How long was the typical U-Boat patrol?

[gAiNiAc]

I'm using a VIIB at the moment and I average 30 days......

[GoldenRivet]

I made the following post in a long dead thread ages ago:

hope it helps

"Lets have a look at U-boat.net at Otto Kretschmer's service record as an example.

from april 1940 to March 1941... an 11 month period he had completed 8 war patrols for a total of 119 days at sea.

on average this means that each patrol would have been about 14 and a half days long. (combined submerged and surfaced runs preying off the english east cost and the close in western approaches in SH3 yields a similar figure)

also for the same period of time he would have received approximately 216 (or so) days in port.

if you divide these days in port evenly among the gaps between the 8 patrols you will see that he had roughly 27 days in port between each patrol (on average)

from there we can determine that it would be historically accurate for a high scoring commander to complete 8 to 10 patrols per year, with 20 to 30 days in port between assignments.

most commanders were retired after so many patrols at sea.

most likely reasons for a career to end:

1. Death
2. Capture
3. Injury preventing further assignments to sea duty
4. Promotion to a point where the officer's value puts him out of the action
5. Placed in command of a flotilla
6. Germany wanted its officers learning from the experiences of those who had been into the action - often commanders were rotated to training flotillas to ensure that future officers received the best possible training and received the most current information on tactics and threats.

except for the career I am using now - i usually play with two major considerations on "SH3 Commander"

1. Realistic career length enabled

2. Days in port set to 30... if the U-boat is badly damaged i will exit the game and reset days in port to 50 to simulate dry docking and repair of the sub taking a long time.

typically, this yields about 9 patrols per year... unless i have a couple of spurts of bad damage then it will be a lower patrol figure.

If you finish off a career with high realism settings and find yourself "retiring" after anywhere between 8 to 15 patrols and you have gained over 100K tons
that would be a pretty historically accurate figure IMHO"

So in summary... 14 to 30 days at sea, and about 25 - 30 days in port... finish up about 10 or 12 patrols and retire.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by GoldenRivet

2. Days in port set to 30... if the U-boat is badly damaged i will exit the game and reset days in port to 50 to simulate dry docking and repair of the sub taking a long time.

I set my days in port to random, since I think while it sometimes goes to extremes it is mostly centered around 28 days anyway. As for damage, Commander (or the game) adds a day for each point of damage anyway, so I don't think there's a need to reset it.

[bigboywooly]

Tis the game that adds 1 extra day in port for each % of damage

[Brag]

Damage yer ship a bit for more time ashore and fun and games in port.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Brag

Damage yer ship a bit for more time ashore and fun and games in port.

"If I had a hammer, I'd hammer in the mo-o-orning. I'd hammer in the evening..."

[gAiNiAc]

Thank you Kaleuns!