Is Surface Radar Working?

[CaptBeefheart]

I had an interesting result and wondered if surface radar is working as designed. I repeated this three times and got the same exact result each time: Pennsylvania takes 4 shell hits and 6 torpedo hits after Hanson, E. crosses the T and they engage at 1000 yards in 3% moonlight (i.e. at maximum visibility). Note that all allied ships have radar at least to a middle or late 1942 standard.

This is Scen 60 against Japanese AI with the June beta update. This should not be construed as a complaint or anything. I'm just curious.

Cheers,
CC

[kkoovvoo]

Technical note - if you repeatedly run same turn, you always get the same result. Even if you run it 100 times.

[koniu]

Naval radars are working
Early radars are not so good and TB is rather small and easy to be miss by radar.

In reality they where very often ignored by ship commanders.(in first months of war)
Partially because they whee not so good and partially because commanders where from old school.

3% moonlight, overcast, slow 21kn battleships. It is natural environment for Japanese ships equipped with Long Lance. At lest in 1942.
Also Crossing T is not best position against Long Lance because You opening full broad to enemy. From 1000 yards You cant miss

[btd64]

Yup, Probably missed that small ship on the scope. Kind of like trying to see a bird on radar....GP

[dr.hal]

Read about the Battle of Cape Esperance and the US Commander, RAdm Scott. His lack of trust in that new thing called "radar" did not go well for him and the US Navy.

[CaptBeefheart]

Gentlemen: Thanks for the responses and real world thoughts. No offense, but it would be great to hear from Michael or another developer as to how the game is supposed to work.

To me, nine USN ships with decent radar in June 1943 not detecting a bogey at all, and the enemy reaching 1000 yards before being detected with Mk 1 eyeballs, doesn't seem right. Passing a die roll once in a while to reflect a freak situation I can see (simulating incompetence, heavy seas, simultaneous equipment malfunction of nine sets, etc.) and pure chance adds an element of excitement to gaming, but consistently getting close and poking six holes below the waterline of a BB in this situation seems off.

Cheers,
CC

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Commander Cody

Gentlemen: Thanks for the responses and real world thoughts. No offense, but it would be great to hear from Michael or another developer as to how the game is supposed to work.

To me, nine USN ships with decent radar in June 1943 not detecting a bogey at all, and the enemy reaching 1000 yards before being detected with Mk 1 eyeballs, doesn't seem right. Passing a die roll once in a while to reflect a freak situation I can see (simulating incompetence, heavy seas, simultaneous equipment malfunction of nine sets, etc.) and pure chance adds an element of excitement to gaming, but consistently getting close and poking six holes below the waterline of a BB in this situation seems off.

Cheers,
CC

Currently re-reading Guadalcanal by Frank. Land masses did bad things to radar.

[LoBaron]

AS GP already pointed out, detection (independent on whether it is visual or radar) is not 100% reliable and dependent on a couple of factors. One of those is enemy ship and TF size.

For your test you chose the worst possible enemy TF to engage, except for maybe a Dinghy...

Suggest you retest with something that actually has a radar cross section worth mentioning and you might find that radar works. You don´t need Michael for that. [;)]



Edit: Also has been mentioned already but you might have missed this: simply running the same turn replay over and over again will always end with the same result. Thats why you consistently get the same 6 holes poked into your BB.

[Chris21wen]

ORIGINAL: koniu

Naval radars are working
Early radars are not so good and TB is rather small and easy to be miss by radar.

In reality they where very often ignored by ship commanders.(in first months of war)
Partially because they whee not so good and partially because commanders where from old school.

3% moonlight, overcast, slow 21kn battleships. It is natural environment for Japanese ships equipped with Long Lance. At lest in 1942.
Also Crossing T is not best position against Long Lance because You opening full broad to enemy. From 1000 yards You cant miss

Speaking from experience in the late 60-70s you would be lucky to pick up anything that small at 1000yds with a search radar. The snow (noise) could go out as far as a 4-5 miles and the closer you got the worse it got. Nav radars you would but they did not have them.

ORIGINAL: kkoovvoo

Technical note - if you repeatedly run same turn, you always get the same result. Even if you run it 100 times.

Not correct against the AI.

[CaptBeefheart]

ORIGINAL: LoBaron


Suggest you retest with something that actually has a radar cross section worth mentioning and you might find that radar works. You don´t need Michael for that. [;)]



Edit: Also has been mentioned already but you might have missed this: simply running the same turn replay over and over again will always end with the same result. Thats why you consistently get the same 6 holes poked into your BB.

Uh oh, what did I get myself into? I'll try to figure out how to do a test against other IJN ships. I learned how to screw with the editor a bit, so maybe. [:)]

This wasn't a "test" per se, just a situation that occurred when I sent that TF from 1000 Island Bay to Lunga to bombard (the TB was what remained of a transport TF after some TBFs had their say the day before). Also, in my experience replayed turns do usually turn out differently each time when playing against the AI (I'm sure other parts of the combat report were different, but I didn't check). This whole situation was a pure accident.

Cheers,
CC

[Sardaukar]

Combat report would have shown if enemy was detected by radar. In this case, it was not.

Even if there was "detected by radar xxxxxx yds" doesn't mean ships could engage, since visibility was only 1000 yds. Early radars were not really good in fire control.

I have had Allied TFs toasted by IJN torpedoes even when they detected Japanese by radar first.

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: kkoovvoo

Technical note - if you repeatedly run same turn, you always get the same result. Even if you run it 100 times.

Not true. I have rerun many, many turns and seen many different results each time. Especially with random sub encounters.

[Alfred]

It is quite revealing that over the last 6 or so months posters to this sub forum have not woken up to the fact that michaelm and the other devs rarely respond.  To me the explanation is quite simple; (a) too many threads opened on matters which are WAD and are not a bug, and/or (b) have already been explained by the devs on  many occasions over the years.  Only occasionally does michaelm appear and then he invariably asks for a save and practically always comes back with the answer that it is not a bug.
 
This current thread is no different.  There is no bug here.  It is WAD.  How radar operates has been explained on many occasions by the devs over the years.  All of this is absolutely obvious from any search of the forum.
 
Everyone knows I am not a dev and therefore what I post is usually disregarded but I do, unlike so many forumites, research before posting even when I already know the answer.  A couple of hours research has dug up several clear and on point posts from:
 
JWE/Symon
Nikademus
Don Bowen
jwilkerson
 
on this topic.  Why do they have to repeat ad nauseum what is already on the public record. Instead what happens time and time again is that someone, with their own agenda, finds a "fault" based on their irrelevant and erroneous assumptions.  In doing so they insult the devs.
 
So let us be absolutely clear here.
 [center]There is no fire control devices in the game.  There is no gunnery radar device in the game.[/center] 
So what exactly does the OP expect his radar to achieve?  Answer is jack all as far as his assumptions relate to the game.  The correct answer is to look at how it is abstracted into the game.
 
Back on 27 December 2010, JWE/Symon succinctly summed up the value of radar in the game as follows.
 
"Radar is abstracted in the detection portion of several combat algorithms.  Air and Surface radars allow for early detection of airstrikes or enemy TFs.  It allows for CAP to respond earlier and get into position, or for a TF to have a better chance of spotting the enemy first and crossing the T."
 
The radar which ships have is therefore only a "search" or "detection" radar.  In itself it does absolutely nothing to improve gun effectiveness/efficiency.  As already stated, it is not a fire control device.
 
Even the "search/detection" value is considerably limited as the guns will only start to fire when the Mark I eyeball actually spots the enemy.  Anyone who has read note #46 and #47 of patch 1, and note #68 of patch 2 would not have even bothered to start this thread.  3% moonlight is not good visibility and it should come as no surprise that the enemy was only visually spotted at 1k yards.  Bearing in mind the patch notes, why would anyone be surprised that a TB could adequately engage its weapon systems at that range whereas the American BBs, whose main weapon systems are not designed to engage at such close range, are less effective.
 
Of the many threads which have dealt with this subject previously, this one is perhaps the best.
 
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2958671&mpage=3&key=fire%2Ccontrol&#2965668
 
Pay particular attention to the 29 November 2011 posts from Nikademus and JWE (#65, #70 and #72).  These posts also make it clear that the abstracted improvement in Allied surface radar kicks in late 1943.  The 4th of June combat did not occur in late 1943.
 
In summary, everything is WAD and as explained on numerous occasions.
 
Alfred
 
 

[Bullwinkle58]

I, in my usual half-assed way, had simply recalled a rough memory of the Patch 1 #46/#47 note. IOW, surface gunnery is at visual ranges no matter the max range of the weapon. Had long ago gotten used to seeing BBs need to close to 3000 yards to bang away, and duels between capital ships conducted at those sorts of ranges. Your summary is far superior to that rough memory, as usual.

In any AE2, sensor models and FC radar would top the list of wonderful additions. The ASW war in particular would benefit from sensor modeling. But for now, the Allies just wait for late 1943 and proceed, at least on the surface.

Thanks for the couple of hours work, Alfred.

[spence]

Radar on 9 Allied ships doesn't work = Normal

A 2nd rate IJN torpedo boat scores a hit with every single one of its torpedoes and their reloads (all on the same target ship no less)= NORMAL

Just like real[8|]

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: spence

Radar on 9 Allied ships doesn't work = Normal

A 2nd rate IJN torpedo boat scores a hit with every single one of its torpedoes and their reloads (all on the same target ship no less)= NORMAL

Just like real[8|]

Now, Now!! You're overlooking the obvious JFB retort that of course the TB crew has 99 experience while the Ami BB has a crew with 23 experience.......[8|]

[Jace11]

Bearing in mind the patch notes, why would anyone be surprised that a TB could adequately engage its weapon systems at that range whereas the American BBs, whose main weapon systems are not designed to engage at such close range, are less effective.

Confused by this. While in reality this may be case, I wasn't aware there was any modelling of minimum ranges. The editor only contains one set of range values. Is there an algorhythm at work here where larger calibre weapons are rendered less effective as range reduces? Or is this one more erroneous assumption?

[Bill Durrant]

1. It's a game
2. It's a great game
3. There are over 20,00 topics on the forum
4. There are over half a million posts on the forum
5. The search facility is far from perfect
6. We post here because, in the main, forumites are friendly and helpful
7. We appreciate the time spent by knowledgeable forumites to point out the intricacies of the game

[spence]

You're overlooking the obvious JFB retort that of course the TB crew has 99 experience

Assuming instant reloading of the 3 torpedo tubes so that the 99 experience IJN crew could use the very same firing solution with zero degrees of spread the probability of 6 type 92 hits is a gargantuan .00002187% (x.99)....like I said...just like real.

[Lowpe]

Not enough screening ships. The makeup of the task force is very susceptible to IJN torpedo attacks.

Conditions favor IJN.

But 6 for 6? Could that be fog of war? Would probably take 3 hits and some luck to sink her.

Lesson to be learned here is to use more destroyers with those slow BBs.