ASW

[Revthought]

Greetings! So I am about to embark on my first PBEM game (maybe) and I've been training myself by, ofc, playing the campaign AI. One thing that I noticed I'm terrible at is ASW. For example, no matter how many ASW TFs I seem to have patrolling, I've noticed that Pearl Harbor is always crawling with Japanese submarines.

This has culminated in the Enterprise eating a torpedo and being knocked out for 303 days (ugh). So I thought I'd ask here about best practices on how to deal with submarines.

[HansBolter]

Your personal experience depends heavily on how far into the game you played.

Allied Naval ASW assets have very low ASW ratings (these upgrade over the course of the war) and very low crew experience.

It will be months before daily patrolling starts bringing concrete results.

Couple your naval ASW patrols with air naval search and vector your surface TFs to spotted sub locations.

Patrol in patterns around spotted sub locations with a reaction range (it does work for ASW TFs).

IN addition start training for and actively patrolling with air ASW platforms.

Again, it will be months before you see concrete results. ASW skill has to get to 60-65 before you will start getting regular reports of attacks and hits.

You have to keep in perspective how unprepared and untrained the Allied forces were when the war started.

The game models this exceedingly well.

[Revthought]

ORIGINAL: HansBolter

Your personal experience depends heavily on how far into the game you played.

Allied Naval ASW assets have very low ASW ratings (these upgrade over the course of the war) and very low crew experience.

It will be months before daily patrolling starts bringing concrete results.

Couple your naval ASW patrols with air naval search and vector your surface TFs to spotted sub locations.

Patrol in patterns around spotted sub locations with a reaction range (it does work for ASW TFs).

IN addition start training for and actively patrolling with air ASW platforms.

Again, it will be months before you see concrete results. ASW skill has to get to 60-65 before you will start getting regular reports of attacks and hits.

You have to keep in perspective how unprepared and untrained the Allied forces were when the war started.

The game models this exceedingly well.

I have been doing this largely; however, I haven't gone past February 1942, so this explains why I have had so little success. I do have a follow up question, if I set up ASW forces to patrol and set their reaction to something greater than zero, will they actually react to submarine contacts?

[kaleun]

I have been doing this largely; however, I haven't gone past February 1942, so this explains why I have had so little success. I do have a follow up question, if I set up ASW forces to patrol and set their reaction to something greater than zero, will they actually react to submarine contacts?

Mine do. They still don't actually hit anything, but I'm sure they force the enemy skippers to break out the depth charge medicine (Sake in heir case)

[HansBolter]

They do indeed react.

It can easily be April or May before you start seeing any success and well into late summer or early fall before you start getting regular attacks and hits.

Takes time to build up naval crew experience and getting aerial ASW experience to 65 or better.

[DanSez]

The success off ASW efforts depends on training your land based air units.
The number of planes, range and altitude settings are critical.
Having one unit of 12 planes going 6 hexes at 5k with low skilled pilots will probably get you some ghost sightings at best.

Land Based ASW Bomber Squadron:
NOTE: Range is half the hexes set for ASW
Normal setting
ASW 40%
TRAINING 30%
REST 30%
High Threat setting
ASW 60%
Traning 20%
Rest 20%

Better to have 3 units of 12 planes going 4 hexes (Range would be set at 8) at various altitudes (4k, 2k, 1k).

Point is:
The more you have the better and numbers of planes will help you against the low skills odds.
Don't forget in a high threat area, to add a Night Naval Search squadron at low altitude (2k).

Finally, did you do your due diligence?
Did you watch the combat reports before the turn you moved your carriers from port?
Did you check your combat and intel reports for any sightings (ghost or solid)
-or-
Did you just look at the map and didn't see any enemy units and assumed none were there?
Hey, I have been there and getting sucker punched by some sneaking sub really sucks. Lessons are to be learned.

For a high valued target like a carrier group, running out of a port that I suspect have heavy subs packs lurking about, I would take extreme precautions like this:

Create a 3 ship ASW TF and have it lead the Carrier TF out of the zone.
Set the Carrier TF to follow the ASW TF by 1 hex and set Reaction to 2. Remain On Station. Set Home Port to something near your destination.
And if you have enough assets around create a 3rd ASW TF and have it Follow the carrier TF, Same hex
Be sure to set all your carrier bombers to some level of ASW search.

And I would plot a path that would take your fleet away from any sightings with the way-point function until I got 8-10 hexes from port, then either release the ASW escorts or absorb some of them in the carrier TF and go toward your final destination.

[Pilsator]

setting search arcs in the direction of the suspected subs also helps- Arcs have to be shown black on the map, so the planes will search in both air phases this part of the map. It is esp. important for search/asw Ranges of more than four hexes.

And the effort depends on the Exp/Skill of the pilots and ship crews. Mine start to show effect beginning in April 42. ANd with effect I dont mean that they sink or attack, but at least they detect something. Before April the detection was usually done by AKs ot TKs...[8|]

[dr. smith]

Air ASW really won't be of any early help, your only chance is at sea.
I'm also doing an AI game(just hit April '42), and though I have a mess of ASW air groups, I've gotten zero hits from them and don't expect to.

So ASAP convert your 4 stacker Clemson class DD into APD. They turn a 66 AA, 2 ASW ship into a ship that has the 2nd highest ASW in the start (6 vs an 8 for some Limey DDs and HDMLs). You don't have any US ship with an ASW > 2 until you convert the Clemsons. I've "maybe" sunk 1 or 2 subs, but have been getting hits on subs. Sending a sub back for repair is as good as sinking since it will take a long time to replace a West Coast I-boat. Your WC Yippies (YP) only serve to help I-boats expend torpedoes.

You start with 24 of Clemsons, important to get the 4 in Philippines out safe. Think (working from an old data dump) you got 5 in Borneo, 4 in Java, 1 in Pearl, 10 in West Coast. You'll need them in 3 areas - WC, Pearl, East Coast Oz (Brisbane). I also use the Canadian KVs to help the Seattle and San Fran areas, think their ASW is 4. PS-just found you start with 1 APD in San Diego, great!

PBEMmers tend to send more to interdict West Coast - Pearl, and more to interdict Australia. The first hoping to nail some hurting heavies as they make their way to the navy yards of Seattle. The Canadian KVs can help cover your banged up TFs on their way to Seattle and SF.

In February some DD's upgrade to an ASW of 6, so that will help protect your CVs. Since the Clemsons don't add much AA after conversion, keep these as sub hunters.

[John B.]

One thing to remember is that the British ships tend to be quite good with ASW even early in the war. They are not near Pearl, alas, but they do get a bonus as I recall while early on IJN ships are just awful, perhaps even worse than the American ones. Things really start to improve for the Americans after the first round of destroyer upgrades in early 42. Make sure you take full advantage of those. Oh, and if you can, save some Dutch destoyers. In 1943 they can upgrade to ASW strengths of 11. No range but good for base patrols.

[Revthought]

ORIGINAL: DanSez


The success off ASW efforts depends on training your land based air units.
The number of planes, range and altitude settings are critical.
Having one unit of 12 planes going 6 hexes at 5k with low skilled pilots will probably get you some ghost sightings at best.

Land Based ASW Bomber Squadron:
NOTE: Range is half the hexes set for ASW
Normal setting
ASW 40%
TRAINING 30%
REST 30%
High Threat setting
ASW 60%
Traning 20%
Rest 20%

Better to have 3 units of 12 planes going 4 hexes (Range would be set at 8) at various altitudes (4k, 2k, 1k).

Point is:
The more you have the better and numbers of planes will help you against the low skills odds.
Don't forget in a high threat area, to add a Night Naval Search squadron at low altitude (2k).

Finally, did you do your due diligence?
Did you watch the combat reports before the turn you moved your carriers from port?
Did you check your combat and intel reports for any sightings (ghost or solid)
-or-
Did you just look at the map and didn't see any enemy units and assumed none were there?
Hey, I have been there and getting sucker punched by some sneaking sub really sucks. Lessons are to be learned.

For a high valued target like a carrier group, running out of a port that I suspect have heavy subs packs lurking about, I would take extreme precautions like this:

Create a 3 ship ASW TF and have it lead the Carrier TF out of the zone.
Set the Carrier TF to follow the ASW TF by 1 hex and set Reaction to 2. Remain On Station. Set Home Port to something near your destination.
And if you have enough assets around create a 3rd ASW TF and have it Follow the carrier TF, Same hex
Be sure to set all your carrier bombers to some level of ASW search.

And I would plot a path that would take your fleet away from any sightings with the way-point function until I got 8-10 hexes from port, then either release the ASW escorts or absorb some of them in the carrier TF and go toward your final destination.

This is great information, thanks! What I had been doing, because air crews at the start of the war are rather novice, is setting the training quite higher. So I will adjust that.

What is the best altitude for ASW missions? I've been defaulting this to somewhere between 1 and 2 thousand feet depending on the airframe.

[leehunt27@bloomberg.net]

Its late 1944 and I'm the Japanese in a PBEM game. Almost 95% of my subs are gone, if it makes you feel any better playing as the Allies. You will get them eventually!!

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: John B.

One thing to remember is that the British ships tend to be quite good with ASW even early in the war. They are not near Pearl, alas, but they do get a bonus as I recall while early on IJN ships are just awful, perhaps even worse than the American ones. Things really start to improve for the Americans after the first round of destroyer upgrades in early 42. Make sure you take full advantage of those. Oh, and if you can, save some Dutch destoyers. In 1943 they can upgrade to ASW strengths of 11. No range but good for base patrols.

Be careful reading the ASW numbers. An ASW rating of 11 means you have ammo for 11 attacks. It does not tell you how effective those attacks might be. The real effectiveness gauge is the number of devices that can drop ASW weapons. Ships that can lay a big pattern are most likely to get a hit on an squirming sub.

For an example, look at one of the AMs at PH on Dec. 7th - ASW rating 9, one depth charge rack! Then look in the reinforcement queue for a DE in 1943...

[jamesjohns]

Be careful reading the ASW numbers. An ASW rating of 11 means you have ammo for 11 attacks. It does not tell you how effective those attacks might be. The real effectiveness gauge is the number of devices that can drop ASW weapons. Ships that can lay a big pattern are most likely to get a hit on an squirming sub.

For an example, look at one of the AMs at PH on Dec. 7th - ASW rating 9, one depth charge rack! Then look in the reinforcement queue for a DE in 1943...

Thanks BBfanboy, this is interesting. If I understand your comment correctly ASW platforms that have a diversity of ASW weapons systems are more effective. Never really thought about it that way, tended to only just look at the number

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: jamesjohns

Be careful reading the ASW numbers. An ASW rating of 11 means you have ammo for 11 attacks. It does not tell you how effective those attacks might be. The real effectiveness gauge is the number of devices that can drop ASW weapons. Ships that can lay a big pattern are most likely to get a hit on an squirming sub.

For an example, look at one of the AMs at PH on Dec. 7th - ASW rating 9, one depth charge rack! Then look in the reinforcement queue for a DE in 1943...

Thanks BBfanboy, this is interesting. If I understand your comment correctly ASW platforms that have a diversity of ASW weapons systems are more effective. Never really thought about it that way, tended to only just look at the number

Not necessarily diverse, but more launchers in total. For example when units start to get hedgehog or squid launchers, they are generally used on their own to attack ahead of the ship (but with multiple mortar bombs) so the depth charges do not come into play during these attacks. Hedgehog usually has a smaller ammo capacity so it might be able to make only 4 attacks whereas the depth charges can go 6 or more rounds.

Don't be fooled by the limited animation of the ASW attacks - it will show hedgehog going off like a depth charge but it is a contact weapon, not a depth triggered weapon, so it will only get a hit when one of the circle of bombs hits. There should be no "Near miss rattles sub" - that is just random fluff in the animation.

[Ambassador]

Given the heavy traffic between Pearl and San Francisco, I like to check the courses of the TF shuttling between them, and set autonomous ASW TF along the path, at least for the first four or five hexes, along with a squadron devoted to this arc at each node. It seems the highest danger is close to the ports, and the ocean is too vast to effectively patrol for subs everywhere.
But once I have CVEs and more escorts, I put a TF with ASW air wings along the lane too, to clear the path in mid-ocean.

This is against the AI however - I believe a PBEM player would quickly find my sealane...

[John B.]

@BBFanboy, as the ASW numbers get larger I've noticed that the types of weapons used get more diverse such as adding in Hedgehogs so I've always thought it reflected overall capability rather than just a mere tally of the number of host a ship gets. My SCs for example, get better weapons when their number goes up but it does not seem like there are additional rounds of combat that they get.

[BBfanboy]

Rounds of combat fought in a single engagement is a series of dice rolls involving the relative naval skills of the sub and escort commanders, crew experience and aggression ratings.

It is quite common in 1943 for an escort ship to use up all of its ASW ammo in attack after attack. This is what I was referring to about the ASW rating meaning the ammo supply. A higher number means more attacks are possible.

Again, the effectiveness of the attacks depends on the human factors mentioned above plus the number of weapons fired off in each attack. So a ship that has two depth charge racks and two launchers (throwers) on each side will have a better chance than one with only two racks and one launcher on each side.

So if you are trying to decide which is the best ASW vessel to put with at TF, it depends whether you want one with stamina (big magazines) or a short but dangerous capability. A few ships have both.

[DanSez]

ORIGINAL: Revthought

This is great information, thanks! What I had been doing, because air crews at the start of the war are rather novice, is setting the training quite higher. So I will adjust that.

What is the best altitude for ASW missions? I've been defaulting this to somewhere between 1 and 2 thousand feet depending on the airframe.

Setting training to 100% will get those numbers up faster when they are raw replacements, but they won't be doing any work finding the bad guys. Depends on how many units you want to dedicate to ASW. You can have some 'basic training' units set to 100% with raw recruits and then shuffle those pilots into other units which are actually doing split hunting/training. Depends on how much time you want to invest to micro manage pilot placement.

Best ASW altitudes are 4k and under which increase the chances the aircraft will attack the subs they stumble upon. I like to mix layers if I have more than 1 unit operating out of the same base. If it is a single unit, I tend to search at 4k which may give the pilot a little wider coverage area.

Nav Search layered in with ASW, especially night search, at 5k also seems to increase the DL which I believe will help your ships avoid being attacked.

Once your pilots get into the 70's in ASW experience, they become pretty good at killing subs if you put them in the right airframes. Something single engined, relatively slow with a big payload. Remember for most planes, flying low level missions will cut your payload.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

Be careful reading the ASW numbers. An ASW rating of 11 means you have ammo for 11 attacks. It does not tell you how effective those attacks might be. The real effectiveness gauge is the number of devices that can drop ASW weapons. Ships that can lay a big pattern are most likely to get a hit on an squirming sub.

For an example, look at one of the AMs at PH on Dec. 7th - ASW rating 9, one depth charge rack! Then look in the reinforcement queue for a DE in 1943...

I looked at my AMs at PH in a Scen 2 AI game, December 12th. all of them are ASW 1. What is the name of this ASW 9 vessel?

I have never seen any analysis that correlates ASW level to magazine size. Do you have a link? ASW upgrades don't expand the hull.

A 1944 PF and a DE are both ASW 11, yet a PF has Ammo of 20 and the DE Ammo of 4. Each have 11 launchers.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

Not necessarily diverse, but more launchers in total. For example when units start to get hedgehog or squid launchers, they are generally used on their own to attack ahead of the ship (but with multiple mortar bombs) so the depth charges do not come into play during these attacks. Hedgehog usually has a smaller ammo capacity so it might be able to make only 4 attacks whereas the depth charges can go 6 or more rounds.

Don't be fooled by the limited animation of the ASW attacks - it will show hedgehog going off like a depth charge but it is a contact weapon, not a depth triggered weapon, so it will only get a hit when one of the circle of bombs hits. There should be no "Near miss rattles sub" - that is just random fluff in the animation.

It is true that was the way Hedgehogs behaved in RL, but I have never seen a dev discuss that contact-ASW weapons have their own algorithm for contact only, or that there is any forward-firing code. Do you have a link?

Looking at the editor, it appears the mortar-type ASW weapons all have very small effects versus DCs, and much greater ranges. The "Static" box is also checked for the mortars; I don't know what that does. I don't see any way to make a mortar weapon act as a contact fused weapon in the ASW realm of devices.