Newbie here

DeepFried · 12-05-10, 11:24 AM

Hi! I just started playing SHIII yesterday and to be frank i'm struggling with some of the elements of torpedo targeting... now I know there are guides around here and i've read a couple but there are still some things that confuse me no end, hope someone can help.

First i'm playing the vanilla patch 4 (i think) game on steam, I have checked all the realism boxes except map updates (when i'm less confused i'll probably turn this off too).

These are some of the issues that are confusing me:

1) AoB - I understand what it is and what it does but what I don't understand is how the notepad AoB setting interacts with the TDC nor how (or why) the periscope bearing has anything to do with it.
This lack of understanding is probably the reason that the last aft torpedo I fired went at a 90 degree tangent to the solution I thought I'd plotted

2) Where should I start with this game? Do I just jump straight into a career? Ideally I'd like some practice intercepting lone cargo ships and practice with firing solutions, I've just been practising in the academy torpedo training up to now.

3) What is the best angle to attack a ship from if you're following behind? I can nail them ok if I get ahead and lie in wait at a 90 degree tangent to their track (which takes ages to setup) but whenever I fire at them from alongside or behind my torpedoes either miss or seem to just bounce off!

4) Sonar, what are the basic rules for picking up and tracking ships by sonar? I often seem to find my sonar officer picking up ships miles away but refusing to detect a ship right in front of us.

5) And finally what mods do I want? I don't want to mod too heavily and I normally play games vanilla tbh but I want to enhance realism (and possibly graphics). I have an ATI card, a powerful computer and a widescreen monitor (is there anyway to get the game to go widescreen or change the resolution?)

Sorry for all the questions but any help appreciated!

Edit: I should probably say i've not played a sub or naval sim before so its all a bit new.

desirableroasted · 12-05-10, 01:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DeepFried

Hi! I just started playing SHIII yesterday and to be frank i'm struggling with some of the elements of torpedo targeting... now I know there are guides around here and i've read a couple but there are still some things that confuse me no end, hope someone can help.

First i'm playing the vanilla patch 4 (i think) game on steam, I have checked all the realism boxes except map updates (when i'm less confused i'll probably turn this off too).

These are some of the issues that are confusing me:

1) AoB - I understand what it is and what it does but what I don't understand is how the notepad AoB setting interacts with the TDC nor how (or why) the periscope bearing has anything to do with it.
This lack of understanding is probably the reason that the last aft torpedo I fired went at a 90 degree tangent to the solution I thought I'd plotted

2) Where should I start with this game? Do I just jump straight into a career? Ideally I'd like some practice intercepting lone cargo ships and practice with firing solutions, I've just been practising in the academy torpedo training up to now.

3) What is the best angle to attack a ship from if you're following behind? I can nail them ok if I get ahead and lie in wait at a 90 degree tangent to their track (which takes ages to setup) but whenever I fire at them from alongside or behind my torpedoes either miss or seem to just bounce off!

4) Sonar, what are the basic rules for picking up and tracking ships by sonar? I often seem to find my sonar officer picking up ships miles away but refusing to detect a ship right in front of us.

5) And finally what mods do I want? I don't want to mod too heavily and I normally play games vanilla tbh but I want to enhance realism (and possibly graphics). I have an ATI card, a powerful computer and a widescreen monitor (is there anyway to get the game to go widescreen or change the resolution?)

Sorry for all the questions but any help appreciated!

Edit: I should probably say i've not played a sub or naval sim before so its all a bit new.

You are going to get a ton of useful advice here (this is one of the most helpful forums I have ever seen). Our advice won't agree (it's a tough game), but I'll go first...

5) Learn the game first without modding up. The exception would be SH3 Commander, which mods on with no ill affects, and lets you manage your crew better and keep a record of your patrols.

4) Your hydrophone equipment detects best from the sides. Immediately in front or behind.. rarely.

3) From behind (or in front), I would use a magnetic pistol and set the torpedo for about a meter under. You will get some failures. And some wonderful kerplosians.

2) Jump into a career and play, Die. Rinse again.

1) Until you learn the game thoroughly, manual targeting may be a stretch.

Good luck and hunting!

Mittelwaechter · 12-05-10, 02:05 PM

To your 'sonar' problems:

the hydrophone is a passive device to pick up audible contacts. The active sonar will be availible later in war. Depending on your speed, the weather conditions and the contact speed the range of your hydrophone version differs. Your hydrophone operator becomes better with experience, rank and higher decoration.

The basic hydrophone has quite big deaf spots in front and behind the U-Boot. The hydrophone upgrades minimize them.

As long as your periscope is up and/or you can see your next contact your hydrophone operator will refuse to report that contact. You have to lower it completely to make him call out the contact again.

If you ask for constant tracking of the contact, he'll continue to report even if you rise your periscope.

Jimbuna · 12-05-10, 03:05 PM

Play the game stock/vanilla for a while until you become more proficient, then get a supermod, my choice would obviously be GWX.

TarJak · 12-05-10, 04:04 PM

If you want a bit of practise do the training missions first before jumping into career. That's what they are for. You can revisit them as much as you like to let you try different things.

Don't go the whole hog with manual targetting until you've practised a bit with assistance on. Once you feel confident and getting a hit is easy with the helpers, then disable them one at a time and allow yourself time to practise until you are proficient with each one turned off.

Read up on the manuals a

If your goal is full realism with manual targetting, then GWX with MaGui is the way to go mod wise.

Wilkommen zu Subsim und Gute Jagd!

Sailor Steve · 12-05-10, 04:07 PM

WELCOME ABOARD!

Quote:

Originally Posted by TarJak

If you want a bit of practise do the training missions first before jumping into career. That's what they are for. You can revisit them as much as you like to let you try different things.

The Torpedo Training mission sets you up with five targets, and you can practice submerged and surface attacks until you feel comfortable with it.

DeepFried · 12-05-10, 05:09 PM

Hey thanks for the replies!

Ok so I jumped into a career and am doing patrols, but these are confusing too! What do the different colour contacts mean? (red, green, blue), I've been told to patrol a sector so do I have to stay in that sector or can I engage contacts outside of it? Do I have carte blanche to attack any ship or what?
Where do the contacts come from? they can't be my sightings because they are too far away, yet I have no record of receiving a radio message? is this Third Reich clairvoyance?

Sailor Steve · 12-05-10, 05:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DeepFried

What do the different colour contacts mean? (red, green, blue),

Red: Enemy.
Green: Neutral.
Blue: Friendly.

Quote:

I've been told to patrol a sector so do I have to stay in that sector or can I engage contacts outside of it?

You don't have to go there at all. In the game you earn renown, which you then spend on upgrades and better crew. You get some renown for going to your patrol grid, and some more for staying there the prescribed 24 hours. Some people figure that they can get more for going where the tonnage is than by going to the grid. Me, I follow real procedure and stay there for the entire patrol, which means I sometimes have very low scores, even the occasional zero.

Quote:

Do I have carte blanche to attack any ship or what?

Yes. You get renown for sinking enemy ships, you lose it for sinking neutrals, and you lose a LOT for sinking friendlies; but the choice is yours.

Quote:

Where do the contacts come from? they can't be my sightings because they are too far away, yet I have no record of receiving a radio message? is this Third Reich clairvoyance?

Yes. Actually it's presumed that you're getting reports from other u-boats or recon planes, but the game actually just throws them out there. There are mods that reduce the number of contacts, and that change how they are reported, but that's probably further down the line for you.

DeepFried · 12-05-10, 06:05 PM

Right, I think I'm getting the hang of this now, just setup an intercept that worked perfectly. Unfortunately I did this before reading your post... so now I know that green in neutral

Anyway, if it had of been an enemy ship I could of blown its socks off!

So thats 2 patrols and zero sunk ships

I guess I wont bother patrolling the sector next time and just go straight for the shipping lanes (where ever they are!).

raymond6751 · 12-05-10, 07:11 PM

Take your time and enjoy.

I wouldn't worry about staying at your assigned patrol zone, but it is worth a look anyway. The early targets are along the English Coast, East side. If you survive long enough or get a type VII then you have enough fuel to reach places like Liverpool in the Irish Sea and the Northern entrance to the Irish Sea.

The convoys in 1940-43 headed for those ports away from the Channel or the South of England. Incidentally, the South of England is a deadly place. Get past that and don't hang around.

Axeman3d · 12-05-10, 09:11 PM

Me next....

I would play with Grey Wolves Expansion (GWX) installed right from the start, if for nothing more than the improved graphics and additional ships. It's just SHIII perked up, it doesn't make massive changes to the way you play anyway. You need nothing further for now.

Manual solutions on moving ships with no assistance require a fair bit of practice, start with the weapons officer doing it all and you just picking the targets and pulling the trigger. On a single ship it is do-able, but with multiple convoy targets it gets mental.

As for attacks, yes you are best to take the time to set up with a side on attack. End on shots are possible, but makes things more difficult for yourself. Also the impact trigger on torps only works reliably almost straight on. The more angled the hit, the more likely it will bounce off harmlessly. You can use magnetic triggering by firing just under the keel of the ship, theoretically much more destructive, but early torps are rather unreliable and as likely to blow up half way there as blow the ship in half.

Sonar issues have been explained, they're mounted on the sides so can't hear well directly front or backwards, particularly with your engines whirling away. If you want to hear well, go deep and go slow & quiet. You can upgrade to better systems later in the war, but you still can't hear behind you. That wasn't fixed until much later in the late cold war with towed arrays a mile behind the sub.

When on patrol I tend to head straight for the patrol grid, but make sure to submerge a few times a day and slow to a couple of knots to see if I hear anything nearby. Once I've got my 24 hours in the patrol grid done, I tend to go wait in the western approaches for convoys. Convoys to and from America have to go around Ireland to get to the British ports, so hanging around south or north west of Ireland you will eventually find one. Lone ships are good practice, but convoys have the big targets.

When attacking convoys you can fire a couple of eels at a couple of big targets, or fire off one each at 4 targets. I favour a single torp per target, and they either sink from the lucky shot, or more often they are slowed or go dead in the water. This means I just need to hang around till the escorts move off with the rest of the convoy before surfacing to finish them off with the deck gun. Easy pickings and saves torpedoes. Later in the war they are usually armed with their own deck guns, so it's a case of setting up an easy shot on a sitting duck.

DeepFried · 12-06-10, 06:47 PM

Thanks for all the advice guys! its going well now I think, just finished my third patrol and a sunk two ships this time

, a small merchant and a C2 Cargo, one in my patrol sector and one a sector west.

I went to the patrol sector and though it, got a medium speed contact a couple of sectors away which I intercepted in the next sector;was the small merchant, 2 torpedoes and it went down pretty fast. (was planning to use just one but I forgot to open the tube first, so the first torp hit the stern rather than the engine room)

I was heading back to my patrol sector and I got an aeroplane contact, crash dived and changed course, 3 depth charges but only the first was close, no damage. Got back to the patrol sector and picked up the C2 medium speed, intercepted and gave it my 3 other torps just to be sure, all three hit just behind the engine room and it goes down in about 15 seconds.

All in all very happy, i'm ok with manual targeting now I think, its pretty simple once you work out what all the knobs do, still don't really see the point of the notepad though as it works perfectly just putting the AOB, range, and speed into the TDC directly.

Couple of questions though: Do the crew only get 1xp per patrol? surely that will take forever to promote them! Also I assume I need to leave enough fuel to get back to the starting port? I don't seem to actually need to go back to the port to finish the patrol like I did the first two times. And I assume that the radio qualification applies to the sonar post too?

ShadowOps · 12-06-10, 07:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by raymond6751

If you survive long enough or get a type VII then you have enough fuel to reach places like Liverpool in the Irish Sea and the Northern entrance to the Irish Sea.

Actually raymond, I have gotten to Iceland in unmodded SH3 in a Type II. So you dont really NEED a Type VII to reach those places. I dont mean to be rude or anything but I had to add my 2 cents.

12-06-10, 07:41 PM

If I do get a chance to play?
I keep enuff fuel to return to Base.
I don't like the teleport option.

Axeman3d · 12-06-10, 07:56 PM

I park next to the brass band and pretty nurses myself, I didn't even realise teleporting was an option. I always keep enough fuel to get home, and if a patrol is not going well I can stay out so long hunting that I need to turn for home purely for fuel reasons. Of course type VII and IX's have more than ample range for hunting in the Atlantic for weeks if you keep the speed at 10 knots or less.

12-05-10, 11:24 AM	#1
DeepFried Swabbie Join Date: Dec 2010 Posts: 12 Downloads: 7 Uploads: 0	Newbie here Hi! I just started playing SHIII yesterday and to be frank i'm struggling with some of the elements of torpedo targeting... now I know there are guides around here and i've read a couple but there are still some things that confuse me no end, hope someone can help. First i'm playing the vanilla patch 4 (i think) game on steam, I have checked all the realism boxes except map updates (when i'm less confused i'll probably turn this off too). These are some of the issues that are confusing me: 1) AoB - I understand what it is and what it does but what I don't understand is how the notepad AoB setting interacts with the TDC nor how (or why) the periscope bearing has anything to do with it. This lack of understanding is probably the reason that the last aft torpedo I fired went at a 90 degree tangent to the solution I thought I'd plotted 2) Where should I start with this game? Do I just jump straight into a career? Ideally I'd like some practice intercepting lone cargo ships and practice with firing solutions, I've just been practising in the academy torpedo training up to now. 3) What is the best angle to attack a ship from if you're following behind? I can nail them ok if I get ahead and lie in wait at a 90 degree tangent to their track (which takes ages to setup) but whenever I fire at them from alongside or behind my torpedoes either miss or seem to just bounce off! 4) Sonar, what are the basic rules for picking up and tracking ships by sonar? I often seem to find my sonar officer picking up ships miles away but refusing to detect a ship right in front of us. 5) And finally what mods do I want? I don't want to mod too heavily and I normally play games vanilla tbh but I want to enhance realism (and possibly graphics). I have an ATI card, a powerful computer and a widescreen monitor (is there anyway to get the game to go widescreen or change the resolution?) Sorry for all the questions but any help appreciated! Edit: I should probably say i've not played a sub or naval sim before so its all a bit new.

12-05-10, 02:05 PM	#3
Mittelwaechter The Old Man Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 1,304 Downloads: 35 Uploads: 0	To your 'sonar' problems: the hydrophone is a passive device to pick up audible contacts. The active sonar will be availible later in war. Depending on your speed, the weather conditions and the contact speed the range of your hydrophone version differs. Your hydrophone operator becomes better with experience, rank and higher decoration. The basic hydrophone has quite big deaf spots in front and behind the U-Boot. The hydrophone upgrades minimize them. As long as your periscope is up and/or you can see your next contact your hydrophone operator will refuse to report that contact. You have to lower it completely to make him call out the contact again. If you ask for constant tracking of the contact, he'll continue to report even if you rise your periscope. __________________ 10 happy wolves rear 90 blinded, ensnared sheep. 90 happy sheep banish the wolves. Arrest the 1% - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ6hg1oNeGE

12-05-10, 03:05 PM	#4
Jimbuna Chief of the Boat Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: 250 metres below the surface Posts: 190,500 Downloads: 63 Uploads: 13	Play the game stock/vanilla for a while until you become more proficient, then get a supermod, my choice would obviously be GWX. __________________ Wise men speak because they have something to say; Fools because they have to say something. Oh my God, not again!!

12-05-10, 07:11 PM	#10
raymond6751 Admirable Mike Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Canada Posts: 1,338 Downloads: 421 Uploads: 0	The patient hunter Take your time and enjoy. I wouldn't worry about staying at your assigned patrol zone, but it is worth a look anyway. The early targets are along the English Coast, East side. If you survive long enough or get a type VII then you have enough fuel to reach places like Liverpool in the Irish Sea and the Northern entrance to the Irish Sea. The convoys in 1940-43 headed for those ports away from the Channel or the South of England. Incidentally, the South of England is a deadly place. Get past that and don't hang around. __________________ Game Designer: Close The Atlantic - World War Three https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/...orld-war-three

12-05-10, 04:04 PM	#5
TarJak Fleet Admiral Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Sydney, Australia Posts: 17,052 Downloads: 150 Uploads: 8	If you want a bit of practise do the training missions first before jumping into career. That's what they are for. You can revisit them as much as you like to let you try different things. Don't go the whole hog with manual targetting until you've practised a bit with assistance on. Once you feel confident and getting a hit is easy with the helpers, then disable them one at a time and allow yourself time to practise until you are proficient with each one turned off. Read up on the manuals a If your goal is full realism with manual targetting, then GWX with MaGui is the way to go mod wise. Wilkommen zu Subsim und Gute Jagd!

12-05-10, 05:09 PM	#7
DeepFried Swabbie Join Date: Dec 2010 Posts: 12 Downloads: 7 Uploads: 0	Hey thanks for the replies! Ok so I jumped into a career and am doing patrols, but these are confusing too! What do the different colour contacts mean? (red, green, blue), I've been told to patrol a sector so do I have to stay in that sector or can I engage contacts outside of it? Do I have carte blanche to attack any ship or what? Where do the contacts come from? they can't be my sightings because they are too far away, yet I have no record of receiving a radio message? is this Third Reich clairvoyance?

12-05-10, 06:05 PM	#9
DeepFried Swabbie Join Date: Dec 2010 Posts: 12 Downloads: 7 Uploads: 0	Right, I think I'm getting the hang of this now, just setup an intercept that worked perfectly. Unfortunately I did this before reading your post... so now I know that green in neutral Anyway, if it had of been an enemy ship I could of blown its socks off! So thats 2 patrols and zero sunk ships I guess I wont bother patrolling the sector next time and just go straight for the shipping lanes (where ever they are!).

12-05-10, 09:11 PM	#11
Axeman3d Machinist's Mate Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Central Scotland Posts: 127 Downloads: 29 Uploads: 0	Me next.... I would play with Grey Wolves Expansion (GWX) installed right from the start, if for nothing more than the improved graphics and additional ships. It's just SHIII perked up, it doesn't make massive changes to the way you play anyway. You need nothing further for now. Manual solutions on moving ships with no assistance require a fair bit of practice, start with the weapons officer doing it all and you just picking the targets and pulling the trigger. On a single ship it is do-able, but with multiple convoy targets it gets mental. As for attacks, yes you are best to take the time to set up with a side on attack. End on shots are possible, but makes things more difficult for yourself. Also the impact trigger on torps only works reliably almost straight on. The more angled the hit, the more likely it will bounce off harmlessly. You can use magnetic triggering by firing just under the keel of the ship, theoretically much more destructive, but early torps are rather unreliable and as likely to blow up half way there as blow the ship in half. Sonar issues have been explained, they're mounted on the sides so can't hear well directly front or backwards, particularly with your engines whirling away. If you want to hear well, go deep and go slow & quiet. You can upgrade to better systems later in the war, but you still can't hear behind you. That wasn't fixed until much later in the late cold war with towed arrays a mile behind the sub. When on patrol I tend to head straight for the patrol grid, but make sure to submerge a few times a day and slow to a couple of knots to see if I hear anything nearby. Once I've got my 24 hours in the patrol grid done, I tend to go wait in the western approaches for convoys. Convoys to and from America have to go around Ireland to get to the British ports, so hanging around south or north west of Ireland you will eventually find one. Lone ships are good practice, but convoys have the big targets. When attacking convoys you can fire a couple of eels at a couple of big targets, or fire off one each at 4 targets. I favour a single torp per target, and they either sink from the lucky shot, or more often they are slowed or go dead in the water. This means I just need to hang around till the escorts move off with the rest of the convoy before surfacing to finish them off with the deck gun. Easy pickings and saves torpedoes. Later in the war they are usually armed with their own deck guns, so it's a case of setting up an easy shot on a sitting duck.

12-06-10, 06:47 PM	#12
DeepFried Swabbie Join Date: Dec 2010 Posts: 12 Downloads: 7 Uploads: 0	Thanks for all the advice guys! its going well now I think, just finished my third patrol and a sunk two ships this time , a small merchant and a C2 Cargo, one in my patrol sector and one a sector west. I went to the patrol sector and though it, got a medium speed contact a couple of sectors away which I intercepted in the next sector;was the small merchant, 2 torpedoes and it went down pretty fast. (was planning to use just one but I forgot to open the tube first, so the first torp hit the stern rather than the engine room) I was heading back to my patrol sector and I got an aeroplane contact, crash dived and changed course, 3 depth charges but only the first was close, no damage. Got back to the patrol sector and picked up the C2 medium speed, intercepted and gave it my 3 other torps just to be sure, all three hit just behind the engine room and it goes down in about 15 seconds. All in all very happy, i'm ok with manual targeting now I think, its pretty simple once you work out what all the knobs do, still don't really see the point of the notepad though as it works perfectly just putting the AOB, range, and speed into the TDC directly. Couple of questions though: Do the crew only get 1xp per patrol? surely that will take forever to promote them! Also I assume I need to leave enough fuel to get back to the starting port? I don't seem to actually need to go back to the port to finish the patrol like I did the first two times. And I assume that the radio qualification applies to the sonar post too?

12-06-10, 07:41 PM	#14
Madox58 Stowaway Posts: n/a Downloads: Uploads:	If I do get a chance to play? I keep enuff fuel to return to Base. I don't like the teleport option.

12-06-10, 07:56 PM	#15
Axeman3d Machinist's Mate Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Central Scotland Posts: 127 Downloads: 29 Uploads: 0	I park next to the brass band and pretty nurses myself, I didn't even realise teleporting was an option. I always keep enough fuel to get home, and if a patrol is not going well I can stay out so long hunting that I need to turn for home purely for fuel reasons. Of course type VII and IX's have more than ample range for hunting in the Atlantic for weeks if you keep the speed at 10 knots or less.