Control keys in the game silent hunter 3. Passage of games. Useful hotkeys

Leaving the port of registry for combat duty, the boat goes to the specified square and is on duty there for exactly one day. After that, you can return back. The company is dynamic, the place of duty is assigned randomly - therefore, most often torpedoes are spent on the way back and forth. Merchants swim in the sea, rigging ships can be found off the coast, and large convoys regularly scurry along the routes. You can deviate from the course, sail beyond the Arctic Circle or make your way into the Mediterranean Sea - if only there was enough diesel. You are absolutely free.

For your information: in the first version of the game, it was possible not to return to the base in order to successfully complete the mission. If you run out of fuel - it doesn't matter, the boat will still be able to return. After the patch, this joy was removed, but they made it possible to replenish the supply of torpedoes and fuel in friendly ports.

And now - a little more about those iron apparatuses in which we have to sink.

Submarines

The first submarine was created in the seventeenth century in England, far ahead of its time. In the middle of the nineteenth, the first concepts of modern scuba diving began to be created, but only during the First World War, submarines successfully entered the fleet and were used by the warring parties for their intended purpose - to fight ships and vessels.

Having lost the entire submarine fleet after the defeat in the war, Germany almost immediately began to recreate it anew, financing a dummy design bureau in Holland, and by 1935 the construction of the first coastal boats had begun.

The basic principles of operation of classic submarines of the Second World War have been preserved to this day. Two hulls, one inside the other: a streamlined, lightweight body that allows water to freely enter, and a sealed, durable, balloon-shaped case. The boat sinks, filling empty tanks with water, tilting down the “fins” - depth rudders and rushing forward. To ascend, it is necessary to set the rudders to the ascent and refill the tanks with air. It is very important to monitor the immersion depth so that the boat does not “fall through” deeper than a couple of hundred meters, where its strong hull will simply be flattened by water pressure.

In the surface position, the boat is driven by diesel engines. In a submerged position, they will not work - they need air. If the boat is not equipped with a snorkel - a special “breathing tube” that it exposes to the surface - it can move under water only on the energy of charged batteries. At the same time, its speed is three times less than surface speed, and the batteries are discharged after only twenty miles.

The boat is usually divided into several compartments separated by bulkheads: engine, torpedo, battery, command, residential. Above the command compartment rises a cabin with antennas and periscopes.

Having found a ship flying an enemy flag, the boat intercepts it and sinks it with torpedoes or shoots it with a cannon (which the Germans often did at the beginning of the war). The main purpose of the German boats was the merchant fleet and partly - large warships: battleships, aircraft carriers, cruisers.

Protected convoys are not so easy to shoot. I had to quietly sneak up, fire torpedoes like a fan and immediately dive. The image of a bearded German captain hanging on the handles of a periscope comes to mind. However, the Germans always preferred to launch torpedoes from the surface rather than from periscope depth. Until about the middle of the war, the Germans used the tactics of "wolf packs" developed by Karl Doenitz. Having found the convoy, the boat gave a signal to the headquarters, and all the nearby “colleagues” gathered together to attack the convoy at once from several directions at night, go to depth the next morning and repeat the attack the next night.

In response, small warships (destroyers, destroyers, trawlers) and boats were engaged in boat hunting. They tracked the boat to shoot with impunity on the surface or bombard with depth charges if it was under water. However, the Allied aviation became the main trouble for the Germans - especially from the middle of the war, when the planes began to be equipped with radar and powerful searchlights. The successes of the submarines declined sharply. At the end of the war, when the ships began to throw depth charges in one gulp in front of them, and the planes had a “cheating” torpedo, suggesting the noise of the propellers of a hastily sinking boat, the life of German submariners became so sour that it was impossible to imagine: no successes, losses are huge.

And all these things (except for a smart torpedo) the developers inserted into the campaign mode. Therefore, if it seems to you that the sunk tonnage is given too easily, do not flatter yourself. The “fat years” will pass quickly.

The developers have recreated in detail the four main series of German submarines in the game.

Series II (II-A, II-D). A small coastal boat created four years before the start of the war. For the simplicity of the device and for the characteristic appearance she was nicknamed "canoe". Displacement 250-300 tons. Armament - three torpedo tubes, five torpedoes and a twenty-millimeter machine gun. Not the most successful model: there is only enough fuel to get from the port in Germany to the UK and back. There are few torpedoes, no guns. Intercepting convoys is out of the question. From this boat you will start the campaign if you want to participate in the war from its very beginning - from 1939. Fortunately, after two good campaigns, you can gain enough prestige to transfer to VII.

Series VII (VII-B, VII-C, VII-C/41, VII-C/42). Let me just say: this is the most massive series of submarines in the world - seven hundred pieces, the record has not been broken so far. "Sevens" formed the basis, most of the German submarine fleet - largely because they ideally combined contradictory qualities. They were inexpensive and easy to manufacture (one and a half hull system), easy to operate, went far and had a good supply of torpedoes. Displacement - from 750 to 1000 (VII-C / 42) tons, five torpedo tubes (four bow and one stern), fifteen or more torpedoes, 88-mm gun. The maximum diving depth is from 150 to 250 meters. The fuel supply allows you to get even to the shores of the United States, if you go quietly. When they say "German submarine" - they mean exactly the series VII.

Series XXI. When fascist Germany was driven into a corner by the allies, the forcing of promising projects of the “wonder weapon”, the “wunderwaffe” began. The V-2, the Me-262 jet aircraft and the XXI submarine are phenomena of the same order. They are also united by the fact that they were created when the Soviet army had already stormed Europe, and they could not change the course of the war. They began to build them just a year before the end of the war and managed to make 119 pieces. But only a few XXI boats went on combat duty. And now, attention specifications: displacement 1600 tons (large fish), speed - 15 knots on the surface and ... 17 knots under water, that is, the boat could overtake convoys under water. She did not need a “snorkel” and air, using a Walther turbine with a closed cycle. Despite its huge size, the boat sank in just half a minute and in twenty minutes could fire three volleys of six torpedoes each. The gun had to be removed from the deck - at such a speed under water, the hull should be as streamlined as possible. And besides, at the end of the war, there was no longer anyone to shoot from it: the ships did not sail alone.

Role system

Every captain, going out into the ocean in a submarine, hopes to become famous in order to take his place among such famous aces as Gunther Prien, Wolfgang Luth or Otto Kretschmer. To do this, the developers have inserted a tonnage counter into the game - when you return to the base, you can always compare your achievements. But the captain does not live by tonnage alone. In campaigns, he earns fame, which is used as a "currency" in the game to buy new submarines, upgraded cabins, weapons, instruments and torpedoes. In addition, in exchange for fame, the captain gets the opportunity to hire the best sailors and officers in the crew. The system is very simple and convenient - the way you swim, the way you are treated. It doesn’t work out with the sinking of ships - you won’t see a new, improved vessel.

True, a funny situation arises here: why, having bought himself a “valuable” submarine, does the captain lose fame? It seems that the headquarters and the German "folk" argue like this: "Yeah, any fool can drown the British in an uber-boat."

Fame in a campaign is calculated by the number of ships sunk (military and civilian), by the number of crew members remaining unharmed, by the integrity of the boat. If you sank a neutral ship (for example, attacked an American before 1941), expect a fine. If you suddenly drowned a German snelbot, then the fine will be huge.

There is one more thing that affects fame: the difficulty level set in the game. It is impossible to earn more than three hundred units (a new boat costs 2500) on the minimum difficulty in one trip. But once you sink a couple of ships at the level of complete realism, and expect thousands of units. I usually use a tolerable 54 percent (everything is realistic, except for the automatic calculation of torpedo attacks, automatic icons on the map and the ability to use appearances) and, in principle, I get my eight hundred units in campaigns.

For your information: the level of realism can be changed before the start of each hike.

The crew in the campaign matures and gains valuable experience. In the literal sense - each member of the crew, up to the last sailor in the campaign, is awarded XP. Arriving at the base, you can distribute medals, promote some well-tried non-commissioned officer in level (in rank) and teach someone a specialty. Sailors and non-commissioned officers can master only one profession, officers - two or three at once. After each campaign, you can teach only one person of one specialty: torpedo operator, radio operator / acoustician, minder, doctor, repairman, shooter or observer. At first, minders, torpedomen and observers come in handy most of all.

The crew, filling the compartment, increases the strip of its "efficiency". If there is no one at the diesels, the boat will not float. A couple of sailors won't make the weather either. To start the motors, you must either fill the compartment to the eyeballs with beginners, or put a couple of minders there. The same with torpedo compartments, with electric motors. Inexperienced sailors keeping watch at the felling fence will not notice the convoy until the boat is under fire: put observers there, or better, a whole officer, preferably with the profession of observer. You can change the crew and one person at a time, dragging them from place to place with the mouse. An officer planted in the right place in time can help out at a difficult moment.

Please note: your actions affect the morale of the crew. They sank the ship - everyone rejoices, the spirit flies up to heaven. We are sitting under depth charges - everything is bad, the sailors are sad and react poorly to commands. But the fighting spirit will not cause you any special problems. Crew fatigue is the real scourge of all captains. In stormy weather, minders will be blown away in an hour - exclamation marks will appear above them in the crew menu, and diesel engines will stop. Click on the symbol of a sailing boat, and tired sailors from all over the boat will fall on the berths of the crew quarters, and in return, fresh ones will go to the post (if there are any, of course). You can click on the section efficiency bar - then the watch will change in only one section. Experienced sailors get tired more slowly, but the sailors themselves will not guess to change, and this is very upsetting.

For your information: it is possible to correct the fatigue parameters in the configuration files. Locate the basic.cfg file and change all values to zero in the section. The sailors will stand idle for five hours before going on strike.

In the game, you can speed up time to a scale of a thousand to one. Imagine what swimming would be like if the engine stopped every three seconds. It's a terrible thing - and the developers decided to “freeze” fatigue if time is accelerated by sixty-four times or more. Therefore, the advice is simple: if you don’t want to mess with the Tamagotchi on long journeys, set the time compression ratio to 64x or higher.

Did you know: by pressing the Del key on the numeric keypad, you can hide all the menus to take a beautiful screenshot.

Boat management

You will be taught how to manage a vessel in a very sensible series of films, after which you will have to pass a simple exam. Movement, navigation, shooting, torpedo attack, attack on a convoy - be sure to complete these training tasks. And not only because knowledge is power, but also because then you will get a good boost to the starting “fame” at the beginning of the campaign. You will not find such subtleties as controlling the trim of the boat in the game - the captains did not do this at all, shifting the work of leveling horizontally and taking water after torpedo salvos to assistants.

The menu consists of a bottom and sidebar. From the side, everything is clear: this is a moving list of “hot” places on the ship: a bridge, a periscope, a wheelhouse, a map, a weapon computer, a diagram of a boat with a crew, a mission task, a radio room, a cannon, an anti-aircraft machine gun, and appearance. Very convenient and intuitive.

For your information: the hotkeys for the side menu are functional: from F2 to F12.

The bottom panel consists of three parts: on the left - officers' faces, in the middle - a list of recent messages, on the right - three controls. Let's take a closer look at direct control.

There are three instruments here, on the left is a telegraph. Orders in the style of "full speed ahead", "stop car" or "slow reverse" are given here. Click on the small green button next to it and the telegraph will turn into a speedometer (a useless thing). In the middle is a compass. Click in the direction and the boat will begin to turn to the desired bearing - of course, provided that it is not standing still. Click on the green button and you will see a turn indicator: with it, you can turn the boat not at a certain angle, but in general.

For your information: only the captain's bridge, the interior of the cabin and the radio cabin with the captain's cabin are modeled in the game. Alas, it is impossible to visit either the engine room or the torpedo room.

Finally, on the right is a depth indicator graduated to 25 meters. It is easy to guess that here you give orders to dive or ascent. It's good to remember two hotkeys right away: S - ascent, P - periscope depth. For the depth rudders to work effectively, the boat needs to be moving. As in the case of turning, the faster the boat moves, the more efficiently it responds to commands.

Did you know that you can drag the arrows with the mouse to set the telegraph arrows more precisely.

In the very right corner are the clock, time compression and pause buttons.

Getting to the bottom of the list of messages from the crew in the middle of the panel is very easy. A small silhouette of a boat next to it means your level of visibility: underwater it is the level of noise, on the surface visibility is affected by the height of the silhouette of the boat, lighting (day or night), speed of movement (treacherous foam trail) and weather (it is difficult to notice the boat among stormy waves).

Let's take a closer look at assistants. A helper is someone who this moment occupies the right position. You give orders to them, you receive reports from them.

Starpom

Responsible for the general condition of the boat. If the bow torpedo tube is damaged and leaking, the first mate will inform you about it. Engines, maneuvers, the level of carbon dioxide in the boat - all this is in his competence. Here is the list of commands.

Engines

Give the command to use the energy of the engines to charge the battery (usually they charge anyway).

Raise or lower the snorkel.

Enable or disable the "silent" mode: the engines are muted to the slowest speed, everyone in the boat starts talking in a whisper, torpedoes are not loaded, no repairs are made. You can't give enemy hydroacoustics food for thought.

Maneuvering

Sharp turn with a dive to the left, right and double turn. It is used to quickly leave the line of fire or drop depth charges. I do not use these commands: it is always better to maneuver manually.

Dropping distraction devices from the stern (if the boat is equipped with them). For two minutes, the metal barrel releases clouds of bubbles, distracting the “asdik” and giving the boat time to leave.

Emergency commands Urgent

dive: the boat rushes into the depths and descends to seventy meters as fast as it can. Anything can happen: watchmen overlooked a small armed trawler - and you have to run to the depths.

Ballast blowing - emergency ascent at maximum speed. If the boat suddenly stumbled upon a mine or hit the bottom, it is urgent to surface, appointing a damage control unit.

Report on the battery charge, diesel fuel level, the amount of compressed air (for ballast purge) and the level of carbon dioxide in the boat.

Navigator

Plotting: You go to the map and plot the boat's course to your liking.

Search patterns: The course of the boat turns into a zigzag or spiral to comb the square.

Report on the depth under the keel, the maximum range of the campaign at a given speed, the distance and time to the last point of the laid course.

Weather report: swell, wind, precipitation.

Transition to the course: the most important command. They rounded the destroyer that flashed on the horizon - they lay down on the course. They caught up and sank the coaster - again lay down on the course. We left the home port - again we need to return to the previous course to the patrol point.

Gunsmith

Ship Identification: If you have disabled automatic ship recognition, then call the gunsmith to the periscope, and he will show you the type of ship in the silhouette album.

Calculation of parameters for a torpedo attack: the officer puts the data into the computer and calculates the angle of deflection of the torpedo, taking into account the length, direction and speed of the target. I will talk more about torpedo attacks below.

Torpedo shot.

Completely useless team. What's the point of poking at an officer and looking for her when you can just press Enter?

Selecting a target to attack: the nearest ship, the nearest merchant ship, a warship - or the most advantageous target according to the gunsmith. It is always better to choose the target yourself, so the team is unlikely to be useful to you.

Show the calculated parameters of the torpedo on the map. A torpedo setup window appears in front of you on the background of the map on a large scale.

Show the placement of torpedoes in the boat. You will see how many “fish” you have left, and you will be able to find out the time it will take to reload the torpedo tube.

hydroacoustic

The speaker tells you what he hears around him. All found contacts appear on the map (unless you have specifically disabled this feature, making life difficult for yourself). Almost always, the acoustician suffers from hearing loss and cannot clearly explain what he hears. Therefore, I advise you to put on the headphones yourself (H) every time and carefully listen to the ocean around you. So you can detect a ship twenty kilometers away - if, of course, you stop the engines and listen to the ocean not from the surface, but from a depth of thirty meters.

radio operator

The radio operator uses radar to detect convoys and ships from afar. True, even if you only “walked” the radar along the horizon once, be prepared for guests: for example, for the appearance of curious aircraft on the horizon. In addition, he reports on receiving radio messages from the headquarters (view - M), can send a report on the campaign and turn on the gramophone.

By default, there is only one melody in the record library. But if you put several of your mp3 files (for example, the same “Tipperary” performed by the Soviet military choir) in the Gramophone folder of the game, you can enjoy music while hiking.

Observer

If you put an officer to the fence of the cabin, then in an empty window on the control panel, the physiognomy of the observer will appear. He is responsible for the guns: conventional and anti-aircraft. Order him to put people behind the cannon and open fire when ready - swimming up to the defenseless merchant, you can just stand and watch how the brave Hans send shell after shell into the milk. Send a sailor behind the anti-aircraft installation, and he will start firing at the planes if they suddenly come into view.

But to trust such a delicate technique artificial intelligence I would not advise. It is always better to sit behind a gun yourself.

On a hike

The team is selected, the boat is packed with everything necessary, the captain has an envelope with a given patrol point. From the northern bays of Germany or from the concrete bunkers of France, a submarine sets out on a campaign. Soldiers, commanders, nurses and the anthem of the military band see her off at the pier.

Returning to the base, calculate the exit time at new campaign So:

Without doing anything, you will spend at least 28 days on the shore.

Add here one day for each percentage of damage to the hull.

Updated weapons or devices are installed on average in 1-3 days.

The change of felling takes three weeks.

Moving to a new boat - two months.

Let's go on patrol

Check if all the sailors are in their places. Turn on low speed (second sector) and, carefully maneuvering, exit the labyrinth of lighthouses, breakwaters and moorings into open waters. It's time to take a pencil and carefully lay a course in a given square. You might think that since the sea is the same everywhere, you can sail anywhere? Not at all. If it is possible to bypass the shelf - pave the way through the deep ocean. Never take a shortcut down the English Channel, always try to bypass Great Britain via the northern seas (you will also admire the icebergs at the same time). The fact is that the English Channel is very shallow, and the British are constantly patrolling it - from the very beginning of the war, dozens of destroyers block the way for arrogant submarine captains. Worse than a destroyer can only be a small and maneuverable trawler that drops depth charges right at your cabin with deadly accuracy. And you yourself understand that you won’t go to the depths in the English Channel: if you lie down on the bottom, this will only be enough to ensure that the bottom of the destroyer does not touch the wheelhouse.

Be sure to find the SH3_MAP.jpg file in the game's documentation folder. This is very detailed map submarine operations area: the northern seas, the Atlantic, the Baltic and the Mediterranean. It marks the boundaries of Allied aviation operations, the routes of all major convoys of the war (including the famous PQ) and areas of large ship traffic. Feel free to watch a little west of Ireland if you're on your way - there are a lot of convoys at the beginning of the war.

Drop by Scapa Flow?

You probably know how, at the very beginning of the war, Captain Günther Prien distinguished himself in Scapa Flow. On the instructions of the headquarters, he made his way to one of the most well-guarded naval bases on a small boat U-47 and sank an aircraft carrier with torpedoes, then managing to escape safely. The base was to the UK what Pearl Harbor was to the US. The noise was incredible - the Germans managed to avenge the shameful sinking of their fleet in Scapa Flow after the defeat in the First World War.

It is not difficult to find Scapa Flow on the map: the Orney Islands are in the north of Great Britain. Why not repeat the feat of Prien and show the nose to the British fleet again? It is difficult to get into the bay: the approaches are covered with anti-submarine barriers and mines, searchlights and coastal guns are stuck along the banks, and destroyers and boats are constantly cruising around the bay and inside.

This is interesting: Günter Prien took advantage of the small narrow opposition on the eastern side of the base. This strait is not in the game! They probably buried it with bulldozers so that the enemy would not get through.

I warn you right away: you may be disappointed. Inside you can find a completely empty base - no aircraft carriers, not even the most overwhelmed cruiser. The same applies to other naval bases. Whether you find anything but trouble there is a matter of luck.

However, if you really want to portray U-47, find the corresponding task in the menu of individual missions. Choose any boat. You can try to overcome the approaches to Scapa Flow on XXI, but I warn you right away: when you try to descend to the periscope depth, a huge boat will crash into the bottom with its nose. So I drowned.

Air Raid

A diesel submarine can travel long distances only on the surface. Put experienced watchmen in the wheelhouse, turn on more time acceleration and from time to time stop only to dive thirty meters and “listen” to the sea around you.

Because speed time can suddenly end with the exclamation of “We are under attack!” - and head-to-head with several destroyers, feel free to save every hundred kilometers.

This is a bug: unfortunately or fortunately, one very harmful error lurked in the save system: if you save and there is a ship nearby, the file may break. Therefore, before you record the game, make sure that the watch does not see anyone around, and the hydroacoustic only shrugs.

If the watch noticed the destroyer or received a report that there is a danger nearby, it is worth diving to the periscope depth and avoiding possible troubles. Attacking a destroyer is a waste of torpedoes and an unnecessary risk. Remember that your goal is tonnage and large warships.

It happens that the watch notices the plane. Allied aviation is a serious problem. You have two options: either put the sailors behind the anti-aircraft machine guns, or dive urgently. Remember, without an officer, the sailors themselves will not start shooting - either sit down at the machine gun personally, or put an officer on the bridge, giving him the command to fire. The experience of the war shows that submarines fight badly with aircraft. Shooting down planes is easy in the game, but such a game is still not worth the candle. You won’t make a name for yourself on downed planes, and if the sailors are injured or killed, you can generally remain in the red. Even if the plane does not sink you with well-aimed bombing, explosions can damage the integrity of the boat's hull. And this is a breakdown that you can’t fix on a hike. A damaged hull can come back to haunt you later, when you have to dive to a dangerous depth under the bombs of destroyers. To put it simply: if the integrity of the hull is not 100%, it can crack at a great depth at the most unexpected moment. Therefore, we dive - immediately dive, as soon as the plane appears in the field of view. And we go further underwater, because if you are found, other planes and ships may soon appear at the “meeting” place.

Weapon for battle

A merchant ship, dry cargo ship, coaster or tanker seen on the horizon is, on the contrary, a joyful event. This is an occasion to show Churchill exactly what he should do with his cigar. The equipment of hostile countries is always marked in red. Neutrals are green, German own ships are blue.

The algorithm is simple: catch up with the ship and shoot from the cannon. Preferably by yourself. Wasting a valuable torpedo on a small boat is too much honor. Throw sailors behind the cannon, click on its image in the sidebar and you can start shooting. Tab - turn on the sight and increase it. If you need to quickly lower or raise the trunk, use the up and down key combination with Shift.

The fire is effective from about two kilometers, but it is better to get close to one kilometer in order to guarantee not to smear. Most weakness for dry cargo ships and tankers - usually under the cabin and pipe. One small boat takes about twenty conventional shells. Armor-piercing should be used only when everything else ends. (In general, they are intended for warships, but attacking even a destroyer with only one gun is suicide.)

If you are spotted from the ship, then the whole district will know that a German submarine has been found at such and such coordinates. But you have nothing to fear: unless you are on the very coast of Great Britain, you have time to shoot the ship and leave.

Try not to get too close to the ship - its captain may try to ram the boat. In history, a ram for any boat is certain death. However, there were cases in the game when after ramming a boat by a destroyer(!) it remained afloat with a damaged wheelhouse, and the destroyer sank.

Did you know: the developers claim that if you find a ship not far from the German airfields and “lead” it, planes will fly to your aid. The same applies to German ships - cruisers, snelboats and raiders.

Torpedo attack

But not always at sea there is good weather, which allows you to uncover the gun. If the wind speed exceeds seven knots, the cannon is overwhelmed by water, and firing becomes impossible. Really it is necessary to release "tonnage" with the world? Or will we still carry out a torpedo attack?

German submariners attacked the ships at night from the surface. Look at the map for the position of your submarine and vessel. For a successful attack, you need to be abeam the ship and ahead of it. If there are five kilometers between you and the ship and high waves, most likely no one will notice you. Fullest forward! Overtake the ship, go to the attack position. If it happens at night, you can not dive, but aim at UZO - binoculars installed on the cabin of a submarine. During the day you will have to dive to the periscope depth: if the ship notices you, it will immediately begin to move in an anti-submarine zigzag, and you will not get into it with all your desire.

The Germans used two main varieties of the G7 torpedo during the war. The first works on compressed air. Dignity: high speed. Disadvantage: a trail of bubbles that unmasks a torpedo (however, in the game these “traces” from the ship are noticed very rarely and only in complete calm).

The second is electrical. Advantage: the ship does not know that it is under attack, until the explosion. Disadvantage: slow pace. I prefer to use compressed air torpedoes. Speed is a very important parameter.

Each torpedo has two types of fuse: contact and magnetic. The first is triggered when a torpedo hits the bottom of the ship. There is one important detail here: if a torpedo hits the side not at a right angle, but along a sliding one, it simply will not explode. That is why it is important to attack ships in such a way that at the time of the torpedo strike the boat is abeam.

The magnetic fuse detonates at the moment the torpedo passes under the bottom of the ship. Such an explosion is much more destructive - it tears out a piece of skin from the ship, and the ship sinks in a matter of seconds. The heavy cargo carrier C3 can stay afloat after two hits from "contact" torpedoes, but it has no chance against one mounted on a magnetic fuse.

But here we have two pitfalls. Firstly, it is very important to set the torpedo to the correct depth - a meter deeper than the ship's draft, and the draft will have to be looked at in the book of silhouettes and then manually set in the computer. In this case, of course, do not forget to change the fuse switch from I to M. If the depth is too deep, the torpedo will not explode. If it is too small, the torpedo will stick into the side, and the contact fuse will work.

Secondly, at the beginning of the war, due to poor quality, torpedoes often did not explode. The developers very carefully approached the matter, and in the game they also very often refuse to detonate. However, in the menu for choosing the complexity of the game, such troubles can be excluded.

This is a bug: it takes a lot of time to reload a torpedo - several minutes. But you can use the game error (which, however, was fixed in the patch). Try to “drag” the loaded torpedo to the spare ones - the device will be ready for battle immediately.

The boat stands still, pointing its bow not directly at the intended trajectory of the ship, but slightly at an angle to it. Periscope or UZO is your scope. Lock the ship into it (L). The optimal distance for shooting is about 700-800 meters. Closer than 300 is impossible - the torpedo will not have time to activate. Further kilometers increase the likelihood of a miss. The color of the small triangle above the ship in the sight indicates the accuracy of the calculation: the more accurately the bow of the boat is pointed at the ship, the more accurate the calculations for the volley. It is advisable to shoot when the triangle turns green, but yellow is also okay.

You don't need to go to a gunsmith or do complicated calculations. Everything counts for you. They took the ship into sight, waited for the yellow color - fire. Press Enter or the big red button. The torpedo went.

But, of course, it's easy if you want to turn on the contact fuse. In the case of magnetic, everything is a little more complicated. Open the ship recognition book. By pressing the buttons “up” and “down” on the cover, find the chapter with civil courts. Open it and scroll to the ship you need. Find the draft data (lower right). Let's say this is a C2 transporter, draft - 7.6 meters. So, you need to turn on the ship's computer, set the torpedo depth to 8.5 or 9 meters and turn the fuse toggle switch to M. The rest is as usual: wait for the green triangle, press the red button.

Note: To send a torpedo at a ship, it is not necessary to lock onto it by pressing L or the black button. It is enough that the ship will be in the crosshairs of the sight. In this case, which part of the vessel will be in sight, the torpedo will go there.

As you can see, there is nothing complicated in torpedo attacks. We stood aside, aimed the sight, pressed the button. Boom! But for the most notorious fans of simulators, the game has the ability to calculate the torpedo attack manually by entering data into the computer. It's not all that difficult, but there are so many subtleties to handheld shooting that it looks like she'll have to devote an entire article in the "Advice from the Masters" section.

Toward the middle of the game, the Germans have torpedoes aimed at the noise of engines and going in a zigzag. It was not from a good life that such “fish” were invented - it became dangerous just to get close to the convoys.

Convoy interception

A lone ship is good, but a whole convoy is better. And not only because it makes it possible to shoot all the torpedoes in just a couple of in-game days. It's just that only in convoys can you find really large ships and tankers. It is a pity that your vessel is the only German submarine in the ocean, otherwise it would be possible to give the Allies a good shake-up.

Get out on one of the busy tracks and start shadowing. You can be notified about the movement of specific convoys from the headquarters. Radar can also detect it, if you order the radio operator to search the horizon in a circle. It is not worth abusing the radar: it attracts a lot of attention, so it is best, once “looking around” around, to move away from the illuminated position.

As soon as the convoy square appears on the map, it is in your hands. The orderly rows of ships around which the destroyers scurry move slowly. You know the direction from the very beginning, so your task now is to catch up with the convoy on a parallel course or to cross it. Hydroacoustic equipment will help you navigate the place. Don't trust acoustics - he is the most useless member of your crew. He does not hear contacts, cannot adequately report what the destroyer is doing overhead. Sit down at the hydrophone personally (do not forget to dive into the water) and find where the noise of the propellers comes from in order to direct the boat there. Check the contact every half hour and check the course. You need to enter the convoy from the “half past two” side, just like on a regular ship. For the attack, it is advisable to wait for the night. You can attack during the day, but, you know, not from the surface.

If there are neutrals in the convoy, make sure that you do not accidentally sink a neutral ship: it can get awkward. Remember that a sunken neutral is a small short “war” with the whole country. During the day, any warship or aircraft of the same country will consider you an enemy.

Choose vessels with the largest displacement. Torpedoes are always in short supply, so think carefully about using magnetic fuses. Shoot from all bow torpedo tubes and immediately go to the depth: you can go to the very center of the convoy. This is convenient - I once avoided the depth charges of an angry destroyer by pushing a boat under the bottom of a damaged tanker.

Think carefully about using a volley - and even a divergence volley. True, I don’t like the “God willing” position, but for a shot from a distance it fits perfectly.

A convoy without destroyer cover is either a game bug (there is one) or a big stroke of luck. Having fired torpedoes, you can go after defenseless ships right on the surface, “fighting to the last shell”. But know that hitting large ships from a cannon is just wasting shells. Finish off those that are damaged by torpedoes, and use the remaining shells on small ships.

under depth charges

There is no need to be afraid of cruisers and battleships: they do not have anti-submarine weapons - they are too clumsy for this. Do not be afraid of aircraft carriers - let them be afraid of you. Apart from aircraft, the main enemy of a submarine is a destroyer (and in shallow water, a trawler as well).

Well, your diving trough is not adapted to fighting on the surface. If you notice a boat from afar, then you can still try to enter into a duel with an unknown outcome. But the destroyer who discovered the boat is already a big disaster. He will grope you with “asdik” signals (aka “sonar”), listen with hydroacoustics and throw depth charges (a moment that no film about submariners can do without). And he has enough bombs in stock - more than fifty pieces.

Generally speaking, it is best to keep the boat from being detected by warships. Don't let them get closer than three kilometers to you, don't make noise in the water if the destroyer still passes close. Do not risk the day and in calm water - dive to the periscope depth and wait out the danger under water. Remember that not only the low silhouette of the boat can be noticed from the ship, but also the foam trail behind its stern.

Know that the enemy may also have radars. Enemy radars with the course of the war will become a very big problem for you. If the usual ones simply spot the floating boat for three and a half kilometers, then the 10-centimeter (1943) “see” the boat for five kilometers and can be installed on aircraft. In 1945, the allies have three-centimeter radars that can detect even a periscope or a raised snorkel.

After a volley at a guarded convoy, immediately dive to the depth and freeze. But if trouble happens, immediately dive at full speed. We'll have to start a game of cat and mouse.

The first principle: it is necessary to represent the smallest possible silhouette for the enemy “asdik”. Try to turn so as to keep the destroyer in front of the boat or astern. "Asdik" - ultrasonic radar - should not be demonized. He is not omnipotent. First, its maximum range is two kilometers. Secondly, he cannot detect boats on the surface. Thirdly, it determines only the direction to the boat, but not its depth.

Finally, he has blind spots - this is the space under the ship and behind the stern. Of course, hydroacoustics can also detect you, but it will be difficult: the ship is on the surface, and the noise of its own propellers completely drowns out the sounds from the submarine, which is moving at the slowest speed at great depths. By the way, the depth is not only meters, but also temperature layers, through the border of which the “asdik” impulses simply do not pass.

Ultrasound propagates in the form of a wide beam along the sides of the ship. If you dive under this beam (the farther you are from the ship, the deeper you have to dive), then the ship will not be able to detect you by echo. That's why ships wind around to catch the boat in the ultrasonic beam.

Turn towards the destroyer as quickly as possible and swim towards it. It is important to be close to him, but not astern - then you will fall directly on the depth charges. At a depth of 50 meters, you need to be closer than 300 meters to the ultrasound source to enter the blind zone. Further - deeper. Do not let him sit on your tail until you turn your nose to him and dive into the depths. In this case, a special chic is not to use the cheating view from above, but to snuggle up to the hydrophone and analyze the direction to the destroyer, the distance and time of the bomb release by sounds.

By the way, the sound of exploding depth charges jams you well from the ship's hydrophones - you can go full ahead at this moment and try to go in the direction of the stern. When the ship turns around, repeat the maneuver of leaving the blind zone again.

Of course, the morale of the team will fall in this case. If an insane driver appears on the captain's bridge, get a pistol.

Depth charges in themselves are not dangerous, although in 1942 bombs with double and triple charges appear. Worst of all, the Hedgehog is a bomb launcher that fires a salvo of 24 bombs two hundred meters ahead of the ship. They fall in a circle and "surround" the boat, which is trying to enter the blind zone. The solution to such a problem is to go to a much greater depth before turning towards the destroyer. Remember one thing: the safe depth for VII boats with a whole hull is one hundred and fifty meters, but you can go down to two hundred. The deeper you go, the easier it is for you to avoid depth charges (more time to maneuver), but if at such a depth something explodes nearby, then write wasted.

In 1944, the Squid appeared in the armament of the ships - a bomb fired a hundred meters in front of the ship. The Squids are fired in such a way as to catch the boat trying to pass under the Hedgehog's salvo.

If the destroyers are not one, but two or three - write wasted. They can calculate your position, depth and speed by comparing the data of the asdiks. And this means that it is necessary not only to continuously go “under the sonar” of one of the ships, but also to constantly change the depth, direction and speed. Take advantage of the moment the bomb explodes and try to get away when the noise drowns out the hydrophones. And know that there is one tricky team tactic that enemy AI captains know how to use. One destroyer stands still and gropes for the boat, while the other, at its quietest speed, approaches its location - and, quite unexpectedly for it, pours out a heap of depth charges.

So it will not be easy when meeting with destroyers. But anyway, good luck hunting.

Tell friends:

Mid 1939. The armies of the Third Reich begin their victorious marches across Europe. It's heading for a big war. Great Britain is preparing for a new battle with Nazi Germany that has risen from the ashes of the Great War.

But Churchill does not yet know that the main danger to his country will not be Wehrmacht soldiers, not Goering's Luftwaffe, and not even the "pocket battleships" of the Kriegsmarine. Unterseeboot, the submarines of Captain Karl Dönitz, will be the force that will almost bring Britain, not ready for battle, to its knees.

On September 3, 1939, the submarine U-30 sinks the peaceful passenger liner Athenia, opening an account for the "exploits" of sea robbers. Ahead are years of victories and defeats, a tense arms and technology race. Before the famous order of Grand Admiral Doenitz to surrender for another six long years.

On CD LKI No. 6/2005: watch a video tour demonstrating the main moments of the game - a torpedo attack, avoiding destroyers, attacking a convoy.

You are the captain of a submarine. Your task is to sink allied ships. For this purpose, you are given:

The boat is one.
Boat crew - one set.
Torpedoes and shells for the gun - one set.
Fuel - full tanks.

And now - a little more about those iron apparatuses in which we have to sink.

Submarines

The basic principles of operation of classic submarines of the Second World War have been preserved to this day. Two hulls, one inside the other: a streamlined, lightweight body that allows water to freely enter, and a sealed, durable, balloon-shaped case. The boat sinks, filling the empty tanks with water, tilting down the "fins" - depth rudders and rushing forward. To ascend, it is necessary to set the rudders to the ascent and refill the tanks with air. It is very important to monitor the immersion depth so that the boat does not “fall through” deeper than a couple of hundred meters, where its strong hull will simply be flattened by water pressure.

In the surface position, the boat is driven by diesel engines. In a submerged position, they will not work - they need air. If the boat is not equipped with a snorkel - a special "breathing tube" that it exposes to the surface - it can move under water only on the energy of charged batteries. At the same time, its speed is three times less than surface speed, and the batteries are discharged after only twenty miles.

The boat is usually divided into several compartments separated by bulkheads: engine, torpedo, battery, command, residential. Above the command compartment rises a cabin with antennas and periscopes.

Protected convoys are not so easy to shoot. I had to quietly sneak up, fire torpedoes like a fan and immediately dive. The image of a bearded German captain hanging on the handles of a periscope comes to mind. However, the Germans always preferred to launch torpedoes from the surface rather than from periscope depth. Until about the middle of the war, the Germans used the "wolf pack" tactics developed by Karl Doenitz. Having discovered the convoy, the boat gave a signal to the headquarters, and all the nearby "colleagues" gathered together to attack the convoy at once from several directions at night, go to depth the next morning and repeat the attack the next night.

In response, small warships (destroyers, destroyers, trawlers) and boats were engaged in boat hunting. They tracked the boat to shoot with impunity on the surface or bombard with depth charges if it was under water. However, the Allied aviation became the main trouble for the Germans - especially from the middle of the war, when the planes began to be equipped with radar and powerful searchlights. The successes of the submarines declined sharply. At the end of the war, when the ships began to throw depth charges in one gulp in front of them, and the planes had a "cheat" torpedo, suggesting the noise of the propellers of a hastily sinking boat, the life of German submariners became so sour that it was impossible to imagine: no successes, losses are huge.

The developers have recreated in detail the four main series of German submarines in the game.

Series II (II-A, II-D). A small coastal boat created four years before the start of the war. For the simplicity of the device and for the characteristic appearance, it was nicknamed "canoe". Displacement 250-300 tons. Armament - three torpedo tubes, five torpedoes and a twenty-millimeter machine gun. Not the most successful model: there is only enough fuel to get from the port in Germany to the UK and back. There are few torpedoes, no guns. Intercepting convoys is out of the question. From this boat you will start the campaign if you want to participate in the war from its very beginning - from 1939. Fortunately, after two good campaigns, you can gain enough prestige to transfer to VII.

Series IX (IX-B, IX-C, IX-C/40, IX-D2). Ocean submarine with great autonomy and a stock of torpedoes. Displacement from 1000 tons and above, six torpedo tubes, twenty-one torpedoes, 105-mm gun. Due to their size, Series IX boats are less maneuverable, easier to detect by radars and asdics, but many players prefer them because of the large supply of torpedoes and the ability to hunt off the coast of America.
Series XXI. When fascist Germany was driven into a corner by the allies, the forcing of promising projects of the "wonder weapon", the "wunderwaffe" began. The V-2, the Me-262 jet aircraft and the XXI submarine are phenomena of the same order. They are also united by the fact that they were created when the Soviet army had already stormed Europe, and they could not change the course of the war. They began to build them just a year before the end of the war and managed to make 119 pieces. But only a few XXI boats went on combat duty. And now - attention, technical characteristics: displacement of 1600 tons (large fish), speed of movement - 15 knots on the surface and ... 17 knots under water, that is, the boat could overtake convoys under water. She did not need a "snorkel" and air, using a Walther turbine with a closed cycle. Despite its huge size, the boat sank in just half a minute and in twenty minutes could fire three volleys of six torpedoes each. The gun had to be removed from the deck - at such a speed under water, the hull should be as streamlined as possible. And besides, at the end of the war, there was no longer anyone to shoot from it: the ships did not sail alone.
Role system

True, a funny situation arises here: why, having bought a "valuable" submarine, does the captain lose fame? It seems that the headquarters and the German "folk" argue like this: "Yeah, any fool can sink the British in an uber-boat."

But Churchill does not yet know that the main danger to his country will not be Wehrmacht soldiers, not Goering's Luftwaffe, and not even the "pocket battleships" of the Kriegsmarine. unterseeboot, the submarines of Captain Karl Doenitz, will be the force that will almost bring Britain, not ready for battle, to its knees.

On September 3, 1939, the submarine U-30 sinks the peaceful passenger liner Athenia, opening an account for the “exploits” of sea robbers. Ahead are years of victories and defeats, a tense arms and technology race. Before the famous order of Grand Admiral Doenitz to surrender for another six long years.

On CD LKI No. 6/2005: watch a video tour demonstrating the main points of the game - torpedo attack, avoiding destroyers, attacking a convoy.

You are the captain of a submarine. Your task is to sink allied ships. For this purpose, you are given:

The boat is one.
Boat crew - one set.
Torpedoes and shells for the gun - one set.
Fuel - full tanks.

Note: in the first version of the game, it was possible not to return to the base in order to successfully complete the mission. If you run out of fuel - it doesn't matter, the boat will still be able to return. After the patch, this joy was removed, but they made it possible to replenish the supply of torpedoes and fuel in friendly ports.

And now - a little more about those iron apparatuses in which we have to sink.

Submarines

The boat is usually divided into several compartments separated by bulkheads: engine, torpedo, battery, command, residential. Above the command compartment rises a cabin with antennas and periscopes.

The developers have recreated in detail the four main series of German submarines in the game.

Series II (II-A, II-D). A small coastal boat created four years before the start of the war. For the simplicity of the device and for the characteristic appearance, it was nicknamed the “canoe”. Displacement 250-300 tons. Armament - three torpedo tubes, five torpedoes and a twenty-millimeter machine gun. Not the most successful model: there is only enough fuel to get from the port in Germany to the UK and back. There are few torpedoes, no guns. Intercepting convoys is out of the question. From this boat you will start the campaign if you want to participate in the war from its very beginning - from 1939. Fortunately, after two good campaigns, you can gain enough prestige to transfer to VII.

Series VII (VII-B, VII-C, VII-C/41, VII-C/42). Let me just say: this is the most massive series of submarines in the world - seven hundred pieces, the record has not been broken so far. "Sevens" formed the basis, most of the German submarine fleet - largely because they ideally combined contradictory qualities. They were inexpensive and easy to manufacture (one and a half hull system), easy to operate, went far and had a good supply of torpedoes. Displacement - from 750 to 1000 (VII-C / 42) tons, five torpedo tubes (four bow and one stern), fifteen or more torpedoes, 88-mm gun. The maximum diving depth is from 150 to 250 meters. The fuel supply allows you to get even to the shores of the United States, if you go quietly. When they say "German submarine" - they mean exactly the series VII.

Series IX (IX-B, IX-C, IX-C/40, IX-D2). Ocean submarine with great autonomy and a stock of torpedoes. Displacement from 1000 tons and above, six torpedo tubes, twenty-one torpedoes, 105-mm gun. Due to their size, Series IX boats are less maneuverable, easier to detect by radars and asdics, but many players prefer them because of the large supply of torpedoes and the ability to hunt off the coast of America.

Series XXI. When fascist Germany was driven into a corner by the allies, the forcing of promising projects of the “wonder weapon”, the “wunderwaffe” began. The V-2, the Me-262 jet aircraft and the XXI submarine are phenomena of the same order. They are also united by the fact that they were created when the Soviet army had already stormed Europe, and they could not change the course of the war. They began to build them just a year before the end of the war and managed to make 119 pieces. But only a few XXI boats went on combat duty. And now - attention, technical characteristics: displacement of 1600 tons (large fish), speed of movement - 15 knots on the surface and ... 17 knots under water, that is, the boat could overtake convoys under water. She did not need a “snorkel” and air, using a Walther turbine with a closed cycle. Despite its huge size, the boat sank in just half a minute and in twenty minutes could fire three volleys of six torpedoes each. The gun had to be removed from the deck - at such a speed under water, the hull should be as streamlined as possible. And besides, at the end of the war, there was no longer anyone to shoot from it: the ships did not sail alone.

Role system

Note: the level of realism can be changed before the start of each campaign.

Note: it is possible to correct the fatigue parameters in the configuration files. Find a file basic.cfg and in the section set all values to zero. The sailors will stand idle for five hours before going on strike.

Did you know: By pressing the Del key on the numeric keypad, you can dismiss all menus to take a beautiful screenshot.

You are stupid, boatswain, and your jokes are stupid. The torpedo passed by!

Salty sea humor

Silent Hunter 3 gives the player the opportunity to go through the entire war as a submarine captain. From the autumn of 1939 to the spring of 1941 - sunken tonnage, new boats, weapons and torpedoes, convoys, awards - and new dangers every year. But company mode is many days of play. Not everyone has the patience to spend long hours in the vastness of the Atlantic, in a storm, wearing hydroacoustic headphones. For those who want fast and vivid battles, the developers have provided several single tasks based on real historical events. Bismarck is one of the most spectacular and intense missions.

Disposition

Thunderstorm. Lightning flashes, thunder rumbles. The blue sea is clouded. Sailors feed Ichthyander.

The crews of two British battleships (King George V, Nelson) and two destroyers watch in amazement as the lone German battleship Bismarck rushes towards them. His captain seems to be drunk or full of beasties - but he is quite calmly starting a naval battle. The guns of the British turn in surprise towards the Germans. Bismarck has less than four minutes left to live. As long as he's miles from the enemy, he has the advantage of being harder to hit with a narrow silhouette, while keeping his battleships in full view. But, getting closer, he will reduce his advantage to nothing. And the ability to use only half the firepower (main caliber guns on the nose) is a big drawback.

Quite by chance, between the opponents (closer to the British) is a type VIIC submarine. It seems that the Untersibut team was asleep and only opened their eyes - the boat is in a completely awkward position, it is turned towards the battleships with its rear left flipper. The task from Berlin is to destroy at least one battleship. What will the captain of the submarine do?

Walkthrough

For the task, you can choose any submarine from those presented in the game. But by default, you are offered the VIIC version of 1941. A team of middle peasants - not beginners, but not yet veterans. Conventional steam-gas torpedoes in four bow and one stern apparatus.

The distance to the nearest battleship, the Nelson, is about a kilometer. But the position of the submarine does not hold water. Therefore, if you want to clearly and quickly slam your deadly cargo into the side of the Nelson, you must immediately start moving and turn counterclockwise.

If the boat moves forward, its course will intersect with the course of the British battleship. Therefore, we give the order - the most complete back, a turn to the left by ninety degrees. And at this time we ourselves raise the periscope, turn it to the left and catch the Nelson in the sight.

Theoretically, nothing prevents the boat from releasing all the torpedoes "on the spot." You can count on the fact that every second one will hit the battleship, but only every fourth will explode, since they will collide with the battleship at a very small angle, literally casually - and contact fuses do not like such treatment and can go on strike.

You can assign torpedoes a greater depth. According to the reference book, the draft of the Nelson is 10.7 meters, which means that the torpedoes need to be set to a depth of 11 meters or a little more. (Don't forget that each torpedo is configured individually.)

"King George V" is behind the "Nelson" and a little to the left. Its draft is 8.5 meters. The storm makes its own adjustments, the draft changes with each wave, but the heavy ships, fortunately, fluctuate little. But you will not be able to attack the second battleship immediately, but only after a few hours, when the team will reload all the torpedo tubes. This is a long matter.

The explosion of a torpedo from a magnetic fuse is much more effective than from a contact fuse, because the torpedo passes under an unprotected bottom and, at the time of the explosion, pulls out a fair piece from it. But experiments have shown that four “fish” on board is also a very reliable option. Three is not enough, but four is enough. And don't forget that 1941 magnetic fuses are very unreliable. They may not work at all or blow up a torpedo even on the approach to the ship, without causing the slightest damage to it (wet sailors do not count).

Therefore, the most effective course of action is as follows: turning around and entering the line of attack, the boat stops. It remains only to wait a few seconds until the "Nelson" is in front of the bow of the boat. Five hundred meters is almost point-blank shooting. By default, the ship is "captured" by the sight in the area of the captain's bridge, right behind the main battery guns. And this right choice- there are cellars with shells. But for a change, you can try to launch all four torpedoes at different places on the ship.

Don't be afraid of the destroyers. The periscope can stick out over the sea like a dried mushroom - while there is a shootout with the Bismarck, no one will pay attention to you. However, it is still not necessary to emerge to improve the review.

Four torpedoes fired, four explosions from contact detonators. The battleship "Nelson" is sinking, which means that you have completed the mission. It remains only to dive in and quietly move away from the battlefield, in order to surface later in safety. Or wait for the torpedoes to reload and attack the second battleship.

A few facts about the battleship Bismarck, the most powerful warship of its time.

Length from stem to tank: 248 m

Reservation of towers and sides: up to 33 cm.

Standard displacement: 42,000 tons.

Weight in fully equipped condition: 50,000 tons.

Main caliber: eight 380 mm guns.

Speed: up to 29 knots.

Team: 2000 people.

Protect the Bismarck?

But what about the German battleship? Is he doomed? It seems so. Four minutes - it is during this time that the guns of battleships and destroyers will let the reckless captain sink to the bottom.

Let's see what we can do in those four minutes. A volley of four torpedoes - the time from the team to the explosion - a minute. Getting to the correct position from the traverse - one and a half minutes. And all this time, our victim - "Nelson" - does not wait for anyone, but cheerfully fires at the "Bismarck" along with the second British battleship.

And you have only five torpedoes, and only four pieces will go to one ship. And then if you aim very well. Magnetic fuses will not save, but on the contrary, they will jeopardize the success of the attack with their windy disposition.

Divide the salvo equally between the Nelson and the King? There will be nothing for ships from two torpedoes, but torpedoes have big chance miss in a bad position. And there is no time to get good. You can quickly destroy the Nelson. But the Bismarck during this time will receive such a dose of shells that the King will easily finish it off, and the submarine will not be able to do anything.

I tried different variants. The VIIC version of 1945 did not help with the most experienced crew and "smart" torpedoes. The number of hits in the "milk" has decreased - that's all. Even superboat XXI with six bow torpedo tubes did not turn the tide in favor of the German battleship and her crazy captain. Huge speed under water, maneuverability, the most experienced team - everything is useless! There is not enough time to enter the combat position. Not enough firepower.

Out of grief, I even tried to ram the battleships. The boat will not suffer much from this. Of course, a bent combat periscope is inconvenient to use, but there is also a survey one. Unfortunately, battleships also do not suffer from collisions in any way - you scratch the cabin on the bottom of the ship, and it calmly sails on.

Yes, it is relatively easy to complete a combat mission, but what joy does it bring if you have to powerlessly watch how the British sink the Bismarck?

Torpedoes in a fan

Only a cheat instant reload of torpedoes can help the boat quickly deal with both battleships and save the Bismarck. We take a charged torpedo in the weapon window with the mouse and try to drag it to the reserve. And so - with each. And again - "fire, merciless fire!" Having fired the first five or six torpedoes at the Nelson (we don’t move the boat from a place - there is no time), we instantly reload, retarget at the King George V and fire again in one gulp. If you do this within a minute, then the German battleship will be saved and will quickly deal with the destroyers left alone.

The moral of the Bismarck mission is that submarines are not omnipotent. Yes, the merchant fleet is afraid of them, and sunk ships result in huge losses. But the fate of battle fleets is decided on the surface, in the battles of huge ships. And even if the captain of the boat can sink a battleship or an aircraft carrier - turn the tide sea battle in the right direction, she can not. The episodes of the war in which the submarine succeeded in attacking a large warship are single: the battleship Royal Oak, the aircraft carriers Korages and Ark Royal - all.

The second conclusion is that one in the field is not a warrior. Be the Bismarck at least three times the best in the world, he is nothing against a whole fleet.

The Bismarck was supposed to enter the Atlantic through the Danish Strait along with the cruiser Prinz Eugen and there join the cruiser Gneisenau. But the British, with bold attacks, put the Gneisenau out of action for a long time right in the harbor. And the "Prinz Eugen" was damaged by a magnetic mine, which delayed the ships' departure for a long time.

On May 18, 1941, the two ships moved west on two different routes. Admiral John Tovey immediately began hunting for the Bismarck. The battleship Prince's Wales and the cruiser Hood left Scapa Flow, escorted by six destroyers. Planes took to the skies and German ships were found in the fjords of Norway.

The Danish Strait was patrolled by the cruisers Norfolk and Suffolk. Soon they sat "on the tail" of the German battleship, while the main forces of the British went to intercept. In a short-lived battle, "Hood" quickly died and "Prince of Wales" was badly damaged.

But the Bismarck's fuel tanks were damaged, and the ship's captain decided to go to the French port of Saint-Nazaire. To miss the most powerful battleship in the world - the British could not afford such a luxury. Ships from Gibraltar rushed to intercept. The British battleships, one after another, threw escorts and went to intercept.

The English have always been famous for their ability to hunt foxes. Bismarck was found and lost again - on May 26, torpedo bombers found it. Aircraft from the aircraft carrier Ark Royal torpedoed the propellers and jammed the rudders. The battleship that lost control was doomed. The captain radioed to Berlin: “We will fight to the last shell. Long live the Fuhrer."

Five destroyers, the battleships King George V and Rodney, and the cruisers Norfolk and Dorsentshire finished off the Bismarck. The wrecked ship went to the bottom with a waving flag.

The Kriegsmarine submarines were indeed ordered to defend the Bismarck. But not a single one managed to help the ship in any way, not to mention visiting the site of the final battle.

But Churchill does not yet know that the main danger to his country will not be Wehrmacht soldiers, not Goering's Luftwaffe, and not even the "pocket battleships" of the Kriegsmarine. unterseeboot, the submarines of Captain Karl Doenitz, will be the force that will almost bring Britain, not ready for battle, to its knees.

On CD LKI No. 6/2005: watch a video tour showing the main points of the game - torpedo attack, avoiding destroyers, attacking a convoy.

You are the captain of a submarine. Your task is to sink allied ships. For this purpose, you are given:

The boat is one.

Boat crew - one set.

Torpedoes and shells for the cannon - one set.

Fuel - full tanks.

Note: in the first version of the game, it was possible not to return to the base in order to successfully complete the mission. If you run out of fuel, it doesn't matter, the boat will still be able to return. After the patch, this joy was removed, but they made it possible to replenish the supply of torpedoes and fuel in friendly ports.

And now - a little more about those iron apparatuses in which we have to sink.

Submarines

The first submarine was created in the seventeenth century in England, far ahead of its time. In the middle of the nineteenth, the first concepts of modern diving began to be created, but only during the First World War, submarines successfully entered the fleet and were used by the belligerents for their intended purpose - to fight ships and vessels.

The basic principles of operation of classic submarines of the Second World War have been preserved to this day. Two hulls, one inside the other: a streamlined, lightweight body that allows water to freely enter, and a sealed, durable, balloon-shaped case. The boat sinks, filling the empty tanks with water, tilting down the "fins" - the depth rudders and rushing forward. To ascend, it is necessary to set the rudders to the ascent and refill the tanks with air. It is very important to monitor the immersion depth so that the boat does not “fall through” deeper than a couple of hundred meters, where its strong hull will simply be flattened by water pressure.

The boat is usually divided into several compartments separated by bulkheads: engine, torpedo, battery, command, residential. Above the command compartment rises a cabin with antennas and periscopes.

Having found a ship flying an enemy flag, the boat intercepts it and sinks it with torpedoes or shoots it with a cannon (which the Germans often did at the beginning of the war). The main goal of the German boats was the merchant fleet and partly large warships: battleships, aircraft carriers, cruisers.

Protected convoys are not so easy to shoot. I had to quietly sneak up, fire torpedoes like a fan and immediately dive. The image of a bearded German captain hanging on the handles of a periscope comes to mind. However, the Germans always preferred to launch torpedoes from the surface rather than from periscope depth. Until about the middle of the war, the Germans used the tactics of "wolf packs" developed by Karl Doenitz. Having found the convoy, the boat gave a signal to the headquarters, and all the “colleagues” nearby gathered together to attack the convoy at once from several directions at night, go to depth the next morning and repeat the attack the next night.

In response, small warships (destroyers, destroyers, trawlers) and boats were engaged in boat hunting. They tracked the boat to shoot with impunity on the surface or bombard with depth charges if it was under water. However, the Allied aviation became the main trouble for the Germans - especially from the middle of the war, when the aircraft began to be equipped with a radar and powerful searchlights. The successes of the submarines declined sharply. At the end of the war, when the ships began to throw depth charges in one gulp in front of them, and the planes had a "cheat" torpedo, suggesting the noise of the propellers of a hastily sinking boat, the life of German submariners became so sour that it was impossible to imagine: no success, losses are huge.

The developers have recreated in detail the four main series of German submarines in the game.

Series II (II-A, II-D). A small coastal boat created four years before the start of the war. For the simplicity of the device and for the characteristic appearance, it was nicknamed the "canoe". Displacement 250-300 tons. Armament - three torpedo tubes, five torpedoes and a twenty-millimeter machine gun. Not the most successful model: there is only enough fuel to get from the port in Germany to the UK and back. There are few torpedoes, no guns. Intercepting convoys is out of the question. From this boat you will start the campaign if you want to participate in the war from its very beginning - from 1939. Fortunately, after two good campaigns, you can gain enough prestige to transfer to VII.

Series VII (VII-B, VII-C, VII-C/41, VII-C/42). Let me just say: this is the most massive series of submarines in the world - seven hundred pieces, the record has not been broken so far. "Sevens" formed the basis, most of the German submarine fleet - largely because they ideally combined contradictory qualities. They were inexpensive and easy to manufacture (one and a half hull system), easy to operate, went far and had a good supply of torpedoes. Displacement - from 750 to 1000 (VII-C / 42) tons, five torpedo tubes (four bow and one stern), fifteen or more torpedoes, 88-mm gun. The maximum diving depth is from 150 to 250 meters. The fuel supply allows you to get even to the shores of the United States, if you go quietly. When they say "German submarine" - they mean exactly the series VII.

Series IX (IX-B, IX-C, IX-C/40, IX-D2). Ocean submarine with great autonomy and a stock of torpedoes. Displacement from 1000 tons and above, six torpedo tubes, twenty-one torpedoes, 105-mm gun. Due to their size, Series IX boats are less maneuverable, easier to detect by radars and asdics, but many players prefer them because of the large supply of torpedoes and the ability to hunt off the coast of America.

Series XXI. When fascist Germany was driven into a corner by the allies, the forcing of promising projects of the “wonder weapon”, the “wunderwaffe” began. The V-2, the Me-262 jet aircraft, and the XXI submarine are phenomena of the same order. They are also united by the fact that they were created when the Soviet army had already stormed Europe, and they could not change the course of the war. They began to build them just a year before the end of the war and managed to make 119 pieces. But only a few XXI boats went on combat duty. And now - attention, technical characteristics: a displacement of 1600 tons (large fish), a speed of movement - 15 knots on the surface and ... 17 knots under water, that is, the boat could overtake convoys under water. She did not need a "snorkel" and air, using a Walther turbine with a closed cycle. Despite its huge size, the boat sank in just half a minute and in twenty minutes could fire three volleys of six torpedoes each. The gun had to be removed from the deck - at such a speed under water, the hull should be as streamlined as possible. And besides, at the end of the war, there was no longer anyone to shoot from it: the ships did not sail alone.

Role system

Every captain, going out into the ocean in a submarine, hopes to become famous in order to take his place among such famous aces as Gunther Prien, Wolfgang Luth or Otto Kretschmer. To do this, the developers have inserted a sunken tonnage counter into the game - when you return to the base, you can always compare your achievements. But the captain does not live by tonnage alone. In campaigns, he earns fame, which is used as a "currency" in the game to buy new submarines, upgraded cabins, weapons, instruments and torpedoes. In addition, in exchange for fame, the captain gets the opportunity to hire the best sailors and officers in the crew. The system is very simple and convenient - the way you swim, the way you are treated. It doesn’t work out with the sinking of ships - you won’t see a new, improved vessel.

True, a funny situation arises here: why, having bought a “valuable” submarine, does the captain lose fame? It seems that the headquarters and the German "folk" argue like this: "Yeah, any fool can sink the British in an uber boat."

Note: the level of realism can be changed before the start of each trip.

The crew in the campaign matures and gains valuable experience. In a literal sense, each member of the crew, up to the last sailor in the campaign, is awarded XP. Arriving at the base, you can distribute medals, promote some well-tried non-commissioned officer in level (in rank) and teach someone a specialty. Sailors and non-commissioned officers can master only one profession, officers - two or three at once. After each campaign, you can teach only one person of one specialty: torpedo operator, radio operator / acoustician, minder, doctor, repairman, shooter or observer. At first, minders, torpedomen and observers come in handy most of all.

The crew, filling the compartment, increases the strip of its "efficiency". If there is no one at the diesels, the boat will not sail. A couple of sailors won't make the weather either. To start the motors, you must either fill the compartment to the eyeballs with beginners, or put a couple of minders there. The same with torpedo compartments, with electric motors. Inexperienced sailors keeping watch at the felling fence will not notice the convoy until the boat is under fire: put observers there, or better, a whole officer, preferably with the profession of observer. You can change the crew and one person at a time, dragging them from place to place with the mouse. An officer planted in the right place in time can help out at a difficult moment.

Please note: your actions affect the morale of the crew. They sank the ship - everyone rejoices, the spirit flies up to heaven. We are sitting under depth charges - everything is bad, the sailors are sad and react poorly to commands. But the fighting spirit will not cause you any special problems. Crew fatigue is the real scourge of all captains. In stormy weather, minders will be blown away in an hour - exclamation marks will appear above them in the crew menu, and diesel engines will stop. Click on the symbol of a sailing boat, and tired sailors from all over the boat will fall on the berths of the crew quarters, and in return, fresh ones will go to the post (if there are any, of course). You can click on the section efficiency bar - then the watch will change only in one section. Experienced sailors get tired more slowly, but the sailors themselves will not guess to change, and this is very upsetting.

In the game, you can speed up time to a scale of a thousand to one. Imagine what swimming would be like if the engine stopped every three seconds. It's a terrible thing - and the developers decided to "freeze" fatigue if time is accelerated by sixty-four times or more. Therefore, the advice is simple: if you don’t want to mess with the Tamagotchi in long-distance transitions, set the time compression ratio to 64x or higher.

Did you know: By pressing the Del key on the numeric keypad, you can dismiss all menus to take a beautiful screenshot.

Boat management

Note: hotkeys for the side menu - functional: from F2 before F12.

The bottom panel consists of three parts: on the left - officers' faces, in the middle - a list of recent messages, on the right - three controls. Let's take a closer look at direct control.

There are three devices here, on the left is a telegraph. Orders in the style of "full speed ahead", "stop car" or "slow reverse" are given here. Click on the small green button next to it and the telegraph will turn into a speedometer (a useless thing). In the middle is a compass. Click in the direction and the boat will begin to turn to the desired bearing - of course, provided that it is not standing still. Click on the green button and you will see a turn indicator: with it, you can turn the boat not at a certain angle, but in general.

Note: in the game, only the captain's bridge, the interior of the cabin and the radio cabin with the captain's cabin are modeled. Alas, it is impossible to visit either the engine room or the torpedo room.

Finally, on the right is a depth indicator graduated to 25 meters. It is easy to guess that here you give orders to dive or ascent. It's good to remember two hotkeys right away: S- ascent, P- periscope depth. For the depth rudders to work effectively, the boat needs to be moving. As in the case of turning, the faster the boat moves, the more efficiently it responds to commands.

Did you know: to more accurately set the arrows of the telegraph, you can drag them with the mouse.

In the very right corner are the clock, time compression and pause buttons.

Let's take a closer look at assistants. An assistant is someone who currently holds the desired post. You give orders to them, you receive reports from them.

Starpom

Engines

Give the command to use the energy of the engines to charge the battery (usually they charge anyway).
Raise or lower the snorkel.
Enable or disable the "silent" mode: the engines are muted to the slowest speed, everyone in the boat starts talking in a whisper, torpedoes are not loaded, no repairs are made. You can't give enemy hydroacoustics food for thought.

Maneuvering

Sharp turn with a dive to the left, right and double turn. It is used to quickly leave the line of fire or drop depth charges. I do not use these commands: it is always better to maneuver manually.
Dropping distraction devices from the stern (if the boat is equipped with them). For two minutes, the metal barrel releases clouds of bubbles, distracting the "asdik" and giving the boat time to leave.

Emergency commands

Urgent Dive: The boat rushes into the depths and descends to seventy meters as fast as it can. Anything can happen: watchmen overlooked a small armed trawler - and you have to run to the depths.
Ballast blowing - emergency ascent at maximum speed. If the boat suddenly stumbled upon a mine or hit the bottom, it is urgent to surface, appointing a damage control unit.
Report on the battery charge, diesel fuel level, the amount of compressed air (for ballast purge) and the level of carbon dioxide in the boat.

Navigator

Plotting: You go to the map and plot the boat's course to your liking.
Search patterns: The course of the boat turns into a zigzag or spiral to comb the square.
Report on the depth under the keel, the maximum range of the campaign at a given speed, the distance and time to the last point of the laid course.
Weather report: swell, wind, precipitation.
Transition to the course: the most important team. They rounded the destroyer that flashed on the horizon - they lay down on the course. They caught up and sank the coaster - again lay down on the course. We left the home port - again we need to return to the previous course to the patrol point.

Gunsmith

Ship Identification: If you have disabled automatic ship recognition, then call the gunsmith to the periscope, and he will show you the type of ship in the silhouette album.
Calculation of parameters for a torpedo attack: the officer puts the data into the computer and calculates the angle of deflection of the torpedo, taking into account the length, direction and speed of the target. I will talk more about torpedo attacks below.
Torpedo shot. Completely useless team. What's the point of poking at an officer and looking for her when you can just press Enter?
Choose a target to attack: the nearest ship, the nearest merchant ship, a warship - or the most profitable target according to the gunsmith. It is always better to choose the target yourself, so the team is unlikely to be useful to you.
Show the calculated parameters of the torpedo on the map. A torpedo setup window appears in front of you on the background of the map on a large scale.
Show the placement of torpedoes in the boat. You will see how many "fish" you have left, and you will be able to find out the time it will take to reload the torpedo tube.

hydroacoustic

The speaker tells you what he hears around him. All found contacts appear on the map (unless you have specifically disabled this feature, making life difficult for yourself). Almost always, the acoustician suffers from hearing loss and cannot clearly explain what he hears. Therefore, I advise you to put on your own headphones every time ( H) and carefully listen to the ocean around you. So you can detect a ship twenty kilometers away - if, of course, you stop the engines and listen to the ocean not from the surface, but from a depth of thirty meters.

radio operator

The radio operator uses radar to detect convoys and ships from afar. True, even if you only “walked” the radar along the horizon once, be prepared for guests: for example, for the appearance of curious planes on the horizon. In addition, he reports on receiving radio messages from the headquarters (view - M), can send a trip report and turn on the gramophone.

By default, there is only one melody in the record library. But if you put several of your mp3 files in the Gramophone folder of the game (for example, the same "Tipperary" performed by the Soviet military choir), you can enjoy music while hiking.

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Observer

But I would not advise trusting such a subtle technique to artificial intelligence. It is always better to sit behind a gun yourself.

On a hike

Returning to the base, calculate the time to start a new trip as follows:

Without doing anything, you will spend at least 28 days on the shore.
Add here one day for each percentage of damage to the hull.
Updated weapons or devices are installed on average in 1-3 days.
The change of felling takes three weeks.
Moving to a new boat - two months.

Let's go on patrol

Be sure to find the file in the game documentation folder SH3_MAP.jpg. This is a very detailed map of the submarine operations area: the northern seas, the Atlantic, the Baltic and the Mediterranean. It marks the boundaries of Allied aviation operations, the routes of all major convoys of the war (including the famous PQ) and areas of large ship traffic. Feel free to watch a little west of Ireland if you are on your way - convoys at the beginning of the war there very a lot of.

Drop by Scapa Flow?

It is interesting: Günther Prien took advantage of the small narrow opposition on the eastern side of the base. This strait is not in the game! They probably buried it with bulldozers so that the enemy would not get through.

Air Raid

Because speed time can suddenly end with the exclamation of "We are under attack!" - and head-to-head with several destroyers, feel free to save every hundred kilometers.

This is a bug: Unfortunately or fortunately, one very harmful error lurked in the save system: if you save and there is a ship nearby, the file may break. Therefore, before you record the game, make sure that the watch does not see anyone around, and the hydroacoustic only shrugs.

It happens that the watch notices the plane. Allied aviation is a serious problem. You have two options: either put the sailors behind the anti-aircraft machine guns, or dive urgently. Remember, without an officer, the sailors themselves will not start shooting - either sit down at the machine gun personally, or put an officer on the bridge, giving him the command to shoot. The experience of the war shows that submarines fight badly with aircraft. Shooting down planes is easy in the game, but such a game is still not worth the candle. You won’t make a name for yourself on downed planes, and if the sailors are injured or killed, you can generally remain in the red. Even if the plane does not sink you with well-aimed bombing, explosions can damage the integrity of the boat's hull. And this is a breakdown that you can’t fix on a hike. A damaged hull can come back to haunt you later, when you have to dive to a dangerous depth under the bombs of destroyers. Simply put: if the integrity of the hull is not 100%, it can crack at a great depth at the most unexpected moment. Therefore, we dive - immediately dive, as soon as the plane appears in the field of view. And we go further underwater, because if you are found, other planes and ships may soon appear at the “meeting” place.

Weapon for battle

The algorithm is simple: catch up with the ship and shoot from the cannon. Preferably by yourself. Wasting a valuable torpedo on a small boat is too much honor. Throw sailors behind the cannon, click on its image in the sidebar and you can start shooting. Tab - turn on the sight and increase it. If you need to quickly lower or raise the barrel, use the up and down key combination with Shift.

The fire is effective from about two kilometers, but it is better to get close to one kilometer in order to guarantee not to smear. The weakest point for bulk carriers and tankers is usually under the cabin and pipe. One small boat takes about twenty conventional shells. Armor-piercing should be used only when everything else ends. (In general, they are intended for warships, but attacking even a destroyer with only one gun is suicide.)

Did you know: the developers claim that if you find a ship not far from German airfields and will “lead” it, planes will fly to your aid. The same applies to German ships - cruisers, snelboats and raiders.

Torpedo attack

But not always at sea there is good weather, which allows you to uncover the gun. If the wind speed exceeds seven knots, the cannon is overwhelmed by water, and firing becomes impossible. Is it really necessary to release the "tonnage" in peace? Or will we still carry out a torpedo attack?

The Germans used two main varieties of the G7 torpedo during the war. The first works on compressed air. Advantage: high speed. Disadvantage: a trail of bubbles that unmasks a torpedo (however, in the game, these "traces" from the ship are noticed very rarely and only in complete calm).

Each torpedo has two types of fuse: contact and magnetic. The first is triggered when a torpedo hits the bottom of the ship. There is one important detail here: if a torpedo hits the side not at a right angle, but along a sliding one, it will simply will not explode. That is why it is important to attack ships in such a way that at the time of the torpedo strike the boat is abeam.

The magnetic fuse detonates at the moment the torpedo passes under the bottom of the ship. Such an explosion is much more destructive - it tears out a piece of skin from the ship, and the ship sinks in a matter of seconds. The heavy bulk carrier C3 can stay afloat after two contact torpedo hits, but it has no chance against one mounted on a magnetic fuse.

But here we have two pitfalls. Firstly, it is very important to set the torpedo to the correct depth - a meter deeper than the ship's draft, and the draft will have to be looked at in the book of silhouettes and then manually set in the computer. In this case, of course, do not forget to change the fuse switch from I on the M. If the depth is too great, the torpedo will not explode. If it is too small, the torpedo will stick into the side, and the contact fuse will work.

This is a bug: reloading a torpedo takes a long time - several minutes. But you can use the game error (which, however, was fixed in the patch). Try to "drag" the loaded torpedo to the spare ones - the device will be ready for battle immediately.

The boat stands still, pointing its bow not directly at the intended trajectory of the ship, but slightly at an angle to it. Periscope or UZO is your scope. Grab a ship in it L). The optimal distance for shooting is about 700-800 meters. Closer than 300 is impossible - the torpedo will not have time to activate. Further kilometers increase the likelihood of a miss. The color of the small triangle above the ship in the sight indicates the accuracy of the calculation: the more accurately the bow of the boat is pointed at the ship, the more accurate the calculations for the volley. It is advisable to shoot when the triangle turns green, but yellow is also okay.

But, of course, it's easy if you want to turn on the contact fuse. In the case of magnetic, everything is a little more complicated. Open the ship recognition book. By pressing the buttons "up" and "down" on the cover, find the chapter with civil courts. Open it and scroll to the ship you need. Find the draft data (lower right). Let's say this is a C2 transporter, draft - 7.6 meters. So, you need to turn on the ship's computer, set the depth of the torpedo to 8.5 or 9 meters and turn the fuse toggle switch to M. The rest is as usual: wait for the green triangle, press the red button.

Note: to direct a torpedo at a ship, it is not necessary to aim at it by pressing L or black button. It is enough that the ship will be in the crosshairs of the sight. In this case, which part of the vessel will be in sight, the torpedo will go there.

As you can see, there is nothing complicated in torpedo attacks. We stood aside, aimed the sight, pressed the button. Boom! But for the most notorious fans of simulators, the game has the ability to calculate the torpedo attack manually by entering data into the computer. It's not that difficult, but there are so many subtle moments in hand-held shooting that it looks like