not be spotted from the elevated deck of an escort or a freighter against the dark sea.
If you spot an escort they will only spot you minutes later, if at all. They will sometimes not see you at 50 meters running alongside -
GO IN, you will NOT BE SEEN ! ..."

And they did. They went through the destroyer "screens", often ran parallel within the convoy at the same speed, unseen by merchants or escorts, carefully picking out targets, course and speed, and even leaving the convoy surfaced again. In unescorted convoys they ran with the ships, taking them out with the deck gun. There are hundreds of reports in the early war of doing exactly that. If they got in real trouble they dived, but only then. Even if someone saw them they would just run at the other side of a merchant, blocking the escort's sight until it vanished in the night again.
And one word about the guns installed on merchant ships: Exactly two U-boats were damaged by merchant guns, in the whole war. One of it was scuttled.

The british had their ASDIC, but they were completely overrun by torpedo boats attacking with 18 knots at the surface, their ASDIC did not help them at all.
And again: Not much radar, inferior systems and sometimes none at all. Repair lists of 39 show how often the few radar-equipped ships were in dock with their radar unusable, due to storm damage, electrical failures and generally poor design in the early war.


Those conditions certainly changed during the war, but when the odds turned against the U-boats in late 1942, they found themselves new hunting grounds before the US coast in 1943.

And SH5 ?
I just happened to again experience the destroyers in october 1939, 8 (EIGHT!) full-blown destroyers for an 8-ship "convoy", all with radar also working under 1000 meters (in reality the radar beam would be useless from ownship to 1000 meters), but with me surfaced in fog and storm (!) with a visibility of 50 meters ALL destroyers were at my exact location within 5 minutes. All, at the spot. They also kept firing "blind" through the fog from some 200 meters away, only that every shell hits.
MY visibility was 50 meters, but theirs was 20 kilometers. I even received messages from merchants that obviously had spotted me without me never seeing them. It was the other way round, and the way it is now this is ridiculous, even in 1945.

Ok, it's a game

Greetings,
Catfish

[Zedi]

Originally Posted by Catfish

Hi there....
I even received messages from merchants that obviously had spotted me without me never seeing them. It was the other way round, and the way it is now this is ridiculous, even in 1945.
....

Is the one of the main reason why I dont use TDW UI.
UI should be about interface, nothing more.

[stoianm]

Hi,

Now i made an ideea how to chose my torpedo loaudout.

Many thanks for all your posts!

[Catfish]

Hello,

Originally Posted by Magnum

Is the one of the main reason why I dont use TDW UI.
UI should be about interface, nothing more.

Hmm, to shut it off because it kills immersion is one thing, but if you have it on, you can clearly see what the sim or the AI in the sim "sees" !

It is an indicator what happens inside detection-wise

It is highly improbable to say at least, that a merchant sees you in fog, if you yourself do not see him. Now imagine what the destroyers "see" in SH5, in dense fog ...

Greetings,
Catfish

[Trevally.]

I may be wrong here but,

I think that TDW could not adjust the IRAI mod by date. So we had to have impoved escorts and anti-uboat tactics from the start of the war or not at all.

For the message "u-boat spotted" - I think that your boat is not spotted. This was added by the script scanning a distance from your boat and detecting contacts. If contacts were found there was a %chance that they would send a message "spotted".
I have not yet read the note from patch 6.3.6 but I think there are options to reduce or even stop this from happening.

[TheDarkWraith]

the game does not make the current environment conditions available to scripts. Thus I have no way of knowing whether it's foggy, rainy, sunny, etc. The radio messages were added because people wanted them. I did the best I could do given what little is available to use from the game.

[TheDarkWraith]

Originally Posted by Trevally.

I may be wrong here but,

I think that TDW could not adjust the IRAI mod by date. So we had to have impoved escorts and anti-uboat tactics from the start of the war or not at all.

For the message "u-boat spotted" - I think that your boat is not spotted. This was added by the script scanning a distance from your boat and detecting contacts. If contacts were found there was a %chance that they would send a message "spotted".
I have not yet read the note from patch 6.3.6 but I think there are options to reduce or even stop this from happening.

if we could 'clone' a GR2 file and reassign all the IDs to new IDs we could solve this problem of uber destroyers and escorts at beginning of war. By cloning it then I could readjust all the sensors to dumb down the AI so they are more realistically modeled in the early years. Just haven't figured out how to change IDs in the GR2 file yet.