Detection Range Glitch?????

[swimsalot]

Ok, need some professional adice on detection ranges.
Recently have noticed that a player consistantly seemed to be able to acquire other players very quickly, at long ranges.
Unnamed player would be in an Akula, others in SW.
Having heard about this happening to other players, I was curious as to how it was happening. Not worried about a cheat, I was worried about my own skills.

At 15-20 minutes into the game, Akula would fire missile torps at Sw, landing them within 700yards of where the SW started mission.
Sw usually wasnt there anymore, but pretty close- close enough to kill the SW 4 out of 5 times. Not bad.

Since I was bored, and a little suspicious, I replayed the map.
It's a busy map, 3 cargo/car carriers in the area, 20nm circle. A few trawlers outside the circle.
1 Akula and 1 SW inside.
Akula was 19.1nm from SW, both at about 190 feet, both speed 6kts.
Layer at approx 370 feet.
SSP was rock bottom, SD.
Sea state was light chop, daytime.
The Akula apparently picked up the SW at 19,1nm, and at 14minutes fired a salvo of missile torps at him, which he narrowly evaded. taking into account the time needed to stream the array, acquire and mark contacts,preset, and fire, I thought 14minutes was pretty damn fast for 19.1nm range.

I had the mission designer that made the original map set up a new map with 3 subs in it, same size and SSP, no neutrals.

All subs started at 192 feet, 6kts, above layer that was at approx 500feet.
We then spent a few hours checking detection ranges.
We found a curious situation, which bears further review.

At beginning of mission, for the first 4-5 minutes, I was able to hear the SW, which at the time was 48,000 yards away. Clear solid 60hz line.
I could hear the Akula at 38,000 yards, with clear line at 50hz and 125hz.
Seemed a little far away for a good track on a SW.
The Akula tracked both Seawolves at mission start, 1 at 38,000 yards, other at 44,000 yards!!!!!

So all subs were able to hear contacts at 44-48,000 yards at mission start.
Wierd thing is that 5-10 minutes into the mission, the contacts disappeared, or got alot quieter.
But the auto -TMA kept tracking the contacts, updating lines on the TMA chart!!!
I had my Gamma settings tweaked up by Powerstrip, so I can see even the faintest contacts.
We didnt slow down or head away from each other; I closed range on the SW until I re-acquired him at about 38,000 yards.
This would be where I would expect to hear a SW at 9kts.

So why could we ALL hear each other, at these ranges, at mission start, but not 10 minutes into the game, if no changes had occurred to speed or depth?

Is 48,000 yards detection against a SW, by a SW, too far?
Is 44,000 yards detection against a SW by an Akula to far?

I have the map our designer made if you would like to try it out.
Nothing fancy, should be easily reproduced.

I think this unnamed player has figured out that if ya get a contact at the very beginning, auto-TMA will track it even if it's not visible to you.
And initial detection ranges at start are far in excess of what I thought were normal ranges.

1 time random thing? Maybe, except the unnamed player did it a handful of times. And we were able to reproduce it, I ran it 2 times myself.
A glitch in the code?
(we were running plain 1.03, no mod.)

Thoughts?


NOTE- I am specifically NOT accusing anyone of a cheat- I think there is a glitch in here that someone figured out.
(sorry fpr length!!!)