Attacking Scapa Flow

[pickinthebanjo]

Originally Posted by dyslexic doggie

this morning, before i had to drag myself to work for 12hrs of fun and grease i got an hour in to play with my new xxi, did my 24hr patrol sank a couple of merchants, a destroyer, then decided to check out lock ewe, took my time crept in to about ten or so miles out and my sound contacts went nuts, there were destroyers parked everywhere it seemed, they were at the docks, parked at the shoreline, i sank 8 destroyers and a destroyer escort before i ran out of torpedoes, this is in early 1940, what a great morning.
dyslexic doggie.

Thanks for the tip, but were there any merchants? (or 4000+ ton ships)
I like doing harbor attacks, and am trying to find more ports to attack.

If I get ballsy enough ill head for gibraltor but I cant help but feel like it would be suicide

[dyslexic doggie]

no i don't think i saw any merchants that were not already on the bottom,
no big transports, or anything like that, but the destroyers who have hunted me relentlessly and blown off various pieces of my boat were good enough for me.

[krashkart]

Originally Posted by pickinthebanjo

Thanks for the tip, but were there any merchants? (or 4000+ ton ships)
I like doing harbor attacks, and am trying to find more ports to attack.

If I get ballsy enough ill head for gibraltor but I cant help but feel like it would be suicide

I tried Gibraltar in early '43. Scary stuff - destroyers and Elcos everywhere. By then of course they have some decent radar, so even at night in medium fog I had to be very careful. I don't know how, but I managed to get away from an escort destroyer that had snuck up on me. Caught me totally off guard and started blasting my sub to shreds with her guns. Thankfully the waters were deep enough to dive under a thermal layer.

If you can range far enough I recommend New York harbor. I had to cheat a little to make it there in '43, but found the trip worthwhile. You might be able to follow a shipping lane most of the way in if you plot a course out of the middle BC's IIRC, more or less in the direction of New York. Found a passenger liner that was on her way in, and plenty of cargo and tanker at the docks. Again, this is all in stock game. GWX players might find their experiences different from mine.

Speaking of GWX, maybe it's about time I install it.

[Kptlt. Neuerburg]

Heres is the best way that I have found to enter Scapa Flow, and I can say it is one of the safer ways of entering this anchorage.

The enterance is located to the West and is inbetween the large island of Mainland and the small island of Graemsay. There is only one ASW trawler that patrols these waters. It is better to sink it if you decide to leave via the same route. Stay close to the coast until you reach the area where the large ships are anchored. From there the best ways out are eathier back the way you came in or to the south inbetween the islands of Flotta and South Ronaldsay. Give it a try for yourselfs and tell me if it is better or worse.

[Freiwillige]

The original posters map and directions are the same route Gunther Prein took when he sunk the battleship Royal Oak in 39'.

There is a map of his attack here. WWW.U47.org

"The stern still touches the cable, the boat becomes free, it is pulled round to port, and brought on course again with difficult rapid manoeuvring, but... We are in Scapa Flow!"


0027 hours 14th Oktober 1939

In GWX III you can find the Royal Oak on that date but its out of place about 4-6 miles to the north west of its original position

[Tessa]

Going through the southern straight is easiesr, aren't any blockships but there are mines to deal with if you are forced to go in submerged. Which is a bad idea anyways with a minefield being just outside the straight also (times I've hit a mine has always been submerged, so must been chained to the floor.)

When there is a gale or massive storm getting in and out of there can be a real breeze. Last time felt like a lvl 5 hurricane (15, 1.0 weather readings) heavy rain heavy wind, and only 300m or so of visibility in daylight. Travelled to each area where there's usually a subnet (and hopefully a BB or flat top) but only found an Aux Cruiser that time (only have 5 torpedoes left anyways, rough water makes flooding go faster but without any forward movement a stationary target can be a real vice). Was the first and only time the weather was still so bad in the middle of the day I was able to literally walk out the front door on the surface. And didn't get detected by the patrol ships or land defenses.

Gibraltor's pretty easy to get into with the kinks in the subnet that you can let you slip in while submerged. Loch Ewe is the really harsh one to try. Either choose to surface decks awash between two cannon enplacements while you go over the net or go the slightly safer route but have to go over 2 nets and evade no less than 4 DD/trawlers till you can get into the harbor. Can be some juicy merchant ships there but is tougher to catch the big ships in there like there's usually something in Scapa, Gibraltor or Southend that can put up massive tonnage.

[Jimbuna]

Thank you for the info...I never could have imagined it was so easy