I grouped the six transports into a tight block, with the HMS Hampshire in close escort (~1.5nm ahead) and set them on a zig-zag course to Germany. I set the speed to Cruise (14 kts) because the formation started to fall apart any faster than that, and I adjusted the zig-zags until the projected time to the final point in the course was about 90 minutes before scenario end.
HMS Ajax was set on a course to stay 5-10 nm ahead of the convoy, and put on sprint-and-drift. I micromanaged this one for no really apparent reason, but it did enable me to set his 'drift' periods to be in between rows of sonobuoys.
And that's an excellent lead-in to the Shackletons. I set them on an ASW patrol with a patrol box moving ahead of the convoy (Relative, Fixed Bearing, 10-45nm ahead). The first Shack started laying a carpet of buoys ahead of the group... and his radar started picking up surface contacts. Since that the only ready aircraft, I would lay a couple lines of sonobuoys, then divert him to go check out surface contacts. Then back to the convoy for more ASW coverage, then back out on a sweep. Lather, rinse, repeat, until a second Shackleton was finally up.
Somehwere along the way one of the trawlers, when ID'd, had range rings pop up. That combined with that contact being on a different 'side' than the other trawlers looked awfully suspicious, so I adjusted the formation's course a bit. Cheating? Possibly. But why be dumb.
The rest of the way across I generally kept two Shackletons on-station at any given time, with occasional surface-search sweeps toward the destination. At no point did I have any legitimate sub contact within 100nm of the convoy... several false contacts, executed with extreme prejudice.
The biggest excitement was when the German frigate spotted a sub in his area. I diverted a Shackleton to help out, and he ended up killing a Juliet class. Glad I avoided the trawler! Early-60s air defenses weren't so great aganst anti-ship missiles.
Anyway, I got all the way across with no one directly threatening the convoy. I did get very lucky as we pulled into port, but I don't want to spoil EVERYTHING.
I opened the last save game in the editor, to see what I missed. Somehow I avoided three Whiskey's and two Foxtrots, never had a sniff. I saved the USSR message log, it looks like they barely knew where I was either.
Major Victory, 550 points.
SIDE: United Kingdom
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LOSSES:
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EXPENDITURES:
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342x Type 30059 LOFAR [Mk1c]
53x Type 17054 Active Directional [Mk1c]
3x Mk44 Mod 1
10x Mk11 Depth Charge
SIDE: Germany
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LOSSES:
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EXPENDITURES:
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2x Mk44 Mod 1
SIDE: Soviet Union
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LOSSES:
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1x PLRK-651 Juliett
EXPENDITURES:
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4x Generic Acoustic Decoy
SIDE: Neutral Fishing Boats
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LOSSES:
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EXPENDITURES:
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SIDE: Nature
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LOSSES:
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3x False Contact (Medium)
EXPENDITURES:
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SIDE: Neutral Merchants
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LOSSES:
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EXPENDITURES:
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