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Topic Summary

Posted by: alex_brunius
« on: Today at 03:22:17 AM »

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on July 03, 2025, 07:21:24 PM
Intuitively, I think players expect a decoy to "look like" the ship it's decoying from, i.e., to have the same signature. I can see why the actual mechanic is different, as its more flexible and less micromanage-y than requiring exact size matching (plus avoid issues with ship sizes that aren't nice, round numbers), but the fact that an infinite swarm of size-5 decoys is arguably optimal (same performance and cost as any other option, maximum flexibility) seems to eliminate what could/should be a gameplay decision point.

I don't agree smaller decoys are always optimal. For when your facing negligable missile threats smaller sized decoys mean ships with standard settings will always launch some decoys even against tricklefire from AMMs that your PD or Shields can shrug off which adds cost (or alot micro if you want to turn it off situationally).

For larger decoys it's much easier to have a sensible cut-off setting so that for negligable threats with fewer incoming MSP then 0 decoys will be launched, while still ensuring all decoys will be launched against that deadly alpha strike.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: Yesterday at 05:27:12 PM »

Quote from: AdamantineAxe on Yesterday at 05:18:41 PM
Can player races resurvey a system if they suspect a dormant jump point?

I assumed you had to wait until you could have a sensor detect another race's ship transit through the suspected dormant jump point.

Yes, it was added a while ago, although you were always able to manually resurvey a specific location, IIRC.

Quote from: EclipsedStar on Yesterday at 05:22:00 PM
Do you mean literally resurveying jump points

This one.
Posted by: EclipsedStar
« on: Yesterday at 05:22:00 PM »

Do you mean literally resurveying jump points/celestial bodies, or do you mean having a ship fly around each body with sensors active to see if anyone's 'home'?
Posted by: AdamantineAxe
« on: Yesterday at 05:18:41 PM »

Can player races resurvey a system if they suspect a dormant jump point?

I assumed you had to wait until you could have a sensor detect another race's ship transit through the suspected dormant jump point.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: Yesterday at 02:45:40 PM »

A repeat of an earlier, unanswered question: Do NPRs ever get suspicious of a dormant jump point and conduct resurveys of their systems? Asking for a friend(ly battlefleet)...
Posted by: serger
« on: Yesterday at 02:17:59 AM »

I'd suggest to make larger decoys significanty better, something like (size^2) factor for the probability of a missile hitting the decoy. The drawback is obvious, it would not be an imbalance the opposite way.
Posted by: serger
« on: Yesterday at 01:06:10 AM »

Quote from: Andrew on July 03, 2025, 08:48:37 PM
One of the closest things to decoys used on modern ships is Chaff, which is a lot of very small things to confuse incoming missiles. So smaller decoys make a degree of sense. Aside from a small number of air launched drones I am not aware of any decoys which do try to match the signature of a real vehicle.

Not a Navy example, yet nearly half of the russian long range drones currently launching at Ukraine every day are Gerbera type, which are mostly decoys, mimiking the main long range strike drone type (Geran-2, the russian licensed copy of Iranian Shahed-136). Gerbera type radar signatures are artifically enlarged to match Geran-2.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: July 03, 2025, 11:10:52 PM »

Quote from: Andrew on July 03, 2025, 08:48:37 PM
One of the closest things to decoys used on modern ships is Chaff, which is a lot of very small things to confuse incoming missiles. So smaller decoys make a degree of sense. Aside from a small number of air launched drones I am not aware of any decoys which do try to match the signature of a real vehicle.

Quote from: Garfunkel on July 03, 2025, 10:52:56 PM
Modern flares are mimicking the actual engine signature in wavelength, not just heat, to fool heat-seeking missiles as their homing heads have gotten increasingly sophisticated. And decoy drones, most of which specs are secret, are trying to mimic the sensor signatures of real planes or ships. Same with sonar and submarine-launched decoys.

Usually the real-world example I think of when I think of decoys is the AN/SLQ-25 Nixie (because all ECM components should have cute names!). However, even this doesn't try to exactly mimic the ship's "active signature", per se, but tries to draw off fire by mimicking ship noise or by reflecting the torpedo's pings back at it. Since missiles in Aurora usually home on the gravitational signature rather than noise, I think the former method is probably not applicable, but the idea of reflecting the active pings of the enemy sensors/MFCs to confuse incoming ordnance works fine, so if decoys do not have to (or cannot) match ship size I don't think it's a problem, even if it would be nice to support that for roleplay purposes.

One stills lacks a reason to use anything larger than the minimum size of decoys, however.
Posted by: Garfunkel
« on: July 03, 2025, 10:52:56 PM »

Modern flares are mimicking the actual engine signature in wavelength, not just heat, to fool heat-seeking missiles as their homing heads have gotten increasingly sophisticated. And decoy drones, most of which specs are secret, are trying to mimic the sensor signatures of real planes or ships. Same with sonar and submarine-launched decoys.
Posted by: Andrew
« on: July 03, 2025, 08:48:37 PM »

One of the closest things to decoys used on modern ships is Chaff, which is a lot of very small things to confuse incoming missiles. So smaller decoys make a degree of sense. Aside from a small number of air launched drones I am not aware of any decoys which do try to match the signature of a real vehicle.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: July 03, 2025, 07:21:24 PM »

Quote from: Steve Walmsley on July 03, 2025, 05:30:55 PM
Decoys can be any size. A few, smaller decoys would give you more flexibility if want to lessen a strike rather than commit everything.

I think the confusing part is that there appears to be no reason, mechanically, to make decoy missiles that match the ship size, or in fact anything larger than the minimum decoy size. As far as I can tell, only the total mass/signature of decoys determines the fraction of missiles deflected, and cost scales linearly for both decoys and launchers.

Intuitively, I think players expect a decoy to "look like" the ship it's decoying from, i.e., to have the same signature. I can see why the actual mechanic is different, as its more flexible and less micromanage-y than requiring exact size matching (plus avoid issues with ship sizes that aren't nice, round numbers), but the fact that an infinite swarm of size-5 decoys is arguably optimal (same performance and cost as any other option, maximum flexibility) seems to eliminate what could/should be a gameplay decision point.
Posted by: Steve Walmsley
« on: July 03, 2025, 05:30:55 PM »

Decoys can be any size. A few, smaller decoys would give you more flexibility if want to lessen a strike rather than commit everything.
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: July 03, 2025, 01:34:50 PM »

Quote from: Kurt on July 03, 2025, 11:54:07 AM
I thought that only decoy missiles with the correct signature will defend a ship.  In other words, a 20,000 ton ship must be defended by decoys which each have a signature of 20,000, not multiple decoys with signatures that add up to 20,000. 

Hmmm...after reviewing the section on decoy missiles I can't rule out your take on it, or mine.  It isn't clear.  Arguably your take is better given the limitation on decoy launcher size, but that could be an oversight.

This way would make more sense to me as well. However, my observations of NPR designs is that they don't really match the decoy size to the ship size, and I assume Steve would not deliberately saddle the NPRs with an unworkable design feature.
Posted by: Kurt
« on: July 03, 2025, 11:54:07 AM »

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on July 03, 2025, 11:24:58 AM
Quote from: Kurt on July 03, 2025, 11:06:15 AM
A quick question on decoy launchers. 

After reviewing the section on the 2.20 changes list on decoy missiles and launchers, I'm left a bit confused and wondering if I've done something wrong.  After recent reverses, my navy is looking to install decoy missiles and launchers on its capital ships.  Easy enough.  I used the missile designer to design a decoy missile for a new 30,000 ton strike cruiser design.  The resulting missile is 150 MSP (375 tons), with a decoy signature of 30,000 tons.  As intended.  The problem arises in trying to design a launcher.  The section in the create research project window for designing the decoy launcher gives the largest size launcher as 99.  This appears to mean that I cannot have a decoy missile for anything larger than 19,800 tons.  Is this correct? 

I feel like I'm missing something.  Is there a research branch I'm missing? 

Kurt

I have noticed the same thing and believe this is an oversight on Steve's part. Probably copied from the regular missile launcher designer.

I'm still a bit unclear on the mechanics, but it seems like two decoys of half the size are as effective as a single full-size decoy. I'm not sure how the size scaling is supposed to work to make "right sized" decoys the most effective.

I thought that only decoy missiles with the correct signature will defend a ship.  In other words, a 20,000 ton ship must be defended by decoys which each have a signature of 20,000, not multiple decoys with signatures that add up to 20,000. 

Hmmm...after reviewing the section on decoy missiles I can't rule out your take on it, or mine.  It isn't clear.  Arguably your take is better given the limitation on decoy launcher size, but that could be an oversight. 
Posted by: nuclearslurpee
« on: July 03, 2025, 11:24:58 AM »

Quote from: Kurt on July 03, 2025, 11:06:15 AM
A quick question on decoy launchers. 

After reviewing the section on the 2.20 changes list on decoy missiles and launchers, I'm left a bit confused and wondering if I've done something wrong.  After recent reverses, my navy is looking to install decoy missiles and launchers on its capital ships.  Easy enough.  I used the missile designer to design a decoy missile for a new 30,000 ton strike cruiser design.  The resulting missile is 150 MSP (375 tons), with a decoy signature of 30,000 tons.  As intended.  The problem arises in trying to design a launcher.  The section in the create research project window for designing the decoy launcher gives the largest size launcher as 99.  This appears to mean that I cannot have a decoy missile for anything larger than 19,800 tons.  Is this correct? 

I feel like I'm missing something.  Is there a research branch I'm missing? 

Kurt

I have noticed the same thing and believe this is an oversight on Steve's part. Probably copied from the regular missile launcher designer.

I'm still a bit unclear on the mechanics, but it seems like two decoys of half the size are as effective as a single full-size decoy. I'm not sure how the size scaling is supposed to work to make "right sized" decoys the most effective.