Silent hunteriii

[JAP 2]

Just had a cool sortie, my 11th in the career.

Had to patrol a zone West of the south african coast, nothing much happened and when my objectives were complete i plotted a route back to base.  While surfaced at night in a storm the captain yelled we were being under attack ... i was like WTF ?!?, there had been no sonar contacts, my guess was a torpedo boat but i was under attack from a Hunt class destroyer who was approaching me fast guns blazing from the right side, i ordered a crash dive narrowly avoiding being hit by it.  I avoided 3 more attack runs of it and after that he didn t know exactly where i was anymore ... time to switch from defence to offence i thought.  Scanning my surroundings with the periscope i saw that i stumbled on a rather large convoy with about 10 merchants ( of which 3 C2 cargo's 1 T2 tanker and a troop transport, the rest were coastal merchants and small merchants and 2 hunt class destroyers )

Time for some serious planning.  I was in a storm so i could forget deckguns so had to do it all with my torps.  Choices choices.  I opted to hit the T2 tanker which is mostly a 1 shot kill for some serious tonnage first.  I successfully got into position and hit m with my first torpedo and he got destroyed, while that was happening i kinda forgot about the destroyer tracking me and suddenly he came from behind and ran over me ... he completely destroyed my attack periscope but damaged himself in the process ... i crashdived and took some distance from the convoy ( it was night ) because i had some serious damage to my conning tower, deckgun and flakgun.  While i was doing that the hunt destroyer sank cause of the damage it took from running over me    , i didn t get the tonnage though  

So being about 2km away from the convoy now i surfaced to repair the damage in the hopes i could still use my attack periscope but they couldnt fix it.  While repairing the damage the second hunt class destroyer spotted me again and started an attack run, He came from the back, but was about 2 km away, i dived just as they finished fixing the damage by then the hunt was about 700m away, turned so he was directly behind me and switched to the torpedo map, i manually aimed my rear torpedo in the sonar contact line of the destroyer and let it rip in the hopes he wouldn t change course on me and hoping it wasnt going to be a dud ... switched to external view ( no periscope remember ) and amazingly the destroyer got hit straight on .. it sank  

With the two destroyers gone now i could pick my targets while being surfaced one by one.  Sank 2 more C2's and the plan was to trail the convoy and hope to get clear weather so i could finish of the remaining ships with my deckgun ... after 3 days of trailing we got into some heavy fog, still storm and then i lost them

Searched the waters where i lost them ( about 500km2 ) zigzagging but didn t find them anymore.  Since the storm was still blazing hard i gave up and headed to base with a 31.000 tonnage sortie and some serious decoration choices to make ...  

This is a great game, very emerging and i m still smiling about that second destroyer kill purely on sonar and manual aim.

The only negative thing was i made the choice to hit another C2 with my last 3 torpedo's instead of taking out the troop transporter .. but i was sure the weather would improve which didn t.

Cheers,

Jap

[DeLiltMon 0]

Only just started a career, done one complete patrol so far and just started my second.

My first patrol was pretty uneventful, was ordered to patrol sector AL23 which is out in the Atlantic, West of Ireland about level with Iceland.

I chose to go the northern route past Scapa Flow out to my patrol area, picked up a few long range contacts between the Norwegian coast and Scapa Flow but due to weather or me not reacting quick enough I was unable to get within visual range.

The trip from there to my patrol area was dull with not a single sighting, as was my patrol of the sector.

On the return trip I encountered a lone Coastal Merchant at night north of Ireland.

I closed undetected to within 2500m on the surface before diving for my attack run. At 900m I fired a single torpedo and watching through the periscope saw it hit the middle of the port side crippling but not sinking her.

Ordering the boat to the surface, I was annoyed to find that the sea was too rough to use the deck gun meaning I would have to use another torpedo to finish her off.

After watching the burning wreck slip beneath the waves I resumed my course for home.

Just north of the Shetlands at about noon, the bridge lookouts spotted a trawler dead ahead, muttering "No fish and chips for you Tommy Englisher" to myself, I ordered to crew to action stations. Ordering the deck gun to be manned, I was again annoyed when the Watch Officer reported that the sea was too rough to use the deck gun.

Wondering if my crew were afraid of getting their feet wet I ordered the boat to periscope depth.

At about 1000m I fired the torpedo and watched it close in on the slow moving trawler, unfortunately the trail of bubbles coming from the steam torpedo was seen by the trawler's crew and she turned out of it's path.

Now determined to send this bucket to the bottom I launched a second at it, which was again seen and avoided.

This continued until all my bow torpedos had been fired, at some point this old rusty trawler had gone from being just another ship to my arch nemesis, kind of like Capt Ahab and Moby Dick  

Now out of torpedos I ordered the boat to the surface and the Chief Engineer to get everything he could out of the diesels, that trawler was going to the bottom even if I had to go with it.

At 16 knots the u-boat smashed into the starboard side of the trawler, nearly capsizing it, the serated metal on the bow doing it's job and ripping a hole in her side before the u-boats momentum and the angle at which I'd hit it pushed it aside taking on water fast, within a minute the trawler was gone and with the crew already getting started on repairing the damage we turned for home.

[theavonlady 2]

"From hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee. Ye damned whale."

- Captain Ahab

[hellfish6 7]

I just made it to January of '42 and started looking for new waters to hunt it. I took a transfer to the 10th Flotilla, operating in the Med out of La Spezia. I've only had two patrols, but I'm already regretting my decision to transfer. My first patrol had me go out of the Med, through Gibraltar, and into the west coast of Morrocco. If none of you have ever transited Gibraltar before, it's an experience.

I had to do it all at night and rarely a moment on the surface. I was attacked by 12 Typhoon aircraft before I even reached the approaches to the straight, and encountered 4 torpedo boats and 8 destroyers. All the torpedo boats caught me on the surface when I tried to recharge the battery. Two destroyers detected and depth charged me, but I was too wily for them.

All of that, and I only managed to sink one damn coastal merchant before my fuel got low.

My second patrol in the Med put me off the coast of Tobruk, and I had to swing by Malta to get there. Again, lots and lots of Typhoons found me on the surface. And I only sank a C2 and a Small Merchant.

I wanna transfer back! My last flotilla had me patrolling off of Portugal - I'd easily sink 10 ships and 40,000+ tons per patrol, as the seas were totally calm most of the time and there was lots and lots of shipping there (no convoys, though).

[Monkey Lib Front 10]

Hellfish just patrol the areas on the map that is supplied with the game, it's got all the convoy routes marked on it.

[hellfish6 7]

I do, but I haven't run across a convoy in about 10 patrols now - not since I was last patrolling the Irish Sea.

[Colossus 2]

Help!

Old pic in early stage of the game/war.

EDIT:

(Base: Brest)

I was beginning my trip back home from a successful patrol at AN43 and suddenly a plane came from the skies.

Luckely I got it.

But then after moving in the the English Canal ships began to appear, I dived and ordered silent running.

Then the pinging started and the show was on, there was no escape.

Sorry my lack of spelling, if there is some.

[hellfish6 7]

Wow... you must have pissed someone off! I haven't seen that many destroyers at once since I tried one of the single missions (the Bismarck one maybe?)

Normally when I get detected near the UK I'll have a single ship followed by maybe one more hunting me. Rarely more than that - certainly not that many.

Has anybody ever tried hiding under enemy ships? I learned this tactic while dodging destroyers in one of the single missions (the one with the carriers you have to sink). I'd crippled both carriers so that they were dead in the water, but I had about 5 destroyers coming after me. In the Type XXI U-Boats you can do 17 knots underwater (!!!!!) so I was able to run and hide under one of the crippled carriers. Does a great job of protecting you from destroyers overhead.

I later tried this during a career and it worked very well when I attacked a convoy and had a destroyer chasing me - I'd fired all my torps at about 1000m from the convoy, sprinted underwater and managed to hide under a C3 while I reloaded. It's not easy - you have to pay attention to the course and speed of the ship above you and almost certainly have to use your external view to do it - but it's effective when you're being hunted. IIRC, you have to be deeper than perisope depth as well.

[Monkey Lib Front 10]

My english channel tactic if detected would be full speed ahead till i reached maximum submerged speed, rig for silent turn off all engines and take a hard turn left or right at maximum submerged depth until i hot 90 then level up the rudder and then to drift.

[DeLiltMon 0]

The most I've had looking for me so far has been 3 armed trawlers and an Elco PT boat, which was on my second patrol that I'm in the middle of at the moment.

That was just of Calais, I saw the what I thought was a lone armed trawler, as I was closing on it, it saw my periscope, while I was trying to sneak away the other 3 ships turned up to join in the search.

With only 20m of water to play with there wasn't much I could do except sit just above the bottom and wait for their search pattern to take them away from me.

After that I came accross a H & W Destroyer off the Channel Islands on an overcast night, I closed to within 2000m on the surface, as it was travelling at 12 knots it was the only way I could keep up, then dived and at 1800m fired 2 torps, they never knew what hit them.

The tension of trying to get away from enemy warships reminds me very much of Silent Service 2, I spent many an hour sat on the bottom waiting for the destroyers to give up their search so I could come back up to periscope depth and torpedo them as they left

[Colossus 2]

More pics form me, enjoy.

(More coming up)

Pic #1

Pic #2

Pic #3

Pic #4

and

Windows refuse to save my picture (So nice and now it's gone)

(Every pic got a "facelift" before I posted them)

<s>EDIT: Looking at another computer my pics has wrong color and brightness, my monitor is a bit screwed.</s>

[S_Z 0]

There seem to be a problem with escorts in the campaign at the moment. Apperently not all of them are spawned as they should. But you guys doesnt seem to have a problem with too few warships hunting you

[bitchingbetty 0]

i cant even get my boat out of dock without it crashing into the rocks and killing everyone, hah i suck

[Gedis 0]

today i did interesting my first mission/ship hunting...

shiped to grid AN56, patroled all area about 3 days, when game speed slowed down (from x1024 to x8) i realised, that sonar detected something, so i went to sonar and did sonaring by my self, find some ship... moved at flank speed and cerrected course by hearing ship propelers, so i folowed it maybe for 2 hours, and finaly when i went to check the sonar, it recognized as a merchant, so the hunting begun...

it was night, 0200 hour and i can see just for 500m... so again, corrected cource and folowed ship until in periscope i saw something... it wrote that it's a cargo ship, but i couldn't see anything so when i saw it correctely, i checked the range in the sonar, and what do you think it was? 325m far from me so i tryed to keep that distance and maned torpedo room with crew, lounched a torpedo, but it missed, i looked why... it was simple i forgot to place some officers in place so fired another torpedo, and it hit merchants back, in to the propelers... merchant stoped, i didn't wanted to fire another torpedo because there were only 3 left so I decided to taran it, after taran i saw what damage i took, 10% of hull integrity left and merchant was still floating with it's back almost gone in the water. Decided to wait until it will sink, i swam back and got pretty good distance 4000m and i waited there with x1024 time speed after 2 days, time speed again downed to x8, and i went to sonar again, detected merchant, it was smal coastal merchant, lounched one torpedo from 3000m and sank it! decided to wait again...

again after 2 days i spoted the ship! it was C2 cargo, with only 2 torpedoes left, decided to wait, when it will be close enough, i dived to periscope  deph and waited until it will reach 2000m range, fired one torpedo, waited when i will see the impact, but it just disappeared at half range from target, it was bad torpedo, launched another and it striked c2 cargo, but it didin't sink it and continued its way

when i got back to base it wrote that i sinked 1992tons of cargo and get only 860renown, if i would sank those ships that were hit by torpedoes, i would get 10200tons of cargo (Small Merchant=~2200tons; Coastal Merchant=~1900tons; C2 Cargo=~6200tons...) and renown bigger than 1500

so i will restart this first patrol...

My u-boat was Type-IIA with best officers bought, i spent 1500 renown on them

game settings 100% realism...

and i come to great idea, when you strike the ship, which can't continue it's course(stoped due to engine damage) it will call other ships for help...

well it's only my idea...

good hunting for everyone

[bitchingbetty 0]

what am i doing wrong to not even get out of port?

i set way points to the grid i have to go to but i just end up ploughing into the sea wall?/

[Billabong81 0]

You have to manually steer into it using the rudder controls. Also, once your are relatively close to the port, you can go to the pause menu and click exit patrol and it gives you the option to dock at the port...thus completing the patrol .

[Gedis 0]

firstly when you are in map, what you see... you see land and sea, if you dont want to crash into something in the port, you need to place waypoints far enough form the port or land...

man... my english is realy bad :/

P.S. do i realy need to go back to base?

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

So do I get this right, it is worth buying! right?

[DeLiltMon 0]

Also, once your are relatively close to the port, you can go to the pause menu and click exit patrol and it gives you the option to dock at the port...thus completing the patrol .

I only found this out after I'd steered the boat into the sub pen and into the end wall - the crew were a bit slow in responding to my order to reverse the engines

[Winters 1]

I recently had a mission that required me to do the channel run. It was early 1940 and i stayed as close to the french coatline as i could. They only managed to send a few Armed Trawlers after me which were no match for me.

I only ran into 2 British Detroyers that i managed to stay away from easily enough.

I also spent most of my time on the surface during the run.

[Winters 1]

Also, once your are relatively close to the port, you can go to the pause menu and click exit patrol and it gives you the option to dock at the port...thus completing the patrol .

I only found this out after I'd steered the boat into the sub pen and into the end wall - the crew were a bit slow in responding to my order to reverse the engines  

If your in career mode all you need to do is complete your objectives and you can then hit the "esc" key and you see the option for "Exit Patrol"

@Gedis: you never have to actually plot a course all the way back to your home port to complete the mission.

@Albert: Yes it is 100% worth the money.

[Colossus 2]

So do I get this right, it is worth buying! right?  

Of course

Looks a bit boring but it is a great game.

[Gedis 0]

if i only had a version which i could update... i would be able to save game :/

any ideas?

[Balschoiw 0]

I got the game yesterday and I am very much impressed by the possibilities you have ingame. Crew management and hours of hunting are big fun. I passed the channel yesterday night and made a big bounty on my way. I got attacked from destroyers, been shot at by planes and accidentially ran into a big unguarded convoi near my mission area. Unfortunally my eels were counted and the weather was too bad for a deck gun attack. So I followed them for 3 days with the hope that weather would get better, but no luck.

Here are some impressions from this very nice game:

The convoi without protection I ran into.

My first passage through the canal and it´s results

Leaving Kiel for my 3rd mission:

A depth charge coming down near my boat in the seas around Scapa Flow.

The way to take down boats when you have run out of ammo. NOT !

This stunt kept my guys busy for 18 hours and I lost 3 men

Sorry for the 5th pic, but I didn´t want to make another post just for one pic mods.

[hardrock 1]

Reading much about SHIII, this sounds really great! If I had time to play I'd get this too, unfortunately I haven't