If You're Looking for Submarine Gameplay...

[sulghunter331]

As the title says, if you feel like playing around in a submarine where would you go to satisfy your sub-aquatic itch?

[puckhead77]

Cold Waters is great but different era. Cant wait for Sea Power to come out.

[CatinHat]

you forgot navyfield

 

[sulghunter331]

3 minutes ago, puckhead77 said:

Cold Waters is great but different era. Cant wait for Sea Power to come out.

I included Cold Waters because the game play the devs are hashing out for the subs in WoWS is more like what one would see in Cold Waters than in Silent Hunter.

[Navalpride33]

Subnautica for me...

Its one of those games I really enjoyed to play... Its a classic in the making,

[Taylor3006]

None of the above. I just get into power armor and hop into the water in/around the Commonwealth when I want underwater fun. 

[shinytrashcan]

Well, I played both Silent Hunter 3 and 4 quite excessively in the past before switching to Dangerous Waters. Lately though, from the list I have played mostly Subnautica.

[Valas1]

Silent Hunter, Wolves of  the Pacific. Although I haven't touched it for awhile. I have zero interest in the abomination that is coming.

[Lynx7386]

I was a big fan of silent hunter 3/4 back in the day, never played the latest one.  I've tried Uboat in early access on steam as well and I love the detail and how you can go into 1st person and tour the sub, feels like you're almost there.

However, all of those games suffer from the same problem:  They try to be a little too realistic when it comes to combat/encounters, in that you hardly ever see another ship to shoot at on your patrols.  They end up becoming a game of watching the world map in 5x time compression just waiting for something to happen.  Not to say that isn't realistic (well, sans the fast forward), but it isn't very fun or engaging until you actually find something to attack.

I also played sub command back in the day, which seems to be the predecessor to cold waters, though I havent tried that one yet.  It's modern era so there's a lot more missiles/long range homing torpedoes and not much depth charge suspense going on.


Needless to say I'm a submarine fanatic, and I'm less than thrilled with how wargaming is handling them on test.  I'm happy they went back on not being able to recharge dive capacity, but this latest change with their vision/spotting distance is really, really bad, it essentially makes them blind, and if that's going to be the case they should receive spotting info from allies even while underwater.  Wargaming is achieving neither realism nor enjoyability with the changes they're making to submarine gameplay, and in the end I fear it's going to make subs either useless, a burden on the team, or just not fun to play, or a mix of all three.  I'm not a fan of homing torpedoes either, or the ping mechanic, but with the current state submarines are in those things are damn near necessary just to give them the ability to deal damage at all.  I can't imagine trying to play subs with dumbfire torps and all these other artificial obstacles they've been stuck with.

Ideally, I'd like to see something along these lines for subs in WoWS, based on where they are now:

• The "aircraft spotting distance" they've given subs should only apply when at periscope depth
• Submarines should still have better surface concealment than destroyers of equal tier, advanced warning of an enemy ship is necessary to dive on time and approach for combat
• Snorkel should be added as an equipment option, and allow the sub to remain at periscope depth without using dive capacity, or even recharging it.
• The ping mechanic should go away entirely.
• Subs should have 3 ammunition options on keys 1-2-3:
  • 1. Acoustic Homing Torpedoes: low range (5-8k), low damage (the current 3-6k damage non-citadel sub torps have), high chance to disable systems, no ping mechanic, will travel along a straight path until they get within a radius (1-2km) of an enemy ship, then lock onto its propeller sound and turn towards it.  These are basically the submarine's main batteries and a way of dealing consistent damage to even dodgy ships.  Torpedo agility and homing strength should be high, but damage per torpedo is low with a fast reload time.
  • 2. Standard Torpedoes: dumbfire/straight line only, medium range (6-10k), work just like destroyer torpedoes, decent damage (15-18k), moderate reload speed - should still be faster than DD reloads since subs have no other armaments available.
  • 3. Deepwater Torpedoes: Dumbfire/straight line only, long range (10-20k), can only hit Battleships/Carriers, hard to detect, longer reload times, high chance to cause flooding.

I think having the torpedo options like that would really help submarines have choices of engagement.  If you're dealing with a squirmy destroyer or a light cruiser, it might be best to stick to the acoustic homing torpedoes where you can deal relatively assured damage and disable a lot of systems.  If you're going up against medium targets (CL's/CA's, supercruisers or even light battleships) you go with the standard torpedoes for more damage if you can get a good aim on them.  If you're dealing with large/slow targets (BB's and CV's) you go with deepwater torps to cause the most flooding, highest damage, and have the longest range.  It also means the homing torpedoes aren't reliant on some ping mechanic that doesn't make any historical sense whatsoever, but rather work more like they actually did, by passively homing in on a target's acoustic signature - it also means you have to aim the torpedo and get it relatively close to the target for the homing to activate, so it's easier to hit with but not a sure thing, and that gets around the stupid DCP immunity to pings as well.

 

 

[Telastyn]

Voted bacon. But give me the old Silent Service game. Enemies cheat too much in Silent Hunter.

[Rolkatsuki]

I went to Warships Beta and Le Bote on Roblox if I wanted naval combat with Submarines

[Rollingonit]

Single player - The original Silent Hunter, only 1 I played

Mulitplayer - I suppose it's WoWs, but I dont intend to play them.

[tcbaker777]

i cant vote because im stuck between all but WOWS, theyre all great, dont own any of them, but ive seen gameplay of them 

[Laser_Beam]

How submarine gamplay works

1. Drop a load in the head
2. See what floats and what doesn't
3. Realise it's all just crap
4. Flush

 

OMG - why hasn't this mode load been flushed away already?

[Acme1970]

I still play Silent Hunter 3 and 4 on Steam

[LunchCutter]

1 hour ago, Valas1 said:

Silent Hunter, Wolves of  the Pacific. Although I haven't touched it for awhile. I have zero interest in the abomination that is coming.

Spent way to long playing that excellent game with dozens of excellent mods. 

 

 Strange how if a enemy warship shows up in Silent Hunter, you run. Sometimes you could successfully engage a escort or even sneak into a task force and attack a capital ship. Most of the time it was just playing the survival game..

[YouSatInGum]

1 hour ago, Lynx7386 said:

• Submarines should still have better surface concealment than destroyers of equal tier, advanced warning of an enemy ship is necessary to dive on time and approach for combat

 

 

That would break the game for DDs.  Subs will just camp at caps and/or div with something that can smoke up.  DD mortality would go up significantly and you'd see people start to camp instead of pushing objectives...even more than they do now.

[Lynx7386]

41 minutes ago, YouSatInGum said:

That would break the game for DDs.  Subs will just camp at caps and/or div with something that can smoke up.  DD mortality would go up significantly and you'd see people start to camp instead of pushing objectives...even more than they do now.

Subs are slower than DD's, it wouldn't be an issue.

The problem right now is that a DD can see a sub before a sub can see a DD.  WG wants subs to be on the surface until they need to get into combat, and then dive - but if you're spotted before you ever get a chance to dive, you lose the element of surprise/ambush, which is what submarines are all about.  Real-world, subs are hard to spot because they're very low to the water with a very small conning tower; their silhouette is tiny compared to even the smallest destroyers, and that meant that they could spot another surface ship at range and dive to periscope depth where they were essentially invisible in order to carry out an attack.  Without that advantage, you have destroyers knowing where subs are right away, and being able to plow towards them at max speed, get into their concealment radius even when submerged, and depth charge the hell out of them - and there's no counterplay from the sub at that point.
Ideally, when a sub is going up against a DD without any interference from other ships, the sub should spot the DD first and dive before the DD knows the sub is there.  The fact that the DD has been detected alerts him to a submarine being nearby, at which point he can use hydro and seek out the submarine to depth charge.  Both sides have play and counterplay in that scenario.

 

 

45 minutes ago, LunchCutter said:

Spent way to long playing that excellent game with dozens of excellent mods. 

 

 Strange how if a enemy warship shows up in Silent Hunter, you run. Sometimes you could successfully engage a escort or even sneak into a task force and attack a capital ship. Most of the time it was just playing the survival game..

That's because in the atlantic theater, generally submarines were being used to attack shipping/commerce rather than warships.  It was a smarter move to avoid warships when possible - though, personally, I tended to hit the escorts first and then make easy pickings of the cargo vessels.  In the pacific theater, subs were used to deal with enemy carriers and military assets much more often.

 

 

1 hour ago, Laser_Beam said:

How submarine gamplay works

1. Drop a load in the head
2. See what floats and what doesn't
3. Realise it's all just crap
4. Flush

 

OMG - why hasn't this mode load been flushed away already?

Carriers shouldn't have been introduced either, but look what we're dealing with from them.  WG wasn't content with rock, paper, scissors - they had to add lizard, and now they're adding spock.

[capncrunch21]

The War on the Sea game has pretty fun play with subs (and all other ships) - WAY better than WeeGee's 'ping' disaster of a model.

Check it out: https://youtu.be/PtuXYOZ7AHQ?t=973

[Valas1]

2 hours ago, LunchCutter said:

Spent way to long playing that excellent game with dozens of excellent mods. 

 

 Strange how if a enemy warship shows up in Silent Hunter, you run. Sometimes you could successfully engage a escort or even sneak into a task force and attack a capital ship. Most of the time it was just playing the survival game..

I used to like to start a new game in the Philippines and hang around the NW side of the island. The historical Japanese Invasion fleet, would show up and anchor close by, and I would see how many ships I could sink while running away. Really challenging in an old S class. The is a brief amount of time, the transports aren't moving, and if I remember right, a couple of heavy cruisers.  You have a few "sentry" DD's and DE's roaming. It's been so long, I can't recall if there were any BB's.

I liked how the game included several historical battles. So if you were in the right place, at the right time, you could participate in them. 

[xHeavy]

The last one is silent hunter 5 I think it was. Mostly fast forward waiting for something to happen.

Ive played sub and naval games since Amiga Computer days. Which was 35 years ago. I dabbled in subs in wows test run and found it to have too many issues. I have zero interest in subs in wows.

Most of the time it was simulations. takes a little time to run. There are other games such as Sea Power coming out that I will probably get involved in.

[LunchCutter]

40 minutes ago, Valas1 said:

I used to like to start a new game in the Philippines and hang around the NW side of the island. The historical Japanese Invasion fleet, would show up and anchor close by, and I would see how many ships I could sink while running away. Really challenging in an old S class. The is a brief amount of time, the transports aren't moving, and if I remember right, a couple of heavy cruisers.  You have a few "sentry" DD's and DE's roaming. It's been so long, I can't recall if there were any BB's.

I liked how the game included several historical battles. So if you were in the right place, at the right time, you could participate in them. 

I remember randomly stumbling upon a huge Japanese task force in the middle of the Pacific at midnight. Snuck under destroyer screen, sunk a heavy cruiser (blew up in 1 hit) a light cruiser, a light carrier and disabled a Kongo Battleship all with 6 Torps🙂🙂

[HazeGrayUnderway]

The last dedicated submarine game I ever played was 688 Attack Sub on my Sega Genesis.  I don't have it anymore, but some searches yielded this stuff about it:

What was different about it to me as a kid at the time, was that not only could you play as a Los Angeles-class submarine, but you also could do a campaign as a Soviet Alfa-class.  The game had voiceovers as best as the Genesis could do, but it blew my mind that when you played as the Russian submarine, you heard the characters speaking Russian.

 

My dad got me the game on his way home from work one day and figured I'd somehow enjoy it, which I did.  It was very difficult, especially since the only thing I knew about submarines was from watching old black and white WWII movies.  Modern submarine warfare was completely different.  I remember my friends questioning what I saw in this game to enjoy it so much, especially since it was difficult.

My dad also got me M1 Tank Platoon for the Genesis also, another odd game for consoles that I enjoyed.

 

[Wolfswetpaws]

Silent Service and Red Storm Rising were interesting and educational Submarine simulation games.
They're not listed.  So ....

[Navalpride33]

6 hours ago, HazeGrayUnderway said:

The last dedicated submarine game I ever played was 688 Attack Sub on my Sega Genesis.  I don't have it anymore, but some searches yielded this stuff about it:

What was different about it to me as a kid at the time, was that not only could you play as a Los Angeles-class submarine, but you also could do a campaign as a Soviet Alfa-class.  The game had voiceovers as best as the Genesis could do, but it blew my mind that when you played as the Russian submarine, you heard the characters speaking Russian.

 

My dad got me the game on his way home from work one day and figured I'd somehow enjoy it, which I did.  It was very difficult, especially since the only thing I knew about submarines was from watching old black and white WWII movies.  Modern submarine warfare was completely different.  I remember my friends questioning what I saw in this game to enjoy it so much, especially since it was difficult.

My dad also got me M1 Tank Platoon for the Genesis also, another odd game for consoles that I enjoyed.

 

 Speaking of old GENESIS games... I loved the old "IRON STORM" game for the SATURN... The subs in the game were awesome.