Why I am not that anxious for GWX!!!!

[Wulfmann]

Until a few weeks ago when I stated refinishing Kar98Ks and 24/47s I had run a SH3 patrol every night since May 2005. In most of that time I frustratingly tweaked and tested all for that day when I had nothing more that could be done to make SH3 as realistic as possible. A couple months ago I finally accomplished my goal which means I am in hell every time I leave port in 1943 on.
With a GW install and NYGM sensors both tweaked to be harder, my own RND and SCR mis files and many new ships I finally have this like reading like an account from various U-Boat books. A big help to me was having the Seawolves Med ships. They add a Hunt as a DE (along with GW adding a US DE as a Brit) and the extra sloops (frigates) I could make the escorts of convoys much more realistic and that really mattered to me because the predictability was gone with the added variation that allowed me to eliminate all DDs except a few named ones from 42 one (that was real)

When I approach a convoy now I better be submerged long before they see me, silent and at one knot or dead to have any chance of getting in a convoy. With a minimum of 12 or as many as 20 escorts that is slim. I have counted 7 escorts across the horizon with no sign of a merchant’s smoke. No escort is less than 3 crew rated.
As hard as this is; one quickly adapts (or dies fast!). No reloading, no off silent at all that is history. God help me if I get damaged at all because repairs draw escorts like a magnet.
I have adjusted and succeeded. This 1943 career I had made it to D-Day and went on patrol. I was damaged by Elcos patrolling right outside of St Nazaire before I could dive(I need to start diving in the pen and then leave).
I found 2 stragglers for 9,800tons. By the beginning of July I had evaded 2 DDs and finally found a juicy convoy. I got lucky and snuck in. I took out the fat T3 and a troopship and fired one my twoT5s at a DD but though it hit something I knew not what. T5s cost me 500 renown and I get one free in 44 so had to buy the second as back up.
For the next 6 real hours I was on nerve’s edge as 4 escorts took their turn attacking me. I have learned all the tricks of using my hydro and listened carefully cranking up the electrics to get away from certain death time and again. An hour in I made a mistake or was just plain out smarted as I caught a good group of Wasser bombs. Flooding in 3 (orange) compartments both peris destroyed I went to flank and zig zagged as my repair boys worked their magic but I really thought I was a goner. Repairs completed I went back to cat and mouse. By 2 hours of this 2 escorts had left and I could hear the 2 distinct sounds of different motors. One was a corvette (or a sloop?) and the other a DE, Hunt type as there were many in the convoy.
This helped me keep track of who was where and all.
Time and again they tried to sneak a surge attack and time and again I read the plan and evaded. I would play for about an hour and save it so I would not get frustrated or over confident so this lasted 5 days in a row. After 6 hours they kept looking but their sweep was further and further astern. I think they ran out of DCs as well.
Once clear I surfaced (no peris) and retraced to see if that T5 had disabled anything and found a C2 down by the stern and on fire. I had to attack on the surface but put in a fish so sank my third big ship in this convoy.
But, the convoy was so vast seven ships deep and horizon to horizon so what was getting through was certainly dooming Germany
It was mid July and 36K was a patrol to be proud of as I was certainly hunted far more than I hunted. I had to evade more DDs on the way home and was almost sunk again by ships and aircraft but finally made it home in a patrol that was nothing but constant nervous strain.
I have now been ordered to leave France and head for Norway. Perhaps I will survive this war and immigrate to America when all is said and done.
Once GWX is released I will have to start the tweaking all over again as it will have to compete with this very realistic version or the extra candy will be meaningless to me. IMO, of course.

Wulfmann