Zig Zag... nope!

[kylania]

I was waiting outside London for ships or something and sure enough a full convoy appeared out of nowhere! The hunt was on!

I finally caught them heading due east and managed to get in front and lined up to hit the first three ships. Closer... closer... fire, fire! Waiting for the close one to cross my wire...

As the first torpedo passed the second ship they got alerted and started to zig zag. No big deal. I dropped the speed in the TDC and fired at two more ships, 1km away, no problem.

Then.. instead of zig zagging, these merchants just turned and headed due south!! Wha! Every torpedo missed while sliding along side rather than sliding INTO their side. Totally messed up attack.

Ended up sinking one by my deck gun before high tailing it away from the incoming escorts.

[robbo180265]

Originally Posted by kylania

I was waiting outside London for ships or something and sure enough a full convoy appeared out of nowhere! The hunt was on!

I finally caught them heading due east and managed to get in front and lined up to hit the first three ships. Closer... closer... fire, fire! Waiting for the close one to cross my wire...

As the first torpedo passed the second ship they got alerted and started to zig zag. No big deal. I dropped the speed in the TDC and fired at two more ships, 1km away, no problem.

Then.. instead of zig zagging, these merchants just turned and headed due south!! Wha! Every torpedo missed while sliding along side rather than sliding INTO their side. Totally messed up attack.

Ended up sinking one by my deck gun before high tailing it away from the incoming escorts.

I've had them change direction as I'm stalking them - but never as I'm lining them up.

Lol - that's gotta hurt.

[Der SchattenJager]

I'm having the exact opposite problem. A small convoy of 4 unescorted freighters in a 2x2 config were traveling at steady speed and bearing for the entire 6-8 hours I was stalking them to get into a Fast 90 position.

In position and not caring about simultaneous strikes, I waited as the closest ship reached my scope crosshairs and fired two torps.

I think I had accidently changed my AOB slightly, so the two torps were heading for the aft of the ship. The first hit, and the second went behind but hit the lead ship in the next column.

So here I had two freighters hit and on fire, and all 4 of them continue about their course as if nothing happened. No zig-zagging, no speeding up, no evasive maneuvers of any kind.

This has happened every time I've engaged a target or group of targets so far. Granted, this is ~ September of '39, as I had waited to play SHV until after the 1.2 patch, so maybe it's just an "early war" thing.

A couple times I even engaged a lone freighter on the surface where I followed it to an intercept point in sunny clear weather, and it never once changed course or speed. It just proceeded to meet me to it's death.

Is this normal?

[kylania]

Welcome aboard!

I've seen some merchants in a very large convoy not react if some edge ones were hit, but usually merchants always zig zagged to some degree.

What I did see once that disappointed me was as soon as one of my torpedoes was seen all the merchants started to swerve, while the escorts didn't react at all. Even after two merchants sank.

[The General]

Glad to see I'm not the only one enjoying the hell out of SH5. If some modders teamed up and put together something like GWX for SH5 then it would blow SH3 out of the water! It already does in many ways.

[Der SchattenJager]

Originally Posted by kylania

Welcome aboard!

I've seen some merchants in a very large convoy not react if some edge ones were hit, but usually merchants always zig zagged to some degree.

What I did see once that disappointed me was as soon as one of my torpedoes was seen all the merchants started to swerve, while the escorts didn't react at all. Even after two merchants sank.

Thanks, long time lurker, first time poster

Speaking of escorts not reacting, after I sunk enough tonnage to complete the British coastal mission, I had quite a few torps left, so I saved and decided to mess around by sneaking into the port near Leven, Scotland (I can't remember the name on the map.)

Submerged, I snuck past the 4-5 warships patrolling the bay, and proceeded to the harbor where I stopped at around 3,000m from the docks. There were about 12 warships moored there, and decided have some fun and slammed torpedoes into 4 of the biggest ones I saw.

Fully expecting a swift retaliation, I sat there for a good 5 hours to watch them all sink, and not a single warship patrolling the harbor responded. None of the other moored ships responded either. It was like the entire port was on holiday.

I thought the 1.2 patch was supposed to improve the AI.

[Der SchattenJager]

Originally Posted by The General

Glad to see I'm not the only one enjoying the hell out of SH5. If some modders teamed up and put together something like GWX for SH5 then it would blow SH3 out of the water! It already does in many ways.

I think with patch 1.2 and a couple of choice mods, the game is actually quite fun. I think the immersion factor, minus some small niggles, is far greater in V than it was in IV/III.

[kylania]

Early war escorts are pretty stupid. It does ramp up a bit later on though. Or you can use things like the Elite Campaign mod to get your butt sunk from the beginning.