Champion becomes Chumpian!

[Rockin Robbins]

I've always been a champion of getting in close and personal, inside of 800 yards, and taking as close to 100% probability shots as possible. There have been some quite loud and indignant cries for any kind of evidence of long distance shooting in the war by real boats. Well, courtesy of ussubvetsofwwii.org:

REMEMBER THIS USS BERGALL?

On the evening of Dec. 13, 1944 as Bergall (Hyde) was preparing to plant mines off Indo-China, she picked up a distant radar contact. Closing to 26,000 yards, the contact was tentatively identified as 2 cruisers, later determined to be a cruiser and destroyer escort. After attaining a firing position 3300 yards away from the overlapping targets, six bow tubes were fired. Moments later a tremendous explosion occurred, seemingly, breaking the Imperial Japanese heavy Myoku in two. Hauling clear to reload when the escort seemed reluctant to attack, Bergalll charged in for a second attack when, at 9000 yards, the escorting destroyer opened fire, one shell landing in Bergall's wake, another directly into her forward torpedo loading hatch, opening a large hole in her pressure hull. Retreating at full speed. Bergall hauled clear only to find that the damage was beyond repair at the scene, 2000 miles from the nearest friendly port, Ex- mouth Gulf, Australia. When reporting the problem to Admiral Christie Cdr. Hyde was ordered to rendezvous with Angler, Bashaw and Paddle, remove the crew and destroy Bergall. After carefully reviewing the situation, Cdr. Hyde decided to disobey this order and try to take Bergall home through Karimata, the Java Sea and Lombok on the surface. He removed one officer and 54 men to the Angler, destroyed all confidential gear, set demolition charges by her torpedoes and mines and got underway for Exmouth Gulf, Angler following closely, standing by to remove personnel from Bergall if danger threatened. Five days later, they arrived at Exmouth Bay on 20 December 1944.

It warn't safe out there!

[Salty Longshanks]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

I've always been a champion of getting in close and personal, inside of 800 yards, and taking as close to 100% probability shots as possible. There have been some quite loud and indignant cries for any kind of evidence of long distance shooting in the war by real boats. Well, courtesy of ussubvetsofwwii.org:

REMEMBER THIS USS BERGALL?

On the evening of Dec. 13, 1944 as Bergall (Hyde) was preparing to plant mines off Indo-China, she picked up a distant radar contact. Closing to 26,000 yards, the contact was tentatively identified as 2 cruisers, later determined to be a cruiser and destroyer escort. After attaining a firing position 3300 yards away from the overlapping targets, six bow tubes were fired. Moments later a tremendous explosion occurred, seemingly, breaking the Imperial Japanese heavy Myoku in two. Hauling clear to reload when the escort seemed reluctant to attack, Bergalll charged in for a second attack when, at 9000 yards, the escorting destroyer opened fire, one shell landing in Bergall's wake, another directly into her forward torpedo loading hatch, opening a large hole in her pressure hull. Retreating at full speed. Bergall hauled clear only to find that the damage was beyond repair at the scene, 2000 miles from the nearest friendly port, Ex- mouth Gulf, Australia. When reporting the problem to Admiral Christie Cdr. Hyde was ordered to rendezvous with Angler, Bashaw and Paddle, remove the crew and destroy Bergall. After carefully reviewing the situation, Cdr. Hyde decided to disobey this order and try to take Bergall home through Karimata, the Java Sea and Lombok on the surface. He removed one officer and 54 men to the Angler, destroyed all confidential gear, set demolition charges by her torpedoes and mines and got underway for Exmouth Gulf, Angler following closely, standing by to remove personnel from Bergall if danger threatened. Five days later, they arrived at Exmouth Bay on 20 December 1944.

It warn't safe out there!

Fantastic story RR! Thanks much for sharing it with us.

[Sniper31]

x2...that is a good story indeed...imagine the tension the crew must have felt, threading thier way to port through those enemy waters, unable to dive! Must've been something else....

[ReallyDedPoet]

Very nice story RR


RDP

[Rockin Robbins]

There are a couple of things in this one real life instance (not my story!) that show frequent complaints of SH4 being unrealistic are off-base. Let's take 'em one by one:

After attaining a firing position 3300 yards away from the overlapping targets, six bow tubes were fired.

These were warships and they were going to be fought from a distance that gave Bergall the best chance for escape, even if they used more torpedoes than might seem necessary. This was after the order that escorts were to be given priority over merchants in targeting (still looking for that order to nail down the exact date). Long distance attacks were made and the six torpedoes shot shows intent to do deadly harm.

Bergalll charged in for a second attack when, at 9000 yards, the escorting destroyer opened fire, one shell landing in Bergall's wake, another directly into her forward torpedo loading hatch, opening a large hole in her pressure hull.

Another frequent complaint is that Japanese warships hit hard to target subs from unrealistically long ranges with too few shots. Hmmmmm 4½ miles. I'd call that even further than warships are a danger in SH4. And the account implies deadly accuracy. Another couple of complaints about SH4 turn out to be complaints against reality.

Retreating at full speed. Bergall hauled clear only to find that the damage was beyond repair at the scene

And finally a most curious deal. In SH4, if you are tagged by an escort and can't submerge, he will definitely chase you down and at 30 knots he will absolutely catch you and kill you. Here Bergall escaped! Astounding!

In that second instance, these SH4 devs seem to have been more on the ball than most of us (I include myself here too) have been willing to give them credit for.

[ReallyDedPoet]

Nicely said RR, hopefully a few folks see this ^^^^ post


RDP

[Sniper31]

I have to agree there RR. You bring up some excellent points, and I think it definately serves to point out to all of us that the Devs do actually do some historical homework when they work on these sims.