Discussion of the detection model for cloaked vessels [Archive]

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cocoa-jin

12-24-2008, 10:47 AM

I'd like to see the means of detecting cloaked vessels be mainly a player interface, not a level up "skill" feature.

I'd like to see the means of detecting a cloaked vessel be a process in which the player himself either does or doesnt do, either does well or doesnt do well.

I'd like to see the detection of cloaked vessels not require any special equipment on the ship, but perhaps provide some ability to use speicalized equipment off ship like faction sensor arrays, or highly specialized other player's vessels(with minimal offenive capability) for support in increasing one's ability to detect and possible track cloaked vessels.

In my mind I feel I see Starfleet vessels having sensor suites that can detect all sorts of fields, spectrums, particles, etc. And that a skillful science officer can use the basic sensor suite to recognize the various data that could indicate the presence of a cloaked vessel and even a useable target lock or at least targeting solution if the cloaked vessel makes mistakes in how it operates.

In my mind I picture an interface remiscent to that found on modern submarines. Essentially a multi-function display(MFD) that provides data from the vast array of sensors on the ship. This MFD can switch between detection types(electro-magnetic, gravimetric, particle radiation, gases, solids, energy fields, etc) Each one of these detection types would provide data along the spectrum, with the ability to focus in specific points along that spectrum, or filter.

So imagine your monitor screen with a graph scale on it. One scale from left to right 0-359^...your horizontal plane wraping around the ship. The other top to bottom 0-359...your vertical plane wraping around your ship. Lets say you choose gravimetric, you get spikes on the graph corresponding to gravity "wells" based on their bearing from the ship. Of course planet and other celestial bodies would register...those you can see and those youcouldnt see like som ebalck holes...everything looks fine.

Then you choose gases. You can get a all inclusive read out which looks like your TV on ch 1...multi-colored white noise. You choose the temp filter and move a slider back and forth from near zero kelvin to ioned(plasma). The screen changes as it shows gases meeting teh criteria and concentrations. Some look like blobs, others appear as tracks....hmmm. Your click on the blob, it shows various hydrogen isotopes and a few heavier elements...just a plain gas cloud. One track is pretty big, spans a long distance and has lots of water and methane and such in it...comet trail Another isnt so big, starts abruptly and ends with a blob...it shows in the ionzied spectrum and consists of more exotic compunds and elements...could this be a cloaked vessel?

How is this ionized track behaving, is it traveling in a straight line, is it stationary, is its relative motion changing. Could it be an old propulsion/warp signature of a ship that was here earlier and left a remnent as it left? Let me focus my search on the area using other detection types, maybe energy fields. maybe if I can pick up a weak energ signature at the location I can attribute it to a cloak, if I cant...then maybe its just a remnant. Maybe I can reposition the the anamoly between me and the star in the system. If its a cloaked vessel it would be able to manipulate the light radition form the star...but not particle radiation, not matter. If I note an eclipes of alpha particles or neutrinos, or something composed of matter at the anomolie posituion, then I have a claoked vessel...and if I know its a vessel, i now know how to track it...by the ionized exotic gases.

If I can track it, im on the offensive now. Keep it mind this coul dbe stream lined throuh the interface. The had part is processing the data, but its there...the means of detecting the cloaked vessel is there and present. But once you got, you have something to work with and the tide of advanatge starts swinging to ship hunting the cloaked vessel.

Next...counter-measures to be used by the cloaked vessel to minimize detection range.

Thibor

12-24-2008, 11:17 AM

Dear god man ... think of the children. Or if not the children, then simply your average gamer.

No, I'm advocating for this or any game coming out today to be as simple as Pong or even Q-Bert.

And I understand from your posts in another thread Cocoa that you get enjoyment out of throwing yourself into the whole minutia of a topic. Reading up books on WW1 and WW2 tactics and avionics, etc etc.

That's great and all and if there are niche games made to sate your desires for such mind numbing detail, which to your average gamer is what it is, then I'm happy you can find those games.

But your average gamer .. be they 12, 32 or 52 years old, isn't going to get a kick out of watching fuzzy graphs over and over trying to detect a cloaked ship. Maybe once to say either a) they did it or b) now I see how it's done but, I just don't see those looking for engaging and entertaining combat, be it against computer AI or other players, are going to enjoy staring a fuzzy graph/spectrum screens trying to see if there's a ship that's cloaked out there.

I'm going to be captain of the ship. And either I've recruited/trained a great NPC science/tactical officer that has a decent chance of detecting the cloaked ships. Or, I'm going to be working on my own rank/prestige/whatever "stat" so that I can recruit such an officer staff.

Loekii

12-24-2008, 11:53 AM

I tend to like the base systems for detecting stealth in fantasy MMOs. Take WoW for example, if you don't have the skill (ie the tech) to detect stealth, you see nothing. If you do have some tech, you see a 'faded'/ghost image. And if you have more than enough ability to see the stealthed player, you simply see them.

Graphically, I would like to see it range from nothing, to a distorted bubble in the graphic position of the ship, to see basically a 90% phase of the enemy ship.

I think it would be nice to have an option to re-allocate power to the sensors to 'detected' cloaked ships, which would basically be a buff modifier to the detection calculation. I also would like to see 'counter measures' be an option, where you kick up more power to avoid detection by taking power from other systems (ie propulsion, weapons, etc).

cocoa-jin

12-24-2008, 12:39 PM

How about providing the basic detection model used in Klingon Academy for the intermittent detection and lock on cloaked vessels by NPC crew(based on range and cloaked vessel speed primarily), but my proposed method be an optional advance method which could provide an early warning potential.

Keep in mind, this proposal in the initial approach is not intended to be used during combat. It is intended for use before an engagment and that info learned could be used automatically by the NPC crew during the fight.

So those looking for entertaining fights could still do so without utilizing the advance functions. But those looking for entertaining fights and engaging tactics to improve their position at the start of the fight versus cloaked vessels can utilize the advance features of the science/sensor station.

Such an advance sensor/science station would provide immersive and highly functional content for science/exploration vessels.

Also keep in mind one wouldnt use this feature all the time. It would be something one uses breifly when entering a system, approaching suspcious or hostile location, points of interset, combat areas, etc, etc. The frequency of use would be up to the player and what he feels appropriate for the circumstances.

Many players may not appreciate the feature...and many may not need to. But science/exploration based players would use it all the time during research/exploration operations and even has support vessels during combat.

I'd just rather not see a level "skill" that allows for auto-detection of cloaked vessels...it requires no skill on the actual player's part to skillfully defeat the enemy's system. My proposal allows for just about anyone to detect cloaked vessels on day one with the systems already on the ship if they make skillful use of the system....but it also means a skillful cloaked captain can also minimize the odds of his detection if he can keep his detectable emissions and signatures minimal enough to miss notice by the player looking for him.

Presumably better sensor systems make eluding harder...but it would still require skillful use of the system by the player for early detection.

cocoa-jin

12-24-2008, 12:54 PM

thefreshjedi

12-26-2008, 06:03 AM

Cloaked counter-measures to detection

Keep the scanning ship between you sources of particle radiation sources(stay on the shady side of ships) to prevent a cloaked eclipse of the radiation from the source

Stay out nebulas
* You can be tracked by the bow-wave and wake you produce
* The gases my flourese(like the northern lights) as they interact with the energized cloak and/or deflector shield)

Shadow other ships(like frieghters and other civilian vessels, unsuspecting warships, comets, etc) to mask your plasma trail

Keep your speed low to minimize emissions

Keep your distance to reduce the ease of detecting various emissions and signatures

Maintain close proximity to or maintain position between scanning vessel and some large broad spectrum electro-magnetic and/or energy anamoly to mask your own signature amoungst its white-noise

I like your ideas cocoa, but I would have to agree that this would have to be an optional form of control for the weapons/science officer duties. I mean you would have to have a competitent or "elite" form of stationary crew member that could over-see these duties such that you don't have to do as much work yourself (unless you want to take direct control of these functions). But I think this would be overwhelming to the average joe.

I think that the WoW rogue stealth mode is a great start for the design in looking for, tracking and killing cloaked vessels. I mean if you are a level 50+ and the rogue that is sneaking up on you is only level 40+, you will hear the traditional "cloak sound" nearby, which I can't describe really in words, other than it makes a distinguishable sound. And anyone that's ever been ganked in wow by a rogue, will know that sound. But basically it means that there is something stealthed nearby...and the smart player will start cycling through available targets by pressing the "TAB" key like a mad man, trying to get a lock on the rogue. This is especially useful in Battlegrounds, where a rogue is trying to get the drop on you.

But here's the catch, if the rogue is above your level, not only do you get a much lower reduced chance to target him/her, you also have less of a chance of resisting their sapping abilities, and they can do some serious dps to you before you can react.

That's how I imagine a ship-to-ship fight going between a stealthed ship and a non-stealth or Fed ship; is that you will "know somehow", either by persistant sector scans indirect scans, or by direct detection that there is a stealthed ship nearby...and if your weapons officer or science officer are of the right skill level, then it may be highly possible to temporarily track the cloaked vessel as long as you are nearby and moving slowly enough to maintain a lock. But that lock and track are only going to be as good as the relative skill of the officer that you have working at that station. And then other rules would be that if you are moving too fast, or if the cloacked ship is behind you then you have almost zero chance of detecting or locking onto it. Especially if the captain or crew of the opponent vessel have skill levels that are way beyond yours. But if your skill is sufficiently higher than your opponents, then you should have a much higher chance of even identifying that cloaked vessel, let alone track it and lock on it.

But who knows, I have no idea how Cryptic will approach this subject, or implement it ingame. EvE has a similiar model to this. Anyone that has experimented with countermeasures or cloaking, or even cloak tracking. Those are good skills to spend time training in that game.

The other thing about cloaking is that it has to be limited to the type of ship. Remember, cloaking per canon is a massive power drain on the vessel in question. So if you're in a bird of prey, and you have cloaking active, then you should also suffer a significant loss in other areas, such as movement, warping, defenses, etc. Unless you are on a Romulan Warbird, or Klingon Cruiser, then you will have a greater movement rate while cloaked or a better defensive response system, because it's a much larger vessel with a much larger engine. Remember though, not all Klingon and Romulan vessels have cloak. Some of the largest vessels don't for example, (but they usually have cloaked escorts). I would imagine also that if you are customizing your vessel (much as you can in EvE), that if you are to put a cloaking unit inside the ship, then you will probably lose points to spend on other components as a result, because of the massive power drain that a cloak requires.

I'm curious to see how Cryptic will balance the ship systems, which you can pick, and how you install them, and what upgrades will improve the overall balance of the ship's components.

-avery

Loekii

12-26-2008, 08:43 AM

Perhaps the 'Cloaked sound' could come in the form of your Bridge crew saying 'Captain, detecting an anomoly off the port side, could be a cloaked ship' followed by your ship going to Yellow Alert.

cocoa-jin

12-26-2008, 01:47 PM

The WoW style level based detection thing is too simplified in my opinion. I can accept the use of NPC officer skill to allow system competency to provide a better early warning of possible cloak anamolies. Essentially they can possibly alert the captain of anamolies that could be cloaked vessels sooner and with lesser emissions or greater background maskings...even ignore false alarms more. But when it comes to the actual early warning detection of a cloaked vessel, it should be done by the player.

Any auto-detection or intermittent locks at closer range during combat engagments could use the actual system's specs/levels to determine when and how cloaked ships are detected, tracked and locked...but this wouldnt be early warning, instead its detection that may or may not happen with the cloaked vessel within combat range.

In my mind early detection is a skill utilizing systems...close range detection would be system focused since at close enough range the cloaked vessel's emissions are easy enough to detect...still better sensory systems would have a better chance than others. In addition, through the use of early detection and isolating emissions and signatures by the player to sniff out the cloaked vessel, the NPC science officer could then automatically augment the sensory system's data to provide better and stronger close range/combat detection and locks during the engagement.

I dont agree with levels being too important or soley responsible for determining if a cloaked vessel is detected or not because it eliminates the ability of cloaked captain(essentially the player) from skillfully using/operating the cloaked vessel to minimize detection...yes, at close range, level does have a more significant impact on detectability(perhaps as it should)...but for early detection it comes down to player vs player skill. It comes down to what I d or dont do, compared to what you do and dont do, that determines how well I can remain hidden, how close I can close the gap and weither or not I can get into attack range undetected or I see your shields come up just outside my firing range...or perhaps I dont even get close and see a phaser shot whiz over my port wing.

You see, a lot of this advanced stuff would be happening before the fight, not during it...not that it couldnt be done during the fight, it would just be difficult to pull off by either side at those ranges as shots are being fired. What you do before the fight helps to determine what advantage, if any, you enter the fight with...granted, this advantage is mainly first sight, first shot...what happens after that depends on the two opponents.

With response to a cloaked sound...I'd rather not a cloaked sound. If its detected its detected, have the science or tactical officer announce the intermittent lock or suspicous anamoly. Save the cloaked sound for the actual decloaking/cloaking action.

I really dont like idea of cloaked vessels having their cloak nullified. If you can lock him, dont make him visible...just provide a tracking and/or target lock.

And cloaked vessels shouldnt get a heads up that they may be detected until a shot is fired at them or a ship maintains a intercept course or fleeing course by maintaining a 180 degree bearing from the cloaked vessel while moving away(basically they always keep their tail pointed at cloaked vessel while moving away).

Trekkie

12-26-2008, 07:07 PM

cocoa-jin

12-26-2008, 08:42 PM

This is an interesting concept and I think that it could really add a lot of strategic depth to the game if it were implemented correctly, but honestly I think if it is in the game at all it will be streamlined simply because the developers have alreadys tated that they are trying to make the game as accessible as possible.

Im open to discussion on stream linning it. Maybe fewer detection types, fewer gradients within the various spectrums...so instead of 10mhz gradients, maybe 1000mhz gradients with color coded bands at 100mhx increments.

It should be relativly easy to spot potential sigantures of interests(provided its close enough and of sufficent strength/concentration to stand out), but it should take a little time to determine weither or not its worthy of further concern and to isolate the target if present.

The key in doing quickly is being familiar with it of course, but also knowing what detection types to utilize and which to ignore. For instance, attempting to detect plasma trails in a nebula(especially a high energy one), or in or near a star's cornoa, or the poles of a planet would be a bad idea since all but an incompotent cloaked captain would operate his vessel so it could produce enough emissions for easy detection in these environments.

But scanning gases in or near a nebula, like doppler radar tracks rain drops, you might see tracks in the gas cloud from the ship's wake...now these could be currents in the cloud, but you might look for gases radiating/florescing light(not necessarily visible light) at a higher rate than the rest of the cloud that corresponds with one of the tracks...but by itself, the clusters of extra light raditation may not equal a cloaked vessel...they could radiating because of solar bombardment or even clusters of gas collapsing in on itself because of localized concentrations of mass and gravity.

Im thinking about 15sec to 1min to determine if something is suspicous...then maybe 30secs to 1min, maybe 2mins in extreme cases, to isolate a trackable signature if able. Basically not much more than the time it takes to read my description of the process.

Like I mentioned in another post, particle radiation can be eclipsed/blocked by cloaked vessels(like casting a shadow), or even the localized disruption of particles flowing away from the star.

I havent come up with anything for detecting cloaked vessels over a planet's pole yet.

cocoa-jin

12-27-2008, 02:24 PM

How about active detection methods similar to a sonar ping(I cant remember if I talked about this yet)? If the searching ship can produce some release that would provide a detectable return. Some kind of pulse that might react to the cloaking field, or energize the ship's plasma trail.

What could be used to do this? A modified torpedo with its weapons grade war-head removed and replaced with some kind of energy coil or reactant...so no damage effect. Modifying the ships warp nacelles to produce single or continous field discharges radiating out from the ship in all directions(at a significant drain in power).

Each of these methods require you have an idea where the cloaked vessel is, in the case of the modified torps. Or you have no idea(or maybe you do have an idea) that its close by and your using the modified warp field to deter the cloak vessel from getting closer or hoping it will enter the range of the field before entering its effective weapon's range.

What about hunter-killer groups. It became come place for several ships to use group tactics for hunting subs. With a minimum of two ships they'd have one or more ships ping and the other ship(s) listen and perform attack runs.

Though not exactly the same tactic, what if we used a group tactic like this. Several ships create a sensor net/web using particle(not light) emissions. Each ship releases particle radiation(maybe released from the Bussard collectors or modified torps or maybe the deflector shield array if applicable...can the deflector array split and release particles at some angle 90 degrees or more port or starboard of the ship's bow?) Each ship will release its particles a distinct phase, freq, wave-length. Each ship in the net is monitoring the various distinct signals coming from the other ships in the net. Depending on the release type chosen, it could be a literal link or a expanding spheres(pings)...either way, I'll refer to them as links...though the expanding sphere release would appear to provide better coverage with fewer ships, be more efficient and more flexiable.

If a cloaked ship breaks one or more links in the web(because mass particles would be eclipsed by the cloaked ship), the corresponding ship(s) can approximate the location(with increasing accuracy with more ships linked in the web and the more links broken) or at least proximity of the cloaked ship.

The web is benefical because it increase the area that can be covered by the active "ping", plus the more ships you have the less likly a single or inferior group of cloaked ship will attempt to attack...big question...how do you coordinate the movement of several player ships to maintain the net? I assume some simple radar screen like layout wout work. Put a ring around each ship in the net, everyone tries to keep as many others ships who are part of the net within their ring as possible...it wont be a perfect symetrical net all the time, it'll frequently be a amorphous blob during chaotic encounters...but members of the net will generally have better cloak detection regardless...even if your individual ability to detect cloaked vessels will vary based on relative position within the net.

Im thinking the best release method would be a Bussard release, it could be radiant in all directions.

The draw back...all these methods would produce a significant power drain or requires limited resources on-board the ship...and even those that can replenished/re-supplied(power or gas/particle gathering) take time and cant replenish faster than their use.

Loekii

12-27-2008, 04:38 PM

cocoa-jin

12-27-2008, 11:17 PM

I agree that detection should be the summation of a number of factors (skill, energy allocation, speed, distance, environment, etc), but I disagree that it should be 100% player dependent.

We are talking about a Crew, not an individual, augmented with tech. So it should not solely be the result of a player visually or audibly searching the 3rd person perspective of their Starship cruising through space for some sort of visual distortion.

It should be the result of the various factors, which includes both the ship and its crew, as well as the player's awareness.

This is not like WWII submarine warefare -- where everything is relying on a 'ping' and lots of estimations, but rather it is more like trying to catch a drug runner trying to sneak into the harbor -- where you have a number of elements that can help coordinate and identify the target.

Detection is not some random analog flicker to the port side about 2,000m away somewhere, but rather is a spot on 'hit' with computer logs, calculation and precision.

None of these ideas rely on visual detection cues...its all sensor dependent. The early detection and subsequent easy of detection and tracking during close quarter tactical engagments and ranges is player dependent. Ship systems and NPC crew would handle detection and tracking at close range and during engagments(and once again, supplemented by any advantage created by player early detection of a viable signature)

Everything isnt dependent on a "ping". The 'ping" is just one of the ways of detecting a cloaked vessel...in this case an active detection method. Ive discussed in detail passive detection methods. Keep in mind, all methods are sensor dependent, not visual detection in 3rd person.

A spot on hit would be a track and/or lock...that is an aspect of my proposal. But detection can be a flicker on the sensor screen, or remnants of some emission, a trail of emissions in plain sight or filtered from other data presented on the screen.

My proposal does make use of several data sources, known variables and personal processing and filtering of data to find the target.

Once again, close range detection and trackin would be systems and credw dependent. Long range and early detection would be player dependent and provide a boost for systems and crew pereformance in detecting and tracking cloaked vessels at close range(combat ranges)...and even farther out if the contact is strong enough.

My submarine analogy for detecting cloaked vessels wasnt from the perspective of a sub, but from the perspective of a hunter-killer surface vessel.

I think my idea is closer to what you suggest than you think. I think Ive failed to paint the picture effectivly for you.