No telling what sensors will be added into the game yet, since a single addition of a sensor may vastly change the gameplay/meta in unintended ways. That being said, it would open up a vast world of electronic warfare to see Radar implemented in ways that interacts with the existing transmitter/receiver device. From the wiki, we see a transmitter already has fields for transmit/receive ranges, frequencies, etc. A radar device could operate in similar ways, and the devices could be used together for things such as ship tracking, automation, weapon guidance, asteroid detection, and more. Most importantly, it adds depth to the current aspect of radio signals in game.
Radar works by emitting a pulse at a frequency, and then listening for the reflection off an object. The direction the reflection is received provides the object's relative direction in degrees from the radar, the strength of reflection indicates the size (or shape, or numbers) of the object, and the time it takes to receive the reflection gives us the range to the object.
First off, this would add a mechanic of passive or active signal use in-game. Do you stay stealthy and listen for other signals (passive), or do you constantly ping around to hunt for what's out there (active)? The transmitter can already listen and output an X,Y (listen angle, and pitch), but then you also have a matter of how many transmitters or radars do you have on your ship? What direction/s do they face? It could be costly to see everywhere--maybe you have to settle for a 30 degree cone in front of you.
Then there are all sorts of ECM and ECCM strategies that could be employed, such as listening to a radar ping and amplifying it back to make the source think there's a larger target, or jam the source by blinding it with massive amplification or noise. You could delay and return multiple artificial reflections to obscure your range. In an asteroid field, you may even be able to radar ping back towards the source so they pick up multiple reflections off the asteroids.
To counter this you have ECCM techniques, such as radar pinging at multiple frequency ranges and filtering out unwanted or unlikely returns to counter popular ECM techniques. Maybe you use multiple independent, smaller radar panels/sensors that sacrifice the sensitivity of a larger array to be able to triangulate a target in order to cut through ECM. It could all get very interesting.
It could even go as far as having meaningful choice of frequencies to use. For example, high frequencies are great for detecting edges and angles perpendicular to the radar. This could lead to more "stealthy" ship designs that attempt to avoid boxy shapes, or reflect away from the source. Low frequencies can help cut through this and see stealthier designs better, but are worse at identifying accurate direction or size of target, and may return false positives, making good radar use both high and low frequencies in different ways.
Like any other tech in the game, those who develop it will be faced with the choice of having an upper hand or releasing the tech to the open market and profiting from it, so there's hope for balance while introducing depth into the game.
Radar works by emitting a pulse at a frequency, and then listening for the reflection off an object. The direction the reflection is received provides the object's relative direction in degrees from the radar, the strength of reflection indicates the size (or shape, or numbers) of the object, and the time it takes to receive the reflection gives us the range to the object.
First off, this would add a mechanic of passive or active signal use in-game. Do you stay stealthy and listen for other signals (passive), or do you constantly ping around to hunt for what's out there (active)? The transmitter can already listen and output an X,Y (listen angle, and pitch), but then you also have a matter of how many transmitters or radars do you have on your ship? What direction/s do they face? It could be costly to see everywhere--maybe you have to settle for a 30 degree cone in front of you.
Then there are all sorts of ECM and ECCM strategies that could be employed, such as listening to a radar ping and amplifying it back to make the source think there's a larger target, or jam the source by blinding it with massive amplification or noise. You could delay and return multiple artificial reflections to obscure your range. In an asteroid field, you may even be able to radar ping back towards the source so they pick up multiple reflections off the asteroids.
To counter this you have ECCM techniques, such as radar pinging at multiple frequency ranges and filtering out unwanted or unlikely returns to counter popular ECM techniques. Maybe you use multiple independent, smaller radar panels/sensors that sacrifice the sensitivity of a larger array to be able to triangulate a target in order to cut through ECM. It could all get very interesting.
It could even go as far as having meaningful choice of frequencies to use. For example, high frequencies are great for detecting edges and angles perpendicular to the radar. This could lead to more "stealthy" ship designs that attempt to avoid boxy shapes, or reflect away from the source. Low frequencies can help cut through this and see stealthier designs better, but are worse at identifying accurate direction or size of target, and may return false positives, making good radar use both high and low frequencies in different ways.
Like any other tech in the game, those who develop it will be faced with the choice of having an upper hand or releasing the tech to the open market and profiting from it, so there's hope for balance while introducing depth into the game.
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