Happy Hunting Grounds

Brag · 05-07-07, 08:17 AM

To all Kaleuns!

We need your help to compile enemy shipping routes!

Recently I started making detailed notes of shipping routes. Like all intelligence gathered, the observations are fragmentary and need more inputs.

The way I identify a hot area is:

Either a contact report or a real contact. This is followed up by actual intercepts to confirm traffic frequency.

A good example: On my way home a contact appeared too far to act on it. But I would be transiting the area in a day or two.

I drew a course line on the chart. Reaching the location, I patroled this line for two days. During that period one large freighter (11K) and two small freighters appeared. Not a bad place to get tonnage.

One needs to be precise as a few kilomters difference you could end up out of hearing range and each ship's path will be slightly different.

Here is my description of this fairly good hunting ground:

AM51 20 KMS south of northern edge of grid square. Direction of route 095-275. GWX 1.03

Here is another heavily traveled sea lane:

Center of Gibraltar Strait to 20 KMS of Cape Sao Vicente. Some ships take an arched route to the north (westbound traffic mostly). Big tonnage possible here. GWX 1.03

In your reports Include what mode you're using as traffic is quite different in the mods.

ReM · 05-07-07, 08:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Brag

Here is my description of this fairly good hunting ground:

AM51 20 KMS south of northern edge of grid square. Direction of route 095-275. GWX 1.03

You might want to use another sytem to precisely designate the location.....

Use the old German grid system for instance....

Read about it here

Your location would be something like AM 5133 or 5132

Brag · 05-07-07, 08:34 AM

Rem:

Thanks for your imput!

Good idea for one spot (datum)-- we're looking for a line to identify a route. So two of these locations are needed to establish a line. I use the projected course of a reported ship as a base line.

We also need to keep in mind that routes are not straight.

KeptinCranky · 05-07-07, 08:18 PM

note: all this data has been gathered between september of 39 and april of 41
also I'm assuming GWX here,

BF17 to CG48 A good line to follow for outbound convoys, mostly cargos some tankers, sometimes a bigger warship.

the eastern half of AM36

CG94 except for grids 1 2 and 3 (but you knew that

)
also goes for CG86 although less so as well as CG95 grids 4 and 7

Any grid starting with BE3x mostly inbound convoys

AM17 18 19 and 01

AM53

and between 9-3-1940 until half of april 1940 definitely check out AF8325, but be there early or the nutcases in the Stukas will have sunk all the lovely troopships.

Now, obviously, looking at the map you will notice some of these areas are in shallow waters and definitely within aircraft range. This might result in big red exclamations along the lines of OMGWTFBBQ STAY OUT OF DER KANAL and so forth

and I couldn't agree more, but sometimes that's the chance you take for nice tonnage

other no go areas IMO anything starting with AN7x or AN8x, unless of course one is fond of mines and MTBs and planes in 20meters of water or so

I've also sort of come up with a no go chart as follows

with a type II sub in 1939 don't go near anything with less than 25 meters of water

add 50 meters to that figure for:

a: type of submarine above II (so add 50 for a VII 100 for a IX)
B: every year after 1939

Ignore tables at own risk or for more than 20k tonnes of warship

Brag · 05-07-07, 10:29 PM

Thanks, Cranky!

We have a good start collecting info.

On my present patrol (Late May 1940) I stopped by the E-W sea lane crossing AM51 and stooged around for 48 hours. Made contact with 5 small freighters. they all came within visual contact without my need to change course.

It would have been excellent target practice for the gunnies in calmer weather.

Brag · 05-09-07, 06:45 PM

Bump to give Kaleuns a chance to contribute. Come on, guys, time to share your knowledge!

Sneaky_Pete · 05-09-07, 06:52 PM

AM51 here too Brag. I usually just hang around in that vicinity when I'm too lazy to go hunting elsewhere

. It's Nov 15, 1939 in-game for me btw.

KeptinCranky · 05-09-07, 06:55 PM

was gathering data tonight, went really well too, found a convoy, had just torpedoed the escorting Fiji and a c3, in my patrol area too BE67 when stupid power company had a surge,

game gone, pc reboots....gah!
will update this thread as relevant info becomes available...

on the matter of the north sea,
find the easternmost point of Scotland, north of Aberdeen, draw a circle about 75km from that point, if in a type II it's definitely a good place to lurk, lots of lone merchants and the occasional convoy, also lots of small fry (schooners and such) ignore those, wait for something big to come along (like HMS Hood) and sink that

Oh, as an aside, I saw some people mention this elsewhere and have experienced it repeatedly myself.....Passenger/Cargos what's up with those things

are they made of high grade steel and filled with bubblewrap???

they just won't sink with one eel, and they're only 2000 tonnes, what's their weak spot? I'm not shooting any more till I know, it's just not worth it

oh well, If i find some other traffic hotspots I'll report in

Cranky out

ReM · 05-10-07, 02:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by KeptinCranky

Oh, as an aside, I saw some people mention this elsewhere and have experienced it repeatedly myself.....Passenger/Cargos what's up with those things

are they made of high grade steel and filled with bubblewrap???

they just won't sink with one eel, and they're only 2000 tonnes, what's their weak spot? I'm not shooting any more till I know, it's just not worth it

oh well, If i find some other traffic hotspots I'll report in

Cranky out

I found that out too; I usually don't even engage them because they are so hard to sink.

If I can bag one using the deck gun I will happily send it the bottom, if not....I'll let it go because I am not gonna spend 3+ eels on such a meagre tonnage...

TarJak · 05-10-07, 02:49 AM

I've managed a few P/C's with one eel. The problem is how much random damage you can do with one torp and the amount of hit points. If you have the time to be patient they can sink from flooding, but you have to hit them somewhere vital to get anywhere.

I think bow hits make a big difference because they then seem to drive down under the waves as the bow compatrment fills with water and the rest of the boat gets pulled under.

Canovaro · 05-10-07, 03:20 AM

If we would just make notes together of all our encounters using the German grid system, we would have a whole lot of dots on a map.
There are map systems online like Google that we could use to make a community dot map, the dots together revealing real shipping lanes. However these maps do not have the German grid system.

I would be possible to do this manually.
To have a picture online and manually put the dots on it.
If everyone would send this person a list of contacts frequently, it could be updated like every week or so.

Downside would be that the closer to europe, the more dots you would have, because that's where we are most of the time.

Any thoughts?

Avatar · 05-10-07, 12:07 PM

Just south of Ireland. I'm at the library and I dont know what grid loc. that is, but it's the only place I've seen convoys. I've only been to that area twice, as I've only been playing sh3 for about 2 weeks now.

Also, I might be dumb but I shoot at anything that comes across my path. It does take a few torps to sink a Passenger/Cargo, but I shoot anyway. I sometimes even use two torps against a Tramp. I dont know what the torpedo/ship ratio is for every ship, but I think that anything like a Tramp or DD gets one torpedo. Anything bigger gets more eels.

This brings me to a question, I'm playing GWX1.03 and SH3 Commander, and if you sink a ship is that like a "flaming datum" where other ships will avoid like the plague?

Jimbuna · 05-10-07, 12:15 PM

BF13-15

gabeeg · 05-10-07, 12:35 PM

The southern ends of CJ 72, 73 and Northern ends of CJ 75, 76. Right in the middle between Sardinia and Tunisia. This is a bottle neck where single ships and MKS, MKF, KMF, KMS must pass going east to west and west to east in the Med. It is narrow enough a bottle neck that by cruising in the middle you will pickup any contacts coming thru. I have only cruised this area so far for most of 1942, but I never go home with torpedos left (VII boat)

So far during '42 the only down side is that most all trafic has been single ships so far and of those 70% were small or coastal merchants and ~30% C2's (I have also seen two Pyro's). Maybe someone else can post what can be expected during the later war years.

One other benefit is that in 1942 there is no allied air cover in this area...there is Axis aircover though...for better or worse...I had a ship sunk right under my nose as I lined up my attack on a Pyro...doh!

I am playing Stock (Heavily modded) with "ImprovedConvoys" Mod.

FIREWALL · 05-10-07, 12:47 PM

IIRC the Wiki has some good areas on it. But that could be for vanilla SH3.

05-07-07, 08:17 AM	#1
Brag Navy Seal Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Docked on a Russian pond Posts: 7,072 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Happy Hunting Grounds To all Kaleuns! We need your help to compile enemy shipping routes! Recently I started making detailed notes of shipping routes. Like all intelligence gathered, the observations are fragmentary and need more inputs. The way I identify a hot area is: Either a contact report or a real contact. This is followed up by actual intercepts to confirm traffic frequency. A good example: On my way home a contact appeared too far to act on it. But I would be transiting the area in a day or two. I drew a course line on the chart. Reaching the location, I patroled this line for two days. During that period one large freighter (11K) and two small freighters appeared. Not a bad place to get tonnage. One needs to be precise as a few kilomters difference you could end up out of hearing range and each ship's path will be slightly different. Here is my description of this fairly good hunting ground: AM51 20 KMS south of northern edge of grid square. Direction of route 095-275. GWX 1.03 Here is another heavily traveled sea lane: Center of Gibraltar Strait to 20 KMS of Cape Sao Vicente. Some ships take an arched route to the north (westbound traffic mostly). Big tonnage possible here. GWX 1.03 In your reports Include what mode you're using as traffic is quite different in the mods. __________________ Espionage, adventure, suspense, are just a click away Click here to look inside Brag's book: Amazon.com: Kingmaker: Alexey Braguine: Books Order Kingmaker here: http://www.subsim.com/store.html For Tactics visit:http://www.freewebs.com/kielman/

05-07-07, 08:34 AM	#3
Brag Navy Seal Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Docked on a Russian pond Posts: 7,072 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Rem: Thanks for your imput! Good idea for one spot (datum)-- we're looking for a line to identify a route. So two of these locations are needed to establish a line. I use the projected course of a reported ship as a base line. We also need to keep in mind that routes are not straight. __________________ Espionage, adventure, suspense, are just a click away Click here to look inside Brag's book: Amazon.com: Kingmaker: Alexey Braguine: Books Order Kingmaker here: http://www.subsim.com/store.html For Tactics visit:http://www.freewebs.com/kielman/

05-07-07, 10:29 PM	#5
Brag Navy Seal Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Docked on a Russian pond Posts: 7,072 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Thanks, Cranky! We have a good start collecting info. On my present patrol (Late May 1940) I stopped by the E-W sea lane crossing AM51 and stooged around for 48 hours. Made contact with 5 small freighters. they all came within visual contact without my need to change course. It would have been excellent target practice for the gunnies in calmer weather. __________________ Espionage, adventure, suspense, are just a click away Click here to look inside Brag's book: Amazon.com: Kingmaker: Alexey Braguine: Books Order Kingmaker here: http://www.subsim.com/store.html For Tactics visit:http://www.freewebs.com/kielman/

05-09-07, 06:45 PM	#6
Brag Navy Seal Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Docked on a Russian pond Posts: 7,072 Downloads: 2 Uploads: 0	Bump to give Kaleuns a chance to contribute. Come on, guys, time to share your knowledge! __________________ Espionage, adventure, suspense, are just a click away Click here to look inside Brag's book: Amazon.com: Kingmaker: Alexey Braguine: Books Order Kingmaker here: http://www.subsim.com/store.html For Tactics visit:http://www.freewebs.com/kielman/

05-10-07, 03:20 AM	#11
Canovaro Ace of the Deep Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Netherlands Posts: 1,062 Downloads: 34 Uploads: 0	If we would just make notes together of all our encounters using the German grid system, we would have a whole lot of dots on a map. There are map systems online like Google that we could use to make a community dot map, the dots together revealing real shipping lanes. However these maps do not have the German grid system. I would be possible to do this manually. To have a picture online and manually put the dots on it. If everyone would send this person a list of contacts frequently, it could be updated like every week or so. Downside would be that the closer to europe, the more dots you would have, because that's where we are most of the time. Any thoughts? Last edited by Canovaro; 05-10-07 at 06:35 AM.

05-07-07, 08:18 PM	#4
KeptinCranky Ace of the Deep Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Netherlands Posts: 1,050 Downloads: 3 Uploads: 0	note: all this data has been gathered between september of 39 and april of 41 also I'm assuming GWX here, BF17 to CG48 A good line to follow for outbound convoys, mostly cargos some tankers, sometimes a bigger warship. the eastern half of AM36 CG94 except for grids 1 2 and 3 (but you knew that ) also goes for CG86 although less so as well as CG95 grids 4 and 7 Any grid starting with BE3x mostly inbound convoys AM17 18 19 and 01 AM53 and between 9-3-1940 until half of april 1940 definitely check out AF8325, but be there early or the nutcases in the Stukas will have sunk all the lovely troopships. Now, obviously, looking at the map you will notice some of these areas are in shallow waters and definitely within aircraft range. This might result in big red exclamations along the lines of OMGWTFBBQ STAY OUT OF DER KANAL and so forth and I couldn't agree more, but sometimes that's the chance you take for nice tonnage other no go areas IMO anything starting with AN7x or AN8x, unless of course one is fond of mines and MTBs and planes in 20meters of water or so I've also sort of come up with a no go chart as follows with a type II sub in 1939 don't go near anything with less than 25 meters of water add 50 meters to that figure for: a: type of submarine above II (so add 50 for a VII 100 for a IX) B: every year after 1939 Ignore tables at own risk or for more than 20k tonnes of warship

05-09-07, 06:52 PM	#7
Sneaky_Pete Watch Join Date: May 2007 Posts: 19 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	AM51 here too Brag. I usually just hang around in that vicinity when I'm too lazy to go hunting elsewhere . It's Nov 15, 1939 in-game for me btw.

05-09-07, 06:55 PM	#8
KeptinCranky Ace of the Deep Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Netherlands Posts: 1,050 Downloads: 3 Uploads: 0	was gathering data tonight, went really well too, found a convoy, had just torpedoed the escorting Fiji and a c3, in my patrol area too BE67 when stupid power company had a surge, game gone, pc reboots....gah! will update this thread as relevant info becomes available... on the matter of the north sea, find the easternmost point of Scotland, north of Aberdeen, draw a circle about 75km from that point, if in a type II it's definitely a good place to lurk, lots of lone merchants and the occasional convoy, also lots of small fry (schooners and such) ignore those, wait for something big to come along (like HMS Hood) and sink that Oh, as an aside, I saw some people mention this elsewhere and have experienced it repeatedly myself.....Passenger/Cargos what's up with those things are they made of high grade steel and filled with bubblewrap??? they just won't sink with one eel, and they're only 2000 tonnes, what's their weak spot? I'm not shooting any more till I know, it's just not worth it oh well, If i find some other traffic hotspots I'll report in Cranky out

05-10-07, 02:49 AM	#10
TarJak Fleet Admiral Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Sydney, Australia Posts: 17,052 Downloads: 150 Uploads: 8	I've managed a few P/C's with one eel. The problem is how much random damage you can do with one torp and the amount of hit points. If you have the time to be patient they can sink from flooding, but you have to hit them somewhere vital to get anywhere. I think bow hits make a big difference because they then seem to drive down under the waves as the bow compatrment fills with water and the rest of the boat gets pulled under.

05-10-07, 12:07 PM	#12
Avatar Commodore Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Way out there Posts: 603 Downloads: 24 Uploads: 0	Just south of Ireland. I'm at the library and I dont know what grid loc. that is, but it's the only place I've seen convoys. I've only been to that area twice, as I've only been playing sh3 for about 2 weeks now. Also, I might be dumb but I shoot at anything that comes across my path. It does take a few torps to sink a Passenger/Cargo, but I shoot anyway. I sometimes even use two torps against a Tramp. I dont know what the torpedo/ship ratio is for every ship, but I think that anything like a Tramp or DD gets one torpedo. Anything bigger gets more eels. This brings me to a question, I'm playing GWX1.03 and SH3 Commander, and if you sink a ship is that like a "flaming datum" where other ships will avoid like the plague? Last edited by Avatar; 05-10-07 at 12:18 PM.

05-10-07, 12:15 PM	#13
Jimbuna Chief of the Boat Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: 250 metres below the surface Posts: 190,525 Downloads: 63 Uploads: 13	BF13-15 __________________ Wise men speak because they have something to say; Fools because they have to say something. Oh my God, not again!!

05-10-07, 12:35 PM	#14
gabeeg Helmsman Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Fresno, CA USA Posts: 101 Downloads: 15 Uploads: 0	The southern ends of CJ 72, 73 and Northern ends of CJ 75, 76. Right in the middle between Sardinia and Tunisia. This is a bottle neck where single ships and MKS, MKF, KMF, KMS must pass going east to west and west to east in the Med. It is narrow enough a bottle neck that by cruising in the middle you will pickup any contacts coming thru. I have only cruised this area so far for most of 1942, but I never go home with torpedos left (VII boat) So far during '42 the only down side is that most all trafic has been single ships so far and of those 70% were small or coastal merchants and ~30% C2's (I have also seen two Pyro's). Maybe someone else can post what can be expected during the later war years. One other benefit is that in 1942 there is no allied air cover in this area...there is Axis aircover though...for better or worse...I had a ship sunk right under my nose as I lined up my attack on a Pyro...doh! I am playing Stock (Heavily modded) with "ImprovedConvoys" Mod. __________________ Kind Regards, Harry J. Miktarian

05-10-07, 12:47 PM	#15
FIREWALL Eternal Patrol Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: CATALINA IS. SO . CAL USA Posts: 10,108 Downloads: 511 Uploads: 0	IIRC the Wiki has some good areas on it. But that could be for vanilla SH3. __________________ RIP FIREWALL I Play GWX. Silent Hunter Who ???