[Fineus]

Whilst watching Down Periscope a couple of days ago (Hella funny Submarine based film).

Anyway, I'd like to see this added - a sensor range setting on all ships. This could be included by means of the source code and adjusted by new entries in the table files. The default (0) would mean infinite range and that nothing would change, it'd be like your standard game of Freespace.

However anything other than 0 and things would get interesting, any ship outside sensor range would not be visible on the HUD sensor or visually (so we don't have people seeing ships even if they can't be targetted. To get round the problem of ships appearing out of nowhere they could be made to "fade in" as done with HW ships. If done properly it wouldn't look crap

With this ships could be made to be far more useful tactically - ships with larger sensor ranges (capital ships) could provide logistical support for fighters and so on (therefore the player wouldn't allways be flying blind to anything outside 10K or something). Enemy ships set to engage eachother could be evaded by other ships by staying outside sensor range - all this would allow for a more diverse mission style as ships would have to hunt eachother down and so on. It'd make things a hell of a lot more interesting. Of course I realise that this isn't for everyone despite the incredible oppertunities it could bring so an option to disable it would of course be needed.

Just a thuoght, I love it but like I said not everyone might like the sneaking around aspect.

[penguin]

Sorta like a nebula mission (without the nebula).

[Fineus]

Basically yes - except each ship gets set its own sensor range - thus ships may have to work together to get all ships on that team to see a target - recon will actually have a job in this (for instance if a recon ship spots a ship 7K out then a capital ship with a 5K sensor range can open fire on the target if it has weapons ranged far enough - like TAG but without having to fire anything). And of course it's possible to sneak around ships by evading their sensors. And of course ships don't appear at all on sensor scopes - in nebulas they kind of flicker around a bit.

[WMCoolmon]

How is the nebula handled...does it have a straight sensor range, or does it subtract the distance by a percentage? It should do it by a percentage, IMO, to reflect the different sensor strengths.
I disagree about the visual range...I think that ships should always be able to be seen, unless there's something in the way or the environment causes ships to be invisible (like a nebula). Otherwise, it'll look odd to see an Orion fading in from the depths of space.

Personally, I think a system based on sensor strength should be used in conjunction with the mass of vessels-thus, a fighter could detect a cruiser ten kilometers away, but a Perseus at the same distance would be all but invisible.

[phreak]

Originally posted by WMCoolmon
Personally, I think a system based on sensor strength should be used in conjunction with the mass of vessels-thus, a fighter could detect a cruiser ten kilometers away, but a Perseus at the same distance would be all but invisible.

This may be something like radar cross section used to calculate how stealthy an object is.  Someone could give the ship two side RCSes (left and right) a front RCS, back RCS, top RCS and bottom RCS to accurately depict how the radar behaves when it hits a certain side of a ship

[penguin]

I'm kinda along the same lines as WMCoolmon -- I can't see how this could be done visually in a realistic way in "pure space" with no nebula.  BTW I'm using the term "nebula" rather loosely here -- I mean anything that impedes visibility (in OpenGL it's called "fog.")

I still thinks it's a neat idea to tweak the settings, though.  And the "stealth" factor is what makes nebula missions so spooky, even when you know what's gonna happen next..

I think the way the current engine works is the +NebAwacs setting in the mission file, which oddly has nothing to do with AWACS The AWACS radius is established via the awacs-set-radius sexp.

[LtNarol]

be especially nice if the sensor range could be set in Fred instead of tables...especially useful for asteriod missions.

[ShadowWolf_IH]

So then all you are asking for is a new line for each ship in the ship table for RCS, and maybe couple another one for magnetic anonomoly, which we already have tech for in the real world, or maybe even combine the two for a spectrographic analysis.  End result being that the computer does all the work and that set of parameters in the analysis depicts an "Orion" in the onboard warbook.  I think it's highly justified.  We already use magnetic anomoly detection to find sunken ships, and spectrograph already tells us what a star is composed of.  Has anyone seen the new sonogram?  Highly detailed work.

Radar waves will dissipate at certain distances, but adding AWACs support could be true AWACs support.  Farther reaching, yet out of site of their scanning ability for the most part.  As long as we are at it why not add active and passive sensors.  With the thing set on active, the chances of discovery are higher, but on passive, the range is severly limitted.  Or maybe this would just revamp the radar range option?  it's already in place, and it may be easier to modify it than to build a new system to handle active and passive sensors.


And can we do something?  can we add something in fred that makes it easier to investigate cargo or transports? Things are scannable, but scanning cargo that has Cargo known not checked does nothing but scan it.  Investigating would bring up what is in the cargo container.  Or just have scanning investigate as well.

That's just my idea on sensors.

[Nico]

mmh... lose your awacs, and you can start the mission again coz you will NEVER be able to find ships that are beyond visual or radar range. We ( in real life ) have radars with a range of hundreds of kilometers. Imagine in 300 years and in space.
I don't like the idea.

[Fineus]

That's why I put in the optional part - I agree that a large amount of the time I wouldn't want this active, but as a mission designer it's something I'd like to see because it adds another option to missions that wasn't already there (without extremely heavy scripting).

As far as having ships "always visible" as opposed to fading in, perhaps a universal fade in distance might be better. It'd be bloomin' miles away obviously.

Really in the end I'd just like the option to use stealth tactics - giving things a radar range would be one option, yet another could be giving them a variable "Signiture" which could be altered by SEXPs. Setting it to 0 would mean it would be invisible to everyone and everything on sensors (but could still be seen) thus it would be as if it'd shut down all its system and could thus hide in a nebula/asteroid field/whatever.

Perhaps I'm just ranting

[WMCoolmon]

Here's another idea, stealth mode. This could go with active and passive mode, and when you switched to it, it would shut down all systems but engines (including comms) and deplete them. However, it would be VERY hard to detect to someone with passive mode, and active mode's detection would be cut in half.

Code: [Select]


while(active_mode)
{
//disable weapons
//deplete weapons
//disable shields
//deplete shields
//disable afterburner
//deplete afterburner
//disable comm
//go to passive sensors
}


[LtNarol]

I'd say that this passive mode thing should affect engines as well...perhaps cut their speed by half, with use of afterburners switching the ship back to active mode (although not the only way to switch between the two).

[ShadowWolf_IH]

Well it seemed like the idea was a simple little thing, but if we are going to make it complex anyway, why not have each subsystem be able to be manually powered up, but at the loss of some stealth, this puts the amount of stealth directly into the hands of the player, and would messages sent in the mission not be received by the player if he was in full stealth, with comm shut down as well?  you guys scare me, i'm gunna go get held by the mrs.

[IceFire]

Thats probably too complex (individual subsystems - seems like of work and finicky stuff for not too much gain).  But I do like the idea of having an active stealth and passive stealth modes.

Activate Stealth mode (Alt-S or something) and your speed drops drastically...your weapons are offline...maybe a few other things (comms should remain open - important for scripting especially).

[ShadowWolf_IH]

two things with active and passive stealth.

1.  Would we be able to add a command to the communcation menu, use active stealth,

and

2.  would we have an active stealth option in miscellaneous in fred, under ship edit?

[StratComm]

The reciever systems should be a passive system anyway (except secure chanels) so messages should still be able to come in.  You just wouldn't be able to issue orders.