Sumbarine counterplay.

Figment · December 1, 2022

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

It is significantly different. I play gunboat destroyers and I generally don't have any issues hunting down and killing torpedo boat destroyers. Why? Because a) they know they cannot win a gunfight against me, b) they cannot make themselves invulnerable to either my guns or torpedoes, c) they generally don't have the concealment necessary to stay in the cap while being chased. So I basically wait a bit for the support to catch in and then go in and contest.

Let's first establish that you're bad at sub hunting and I'm not. So please stop trying to be a wise guy. I'm the authority, you're not.

And I have to stress this, I AM good at this, you're not by your own admission. So let's stop with your arrogantly telling me I'm not killing dozens of subs every week without getting myself killed in the process. YOU SAY YOU ARE NOT ABLE TO DO THIS. STOP WHINING. START LISTENING AND STOP PRETENDING YOU KNOW BETTER BECAUSE YOUR EGO AND STUBBORNESS TO NOT ADMIT THIS TO YOURSELF IS ONLY HURTING YOUR CAPACITY TO DEAL WITH SUBS.

Anyway.

No, it really isn't... The timing is a little different and your tools are (you first force a sub down with HE, then dump ASW on them). But the principle is the same: You don't storm in to cap first, you wait for them to come forward by providing them with a sense of safety by not showing your face, yet. Your goal is to remove the threat to you before you cap.

Hence you must create an ambush situation where the spotting distance advantage is minimal. With most DDs that means getting the enemy DD within about 5.8km of where you're hiding out of sight. Often you can do that with islands. Maybe you overcome that distance by boldly and openly storming the enemy DD over the entire spotting difference from open water to detect it (where you can be targeted but that ship can't, basically gambling you can yolo to overwhelm the enemy DD, but that's not the smartest way to go about it. And if you do that against subs, no wonder you're failing. You clearly are overconfident in a gunboat vs DD situation as you describe just waiting for some support to rush in and win the attrition number game with superior firepower, while taking damage.

That is... kinda foolish and a waste of HP IMO, but it works for single gunboat vs stealth torp DD fights at times. You don't mention an approach route that conceals you to the very last moment. You don't mention ambush traps where you give the enemy the idea that there's nobody blocking its advance. Either by staying in hiding, or by giving them the idea that you're preoccupied elsewhere by deliberately showing up somewhere else supposedly not caring about them. You give them the idea that it's save to move up in order to engage either you or someone else. A sub obviously needs to move up further because of needing torp angles, where the DD might go for low islands to fire over.

That is what you need to do with a sub. Make it come closer to you, rather than come to it. Every inch it gets closer to you is distance you don't need to cross towards it in the open to detect it.

So with a sub, what you want is to let it come near you with its surface or periscope depth spotting range. Only when you're certain where it is more or less (because it targets someone for instance or tried to target you before you "ran" behind an island) is when you start planning an approach. You don't do so immediately. Have some bloody patience for crying out loud. THEN you rush it guns blazing. Of course, before you do you do check for other threats in the area. If there's too many, lure it closer still.

And stop whining that it can dive to evade your torps (nobody should care about torps vs subs, only subs since they'll dive and remove their own situational awareness and you disrupt their aim and actions). YOU WANT IT TO DIVE, that's the only reason I send torps its way, to give it another reason to not pop up. And keep diving. Because then it will stop spotting you and transmitting your position to others. It'll get much harder to ping you and get torps on you because when it's diving it can't fire torps upwards towards you as easily. So you keep firing at where it disappeared and went till you're sure it's deep enough that your HE can't damage it further. You should see oil spills if you did hit it. Extrapolate its position and take on an intercept course. Go silent or lay smoke if needed so other enemies cannot engage you. You've effectively should cut it off from allied help. Get over it, ensure you're pretty much ahead of it, then drop your ASW.

In principal you most the time don't need to close that much distance. If you do only do so when you know the sub is targeting say a BB or something somewhat orthogonal to your position and is therefore not paying proper attention. Preferentially come at it from the side.

That's all pretty similar to how you can overwhelm stealthy DDs. You disrupt their gun aim with early fired torps as they have to swirl around to reduce their DPS too, right? If it nets a hit that's just a bonus. Similarly, you don't engage a stealth DD in a position where its stealth is helping it and its allies are in a better position. There's really not that big a difference.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

Submarine? They a) can win a fight against a destroyer because they can attack from range whereas destroyer cannot,

You allow that? That's on you.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

b) can make itself invulnerable by diving

Not invulnerable till its deep down and then it's only invulnerable to non-ASW weaponry. It's not invulnerable. You're just not good enough to be in a position to drop ASW by this time. And that's down to YOUR inexperience in sub-hunting. You allow them time to get away because you engage them from too far away.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

and c) has far better concealment than even torpedo destroyers when surfaced.

If it's pinging that concealment is much worse.

When surfaced that concealment range is only a 200m distance. Most gunboats have more distance to overcome to detect a stealth DD.

What this tells me again is that you try to rush approach from far too far away. Which again is down to your inexperience. You don't even try to control the terms of engagement by determining where it has to go to engage you. That's entirely your fault for letting it pick the field of battle.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

So unless submarine significantly misplays, ambushing it is impossible, and unlike torpedo destroyers I find I am not enough of a threat to keep submarine away simply by placing myself between it and the ships I am screening. And submarine can submerge, which means that I cannot simply maneuver to push it into position where I will be able to spot and kill it, the way I can do it with torpedo destroyers.

You clearly don't understand the sub. If that sub is close enough to engage your allies, then there's one of two situations possible:

A. It's in the middle of the map and there are islands nearby. It will be targeting orthogonal to most those islands.

B. You let it slip by the middle of the map as your allies are far in the rear and you can engage it from the side and behind.

If you engage it while in front of you, you're making things unnecessarily tough on yourself by giving it not just a pre-warning as it's looking in your direction, it's also already aiming in your direction.

This is YOUR positioning at fault.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

So yes, bolded part is completely innacurate.

No, you just don't understand sub-hunting.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

Uh... you mean, two kilometers? Because submarine can dive literally whenever. And see above about the lack of ranged options against submarines on destroyers.

No, it can't dive whenever. If it runs out of dive time, it has to surface.

And no, you don't need to be within 2km to start engaging it or finding it. This really is you not getting how sub captains think tbh. :/ You just look at specs and proclaim things can't be done because there's a mathematical mismatch in your head that in practice is largely irrelevant if you know how to read and predict a sub's movement and act accordingly with your hull orientation, timing and approach vectors.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

And even submerged submarine is generally fast enough to see you coming and escape.

No, you let it escape because you time and again indicate you engage it way too soon on its terms. You're a bad sub-hunter, please understand that your experiences are skewed by this fact because your initial approach is wrong and skewing your idea of what it's like to engage a sub in combat. The distances you think about are too large because YOUR attempts are timed poorly.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

Smoke is basically a replacement for islands.

No. It's a completely different thing. Torps can pass through smokes, not through islands (and look for reefs sticking out from island corners too, those trick a lot of subs). Treat it differently and combine it. Don't pretend it's the same thing.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

If there is an island close enough to do what you are suggesting, then you don't need smokescreen at all, unless you are in a carrier game.

Heh. Well your creativity is absolutely sparkling.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

And no, I never sit inside a smokescreen, unless a carrier is present. Smoke is best used to break line of sight to get away - but against submarine, even that is of limited utility. And if you have both carriers and submarines in the game... yeah. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

One trick pony that tool much? Smoke is extremely versatile... Both as a tool to aid allies, deception and even manipulation. If you think it's limited use against subs... Eh... You're clearly not someone who experiments with new strategies and tactics much... A mobile DD in smoke is unlikely to be hit by a sub. A DD in smoke pinged by a sub should have an escape plan. It should be of no consequence.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

And as I said, not all maps have good islands.

Every map has good enough islands to deal with subs aside from Ocean.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

I said annoying, not dangerous. Yes, they are easy to dodge, but pings are bloody annoying.

Barely get pinged. Why do you get pinged so often? You being out in the open in front of a sub constantly? I might get pinged twice in a typical approach engagement, most the time there's no use for it to ping me. As a BB I might get pinged more but that is of no consequence. As a cruiser I don't get pinged more than once. I don't need to approach the sub to kill it and if I'm too far to get a good lead on me it has no reason to. If I'm closing in with hydro all it wants to do is run and hide. If ping is annoying you, and yes, the mechanics are poorly designed, but that's on you for giving it reason and opportunity to. Again, your approach towards sub is poor and if you're being surprised by it, caught out in the open, then you've not been paying attention.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

Also, you keep forgetting that this is not about "destroyer vs submarine" in a vacuum. Even just dodging torpedoes can be extremely dangerous when you are being spotted by the sub.

Dude, when will you start remembering I'm the sub-hunter here, you're the noob? I KILL SUBS WITH ANYTHING YOU GIVE ME. Even the things people claim don't have any countermeasures against subs (Dutch cruisers and ASW lacking DDs). YOU DON'T. Please for the love of all that is holy, get it through your head that I kill a sub in virtually every game with one in it if nobody beat me to it. I kill them constantly, often multiple in the same match, you clearly don't. Why do you think you're an authority that can mansplain things to me? You're a noob-sub-hunter. You're that 43% BB player saying stealth DDs can't be dealt with. :/

You don't think I take the environmental threats into account? I do, but you don't! YOU ignore the countless opportunities the environment provides. you think about yoloing in and getting killed by the sub's allies and how this doesn't work for you, "therefore nothing works".

Yes, there are other threats, so take them into consideration when devicing a plan. You don't seem to have the sneaking experience or sub-handed attitude (pun intended) to trap subs. Control the environment. Make them go where you want them to. Pick spots where you will have the upper hand. Consider not directly engaging but directing allied airborne ASW by providing the opportunity without exposing yourself too much. Again, islands are key.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

In the end, submarines are just another tool to keep people camping at the backline.

Bad players. Good players sit close to subs so they can use their ASW tools. If you see your allies pull away because of a sub, you will lose them to the sub. If you see them overwhelm it, TOGETHER, the sub has nothing it can do to thwart the massive ASW spam it will receive the moment it's spotted or even just alerts people to its presence. people moving back are the problems created by clearly ignorant players like yourself, not the logical consequence of subs. Players just have no idea how to engage them and thus do the intuitive part of fight or flight: flight. And that's the one thing you shouldn't do because you'll let it dictate the engagement from there on. Especially if you let it reach the open waters on your side of the islands. Move closer. It'll have a harder time getting a good lead on you in between islands. Its torp spreads become more predictable. Its location as well. Even if you die your allies near you will kill it. Move back and lose.

Besides subs are good for removing and flushing out back campers. Especially somewhat stationary hiding behind islands ships like radar cruisers. Often see them engage CVs too.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

And again, I do all of that when possible. Generally, I approach submarine at an angle or in a spiral, precisely so that I don't get a bunch of torps to the nose.

Great.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

But see above: it is never about submarine alone. If submarine couldn't share its spotting data with other ships, then it would be no problem. But since it can...

Since it can you need to make it dive asap and not engage within long line of sight exposure of other enemies. So time that attack. Don't expect to do it at the start of the match. Read the battle.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

I have done that, and it usually doesn't work at killing the sub, just at keeping it away. And if I am limited to being near an island, I cannot properly spot or kill enemy destroyers, which just shows that measuring submarine's influence by damage numbers and how easy it is to kill in some conditions is load of garbage.

YOU can't. Maybe you're doing something wrong... I have no such issues.

4 minutes ago, Pukovnik7 said:

Oh, don't start me on Dutch cruisers. You know, saying "this pile of crap doesn't stink as much as that other pile of crap" does nothing to prove that other pile isn't actually a pile of crap.

They're not a pile of crap... Well, the De Witt kinda is to me though I've had a lot of bad luck with that in terms of friendly DDs yoloing and last second throws by allies. Rest is easily at 50% or higher WR. Something I can't say for my German and Russian cruisers.

Which means it's more of an optimizing playstyle thing whether you do good in it or not.

But the point in case is that we're talking about ASW capacity and having any deep hitting ASW on any other ship in any capacity makes them automatically better at hunting subs situationally at least. Air strikes are always more OP towards subs than having to get over them. And the Dutch airstrikes can utterly devastate subs at periscope level and surface level. I do recommend the +15% HE explosion radius (fire starting chance) skill though.

lup3s · December 1, 2022

19 minutes ago, Figment said:

So with a sub, what you want is to let it come near you with its surface or periscope depth spotting range. Only when you're certain where it is more or less (because it targets someone for instance or tried to target you before you "ran" behind an island) is when you start planning an approach. You don't do so immediately. Have some bloody patience for crying out loud. THEN you rush it guns blazing. Of course, before you do you do check for other threats in the area. If there's too many, lure it closer still.

imo most of the time i found going in gun blazing wasn't the best approach; usually the Sub dives anyway so having fired your guns just keeps you spotted by other ships

more often than not the Sub dives and i can go undetected, free to drop DCs on that little ocean turd

Pukovnik7 · December 4, 2022

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Let's first establish that you're bad at sub hunting and I'm not. So please stop trying to be a wise guy. I'm the authority, you're not.

And I have to stress this, I AM good at this, you're not by your own admission. So let's stop with your arrogantly telling me I'm not killing dozens of subs every week without getting myself killed in the process. YOU SAY YOU ARE NOT ABLE TO DO THIS. STOP WHINING. START LISTENING AND STOP PRETENDING YOU KNOW BETTER BECAUSE YOUR EGO AND STUBBORNESS TO NOT ADMIT THIS TO YOURSELF IS ONLY HURTING YOUR CAPACITY TO DEAL WITH SUBS.

I am explaining you that good portion of your advice simply doesn't work for me, because I have tried it. Either you are failing at actually explaining stuff, are doing something completely different from what you are describing, or else I am failing at explaining what an issue is.

And then there is the fact that you focus on killing subs when I have already told you that killing them is literally the only thing about subs I don't have a problem with. What I have a problem with is everything else. Which so far you have ignored while potinficating about how subs are easy to kill. Which, again: not the point, man.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Hence you must create an ambush situation where the spotting distance advantage is minimal. With most DDs that means getting the enemy DD within about 5.8km of where you're hiding out of sight. Often you can do that with islands. Maybe you overcome that distance by boldly and openly storming the enemy DD over the entire spotting difference from open water to detect it (where you can be targeted but that ship can't, basically gambling you can yolo to overwhelm the enemy DD, but that's not the smartest way to go about it. And if you do that against subs, no wonder you're failing. You clearly are overconfident in a gunboat vs DD situation as you describe just waiting for some support to rush in and win the attrition number game with superior firepower, while taking damage.

What I do when facing a destroyer in the cap - especially if it is a torpedo destroyer - is that I try to keep in island between me and the cap, and then I round the island, engage the engine boost and charge into the cap. So "boldly and openly" part at least is not correct. And even that I do only until I have chased him out of the cap.

I don't know, maybe I suck at explaining stuff. If you are interested, I have my two last destroyer replays attached.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

That is... kinda foolish and a waste of HP IMO, but it works for single gunboat vs stealth torp DD fights at times. You don't mention an approach route that conceals you to the very last moment. You don't mention ambush traps where you give the enemy the idea that there's nobody blocking its advance. Either by staying in hiding, or by giving them the idea that you're preoccupied elsewhere by deliberately showing up somewhere else supposedly not caring about them. You give them the idea that it's save to move up in order to engage either you or someone else. A sub obviously needs to move up further because of needing torp angles, where the DD might go for low islands to fire over.

Why I would need to mention it? It is obvious that announcing approach from the beginning is dumb, especially if you are hunting something stealthier than you. And I already mentioned before that lack of islands is a major problem when facing subs.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

That is what you need to do with a sub. Make it come closer to you, rather than come to it. Every inch it gets closer to you is distance you don't need to cross towards it in the open to detect it.

OK.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

And stop whining that it can dive to evade your torps (nobody should care about torps vs subs, only subs since they'll dive and remove their own situational awareness and you disrupt their aim and actions). YOU WANT IT TO DIVE, that's the only reason I send torps its way, to give it another reason to not pop up. And keep diving. Because then it will stop spotting you and transmitting your position to others. It'll get much harder to ping you and get torps on you because when it's diving it can't fire torps upwards towards you as easily. So you keep firing at where it disappeared and went till you're sure it's deep enough that your HE can't damage it further. You should see oil spills if you did hit it. Extrapolate its position and take on an intercept course. Go silent or lay smoke if needed so other enemies cannot engage you. You've effectively should cut it off from allied help. Get over it, ensure you're pretty much ahead of it, then drop your ASW.

That is pretty much what I do anyway.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

You allow that? That's on you.

Again: attacks by sub are not an issue by itself. Torpedoes are easy enough to evade unless I misposition (and even that only when I'm playing a battleship). Issue is interplay of elements: fact that submarine can spot a destroyer from beyond its distance, and the fact that submarine itself cannot be spotted at all when it is at maximum depth, meaning it can simply dive and slip below if it feels it is in danger. And if it launches torpedoes then they do present a threat which needs to be focused on and evaded.

I have had situations where submarine would dive to the maximum depth, slip past the entire team by basically blind navigation, and then pop up to enter the base cap, or else spot everybody from behind the team, or set up a crossfire. Granted, these were rare, and I am yet to check out whether they can be done still, but...

Essentially, the main problem with submarine is the same as that with a carrier: a good submarine player can keep people spotted, and set up a crossfire whenever, wherever. And once that happens, you have a problem even if you manage to evade all the torpedoes. Then there is the fact that it is another heterogenous threat, which generally means more passive gameplay for most people.

In such conditions, it literally doesn't matter how much damage a sub does or doesn't do.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Not invulnerable till its deep down and then it's only invulnerable to non-ASW weaponry. It's not invulnerable. You're just not good enough to be in a position to drop ASW by this time. And that's down to YOUR inexperience in sub-hunting. You allow them time to get away because you engage them from too far away.

From what I remember, isn't a submarine at maximum depth invulnerable to everything, or they changed something lately?

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

If it's pinging that concealment is much worse.

When surfaced that concealment range is only a 200m distance. Most gunboats have more distance to overcome to detect a stealth DD.

What this tells me again is that you try to rush approach from far too far away. Which again is down to your inexperience. You don't even try to control the terms of engagement by determining where it has to go to engage you. That's entirely your fault for letting it pick the field of battle.

And that again comes down to islands. Yes, when there are islands around, catching a sub is not too difficult. But I also have to protect friendly ships from enemy DD, which often requires staying in open or semi-open water so as to prevent him from slipping by. Which in turn prevents the sort of ambushing you describe.

As I have explained before, and what you have ignored: it is not about submarines themselves, but how they interact with other classes.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

You clearly don't understand the sub. If that sub is close enough to engage your allies, then there's one of two situations possible:

A. It's in the middle of the map and there are islands nearby. It will be targeting orthogonal to most those islands.

B. You let it slip by the middle of the map as your allies are far in the rear and you can engage it from the side and behind.

If you engage it while in front of you, you're making things unnecessarily tough on yourself by giving it not just a pre-warning as it's looking in your direction, it's also already aiming in your direction.

This is YOUR positioning at fault.

Or:

C. It has slipped by the map border and is flanking the team or even located behind it.

I have had a couple of situations like that. Some subs even go after carriers.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

No, it can't dive whenever. If it runs out of dive time, it has to surface.

And no, you don't need to be within 2km to start engaging it or finding it. This really is you not getting how sub captains think tbh. :/ You just look at specs and proclaim things can't be done because there's a mathematical mismatch in your head that in practice is largely irrelevant if you know how to read and predict a sub's movement and act accordingly with your hull orientation, timing and approach vectors.

And yes, submarine can be killed in such a way, if it allows itself to be caught.

I really wanted to grind Le Fantasque, Adriatico and North Carolina, but I guess I'll have to play submarines lot more than I do right now (couple of games in U-69).

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

One trick pony that tool much? Smoke is extremely versatile... Both as a tool to aid allies, deception and even manipulation. If you think it's limited use against subs... Eh... You're clearly not someone who experiments with new strategies and tactics much... A mobile DD in smoke is unlikely to be hit by a sub. A DD in smoke pinged by a sub should have an escape plan. It should be of no consequence.

Quote

DD in smoke cannot spot for his team, and is likely to eat a bunch of torpedoes from either enemy DD or a CV, mobile or not. I generally do not sit inside the smoke unless I absolutely have to, or else I'm in a German destroyer with hydro and all enemies have been spotted anyway.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Bad players. Good players sit close to subs so they can use their ASW tools. If you see your allies pull away because of a sub, you will lose them to the sub. If you see them overwhelm it, TOGETHER, the sub has nothing it can do to thwart the massive ASW spam it will receive the moment it's spotted or even just alerts people to its presence. people moving back are the problems created by clearly ignorant players like yourself, not the logical consequence of subs. Players just have no idea how to engage them and thus do the intuitive part of fight or flight: flight. And that's the one thing you shouldn't do because you'll let it dictate the engagement from there on. Especially if you let it reach the open waters on your side of the islands. Move closer. It'll have a harder time getting a good lead on you in between islands. Its torp spreads become more predictable. Its location as well. Even if you die your allies near you will kill it. Move back and lose.

True, but it is not just the subs. People moving back is in fact a logical response created by a significant number of heterogenous threats, not subs specifically. Ideally, game would have battleships, cruisers and destroyers, and nothing else. But when you add carriers and now submarines into the mix, people - especially new players - find it difficult to deal with it. Use island for a cover? You don't have speed or room to avoid a carrier strike. Stay at speed? Unless islands are really dense, you are at significant risk of getting shot at broadside. And so on and so forth. And natural response is to put distance from the threat.

So no, it is not logical consequence of subs. It is however a logical consequence of there being five different classes of ships. When you are attacked by a carrier, you want to be away from islands to have freedom of maneuver without potentially running aground (especially with there now being underwater terrain). But as you yourself pointed out, best counter to subs is to stay close to islands. So if you have carriers and subs both, you are basically in a Scylla or Charybdis situation. Damned if you do, damned if you don't... although submarines at least are a lesser evil compared to carriers.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Since it can you need to make it dive asap and not engage within long line of sight exposure of other enemies. So time that attack. Don't expect to do it at the start of the match. Read the battle.

Quote

OK.

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

They're not a pile of crap... Well, the De Witt kinda is to me though I've had a lot of bad luck with that in terms of friendly DDs yoloing and last second throws by allies. Rest is easily at 50% or higher WR. Something I can't say for my German and Russian cruisers.

Which means it's more of an optimizing playstyle thing whether you do good in it or not.

I wasn't talking about their combat ability or WR. They are a pile of crap in terms of their influence on the game. I mean, you have a class whose entire gimmick is sitting behind an island and spamming aircraft without ever moving or shooting their guns.

Yeah, great design there, WeeGee.

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Hirohito · December 4, 2022

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Hence you must create an ambush situation where the spotting distance advantage is minimal. With most DDs that means getting the enemy DD within about 5.8km of where you're hiding out of sight. Often you can do that with islands. Maybe you overcome that distance by boldly and openly storming the enemy DD over the entire spotting difference from open water to detect it (where you can be targeted but that ship can't, basically gambling you can yolo to overwhelm the enemy DD, but that's not the smartest way to go about it. And if you do that against subs, no wonder you're failing. You clearly are overconfident in a gunboat vs DD situation as you describe just waiting for some support to rush in and win the attrition number game with superior firepower, while taking damage.

Excuse me, but this only works versus bad sub players that waste their concealment advantage by trying to go into island areas, while doing so from a position where their presence has already been revealed.

If the sub plays for a more open area or goes in for a shotgun approach being dark, that "ambush" of yours is not gonna work.
You are usually putting yourself at risk of getting gun bloom spotted by shooting at a sub to begin with, and especially so if you plan on rushing him to follow up with DCs at the same time.
If the sub kites and you charge after him, we're talking about a long time where you remain spotted while not nearly close enough to drop DCs, and this is just too risky to do in most cases.
Speaking of rushing, that is highly risky as well because a good sub can just delete you with torps as you come towards him, and since you are running into torps at very short range, your time to react that spread puts you at far higher risk of failing than succeeding - hence, you should never do it against a competent sub.

This leaves you with really only one option against a good sub - get out of there, this is his area now.

Yosha_AtaIante · December 4, 2022

1 hour ago, Hirohito said:

Excuse me, but this only works versus bad sub players that waste their concealment advantage by trying to go into island areas, while doing so from a position where their presence has already been revealed.

If the sub plays for a more open area or goes in for a shotgun approach being dark, that "ambush" of yours is not gonna work.
You are usually putting yourself at risk of getting gun bloom spotted by shooting at a sub to begin with, and especially so if you plan on rushing him to follow up with DCs at the same time.
If the sub kites and you charge after him, we're talking about a long time where you remain spotted while not nearly close enough to drop DCs, and this is just too risky to do in most cases.
Speaking of rushing, that is highly risky as well because a good sub can just delete you with torps as you come towards him, and since you are running into torps at very short range, your time to react that spread puts you at far higher risk of failing than succeeding - hence, you should never do it against a competent sub.

This leaves you with really only one option against a good sub - get out of there, this is his area now.

I mean you are not wrong in all your points but it isn't this easy for the sub either.

What I wonder is, since you said so often lately that you quit playing random, where you got the experience from to explain all this?

Hirohito · December 4, 2022

1 hour ago, AtaIante said:

I mean you are not wrong in all your points but it isn't this easy for the sub either.

What I wonder is, since you said so often lately that you quit playing random, where you got the experience from to explain all this?

Subs in several iterations have been present in the game for what, 2 years now?

And they were already permanently introduced when I pulled the plug on this game completely after this season's first sprint (late September?).
Had several encounters with potato subs that still ruined the fun of that game, and some even worse encounters with super unicums griefing intentionally with things that have zero counterplay (like baiting my radar just to duck down and having me waste it, followed by a shotgun later in the game).

LukkaiCH · December 4, 2022

Vor 9 Stunden, Pukovnik7 sagte:

Am 1.12.2022 um 11:45, Figment sagte:

Not invulnerable till its deep down and then it's only invulnerable to non-ASW weaponry. It's not invulnerable.

From what I remember, isn't a submarine at maximum depth invulnerable to everything, or they changed something lately?

Nope, depth charges will hit and damage submarines no matter the depth they are at. And that is nothing new. What is special with maximum depth is that they cannot be spotted except by submarine surveillance or by hydro within 2km.

Figment · December 4, 2022

49 minutes ago, LukkaiCH said:

Nope, depth charges will hit and damage submarines no matter the depth they are at. And that is nothing new. What is special with maximum depth is that they cannot be spotted except by submarine surveillance or by hydro within 2km.

Pretty much, but you don't need to detect a sub to drop depth charges. Those recharge so quickly you really don't need to worry about depletion. A sub at that depth might be hard to track-ish, it's also likely semi-blind and can easily be engaged without repercursions if you know a recent "was there" location". Especially if you caught a glimpse of its direction and speed.

_TedStriker · December 4, 2022

13 minutes ago, Figment said:

Pretty much, but you don't need to detect a sub to drop depth charges. Those recharge so quickly you really don't need to worry about depletion.

One of my favourite ships - the tier 5 October Revolution - gets 1 depth-charge per drop, and this will be dropped in a random spot in quite a big area. The ASW range is pretty short too. I can be torped from a lot further away. I can't damacon to remove pings because I only get 5 of those. I can't kill the sub unless the player is really bad and sits on the surface.

I play the October a lot and I've won some tough fights in it. I don't mind fighting BBs, cruisers or DDs. I don't mind if I'm overmatched by 2 tiers. I don't mind being outnumbered. I don't mind if I get focussed by a CV. But I have no tools with which to counter a sub. And it comes down to one thing - homing torpedos. If the sub didn't have those I'd take them as a fair part of the game. I can angle, dodge and soak-up every other damage type but with homing torps my only options is BOHICA. It's a cheat mechanic for bad players.

LukkaiCH · December 5, 2022

Vor 48 Minuten, Figment sagte:

Pretty much, but you don't need to detect a sub to drop depth charges. Those recharge so quickly you really don't need to worry about depletion. A sub at that depth might be hard to track-ish, it's also likely semi-blind and can easily be engaged without repercursions if you know a recent "was there" location". Especially if you caught a glimpse of its direction and speed.

That can be a big "if" however. And likely not to happen if the submarine player is actually good, unless he gets very unlucky. And if you're just driving a search pattern over a general area you think it might be at, you give it time to get away even at reduced underwater speed. And will give it information on your speed and heading if you run depth charges. So that's not really a viable option unless you have some kind of extra information.

Figment · December 5, 2022

1 hour ago, LukkaiCH said:

That can be a big "if" however. And likely not to happen if the submarine player is actually good,

Wrong approach. The sub is the hunted, you're the hunter. If the sub "is any good", then you allowed it to control the battlefield by starting your approach from too far away, or you engaged without a plan and any pre-knowledge of where it is likely to be. Under these circumstances, take your time to use you being spotted to determine the angle it is in (like you do with DDs spotting you), then toss some ASW if you have air strikes in the direction along the island edge when you stopped being spotted. Usualy somewhere between mid to furthest away of where you are, though if there's terrain in that direction it will narrow it down. If the sub is after you, find a good ambush site. Often times it'll be close to the surface and will round very close to the corner to minimize travel time, which allows for excellent ambushes, or at least a sense of where it is now (as you get spotted and had a last known angle, new angle and knowing roughly how fast it can move, narrows the spots a bit).

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unless he gets very unlucky.

This is a miconception. Subs aren't that lucky, when hit there's a very good chance it dies. Players are just bad at making the right choices that put a sub in a dangerous position. When I drop ASW and I have a sense of where it must be, then most of the time I get multiple hits. Usualy I only need one run when I'm on top of it, though I tend to drop the second for good measure right after the first ends (unless the sub becomes detected and I'm sailing away from it). If I have long range ASW and have only a little idea of where it is, I still hit 20% of the time, some of which resulted in instant death on the sub because I figured it may have recently rounded a cap and instantly started firing torps to optimize its potential DPS output.

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And if you're just driving a search pattern over a general area you think it might be at, you give it time to get away even at reduced underwater speed.

Why would you need a search pattern? If you don't hit it on your second drop, you're an awful sub hunter and you've mismanaged the engagement completely. :/ Again, you ought to be fighting on your terms, most people here always seem to presume the sub is in control of the engagement area. It shouldn't if you're smart about it and forced a location on it with a narrow scope of options. Preferably engage subs in between islands near a chokepoint. It'll have the choice of running in a near straight line to the exit, sit still, back up or run aground. All of which are covered by ASW in two drops.

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And will give it information on your speed and heading if you run depth charges. So that's not really a viable option unless you have some kind of extra information.

That's not practical info to actually work with. You should be pretty much on top of it.

Figment · December 5, 2022

2 hours ago, Brian_Mankin said:

One of my favourite ships - the tier 5 October Revolution - gets 1 depth-charge per drop, and this will be dropped in a random spot in quite a big area. The ASW range is pretty short too. I can be torped from a lot further away. I can't damacon to remove pings because I only get 5 of those. I can't kill the sub unless the player is really bad and sits on the surface.

That depth charge however has a huge blast radius and damage compared to others. It's bloody potent. Don't underestimate those. The short range is typical of some ships, so you'll want these ships to stay close to islands and be able to run torps aground rather than try to dodge. If you move out of sight subs will likely opt to approach to find a new target and get it in range. They might get distracted with different targets and not know you're on the other side of the island waiting with ASW. Got lots of sub kills with Sinop and some with Izmail, so I'm familiar with the potential issue of range and depth charge size. However, it's never been much of a show stopper for me.

2 hours ago, Brian_Mankin said:

I play the October a lot and I've won some tough fights in it. I don't mind fighting BBs, cruisers or DDs. I don't mind if I'm overmatched by 2 tiers. I don't mind being outnumbered. I don't mind if I get focussed by a CV. But I have no tools with which to counter a sub. And it comes down to one thing - homing torpedos. If the sub didn't have those I'd take them as a fair part of the game. I can angle, dodge and soak-up every other damage type but with homing torps my only options is BOHICA. It's a cheat mechanic for bad players.

Homing torps aren't that big a problem unless you give them open sea to lead you on. And even then homing stops at 300m, so maintain a shallow diagonal towards the sub, such that you can turn and dodge while the lead makes them go past you. If you're forcing a bit of lead this gives you maneouvring time to dodge at least some of them. When you spot the torps, suddenly slow and turn, though with some BBs that's harder than with others, often don't even need to use R. Alternatively, go for a hard turn towards an island even if it means grounding your ship, the torps will likely take a sharp turn into the island due to the automatic leading. Timing is important here. All in all, you have ranged ASW, be it limited and you have A-S-W-D, so you have the tools you need.

I strongly suggest you practice some sub homing torps and see when and how you'll end up missing so many volleys. They're far from cheating, in fact, when I play subs, I often rather fire without a ping or only ping at the last moment.

El2aZeR · December 5, 2022

4 minutes ago, Figment said:

That depth charge however has a huge blast radius and damage compared to others.

All aerial depth charges have been standardized. October DCs are no different to ones on any other T5 ship. Or T6 or T7 ships for that matter. It will deal 3400 alpha within a 150m radius, 1700 between 150-300m radius and cause only flooding and/or oil spills inside 300-375m. Starting T7 you will get an extra charge, at T8 your DC strike will drop 2 per charge and the damage values increase to 4200/2100, at T10 then to 4900/2450 respectively but the radii never change.

Needless to say because of the pathetic aoe and long approach times you will typically only hit potato subs with predictive drops even if it is somewhat accurate as they are fairly easily outmaneuvered.

Exception are the depth charges thrown by CV auto ASW. These have significantly improved performance in both damage fall off (65% of alpha on second radius rather than 50%) and aoe (300/480/600m instead of the standard 150/300/375m).

LukkaiCH · December 5, 2022

Vor 2 Stunden, Figment sagte:

Wrong approach. The sub is the hunted, you're the hunter. If the sub "is any good", then you allowed it to control the battlefield by starting your approach from too far away, or you engaged without a plan and any pre-knowledge of where it is likely to be. Under these circumstances, take your time to use you being spotted to determine the angle it is in (like you do with DDs spotting you), then toss some ASW if you have air strikes in the direction along the island edge when you stopped being spotted. Usualy somewhere between mid to furthest away of where you are, though if there's terrain in that direction it will narrow it down. If the sub is after you, find a good ambush site. Often times it'll be close to the surface and will round very close to the corner to minimize travel time, which allows for excellent ambushes, or at least a sense of where it is now (as you get spotted and had a last known angle, new angle and knowing roughly how fast it can move, narrows the spots a bit).

Again, if the sub player is good, you will at times run close to one without realising. Until you're suddenly spotted, that is. Or, if in a bigger ship or under the right/wrong circumstances because the torps suddenly reach spotting distance. Particularily if you're not in a DD, you may well be spotted by something else after all. And as much as you try to anticipate what the sub is going to do, the real good players in a sub will do the same to you. Luckily, there's not yet a lot of them around, with most people still learning and gaining experience. Of those that even plan to play them competitively that is.

The rest is good advice. But not always applicable. It does require you being otherwise unspotted and matching terrain being near enough to you. Depending on the map, position and how the battle went, that will not always be the case. Though if you suddenly get spotted in open water like that and are in a DD or fast cruiser at speed, you do at least have a good idea as to the general direction of the boat.

Vor 2 Stunden, Figment sagte:

This is a miconception. Subs aren't that lucky, when hit there's a very good chance it dies.

True, but has nothing to do with the point I was making. You're talking about depthcharging a sub. I'm talking about spotting a prior unknown submarine. Two entirely different discussions. This misconception of yours also plays into the next part, although it goes a lot further.

Vor 2 Stunden, Figment sagte:

That's not practical info to actually work with. You should be pretty much on top of it.

Not in the situation as described, you aren't. Or maybe you are, but you have no way of knowing until you drop those charges. As elaborated before, I'm talking about a situation where you realise a submarine is in the general area that you did not have any kind of information on prior. And now you need to find out where. You are talking a situation where you have prior knowledge of the locations or good reason to suspect it near (beginning of the battle, they often seem to be set on either supporting the nearest cap to their starting position. Or breaking through the lines to go after sniping BBs and/or CVs), so you were able to prepare for and plan out the encounter.

That is not to say you cannot turn the former into the latter and sucker the boat into a bad situation. But you are betting on them letting themselves be suckered into it. Else you... well you will just be able to disengage from it and that's it. No harm done to you. But you won't get them either in that case. Unless you then try to run after them, which may be just what they are betting on.

And as for the info: It's just as practical for the sub to estimate your position and course as torpedoes and sonar pings are the other way around. If you are in a ship with depth charges dropping right from it, that is. If they are dropped by planes, it only gives you the direction towards the enemy ship and maximum distance, nothing more.

Vor 2 Stunden, Figment sagte:

Again, you ought to be fighting on your terms, most people here always seem to presume the sub is in control of the engagement area. It shouldn't if you're smart about it and forced a location on it with a narrow scope of options. Preferably engage subs in between islands near a chokepoint. It'll have the choice of running in a near straight line to the exit, sit still, back up or run aground. All of which are covered by ASW in two drops.

That is good advice, absolutely. Don't think I'm not taking it to heart. But it does require the sub player to play by your rules. Which the majority absolutely will, no doubt about that. But we have to be honest here: Right now, the typical submarine player is not good at driving submarines. From all I've seen myself and by watching streams, the majority still ranks somewhere between absolute potatoes (at least in subs) and decent, but not yet experienced enough at actually using the capabilities of their boats and acting tactically sound. (I'm rather rubbish with them myself, to be honest. Haven't even tried them in PvP, because I know it would end in catastrophy.)

tl,dr-version: You are right against the majority of sub players. But not all of them.

As an addendum: My current problem/worry with the submarines is that they will go the same way as original CVs did. Maybe with better popularity because submarine movies and reputation, but the same problems in skill floor and ceiling. And I do actually expect at least a partial rework of the whole class some time within the next ten to twenty months.

Deckeru_Maiku · December 8, 2022

Nice to see that @Figment hasn't changed a bit, still dodges arguments with his "but in MY world..." attitude and tldr: posts.

Subs are bad for the game. It doesn't matter, that slightly better than average players usually can sink subs. There's usually 10 players per team in a battle that can't.

Subs are bad for the game, as they make BaBBies hug islands even harder than before they got implemented.

Subs are bad for the game, as they put a further strain on DDs.

Subs are bad for the game, as unless one has a certain mentality they are not to play with. And usually they aren't fun to play against for anyone.

Subs are bad for the game.

Figment · December 8, 2022

1 hour ago, Deckeru_Maiku said:

Nice to see that @Figment hasn't changed a bit, still dodges arguments with his "but in MY world..." attitude and tldr: posts.

I'm not dodging, I'm just not inept. TLDR just means YOU have no attentionspan, that you actually think a long post means it's a bad thing means you're not capable of putting your mind to something. Some people write long posts, some have no capacity to either write or read long posts... That's just how humans differ from one another. That you try to use that against someone just shows how poor your debating is. You (and many other people here) often try to do character attacks like this one way or another. Pathetic method for the weak debater, but very easy to do and the lemming train bandwagon will not frown on it, for its convenient when the attack comes from their side.

I also have a nuanced constructive few, and hate dishonesty, instead of an fanatical extremist / pessimist perspective where being dishonest is okay if it might get you what you want.

There are faults with subs which can be fixed, but I'm not a fanatic extremist like most people who are too lazy to adapt and find new ways to deal with a new threat and will use bad players as shield for their own pet peeve grievances instead of being constructive. Advocating removal of something you dislike personally is also a signal of "a certain attitude" towards gaming and design. Especially when it's obvious some basic changes and some better design limits to subs would create massive improvements.

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Subs are bad for the game. It doesn't matter, that slightly better than average players usually can sink subs. There's usually 10 players per team in a battle that can't.

That is largely a learn to play issue as is though. But the learning curve is high, especially for people who are biased against playing subs themselves and have little experience reading other people's moves, particularly those who play stealthily.

But luckily, it's nice to see that you continue to fail to notice the changes I'm in favour of that would change how subs are spotted and make them more vulnerable and less capable of targeting DDs, amongst other things. But hey.

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Subs are bad for the game, as they make BaBBies hug islands even harder than before they got implemented.

Bad BBs yes. Good BBs stay mobile but still use islands. And go in closer, which is good for the game. But hey, bad players. And cowards, really. Cowards are a major problem when facing subs. And since you lot have been fearmongering lots, we've got plenty of those... People here even suggested to run, which is the dumbest thing to do.

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Subs are bad for the game, as they put a further strain on DDs.

Again, see above. All in all I don't suffer while playing DDs from subs (radar on the other hand), but sure, bad DD players do, as anyone does who can't adapt to a new situation. If you just don't go out in front of a sub with open water and no escape routes, then it shouldn't be much of a problem.

People who can't adapt are the people unwilling to learn and much worse for the game, by the way.

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Subs are bad for the game, as unless one has a certain mentality they are not to play with.

I like how you always generalize and stereotype people into convenient dehumanized packages when they're not doing what you want them to do or think. What would happen if I'd typify anti-sub players as having "a certain attitude" that should make people want to avoid socialising with?

How easy would it be if there's just the ONE opinion, the ONE reason for people to have an opposite view or do something. And let that just so happen to be the things that you despise or use to make others despise it. This is really a sub-human argument for the pathetic minded who don't think they can win a debate without the need for character murder.

Very sad. Low. And dumb.

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And usually they aren't fun to play against for anyone.

Not for bad players who have no idea how to tackle, herd and handle them, sure. For me it's the same as hunting a DD. Just easier since the threatlevel is lower.

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Subs are bad for the game.

Not really need to be. They need to be improved on, but they're not all that bad or impactful. If you've got basic map reading and stealth skills so you know how to predict them.

Hirohito · December 8, 2022

52 minutes ago, Figment said:

Again, see above. All in all I don't suffer while playing DDs from subs (radar on the other hand), but sure, bad DD players do, as anyone does who can't adapt to a new situation

On 12/1/2022 at 11:45 AM, Figment said:

Besides subs are good for removing and flushing out back campers. Especially somewhat stationary hiding behind islands ships like radar cruisers

Lol.
If you struggle with radar as a DD, you are honestly not that good of a DD player to begin with.
And the fact that you refer to radar cruisers as "campers hiding in the back" makes me certain of it.

I'd be careful of coming across as an expert here.

52 minutes ago, Figment said:

Not for bad players who have no idea how to tackle, herd and handle them, sure. For me it's the same as hunting a DD. Just easier since the threatlevel is lower.

Again, because you're a slightly above average player fighting potato subs.
Whether or not you can kill red to yellow stat subs as a slightly above average DD is completely irrelevant to how they upset the intra-class balance on a more serious level.

Noone is arguing that you cannot ever kill a random potato sub, the problem arises in how they disrupt the game and neuter other classes on a high level.

Figment · December 8, 2022

2 hours ago, Hirohito said:

Lol.
If you struggle with radar as a DD, you are honestly not that good of a DD player to begin with.
And the fact that you refer to radar cruisers as "campers hiding in the back" makes me certain of it.

I'd be careful of coming across as an expert here.

For someone acting so smug you don't even realise you're conflating two separate sentences:

1. Besides subs are good for removing and flushing out back campers.

2. Especially somewhat stationary hiding behind islands ships like radar cruisers

1. is about "Back campers", including nose camping BBs hugging islands, CVs and HE spamming cruisers using islands for cover.

2. is about radar cruisers, many of which sit in support distance somewhere between behind-the-cap islands, where they're hard to approach for other ships, but make it impossible to approach safely or engage in duels as a smoke dependent DD without having to retreat, relocate or stay further away. It can be overcome, but I'd rather face a sub. Much easier.

Radar basically destroyed high tier close range ambushing as you can't approach an entire flank with a flanking and ambushing moves until it's destroyed. As I like to play DDs very aggressive and frontline ambush style, I have issues with radar ships if there's a number of them, forcing me to sit back further for longer, wait for them to be spotted, often relocate and being offensively relatively neutered, until a path is cleared. That's not to say I can't play under these conditions, it's just not very fun that someone halfway to the other half of the map can expose your stealth approach (which is relatively hard work to do unnoticed by enemy DDs and CVs) by the press of a button regardless of objects in between. And when there's four or five of them on the other side and few if any on yours, well, good luck with that.

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Again, because you're a slightly above average player fighting potato subs.
Whether or not you can kill red to yellow stat subs as a slightly above average DD is completely irrelevant to how they upset the intra-class balance on a more serious level.

Noone is arguing that you cannot ever kill a random potato sub, the problem arises in how they disrupt the game and neuter other classes on a high level.

Let's cut this up in a few bits.

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Noone is arguing that you cannot ever kill a random potato sub,

This is an outright lie (and moving the goalpost).

There's lots of these people who claim you have no defenses against subs. Many claim you can't engage them once they're underwater. Can't track them. Can't kill them with Dutch cruisers...

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Again, because you're a slightly above average player fighting potato subs.

The player level of the sub doesn't matter. I don't let them engage where they'd prefer to engage in the way they want to engage. Whether it's a good or bad player doesn't matter. You assume I fight potato subs only, which is frankly an insulting True Scotsman argument.

People like you can't stand the idea that their notion of unicum sub player impunity is false, simply because you yourself can't handle it.

From where I stand you mostly don't want to accept that you're not good enough at something. You want to think of yourself as being at the peak of gaming and if even you can't handle it then nobody can. Maybe you don't admit this to yourself, but the notion that I can handle it offends you to the core. I wonder why?

Hence people like you are inclined to argue "but you only fought bad players, you would have no defense against a True Sub Player", because this upholds your self-image for when you're beaten by a sub.

Except that I do take such subs on and win. They too are on timers before they have to surface, they can't magically replenish it. They can't steer harder than others. They too can't fire through islands. They can't magically get torps on target that have been dodged. They can't magically relocate to a better position in a certain time frame. They too can't see through islands. They too can't dodge well aimed ASW once detected. They too take damage from HE. They are limited, they're just better at picking unaware and naive targets at proper interception locations than bad sub players. But all the same restrictions apply.

I have encountered unicum and high WR players in subs who die just as easily as others. Often they didn't even see it coming... They're not that different to engage, their positioning and patience is just a bit better.

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Whether or not you can kill red to yellow stat subs as a slightly above average DD is completely irrelevant to how they upset the intra-class balance on a more serious level.

[...] the problem arises in how they disrupt the game and neuter other classes on a high level.

Except that they don't really do so more than a well played stealth DD (aside from the repair interference - which can be mitigated, I rarely need to repair and let a sonar ping stay on).

A Shikishima, Black or Yamagiri in the hands of an unicum is far more dangerous than a top level sub in the hands of an unicum.

Cuddly_Spider · December 9, 2022

On 12/5/2022 at 3:53 AM, El2aZeR said:

Needless to say because of the pathetic aoe and long approach times you will typically only hit potato subs with predictive drops even if it is somewhat accurate as they are fairly easily outmaneuvered.

Submerged subs are slow as hell and the splash damage area of a depth charge, as far as I know, is 800m *radius*.

Let me repeat, 800m RADIUS.

A single depth charge (not an entire bombing run, but one single barrel) covers an area of 2km^2.

If you just get *touched* by that blast it knocks out modules most of the time, which can render the sub harmless.

Submarines can be countered. You're just not doing it right.

OldschoolGaming_YouTube · December 9, 2022

Lately if I encounter a sub on my flank in a BB I just try and disengage and try to flee to the other side of the map rendering my BB and my skill mostly useless to my team for a majority of the time, just hoping that he wont follow me. Reason for this is after playing subs for a while I understand how hilarious useless any "counters" or ASW "weapons" really is. I just laugh at them when playing in a sub when BBs and some cruisers time after time try and send their airdropped ASW at the "marked ping location" while im already long way gone from that place.

You probably have better chance at hitting a sub dropping anywhere on the map EXEPT for where the game tells you to do so.

Any chance to actually hit or counter a sub is if he is a glue eater that either sits still in one spot while throwing pings at multiple targets OR if he used up all his battery to go from the base (because subs must sail at the bottom at all times, right?)and now have nothing left so he must surface 4 km away from you. The "Battery balancing" is also a joke. If I wanna go to enemy spawn to harass the enemy BBs I just go in a straight line, if I encounter a enemy DD on the way I spot him first (my team opens up on hit) when Im close to getting spotted myself I just drop to periscope depth and continue straight on, if he still gets in my way (spotted for my team) I just go under the surface and engage my battery saving consumable (German sub) and just sail all the way to their spawn where I surface and start my work hunting the camping BBs.

Usually, I just go 2,2 km away from their hull and blast them with non-homing torps at periscope depth. They panic and cant understand where the torps came from (since they dont see me 2,2 km away...?!) so they just hip fire ASW way of in the distance and I can just wait for my reload and repeat.

Usually, I end my games after 17-20 min with 4-5 min battery time left.

Figment · December 9, 2022

2 hours ago, OldschoolGaming_YouTube said:

Lately if I encounter a sub on my flank in a BB I just try and disengage and try to flee to the other side of the map rendering my BB and my skill mostly useless to my team for a majority of the time, just hoping that he wont follow me. Reason for this is after playing subs for a while I understand how hilarious useless any "counters" or ASW "weapons" really is. I just laugh at them when playing in a sub when BBs and some cruisers time after time try and send their airdropped ASW at the "marked ping location" while im already long way gone from that place.

Okay, so two things here:

1. The people throwing ASW at you aim in the wrong place because they aim at your last known position without leading the target at all. You know this as you laugh at them.

2. Your conclusion is RUN AWAY, rather than take "educated guess aim" by extrapolating where you would have moved after pinging.

Basically, you've learned absolutely nothing from the observations you've made. :/ That's... well... a self-admitted incapacity to learn?

Why don't you relate where you were at the time of ASW being dropped to where the ripple was that they targeted?

I don't target on top of the ripple itself. Lots of players do, but like you I observed that this is useless, because in 10-15s you'll have moved. Hence I wait for a second ripple. It's amazing that you're so close to learning something and then just go "haha it's impossible". I mean, wow. That's like you argueing "hey I'm in smoke and fired and I moved a bit and they missed me for they fired at where I used to be, so clearly, when I encounter an enemy in smoke, I'll never try to lead and just run instead".

If I'd done that I'd have never gotten hundreds of citadel hits on Fijis and Minos. Instead, I take an educated guess on where the target will be by the time it drops.

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You probably have better chance at hitting a sub dropping anywhere on the map EXEPT for where the game tells you to do so.

The game does NOT tell you to drop there.

It tells you where the sub more or less is at the time of pinging (it's actually a little behind the swirly line and likely at speed).

It also tells you that the ASW drop will take a certain amount of time to arrive and sink, before it will explode.

What the game tells you is: use this swirl and extrapolate 10-15s from there.

In fact, the game has more ways to tell you more accurately. If a second swirl or oil spill is visible, this makes it very easy to do, since the oil spills are a standard time spacing apart and the line of spills is pretty clear, giving you a good sense of direction and speed and with the map information this provides you with a likely destination or maneouvre intend. Now, if swirls stay in the same spot, it means the sub is in the same spot.

If there's a difference between swirly spots, the sub is moving. Extrapolate like in smoke to find its next likely location. Use two drops to widen the area.

So what the game tells you to do is that you should extrapolate and aim ahead of it. That you havn't figured this out is on you, because it's as basic as leading a shot, just under water.

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Any chance to actually hit or counter a sub is if he is a glue eater that either sits still in one spot while throwing pings at multiple targets OR if he used up all his battery to go from the base (because subs must sail at the bottom at all times, right?)and now have nothing left so he must surface 4 km away from you.

Or you learned to extrapolate a target based on your own experience as a sub player... But hey...

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The "Battery balancing" is also a joke. If I wanna go to enemy spawn to harass the enemy BBs I just go in a straight line, if I encounter a enemy DD on the way I spot him first (my team opens up on hit) when Im close to getting spotted myself I just drop to periscope depth and continue straight on, if he still gets in my way (spotted for my team) I just go under the surface and engage my battery saving consumable (German sub) and just sail all the way to their spawn where I surface and start my work hunting the camping BBs.

German sub has the battery preservation, by default twice, which saves about half a minute of dive time.

Whether or not your team opens up on the DD depends on two things:

1. Your team actually moved in close enough after you (honestly, kinda unlikely especially at higher tiers).

2. The DD is naief and stayed in the open water and in front of you.

If the DD is not naief, it would first of all know there's a potential for a sub being out there. So if it's anywhere in a place where it can be open to enemy fire due to being spotted prior to knowing where abouts the sub is, then that's on the DD player for exposing itself needlessly long. If you go past the DD and the DD was smart, while you're close to the enemy spawn (and thus isolated) you'll become a much easier target for that DD. It will backtrack and kill you with ease. Especially if you opened up on a BB with lots of ships with ASW around. You'll not be able to recover diving time and will eventually emerge in the middle of the enemy team, dieing.

But sure, if the enemy makes positioning mistakes... That's on them.

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Usually, I just go 2,2 km away from their hull and blast them with non-homing torps at periscope depth. They panic and cant understand where the torps came from (since they dont see me 2,2 km away...?!) so they just hip fire ASW way of in the distance and I can just wait for my reload and repeat.

Usually, I end my games after 17-20 min with 4-5 min battery time left.

So that should net you loads of damage and kills, every single match on many targets, right?

Your subs:

T6:

U-69: 40K av. damage, 52% WR, 13 matches, 9/13 kills/match, 9/13 survived, 18K av. spot damage

U-69 (old), 36K av. damage, 50% WR, 4 matches, 6/4 kills/match, 4/4 survived, 11.5K av. spot damage

Cachalot (old): 22K av damage, 56% WR, 9 matches, 5/9 kills/match, 12.5K av. spot damage

Random sample DD T6 of yours:

Icarus: 48K av. damage, 75% WR, 12 matches, 18/12 kills/match, 7/12 survived, 13K av spot damage

So T6 DDs are OP is what you're saying?

T8:

U-190: 28K av. damage, 100%, 3 matches, 4/3 kills/match, 2/3 survived, 20K av. spot damage

U-190 (old): 48K av. damage, 100% 2 matches, 2/2 kills/match, 43K av. spot damage

Salmon: 0K av. damage, 0% WR, 1 match, 0/1 kills/match, 0/1 survived, 1123 av. spot damage

Random sample DD T8 of yours:

Benson: 34K av damage, 59% WR, 75 matches, 64/75 kills/match, 36/75 survived, 47K av. spotting damage

Not sure if 6 matches are able to tell a story, other than that it doesn't seem too off.

T10:

U-2501: 31K av damage, 66,67% WR, 15 matches, 3/15 kills/match, 7/15 survived, 46K av. spot damage

U-2501 (old): 29K av damage, 71% WR, 7 matches, 1/7 k/m, 5/7 survived, 46K av. spot damage

Balao (old): 37K av. damage, 18 matches, 72% WR, 10/18 kills/match, 52K av. spot damage

Random sample DD T10 of yours:

Shimakaze: 65K av. damage, 56% WR, 354 matches, 443/365 kills/match, 169/354 survived, 37K av. spot damage

So according to you, T10 stealth DDs are massively OP compared to subs?

Is that to be dubbed impressive? I mean the WR are there, but in all honesty I kinda doubt it was down to you with these statistics, though you might argue you broke a flank and then got stuck in limbo due to lack of relocation capacity (despite the high speed, right?).

You don't seem to do that much spotting damage and the higher you get the higher the ratio of spotting damage over dealing damage becomes.

Hence I think you're exagerating your results greatly and impact in terms of "there's nothing they can do against my immortal killing machine!!!11!!". Instead, your stats tell a story of how average or even below average subs are in terms of combat power. All in all it sounds like you learned very little playing subs and have a very hard time putting them in perspective.

Deckeru_Maiku · December 9, 2022

22 hours ago, Figment said:

TLDR: I don't have any problems with subs, so IDGAF about the majority of bad players who do have problems and about what it means to the game overall

yes, exactly the answer I expected.

Pukovnik7 · December 10, 2022

@Figment

So instead of playing against submarines only, I started playing submarines as well. It is more of what I remember from the test server: repetitive, boring gameplay. More importantly, very little risk so long as you don't misposition.

Anyway, preliminary observations:

submarine can do 20 knots underwater, so I was basically under no threat from majority of Tier VI and lower battleships
even so, I kept primarily on the surface, using diving time only as an escape mechanism
I can easily see a destroyer coming, so not much threat there so long as I keep an eye out; even if it is one of stealthy DDs, I can easily dive and evade
airstrike can be seen from afar and can be easily evaded, especially if submarine is on surface
- ability to ping in 360 circle is overpowered; if I sail side-on at the target and ping, ASW strike and any sort of return fire will miss as most people assume pinging is done in the direction of movement (due to torpedo tubes being on bow and stern). "Leading the target" is irrelevant.
- I can easily play "peek a boo" with ASW drops by pinging, pinging again, and then changing the direction of movement so that ASW drop will miss. Most I ever got was moderate damage.
literally the only threat are the islands and the concentrated masses of ASW-airstrike capable ships; destroyers would be dangerous but they cannot reach me for fear of being shot up. Enemy submarines are also a moderate threat.
submarine does not nead to do damage to literally collapse the entire enemy flank:
- just staying on surface and spotting targets is a very effective strategy
- even only pinging will keep enemy surface ships away, in some cases even pushing them to the border
- for submarine, pings are more important weapons than torpedoes
- using damage to extrapolate how dangerous submarines are is completely worthless

So this:

On 12/9/2022 at 1:21 PM, Figment said:

So according to you, T10 stealth DDs are massively OP compared to subs?

Is wrong, and this:

On 12/9/2022 at 1:21 PM, Figment said:

Is that to be dubbed impressive? I mean the WR are there, but in all honesty I kinda doubt it was down to you with these statistics, though you might argue you broke a flank and then got stuck in limbo due to lack of relocation capacity (despite the high speed, right?).

Is correct.

Lack of damage, in my experience of playing the sub so far, is mostly due to enemy ships simply running away. When enemies run away, destroyer can either chase and flank them, or farm damage with guns. Submarine can do neither, most of the time. But relying on damage to extrapolate influence that submarine has on the battle is, as I have said, completely useless.

Figment · December 10, 2022

On 12/9/2022 at 8:13 PM, Deckeru_Maiku said:

yes, exactly the answer I expected.

And yet not the answer I gave. But then you're incapable of reading and context comprehension for years now.

Figment · December 10, 2022

9 hours ago, Pukovnik7 said:

@Figment

So instead of playing against submarines only, I started playing submarines as well. It is more of what I remember from the test server: repetitive, boring gameplay. More importantly, very little risk so long as you don't misposition.

Anyway, preliminary observations:

submarine can do 20 knots underwater, so I was basically under no threat from majority of Tier VI and lower battleships

Question? Why would they need speed? They got range. All they need is range over you and a sub getting spotted in an area. :/ I've killed about 3 subs with Kongo, 5 with US T4 BBs, a couple with the new Brits and a couple more with Russian and Italian low tiers and I rarely play any of those... Position close to the front is important, doing the spotting yourself is not really the goal. Noticing chokepoints and its targets however is. Providing close support to DDs is as well.

The boring gameplay I agree. The cat and mouse bits need to be much more intense and likely to occur. That requires more intuitive and less dangerous tactics in approaching subs. As you can do it as is, but it takes more skill and knowledge than the average player has in their standard package. It's not necessarily hard to learn skills, but the combination of information gathering and timing and knowledge of game mechanics and reading the enemy takes experience.

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even so, I kept primarily on the surface, using diving time only as an escape mechanism

I can easily see a destroyer coming, so not much threat there so long as I keep an eye out; even if it is one of stealthy DDs, I can easily dive and evade

Situationally agreed, but that depends on the sub in question as well. Some have 6.4+ surface detection, so that's not the same. Dive and evade is dependent on having an escape route as well. It's not a foregone conclusion you can get away if the sub hunter catches you with your pants down and the airborne ASW in the area is alert. Those ships you mention above CAN devastate you with 4 + ASW strikes with ease as only a few need to hit.

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airstrike can be seen from afar and can be easily evaded, especially if submarine is on surface
ability to ping in 360 circle is overpowered; if I sail side-on at the target and ping, ASW strike and any sort of return fire will miss as most people assume pinging is done in the direction of movement (due to torpedo tubes being on bow and stern). "Leading the target" is irrelevant.

Agreed on the ASW that it's commonly evaded for light damage only, if it's improperly lead and the sub is not actively spotted at any point, they're not a big threat. Not irrelevant, if you force multi-pings the direction becomes known. Hence I don't drop on the first swirl as it gives no sense of orientation. If torps come from a different direction than the ping this gives a sense of direction though.

However, with changes I propose in terms of range of torps, deep water torps, reduction of situational awareness and decreasing concealment over time within the vicinity of ships, you wouldn't need to be an expert sub hunter to deal with subs. People like Deckeru always read over those posts, being the biased people they are. He doesn't comprehend I'm not advocating for subs as is, but the premise of subs and the overhyping that the status quo is completely impossible to deal with, which it is not. As I've frequently said though, it's too hard for the less situational aware, it's frequently counter intuitive on how you play against them if you have next to no experience with them and DDs in particular are too vulnerable.

The changes I propose should also increase adrenaline rush from cat and mouse, I'd have vulnerable ballast tanks, chance of hull breaches from compression at max depth (especially when damaged) and oxygen tank damage.

Running a sub would take a lot more management and considerations than it does now.

However, that doesn't take away that they're easily dismissed as is if you pay attention.

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I can easily play "peek a boo" with ASW drops by pinging, pinging again, and then changing the direction of movement so that ASW drop will miss. Most I ever got was moderate damage.

From most poor players yes, as said before, people don't learn to think like a sub and the swirl is seen as a target to fire at directly, which means most will miss as they don't even try to lead. You'll do better in the future knowing what you do yourself to avoid drops.

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literally the only threat are the islands and the concentrated masses of ASW-airstrike capable ships; destroyers would be dangerous but they cannot reach me for fear of being shot up. Enemy submarines are also a moderate threat.

submarine does not nead to do damage to literally collapse the entire enemy flank:
just staying on surface and spotting targets is a very effective strategy

That's true for DDs as well, they just do it better IMO as they have better situational awareness, lateral torp drop options and IMO better maneouvrability.

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even only pinging will keep enemy surface ships away, in some cases even pushing them to the border

Yeah people are dumb, who knew? The fun thing is they stay in open water too, where you can keep pinging them with ease... If they used islands you can't actually lead the ping on them and even if you'd hit them, the torps would hit the island. Very sad the level of thought people put into these things.

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for submarine, pings are more important weapons than torpedoes

using damage to extrapolate how dangerous submarines are is completely worthless

The psychological warfare is only effective if the player is unaware of the sub's actual capacity to strike and they're therefore easily spooked. The ping is not an important weapon against me, instead, it provides me with the intel I need to counter. But yes, pinging targets you're not going to strike may cause premature repairs. But HE is no different to these players in that respect. If people press R too early, they'll do this in any circumstance against any threat. :/

I blame WG for not providing good instructions and tips in the loading screen for a lot of this insufficient basic knowledge.

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So this:

Is wrong, and this:

Is correct.

Both are corrrect. DDs can do the same thing, only do more damage and more spotting damage on average. They too have psychological deterrence, though less as people are more familiar with them. Subs will become less scary over time as people learn to deal with them, so that effect will diminish. For now, there's a lot of needless and senseless fear that makes players do stupid things. :/ Thing is, a DD that broke a flank can continue to support another flank. Subs rarely can. Hence DDs are the better unit IMO.

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Lack of damage, in my experience of playing the sub so far, is mostly due to enemy ships simply running away. When enemies run away, destroyer can either chase and flank them, or farm damage with guns. Submarine can do neither, most of the time. But relying on damage to extrapolate influence that submarine has on the battle is, as I have said, completely useless.

No, it's not. It's one indicator.

As I also showed you from your own stats, a DD is much better at finishing off targets than subs. The HE/AP option it has at range and from safety over hills is far more reliable, more damaging, longer range and way faster than sub torps.

Ultimately, though the subs are niche specialists. They have to do something well.

Sumbarine counterplay.

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