Targeting and Detection

[Kurt (OP)]

Steve-

I'm having a problem, but I'm not sure if it is a bug or a feature, so I thought I'd put this here.  I've encountered this before, but I don't fully understand the sensor rules so I've always suspected that I'm doing something wrong.  

The situation is as follows.  I have a PDC equipped with anti-missile sensors as follows:
Active Sensor Strength: 240
Sensor Size: 15    Sensor HTK: 1
Primary Mode:   Resolution: 0.2    Maximum Range: 480,000 km

As I understand it, this sensor should detect the smallest missile at 480,000 km's, and will detect larger missiles at longer ranges.  

Missiles are currently incoming towards this PDC.  They are size 20 missiles, and have been detected by the side with the PDC.  They show up on the system map as follows: "Unknown #1551 T20x5 10,000 km/s"

When I go to the contacts tab on the system map, the incoming missile salvoes show up here as well.  They do not, however, show up as available targets on the Combat Assignments window.  

This is somewhat frustrating.  I wouldn't have to worry about it if this race relied solely on lasers in point blank mode for its defense, but this race uses anti-missiles as well, which I have to manually target on the incoming missiles, but I can't target the incoming missiles if they don't show up as available targets.  The missiles are at 240,000 Km's right now, and as they are size twenty and at half the maximum range for detection of the smallest missile I don't understand what is going on.  

Kurt

[Haegan2005]

What is the range of your counter missiles?

[Steve Walmsley]

Steve-

I'm having a problem, but I'm not sure if it is a bug or a feature, so I thought I'd put this here.  I've encountered this before, but I don't fully understand the sensor rules so I've always suspected that I'm doing something wrong.  

The situation is as follows.  I have a PDC equipped with anti-missile sensors as follows:
Active Sensor Strength: 240
Sensor Size: 15    Sensor HTK: 1
Primary Mode:   Resolution: 0.2    Maximum Range: 480,000 km

As I understand it, this sensor should detect the smallest missile at 480,000 km's, and will detect larger missiles at longer ranges.  

Missiles are currently incoming towards this PDC.  They are size 20 missiles, and have been detected by the side with the PDC.  They show up on the system map as follows: "Unknown #1551 T20x5 10,000 km/s"

When I go to the contacts tab on the system map, the incoming missile salvoes show up here as well.  They do not, however, show up as available targets on the Combat Assignments window.  

This is somewhat frustrating.  I wouldn't have to worry about it if this race relied solely on lasers in point blank mode for its defense, but this race uses anti-missiles as well, which I have to manually target on the incoming missiles, but I can't target the incoming missiles if they don't show up as available targets.  The missiles are at 240,000 Km's right now, and as they are size twenty and at half the maximum range for detection of the smallest missile I don't understand what is going on.  

The contact above is a thermal contact, showing five strength-20 thermal contacts. You can only target active contacts, which is why they are not showing up as potential targets. Time for a dumb question . Have you switched your active sensors on?

Steve

[Haegan2005]

(puts on dunce cap)
I wouldn't have thought of asking that. It would seem that I need to pay more attention here regarding sensors and new stuff in the versions after 2.0. If I could easily upgrade to a later version I probably would, but the story line is now getting to be interesting.

[Kurt (OP)]

The contact above is a thermal contact, showing five strength-20 thermal contacts. You can only target active contacts, which is why they are not showing up as potential targets. Time for a dumb question . Have you switched your active sensors on?

Steve

Okay, I understand now.  What happened was that I activated all of the active sensors on the orbital forts, but only activated the sensors on one ground base, one that had already been detected, so that hopefully the other bases would remain undetected.  

What I didn't realize, until I read your post, was that I screwed up.  The orbital forts all have a smaller, less capable sensor, due to space constraints.  This sensor is only capable of detecting missiles out to 100,000 km's.  The single PDC's sensors should have been enough, but unfortunately, I forgot that the base had been damaged in the first war.  It lost its primary sensor array, which was never replaced.  Thus, the incoming missiles are only being detected on the thermal planetary arrays.  

I feel much better now that I understand the situation.  Of course, this brings up another question.  Is there some way to repair/upgrade PDC's that I'm not aware of?

Kurt

[SteveAlt]

The contact above is a thermal contact, showing five strength-20 thermal contacts. You can only target active contacts, which is why they are not showing up as potential targets. Time for a dumb question . Have you switched your active sensors on?

Steve

Okay, I understand now.  What happened was that I activated all of the active sensors on the orbital forts, but only activated the sensors on one ground base, one that had already been detected, so that hopefully the other bases would remain undetected.  

What I didn't realize, until I read your post, was that I screwed up.  The orbital forts all have a smaller, less capable sensor, due to space constraints.  This sensor is only capable of detecting missiles out to 100,000 km's.  The single PDC's sensors should have been enough, but unfortunately, I forgot that the base had been damaged in the first war.  It lost its primary sensor array, which was never replaced.  Thus, the incoming missiles are only being detected on the thermal planetary arrays.  

I feel much better now that I understand the situation.  Of course, this brings up another question.  Is there some way to repair/upgrade PDC's that I'm not aware of?

No, its a serious omission on my part that I still need to correct. If you want to simulate the repair you could repair the PDC in SM-mode on the ship window and deduct the necessary minerals using the SM Mods window.

Steve

[Kurt (OP)]

The contact above is a thermal contact, showing five strength-20 thermal contacts. You can only target active contacts, which is why they are not showing up as potential targets. Time for a dumb question .  I find I have little reason to research and develop more advanced launchers given the reality that I can't upgrade my PDC's.  After all, what is the use of deploying faster reloading launchers when the bulk of my launchers are still the old version.  Splitting salvoes is almost never a good idea, so I'd have to slow down the faster launchers anyway.  

Now, having griped   , I'd like to comment on how much I liked the way Aurora performed during a recent battle.  I was able to set up a layered defense, with long ranged anti-missiles backed up by short-ranged lasers, and it was really neat to watch the incoming missile salvoes fray away as they were worn down by the defenses.  

Very impressive.  Aurora has come a long way.  

Kurt

[Steve Walmsley]

I'm glad to hear that you are aware of, and thinking about, the issue   , I'd like to comment on how much I liked the way Aurora performed during a recent battle.  I was able to set up a layered defense, with long ranged anti-missiles backed up by short-ranged lasers, and it was really neat to watch the incoming missile salvoes fray away as they were worn down by the defenses.  

Very impressive.  Aurora has come a long way.  

Thanks!  I am probably going to look at automated point defence for missile fire control as well, although that is a lot more complex than the automated beam weapon point defence.

Steve