Chaff Launcher Discussion

Xzanron

Xzanron
Chaff was mentioned as a tool in your arsena; to deal with attackers.

Traditionally Chaff is loads of little particles designed to reflect radar and make the chaff appear to be you by presenting a juicy target.

I think in the "age of lasers" it can function in second way.

What if Chaff were a cloud of millions of small mirrors? Drop chaff behind you and all of a sudden there's this cloud of mirrors that are reflecting laser fire in any old direction.

Until your pursuer burns through enough of the mirrors to hit you again will take a second or two, and might give you enough time to think or help your shields recover.

Of course, it wouldn't really help against particle weapons, so there would be a skill element involved in knowing when to use it.
 

Rubbernuke

Rubbernuke
In theory it would work, or with any gas that diffuses the laser beam- but I'm not sure if this goes into ultra hard scifi territory.

But you never know- it might become an 'undocumented feature' someday...
 

Andrew Sayers

A
Xzanron said:
What if Chaff were a cloud of millions of small mirrors? Drop chaff behind you and all of a sudden there's this cloud of mirrors that are reflecting laser fire in any old direction.
Click to expand...

I have this image of a beam of white laser light going in, and turning into a rainbow spreading out the other. To be honest, I'd probably break off my attack just to play with it :)
 

Xzanron

Xzanron
I'm sure we could have some pretty graphics effects for it.

In some ways it's a bit of a variation on a shield battery, but instead of charging your shields, it reduces incoming damage and unlike a shield battery the attacker has a chance to mitigate it, e.g. by manoeuvring aside or switching weapon types.
 

Bingo Brewster

Bingo Brewster
Chaff, how does it work

For those who have only been playing mulitplayer since it was available, you may not have noticed that in the single player scenarios you can now have chaff available.

I used it for the first time, today but to no noticeable effect. Can anyone shed light on chaff and its use.

(Please don't post an explanation of what chaff is. Just how it is used in-game)
 

Mark Allen

Programmer- Elite: Dangerous
M
It'll only have a noticeable effect if you've a missile targetted at you (I'm not actually sure if what's in game is chaff or flares, there's a little confusion in the text files last I checked ;) ) - Basically it just forces the missile to recheck its targets, high chance it'll pick something else that "looks" similar to you (which may still be you) plus a chance that it'll lose tracking entirely and spiral off into oblivion.

Just an overview - Exact details subject to change ofc, as with everything! There's certainly work we've still got to do to make them a fun part of gameplay, but I can tell you that those plans do exist, and they'll be awesome.
 

Kipper

K
I expect if you trade with agricultural worlds and mix up your cargo, you will need a device to separate the wheat from the chaff.

I'm here all week.... :)
 

Bingo Brewster

Bingo Brewster
Kipper said:
I expect if you trade with agricultural worlds and mix up your cargo, you will need a device to separate the wheat from the chaff.

I'm here all week.... :)
Click to expand...

On the bright side you are the first person I have negative repped :) I'll be waiting for you in Endeless War with my Chaff activated ;)
 

CMDR Texas Stu

CMDR Texas Stu
Thanks Mark!
Somewhat related, on jettisoned heat coils (after venting) I've imagined these as having a fairly high heat signature. Any chance of dropping one of these after venting and immediately turning off silent running and having the (now jettisoned) heat coil (being relatively hotter than a cold ship - <20 cockpit temp) picking up the target lock (by a ship or missile)?
 

Siblin

S
I'd be interested to see what this looks like on a radar in a multiplayer scenario. Chaff used to be used to jam up radars with too much reflected signal, so it could be that the radar fails altogether, or you suddenly get hundreds of bogeys.

... or nothing might happen ;)
 

Rex_Black

R
Siblin said:
I'd be interested to see what this looks like on a radar in a multiplayer scenario. Chaff used to be used to jam up radars with too much reflected signal, so it could be that the radar fails altogether, or you suddenly get hundreds of bogeys.

... or nothing might happen ;)
Click to expand...

In the good old days it was called 'window'. Over to you Chock..
 

Mark Allen

Programmer- Elite: Dangerous
M
Stu2 said:
Thanks Mark!
Somewhat related, on jettisoned heat coils (after venting) I've imagined these as having a fairly high heat signature. Any chance of dropping one of these after venting and immediately turning off silent running and having the (now jettisoned) heat coil (being relatively hotter than a cold ship - <20 cockpit temp) picking up the target lock (by a ship or missile)?
Click to expand...

It's certainly come up yes, there's a design decision to be made though - whichever way we go there's likely more treatment of countermeasures coming :)

Anyone designing a missile (and I believe modern heat seekers to this to a significant degree) will have a lot of code in its guidance to discount decoys - they don't simply head for the hottest nearby thing. There's a lot of options in testing the emission spectrum & signature size, looking for two signals in close proximity (two engines) the expected range of temperatures for an engine, etc. Guided missiles are surprisingly smart things in the real world.

However "Head for hottest thing in view" is a nice easy thing to get your head around an use in combat, and will lead to a lot less of a feeling of dice-rolls you get when a complex system with multiple inputs you can't see makes a decision.

Which way we go? or if there's a 3rd (4th/5th...) route - well that's for design, I've just gotta make it work ;)
 

ralfidude

ralfidude
Question regarding chaff

I have looked around and asked a bit but found no real answer to how to properly use chaff in this game.


Now, I am an experienced military flight simulator guy, known around the titles such as Falcon BMS, and Digital Combat Simulation, so I know what chaff IS, but what I need to know is HOW to use it properly here.

The frustration that I'm having is that there does not seem to be a separate input for chaff alone as I have been so accustomed to in my flight simulators with our counter measure panels. What option I have found is the way of binding chaff as a weapon slot? But this just seems absolutely stupid to me in every sense so I know I must be doing something wrong.

Could someone please explain it to me in detail on how to properly work this feature? I am getting my ass handed to me by every single missile and I cannot seem to be able to pop this chaff at all.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom