Subs Balance

[Chris21wen]

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

So, we're left with the age-old (and impenetrable) question:

History is the problem, we all know what happened and are striving to obtain it. A pointless exercise unless you want to what the game to turn into a historical documentary.

[Chris21wen]

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

In my game while the "super E" has certainly caused havoc its really the air ASW that is killing me. I lost over 50 subs sunk by ASW patrols so far. Under my opponents air umbrella I expect a sub to last about 1-2 days before either getting sunk or having to RTB due to damage from bombs.

I largely agree with Q-ball about the DL. Any sub I have within range of Eriks ASW planes instantly gets a 10/10 DL. And this is in mid 44 so my subs have air search radar. In the rare occasions I do manage to intercept something 9 out of 10 times the sub fires at the escorts. This is making merchant hunting an even bigger waste of time. I wish I had realized this sooner! [:)]

Has anybody installed the latest Beta data patch? This is supposed reduce the effectiveness of the super E?

[janh]

ORIGINAL: crsutton
...Not a game breaker but it seems to me that in any good simulation of the Pacific War (and this is the best)the Japanese player needs to sweat a lot over the Allied sub threat. Otherwise something is missing.
...

In principle yes, but only so when the Japanese player also sticks to measures like small or no convoy forming, poor escorts, poorly prepared/trained air cover etc. Which means that I believe the Japanese could have taken countermeasures to vastly reduce the effectiveness of the Allied sub threat just as the Allies managed themselves in the Atlantic. But that would have required hindsight and rethinking of Japanese priorities and doctrines, which happens and is explicitly enabled in this game. See Alreds post above, it's the benefit of hindsight.

And exactly what Greyjoy did -- a huge effort on managing the merchant fleet and ASW cover. The question should then indeed be: what is the Allied countermove to the countermove? Wolfpack tactics? I guess that's what I would be pondering about now.
I recall numerous times the question being asked whether having 2-3 subs in a TF makes a difference in detection and attack likelihood, but I never saw a clear and undisputed answer to that. I tried myself for a while, but it seemed to make hardly a difference. Perhaps even a negative one since it reduced my hunting area coverage. Any ideas on how to effectively organize something like a Wolfpack aside from just stacking single sub TFs in a small region?

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

As a somewhat student of the USN submarine campaign I have opinions on this of course. The game models have always been far afield of history, both pro and con. Probably the most askew of any of the model sets in the game. Compared to the A2A models for example the sub war is looney-tunes. In RL it was decisive. In the game, as you say, it is far more marginal even in the hands of an expert player, primarily for the reasons you state. It is far too easy to find a sub and once it is found it is essentially ineffective until it dumps the DL.

I would argue that the US Submarines were flattered by the competition. There was nothing particularily exceptional about the US fleet boats. They were large and comfortable, with good range, and there were a lot of them. However, there were a lot more Uboats, and what they gave up in range and comfort, they gained in being quicker to dive and could dive deeper than most US boats. Compare Werner's comments on his dive times to O'Kanes. Uboat's crush depth was 200 -280m. The Gato's crush depth was considerably less and the Balao's hulls could withstand the pressures at 280m but their other fittings could not. The Uboats were were largely annihilated by Allied air and surface ASW in the Spring of 43. Werner's description of his first patrol in the Spring of 43 is chilling. They were so overmatched by the radar equipped long range patrol aircraft. The US boats had surface search and air search radar. But, again, a carefull read of O'Kanes patrols suggest the readiness rate of this equipment was not very high on a long patrol. American torpedoes were a problem throughout the war. So why was the US campaign "decisive" in real life when the Germans were so soundly defeated...I suggest that it was due to the competition. Most players don't replicate the incompetence of the Japanese ASW campaign just as most Allied players don't replicate the incompetence of the British defense of Malaya and Burma or the Dutch defense on Java.

Bottom line: I enjoy the submarine campaign from both sides.

Mike

Comparing the Battle of the Atlantic to the PTO sub war is ridiculous on so many levels I won't try. Submarines are built to the mission. U-boats would have been garbage, less than useless, operating in the Pacific. USN fleet boats were a wonder weapon for the environment they fought in, in no small measure due to their crews and COs, whose training and esptit was never matched by the U-boats after their own "easy" years in 1939-1941. A submarine is far, far more than the sum of its equipment. And diving speed as a core design attribute, which drives many, many trade-offs, is only imnportnat if your war economy can't produce decent air search radar. The US did that for its subs by mid-1942. The Germans never learned how to deal with radar in their environment.

Bottom line--in the PTO the submarines, with 2% of the Navy, destroyed Japan's ability to produce war materiel. In the Atlantic the U-boats failed in their basic missions. There's really no more to be said.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: janh

ORIGINAL: crsutton
...Not a game breaker but it seems to me that in any good simulation of the Pacific War (and this is the best)the Japanese player needs to sweat a lot over the Allied sub threat. Otherwise something is missing.
...

In principle yes, but only so when the Japanese player also sticks to measures like small or no convoy forming, poor escorts, poorly prepared/trained air cover etc. Which means that I believe the Japanese could have taken countermeasures to vastly reduce the effectiveness of the Allied sub threat just as the Allies managed themselves in the Atlantic. But that would have required hindsight and rethinking of Japanese priorities and doctrines, which happens and is explicitly enabled in this game. See Alreds post above, it's the benefit of hindsight.

And exactly what Greyjoy did -- a huge effort on managing the merchant fleet and ASW cover. The question should then indeed be: what is the Allied countermove to the countermove? Wolfpack tactics? I guess that's what I would be pondering about now.
I recall numerous times the question being asked whether having 2-3 subs in a TF makes a difference in detection and attack likelihood, but I never saw a clear and undisputed answer to that. I tried myself for a while, but it seemed to make hardly a difference. Perhaps even a negative one since it reduced my hunting area coverage. Any ideas on how to effectively organize something like a Wolfpack aside from just stacking single sub TFs in a small region?

It's false to claim that Japan did not convoy. After the early months they almost never sent merchants out without escorts, except in severe back areas such as coastal China. Out to the islands they always did. I have read scores of war patrol reports in addition to all the major memoirs and you can too--they're on-line and free. These formations were not the mega-convoys of the Atlantic, but they didn't need to be. The geography was entirely different and the volumes as well. But to assert that USN subs had an open field to merrily sink merchants whithout opposition is plainly false.

What the game gets the most wrong is what everyone here is speaking to--air search and detection. Subs in deep zones patrolled in daylight at PD, not surfaced. Japan had no small wave radars capable of finding scopes as the Allies did in the Atlantic. Very little of even the HI ASW patrols were anything other than visual. By day a sub was safe, the crew resitng. At night they surfaced, charged batteries, and used surface search radar to hunt, often with an end-around maneuver which set up optimal angles-on-the-bow for a night surface attack.

Air ASW at night was almost non-existent. If there were any the subs from very early days used their own radar sets as early-warning devices. A radar signal can be seen at multiiples of the range it will give the sender a return; this is still used in naval warfare today quite a bit. A fleet boat could dive to PD in between 45 and 60 seconds, and be at 150 feet in two minutes. Patrol reports and memoirs have hundreds of cases where Japanese planes were detected, either passively or with active air search radar, and the boat dove without being detected. If a plane were seen at ten miles, even by day, the sub was virtualy ensured of escaping with maybe a single badly-placed bomb and no damage.

The game's instant air detection routines are not "real" and are the single biggest reason subs don't score more. Those routines are a game balancing gift to JFBs. No amount of tactical changes by RL Japan could have achieved them. The equipment and training did not exist.

[Wirraway_Ace]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

As a somewhat student of the USN submarine campaign I have opinions on this of course. The game models have always been far afield of history, both pro and con. Probably the most askew of any of the model sets in the game. Compared to the A2A models for example the sub war is looney-tunes. In RL it was decisive. In the game, as you say, it is far more marginal even in the hands of an expert player, primarily for the reasons you state. It is far too easy to find a sub and once it is found it is essentially ineffective until it dumps the DL.

I would argue that the US Submarines were flattered by the competition. There was nothing particularily exceptional about the US fleet boats. They were large and comfortable, with good range, and there were a lot of them. However, there were a lot more Uboats, and what they gave up in range and comfort, they gained in being quicker to dive and could dive deeper than most US boats. Compare Werner's comments on his dive times to O'Kanes. Uboat's crush depth was 200 -280m. The Gato's crush depth was considerably less and the Balao's hulls could withstand the pressures at 280m but their other fittings could not. The Uboats were were largely annihilated by Allied air and surface ASW in the Spring of 43. Werner's description of his first patrol in the Spring of 43 is chilling. They were so overmatched by the radar equipped long range patrol aircraft. The US boats had surface search and air search radar. But, again, a carefull read of O'Kanes patrols suggest the readiness rate of this equipment was not very high on a long patrol. American torpedoes were a problem throughout the war. So why was the US campaign "decisive" in real life when the Germans were so soundly defeated...I suggest that it was due to the competition. Most players don't replicate the incompetence of the Japanese ASW campaign just as most Allied players don't replicate the incompetence of the British defense of Malaya and Burma or the Dutch defense on Java.

Bottom line: I enjoy the submarine campaign from both sides.

Mike

Comparing the Battle of the Atlantic to the PTO sub war is ridiculous on so many levels I won't try. Submarines are built to the mission. U-boats would have been garbage, less than useless, operating in the Pacific. USN fleet boats were a wonder weapon for the environment they fought in, in no small measure due to their crews and COs, whose training and esptit was never matched by the U-boats after their own "easy" years in 1939-1941. A submarine is far, far more than the sum of its equipment. And diving speed as a core design attribute, which drives many, many trade-offs, is only imnportnat if your war economy can't produce decent air search radar. The US did that for its subs by mid-1942. The Germans never learned how to deal with radar in their environment.

Bottom line--in the PTO the submarines, with 2% of the Navy, destroyed Japan's ability to produce war materiel. In the Atlantic the U-boats failed in their basic missions. There's really no more to be said.

Bullwinkle,

Blair compares the two campaigns so I thought I might too...

Why were US fleet boats a wonder weapon? I have looked at the German, British and US boats from a technical perspective and don't see anything about the US boats to suggest they were significantly better. the Brits had a better scope system, but not as good a TDC. The Brits had better torps than either the Americans or Germans. The type XII Uboats were quick divers, had excellent optics and TDC, and were well led and crewed until 43. The Snorkel was a potentially important technology that came too late in the campaign to save the UBoat Corps from the horrific attrition of 43. The US did not develop this capability during the war. The Type IX boats that patrolled the US East Coast were comparable to the US Fleet boats with a similiar range and number of torps, but slower on the surface and submerged.

I see no objective reason to suggest the US boats and significantly better crews or captains than other navies.

It appears to me that many have inferred from the success you cite, "2% of the Navy, destroyed Japan's ability to produce war materiel", that US boats were some sort of wonder weapon led by the best and crewed by heros. I simply have tried to suggest that , objectively, the relative strength of their opponent was a key difference in the US success in the Pacific compared to the German failure in the Atlantic...And, that it is rational for an IJN player to apply more resources, planning and a convoy strategy than the Japanese did in real life, which will lead to less dramatic success by the Silent Service.

Mike

[Canoerebel]

Bullwinkle did not suggest that US boats were wonder weapons or crewed by the best and crewed by heroes.

[Lecivius]

ORIGINAL: Chris H

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

In my game while the "super E" has certainly caused havoc its really the air ASW that is killing me. I lost over 50 subs sunk by ASW patrols so far. Under my opponents air umbrella I expect a sub to last about 1-2 days before either getting sunk or having to RTB due to damage from bombs.

I largely agree with Q-ball about the DL. Any sub I have within range of Eriks ASW planes instantly gets a 10/10 DL. And this is in mid 44 so my subs have air search radar. In the rare occasions I do manage to intercept something 9 out of 10 times the sub fires at the escorts. This is making merchant hunting an even bigger waste of time. I wish I had realized this sooner! [:)]

Has anybody installed the latest Beta data patch? This is supposed reduce the effectiveness of the super E?

I have not seen it. My subs, in '45, are really squishy against E escorts. By & large I agree with everything posted above. But the incredible effectiveness of late war ASW by Japan is something that needs to be given a hard look. Virtually any attack by a US sub against an escorted group of Japanese ships gets a severe counter attack forcing the sub to retire, if it survives. My subs receive a minimum of 4 hits received for every attack. Being forced down & not effective is one thing. Being suicidal is something else.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

Bullwinkle,

Blair compares the two campaigns so I thought I might too...

Why were US fleet boats a wonder weapon? I have looked at the German, British and US boats from a technical perspective and don't see anything about the US boats to suggest they were significantly better. the Brits had a better scope system, but not as good a TDC. The Brits had better torps than either the Americans or Germans. The type XII Uboats were quick divers, had excellent optics and TDC, and were well led and crewed until 43. The Snorkel was a potentially important technology that came too late in the campaign to save the UBoat Corps from the horrific attrition of 43. The US did not develop this capability during the war. The Type IX boats that patrolled the US East Coast were comparable to the US Fleet boats with a similiar range and number of torps, but slower on the surface and submerged.

I see no objective reason to suggest the US boats and significantly better crews or captains than other navies.

It appears to me that many have inferred from the success you cite, "2% of the Navy, destroyed Japan's ability to produce war materiel", that US boats were some sort of wonder weapon led by the best and crewed by heros. I simply have tried to suggest that , objectively, the relative strength of their opponent was a key difference in the US success in the Pacific compared to the German failure in the Atlantic...And, that it is rational for an IJN player to apply more resources, planning and a convoy strategy than the Japanese did in real life, which will lead to less dramatic success by the Silent Service.

Mike

Blair compares yes, but does not equate. Again, Germany failed (twice) to close the Atlantic. The USN submarine force did not fail in its mission as Germany did, but instead wildly exceeded it as it was defined on 12/7/41, using hardware designed for fleet scouting and support. And yeah, I do attribute a lot of that to COs and crews. I've known some of them. The U-boats by 1943 were putting to sea with enlisted crews barely able to do their jobs in boats largely made with slave labor. And at far more than 2% of the Kriegsmarine and a fair portion of the size of the Luftwaffe.

Submarines are built for the job. Yes, US torpedoes were crap for awhile. They were not, as you said, that way by 1944. They were highly reliable and had much better warheads. The overwhelming challenge in the PTO was range, not diving speed or diving depth, and our boats were built for that. No German design was compatible with the PTO, not even the IX. Air conditioning was not for crew comfort alone, but for equipment reliablity. It took space, but it was more than worth it. Optics? Germans had excelent optics. US optics were adequate. Because, seldom discussed here, USN subs attacked from closer, more dangerous ranges than U-boats in general. U-boats attacked huge convoys running in straight lines. They didn't care if they hit THAT target; they just wanted to hit A target. Ladder-search torpedoes and longer range slow speed weapons and U-boats could launch farther out. And they often had wolfpack help; USN boats had no one to take the ASW off them.

Were U-boats perfect? Heck, no. What design genius thought storing reloads outside the pressure hull was a good idea? So you got to wallow on the surface, massively breaking rig-for-dive, to rig out handling gear and move weapons down to the torpedo rooms while at sea? The snorkel was a compromise that caused as many operational problems as it solved. It is often commented that the USN didn't develop it so they were less techie than Germany. They didn't need it, and Germany's models were a kludge. In the 1950s the USN developed models that worked on the Guppies.

But of all the issues in comparing the two navy's efforts the most important by far was not materiel, it was leadership. And there, yes, Germany was terrible. Probably detracted at least 50% from results that could have been achieved. The patrol sector maps, the incessant radio traffic, the running here and there--insanity, but right in there with German national psychology. More control is better. The lower-ranking must be kept on a leash by thier betters. The Junkers would have been proud. U-boats every day put up a big flag that screamed "Here I am!" when they made required radio calls back to Mama. USN crews went off into Indian country, in a way the Germans never did except for a few months in early 1942, all alone. No help, no buddies, no milch cows, no spare parts. Just the boat, the crew, the CO. Hunting somewhere in a vast assigned area. No other naval force in the war operated that way at those ranges with anything close to those results. So, heroes? Yeah.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Bullwinkle did not suggest that US boats were wonder weapons or crewed by the best and crewed by heroes.

I didn't say the heroes part, but I just did. I do believe that. Few modern sailors exept submariners know what it feels like to be out there alone, with no one to the left or right.

As for the boats, they were desigend for their jobs. So were U-boats. Swap oceans with both and they both would have failed. The U-boats worse though, since a Type VII could have almost gotten half way to the patrol area before needing to turn back for fuel.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Lecivius

ORIGINAL: Chris H

ORIGINAL: JocMeister

In my game while the "super E" has certainly caused havoc its really the air ASW that is killing me. I lost over 50 subs sunk by ASW patrols so far. Under my opponents air umbrella I expect a sub to last about 1-2 days before either getting sunk or having to RTB due to damage from bombs.

I largely agree with Q-ball about the DL. Any sub I have within range of Eriks ASW planes instantly gets a 10/10 DL. And this is in mid 44 so my subs have air search radar. In the rare occasions I do manage to intercept something 9 out of 10 times the sub fires at the escorts. This is making merchant hunting an even bigger waste of time. I wish I had realized this sooner! [:)]

Has anybody installed the latest Beta data patch? This is supposed reduce the effectiveness of the super E?

I have not seen it. My subs, in '45, are really squishy against E escorts. By & large I agree with everything posted above. But the incredible effectiveness of late war ASW by Japan is something that needs to be given a hard look. Virtually any attack by a US sub against an escorted group of Japanese ships gets a severe counter attack forcing the sub to retire, if it survives. My subs receive a minimum of 4 hits received for every attack. Being forced down & not effective is one thing. Being suicidal is something else.

This was addressed by the Babes series of mods. I would be very surprised if it is included in the stock game in the future. But never say never.

[Wirraway_Ace]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58



What the game gets the most wrong is what everyone here is speaking to--air search and detection. Subs in deep zones patrolled in daylight at PD, not surfaced. Japan had no small wave radars capable of finding scopes as the Allies did in the Atlantic. Very little of even the HI ASW patrols were anything other than visual. By day a sub was safe, the crew resitng. At night they surfaced, charged batteries, and used surface search radar to hunt, often with an end-around maneuver which set up optimal angles-on-the-bow for a night surface attack.

Air ASW at night was almost non-existent. If there were any the subs from very early days used their own radar sets as early-warning devices. A radar signal can be seen at multiiples of the range it will give the sender a return; this is still used in naval warfare today quite a bit. A fleet boat could dive to PD in between 45 and 60 seconds, and be at 150 feet in two minutes. Patrol reports and memoirs have hundreds of cases where Japanese planes were detected, either passively or with active air search radar, and the boat dove without being detected. If a plane were seen at ten miles, even by day, the sub was virtualy ensured of escaping with maybe a single badly-placed bomb and no damage.

The game's instant air detection routines are not "real" and are the single biggest reason subs don't score more. Those routines are a game balancing gift to JFBs. No amount of tactical changes by RL Japan could have achieved them. The equipment and training did not exist.

Your points are completely valid. But, I would still point out that the DL is reset to 0 at the beginning of the night phase and the Japanese seemingly did develop and field radar capable of detecting a surfaced sub recharging her batteries and racing to get ahead of a convoy.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

Your points are completely valid. But, I would still point out that the DL is reset to 0 at the beginning of the night phase and the Japanese seemingly did develop and field radar capable of detecting a surfaced sub recharging her batteries and racing to get ahead of a convoy.

Even if they had widely fielded millimeter wave radars (they didn't have the industiral base, but handwave that away) they still would have had to operate at night, which they were terrible at, and subs still had early-warning equipment that let them dive away from even an incoming Zero. It's in the patrol reports. Ten miles visual sightings and the plane was still looking at an expiring wake most of the time.

In the game my main beef is not radar or not-radar. It's that the DL goes to max in one pass by a searcher pretty much all the time. Even with radar you miss subs. Gear fails, crews are tired, they patrol the slice incorreclty, the weather is bad, etc. The game is much more mechanical. Subs are stealthy, but in the game they're treated about like a destroyer would be when either an ASW or Search mission passes through the hex. If there were just a higher chance the DL would not increase I'd be a happy camper.

I'll wait for WITP2 to get multiple targets attacked in a phase by one sub, as happened hundreds of times in RL. Imagine the wailing from JFBs if they lost three loaded xAPs to one sub in one turn. Or three tankers.

[Wirraway_Ace]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Bullwinkle did not suggest that US boats were wonder weapons or crewed by the best and crewed by heroes.

"USN fleet boats were a wonder weapon for the environment they fought in, in no small measure due to their crews and COs, whose training and esptit was never matched by the U-boats after their own "easy" years in 1939-1941."

I admit, I took his quote above to an extreme to make the point about possible bias about the strengths and weaknesses of the USN.

[Wirraway_Ace]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

Your points are completely valid. But, I would still point out that the DL is reset to 0 at the beginning of the night phase and the Japanese seemingly did develop and field radar capable of detecting a surfaced sub recharging her batteries and racing to get ahead of a convoy.

Even if they had widely fielded millimeter wave radars (they didn't have the industiral base, but handwave that away) they still would have had to operate at night, which they were terrible at, and subs still had early-warning equipment that let them dive away from even an incoming Zero. It's in the patrol reports. Ten miles visual sightings and the plane was still looking at an expiring wake most of the time.

In the game my main beef is not radar or not-radar. It's that the DL goes to max in one pass by a searcher pretty much all the time. Even with radar you miss subs. Gear fails, crews are tired, they patrol the slice incorreclty, the weather is bad, etc. The game is much more mechanical. Subs are stealthy, but in the game they're treated about like a destroyer would be when either an ASW or Search mission passes through the hex. If there were just a higher chance the DL would not increase I'd be a happy camper.

I'll wait for WITP2 to get multiple targets attacked in a phase by one sub, as happened hundreds of times in RL. Imagine the wailing from JFBs if they lost three loaded xAPs to one sub in one turn. Or three tankers.

I agree that the game engine could be improved in the sub campaign and hope for a WITP2. To your wish list, I would add modelling of damaged subs ability to dive. Patrol reports are replete with battery damage/failure that seriously limited the ability of the sub to stay submerged or other serious hull damage. I have watched many, many of my own subs crawl away crippled from deep patrols under an enemy air umbrella essentially unmolested. Every time I see it, I think of Wahoo.

[janh]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58
Comparing the Battle of the Atlantic to the PTO sub war is ridiculous on so many levels I won't try. Submarines are built to the mission. U-boats would have been garbage, less than useless, operating in the Pacific.

I am not so sure about that either, but likely only the type XI would have been adequate for this environment. In the face of an enemy ill-prepared and poorly equipped, who never recognized this threat in time, the U-boats may have served just well enough.

A comparison to the ATO needs eye for detail, you are right with that. It is one thing to start with small, totally-insufficient boat numbers, and only when enemy has already gained the technical and numerical superiority, get close to the number of subs needed. But that time the German crew quality was already being hurt badly, it had peaked probably in late 41 (if not even earlier). Change a few factors on the Japanese setup, namely give them good numbers of long range ASW patrol aircraft comparable to the Sunderlands, Lancasters, Catalinas etc. Add naval ASW capabilites on par with the Allied platforms in good measure as well, and allow for well-trained crews by 1943 as if the IJN had seen it coming for 3.5 years by that time like the Allies did in the Atlantic. I would guess the story of the fleetboats might have been somewhat different in such a case where the opponents were better prepared than the Japanese.

Which is to some degree what Greyjoy seems to be doing successfully. Perhaps a bit too successful, grant you that, if the detection routines are too forgiving, but that's not my gut feeling. Except for the Super-Es I thought the sub-warfare was actually quite well done in stock AE.

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58
It's false to claim that Japan did not convoy.

Sure they did convoy, never said the opposite or meant to say so. But their convoy system was not on the level the Allies used in the Atlantic. Large, well escorted convoys with CVE and long-range air-cover, air patrols of routes and even the hunter-killer groups in the last two years. The Japanese formed much smaller convoys, typically escorted insufficiently with smaller, slower craft rather than one or two "layers" (?) of DD or DE. I recall some statistics on ships sunk from convoys versus single ships/unescorted small groups, but I can't recall where I saw that. There was a similar table in some older German book on the ATO battle, which showed how the U-Boat system failed when the convoy system matured and few ships traveled unescorted. Maybe someone knows where to find these numbers. If this is even only remotely transferable, a better convoy system should already do a lot to improve the Japanese situation.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: Wirraway_Ace

Your points are completely valid. But, I would still point out that the DL is reset to 0 at the beginning of the night phase and the Japanese seemingly did develop and field radar capable of detecting a surfaced sub recharging her batteries and racing to get ahead of a convoy.

Even if they had widely fielded millimeter wave radars (they didn't have the industiral base, but handwave that away) they still would have had to operate at night, which they were terrible at, and subs still had early-warning equipment that let them dive away from even an incoming Zero. It's in the patrol reports. Ten miles visual sightings and the plane was still looking at an expiring wake most of the time.

In the game my main beef is not radar or not-radar. It's that the DL goes to max in one pass by a searcher pretty much all the time. Even with radar you miss subs. Gear fails, crews are tired, they patrol the slice incorreclty, the weather is bad, etc. The game is much more mechanical. Subs are stealthy, but in the game they're treated about like a destroyer would be when either an ASW or Search mission passes through the hex. If there were just a higher chance the DL would not increase I'd be a happy camper.

I'll wait for WITP2 to get multiple targets attacked in a phase by one sub, as happened hundreds of times in RL. Imagine the wailing from JFBs if they lost three loaded xAPs to one sub in one turn. Or three tankers.

I agree that the game engine could be improved in the sub campaign and hope for a WITP2. To your wish list, I would add modelling of damaged subs ability to dive. Patrol reports are replete with battery damage/failure that seriously limited the ability of the sub to stay submerged or other serious hull damage. I have watched many, many of my own subs crawl away crippled from deep patrols under an enemy air umbrella essentially unmolested. Every time I see it, I think of Wahoo.

I'd be fine with that. ASW action IMO is too light on system damage accumulation, and probably too hard on flooding. Piping was double- or triple-redundant in valve line-ups, and pressure hull damage was most often the result of shells, not DCs. If a DC punched a hole in the pressure hull, or dished it in enough to tear a seam, it was probably fatal. I don't think a sub with 53 flooding should be able to get home across 4000 miles most of the time. Too little reserve buoyancy. But the devs I think were hampered by the durability rating. It has to work for undamaged and damaged, and in truth a damaged sub has very different problems than a damaged skimmer.

The game also imposes restrictions in the phase structure which are inherent. In RL a divng sub changed course and even at 2-3 knots opened a huge circle of probability in a few undetected hours. Lots of cases of subs moving away 4-5 miles, surfacing, seeing the ASW still prosecuting their last datum, and getting away unseen. In the game if a sub is assigned a DL it has the DL for that phase. It's useless. In RL, not so much.

OTOH, going back to the first weeks after AE shipped I'm on record as wishing for required R&R periods to slow down sub cycle time, and making subs take longer to repair. Subs are little, but they're dense. I've fixed percentage system damages in a day at Pearl that should have taken 3 weeks alongside a tender or pier at a full subase. The cycle times are too fast, but the attacks are too limited in number of targets. In the main it sort of balances out, but at the cost of a lot of suspension of disbelief. Subs find targets too easily in the game, but when they do they usually shoot at an esocrt, or at most one merchant. I'd rather find less and shoot more. Then have three weeks at Waikiki and the Royal Hawiian between patrols. [:)]

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: janh

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58
Comparing the Battle of the Atlantic to the PTO sub war is ridiculous on so many levels I won't try. Submarines are built to the mission. U-boats would have been garbage, less than useless, operating in the Pacific.

I am not so sure about that either, but likely only the type XI would have been adequate for this environment.

Absolutley the only one useable, and they were a very small proportion of the U-boat fleet. The vast majority were Type VIIs.

In the face of an enemy ill-prepared and poorly equipped, who never recognized this threat in time, the U-boats may have served just well enough.

Not if they couldn't even get to the patrol areas from Pearl via Midway, as was needed until mid-1944.

A comparison to the ATO needs eye for detail, you are right with that. It is one thing to start with small, totally-insufficient boat numbers, and only when enemy has already gained the technical and numerical superiority, get close to the number of subs needed.

But your own statement belies this. U-boat numbers peaked long before the Allies' ASW effort. Certainly before jeep carriers became the norm.

But that time the German crew quality was already being hurt badly, it had peaked probably in late 41 (if not even earlier). Change a few factors on the Japanese setup, namely give them good numbers of long range ASW patrol aircraft comparable to the Sunderlands, Lancasters, Catalinas etc. Add naval ASW capabilites on par with the Allied platforms in good measure as well, and allow for well-trained crews by 1943 as if the IJN had seen it coming for 3.5 years by that time like the Allies did in the Atlantic. I would guess the story of the fleetboats might have been somewhat different in such a case where the opponents were better prepared than the Japanese.

You're mixing years and numbers. The Allies didn't have 3.5 years of warning and their efforts then sprang forth fully formed. They worked incrementally, experimenting. The Japanese had ample warning too. USN fleet boats were leaving Pearl on war patrol on 12/8/1941.

People who try to compare the two theaters also usualy forget geography. The task of the Allies was far easier than Japan's. They needed to control a relatively narrow strip of ocean for only the time a very large convoy was passing through it. They did not have to do 360 degree patrols around hundreds of small islands. They didn't have to patrol water the convoy was already through with. They only had to patrol the flanks and the area 10-30 miles ahead of a moving box. They also had ready-made infrastructure in British and other nations' bases at Halifax, the Azores, Iceland, Bermuda, etc. The Japanese in many places started with a beach backed by jungle. That they even managed to get flaot plane ASW up in many of their islands is remarkable, not a failure. But to expect them to be able to operate multi-engine, radar-equipped ASW from flyspecs in the DEI is nuts. They fought on the territory they had. And it wasn't at all what the Allies had in the Atlantic.

Sure they did convoy, never said the opposite or meant to say so. But their convoy system was not on the level the Allies used in the Atlantic.

It could never be that. The Allies needed to go from a couple of huge CONUS and Canadian ports--NYC, Halifax, Norfolk, etc--to a few huge ports in England, the USSR, and North Africa. Japan's task was far more fragmented and they had to pass through multiple choke points. If the Atlantic Allies had been forced to go through the Sunda Strait, the Malaccan Strait, the various exits from the Sea of Japan, etc. the U-boats would have had an easier time.

[Wirraway_Ace]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58


OTOH, going back to the first weeks after AE shipped I'm on record as wishing for required R&R periods to slow down sub cycle time, and making subs take longer to repair. Subs are little, but they're dense. I've fixed percentage system damages in a day at Pearl that should have taken 3 weeks alongside a tender or pier at a full subase. The cycle times are too fast, but the attacks are too limited in number of targets. In the main it sort of balances out, but at the cost of a lot of suspension of disbelief. Subs find targets too easily in the game, but when they do they usually shoot at an esocrt, or at most one merchant. I'd rather find less and shoot more. Then have three weeks at Waikiki and the Royal Hawiian between patrols. [:)]

Completely agree

[HexHead]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Bullwinkle did not suggest that US boats were wonder weapons or crewed by the best and crewed by heroes.

I didn't say the heroes part, but I just did. I do believe that. Few modern sailors exept submariners know what it feels like to be out there alone, with no one to the left or right.
As for the boats, they were desigend for their jobs. So were U-boats. Swap oceans with both and they both would have failed. The U-boats worse though, since a Type VII could have almost gotten half way to the patrol area before needing to turn back for fuel.

"We were corsairs...and I believe the last of the corsairs....When you think of yourself as a lone wolf stalking the seas, searching down the enemy and engaging him in personal combat, it is a thing you can grasp....

We were the last of the corsairs. It is a conviction that has grown in me since those final months in the Pacific..."

- George Grider, War Fish