Grey Wolves Errata Report Thread.

Catfish · 03-31-06, 08:58 AM

Hello,
just started anew with SH3 and the grey wolves mod. I like it very much, especially that you need only one mod to have it almost all - great!

If i would post what i like here, i would need ten pages at least, so ... i have some issues with the deck and AA guns:

Deck gun:

Succeeding at school is much harder now (maybe like it should be), but it is impossible to sink the requested four ships with the deck gun.
This was already discussed during Beery's "Real U-boat mod", the firing rate was changed to 1 or two shots per minute, but at least RUB's deck gun did any damage. Now you're mostly not even able to destroy any cargo, let alone a C2.

In the beginning of the war, when ships were still stopped to let the crew escape, and then sunk, U-boats often used the deck gun. There is some ammunition in a locker at the foot of the deck gun, so at least the first twenty shots could be fired very quickly - in the meantime, after those 20 shots, there would be enough ammunition on deck provided by the crew to keep up the firing rate.

If there was no immediate danger the shots were even aimed carefully and precisely to see and estimate if there was still another shot needed. Usually the captain would advise the weapon's officer to fire five shots, and the gun crew was allowed to fire those shots by the weapon's officer, repeating the captain's orders aloud again. After this all waited to see what happened.

And the hit rate was much higher than 50 percent, again i don't know where you get the numbers from. U-boat crews fired at distances of 200-700 meters rather than remote targets. Hitting ships at a distance of 2-3000 metres so well in SH is a bit unrealistic. Maybe you could make it harder to hit remote targets, but increase the effect on close shots ?

I guess you over-estimate a freight ship's "armour" - there was none. Even a light cruiser had virtually no real armour, let's not talk about destroyers - those were tin cans (Read Forester's "The ship" about a light cruiser in the mediterranean sea). A usual tactic for U-boats that had time, and if there was no other danger present, was to shoot 5-10 times at the waterline of a freighter, and finally hole the hatch covers with the 2cm gun to let the air escape to speed up sinking.
U-boats where known of surfacing in convoys and sinking freighters with the deck gun alone, if only during the early years. And imagine explosive shells and a tanker ...

The 8.8 as well as the 10.5 cm was a rapid firing gun, even the marine versions were able to fire 13-15 shots per minute with manual (!) loading.

It seems you want to model an average deck gun kill rate through the whole war, rather than allowing more deck gun kills in the beginning, and making that impossible in the later years to level this out (?). The effect of the 8.8 and 10.5 was disastrous, and it was only because of the danger in the later war (armed mechants, more escorts, air superiority) and risk for a U-boat to be surfaced that the deck gun was not used often any more.

AA guns:

The FlaK (or AA in english) is somehow strange: In the AA training mission i'm supposed to down four planes, ok. I have to hit a Swordfish at least 30 times with a 2cm (=20mm) gun to down it. I see and can count it because there's some debris flying away from the plane's area being hit.

ME Bf 109s and FW 190 planes had 20mm cannons, and it made toast of other planes if they hit properly. If you toned this down to represent the poor hit rate of U-boats downing planes that's ok, but real enemy planes would not fly over the boat again and again at a range i would hit it with a flyswatter. Thinking of Kaminsky defending his boat in the Caribbean sea this sure looks strange.

Remember allied planes did not approach U-boats when they had dropped their bombs, they mostly circled just outside of the AA gun range and asked for support. Allied planes where downed seldomly because no one saw them coming, and it was too late to man the guns. A boat that was well aware of ac attacks would sure hit and down incoming planes, even if that would be the last action. So either the planes need too many hits to be downed, and this needs changing, or the (unseen) ac attacks are not deadly enough, as they were in reality.

Torpedoes:

Regarding torpedoes all i can say is that it is not only the hole and water rushing in that sinks a ship, but the shock of the explosion that destroys bulkheads and tears off steam pipes. Needing more than two torpedoes to sink a 2000 ton freighter ? Come on ...

Thanks for your patience

Don't get me wrong, i love this mod, it is just that a few thing should be changed imho. It is unbelievable what you guys did with the original SH3 !

Thanks and greetings,
Catfish

03-31-06, 08:58 AM	#11
Catfish Dipped Squirrel Operative Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: ..where the ocean meets the sky Posts: 17,770 Downloads: 38 Uploads: 0	Hello, just started anew with SH3 and the grey wolves mod. I like it very much, especially that you need only one mod to have it almost all - great! If i would post what i like here, i would need ten pages at least, so ... i have some issues with the deck and AA guns: Deck gun: Succeeding at school is much harder now (maybe like it should be), but it is impossible to sink the requested four ships with the deck gun. This was already discussed during Beery's "Real U-boat mod", the firing rate was changed to 1 or two shots per minute, but at least RUB's deck gun did any damage. Now you're mostly not even able to destroy any cargo, let alone a C2. In the beginning of the war, when ships were still stopped to let the crew escape, and then sunk, U-boats often used the deck gun. There is some ammunition in a locker at the foot of the deck gun, so at least the first twenty shots could be fired very quickly - in the meantime, after those 20 shots, there would be enough ammunition on deck provided by the crew to keep up the firing rate. If there was no immediate danger the shots were even aimed carefully and precisely to see and estimate if there was still another shot needed. Usually the captain would advise the weapon's officer to fire five shots, and the gun crew was allowed to fire those shots by the weapon's officer, repeating the captain's orders aloud again. After this all waited to see what happened. And the hit rate was much higher than 50 percent, again i don't know where you get the numbers from. U-boat crews fired at distances of 200-700 meters rather than remote targets. Hitting ships at a distance of 2-3000 metres so well in SH is a bit unrealistic. Maybe you could make it harder to hit remote targets, but increase the effect on close shots ? I guess you over-estimate a freight ship's "armour" - there was none. Even a light cruiser had virtually no real armour, let's not talk about destroyers - those were tin cans (Read Forester's "The ship" about a light cruiser in the mediterranean sea). A usual tactic for U-boats that had time, and if there was no other danger present, was to shoot 5-10 times at the waterline of a freighter, and finally hole the hatch covers with the 2cm gun to let the air escape to speed up sinking. U-boats where known of surfacing in convoys and sinking freighters with the deck gun alone, if only during the early years. And imagine explosive shells and a tanker ... The 8.8 as well as the 10.5 cm was a rapid firing gun, even the marine versions were able to fire 13-15 shots per minute with manual (!) loading. It seems you want to model an average deck gun kill rate through the whole war, rather than allowing more deck gun kills in the beginning, and making that impossible in the later years to level this out (?). The effect of the 8.8 and 10.5 was disastrous, and it was only because of the danger in the later war (armed mechants, more escorts, air superiority) and risk for a U-boat to be surfaced that the deck gun was not used often any more. AA guns: The FlaK (or AA in english) is somehow strange: In the AA training mission i'm supposed to down four planes, ok. I have to hit a Swordfish at least 30 times with a 2cm (=20mm) gun to down it. I see and can count it because there's some debris flying away from the plane's area being hit. ME Bf 109s and FW 190 planes had 20mm cannons, and it made toast of other planes if they hit properly. If you toned this down to represent the poor hit rate of U-boats downing planes that's ok, but real enemy planes would not fly over the boat again and again at a range i would hit it with a flyswatter. Thinking of Kaminsky defending his boat in the Caribbean sea this sure looks strange. Remember allied planes did not approach U-boats when they had dropped their bombs, they mostly circled just outside of the AA gun range and asked for support. Allied planes where downed seldomly because no one saw them coming, and it was too late to man the guns. A boat that was well aware of ac attacks would sure hit and down incoming planes, even if that would be the last action. So either the planes need too many hits to be downed, and this needs changing, or the (unseen) ac attacks are not deadly enough, as they were in reality. Torpedoes: Regarding torpedoes all i can say is that it is not only the hole and water rushing in that sinks a ship, but the shock of the explosion that destroys bulkheads and tears off steam pipes. Needing more than two torpedoes to sink a 2000 ton freighter ? Come on ... Thanks for your patience Don't get me wrong, i love this mod, it is just that a few thing should be changed imho. It is unbelievable what you guys did with the original SH3 ! Thanks and greetings, Catfish