the story so far
Feb. 1945.
We have left the mediterranean and the afrika korps behind. A lost cause anyway, and it cost us 2 crewmen. We got 2 months off in Dec. for massive repairs to the boat. Cheaper to just build a new one, but the brass was insistent. I got accused of leaving "my friend" in the lurch, but the truth is, we were never friends by any personal experience, more like respect of one's career. With no regrets we leave it all behind. On to Norway. Transferred to the 11th fleet, December, 1944. Trusty ole U99 has been around for 33 patrols and has returned to Bergen for the last time. With great pleasure we announce the appointment of the Captain and crew of U99, to take command of the new type XXI, U2511, effective immediately. You are to make the fullest demands on your craft so that any problems that arise may be dealt with swiftly. (memo doesn't say why) Also, nothing in there about a promotion. Same ole Kaptänleutnant as before. Oh well, at least we got a new ride. Braved about 180m deep dive on first patrol. Sunk a few ships. Discovered how much I hate pattern running torpedos. Returned to base. 2nd patrol, beginning of Feb. 1945. Still getting used to the new sub. Our old sub, U99 was assigned a new captain and crew, and departed for duty, about the same time as our first patrol. Monitoring the radio transmissions, U99 has been ordered to report position 3 times, and so far, each call has remained unanswered... Deep dive report, 260 meters and all is well. Seals remain tight. Can't wait to put it to the real test. |
December 11th, 1939. We open our Top Secret orders as we pass Den Helder. We are to try a repeat of the raid on Scapa Flow, but our target is Portsmouth.
We approach at darkness and surface to slide over the sub net at the choke point into the harbor. We hug the pier and at silent speed navigate right into the main anchorage. A destroyer and a patrol boat are plying the waters of the bay. What a disappointment. Only a few merchant ships lie at anchor. I took out a 10,000 ton Modern Tanker and another small tanker and then we left the way we came, hugging the pier. We were never detected. We surface and clear the sub net, and then race at flank speed back out into the channel. Just when I thought we were clear, star shells appear above us and we hear faint sirens from the shore. Shore batteries start to fire on us, so we dive. All of the escorts, at least 4 of them, in the channel have predictably beached themselves on the channel side as they could not find the way into Portsmouth. We egress the channel by Dover and resume our usual 1939 ravage of the eastern coast of Britain. Steve |
16 March 1940. I am back in Wilhelmshaven without incident. I did everything the same on this mission as I did on the previous ones, but the tonnage is lower. I only sunk 31,158 tons. Part of the problem was the weather. For 8 days I shadowed three different cargo ships with no torpedoes while waiting to use the last 80 rounds of my deck gun on one of them. Sadly the gale force winds continued and when I switched to a fourth cargo ship only to find her neutral, I threw in the towel. As soon as I got back into Wilhelmshaven the winds died down to a peaceful 3 knots. How annoying.
I was awarded 4 u-boat badges, a painful reminder of the four men killed during patrol 4. I promoted Wolf Steinmeier and August Krüger for their fine work in handling the boat's engines and awarded both the iron cross. I called in every favor I had, talked to every person I knew, but despite my fine record I was denied the transfer to U-103, a fine IXB that will be launching soon. It will be captained by Viktor Schütze, who is a fine officer. I wish him well and will soon be launching once more in U-48. |
U2511
U-2511, 3rd patrol. March 22, 1945.
Type XXI fitness report. Deep dive to 285 m, danger, do not exceed 285m, damage occurs at 290+ (was trying to break 300 meters deep dive, instead it tried to break me). Blow ballast for emergency surface, took the next 4 hours to restore the compressed air supply. Anti-aircraft turrets serve a reduction in visibility, but safer for the crew. Use the dash ability sparingly, it really eats into the battery charge. If you are familiar with the recharge times of the improved batteries aboard the typical type IX, then you should be ok here. Speed is life. And finally there is a use for those decoys. You can now get far enough away from a decoy at 13 knots underwater. Run that speed for 30 seconds and then hit "creep mode". Even if you are forced to move faster, at first, they won't be expecting a uboat to be moving that fast, so they may not recognize the sound signature. But, the type XXI is not a super submarine, that is, it's not invincible. And for you deck gun pirates, well, you can forget that, those days are over. But the plus side, the torpedos are hydraulically loaded, in about 2-3 minutes. And with as few as 4 qualified crew. Yes, in all, I can recommend the type XXI for any interested captain. But offer a caveat. If you are already experienced with the type IX, or even the type VII, then only those hulls with all the upgrades might still be worth hanging on to. Our patrol area this time seems a risky venture. AM98, almost at the Bristol channel. As if the high command wants us to... Nevermind that. In any case, we may not come back from this one. Aufwiedersehen from valhalla, U-2511. |
May 8th, 1945.
We received the order to stand down. Our last patrol area took us up the Irish sea. U2511 wormed its way up the channel and surrendered at the British city of Liverpool. Unfortunately we sank 3 ships on our way in, on May 5th, as per our previous orders. Ships that had just been serviced at Liverpool... We hoisted a black flag on the periscope mast and announced by wireless our intent to surrender. The Captain, as he speaks english pretty well, was able to broker a deal with the British. But not before the first watch officer got to experience the "hospitality" of the dockworkers, one of whom stole his knights' cross. The military police showed up shortly and took the captain and crew into custody, and spared a team of officers to impound the sub. And so ends the "glorious" career of Kaptänleutnant Johan König... After 37 patrols, and 5 (ish) years of war, sank: 219 merchantmen (all types) 78 warships (all types) 297 ships = 1.226.913 tons 96 aircraft shot down, including 3, B24s. I play this game as tribute to all those who went to sea during this conflict and doubly so for all those who never came home... |
Torshavn Habor Incursion Report
My old stomping grounds of the North of England are no longer as I remember them. There are fewer merchants, their ships are faster, and the sky is teaming with aircraft. I cannot catch the ships under water and I cannot surface because aircraft show up every 10 minutes. So I push on westward where I spy Torshavn. I know little about it, but it's a hostile city. Does it have a harbor? Maps say yes. I study them carefully. It looks possible. Let's investigate. After two days underwater adventure, surfacing only to get air, I am within sight of the harbor. I see two coastal vessels of some sort, a warship, and a heavy cruiser. Hydrophone contact negative. My watch officer assures me that all ships are stationary. Periscope depth and we move in at 1 knot, rigged for silent running. My navigation officer assures me that depth under keel is 4 meters. :nope: I must be crazy. At dusk I spend two hours maneuvering for a shot on the heavy cruiser. Finally I give up. I can't even get a 45º AOB. In frustration I torpedo the other warship–a destroyer as it turns out. It sinks immediately. No sirens, no warnings, no screaming, but a warship comes to investigate and beaches itself on the opposite island. What an idiot. At 1 knot I slip off into the night. I am not likely to return. |
May 13, 1940. I have safely returned to Wilhelmshaven after the most harrowing mission of my career. After an uninteresting tour of the coast of Norway, which was occupied by Germany for its own safety to protect it from further Allied treachery, I rounded England. I had hoped to find numerous ships off the northern coast of England, as before, but the skies were teaming with aircraft and I had only modest success. I headed for Torshavn Harbor, which was similarly disappointing. I sank a moored destroyer and headed south. I tried the northern entrance to the Irish Sea, but I had no success there other than finding a few sailboats in winds so extreme that shots were impossible.
Finally I headed further south where I finally hit gold: A convoy moving along at at 6 knots. I located two steamers straggling behind at 4 knots and sank the first of the two with no difficulty. A frigate came to investigate, but I was long gone from where he looked for me. An hour later I set up a firing solution on the second and sent it to the bottom. Four hours later I caught up with the convoy again and sank another ship. Again the frigate came searching for me, but by the time he followed the trail of bubbles I had left that location. He never found me. Back on the trail of the convoy I found it impossible to stay on the northern flank of the convoy because another convoy heading in the opposite direction made it impossible. I switched convoys and it was here that disaster nearly struck. An unusually clear day (coinciding with the installation of the 16 km atmosphere mod) resulted in the destroyers seeing me well out beyond my normal 8 km end-around range. Even at 16 km I was still detected and finally in desperation to make progress I foolishly went to 1/3rd submerged in an attempt to make progress. The frigate heard me and began pinging me relentlessly. Soon he followed up with a few depth charges, but I dodged most. Unfortunately he got a lucky shot in and I found myself sinking and nearing crush depth. U-48 was in dreadful danger so I was forced to throw off all attempts at stealth and I called for flank speed, maximum surface angle, and blew ballast 3 different times. The flood control and pumps finally got things under control and I was able to go to max depth again, but for some reason U-48 would not hold her depth at low speeds! Frantic to evade my pursuer, I was nevertheless forced to go at 5 knots to keep U-48 from sinking like a stone. Battery power was running out and I was desperately heading towards a shallow zone so that I could bottom her and wait the frigate out. Fortunately for me the escort finally gave up and I surfaced with the last of my ballast. Battery power was below 25 percent, but it recharged within a few hours. I radioed other captains to see whether they knew what was wrong with U-48. Most advised abandoning the pursuit and returning to base, but I knew in my heart that I would never be happy with that decision. I engaged a lone ship and after hitting her with a torpedo sank her with my deck gun. I was less than 20 km from the convoy and was afraid that the frigate would show up again to harass me. Fortunately he did not get the beleaguered ship's distress call. As discretion is the better part of valor, I decided to sink another lone ship to the south, but soon I realized that the convoy's southwesterly course intersected the target's. I knew then that it would be impossible to catch her and sink her without detection so I abandoned that plan and went after the convoy. With three forward torpedoes left, I spotted the jewel at the center of the convoy–a fine cruiser waiting to be torpedoed. At 3 km I let fly with a perfect salvo, but sadly another cargo ship interposed and took both torpedoes sinking immediately. The third torpedo scored a perfect smokestack hit on another ship sending it to the bottom. But now the frigate was back on the trail with fresh depth charges (restored, I imagine, by the save and restore operation). Again and again he pounded my position until he finally scored another light hit on the same section of the sub that had previously been damaged. Once the damage was repaired U-48 magically regained her buoyancy and I was able to slip away at 1 knot, at 99 meters below the sea. By this time CO2 was high and I surfaced only to find myself 14 km from another warship, which promptly began shelling me. Cursing my luck, I crash dived with what little oxygen I had and began the cat-and-mouse game again. It took another 40 minutes, but I slipped away from him too by turning at flank speed into his baffles and then dropping to 2 knots. Once he had turned around again, I went to 1 knot and managed to slip away. I surfaced and rounded England again on the way home where I spotted a patrol craft and a ship behind it. To my surprise the ship was traveling at an astonishing 14 knots, but I carefully put my stern on the ship and sank the tanker with a single torpedo. The patrol craft followed the bubbles to my location and buzzed around angrily, but it had no depth charge ability and so I easily slipped away. On the way back I encountered another tanker and tried the same tactic. Trying again to ensure a single shot kill I aimed for the smokestack at the back of the ship, but I missed cleanly and with winds at 13 m/s I threw in the towel and headed for home. I was so happy to be headed to port that I threw conservation to the wind and sped across the North Sea at full speed. I feared that U-48 was in horrible shape from the depth charges that had caused her to sink nearly uncontrollably. To my surprise, the repair crew told me that U-48 had 95.16% hull integrity. Other than the radio antenna and the observation periscope (both kaput) the boat was in excellent shape. The Befehlshaber der Unterseeboote (BdU) had given us up for sunk as we had stopped all radio contact after the loss of the antenna. They were happy to see us safely in port. Final Result: 40,096 tons 1195 renown Promoted Gotthard Becker and Wolf Steinmeier to Stabsoberbootsman Certified Alois Mülbach proficient at repairs. Awarded Iron Cross second class to Heinrich Gabelmann Awarded Iron Cross first class to Peter Weller Received: Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves Command of U-108, a new type IXB boat. |
@Ukoning
Great achievement! How long did it take to play along the whole war? Or, to put i in another way, do you remember the day in which you started your career (in RL, I mean)? @Zosimus Awsome patrol, kaleun :salute: I hope to mimic your venture, one day or another :up: |
I think this last career I started (game time) Oct. 1940 and carried it through to the end.
It took about 6-7 months of actual time to complete. I do a lot of 'short cutting' and save some time by not plotting return trips, I just accept the 'return to base' option. But the first career i started after many years of not playing took me almost one full year to complete. It was right about then I discovered that I would never play this one to one speed. I started a new career at day 1, with a type IIA. Only last week. So far it is now Aug. 1940 and I upgraded little U-4 with U-110, after 11 patrols. Yeah, it's a different war experience with the type II... |
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I found the "small thing" (Type IIA) a nice challange but so far is horrid for underwater diving/surfacing at low speed (1-2 knoten). Also, could be my extremly thin and underrated crew that have some difficulties in getting and mantaining PD (I'm using SH3C, with ralistic crew with random values, it produced a funny assortments of men for me...), maybe that "Helm Qualification" really do something after all. I should grab some more men and drills more some of my trusted ones before the war... |
It was a good weekend.
I nailed the HMS Aquatainia on one patrol, and I nailed an Illustrious class carrier doing 17 knots with 4 steamer torpedoes at 4 km distance. All 4 torpedoes hit and exploded! That may be my best shot ever. 100% realism, including no map contacts. I did, however, report the contact to obtain the speed, which of course is a big part of the firing solution. Steve |
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I was surprised also because they took about 30 seconds longer to hit than I expected. I had already assumed that my attack was a failure when I got Torpedo impact! Torpedo impact! Torpedo impact! Torpedo impact! :yeah: Steve |
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I have always wondered why the programmers chose to put the green-yellow-red light combination on "just" gyroangle. But, of course, they probably never dreamed players would mod the game to make it so much more realistic, or that players would actually use sliderules as they played. |
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Steve |
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