Jets - Sensor overhaul (Radars, IRs, Lazors, PGMs)

[Strike_NOR 898]

Just like sensors have a max range, and weapons have a max locking range. Maybe confirmSensorTarget could be linked to range. In real life, if the enemy is not transponding their identity the only thing you have to go by is really a radar signature or visual confirmation. Unless you can use elimination, by removing all friendly aircraft and all civilian aircraft from the mix, and hoping that all "unknown" targets are enemy.

 

 

However I propose a suggestion to identification:

 

• If the target is emitting radar energy, this will be recognized by your RWR and Identified due to radar signature. (Gives players reason to switch off Radar - even if you are "seen" by the enemy, you are not identified).
• If the target comes within visual sensor range, it will be identified.
• If the target is lost from every friendly sensor for a given time, the confirmSensorTarget is reset again. (Gives players a reason to break radar contact).

 

I think these are some simple rules that enhance gameplay :)

[snoops_213 75]

5 hours ago, dr. hladik said:

 

To see target red, it must be confirmed as enemy by someone (by mission maker and script command "confirmSensorTarget").

In that case should they not turn red if they fire a missile at us or visual confirmation that its shooting at us, even radar for air targets when locked and id is established, as one of the devs said its assumed the every soldier carriers an iff that they can plug into a vehicle.

Oukej most modern radars have a2a and a2g modes, and various modes in that. Im not saying simulate all the different modes but a simple switch between a2a and a2g would be nice and delcutter the radar abit. Have a2a mode with a longer range and a2g mode with shorter range but more likely to pick up ground vehicles would be a good compromise. Do the camo netting in game atm add to hiding vehicles in any way? That would be intresting if the could make it harder to find on radar/ir/visual sensors. Is the radar dish on the aa vehicles able to be damaged without taking out the rest of the tank? Would be cool if we could shoot it and leave the take with out radar :)

 

My other burning question is about the data link and its possible expansion. So with this being 2035 and were assuming a few things like individual iff ect is it possible to have the ground threats and friendly postions shown on the map/gps? This would get taxing for large groups so attach it to a radio so if the radio is damaged, lost contact with freindlies. Can the data link be damaged in vehicles now or is it always on? With enemy contacts just a marker indicating type would do.  Would the engine be able to handle radar sharing for sams/aa ie have missile launcher seperate from radar vehicle or AWACS/EWR make friendly planes aware of enemy contacts, that the AI could handle/use? 

[Varanon 892]

Is there a way to get rid of the "game" target markers ? The box and diamonds that appear when using missile locks from within jets/choppers ? Because the HUD already has them. They don't seem to be removed with the crosshair difficulty settings

[GBee2 68]

21 minutes ago, Varanon said:

Is there a way to get rid of the "game" target markers ? The box and diamonds that appear when using missile locks from within jets/choppers ? Because the HUD already has them. They don't seem to be removed with the crosshair difficulty settings

 

I believe* they said they won't be there in the final release now that they are incorporated into the HUD. However as not all vehicles had this change implemented yet they've left it in the dev build for now?

 

* Don't shoot me if I'm mis-remembering this. 

[fn_Quiksilver 1636]

can one of you brave dev build warriors PM me with list of all the new jet classnames (incl variants)? thanks :)

[xon2 102]

Will the Ghosthawk get an active radar upgrade as well? The cockpit has that 'radar-like' display on the outer left and right of the front dashboard.

[darkChozo 133]

New jet classnames are:

 

• B_Plane_Fighter_01_F (Black Wasp II)
• B_Plane_Fighter_01_Stealth_F (Black Wasp II Stealth)
• B_UAV_05_F (Sentinel)
• O_Plane_Fighter_02_F (Shikra)
• O_Plane_Fighter_02_Stealth_F (Shikra Stealth)
• I_Plane_Fighter_04_F (Gryphon)

[dragon01 902]

2 hours ago, xon2 said:

Will the Ghosthawk get an active radar upgrade as well? The cockpit has that 'radar-like' display on the outer left and right of the front dashboard.

Ideally the MFDs will get changed. Ghosthawk has no reason nor a place to put a radar. 

[oukej 2911]

3 hours ago, xon2 said:

- the 'point track' function does not work reliably. It often does not change from area to point track in tgp view.

Which vehicle pls? (it changes from point to area after loosing the track)

 

2 hours ago, arkhir said:

1. Flares and chaff seem to be a bit too reliable in distracting missiles
2. There is no automated "timed" flare dispensal mode

Under partial re-balancing. What weapons have you been trying? Against what vehicles? What distance approx.? Have the defender been dumping bursts or singles?

 

2 hours ago, arkhir said:

1. RWR doesn't warn about radar lock-on, only about incoming missile.
2. (not sure if intentional) Heat-seeking passive missiles are being detected on launch. While I understand this gameplay-wise, it'd be more realistic to just make them relatively easy to flare but hit without warning, unlike radar-guided munitions. This would force players to dispense flares preemptively like it is done in real life when there is a threat of MANPADS. If there was a possibility of achieving such results by re-configuring passive missiles or airplane warning recievers then it's fine I guess.

Can you please point us directly to the ammo that doesn't trigger warning (or conversely does, incorrectly) inside the locked vehicle?
 

24 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

I've found another problem. GBU-12s can't lock onto the laser from a very long distance (another reason to get rid of that bloody thing and give them proper LOAL, BTW).

Will check that lock. Btw, have you tried dropping the bomb without a lock, just on a marked target? ;)

[dragon01 902]

51 minutes ago, oukej said:

Will check that lock. Btw, have you tried dropping the bomb without a lock, just on a marked target? ;)

I did, though this was before the latest update. It didn't appear to guide (it did fall in the general neighborhood of the target, so it's not that I missed). It was dropped from a Gryphon, from about 2-3km.

[arkhir 135]

3 hours ago, oukej said:

Under partial re-balancing. What weapons have you been trying? Against what vehicles? What distance approx.? Have the defender been dumping bursts or singles?

Mostly been dogfighting, Black Wasp versus Shikra. I've been trying both mrange and srange munitions, on distances ranging from 400 to BVR. Got one kill on head-on engagement on about 3km with AMRAAM, then started turning on the wingman.

 

Defenders dumped bursts (standard AI behaviour), but even then the flares seemed to defeat missiles in somewhat unlikely scenarios — for example, a missile was fired after a flare dump was provoked by a previous heatseeker, on a distance of about 700-900 meters. Missile flew erratically in a direction completely opposite to the flares (it has turned hard up and to the left), and was just... gone, even after the flares finished their burn.

 

I'd expect that proper behaviour in this case would be more in-line of this: heatseeker flies towards the flare dump initially, as they attract him first. But after flying too close / through the flares - enough to lose lock and regain it on jet engines - it should hone-in on them and go in for a kill.

Instead it has just... Done something weird, flying in an unprobable pattern. I guess it has something to do with core in-game flare simulation mechanics rather than anything else. But yeah, generally speaking I feel like this just needs some proper balancing, I played around with it for only about 1-2 hours, so I don't know.

Sometimes though it just feels like flares are impossible to defeat, and I tried different firing disciplines: rippling, dumping a couple or firing off successively with interval. Got some good splashes, but most of the time it wasn't enough to cut it.

 

Oh, also - whoever did the AI deserves some praise. After damaging enemy jet heavily he disengaged from a fight and headed for landing :D

 

3 hours ago, oukej said:

Can you please point us directly to the ammo that doesn't trigger warning (or conversely does, incorrectly) inside the locked vehicle?

AA guided missile used by Cheetah. Clearly getting locked, RWR doesn't warn about the radar lock, only getting the 'incoming missile' after the missile fired. Not sure if this missile is supposed to be a heatseeker or radar-guided missile, so tried again, this time with radar-guided munition:

AMRAAM with active radar homing. Same deal: no warning before the launch, only after (no radar warning reciever warning, only missile approach warning system triggers).

Titan MANPAD heatseeking missile triggering approach warning system. No idea if this is supposed to happen or not; older jets are unable to detect MANPAD launches though, even if they can detect radar-guided missiles. Also I don't know what's wrong with these missiles, but none of them hit me despite not flaring or evading them and flying very slow (airbraking )

 

I would expect it to work something like this:

1) RWR lock-on tone. Warns pilot about being locked-on by a radar. This is not happening when enemy is locking us with radar-guided munitions, or any other systems utilizing radar lock-on (e.g. AAA ballistic computers tied to their radars). It would be nice if we had a lock-on warning for radar-guided munitions, displayed in flashing yellow/orange with some sort of tone on the RWR.

2) Missile launch warning! Something we already have! Yay.

 

Although I'm aware in 2035 5-gen jets will most likely be able to detect MANPAD launches, I'm fairly sure that some older jets don't necessarily have MAWs. That's why I staded I don't know how intentional this feature is, and whether it should be possible to disable it for modding purposes (e.g. for SU-25T, which as far as I am aware - cannot detect heat-seeking, but can detect radar-guided munitions) or L-159 Alca, which most likely doesn't have MAWs capable of detecting MANPAD launches.

 

With this sort of behaviour, two classes of guidance would be much more distinct than they currently are:

1. No MAW for IR-guided missiles
2. IR guided missiles easy to dispatch with flares
3. RWR lock-on warning for radar-guided missiles
4. RWR-based MAW for radar-guided missiles
5. Radar-guided missiles harder to dispatch with chaff than IR with flares
6. Add automatic "timed" flare release mode.
   Once activated, your aircraft is dumping a flare/chaff round every couple of seconds, untill activated again, to make it stop. This would essentially protect you from virtually any sort of heat-seeking missile, but wouldn't be enough to save you from a radar-guided missile fired from a close range

 

This way we reach a couple of different results with distinct balance between them:

1. To be reliably protected from MANPADs you need to stay high (beyond their range), or continually dump flares, or fly fast and in evasive pattern. IR-guided missiles wouldn't be as effective, if countered actively, but would be deadly and surprising if they weren't expected.
2. To be reliably protected from radar-guided munitions you need to break your trajectory, performing evasive maneuvers and dumping a lot of chaff. Radar-guided missiles wouldn't be surprising, but would require taking a timed defensive action upon launch (like they do now)

 

edit:

1 hour ago, Strike_NOR said:

on a different note, I think this is going off topic. I believe Saul wants us to discuss the vehicles more specifically. There's a seperate thread for sensors, HUD symbology and MFD's.

It wasn't specified in the thread - so if this is off topic then please move this post and any other post I made here to respective threads (about sensors, or other feedback I've compiled)

Edited April 18, 2017 by arkhir
note for mods, additional post content with explained reasoning, sources and videos

[dragon01 902]

Cheetah missiles are Titans. And yes, Titan is supposed to be detectable. IIRC, all ArmA3 jets are supposed to be equipped with MAW. It's already pretty common on modern fighters (dunno about Gripen) and A3 is set in the future.

 

BTW, I just tested the LGBs again. Without lock they don't hit the laser. Tested from about 2.5km up. 

 

In fact, it seems that the laser doesn't even exist at long ranges. I've tracked this down to my object view distance. When I bumped it, I was able not only to lock, but hit from much further out. I think that something needs to be done about it, because right now, it appears that weapon performance is dictated by graphical options. The laser should be visible and exist at least up to terrain VD. Also note, this test was done in SP (Eden editor). LOAL would also improve things on that front, because the time where lasing "counts" is the terminal guidance, where the aircraft would be just above the target. Launch, on the other hand, will generally occur with target at a distance of about 1.4 times the altitude. When self-designating it won't, of course, be practical, but it's another story when a JTAC is lasing things for you.

 

Also, I found that the TGP's range readout maxes out at 5km. This is a bit too short when flying at high altitude. It should be a 5-digit number and go up to 12km (max. terrain VD).

 

Another thing I'd appreciate would be some sort of pitch information when in TGP view. With the TGP locked onto an area, it's easy to lose track of the aircraft's pitch, which can be deadly in low-alt bombing (and is an annoyance during testing, as well). It'd greatly help keeping the plane steady.

[arkhir 135]

39 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

LOAL would also improve things on that front, because the time where lasing "counts" is the terminal guidance, where the aircraft would be just above the target. Launch, on the other hand, can occur with target 

Lock-on-after-launch would be awesome, it would allow people to launch maddogs, and (hopefully) mod-in anti-radiation variants of Mavericks and Kedges, apart from solving the bomb issue. Three birds with one stone?

 

I feel this feature, if implemented, should be extended to missiles, not only bombs.

 

39 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

Cheetah missiles are Titans. And yes, Titan is supposed to be detectable. IIRC, all ArmA3 jets are supposed to be equipped with MAW. It's already pretty common on modern fighters (dunno about Gripen) and A3 is set in the future.

Gripen E has MAW but it would still be nice to have possibility of disabling this feature for older aircraft, helicopters or other aircraft not equipped with these systems.

 

39 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

Also, I found that the TGP's range readout maxes out at 5km. This is a bit too short when flying at high altitude. It should be a 5-digit number and go up to 12km (max. terrain VD).

I think that's related to limited capability of laser rangefinders. Russian Klen-PS laser rangefinder has 5km of total range with ±12 azimuth, -30 to +6 elevation constraints and with ranging error of ~5m.

[dragon01 902]

Definitely. I've been saying that Scalpel should be switched to pure LG and given LOAL since the overhaul began. LG missiles and bombs should use the same mechanic, as far as guidance goes.

[Strike_NOR 898]

8 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

It's already pretty common on modern fighters

 

Some modern fighters feature this as a built-in system, others have stuff like that integrated in pylons or pods. But I think you can agree that it is technically difficult to estimate the exact location of the missile through it's entire flight. Right now, Arma shows you an "M" moving from launcher to you. This is Okay for Active radar seeking missiles, because you can measure the energy from the incoming missile to estimate a range. The problem is that MAWS is designed specifically to deal with Manpads. And Manpads are generally going to be IR-seekers. So like you say, they detect the UV and/or IR light from the rocket plume and give you a directional warning like "missile launch, two O'clock", but nothing thereafter. It is now the pilots job to dispense flares and defend against that threat.

 

For MAWS to be able to show the flight path of a missile, it would have to either:

-Know the exact missile type, range to launcher and guidance system.

or

-Visually track the missile and range it by laser.

 

Both of which are equally "impossible" to do.

 

Therefore I suggested in the sensors thread that IR missiles only give a directional launch warning on MAWS fitted aircraft, and Radar missiles give a lock, launch and range estimate on the RWR.

 

 

on a different note, I think this is going off topic. I believe Saul wants us to discuss the vehicles more specifically. There's a seperate thread for sensors, HUD symbology and MFD's.

 

I will post more on the jets tomorrow.

 

[dragon01 902]

4 minutes ago, Strike_NOR said:

Both of which are equally "impossible" to do.

Hardly. More advanced systems actually use radar tracking to locate the incoming missile. They're not usually found on fighters, but in time of ArmA they could very well be (well, at least as far as 5th gen fighters go).

[Strike_NOR 898]

4 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

Hardly

Instead of condescendingly trying to outbest every member on the forum with your "facts", look at your own statement that I quoted. You claimed most modern fighters had this? We're not discussing anything but the DLC fighters so why bother?

 

38 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

It's already pretty common on modern fighters

 

9 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

They're not usually found on fighters,

 

[dragon01 902]

9 minutes ago, Strike_NOR said:

Instead of condescendingly trying to outbest every member on the forum with your "facts", look at your own statement that I quoted. You claimed most modern fighters had this? We're not discussing anything but the DLC fighters so why bother?

First quote, I was speaking of MAW in general. Second quote, I was speaking of MAW that tracks the exact position of missiles via radar. Don't quote me out of context. Both systems exist and are in service, but the latter is much bulkier due to the need for an additional, independent radar system for missile tracking. 

[xon2 102]

@oukej All jets, old CAS and new DLC jets. I put csat tanks, artillery, ifrits and apcs on Altis and tested it with all Nato/AAF planes. It goes to point track once i lock it, but without locking only very seldom. Weird thing is, after some flybys it might go to point track on one of the vehicles down below without locking it first, but not others, even when they are the vehicle class. 

 

Just to make sure its not me being stupid: on what condition does point track depend? Is the tgp supposed to change to point track when i place it over a vehicle/person absolutely independent from range, angle of aircraft nose, flir modes, active radar etc. or does the target has to do something, be in a special state?

[CNutter 24]

Forgive me if this has already been asked, didn't feel like skimming this whole thread...

First, even with object and overall render distance set as far out as it will go, the right panel camera feed has really low render distance (same problem w/ the missile camera). Is this a known issue?

Second, will the right and left panels be resizable in the layout editor? That would be a greatly appreciated addition!


Also, somewhat unrelated, since the Ghosthawk has the radar displays on the dash, why not give it some form of radar? If it's not going to get any, I think it would be best to remove them since they could be misleading for that very reason.
Also, what's up with the third joystick on the center console of the Ghosthawk? Is it just for looks or is it based on something in real life (spotlight / camera pod control maybe?)

[chortles 263]

14 hours ago, arkhir said:

1. Really missing new weapon types. Sorta surprised we're not getting different sorts of tools that would utilize all the awesome new mechanics introduced by the DLC.
   A lot of potential goes to waste: anti-radiation ordnance, beam-riding semi-active missiles, cluster bombs, bomblet dispensers, or different sized unguided bombs (FAB-250, 500) for CSAT, no GPS guided munitions, not much difference in size between unguided rockets.

I'll agree re: anti-radiation ordnance (especially because of the allowsMarking config parameter existing specifically to differentiate between anti-radiation weapons -- complete with a specific sensor template for them -- and radar warning receivers) and different bomb sizes but if I recall correctly semi-active radar homing (SARH) was unfortunately ruled out earlier on, and while the lack of GPS guided munitions is unfortunate I'm still working out in my head how they "should" work without further changes (that is to say, would it essentially be a player-placeable "laser spot"-like invisible target?), and gameplay-wise there are indeed stat differences between the performance of unguided rockets if not necessarily corresponding to visible size...

14 hours ago, arkhir said:

1. Anti-air defence options are very limited in vanilla game, currently we have only 2 vehicles, 1 static and 1 manpad. It's a pity AA(A) assets weren't in the scope of this DLC.
   Well, we did get three more assets, but they are bound to the aircraft carrier and NATO faction.

It seems that the three systems in question can in fact be placed independently of the carrier, so if their side can be changed, i.e. targets BLUFOR and/or INDFOR, maybe BLUFOR and OPFOR if on INDFOR side, then the Mk-49 Spartan and Mk-21 Centurion systems could definitely be the centerpiece of a SAM site composition in Eden or Zeus -- after all, we're looking at going from the Cheetah's/Tigris' four (4) IR-sensor-equipped Titan (AA) missiles to "21 IR guided short range Anti Air missiles and 8 radar guided medium range Anti Air missiles" (quoting the DLC's Steam page here) when both autonomous systems are placed.

[woore 10]

 

Quote

• If the target is emitting radar energy, this will be recognized by your RWR and Identified due to radar signature. (Gives players reason to switch off Radar - even if you are "seen" by the enemy, you are not identified).
• If the target comes within visual sensor range, it will be identified.
• If the target is lost from every friendly sensor for a given time, the confirmSensorTarget is reset again. (Gives players a reason to break radar contact).

 

I think these are some simple rules that enhance gameplay :)

 

1) It's already there AFAIK. If not, it can be configured and would be right.

2) Recognizing a contrast spot != identification. And no, 2035 number won't give you that ability as well. It requires quite a work on image recognition and target database, and would be in development by 2035.

3) Yes, would be right.

 

As of your post about IR and active radar missiles - no, IR missiles are not that stealthy as you want them to be. All modern NATO missile warning receivers are multispectral, like AN/AAR-57, and detect the missile itself. They don't show its path on the display, like Arma MAWS, but it tracks them. Laser warning receivers are available as well, AH-64s even have an automatic avoidance algorithm activated by LWR.

Older systems like Russian SPO-15 were equipped with passive radar sensors only, yes, but current ones are way ahead of them.

[dragon01 902]

9 hours ago, CNutter said:

Also, somewhat unrelated, since the Ghosthawk has the radar displays on the dash, why not give it some form of radar? If it's not going to get any, I think it would be best to remove them since they could be misleading for that very reason.

It's not going to get radar because it doesn't need it. What would a stealth transport helicopter use that for, anyway? Gunlaying for miniguns?

 

The MFDs should be reworked, they'll probably be changed into something usable somewhere along the line.

[Strike_NOR 898]

48 minutes ago, woore said:

Recognizing a contrast spot != identification.

 

I didn't elaborate enough. What I meant is that if we want it "automated" (player does not have to ID it himself), it would "simulate" the pilot slaving the TGP to radar point of interest, this would allow the pilot to effectively zoom in and identify the aircraft. No algorithms required, of course. But like you mention, many modern cruise missiles have a surface vessel database and contrast image recognition so they can pick out high-value targets autonomously. I just don't see this in use against incoming missiles.

 

And by the way, the IR- missiles' stealth comes from not having an active radar tipping you off that someone is preparing to fire at you. Also, once missile is fired it does not emit anything other than massive amounts of heat and therefore IR light. During rocket flame burn it also emits UV light. Like you state, these are all observable by such devices, but my gripe with ArmA 3 is that it currently shows you the incoming missile on the RWR, even if it's a heat seeker. In my opinion, based on knowledge about current systems, it should only show the launch direction and as long as the rocket is burning, where the missile direction is.

 

This all works to my personal opinion about game balance. Handheld Manpads are generally quite weak and simplistic in design when it comes to target tracking. They do have built-in algorithms to counter flares, but are far easier to spoof than larger missile with better contrast, cooling etc, thermal imaging etc. So to balance the "weakness" of manpads, they should only tip off pilots that they're coming from a direction, but not how close or remaining time until impact. Being manpads, their major advantage above all should be stealth. It's hard to spot the infantry carrying it, it's not possible to lock onto with any aircraft sensors (except if you can find him on TGP) and it should only give a "launch detected X O'clock" warning.

Its downsides are: Short range, mediocre tracking and guidance, small warhead.

 

Chances are you will miss every time with the current system, and if the missile has short range and does little damage additionally, it becomes completely ineffective as a weapon. And ARMA has few SAM options to choose from...

[dragon01 902]

It makes sense to combine the RWR, LWR and MAWS displays (it's usually done IRL, as well). Also, the motor burning out doesn't cause the missile to instantly cool down and become invisible, it'd still be giving out heat, not to mention modern MAWS use UV light for tracking, as well. Modern systems can determine a missile's position well enough.

 

Removing the "M" marker would be a good option, but I'd leave "flashing sector" warnings. Rather than messing with that, I'd focus on making flares slightly less effective and a bit harder to use.