Space Combat - Did I miss something?

[Endie]

Ah, high-tech super sensors. of course! Yes, I had overlooked that!

Please point me to the pages where they are defined; I am stuck using p 76 of the HGU 2022:

And p 160 of the Core Rules Update. Apparently 'minimal information' (whether or not an object is 'active' in EM) for 'EM sensors' is confined to Very Long range.

There is a huge number of unidentified objects to sift through, and a ship does NOT know their vectors, exact position, or much of anything at all, until the object has been scanned. And scanning an object for information takes time, and is limited in what information can be determined -- and range is a very large factor.

And of course it is left up to the referee to determine what quality of information is required to determine the size of an object, or the class-type of a detected ship, or the probable / positive identification of a particular ship, or sufficient resolution to make a firing solution. To my mind, all of that requires somewhat more than 'minimal' information.

If you have a fleet that is large enough to include BBs, as we have discussed throughout, then they're absolutely going to have "super sensors" as you call them: extended arrays or rapid deployment extended arrays on at least one ship (those are available at only TL11 and extend sensor range). It's not a player ship fighting a peer. It's a BB fleet plus support.

What you quoted does not even disagree with @AnotherDilbert - he said they'll see each other at distant range or longer, and can fight each other starting at distant range. The book agrees. This they can do, and if they use extended arrays they can see each other in greater detail, as well!

Unless, of course, one side or the other uses stealth coating to avoid detection entirely until closer range: pricy but achievable.

I'd entirely agree that there will be a lot of objects to track when facing a large enemy fleet, and that fleets will include pickets and sensor boats performing a bit like Aegis, AN/SPY-1 ships today, probably handing off targeting info using the rules for that to less capable ships.

The sarcasm is a bit unnecessary since he has been very polite.

Edit: this is the info you get with extended arrays from EM and active radar/lidar at Distant. You'll get the outline, and you'll know from basic sohcahtoa that this is an (operating) Tigress, for instance, and not a Gailka Megula. You'll also know that this is forty ships and not forty weirdly-organised asteroids!

 

[Vormaerin]

Underlying this argument is that the HG sensor rules are a joke and treats ships as blind even by today's standards. Many other editions of Traveller (including 2300) have better sensors than High Guard ships do.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Ah, high-tech super sensors. of course! Yes, I had overlooked that!

More or less any sensor has a thermal unit, resolving Minimal detail at Distant range (Core'22, p160):


Distributed Arrays, Extended Arrays, and Extension Nets (HG'22, p55) extends the range of some sensor types.

HG'22, p26 outlines how sensors work beyond Distant range, at Very Distant and Far ranges.


Yes, ships can detect each other at Distant range, and warships with good sensors and crew will very likely detect them.

 

[rinku]

I'm not that sure that they are that much of a joke, really. HG is quite focussed on space combat; most of the sensor rules are directly related to having a firing solution (sensor lock) and combat ranges, which may obscure the underlying assumption that it's easy to detect that *something* is way out there, but not what (Thermal, as stated just now while I was typing this).

CRB only lists stuff out to distant, but HG does discuss ranges beyond that. And realistically mentions that you can see all the little dots, but sorting out range and detail is not easy.

 

[Endie]

I'm not that sure that they are that much of a joke, really. HG is quite focussed on space combat; most of the sensor rules are directly related to having a firing solution (sensor lock) and combat ranges, which may obscure the underlying assumption that it's easy to detect that *something* is way out there, but not what (Thermal, as stated just now while I was typing this).

CRB only lists stuff out to distant, but HG does discuss ranges beyond that. And realistically mentions that you can see all the little dots, but sorting out range and detail is not easy.

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Yep and there are several ways to get quite large bonuses to the Electronics (Sensors) check needed to get a firing solution mentioned there, at distant range.

 

[Sigtrygg]

There are many weapons that can fire at very long range, if you take the long range advantage then any weapon with a normal range of long becomes very long, and comfortably score hits, therefore weapon targeting sensors are more than capable of detecting objects at very long range with sufficient resolution for a firing solution. It stands to reason that ship sensors should be longer ranged than the Traveller core rule book makes out.

Perhaps the sensor task margin of success should shift the amount of information "up" the core rule book table, say one level for every effect number of 4 or 6; the stacking bonuses of expert programs, skill level, augmentation, advanced sensors, sensor "advantages" makes the DM scale of such things difficult to balance. I wonder what a typical sensor op PC/NPC would have as total DMs on a warship and what a fully augmented sensor op bonus would look like... then there are robots and virtual crew...

 

[rinku]

In real life, you generally need observation time to gather more data. But also, spaceships are small things and you start to run up against the limitations of optics and other wavelength related stuff. If a ship on your scope is a dozen pixels, there's a limit to how much data you can extract from it. And you'll need to observe it over time - at any range - to get its lateral motion. Outside of active sensor range, good luck getting any kind of accurate range value, unless you have a good baseline (which you may well have. A single ship may struggle to determine the range to a bogey, but a pair of them far enough apart can quickly solve that).

Now, I am talking in general. I don't have the background to know if the actual listed ranges do make sense from the point of view of it all. Maybe they should be longer, maybe they should be shorter. But there will be a limit where you're no longer doing target tracking and are now doing astronomy.