The b!tchiest gig ever

[msalama]

Seriously, what a frikking patrol

I was assigned to AN15 which, even in 1940, is a bit too close to Scapa Flow for a Kaleun to feel comfortable with. But there we went regardless, and soon ran into a s**tstorm of action; bumped into a bunch of destroyers we just managed to evade, and then into a sizable convoy - attacked them in shallow waters, did pretty well, a large merchant sunk, the escorts clueless. Then ran into a whale factory ship escorted by an ASW trawler, screwed it up, got detected in 40m of water Succeeded in getting out alive regardless, and decided back to old Wilmie we go...

All good for awhile, but then the weather turned to total c**p, as bad as you know it sometimes goes. And immediately after that, a contact report of a large convoy 20nm southeast of us (the game was stuttering badly in TC over 128 at this point anyway so I knew someone's there, contact report or not). Had to check it out of course, even in zero visibility, so there we went diesels howling...

We're in the area now and the watch reports nothing (I'm at TC x 64 of course by now). I up the TC to 128 and everything goes all choppy, so I know they must be right here. Wait for a couple of minutes, still nothing. And then...

"Schiff gesichet, lage 63! Geringe Entfernung!"
"Schiff gesichet, lage 67! Geringe Entfernung!"
"Schiff gesichet, lage 72! Geringe Entfernung!"

I'm in the middle - and I mean literally, I could've almost touch the buggers - of a HUGE convoy Freighters all around, everywhere, in every *******ing direction, just a huge mass of ships all happily sailing away, oblivious to a tiny U-boat in the midst of them! I pick a large merchant, turn into a fast 90, hastily estimate (guess) his speed at 7kts, set the 'pedos, and wait for him to cross my UZO.

There he is, but too near, all too near! Back emergency, now, Chief, or I'll have your cohones for breakfast!!! We back off with all we have, and I fire the eels. A misfire, a hit, a second hit, a miss...

The crew cheers, and at the same time EVERY f**ing spot, bulb, candle, anything putting out light, is turned onto us from EVERY ship in the vicinity, from all directions. I order crash dive and down we go, nothing in the sonar so far but I'm sure they're coming. We suddendly hit the bottom violently at 50m - verdammt, is it really that shallow here!!! - and damage the boat extensively. I'm listening to the reports coming in from every quarter and yell to the Exec to get the repair team cracking NOW, when I'm interrupted by the sonarman informing us that there're at least three warships closing in on us now...

Here they are, and they seem to be good; one listens, the second one pings, and the 3rd one throws DCs at us like he doesn't have to pay for them, and they seem to alternate their positions and duties as they go, too! There's only 50m of water, so there's nothing much I can do apart from evading them the best I can, and praying. Nevertheless I finally, after receiving some consiredable damage from their DCs, manage to hobble away after 2 hours of us s**tting bricks... and by the smell of it then in the boat, not just metaphorically

And now we're here, in the seediest bar of all of Wilhelmshaven, having just barely escaped horrible death against all possible odds. Ain't this just the most bitchin' game ever, I ask you???

PS. And yes all ye auld moldy geezers, it's GWX3 of course