Mine Deployment Via Drone issue

[ChubbyPitbull (OP)]

Continuing along my current game's path of few space ships + heavy drone usage, I created a small anti-ship missile with an active sensor with a range of 890,000 km (Resolution 160, enemy has been using 8kton-16kton ships), designed a mine with an 800,000km/Res160 active sensor with 3x ASM as a second stage, then finally designed a drone to carry the mine to a waypoint set on a jumpgate.

I sent out 15 of these drones; 5 to deploy on a waypoint centered on the jump gate itself, 5 1m km closer to earth, and 5 more another 1m km closer to earth. The drones successfully deployed the 15 mines on their assigned waypoints, and everything looked good. I advanced time by 30 days, however according to the event log the game stopped the time increment after 6 hours, and all 15 mines released their submunitions. There are no active sensor contacts listed or reported, and the mines' active sensors are not in range of the other groups of 5. I did some 5 second time advancements, and the released missiles are still active but are not moving away from the mines. What did I do wrong? Are the mines attempting to fire their missile at the other mines in their stack?

Here are my relevant designs:

Submunition:

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Alliant Techsystems M46-TN ESRASM
Missile Size: 2 MSP  (0.1 HS)     Warhead: 4    Armour: 0     Manoeuvre Rating: 16
Speed: 24000 km/s    Endurance: 1 minutes   Range: 1.3m km
Active Sensor Strength: 0.294   Sensitivity Modifier: 240%
Resolution: 160    Maximum Range vs 8000 ton object (or larger): 890,000 km
Cost Per Missile: 2.244
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 384%   3k km/s 128%   5k km/s 76.8%   10k km/s 38.4%
Materials Required:    1x Tritanium   0.294x Uridium   0.838x Gallicite   Fuel x25


Mine:

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Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine
Buoy Size: 10 MSP  (0.5 HS)     Armour: 0
Reactor Endurance: 22.9 months
Active Sensor Strength: 0.266   Sensitivity Modifier: 240%
Resolution: 160    Maximum Range vs 8000 ton object (or larger): 800,000 km
Cost Per Buoy: 11.72
Second Stage: Alliant Techsystems M46-TN ESRASM x3
Second Stage Separation Range: 800,000 km
Materials Required:    3x Tritanium   4.572x Boronide   1.148x Uridium   2.264x Gallicite


Drone Launch Vehicle:

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Saturn-XI LV(M-1) (M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine)
Missile Size: 24 MSP  (1.2 HS)     Warhead: 0    Armour: 0     Manoeuvre Rating: 5
Speed: 10000 km/s    Endurance: 1607 minutes   Range: 964.3m km
Cost Per Missile: 15.595
Second Stage: Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine x1
Second Stage Separation Range: 0 km
Overall Endurance: 687 days   Overall Range: 964.3m km
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 50%   3k km/s 15%   5k km/s 10%   10k km/s 5%
Materials Required:    3x Tritanium   4.572x Boronide   1.148x Uridium   6.014x Gallicite   Fuel x22500


[ChubbyPitbull (OP)]

Sorry to bump this back, but I figured out what the problem was and just wanted to update this thread.

What happened as I set a way point on the jump gate, and 2 waypoints moving closer to earth. I targeted the waypoints using a PDC on Earth, and launched drones at each waypoint carrying the mine buoys.

The goal here was for the drones to deploy the buoys at the waypoints, and the mine buoys would then use their onboard active sensors to wait for hostile ships to engage on their own. The problem I ran into was the mine buoys were firing their munitions shortly after being deployed, without any hostile contacts. I figured out that the problem was, the Missile Fire Control on the PDC in Earth was in range of the Waypoints. The effect of this was that the drones, and then the deployed mine buoys, maintained the targeting information from the MFC.

Basically, here is what was happening:

1. Earth PDC Launches 5 "Saturn-XI LV(M-1) (M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine)"s at Waypoint 1.
2. The 5 "Saturn-XI LV(M-1) (M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine)"s reach Waypoint 1 at Separation Range 0km, and release 5 "Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine"s.
3. The 5 "Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine"s receive targeting information from the Earth PDC, ordering them to engage Waypoint 1.
4. The Separation Range of a Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine is 800,000km, and its ordered target is Waypoint 1, which is 0km away.
5. Since it's target is within it's Separation Range, each Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine releases its sub-munitions at it's ordered target.
6. The Dahlgren M60TN-10 CAPTOR Mine releases 4x Alliant Techsystems M46-TN ESRASMs, targeting Waypoint 1. The ESRASMs engage, however, since the target is a Waypoint, they simply sit in space till their fuel run out.


I did some testing in a new game using a ship-based Mine Launcher, and was able to successfully deploy mines using this method:

1. Minelayer moves to Jumpgate #1.
2. A Waypoint is set on Earth, ~900km away.
3. Minelayer launches mines on Jumpgate #1, targeting Earth Waypoint 900km away.
4. Since the separation range of the mines (in this case) are 1.4m km, and the given target is 900km away, mines do not release sub-munitions.
5. Earth Waypoint is deleted. Having lost their given target, mine buoys begin searching for new targets. (No message for this is generated in Events, as it is for missiles).

I tested this by using Designer/SM mode to force an enemy civ's Grav Survey ship through the Jumpgate. 5 seconds after the Grav Survey Ship transited and I received the hostile transit/new hostile contact message, the mine released it's sub munitions, and the sub-munitions engaged and destroyed the Grav Survey Ship automatically.

The only bad thing left is the mines had a mission life of ~3 years, and the mine buoys don't seem to disappear after launching their sub-munitions. How do I get rid of the mine buoys?

[Havear]

If I remember correctly the second tab in the combat window (F8) lists all the missile salvos (including mines) in the system. You can either destroy them individually or all at once.

[ChubbyPitbull (OP)]

If I remember correctly the second tab in the combat window (F8) lists all the missile salvos (including mines) in the system. You can either destroy them individually or all at once.

Perfect, thanks! Exactly what I was looking for. Although with mines that were launched only ~10 minutes apart, hard to tell which one is the one I want to destroy!