Subs and Wolfpacks

[krieger11b]

My bad for not making myself more clear in my first post.




Upgrading the torpedoes should be as simple as sticking a new torpedo into the existing tube. They were all of the same diameter, 533mm, with compatible mechanisms. I'm not 100% sure for the latter though.

It's more complicated for the AA guns, because usualy the coning tower needed to be modified. But if the other ships are able to upgrade AA guns, so should the subs. Anyway, the best defense against aircraft was to crash dive.

Every torpedo that was a sub torpedo was upgradable because every torpedo was the same size. One of the few areas Germans in WW2 didn't create a logistical nightmare for. Though they did use steam powered torpedoes for a long time until the pre-war stock of them were exhausted. AA was upgraded on many subs, sure you did have to do some modifying. The early and late war Type IX U-Boots looked very different as far as AA goes, at first they had a one 20mm gun and a 37mm single shot AA gun (real useless gun). Late war would have up to one quad 20mm flack, another dual 20mm flack, and a full auto 37mm flack gun (far more useful).

 

[Alex_brunius]

What I was talking about was improvements that you can't research in the game (but still are related to the torpedo or attack value of the sub). Some might say they are related and included in the tech, for example the type XXIs ability to reload much faster and target more accurate without raising the periscope.

A problem of these is that just like most other things, it might historically be Ok to make a few fixes and improvements. But to upgrade a Type II sub hull to have the same offensive capacity as a Type XXI submarine? That isn't something really historical.

The alternative is to consider Uboat flotillas just like Tankdivisions or Airwings and let all aspects of them upgrade forever (reasoning being the individual units are replaced). For balance the same should probably be done to Destroyers if that is the case.

 

[krieger11b]

What I was talking about was improvements that you can't research in the game (but still are related to the torpedo or attack value of the sub). Some might say they are related and included in the tech, for example the type XXIs ability to reload much faster and target more accurate without raising the periscope.

A problem of these is that just like most other things, it might historically be Ok to make a few fixes and improvements. But to upgrade a Type II sub hull to have the same offensive capacity as a Type XXI submarine? That isn't something really historical.

The alternative is to consider Uboat flotillas just like Tankdivisions or Airwings and let all aspects of them upgrade forever (reasoning being the individual units are replaced). For balance the same should probably be done to Destroyers if that is the case.

Destroyers had to have been the most heavily upgraded ships in WW2, many of the old WW1 mothballs brought into service had everything but the hull and main guns upgraded, perhaps the engines stayed the same most of the time too. However their ASW equipment, radios, AA, sonar, and radar were heavily upgraded or put in for the first time.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

A problem of these is that just like most other things, it might historically be Ok to make a few fixes and improvements. But to upgrade a Type II sub hull to have the same offensive capacity as a Type XXI submarine? That isn't something really historical.

That problem can be fixed easily by adding some sea & convoy attack to the hull tech (better hull = more space for torps, so it would also work for other sub models).

As for me, not being able to upgrade torps for subs is kinda strange. On the other hands, subs seem to be overpowered anyway. Having electro torp by 1942 and chewing the RN to pieces with subs feels... awkward...

 

[unmerged(61401)]

It's more complicated for the AA guns, because usualy the coning tower needed to be modified. But if the other ships are able to upgrade AA guns, so should the subs. Anyway, the best defense against aircraft was to crash dive.

AA was upgraded routinely. And think of the infamous Type-VIIC "U-Flak" models, where the conning tower was converted for 3-5 flak guns, then later back to their original state.

On the other hands, subs seem to be overpowered anyway. Having electro torp by 1942 and chewing the RN to pieces with subs feels... awkward...

That's why the adversary should develop adequate countermeasures, should the need rises. If they don't, tough.

 

[General War]

Having electro torp by 1942 and chewing the RN to pieces with subs feels... awkward...

Electric torp was not some ground breaking technology. I'm not sure when it was first used by American, but Germans had it at the beginning of ww2.

Anyway, electric torpedo is not that much of an improvement over the steam one. It's main advantage was less visible wake, making it harder to spot then the steam one, who left a visible trail of bubles. Electric torpedo even had some disadvantages, like shorter range, and inability to be stored outside the hull due to the required frequent maintenance.

I would remove the Electric torp technology, and replace it with Advanced torp, to simulate acoustically guided torpedoes and ladder patern, which Germans started to use from '43 or '44.

 

[krieger11b]

I would remove the Electric torp technology, and replace it with Advanced torp, to simulate acoustically guided torpedoes and ladder patern, which Germans started to use from '43 or '44.

That makes more sense than having electric torpedoes, that is way closer to a 1945 tech than electric torpedoes.

The other problem with electric torpedoes was that they were very slow compared a steam torpedo on the same speed setting. I remember in Silent Hunter III I just hated electric torpedoes, I attacked mostly at night anyways where steam torpedoes didn't give away my position as much. I much preferred to attack with a steam torpedo set to twice the speed of an electric torpedo, made aiming much easier and less chance for the enemy to evade.

 

[General War]

I remember in Silent Hunter III I just hated electric torpedoes, I attacked mostly at night anyways where steam torpedoes didn't give away my position as much. I much preferred to attack with a steam torpedo set to twice the speed of an electric torpedo, made aiming much easier and less chance for the enemy to evade.

I've played SHIII too. I'm still playing it occasionaly. And you're right, the steamers are a real killers at high speed. But there's nothing more frustrating than when your torps got spotted. Like you said, attacking at night is the best option.

 

[dsteve3]

I'll post here as its as relevant as anywhere else.

There are so many different endemic problems with the whole game that I get frustrated just trying to deal with the topic.

First off: there are so many issues with the AI right now that any "tactic" that the player uses and the AI doesn't is essentially an exploit. Before, the AI scripts had access to information and attributes that the player did not, which was supposed to compensate for the player's ability to dynamically trouble-shoot a situation. This no longer applies. The AI does not have any more options or greater abilities. Therefore, anything that the player does that is outside of the AI's programming is virtually an exploit.

Next, there are so many issues with AI scripts in the things that it is doing that the game itself is dysfunctional. It doesn't matter what plans you make playing as Germany, the AI will only build transports for Britain and won't research new techs. There is no point to discussing what's best as its irrelevant. Until we see what and how they fix this, there is no point.

Thirdly, the technology system is as flawed in this game as it is in all the others. Even with all the upgrades, the system still works on 100% pure hindsight. Tech-rush your chosen favourite path as you know in 1936 how the game will be fought in 1946. In reality, the reason Britain rushed sonar and ASW was because the Germans had developed an effective submarine strategy against the British marine fleet. Until the Germans develop an effective submarine strategy, there is absolutely no reason or motivation for Britain to develop an ASW strategy. This applies to a thousand different technological attributes through-out the game, including CV warfare, NAV warfare, armour design and deployment, specialised units, and many many sub-categories.

In practise, there was WWI experience, a handful of forward thinkers in each field and rare opportunities to implement new ideas. Until an actual event occurs in the history of each game, there should be no way to tech-rush equipment, tactics or doctrines.

CV, submarine and surface attacks and defences should work on a three tiered system like "rock-paper-scissors." CV's are vulnerable to submarine sneak-attacks, surface fleets trump any sized submarine pack in direct action and CV's have a significant advantage over surface fleets. Exceptions should be allowed, of course, but generally each should have their own category of attack and defence in each field.

CV's are strong in attack and defence against surface, medium against other CV's and weak in attack and defence against subs until enough CV's have been sunk to inspire research to develop an effective defence. Subs should be virtually ineffective against surface fleets (except with singular surprise attacks) regardless of the size of the hunt pack. I can think of no example where a large surface fleet ran away from a wolf pack. Subs are extremely effective against anything for the first shot, then they are extremely vulnerable. Hit-and-run is their only real tactic; there are no prolonged engagements.

There is no where to begin to really deal with solving these problems. I don't know if the AI scripts will ever be good enough to deal with a human player. I'm waiting for 1.3 to see how they stand up.

 

[Kayapo]

Before anyone cries unhistorical, what do you think would happen to a fleet of CVs, BBs and escorts if they ran into a wolfpack of 100 submarines? It wouldn't be pretty, just because they were not used much in concentration against enemy surface fleets doesn't mean they wouldn't do a good job, the only time I knew they did this was against a particularly troublesome carrier, the carrier was sunk, though one of the best U-Boot aces was killed also.

This doesn't have anything to do with being historical or not. It is just not possible to coordinate 100 submarine boats. Even with today's technology you can't do it. What you are suggesting is simply crazy. There are so many things you are overlooking. Technology, lack of communication, no space to manouver, no space to run away...this idea is just not practical at all.

Going back to the discussion at hand, the problem is that as it is the engine itself will always have trouble managing uboats. Uboats should have been abstracted like convoys are.

 

[krieger11b]

This doesn't have anything to do with being historical or not. It is just not possible to coordinate 100 submarine boats. Even with today's technology you can't do it. What you are suggesting is simply crazy. There are so many things you are overlooking. Technology, lack of communication, no space to manouver, no space to run away...this idea is just not practical at all.

Going back to the discussion at hand, the problem is that as it is the engine itself will always have trouble managing uboats. Uboats should have been abstracted like convoys are.

It's just a wolfpack on steroids, yes coordination would be difficult, unless they lay in wait on the surface and make a night attack while surfaced using radio until the first wave of torpedoes is made, then submerge, of course this would be way more difficult after the advent of radar.

 

[unmerged(61401)]

Subs should be virtually ineffective against surface fleets (except with singular surprise attacks) regardless of the size of the hunt pack. I can think of no example where a large surface fleet ran away from a wolf pack.

Because a surface fleet without a DD screen (if there ever was such a thing) always ran away if they could. Without active sonar and depth charges (e.g. standard ASW equipment that's only practical on fast manoveuring small surface vessels like destroyers and smaller craft), a surface ship is dead meat (if the sub is properly positioned, so it has several shots before being outran).

And yes, I also play Silent Hunter 3.

 

[unmerged(173593)]

I also miss the "Alberich" Projekt for subs in the "Secret Weapon" category.

The Alberich cloaking tech used a layer of specialy prepared rubber that would absorb enemy sonar.

Agreed Germany didn´t build many of those Stealth Subs ... but tests that was run by the end of the war proved that Subs with the Alberich Hull was prakticaly completly invisible to the enemy ... sinking about 5-8 times their own weight like in 1940/1941.

Hull improvements like snorkel and Alberich should greatly improve the visibility of a sub making it harder to detect.

 

[Rithral]

In reality, the reason Britain rushed sonar and ASW was because the Germans had developed an effective submarine strategy against the British marine fleet. Until the Germans develop an effective submarine strategy, there is absolutely no reason or motivation for Britain to develop an ASW strategy. This applies to a thousand different technological attributes through-out the game, including CV warfare, NAV warfare, armour design and deployment, specialised units, and many many sub-categories.

In practise, there was WWI experience, a handful of forward thinkers in each field and rare opportunities to implement new ideas. Until an actual event occurs in the history of each game, there should be no way to tech-rush equipment, tactics or doctrines..

Amen brother!

I've stated something smilar in other threads

I think the BEST way to fix this is to make practicles Very important. Such that it would be almost impossible to develope "1941 Armor" unless you had combat with your 1939 armor. It should be almost impossible to build 1941 INF unless you have gain alot of practicles from fighting with your infrantry.

Also it should be hard to build 1943 Navy unless you have had some experiance building 1936...1938...1941 ships. Navy is a little differnt and you learn Alot just from building and sailing your ships.

 

[AlanC9]

I think the BEST way to fix this is to make practicles Very important. Such that it would be almost impossible to develope "1941 Armor" unless you had combat with your 1939 armor. It should be almost impossible to build 1941 INF unless you have gain alot of practicles from fighting with your infrantry.

But wouldn't that leave everyone at the same tech level in 1939? How does Germany develop an advantage in armored warfare? OK, they do more fighting in September, but not much, and then they'd have to research the techs and build units before May.

 

[Bagsc]

I think the 'practical is most important' mentioned before can still coexist with 'someone can create new paradigms' like Germany with armored warfare. Historically, it's a game of measure-countermeasure-countercountermeasure, and someone obviously has to get to each step first (submarine warfare) for others to try to counter it (ASW). There's got to be a cost-benefit analysis built in (cost of not contesting subs vs cost of ASW program) and a reason to believe ASW is actually important and technically possible.

It's not very exciting because we already know CV/DD will beat BB/BC/CL, and that DD beats SS (because ASW was designed for existing DDs), and SS can get a surprise attack on a CV, but then the ASW will hunt it down while everyone outruns the SS. To get really ahistorical would be to use corvettes for ASW, or BC for ASW. Or for Germany to design counter-ASW ships. If Germany hadn't lost air superiority over the coasts of France, ASW aircraft probably wouldn't have been rushed to service, and probably wouldn't have decimated the SS.

If convoy raiding is the grand strategy, and SS convoy raiding is the dominant convoy raiding strategy in 1939, then new escort ASW might change the dominant convoy raiding strategy to be AA battlecruisers, if Germany's AA is good enough to protect the BC from CAGs, or perhaps aerial convoy raiding. The techs reflecting the way it unfolded in reality being replicated every time is historically accurate and strategically so very wrong. If you were UK and you thought Germany might switch to aerial convoy raiding when you roll out new ASW, you might not use destroyers for the mission.

 

[azedalis]

If convoys are abstract then so should subs. Having zones that are reachable from ports controlled or ports of friendly countries should be considered. Like portugal for axis. They allowed and repaired/supplied subs for germany even though they were never actually anything but neutral.

But the point is I dont mind abstract convoys, but why cant subs be abstract too...or atleast somewhat...destroys are both abstract and placeable...why not Subs? Have the abstract convoys change with naval technology...just like production and have the subs do the same. The computer knows how many convoys are basically in an area and should be able to do the same with the subs. Have sinking by uboats and losses of convoys and escourts based on these. Then a % materials will pass this area...the rest destroyed....This is about the only way to simulate the sub war... as tech changes the % of materials reaching its. I would think a minimum of so much % would get through and but the amount would be based on the number of subs, number of convoys and the number of escourts and the technology of each...With maybe a delay in the technology....kinda like a build up with the tech. I dont think this would be that hard to do...And it would solve this. Atleast it could easily be balanced this way.

Or I kinda like HOI 1s way of dumping destroyers into the kitty. I think the same with subs could work. Have the effective valve of the escorts and the subs be based on the current tech of the subs and destroyers. So basicallly you get an effect value that is used. As the subware is calculate. There will be losses of all ships involved. So to keep up the sub war you will need to add subs to the kitty and the same with destroyers and convoys. To minimize the number of convoys or subs built have them drain supplies at a certain rate. just like other ships.

If the kitty thing dont work how about having a box for each major ocean area where you place. so many destroyers or escourting ships, and so many subs. The ships could be removed and placed in a fleet or whatever. Each area could be detremined and the combats done in each by the computer. You can see only your numbers, and a rough number according to the number of spys you have active in that country...ofcoarse this would be abstract. This way you start using escourts when you want but since ships are in active mode and using more supplies then sitting in port. But the neat thing would be is say there is a limit like 50% sinkage in any one area. So to get closer to 100% you would have to sink convoys in multiple areas. Ofcoarse you would never get 100% sinkage. This way also the ships in each box would use supplies as active ships. This limiting the numbers used maybe besides convoys. Also this would mean the idea of using escout carriers could work also and such. Sub warfare needs to be easy but effective if done right and wrth the effort. Balancing the cost of convoys, subs and escourt (destroyers) will then just be all that is need. Then figuring out what each tech % will do but most of this is determined by the actual ships you place in each area. Have like 2-3 areas between USA and GB. Have it take so much time for a ship to go into or out of the boxes. Infact having 1 map button where this shows up would work with where the dividing lines of each area is.We could just ADD sea zone areas that are combinations of sea zones where the ships must reach the center of the area to be considered part of the area for being part of the area and vise a versa or have a cetain sea zone for each general area be the portal for these that way the ships or subs would have to transit to the area being attacked by surface fleets, subs not in convoy raiding missions etc. This would be shown on a seperate map. This could also lead for naval planes to be added to the mixture.

Also for the question why torpedoes cant be upgraded is historically, the torpedoes designed for each class of ship was just that. the size and cotrols used to operate each new torpedo was normally different alot of times. So upgrading the torpedoes was not done everytime new torpedoes were introduced. Kinda like tanks not getting their turrents replaced everytime there was advances. Some were, some werent. It was very common for armies to have different model of equipment in a unit at the same time. This would be hard to show in this game. Infact the american army basically once the war started really introduce few changes to its equipment compared to other armies using its mass industry capacity to change the balance of the war...

 

[theleif]

Or I kinda like HOI 1s way of dumping destroyers into the kitty.

Why on earth would you be this mean to the kitties?

But seriously, good post.

This was actually how i thought HOI 3 would handle the strategic warfare. Build them like convoys, and assign them to different areas or "boxes". You get access to more areas as you get better subs and control over certain ports. That would have the drawback of you not being able to use the "convoy raiding" subs for normal warfare (you can of course still build "normal" subs and use them the old school way), but as they weren't used that way anyway i wouldn't mind.

 

[erekose123]

i'm going to say the exact opposite of everyone here, but i would hate submarines to be abstracted, in the same way i'd like convoys to be "seen" on the map, i'd like to be able to manage convoys myself and to have more overall control over my supply chain in the end.

i think, but maybe i'm wrong, that player controlling supply was a great announced feature of the game, and i really dont see it anywhere. On the production screen you can set convoys yourself but even then, the AI seems to do what it wants, and you cannot choose exactly the amount of supply or oil you are sending or its frequency, you cant really choose the convoy or its escort's behaviour, well IMO you have too few control on whats going on. And thats a part of the supply nightmare players are experiencing as of 1.2.

I propose :

1. when looking at the map on supply mode, you should first be able to see where on the path is actually your convoy. is it leaving the port ? is the zone dangerous bacause you detected an ennemy fleet, so it should stay in the port ? Is there supplies left in this convoy, so maybe you should tell it to supply another nearby port, before going back to its normal course.
2. then you should be able to clic those green/red arrows, and see exactly how many ships and escorts you have there. What should be their behaviour when meeting an ennemy force ? run like hell to the nearest port ? zigzag and have a popup telling you "danger for your convoys in this zone" so you can send a fleet of yours there to track down the bastards ?
3. thirdly you should be able to clic and hold those arrows to re-direct them into which ever port you want. Say you are Japan and plan on invading Shangai and you are going to land a big force there, maybe you want all the nearby convoys to go to Shangai with just a few clics so you are sure to have supply there for a little bit of time.

IMHO, that would make the supply system more realistic and dynamic, as in any war supplies are damn too important to let them on "automatic".

 

[azedalis]

Well I would rather see supply routes also and have everything on the map...but the more we see or make not automated the slower the game will be. Maybe with this patch enough of the demons causing slower speed will be resolved, which might allow for the removal of this..but actually in WW2 Convoys for US to GB initially would not have escorts the entire way. This was probably due to shorter ranges of subs at the beginning of the war or changes of sub docs or whatever. And escorts were attached to the merchantmen closer to GB. So Zone Escorts are reasonable and were used atleast part of the way in the war. I find it might have been the ranges of the these escort ships and the lack of underway replenishment technologies or whatever it was.

But the big picture is this that convoys could take up alot of your game play time and alot of us dont want to worry about the thousands of noncombative forces in the games. We dont set up the supply trucks and all for our armies...I guess we could...but that would complicate the game alot also. Its all a compromise in the development of a game this complex.