Amount of Crew

[Sailor Steve]

Type II. You never have enough crew to do everything.

[wamphyri]

I do what you do mooncat. I find that if i'm under the waves there's not enough room in the cabins for the idle crew so i'd have to leave them in areas where they'd start getting all "exclimationny"(use that word in english class and your doomed to fail) on me even tho they aren't doing anything. In a VII(anytype) I max the officers but the sailors I drop the the minimum to 23 I think it is.

[panthercules]

I also generally run with a slightly smaller than max size crew, so that I don't have extra guys that don't fit in the crew's resting quarters when off duty - having those extra guys just complicates crew management too much. I find I've been able to do this in the only boats I've tried so far (VIIB, IXB, VIIC - can't remember how it worked in the Type II I used very early on) while still staying within the limits of the historical crew sizes - my current VIIC has 45 guys (5/13/27), and according to u-boat.net the normal complement for this type ranged from 44-52 men.

However, now that it's getting late in the war I may start carrying some extra guys to beef up my repair crews and give me some spare replacements for guys killed topside in air attacks:hmm:

If you start a career with SH3 Commander you can select the "realistic crew" option. This will give you less crew than the maximum.

Type II's carried 25 total including officers. Type VII's carried 44 made up of 4 officers, 10 NCO's and 30 ratings. Type IX's early in the war carried around 48 total crew. As the war progressed and AA armament increased, thus the number of crew increased as well.

Generally speaking there was the captain, first watch officer, second watch officer, and LI (chief engineer). The remainder of the crew were NCO's and ratings at a 1 to 3 ratio.

[Puster Bill]

Originally Posted by wamphyri

I do what you do mooncat. I find that if i'm under the waves there's not enough room in the cabins for the idle crew so i'd have to leave them in areas where they'd start getting all "exclimationny"(use that word in english class and your doomed to fail) on me even tho they aren't doing anything. In a VII(anytype) I max the officers but the sailors I drop the the minimum to 23 I think it is.

You have to remember that an 'exclamationny' sailor is better than no sailor. I like to keep full crews myself. That way, I can keep some in the bunks all nice and rested for when I have to rotate them. Having fewer sailors doesn't allow one to do that. Plus, it comes in handy when you need to have a damage party, which happens *WAY* too often with me.

Originally Posted by Puster Bill

You have to remember that an 'exclamationny' sailor is better than no sailor. I like to keep full crews myself. That way, I can keep some in the bunks all nice and rested for when I have to rotate them. Having fewer sailors doesn't allow one to do that. Plus, it comes in handy when you need to have a damage party, which happens *WAY* too often with me.

Interesting points there, also remember you need the full crew especially if you loose them to injury from air or surface attack. The last thing you need is to battle any repairs while you are losing men on the deck to enemy fire while you try to dodge aircraft etc. You will soon find that there are not enough men to do the job!

[Kresge]

I used to run with the maximum crew that could be rested at one time while submerged. Now, running a corrected fatigue mod, I enlist a full crew, especially since I'm in the middle of '42 and have lost a few to air attacks!