The Target Indicators Thread

[Erimus Kamzel]

No and no again radar don't work as a fov monitor but it work with heat signatures if you want to hide from some one you can reduce your heat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_hP7MV89s8

But that strategy only works at medium to long range when you've got time to drop out of visual sight and power down. With target loss suffered due to line of sight, it adds another dynamic into the situation. It pushes both the pursued and pursuer to rely more on their skills on the joystick instead of relying on instrumentation all the time.

Seat of the pants flying can be fun and tactical if you know you can literally skim around the surface of large objects trying to shake off that lock with both ships in extreme proximity to each other. Its a tactic that can be used in really close combat scenarios.

And forget radar and realism arguments. Its about fun in a game. If we want to go the realism route, I'm sure in 1,300 years time the ship would do all the automatic firing as well as the targeting - where's the fun in that?. In fact there'd be no need for a pilot at all

 

[majormauser]

With the attention to realism in every part of the Alpha I think it should be looked at. But we need to test if a ship that is in Shutdown mode still has a target.

 

[Blethigg]

I suggest that a factor should also be the quality of your scanner module. We know that there will be grades of equipment; so it would be appropriate for the cheaper or 'civilian' scanners to lose the lock when the LOS is interrupted (what would a civilian be doing in an asteroid field anyway? ), but a higher, or military, grade scanner should have some systems to help deal with these situations.

Not suggesting that any scanner should maintain a perfect lock under all circumstances, but it makes sense that you should get what you pay for.

 

[Mysturji]

I agree that ships should be able to hide behind large objects, but I would think that the targetting scanners in the (insert number here)th century would be able to actively scan for, recognise and reacquire a lock on a ship when it becomes visible again.

 

[Bingo Brewster]

Seat of the pants flying can be fun and tactical if you know you can literally skim around the surface of large objects trying to shake off that lock with both ships in extreme proximity to each other. Its a tactic that can be used in really close combat scenarios.

And forget radar and realism arguments. Its about fun in a game. If we want to go the realism route, I'm sure in 1,300 years time the ship would do all the automatic firing as well as the targeting - where's the fun in that?. In fact there'd be no need for a pilot at all

This +BB love

 

[Geraldine]

Run silent, run deep!

Tiefer, LI!

What this? A submarine invasion of the thread!?!

Not yet, Kameraden! Not yet!

 

[Cody]

Down 'scope, rig for silent running!

 

[Dalkeith]

Good idea for a vote - I've gone with lose targeting

 

[Perseus]

Hide and Seek was just as much fun as Tag when I was a kid. Combining them (called Rally-Ho back in my hometown) was even better.
It should be in ED too.

 

[Erimus Kamzel]

I suggest that a factor should also be the quality of your scanner module. We know that there will be grades of equipment; so it would be appropriate for the cheaper or 'civilian' scanners to lose the lock when the LOS is interrupted (what would a civilian be doing in an asteroid field anyway? ), but a higher, or military, grade scanner should have some systems to help deal with these situations.

Not suggesting that any scanner should maintain a perfect lock under all circumstances, but it makes sense that you should get what you pay for.

+1

This could link into Ayo's idea in post #35. So better quality scanner modules offer more accurate 'prediction paths' of ships masked behind large objects. Nothing should be 100% accurate though.


As an addition I'd like to see some form of countermeasures (to offer more options other than the heatsink method). Something akin to chaff that a ship can deploy to temporary destabilize a lock, or even a module that can project a false radar image that either causes the pursuer to lock onto or at the least causes a bit of temporary confusion.

 

[Ty Corcoran]

I think it should depend on the systems of both ships in question - better sensors would help you detect even through solid objects to an extent, but any systems on the other ship that help with stealth should also be taken into account.

Think the above sums my view about it, a targeting system can be "defeated" with the right kit (like any tech race) or if the condtions are against it (interfrence from asteriods or local issues)

Not to have a tracking hud at all is a game breaker for me.

 

[majormauser]

I think it's as simple as being powered down or not.

 

[Blazar]

I voted Yes.
But what if you are up against 3-4 enemy's. The lock for you would then be very helpfull.

 

[Sterlino]

hmmm... i don't understand,

it's an official poll or is just purely speculative ?

don't throw some extra things in the fire before the time pls.

btw i wrongly voted No because i didn't understand the nature of the question.
Are we talking about steady aim or the missiles targetting system ?

 

[Le-Betz]

SIGNATURE AND SENSORS

• Sensors are tuned to be able to fully resolve a contact at a specific distance providing the signature is equal to 1
  • For example a sensor with range 8000m will be able to fully resolve a contact at 8000m with a signature of 1
  • If the contact was instead at 4000m away then it would only require a signature of 0.25 to be resolved
  • Likewise a contact at 16000m away would require a signature of 4 to get resolved
• The environment can affect the stats of the sensors such that ranges are reduced, default signature values increase or lowered, arcs widened etc.
• Additionally special equipment could be used to affect other players scanners such that effective ranges or signatures are reduced when they being scanned
• If the contact is unresolved because their signature isn’t high enough for the range they’re at to be detected instead a scalable VFX is applied on the sensor UI to indicate the possibility of a contact
  • The close the contact is to being resolved the more focussed and consistent the VFX is so the player can try to get closer or turn to point their more powerful frontal sensors at them to finally resolve the contact
  • Distant and low signature contacts might have zero VFX applied or barely show up as a sensor glitch at all
  • False positives are mixed into this to add a layer of uncertainty to the above

Just had a look into the DDA again. Before reading this thread I took for granted that an asteroid might be the kind of 'environment that can affect the stats of the sensors', still I think it should do so massively.

But let's do not forget that this is Alpha, not the finished Game. There might be still a lot of balancing to be done, obviously that includes the ships sensors.

I'm interessted to know what the devs can tell us about that issue.

 

[Rog]

Not in Alpha, but I agree that putting a zillion ton asteroid between you and a target should cause eventual loss of visibility.

That said, if any allies have line of sight, then you should still be allowed to track, as your systems would share information.

"Smart" missiles should enter a seek pattern, or perhaps shut down and loiter for a while (as for instance, some modern anti-radiation missiles do - eg, ALARM), waiting to re-aquire.

 

[Memnoch]

Another tactic would be to break line of site behind said asteroid, and then head away as fast as possible behind this asteroid, rig for silent running and then dump heatsinks, so that when the enemy comes around they will hopefully not see you but you will be flying backwards waiting for them to appear, either opening fire pre-emptively or just waiting to see if you are discovered and then attack.