Tell us what you are upto in your current campaign

[BillCar]

U-83 continued her second patrol after having sunk one medium cargo in the North Sea and one ore freighter north of the Hebrides (both with the deck gun). Continued on to BF61. Patrol of BF61 netted no contact, and U-83 began return trip to Wilhelmshaven. Torpedoed an American medium cargo by mistake. Torpedo thankfully did not detonate on striking merchant. No harm, no foul.

West of Ireland, sank passenger cargo with deck gun. Explosions on board sinking vessel fatally wounded watch officer and two seamen. Damage to boat was repaired.

U-83 came under air attack five times between the northern coast of Ireland and Scapa Flow, sustaining no damage. 20 km west of Scapa Flow, U-83 detected a Task Force comprising four destroyers, as well as HMS Hood, HMS Nelson, and HMS Rodney. Could not close distance, but later encountered an ore freighter and sank with two torpedoes. Also sank one yacht.

Passed between Orkneys and Shetlands. Encountered a lone merchantman and sank with one torpedo directly beneath smokestack and another at the ship's stern.

Came under attack from aircraft, ordered crash dive and sustained no damage.

Returned to Wilhelmshaven on 27 October 1939 after 16 days at sea. Total shipping destroyed in excess of 24,000 GRT.

[KL-alfman]

BE68
just arrived the assigned grid when sonar took contact with a war-ship. intercepted and found out that a convoy (15ships - 5columns, 3rows) sailing at 7knts was accompanied by only two escorts.
first run I was too presumptuous and came too near to the leading escort: had to dive quickly and got DC so that tube 2 was jammed.
second run in the early evening I hit one freighter (she exploded after 2min) and damaged two other ones, one dud. then evasion, but shadowed the convoy and eliminated those two which had fallen behind.
third run in the morning I again could hit two targets which soon sank, again one dud.
so I had 3fish left and decided to go for a fourth run (in the meantime we were nearing SW of Ireland), because I wanted to take out the medium tanker in the middle of the now tattered convoy.
fourth run in the afternoon (sight got worse) I hit the tanker midships and a medium cargo in the bow but both denied to sink, and angrily now I had to register one more dud.
so the results were (only) 25k tons ......

due to the rough sea deck-gun never was available and I learned that arrogance and greed may nebulize one's mind.

I'll bear in mind
- no use of TII in heavy sea
- go for the sinking and not for hitting as many targets as possible
- in convoy always two eels per target to sink it for sure

[Dissaray]

I wish I had as much luck as that in my curent campain. I am patroling the whole of the BE sector and the weather has been bad the whole time. Seas ranging from 1m to 5, raining off and on and always a fog so think the bow of my ship is just about the only land mark I have. I have only killed one ship, a large merchant if I recall, out of the two that I have seen one way or another. And that one I nearly sank by ramming it due to a late sighting, and even then I had to throw three eels at them missing with one due to weather,

The only other ship I came across that could have been a target was moving like a bat out of hell even with the bad weather. I picked it up on the hydrophones and my sound guy said it was moving "fast" and it was merchant. At flank speed I was toping out at just over 10, the which I couldn't sustain for long and still have enuf fule to get back to port. Heres hoping I will stumble across an ungarded convoy on my way home with my grand total 10GRT and change

[KL-alfman]

December 1940
the enemy gets stronger and better.
made acquaintance with the improved ASDIC:
after attacking a convoy and sinking the center-Southampton I was DCed for about 2hours. couldn't escape even at 160m depth, 2 Black-Swans and 1Flower shook the u-boat but didn't hit essential compartments just a minor hull damage. they pinged my boat from a greater distance and into greater depth.
after evasion I went for the second run and could sink 3ships (1 was damaged already before by one of my eels).
again nearly three hours of hunting. this was really stressing because all of my formerly well used and successfully proven evasive tactics failed. the Swan didn't let go. finally the DD broke off (no DCs probably) and I could surface.

interesting:
there were two contact-reports of large convoys as I was already chasing "my" convoy!
date: Nov, 25 - 1940 around noon
in BE6817
and BE6896
(if someone likes to go there)

[Tuor451]

Jan-Feb '42 Type IX

Crossed atlantic to Norfolk area for a patrol, narrowly avoiding 2 destroyers off of French coast.

Travelled up East Coast, sank 2 tugs and 1 large tanker with deck gun for 13000t. Got mild damage from P38s near New York.

Was 'attacked' by a very aggressive liberty type freighter which almost rammed me before sinking near Halifax.

Sailed to AM52 area by Northern Ireland. Was harassed by multiple hurricanes over several days which really left a mark with their 20mm's.

Had to hide and watch a 20+ ship convoy pass nearby as hull integrity is 9%.

Trying to make it back to France now.
Great fun! Cheers James.

[don1reed]

U-45 1200/29.8.40
Page 25 of her log shows she’s 40 days out of Kiel on her 5th patrol, with 5 ships sunk for 30,000 tons and all aals expended. 45% fuel remains. All engines sound. Potable water tastes flat with a 10% diesel mix, all perishable food stores are gone, officers and crew living on condensed milk and assorted canned goods. Morale remains high as we set an eastern course skirting the Scottish coast. Running on dead reckoning as last three weeks we were caught in the grip of terrible storms. U-45 is homeward bound.

[DaveU186]

U-30, October 1939
Allowed Bernard to take control of things while I took a nap just South of Ireland. End result: he took us down to 70m in an area with only 60m of depth. Massive flooding, and one man dead. Unfortunately Bernard survived.

[KL-alfman]

December, 7th 1940
finally got promoted to Kapitänleutnant.

sank HMS Gloucester and 4merchants (total 40k tons)
got lucky so far: no crew member lost and until now just one encounter with the improved ASDIC

btw, what do the different colours of the cloak-indicator mean? I suppose red stands for "position is fixed by DD" ....
and one more question: is there a hotkey to find out about the damage status (hull integrity) in-game?

[BillCar]

Docked at Wilhelmshaven 2 December, 1939, at end of third patrol.

19 November: Sank two merchantmen 200km east of Scapa Flow. Evaded four destroyers.

20 November: Passing north of the Hebrides. Weather deterioriating. Visibilty poor, winds high.

21 November: Arrived at BE61 for patrol. Weather remains horrible. Made contact on hydrophone with merchantman. Plotted course to intercept. Arrived three hours later to discover an American medium cargo ship. Waved at it.

23 November: Began slow return journey to Wilhelmshaven, diving frequently to check for contacts. Weather is not improving.

25 November: Sound contact east of Rockall Bank. Intercepting in rough seas.

26 November: Turned out to be yet another American merchantman. Great.

28 November: Weather still terrible, heading to Scapa Flow to try and offload some eels in rough seas.

30 November: In rough seas, driving rain, and total darkness, entered Scapa Flow from east. Entered port on surface and dove to periscope depth to check for contacts.

Two merchants, three destroyers. Closed to within 500m of destroyer in east end of port. Fired a spread of four torpedos, scoring two hits. Destroyer sank, as two others closed rapidly from west. Flank speed ordered, heading for narrow channel at east end of port. Spotlights and starshells – dove to 11m. Destroyers made seven depth charge runs between them, and rammed U-83's conning tower. Damage control teams successfully repaired damage. After one hour, U-83 was in the North Sea and heading for Wilhelmshaven, saved by bad weather.

Docked at Wilhelmshaven, 2 December, 1939.
Total tonnage sunk in excess of 17,000.
Hull integrity on docking was revealed to be 1.34%.
Daaaaamn, that was tight.

[Schöneboom]

20 May 1942, 0812 hrs.
U-439 shadowing large convoy in AM 75, heading southeast. Only visual contact so far, 1 Corvette. We remain undetected.

[Gaijin]

Jan, 20th 1941. U-48, skulking (and sulking) somewhere out in the western approaches to Gibraltar...


[Two months previously]
Having sailed gloriously and boisterously into port after our ninth mission and with many successes to date, U-48 and its crew were entirely convinced that this Kapitan was about to be re-assigned to a desk command. (Realistic career selected). So much so, that my personal stash of cigars, emergency schnapps and girly poker cards ended up being distributed liberally among the men.

However, after a sh1t, shower and a shave, I was informed that no such orders were coming and that war patrol number 10 would be departing just before Christmas.

Fast forward a month, and here I sit, silent and waiting at PD at the approaches to Gibraltar. I'm here because all I have to show for 4 weeks in the DT Grids (south of the Canaries) is:

1) a funky, musty, dark green fungus over the majority of non-metal surfaces (and inbtween my toes) after 4 weeks of constant rain.

2) A grand total of ONE torpedo expended in all that time...which hit and sunk a Japanese Merchantman. Yes, a japanese merchantman, off the coast of Africa.

3) Two dead sailors, bounced by what looked like a Halifax, off the coast of Senegal (!!!) after detouring to drop off the japanese survivors.



I swear, If I see so much as a rowing boat, I'm unloading 4 eels into it just to get rid of them, so I can go home.At least its safe to say that Im fairly confident that I won't be sent on number 11.

Right?

[Terragon]

Sometime in 1939, second patrol. In a dugout U-Boat.

Ordered to patrol AN52. Same as the last patrol, last time no contacts. On the way back I caught two small American merchants unescorted in broad daylight. Since I had just finished the tutorials, it was my first mission. No other contacts were nearby. One was a tramp freighter, other was a medium freighter.

Lined up my shots at periscope depth, setting up on the ships starboard side.

The lead ship, the medium freighter was traveling at 4-6 kts. Same as the tramp. Aimed shots below the smokestack and bow. Sent torpedoes one and two. Soon as I sent them off, I ordered an all stop and let him drift by, keeping my periscope in direction of the tramp, letting him line up in my sights. Both targets were approx. 700-800 m away. Est time 35 second run?

Soon as the tramp freighter lined up, I fired two more shots. Ten seconds later, impacted the medium freighter. Catastrophic results. Blew up like a firework. Tramp found out they weren't alone, attempted a radical turn to port. Made my second torpedo miss, but not my first, which impacted near the stern. It was enough, thank goodness, because my II boat was not equipped with a deck gun.

Around 9k sunk. Proceeded to dive to 45 meters, and continued to silent run for approximately 30 mins, then continued normal operation.

First kills of SH III.

Currently two SH3 careers on the go:

U-1099 Type VIIC41 in transit to AM53 and the North Channel 4-days out of Bergen October 1944. Weather cloudy, diving 6-7 times per day to avoid aircraft. Caught in air raid leaving port late on the first, suffering minor damage from near misses. Shot down two American Liberator bombers but escorting spurbrecher hit by bombs and sunk with heavy loss of life.

U-150 Type IID on station in the Black Sea outside Batum 9 January 1943. Weather stormy; lost contact with northbound Soviet convoy yesterday and unable to subsequently re-acquire. Returned to station outside port around noon. Estimated return to Constanza 6 February or earlier if torpedoes expended.

[KL-alfman]

@ terragon:

up to December 1941 the U.S.A. are neutrals and sinking american vessels before will reduce your renown .....

nevertheless, welcome to subsim!

[HMS Astute]

Starting anew with U-53, putting out to sea for my first patrol.