[wip]Visual sensor revamp for TMaru

[Peto]

Originally Posted by tater

There were some plans in place by the IJN to patrol certain sea lanes (about 30km wide swath) between certain ports. I think something similar would work. Radiused waypoints to provide coverage, then looped waypoints to mix up the flight plans.

Looks like by 1944, most ASW squadrons had large numbers of radar equipped planes. They flew some at night as well. About 1/3 to 1/2 had MAD gear as well.

Wonder of a radar could be given the same negative surface factor and turned into a MAD so that the planes could have MAD and visual sensors. We'd want the range so short on the MAD that it would only have a max range of a few hundred meters. Planes would fly waypoints at 50m. and maybe detect to 100-150m depth. Course since their air dropped DCs only had 25m and 45m settings, they can't prosecute the target effectively. They will call in more planes/ships, however.

I was reading about this in T. Roscoe's book yesterday. They needed 80 planes to be able to patrol the corridor effectively. The MAD idea is good. The planes had to fly low and only could detect in a path about 150 meters wide (I think that's what I read). When a MAD contact occurred, a marker would be dropped automatically. After getting 4 "marks" they would attack in the middle of them. I doubt that much detail is doable (or nessecary). Honestly, I think the MAD will be tough to model mainly because the computer won't be working on "best guesstimate" properties like RL pilots had to. It would be nice to add a few radar equipped Emilys to fly night patrol as well (as you mentioned).

Going back to SD Radar for a moment: I was going to check out dat files et al with minitweaker last night but my tweaked files aren't giving me modifiable data at the moment. Would it be possible to put a small up angle on radar so it doesn't detect low flying planes until they're very close? MinHeight=2 perhaps?

I think we should keep in mind that the Japanese were never able to accomplish all these things for the simple reason that the planes were never available. Therefore, maybe there should always be gaps in the coverage.

[tater]

Regarding gaps, there are a few ways. One is to have the groups spawn every X hours, but not 100% of the time. So there might be a daylight patrol, 90% of the days in a given area.

Then the random group composition.

make different versions of the planes, a MAD version, one regular plane with, and one without the new visual sensor, etc. Have the group have the leader (which has a 100% probability) be a vanilla search plane, then have there be an X% chance of a MAD plane, a Y% chance of a radar plane, and so forth.

Some days nothing at all, other days planes, but not the "good" kinds, other days an ugly mess of planes

tater

[Ducimus]

Tater ill try your plane loadout beta tonight. Im in between patrols, so its a good time for me to plug it in and see just how much dead i become

That said, planes ARE still too easy to avoid. Its that damn radar. Im wondering of applying enviormental dampeners to it via the sensors.cfg is an answer. Or, just simply lower its max radius, or raise the surface factor on it. Larger the surface factor, the closer the plane has to be in order for it to see it i beleive.

[Rockin Robbins]

Following closely to see if planes are spotting subs too well. Problems are non-variability in the opacity of the water, and apparently planes able to see subs from a mile away. In order to see a sub at periscope depth, you would have to have a very high angle due to the refractive index of water. Once you exceed the rafractive index, you can no longer see through the water, even if it is crystal clear, it merely reflects incident light like a mirror. A plane a mile away is WAY below the refractive index. All he can see at your distance is a reflection of the sky. What IS the refractive index of salt water? Can't be less than 30º, can it? Sorry to be the one throwing monkey wrenches but it IS important if we're trying to reflect (hehehehe) reality here.

A great thing about this mod is that it gets rid of the chickens running all day at periscope depth. Your radar is your friend here, and you better stay on the surface to see where the planes are if you want to avoid nasty surprises. Certainly TC at periscope depth is eliminated here. That's a good thing. Can't have any wartime vacationers avoiding conflict.

[tater]

I posted about the critical angle above in the thread a ways, and I agree. The tricky bit is that since units can only have 1 visual node, if you shorten the visual range too much, they won't see you on the surface.

[hyperion2206]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

Tater ill try your plane loadout beta tonight. Im in between patrols, so its a good time for me to plug it in and see just how much dead i become

That said, planes ARE still too easy to avoid. Its that damn radar. Im wondering of applying enviormental dampeners to it via the sensors.cfg is an answer. Or, just simply lower its max radius, or raise the surface factor on it. Larger the surface factor, the closer the plane has to be in order for it to see it i beleive.

I think you're right: the SD is too powerful (at least early in the war). When I read the patrol logs of USS Gunnel I was surprised to learn that most planes were picked up by watch standers, not by SD radar.
Would be cool if one could recreate that for the game.

[Ducimus]

I honestly don't think refractive angle is a moddable. In reality, this is a hackjob on the AIs visual schema. We're making it do something it wasn't orginally intended to do. I'm just grateful it works at all. Truth be told, its sitting on a razor's edge of working and not working as it is right now. If you'll note, im into decimals on the variable i was working with.

[tater]

Have you done any controlled tests with weather? Might be interesting to see what the lateral offset max range is dead clear vs with any kind of chop.

tater

[Ducimus]

Nope, but im fairly confident that any fair amount of chop makes you undetectable visuallly. I keep retesting it in a career game, and im starting to wonder if its working. Unless they fly within 8,000 meters (maybe as few as 6) in clear/calm weather, they just keep right on going by.

edit: I should add that i think the biggest problem is, the speed of the aircraft in conjunction with detection time. Its universal for ALL visual nodes. Can't touch it without messing everything up. Detection time is too long, planes are too fast, so if you tighten up their visual node, they wont see squat.

[tater]

I forgot about that aspect.

I honestly think the lateral aspect should be pretty narrow, but it's gotta be a compromise based on what the code allows.

BTW, a % of the planes ALWAYS fly on by. I think that if they are not armed with bombs, they won't react, even if they would fire MGs at you on a 2d pass. Since the "basic" load for all is unarmed, some will fly by.

One thing I'm not sure of is what kind of checking the AI does before attacking. They will obviously shoot MG fire at the water above you, and I think they are dropping regular bombs on me which have zero chance of hitting as I'm submerged.

I assume the planes get a load picked randomly from the loadouts (including "basic").

A quick test case would be to throw a bomb or DC in the various "basic" loadouts and see if they all attack. Any that don't didn't spot you.

I guess a scripted test first. A plane with basic loadout right over you. If it never attacks, but does with a bombload, that's one case for sure. Course they might also be detecting the scope if you are watching them.

tater

[Ducimus]

>>and I think they are dropping regular bombs on me which have zero chance of hitting as I'm submerged.

I dont remember which ones i changed, but one of the first things i did was change the depth accuracy of bombs and such, back when TMaru was FTT. In testing, they manage to damage my flak gun and deck gun quite a bit, but not much more then that if im in a crash dive. If im at periscope depth, then i get a whammy for sure.

>>. Course they might also be detecting the scope if you are watching them.

I thought of that. When testing i reran with, and without periscope. your OOD at the table is a BIG HINT if your seen or enemy near by. he tenses up. Id just sit there at 8X TC, and watch his posture. Once he tenses up (and stays tense), you know a plane is incoming, at which point F12 to exterior view, and watch the fun.

[lurker_hlb3]

Originally Posted by lurker_hlb3

FYI

For those who use RSRDC, there may be a problem when using this mod. There is a change in the weapons loadout for the B5N2Kate, i.e. from 1x500kg to 1x800kg. There are three layer that use the original 1x500kg loadout and with this change there is the "possibility" for a CTD.

Conducted some controlled test with this mode and with Ducimus TEST_TMaru_AI_Visuals_1.04 mod, neither mod has any ail effects on RSRDC v102. The only issue is (a) aircraft will no longer strafe you if their weapons load is set to “basic” and B5N2 Kate that are configured with 1x500kg loadout will no longer attack targets. During testing G4M Betty with 3XDC loadout didn’t appear to work, however the H6K/H8K Flying boats with 4XDC loadouts will sink you. I’m planning to integrate these two outstanding modes into the next versions of RSRDC

[tater]

I'll check the betty. I really need to make a spreadsheet for doing the eqp files, all it takes is one number not properly serial and they don't work. I'll test later.

[tater]

Betty was a typo as I thought. one of the eqp entires had the same number as another.