Something i've always wondered about

[Hinrich Schwab]

Originally Posted by DelphiUniverse

Diving gives you a range of about 30-60 km range before battery is halfway flattened, depending on speed settings, it can be lower if you are running full power. Airplane will have taken note of your position and it can draw a circle of your position, patrol the entire circle within 40 km and it will still catch you again, and this time it will catch you when you have a flat battery, with sink mines.

Never seen it happen in-game. Worst I saw was in 4's U-boat missions where the Swordfish dropped a flare and pulled in a Tribal and an Admiralty V&W. I was safe at only 5.5km. I was also near Freemantle, too. Planes kept spotting me, but I kept ruining their runs by turning into them during the strafe. Bombs fell long.

There are many situations where you need to have a last sort of defense against airplanes. I am not against diving, if I am on a very very long trip, I usually dive if I encounter airplanes to save the hull of my ship, I don't want to travel far with a damaged hull, even a few percentage damage so I usually dive.

But again, the airforce team will plot a circle using a protractor and it will very quickly scan the entire circle how far you can reach in a dived position, so diving will not help you there.

And if you have a serious flooding, you can't risk diving or if parts of the uboat is damaged so that diving is technically impossible, you need to have a last sort of defense against air assaults.

Keyword here is if. I avoid situations where this can happen. While I have taken damage to my boat, just like everyone else, I go out of my way to avoid aerial recon issues. I use and abuse the Air coverage map (came with SH3) so I know when and where to institute the dive-during-day routine. Taking more than 25% hull damage will make me return to port for repairs, regardless of mission status, at a heightened state of readiness. I prefer tactics and strategy that counter air power as best as I can without the need to rely on my flak gun, which I find inadequate and marginally useful, regardless of type. To me, the flak gun makes me do the one thing I should not do in a dangerous situation; remain surfaced.

Every airforce expect the daily patrol aircraft to return to base at a given time, if you manage to shoot one down, the airforce will probably wait 10 more minutes before they finally declare it a lost airplane, these 10 minutes will give you a surface boost running on diesel for 10 minutes rather than allowing the airplane to go straight home right on time and report you, you will not have 10 extra minutes.

If you shoot down the airplane, you can surface the ship and travel at maximum diesel-speed away before the next patrol aircraft arrives. If you don't shoot it down, you have to dive and then travel at a slow speed and when you finally surface again the next airplane is ready for you.

1: If you don't attack the airplane, you dive, the airplane return to base, reports you, it will then come straight back again in 15 minutes.
2: If you shoot it down, the airforce expects the patrol aircraft to arrive when its fuel is almost empty, perhaps in another 15-30 minutes, you would have alot of time to run full power on diesel. AND the airbase would have no clue where the airplane was shot down, giving you stealth advantage.

It may be that in real life they had problems shooting down airplanes, but in the game it works, I shot down 2 airplanes flying above me north of scapa flow and my hull had 99% when the battle was over and the planes were lost using the flak38, I have now switched to the quad barrel which I think is much better because of rate of fire is more important with these fast flying aircrafts.

If it works for you, do not let me stand in your way. To me, the flak guns are only there to make U-boat crews (and the player) feel better. I do not trust them and I do not rely on them. Fighters are expendable and there are always more. The only consistent strategy I have seen is to dive. I have been jumped by planes one hour from departing port and used maneuvering and diving to avoid trouble. All kinds of ordinance dropped, to no avail. The tracking abilities of planes can be fooled just like destroyers despite the slow underwater speed of the boat.

Since the flak guns work for you, there is really little more I can say. You have found what works for you. I use a wholly different tactic that works for me.