Survivors of depth charge attacks

[CrusaderKiller]

I am curious about a few mechanics.
1. Do enemy ships pinging you always find you? I was at 190 meters, engine off, curled up in the fetal position sucking my thumb and ole boy still found me.
2. Do enemy ship depth charges always take 6-8 to blow you up? In 2 scenarios the sloop dropped 2 separate iterations of charges over about 5 minutes. Seems the 7th or 8th explosion is what gets you. I ask because I don’t want it to be predictable.
3. Will the enemy actually lose contact with you?

Thanks

[Horcerer]

When you're being hull pinged, they absolutely see you and nothing you do will break that. Your chance to escape detection is when they go in for a depth charge run. In the time between them dropping charges and them exploding you can dodge at slower speeds while going undetected. Go back to silent running once their charges have detonated and repeat until you can get out of hullpinging range.

[kenberg]

For a lot of us 160 meters to 180 meters deep is a good zone as he's right on top of you and his pings stop go full speed 90* left or right after his bombs go off go dead slow for 15 mins,

Or stay at full speed for 7 to 10 mins heading 180* away from convoy and you and he will be fare from convoy and he will auto give up and run back to convoy ( this way has never failed me ),

And a cheat you can do is as hes coming into bomb you set both your diveplane's to +25* up and the rudder 35* left or right,

And as his pings stop go full speed and diveplane's to -25* down and if you set your rudder to 35* left now set it to 35* right and at the end come back up to 160 meters and do first or second sentence,

[bumpywindshear]

...show a low profile, always show bow or stern to the close escort, avoiding possible hull pings, otherwise see above...

[SUBSIM]

1. Do enemy ships pinging you always find you? I was at 190 meters, engine off, curled up in the fetal position sucking my thumb and ole boy still found me.

Each escort has a detection range circle for visual, passive and active. The range circles will vary depending on many factors: visual factors include night/day, fog, profile, moon among others. Passive factors include your sound profile, the faster your are going the more noise you make and the bigger the escort range circle. Keep the bilge pump off, don't use the noisy compressor unless you must, minimize blowing tanks while submerged, etc. and don't play the phonograph (sorry Led Zeppelin fans). Active sonar (pinging), the range circle is more like a half-circle, in front of the escort. They cannot ping behind themselves. And the factors are mostly range, if you are within their active range they can detect you, profile, and depth (the deeper you are the better your chances of evading selection), and the escort's own speed. Escorts must speed up before dropping depth charges and that will blank out their sensors.

So, Answer: no, not always. You can hear ships pinging in the hydrophones but they may not have a contact on you. They are searching. If you get within their detection range, they will come say hello.


2. Do enemy ship depth charges always take 6-8 to blow you up? In 2 scenarios the sloop dropped 2 separate iterations of charges over about 5 minutes. Seems the 7th or 8th explosion is what gets you. I ask because I don’t want it to be predictable.

It is not set, it will depend completely on how close they are with their estimate on where you are. If you do not take any action to evade, they can take you out. Taking evasive maneuvers does NOT guarantee survival but greatly improves your chances.


3. Will the enemy actually lose contact with you?

Certainly, and this is where having a good hydrophone man is essential. He can call out the bearing of the attacking escort to the captain, who can make crucial course and speed changes. When the hydrophone man calls out "splashes!" the captain can try to evade. My crew and I have been able to evade 5, 6, 7 + depth charge attacks and gotten away.

[Adlerson]

Originally posted by SUBSIM:

1. Do enemy ships pinging you always find you? I was at 190 meters, engine off, curled up in the fetal position sucking my thumb and ole boy still found me.

Each escort has a detection range circle for visual, passive and active. The range circles will vary depending on many factors: visual factors include night/day, fog, profile, moon among others. Passive factors include your sound profile, the faster your are going the more noise you make and the bigger the escort range circle. Keep the bilge pump off, don't use the noisy compressor unless you must, minimize blowing tanks while submerged, etc. and don't play the phonograph (sorry Led Zeppelin fans). Active sonar (pinging), the range circle is more like a half-circle, in front of the escort. They cannot ping behind themselves. And the factors are mostly range, if you are within their active range they can detect you, profile, and depth (the deeper you are the better your chances of evading selection), and the escort's own speed. Escorts must speed up before dropping depth charges and that will blank out their sensors.

So, Answer: no, not always. You can hear ships pinging in the hydrophones but they may not have a contact on you. They are searching. If you get within their detection range, they will come say hello.

Does depth charge persistent noise factor in? It's my understanding that an actual depth charge attack will create persistent noise for several minutes after going off, thus helping to blanket sound from the sub for more than just the period of explosions. (This noise of course won't be to the same level as the explosions themselves, but the explosions apparently create a lot of bubbles and churning in the water that will greatly decrease the effectiveness of especially passive detection systems.) None of the previous sims I've seen have modeled this, would be a nice touch if you guys did.

Cheers,
Addy

[CrusaderKiller]

I managed to escape the other day by following advice in this thread. Once a charge was dropped I hauled “fin” and shortly after the booms, I slowed down to be quiet again. Took about 4 attacks but they got further away each time then I lived. Was very.........rewarding to survive solo.

[TetraToxiN]

Originally posted by kenberg:

For a lot of us 160 meters to 180 meters deep is a good zone as he's right on top of you and his pings stop go full speed 90* left or right after his bombs go off go dead slow for 15 mins,

Or stay at full speed for 7 to 10 mins heading 180* away from convoy and you and he will be fare from convoy and he will auto give up and run back to convoy ( this way has never failed me ),

And a cheat you can do is as hes coming into bomb you set both your diveplane's to +25* up and the rudder 35* left or right,

And as his pings stop go full speed and diveplane's to -25* down and if you set your rudder to 35* left now set it to 35* right and at the end come back up to 160 meters and do first or second sentence,

Im not so sure about the auto give up, i was chased by 2 DDs for like 20mins straight and dodge like 7-8 depth charge runs. When I respawn with another uboat, I saw the same 2 DDs out in the middle of nowhere, heading towards a bearing so i followed them, so soon enough I saw the same convoy i was initially attacking AFTER 30MINS of following them.
TLDR; They dont autogive up if they can still ping you and will chase you till the ends of the world

[TetraToxiN]

surviving and dodging depth charge attack is one thing, losing the damn persistent DDs is a real feat for me. I have no clear idea if going dead slow or full speed 180 away from them is better because in the end they always find me no matter the depth or speed.

I would love some advice on how i can successfully escape the eternal nightmare of sonar pings

[Silence Suzuka]

For me 140 meter is safe enough. The depth charge took a long while to reach me if they do managed to find me.

There is a simple way to know if they have detected you.
If there is a long period between their ping, that means they have no idea where you were and still searching.
If they are pinging at quick speed, that means they possibly found something and going for it.


Besides, a loud ping that can be heard with out hydrophone definitely means you are detected.

[Silence Suzuka]

Originally posted by ☠TetraToxiN☠:

surviving and dodging depth charge attack is one thing, losing the damn persistent DDs is a real feat for me. I have no clear idea if going dead slow or full speed 180 away from them is better because in the end they always find me no matter the depth or speed.

I would love some advice on how i can successfully escape the eternal nightmare of sonar pings

The simplest idea is don't let them get you at first place, try attack at further distance then crash dive and leave your position as fast as possible. You should have few minutes (which is enough for you to run like 600m away from where you are, give you much more chance to survive) before the torpedo hit and everyone start to search for you.

Then you should try to turn away from the convoy, the escorts will have to go back to their duty if they are too far from their valuable merchants.