[FIXED B513] Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

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AndrewJ
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Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2014 12:47 pm

[FIXED B513] Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by AndrewJ »

Hello,

I found a situation today (B486, Battle of the First Salvo) where ships will break EMCON in response to non-threat missiles (SAMs, in this case), allowing them to be detected by ESM and engaged.

At the start I have two groups of American ships to the SE of a Soviet group. The American radars are off, EMCON is passive, and the Soviets do not have any detection of the American ships. Then a pair of F14s flying past to the south of the Soviets get a little too close, and trigger a SAM launch.

Image

A few seconds later the hidden American ship groups turn their radars on, broadcasting their presence to the world despite their EMCON rules.

Image

However, the American ESM and radar picture is good enough that they know the missile is not directed at them, and it is far beyond the range of any of their own SAMs. They wouldn't have any way to attack the Soviet missile yet even if it really was directed at them.

Image

A minute later the SAM runs out of fuel and the ships turn their radars off again, so it's pretty clear that it's the SAM which is prompting the radar behaviour.

Image

Then, depending on the situation (position of ships, duration of SAM engagement), the Soviets may have a good enough ESM picture for a bearing only attack, and the skies fill with incoming Shipwrecks.

A large part of this behaviour is quite good - if a real incoming missile threat were to pop up I would definitely want my ships to illuminate and engage in self defense, even if they had previously been radar silent, and then to run silent again after the threat is gone. My concern is that the behaviour is being triggered by missiles which are known not to be threatening - far away, not travelling on an intercept course, and not within range to be engaged by my defences. Perhaps the threat recognition algorithm could be refined to take those factors into consideration before deciding to break EMCON?

Has anyone else run across similar situations, where it became a matter of concern?


Running this a few times gives slightly different results - sometimes one group illuminates, sometimes both, and a Soviet missile attack may or may not happen. (It probably won't in this save - I think in the original situation the F14s loitered while I wasn't looking, drawing multiple shots over a longer period, giving the Soviets more time for an ESM fix.)

EDIT: Forgot the save.
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mikmykWS
Posts: 7185
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2005 4:34 pm

RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by mikmykWS »

Hi Andy

Yes and nice work putting this together. Logging this so we take a look at some point.

Helping the AI figure out what exactly is a threat is upper tier logic that we do need to tackle. It is not as simple as course and bearing calculation as most modern ASM's can fly programmable courses etc. We need to implement these at some point as well.

Mike
AndrewJ
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by AndrewJ »

Here's another example where threat value judgment comes into play.

Now the Kirov and friends have just endured a barrage of incoming HARMs, some of which have overflown the group and are streaking off into the open ocean, but the Kirov (which obviously didn't get shut down by the HARMs, dammit), continues to engage them, launching fresh missiles at the outgoing targets.

Image

Good missiles wasted on valueless targets, and a swarm of more important Harpoons has been spotted clearing the horizon.

But as you point out, I know they're valueless, but how does the AI? [&:] I suppose the AI could check for anything vulnerable downrange, compare observed time of flight to probable time of flight to recognize that they'll probably run out of fuel soon (if they're the "obvious" missile type), recognize that they're not turning now, and check expected threat missiles for the ability to turn and reattack. That shouldn't be so hard for every single missile, should it? [:D][:D]
mikmykWS
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by mikmykWS »

I guess so. Sheesh[:)]
AndrewJ
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by AndrewJ »

Playing further into the scenario, it's becoming apparent that the ships breaking EMCON in response to SAMs is more of a problem than I had anticipated. When it was just one or two long range shots at the edge of the SAM envelope I could usually quickly turn off my radars before the enemy got a good fix on me. However, once my raids started going in, and SAMs started launching rapidly there was no possible way to keep my radars off. Every second or two another Vampire call would play, and my radars would be on again as quickly as I had turned them off.

In practice, it looks like this means that if you have good ESM and are anywhere within ~ 100 miles or so of an engagement you will be radiating and giving away your location whether you want to or not, even though you are not actually threatened. And if there are long range Soviet ASMs around, you really are going to be threatened pretty shortly after that...
kneecaps
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by kneecaps »

Gotta be careful here. Especially with the HARM overflight scenario.

I don't think as a defender you can safely draw any safe conclusion about the 'type' of missile that just over flew you.

However I'm not aware of any doctrine that advocates taking tail shots at missiles moving away from you...

Regarding the ESM detections causing you to radiate. Sounds like EMCON should be strictly enforced with a 'We are detecting incoming threats permission to illuminate?" type pop up (that I see to remember another software having a similar question like this).

Dannyp19
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by Dannyp19 »

ORIGINAL: kneecaps


Regarding the ESM detections causing you to radiate. Sounds like EMCON should be strictly enforced with a 'We are detecting incoming threats permission to illuminate?" type pop up (that I see to remember another software having a similar question like this).


It would be good to have a setting that could be toggled on or off like that.

In regards to the missiles firing, just think of it as the crew being target fixated after surviving a barrage of vampires. [:)]
Dimitris
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by Dimitris »

"Ignore EMCON while under attack" behavior is now doctrine-configurable from Build 513 onwards, and is OFF by default.

Now we'll sit back and wait for the "why aren't my ships lighting up their radars to defend against the incoming aircraft/missiles" posts [;)]
AndrewJ
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by AndrewJ »

Thanks! Was just growling about this to myself again last night, when my ships lit up their radars in response to a distant torpedo, so this will be a great help. [:)]
Shemar
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by Shemar »

Now we'll sit back and wait for the "why aren't my ships lighting up their radars to defend against the incoming aircraft/missiles" posts [;)]

I really don't understand why people would complain about that. I set up new contact messages as popup messages which pauses the game, letting me easily manage what sensors are lit in response to any new missile or torpedo sighting.

I get that there are players that don't want to micromanage but if they really expect AI controlled units to act realistically at all times in a situation as complex as modern warfare, you will never be able to please them anyway [8D]
dillonkbase
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by dillonkbase »

I think the problem here is that generally the devs want the AI to mirror the capabilities of the User... not that the user cannot have there own way, but that the AI is not at a capability disadvantage... IE it cannot preform off axis attacks with tactom but the User can... or in this case how they respond to threats is difference where the AI cannot differentiate a true threat from a spurious contact.

I see this issue most often with ESM contacts... I can usually sort out the list to ID a vessel before the AI can... in some cases even if the vessel has a unique one ship signature the UI cannot positively id it because it has multiple database entries for different eras.

I'm not complaining... I just saying Sunburn is right that the fix is not perfect.
Dimitris
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RE: Ships breaking EMCON in response to non-threat missiles

Post by Dimitris »

I explained the rationale for originally hardcoding this behavior, here: fb.asp?m=3537089

It was (and is) a reasonable remedy to a problem that drove us (and many others) completely bonkers in Harpoon 2/3. Everyone who reads this and remembers the "good old days" knows exactly what we're talking about.

It turned out that this behavior was undesirable under some circumstances, and many players (particularly those who never experienced the original problem) did not understand the purpose of this behavior.

So now we're making it configurable and off by default. It's there for those who do need it, and gets out of everyone else's way.
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