1968 Sub vs Sub tips?

[Skyhigh]

I made a challenging '68 boomer hunting mission:
1-3 Yankees escorted by 2-5 attack subs: Foxtrot, Whiskey, Tango, Romeo or November. Sometimes I have a Victor I in there but that raises difficulty level a bit.
Goal is of course to take the boomers down.

Now of course the Mk37s are pretty slow and the escorts easily outrun them. How close do I need to be to get a hit with a Mk37?

Right now I actually use the Mk37s to chase escorts away (if far enough away, they will just turn their tail and run off) and then try and get close to a Yankee by speeding up into its baffles.

However it is not always easy, as it is unclear how many escorts there will be.

I have yet to kill a Yankee, because this mission is pretty difficult.

[jerseytom]

Against a November my preferred engagement range is 1000 yards dead astern, and even then holding off on letting it search and acquiring until maybe 500 yards or the target gets a sniff of it.

Submerged diesel boats, more comfortable shooting several times that distance and going active very quickly to take advantage of maximum closing speed.

Sounds like a hard mission though. If crap hit the fan maybe you could charge in the thick of them and let some of their torpedoes acquire their own guys!

[caine007]

Generally the Mk 37 has trouble sinking any sub faster than a November (and even those will outrun them if they have enough time to turn and get to flank speed).

Finding Yankees with '68 sonar is hard enough, actually sinking one is even harder. I'd be guessing you'd have to ambush them at close range with a 37 and make sure it stays on the wire so you can gaurantee the hit if they try to turn and run.

Sinking additional Yankee's now you don't have the element of surprise? I have no idea. You'd probably have to sink them with their own torpedoes or get in ridiculously close.

[CaptainCruise]

Is this accurate sub hunting doctrine? Did we really send our guys out to hunt boomers back in the late 60's with Mk16's that were basically WW2 leftovers...no wire, ran straight and level until a hit or out of fuel, and Mk37's that would blow off the bow of your own sub if you launched them above 10 kts, and could be outrun by any sub or surface vessel with a top speed over 22 kts. This seems like a foolish way to go to war. I've read here on the forums that the USN upgraded the Mk37's for more speed and range becoming the Mk37C, but I don't know if the game will eventually give them to us or not as we play on thru the years. I don't know what version of Mk37 the game is giving us.

Didn't we have the Mk48 come online in the late 60's or early 70's? Is there another torp that comes online as a "stopgap" between the Mk37 and the Mk48?

If anything, maybe our modders just need to do a realism tweak to the crop of 1968 torps to simulate upgrades and more realistic performance. What I mean by realistic is having a snowballs chance in hell of completing a boomer hunt with a torp that actually catches up to subs and goes *BOOM*.

What about a early version of the Mk48 pre-ADCAP? When did the USN have them available? Thanks guys...

Tom "CC"

[The Bandit]

Originally Posted by CaptainCruise

Is this accurate sub hunting doctrine? Did we really send our guys out to hunt boomers back in the late 60's with Mk16's that were basically WW2 leftovers...no wire, ran straight and level until a hit or out of fuel, and Mk37's that would blow off the bow of your own sub if you launched them above 10 kts, and could be outrun by any sub or surface vessel with a top speed over 22 kts. This seems like a foolish way to go to war. I've read here on the forums that the USN upgraded the Mk37's for more speed and range becoming the Mk37C, but I don't know if the game will eventually give them to us or not as we play on thru the years. I don't know what version of Mk37 the game is giving us.

Didn't we have the Mk48 come online in the late 60's or early 70's? Is there another torp that comes online as a "stopgap" between the Mk37 and the Mk48?

If anything, maybe our modders just need to do a realism tweak to the crop of 1968 torps to simulate upgrades and more realistic performance. What I mean by realistic is having a snowballs chance in hell of completing a boomer hunt with a torp that actually catches up to subs and goes *BOOM*.

What about a early version of the Mk48 pre-ADCAP? When did the USN have them available? Thanks guys...

Tom "CC"

The Mk 16 was never considered an ASW weapon, although it could be launched as deep as 200 ft, I don't think it could be set to run at a depth deeper than 80 ft. I mean I suppose you could probably use it if you found somebody particularly unlucky at PD/ snorkel depth but slim odds on that.

The Mk 37C which became the NT-37 program and continued on to have about 20 years of commercial success was initiated as a private venture in the mid-to-late 60s and started testing around 1968. It used mainly off-the-shelf parts (notable the engine from the Mk 46 torpedo) but was put through extensive testing until 1973, which was a little bit after the first Mk 48s started going to sea.

From what I can gather on the 37C, the navy wasn't overly enthusiastic about it because they feared (probably rightly so) that it could end up being used as fuel to cancel the Mk 48 at a time of shrinking defense budgets. A whole lot of $$$ was going to fight the Viet Nam war and its quite conceivable that somebody could have gotten it into their head that "We don't need a 55 knot torpedo because the Soviets don't have any 55 knot submarines! Give us the 36 knot upgrade instead!"

The Mk 48 had quite the design program, going from the late-50s/early 60s until 1972 when the first unit entered service. In this time it went from being an ASW torpedo to a general purpose torpedo and three different designs from two different companies were tested against each other in 1971. Before that, the closes thing you have to an "Interim Solution" is the nuclear Mk 45 ASTOR.

In my opinion, the only way that the 1968 torpedoes could be portrayed more "realistic" is some of the steps I've taken with the OAS mod, namely the creation of the Mk 37 Mod 0 and Mod 3 non-wire-guided torpedoes. From what I've been able to tell, these launch at full speed (27 knots vs 26 for the wire-guided variant) and have a shorter range (both because they are smaller, and because they are running at top speed) and again from what I can tell were primarily intended for snap-shots against fairly close / non-maneuvering targets.

The effectiveness of the Mk 37 Mod 2 (main wire-guided version) all comes down to how you use it and who you use it against. If you just make straight on shots with it like you would a Mk 48, your target is going to hear you almost every time, and if he's not a diesel boat he's probably going to escape. Against nuclear submarines, you need to take a very careful, nuanced approach, however this is one that the Mk 37 lends itself well to.

Step 1) Get behind the target
If you are in his baffles, he can't hear you and therefore can't hear you shoot (although the Mk 37 is a swim-out weapon so generates little-to-no transient noise on launch)

Step 2) Get into firing position
Inside 2000 yards for most targets. You have to be extremely careful here as its mandatory that you don't lose the wire, if you do and he launches a decoy, your Mk 37 may come right back! If you do loose the wire, as long as you are right behind him dive quickly, even if you make some noise he likely won't hear it since you're still in the baffles.

Step 3) Keep the torpedo slow
There are a lot of unhappy people dissatisfied with the Mk 37 because enemy subs almost always hear it and get away, even on a baffle shot. They key is, as long as the enemy isn't traveling too fast, keep your weapon pre-enabled until around 800-1000 yards, but no more than that. By activating that close in (and ramping your torpedo up to 26 knots almost instantly and guide it home manually) you are not giving your opponent enough time to accelerate and out-run the fish, under these circumstances you have very favorable odds of scoring a hit. With luck this should slow him down and make a follow-up shot (which is almost always necessary for nuclear boats) that much easier. I have sunk multiple Victor Is using this method, and while some have got away, its worked more than once.

Capt. Jack Harkness has been experimenting with making the Mk 37s quieter at full speed, so they don't get noticed so much on baffle shots and I think this bears out and will probably see about implementing it in my mod.

Anyways sorry for that long rambling explanation but as unorthodox as it seems, this is how the USN would have had to use the Mk 37 against the Soviets in the 60s, there was no other solution (other than the Mk 45 ASTOR) except maybe for running away and trying to call in air support on the radio (which would probably be just as dangerous for you as it would be for the Russian!)

[Capt Jack Harkness]

Great info Bandit, thanks for that. Have you got the Mod 0 or Mod 3 to show up as separate weapons in inventory or did you replace the standard Mod 2?

And yes, I've had good luck with the stock 120 dB pre-enable speed and a modded 130 dB enable speed, but that's just my guess at the difference in noise.

[Julhelm]

The thing with the high noise values for enabled weapons is that this takes into account the output of the active seeker.

[The Bandit]

Originally Posted by Capt Jack Harkness

Great info Bandit, thanks for that. Have you got the Mod 0 or Mod 3 to show up as separate weapons in inventory or did you replace the standard Mod 2?

And yes, I've had good luck with the stock 120 dB pre-enable speed and a modded 130 dB enable speed, but that's just my guess at the difference in noise.

Well I've actually made nearly all variants of the Mk37. Mod 0 and 3 non-wire guided and Mod 1 and 2 wire-guided, plus Mk 37C although considerably few submarines have all of as I think each platform tops out at around 7 weapons (not including what types the VLS can accommodate)

Originally Posted by Julhelm

The thing with the high noise values for enabled weapons is that this takes into account the output of the active seeker.

That makes a bit of sense and, I think I'll do some testing with torpedoes set to active to see how well enemies notice the. Not at all sure if this is even possible (or easy to do) but, what I would propose is having 3 modes for the Torpedo: Pre-enable/Transit , passive enable (where the torpedo comes up to full speed and starts seeking) and active enable (with the high-noise level so that whatever its shot at reasonably hears the active sonar echo and can evade accordingly).

On the topic of torpedoes as well, this may be a mistaken assumption on my part but, would it be possible to create a passive/active guidance mode? My understanding (especially on many non-wire-guided homing torpedoes) is that once a torpedo gets a good sniff of something passive and goes terminal, it would then switch to active-mode for greater accuracy.

[Templar_4450th]

Originally Posted by Julhelm

The thing with the high noise values for enabled weapons is that this takes into account the output of the active seeker.

Wait, does this mean that if you have the seeker set to passive tracking, and the torpedo has gone active... does that mean that it will use the lower of the two WeaponNoiseValues?

Or will it use the 230db level as if it were actively pinging?

[Kazuaki Shimazaki II]

Originally Posted by Julhelm

The thing with the high noise values for enabled weapons is that this takes into account the output of the active seeker.

To be fair to this approach, we probably use passive torpedoes way more than we really should, because they work way too well compared to their likely effectiveness in real life. We are talking about a weapon having good hearing even as it hurtles at dozens of knots, when our subs' much larger passive sonars are wiped. Further, the enemy maximizes their noise level when hearing a passive torpedo where a real enemy might try to go ultraquiet and hope that speeding torpedo won't hear them.

Ideally, torpedoes should be modeled like sonobuoys with sensors that have adjustable sensitivity values. If that's too hard for the average player (or AI) at least make the PASSIVE seeker that way and keep the simpler fixed ranges for the active seeker.

[Julhelm]

Well, at the very least passive torps should probably search at the lower speed setting.

[CaptainCruise]

Originally Posted by The Bandit

The Mk 16 was never considered an ASW weapon, although it could be launched as deep as 200 ft, I don't think it could be set to run at a depth deeper than 80 ft. I mean I suppose you could probably use it if you found somebody particularly unlucky at PD/ snorkel depth but slim odds on that.


Anyways sorry for that long rambling explanation but as unorthodox as it seems, this is how the USN would have had to use the Mk 37 against the Soviets in the 60s, there was no other solution (other than the Mk 45 ASTOR) except maybe for running away and trying to call in air support on the radio (which would probably be just as dangerous for you as it would be for the Russian!)

Thanks for the reply, and a great, in depth reply is never a ramble.

My concern was pretty much what can we do about the Mk16, the WW2 era "dumb" torp that we have along with the Mk37 in the 1968 gameplay. I've used the Mk37 quite a bit now and pretty much have an idea what I need to do to make it work. Basically shooting at anything that can move over 22-24kts is a waste unless you're right on top of them and get your shot in quick and dirty, like if the target is facing you and would have to waste time and speed by turning away and running. Or as you mentioned by working up into their baffles at close range and firing from there. What I was wondering is was there ever anything done to make the Mk16 a more effective ASW/ASuW weapon, because as it is now without wire guidance or any control at all it is, as you had also mentioned....basically useless. The only way we can use it in game is play it like it was Silent Hunter. Forget subs completely unless they are on the surface. Without depth control it'll never connect. The only thing we can do is line it up from the periscope or on the surface and from maybe 1,000/1,500 yds do a straight in salvo shot. That may give you one, maybe two hits at most. If the torp is that useless in gameplay why did the game designers even bother to model it and put it in the game. I would probably guess because that's what the Navy had at that era in time, so we got it. OK, that's fine......only thing, it don't work!!!!

Forgive my rant. It's 0530 in the morning here and I still haven't slept, so Im gettin' a bit cranky. lol Thanks brothers.....

"CC"

[CaptainCruise]

Originally Posted by The Bandit

Well I've actually made nearly all variants of the Mk37. Mod 0 and 3 non-wire guided and Mod 1 and 2 wire-guided, plus Mk 37C although considerably few submarines have all of as I think each platform tops out at around 7 weapons (not including what types the VLS can accommodate)



That makes a bit of sense and, I think I'll do some testing with torpedoes set to active to see how well enemies notice the. Not at all sure if this is even possible (or easy to do) but, what I would propose is having 3 modes for the Torpedo: Pre-enable/Transit , passive enable (where the torpedo comes up to full speed and starts seeking) and active enable (with the high-noise level so that whatever its shot at reasonably hears the active sonar echo and can evade accordingly).

On the topic of torpedoes as well, this may be a mistaken assumption on my part but, would it be possible to create a passive/active guidance mode? My understanding (especially on many non-wire-guided homing torpedoes) is that once a torpedo gets a good sniff of something passive and goes terminal, it would then switch to active-mode for greater accuracy.

That sounds like an interesting idea. How about trying it with the Mk16 we already have in the game? It's useless anyway, maybe giving it a passive/active seeker that sniffs for a target, then goes active if it finds a target it can't maintain passively? Just a thought. I'm so dang frustrated with the Mk16 taking up space on my sub I could be using for salami and pickles.

"CC"

[Swordsman422]

I tend to have my best luck hunting that Yankee is shallower water <1000ft. Normally, I got silent and nearly bottom out and let him pass me by, then creep into his baffles and hit him with 2 torpedoes. If his escorts sniff me out, I impose him between myself and them, and they usually do the job for me. Fairly often I can conserve my own torpedoes by playing mongoose to the enemy's torps, but it's a game I'll lose just less than half of the time.

The issue with the Yankee in 1968 is that it is using 1980's equipment. The sonar is too sensitive, and it has access to the SS-N-16 more than a decade before it was available.

[The Bandit]

Originally Posted by CaptainCruise

Thanks for the reply, and a great, in depth reply is never a ramble.

My concern was pretty much what can we do about the Mk16, the WW2 era "dumb" torp that we have along with the Mk37 in the 1968 gameplay. I've used the Mk37 quite a bit now and pretty much have an idea what I need to do to make it work. Basically shooting at anything that can move over 22-24kts is a waste unless you're right on top of them and get your shot in quick and dirty, like if the target is facing you and would have to waste time and speed by turning away and running. Or as you mentioned by working up into their baffles at close range and firing from there. What I was wondering is was there ever anything done to make the Mk16 a more effective ASW/ASuW weapon, because as it is now without wire guidance or any control at all it is, as you had also mentioned....basically useless. The only way we can use it in game is play it like it was Silent Hunter. Forget subs completely unless they are on the surface. Without depth control it'll never connect. The only thing we can do is line it up from the periscope or on the surface and from maybe 1,000/1,500 yds do a straight in salvo shot. That may give you one, maybe two hits at most. If the torp is that useless in gameplay why did the game designers even bother to model it and put it in the game. I would probably guess because that's what the Navy had at that era in time, so we got it. OK, that's fine......only thing, it don't work!!!!

Forgive my rant. It's 0530 in the morning here and I still haven't slept, so Im gettin' a bit cranky. lol Thanks brothers.....

"CC"

Well I think from a realism standpoint the Mk 16 isn't all that different from the Mk 37 in terms of being a compromised / handicapped weapon. Much like the MK 37, in order to have any success with the Mk 16 you're required to do a very careful and precise attack. Both are low % / low PK weapons that make the captain jump through hoops in order to use effectively.

Originally Posted by CaptainCruise

That sounds like an interesting idea. How about trying it with the Mk16 we already have in the game? It's useless anyway, maybe giving it a passive/active seeker that sniffs for a target, then goes active if it finds a target it can't maintain passively? Just a thought. I'm so dang frustrated with the Mk16 taking up space on my sub I could be using for salami and pickles.

"CC"

Well, there would be more than a few problems with trying to use the Mk 16 as an ASW weapon. Homing or not, the thing really wasn't designed to operate below 200 feet and AFAIK as of right now there isn't any way to portray this in game now (torpedoes don't have depth limitations).

What I have done to the Mk 16 though (will be in the next release of OAS) is add circle pattern running. This can work out to be a very effective "one-two" punch with the Mk 37. If you have a target (say a Riga) that you put a Mk 37 onto, in order to make him evade, other than maybe trying to set up a low % leading shot with another Mk 37, he'd pretty much be in the clear once the first fish runs out of power or he gets outside of its seeker range. Now in many cases this would put you in position to try a spread of Mk 16s at a nice, non-maneuvering target, but in many cases you're left with a horrible oblique angle-on-bow where you're only shooting at a small slice of the ship, which again greatly decreases your likelihood of scoring a hit. With a circle-runner, as long as the target isn't too far away (to the point that he can get out of range before the fish overtakes him and starts running its circle) you have a pretty good chance of being able to plant what amounts to a moving minefield ahead of him. Now obviously all this goes out the window if he starts maneuvering, but if that happens then there's a good chance the Mk 37 is going to get him when he starts making turns.

I'm not sure how many total / which mods of Mk 16 had the circle-running feature but at least two post-war straight/pattern running torpedoes were canceled at least partially in favor of just adding that feature to the Mk 16. As best as I can tell (aside from maybe a few test mules) circle was the only pattern on the Mk 16.