Stealth armor, ECM, and you

[Flyingdebris]

ok game mechanics idea that just came to my brains

right now ecm (both G and A) cuts detection range in half, which is all find and dandy, except that its behavior is more akin to stealth than it is to what ecm is supposed to be about.

idea, instead of halving detection range,  what about having ecm literally just scramble the location of your radar blip.  So that when you show up on the enemy's sensors and are not within LOS, your little red radar dot is zigzagging all over the place like a caffeine junky holding a laser pen.  So the enemy knows you are out there, but has no clue specifically where.

Passive stays the same.

Then you add Stealth armor, which could behave similar to how GECM behaves now, in that you simply do not show up on sensors until within relatively short range, but add some bonuses, like it drops enemy detection of you by 70% rather than just 50%.  but having it turned on fapps with your heatsinks and drops your radar range by 30%
Additionally the system would cost either some armor protection or weapons on account of the added bulk of the armor.

[[IPA] Bravo Cadett]

sounds nice ... but than i would play more with GECM than with stealth armor.

cause i cant fight with stealth , you can just stand around and share you C3 data ... cause your heatsinks are fapped , your weapon loadout is fapped ... i mean ... you can equip a heavy like a medium or less, can't give him LR energy weapons and so on ...

i dont know in what kind of situation i as a singel player could take advantage of this armor u know ?

but popping randomly up with your GECM would be nice ... with short 2-5sec periods where you appear and disappear ^^

[=KoS= Tripod]

I was thinking of something similar to Debris

If the enemy is at the farthest ranges of your ECM (max to 2/3 range) your blip is anywhere within a 50m circle of your mech and moves slowly around that circle randomly (can also have a nearly unnoticeable amount of radar fuzz so people with a good eye can notice the scrambling)

Mid range (1/3 to 2/3 range) your blip is anywhere within a 75m circle of your mech and moves slowly around, making "jumps" every once in a while (can have noticeable static on radar that gets worse every once in a while).

Close range (0 to 1/3 range) your blip is anywhere within a 100 meter circle and changes positions erratically every once in a while (2 times as often as before) there is major static on the radar, making it nearly unreadable every 10ish seconds for about 2 seconds. Your compass indicator is spinning (like in Vanilla Crysis)

EDIT: crap, I forgot to say that at the closer ranges your vehicle identification thing can change (especially for AECM) a light mech may be shown as an assault, or even an aero, etc. This could also scale based on proximity

[Blu C]

Well, in CBT Stealth Armor generates heat.  Also, some of the CBT Stealth 'Mechs are very good at support roles.  For example:

Code: [Select]

Type/Model:    Raven RVN-4L
Mass:          35 tons

Equipment:                                 Crits    Mass
Int. Struct.:  58 pts Standard               0      3.50
Engine:        210 XL Fusion                12      4.50
   Walking MP:   6
   Running MP:   9
   Jumping MP:   0
Heat Sinks:     10 Double [20]               6       .00
 (Heat Sink Loc: 1 LA, 1 RT)
Gyro:                                        4      3.00
Cockpit, Life Supt., Sensors:                5      3.00
Actuators: L: Sh+UA    R: Sh+UA             12       .00
Armor Factor:   96 pts Stealth              12      6.00
 (Armor Crit Loc: 2 LA, 2 RA, 2 LT, 2 RT, 2 LL, 2 RL)

                          Internal    Armor
                          Structure   Value
   Head:                      3          9     
   Center Torso:             11         15     
   Center Torso (Rear):                  4     
   L/R Side Torso:            8      10/10     
   L/R Side Torso (Rear):              4/4     
   L/R Arm:                   6      10/10     
   L/R Leg:                   8      10/10     

Weapons and Equipment    Loc  Heat  Ammo   Crits    Mass
--------------------------------------------------------
2 ER Medium Lasers       RA     10           2      2.00
1 SRM 6                  RT      4   15      3      4.00
  (Ammo Locations: 1 LT)
1 Beagle Active Probe    CT      0           2      1.50
1 TAG                    RT      0           1      1.00
1 Guardian ECM           LT      0           2      1.50
1 Narc Missile Beacon    LA      0   12      4      5.00
  (Ammo Locations: 2 LT)
  Stealth Armor Heat            10
--------------------------------------------------------
TOTALS:                         24          65     35.00
Crits & Tons Left:                          13       .00

NARC and TAG is a bit redundant, but if you could find a good place to hunker with a good view of the battlefield you could make yourself quite annoying.

There are also sniper type designs:

Code: [Select]

Type/Model:    Sha Yu SYU-2B
Mass:          40 tons

Equipment:                                 Crits    Mass
Int. Struct.:  67 pts Endo Steel            14      2.00
 (Endo Steel Loc: 4 LA, 4 RA, 3 LT, 3 RT)
Engine:        280 XL Fusion                12      8.00
   Walking MP:   7
   Running MP:  11
   Jumping MP:   0
Heat Sinks:     13 Double [26]               6      3.00
 (Heat Sink Loc: 1 LT, 1 RT)
Gyro:                                        4      3.00
Cockpit, Life Supt., Sensors:                5      3.00
Actuators: L: Sh+UA+LA    R: Sh+UA+LA       14       .00
Armor Factor:  104 pts Stealth              12      6.50
 (Armor Crit Loc: 2 LA, 2 RA, 2 LT, 2 RT, 2 LL, 2 RL)

                          Internal    Armor
                          Structure   Value
   Head:                      3          9     
   Center Torso:             12         14     
   Center Torso (Rear):                  5     
   L/R Side Torso:           10      13/13     
   L/R Side Torso (Rear):              5/5     
   L/R Arm:                   6        9/9     
   L/R Leg:                  10      11/11     

Weapons and Equipment    Loc  Heat  Ammo   Crits    Mass
--------------------------------------------------------
1 ER Large Laser         RA     12           2      5.00
1 ER Large Laser         LA     12           2      5.00
1 ER Medium Laser        RT      5           1      1.00
1 ER Medium Laser        LT      5           1      1.00
1 TAG                    HD      0           1      1.00
1 Guardian ECM           CT      0           2      1.50
  Stealth Armor Heat            10
--------------------------------------------------------
TOTALS:                         44          76     40.00
Crits & Tons Left:                           2       .00

Or

Code: [Select]

Type/Model:    Ostroc OSR-4L
Mass:          60 tons

Equipment:                                 Crits    Mass
Int. Struct.:  99 pts Endo Steel            14      3.00
 (Endo Steel Loc: 4 LA, 4 RA, 3 LT, 2 RT, 1 CT)
Engine:        300 Fusion                    6     19.00
   Walking MP:   5
   Running MP:   8
   Jumping MP:   5
Heat Sinks:     13 Double [26]               3      3.00
 (Heat Sink Loc: 1 RT)
Gyro:                                        4      3.00
Cockpit, Life Supt., Sensors:                5      3.00
Actuators: L: Sh+UA+LA+H    R: Sh+UA+LA+H   16       .00
Armor Factor:  168 pts Stealth              12     10.50
 (Armor Crit Loc: 2 LA, 2 RA, 2 LT, 2 RT, 2 LL, 2 RL)

                          Internal    Armor
                          Structure   Value
   Head:                      3          9     
   Center Torso:             20         22     
   Center Torso (Rear):                  7     
   L/R Side Torso:           14      20/20     
   L/R Side Torso (Rear):              6/6     
   L/R Arm:                  10      18/18     
   L/R Leg:                  14      21/21     

Weapons and Equipment    Loc  Heat  Ammo   Crits    Mass
--------------------------------------------------------
1 ER Large Laser         RT     12           2      5.00
1 ER Medium Laser        RT      5           1      1.00
1 Guardian ECM           LT      0           2      1.50
1 ER Large Laser         LT     12           2      5.00
1 ER Medium Laser        LT      5           1      1.00
  Stealth Armor Heat            10
5 Standard Jump Jets:                        5      5.00
 (Jump Jet Loc: 2 LT, 2 RT, 1 CT)
--------------------------------------------------------
TOTALS:                         44          73     60.00
Crits & Tons Left:                           5       .00

And lets not forget the support 'Mech with it:

Code: [Select]

Type/Model:    Archer ARC-7L
Mass:          70 tons

Equipment:                                 Crits    Mass
Int. Struct.:  107 pts Standard              0      7.00
Engine:        210 Fusion                    6      9.00
   Walking MP:   3
   Running MP:   5
   Jumping MP:   3
Heat Sinks:     12 Double [24]              12      2.00
 (Heat Sink Loc: 2 LA, 2 RA)
Gyro:                                        4      3.00
Cockpit, Life Supt., Sensors:                5      3.00
Actuators: L: Sh+UA    R: Sh+UA+LA+H        14       .00
Armor Factor:  200 pts Stealth              12     12.50
 (Armor Crit Loc: 2 LA, 2 RA, 2 LT, 2 RT, 2 LL, 2 RL)

                          Internal    Armor
                          Structure   Value
   Head:                      3          9     
   Center Torso:             22         29     
   Center Torso (Rear):                 10     
   L/R Side Torso:           15      21/21     
   L/R Side Torso (Rear):              7/7     
   L/R Arm:                  11      20/20     
   L/R Leg:                  15      28/28     

Weapons and Equipment    Loc  Heat  Ammo   Crits    Mass
--------------------------------------------------------
1 Guardian ECM           LA      0           2      1.50
1 LRM 20                 RT      6   36     11     16.00
  (Ammo Locations: 3 LT, 3 RT)
1 LRM 20                 LT      6           5     10.00
1 ER Medium Laser        CT      5           1      1.00
1 ER Medium Laser        HD      5           1      1.00
  Stealth Armor Heat            10
CASE Equipment:          LT     RT           2      1.00
3 Standard Jump Jets:                        3      3.00
 (Jump Jet Loc: 1 LT, 1 RT, 1 CT)
--------------------------------------------------------
TOTALS:                         32          78     70.00
Crits & Tons Left:                           0       .00

Basically there are a lot of roles where I could see being harder to find would come in handy.

[(TLL) Heretic]

+1 to all of that FD.

*Liking how your thinking*

[Flyingdebris]

sounds nice ... but than i would play more with GECM than with stealth armor.

cause i cant fight with stealth , you can just stand around and share you C3 data ... cause your heatsinks are fapped , your weapon loadout is fapped ... i mean ... you can equip a heavy like a medium or less, can't give him LR energy weapons and so on ...

i dont know in what kind of situation i as a singel player could take advantage of this armor u know ?

but popping randomly up with your GECM would be nice ... with short 2-5sec periods where you appear and disappear ^^

hmm, good point, losing most of your detection range for such a steep cost probably isn't gonna make it worth taking in and of itself.   What if stealth armor gave you the radar detection range of a BA. so you only show up at 150m, and makes missile locks take significantly longer?  I think that'd be worth the heat issues and payload sacrifices.

It'd be the ideal system for sneaking around the enemy to cap points, narc targets, spy on ze enemy, and snipe.  But the heat restrictions would require you to shut off the stealth once you got into a real fight, less you overheat yourself retarded

[Frostiken]

I'd like to see ECM dramatically changed up. I had a few ideas but I've been collecting a few from the forums. My favorite is still making ECM able to work as a directed-energy weapon (which is completely within the realm of reality) to jam single hostile targets. That way if an ELRM Partisan is giving you trouble on a hillside, you can get a Raven to microwave the fapp out of him until he gets bored of being unable to lock missiles or see anything on radar.

[Blu C]

There are other ways to make ECM work differently.

For instance in CBT if a C3 equipped unit is close to a ECM equipped unit the C3 network sharing is jammed.

I think it might also jam NARC and I know that it blocks Artemis IV FCS (which we could implement quite simply by having Artemis IV FCS equipped 'Mechs/Vehicles get a faster lock-on time.)

Basically you could change ECM from a hiding system to something that counters enemy electronics gear.  We would really need to make ECM less common though (right now it almost feels like if you don't have ECM or BAP or C3 you are really short changed).

This would then let us implement Stealth Armor 'Mechs which DO get the hiding advantage formerly granted by ECM.

[Frostiken]

Alright, I did a few cursory searches and found some stuff. The search function on this forum seems to kind of suck though, some of these threads only showed up with certain terms even though they're full of other terms I searched ('jam' would return a thread that talks about GECM but 'GECM' would never show that thread...).

1) GECM 'umbrella': http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=11023.0
2) ECM and countermeasures: http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=5634.0
3) Generalized sensor stuff: http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=2869.0
4) Countermeasures: http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=2580.0 - pre-release discussion, also includes some hilarious stuff from the devs (lol Hawkmoth like the BF2 choppers, lol ASF having a 50/50 chance to dodge LRMs)
5) Lots of ECM stuff: http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=10493.0
6) Jamming and... a lot of cool things: http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=7634.0
7) I had another cool one (one that I had written up) but I lost it. Oh well. Have this awesome unrelated thread on C3 instead: http://forum.mechlivinglegends.net/index.php?topic=4025.0

Some of these are kind of overcomplicated (like having 8 different jamming modes, but the principle is sound) but in general, seeing the huge number of these kinds of posts and the overall consensus of the community in that none of them are really outright rejected, I think it's safe to say that most people wouldn't mind the entire 'sensor aspect' being shaken up dramatically. As one of these threads points out, the best part is there's no models, animations, skins, it's all just code (one thing that doesn't seem to be a bottleneck right now).

[HAARP]

I'm all for everything that would turn ECM into an ECM; scrambling the shit out of electronics.

[(TLL) Heretic]

sounds nice ... but than i would play more with GECM than with stealth armor.

cause i cant fight with stealth , you can just stand around and share you C3 data ... cause your heatsinks are fapped , your weapon loadout is fapped ... i mean ... you can equip a heavy like a medium or less, can't give him LR energy weapons and so on ...

i dont know in what kind of situation i as a singel player could take advantage of this armor u know ?

but popping randomly up with your GECM would be nice ... with short 2-5sec periods where you appear and disappear ^^

hmm, good point, losing most of your detection range for such a steep cost probably isn't gonna make it worth taking in and of itself.   What if stealth armor gave you the radar detection range of a BA. so you only show up at 150m, and makes missile locks take significantly longer?  I think that'd be worth the heat issues and payload sacrifices.

It'd be the ideal system for sneaking around the enemy to cap points, narc targets, spy on ze enemy, and snipe.  But the heat restrictions would require you to shut off the stealth once you got into a real fight, less you overheat yourself retarded

There's no reason why Stealth armour should reduce sensor range, plus good sensor range is essential if it's to fit on "Head-hunter" machines...like a dedicated APC/LTA killer and drive-by harasser, or the ultimate scout....that's it's job description, no?

As for the Heat issues, in canon it halves the heatsink efficiency on the 'mech that has the system engaged; in MWLL this is a little trickier as engine heatsinks (there's 10 by default on every CBT machine) do not seem to be modeled 100%, just the additional Heatsinks.  If we could half the heat efficiency of a machine using Stealth armour then there's no reason why decent Stealth load-outs couldn't be built, some might be able to run cool while firing everything, running full speed while staying stealthed, it all depends on the build. 

The biggest restriction would be the reduction in weapons pod sizes , so take the ShadowCat as an example; Stock, it has one arm assault pod (carries up to a UAC20), one arm Heavy pod (carries a couple of lasers, UAC10 or a PPC) and a couple of small torso pods (medium or small laser mounts).  With Stealth armour ithese pods are reduced to one Heavy pod, one duel medium pod and the small torso pods remain unchanged¹.

So your Stealthed Shadowcat might carry; an UAC10 and 4 Small Heavy Lasers (or 4 Medium Lasers if that's too hot) with enough tonnage² to carry enough extra ammo and Heatsinks to keep the machine running stealthed & firing for a substatial time...although all Stealth 'mechs would live in constant fear of flamers, that build would make a nice LongTom hunter  Other builds...such as SSRM builds are also viable and cool running.

What you'd NEVER get is a Stealthed machine carrying UAC20s, Gauss & Heavy Gauss Rifles or MRM40s...an ERPPC should be pushing the limit of Stealth machines, but is possible if enough DHS are added.


¹  The Smaller weapons pods must be made exempt from the pod-reduction for gameplay IMO.
² JJ's removed for extra DHS....you do not want JJs on a Stealth 'mech in general principle.

[AlfalphaCat]

As long as we don't get injected by the cheeze that is pseudo-invisibilty...

[Frostiken]

Well the same reason stealth armor would have nerfed sensor range is the same reason an F-22 isn't a "stealth plane"  unless its radar is off, its smart weapons are off, and it's not transmitting anything. Spewing out RF everywhere is the ultimate "LOL HAI GUYZ!"

[=KoS= Tripod]

Well the same reason stealth armor would have nerfed sensor range is the same reason an F-22 isn't a "stealth plane"  unless its radar is off, its smart weapons are off, and it's not transmitting anything. Spewing out RF everywhere is the ultimate "LOL HAI GUISE!"

fix'd that last part 4 ya

[Flyingdebris]

what they said :3

i figure that if something is using stealth tech and ecm, it could probably have a means of "sneaking out" a quiter active radar ping,  but the price paid there would be range of signal.

As for the heat, i think it could be done by lowering efficiency of heatsinks to the point that basic running will give you heat build up.  That way even those wanna be clever people who go the gauss route are still going to not want to fight while in stealth mode.

I'm thinking that stealth mode could ostensibly be a 3rd option to the active passive radar toggle.