RADAR - new idea

[max power 21]

What the eff are you trying to say? That pilots should be able to make themselves supersteahlty by switching of their radar or that in general switching off radar should make it impossible to detect any objects/vehicles within and behind visible range? Arcade gameplay much :confused:

No. I was responding to Trips. The entire content of my message is written in explicit language.

First point: The 'radar' in ArmA is not analogous to an actual radar array.

Second point: It's possible and even beneficial to turn off 'military radars' in the real world.

edit: I realize now you must be responding to TOP and not to my post directly.

Edited March 19, 2011 by Max Power

[enforcer1975 0]

What the eff are you trying to say? That pilots should be able to make themselves supersteahlty by switching of their radar or that in general switching off radar should make it impossible to detect any objects/vehicles within and behind visible range? Arcade gameplay much :confused:

I asume you meant the anti radar missile?

The enemy on the surface meaning the guys with the AA turned their radar off to mislead the anti radar missiels fired from the planes not vice versa.

In the end the US still won, they designed a missile that noted the last position of the radar source and flew that way. because those units were immobile they were an easy target in the end.

I do like the idea of removing or at least limiting the radar to something that you have "seen". Where's the fun in looking through a periscope when the only thing you have to do is click a button several times to see where the enemy is? Radar sure is helpful against AI, but the main concern is PvP. At least they could have mad a system where you have to click manually on targets and wait for visual confirmation via screen like in Janes Apache Longbow. THAT radar would be awesome. Unfortunately ArmA 2 doesn't support picture in picture nor manipulating your cockpit with the mouse.

I had an idea with removing the radar and giving the player a screen where you have a visual on your target with a "targeting camera" located in your vehicle ( air vehicles primarily ) to confirm if its an enemy target or not. There is a delay of 5 seconds that adds the identity of the driver. However the game does not support PiP as my buddy says.

The next possible thing would be remove the radar, give text notice in the same corner what people are targeting with a delay of a few seconds so they can't tab / shoot like they do in the moment.

[NoRailgunner 0]

I do like the idea of removing or at least limiting the radar to something that you have "seen".

You do realise that A2OA is not an Worl War I (or Vietnam) game? Or is it just another try to dumb down the gameplay - to make it more "accessible" for shooterkids pro's?

Hell, why do people always stick to their old + gamey habits and don't try or demand something better & more authentic?

Let's find some ideas/solutions instead of going wild about "simulation vs gamey".

Why not adding a unique IFF device for each faction - so mission makers (and maybe players ingame) can add/remove those IFF features themselves?

In this way it would be up to mission design to ident contacts. All other radar blips could be shown as grey boxes. If enough information has been collected (eg via customisable timed delay, other shared info/data) contacts could be revealed as friendly/foe/neutral. Something userfriendly and customisable for mission makers...

[enforcer1975 0]

IFF is already in the game ( you already see the players names if that isnt enough for you ). Radar id is only bound to vehicles instead of the whole unit player/vehicle. So if i use an enemy vehicle i will be identified as an enemy and attacked...obviously. And if i capture an enemy vehicle i won't be attacked at first ( AI is stupid enough not to attack you though ).

Radar shows different colors for faction vehicles already.

Edited March 19, 2011 by Enforcer1975

[Inkompetent 0]

MaxPower is correct about planes turning off their radar. It is a proven and well working technique to limit your own visibility to the enemy. You either turn off the radar completely, or turn off the forward-looking radar and only use the downwards-looking array for elevation data.

Both planes and ground radars can pick up the radar signal sent out by your airplane much earlier than they actually can ID your plane with their own radar. Same with radar jammers. Thus you only use radar when you are certain it does more good than bad, and only use jammers to spoof incoming fire. Not to avoid detection, since the jammer will light your approximate position up like a sun in the sky for radars.

It would indeed be awesome to be able to manually turn off the radar for all vehicles actually having one (like planes and Shilkas), and separate between 'radar signature' and 'radar emission'. Could for example have spoof/dummy Shilkas on the ground then, or just spread out other vehicles nearby, so that one has to either visually ID the Shilka, or sort it out from the clutter by its targeting radar.

Something to make it harder especially for planes to pick out the right target on the ground, and dramatically increase the use of laser on the ground to point out targets.

Mavericks though (from the A-10) would be reasonable to keep giving target ID when viable (i.e. when in line of sight) due the workings of the missile.

[enforcer1975 0]

Locking onto a target should be limited to LOS anyway. You can lock onto anything and keep the lock if you had locked it while having LOS.

Jammers are great but they would only be used continiously like decoys are used in air vehicles right now, you rarely see planes not dragging a chain of flares behind them. And i mean an endless chain not just a burst of flares. I doubt planes have that much like in ArmA 2, too bad there is no information about how much they actually have on board.

Dummy vehicles are already available afaik and also visible on radar as an inactive vehicle marked in grey.

The main concern is it's too easy targeting active vehicles. If they are inactive it's the other way around because you have to point your nose when flying a plane at the target to get a lock. Having a clickable radar where you point and clickfor targets would be a compromise, everyone has a mouse and some even fly with it.

[Inkompetent 0]

I think planes (no idea about helos) have about 40-100 flares depending on type. However when fired at (i.e. known launch) they do tend to be fired in rapid bursts, often from both sides of the plane, so for example a single two-second burst of flares may very well spend 10-20 flares. Precautionary use of flares tends to be much less rapid (instead of firing once ever 0.2 seconds you maybe fire once per second) and in a short sequence.

Suffice to say though, planes IRL don't really have flares to spoof more than a couple of known launches.

[NoRailgunner 0]

Locking onto a target should be limited to LOS anyway. You can lock onto anything and keep the lock if you had locked it while having LOS.

Wrong you can lock on any contact as long as you have proper information about it. LOS is not really needed or why do you think that missiles can be fired on targets BVR and bombs can be dropped from stand-off range? Sorry but some technolgies and tactics have been developed and now are a bit more advanced...

For a start try to search for AN/ALE-47 countermeasure system.

What about shared data and informations from reconaissance, AWACS, satellites and electronic warfare? Guess pvp can't handle this very well - players are simply too much occupied on increasing their own killstats.

Anyway - vanilla islands are still too small for proper (= not spawned) air support especially with fixed-wing aircrafts like F-35 and Su-34.

It depends very often on how many blind eyes one can put on mission design.

[Inkompetent 0]

Wrong you can lock on any contact as long as you have proper information about it. LOS is not really needed or why do you think that missiles can be fired on targets BVR and bombs can be dropped from stand-off range? Sorry but some technolgies and tactics have been developed and now are a bit more advanced...

For a start try to search for AN/ALE-47 countermeasure system.

You still require LOS for most BVR-weapons to work. Just because something is out of view range doesn't mean it is out of line of sight. But indeed GPS-guided weapons, CCRP-lofted bombs, and secondary sources providing target data can get around this (grand example is Apaches firing Hellfires with Lock-On After Launch mode).

[enforcer1975 0]

Lots of stuf that isn't put in by the devs, so you can't blame it on the mission makers. They are limited to what the game can, so carry your wishes to BIS.

There is already a targeting laser in the game, i rarely ( rarely is already exaggerated ) see anyone using it.

[hellfire257 3]

A fully working RWR, ECM, and Radar suite would be awesome though :D It would actually make air-to-air more challenging and realistic.