Thoughts on "out of comms"

[Mgellis]

When I'm writing scenarios, I usually set them with the Communications Disruption option checked. I personally like how Command adds various realism factors. However, this does lead to the frustrating situation when a ship loses its radios that it will blindly continue doing whatever the last thing was you ordered it to do, whether or not this makes any sense.

I wonder if there is any way around this issue. In real life, if two ships were in a battle group and one lost its radios, but it was only a couple of miles away, wouldn't someone get out the old semaphore flags and start hoisting them up so you could send some limited messages? Or use a searchlight to flash out Morse code? Or something?

Just curious...what are you actually supposed to do if this happens in a battle? Or after a battle is over and it would be reasonable to ask higher ups for new instructions? And how could this be modeled in Command?

[Kushan04]

I usually enable it, even if it does lead to some some weird issues like you've mentioned. For me it's not so much that the unit keeps doing what it was doing when it lost comms, it that's units in the same group suddenly no longer recognize it. Ships should be able to use light flashes or signal flags, aircraft could use hand signals to communicate. I'm hoping some planned future improvements will alleviate the issue.

[thewood1]

I use comms disruption a lot. But I rarely send a unit out with it not being on a mission. I also rarely micromanage units. The closest I get to micromanaging is "return to base" or change missions. I do get the oddity around comms now and then, but its not too disruptive.

[Quark73]

... Ships should be able to use light flashes or signal flags, aircraft could use hand signals to communicate. I'm hoping some planned future improvements will alleviate the issue.

Wouldn't it simply work with database entries for torches and flags as Comms/Datalink components? I mean you can define range and properties. Range would be until horizon, properties LOS limited and I would say Jam resistant too. Only thing missing would be day only for flags, degrading in bad weather and probably an additional optical "bandwith" in properties.

[thewood1]

One of the issues with flags and lights is, historically, the brevity required for them has resulted in numerous misinterpretations leading to poor mission execution. Not sure how to work that complexity in.

[Kushan04]

When I'm writing scenarios, I usually set them with the Communications Disruption option checked. I personally like how Command adds various realism factors. However, this does lead to the frustrating situation when a ship loses its radios that it will blindly continue doing whatever the last thing was you ordered it to do, whether or not this makes any sense.

I wonder if there is any way around this issue. In real life, if two ships were in a battle group and one lost its radios, but it was only a couple of miles away, wouldn't someone get out the old semaphore flags and start hoisting them up so you could send some limited messages? Or use a searchlight to flash out Morse code? Or something?

Just curious...what are you actually supposed to do if this happens in a battle? Or after a battle is over and it would be reasonable to ask higher ups for new instructions? And how could this be modeled in Command?

Something you could do to alleviate damaged ships continuing with their previous mission is to add a port/naval base and use the ship withdraw settings (found under doctrine). Having a port would give them somewhere to return to after damage thresholds are met rather then continuing on with their previous mission. If having a named port doesn't make sense for the scenario, you can go the board game and call the port "Off Map Bases" or something similar.

[Kushan04]

... Ships should be able to use light flashes or signal flags, aircraft could use hand signals to communicate. I'm hoping some planned future improvements will alleviate the issue.

Wouldn't it simply work with database entries for torches and flags as Comms/Datalink components? I mean you can define range and properties. Range would be until horizon, properties LOS limited and I would say Jam resistant too. Only thing missing would be day only for flags, degrading in bad weather and probably an additional optical "bandwith" in properties.

I think it would need to be a code change. I imagine it would work like this, if you have a friendly unit in comms within X distance from the out of comms unit, you would be able to issue limited orders; i.e. RTB, course or speed change, etc. but no attack orders.

If you had a torches and/or flags Comms device(s), they could still be damaged/destroyed creating the same issue there is now.

[SunlitZelkova]

I normally do not use it because besides micro-managing, I'll sometimes forgo setting up actual missions and just plot manual courses for some units; for example, with ECM aircraft I'll just plot a course with like 20 back and forth zig zags instead of making a support mission.

Beyond those sort of ergonomical issues, I feel the single player nature of CMO results in an inherent "hive mind" effect that makes comms disruption not make sense. I tend to try to structure the scenario as if I'm in command of a real task force or what have you, but even within that situation, realistically I'm not gonna be making decisions that lower level commanders would be. For example, if I'm in command of a Japan Self-Defense Force task force tasked with retaking the Senkaku Islands, I won't be making individual tactical decisions for the naval task force, the commander of the JMSDF Escort Flotilla will be.

Now ironically that's a bad example because Japan's stringent and vague laws on the use of force to defend the country actually can theoretically result in ridiculous levels of micromanagement (the 2016 Japanese Godzilla movie showcased this really well) but that's kind of the situation that makes me think comms disruption does not make sense to use in a scenario.

There are places (that in my opinion) it does work, for example if I'm doing a scenario centered around SEAD/DEAD I'd use it in order to model the weaknesses of an IADS, despite losing the ability to micromanage.

Not using it does come at the expense of some unrealistic situations, like if a destroyer has had its comms destroyed and then fires its ASMs in concert with the rest of the task force at a single target anyways, but I often find that if a ship gets hit at all it tends to be either catastrophically or suffer only light damage, a situation with operable weapons systems and loss of comms is rare. Maybe the only time that has happened is when I did a WWII scenario and an American light cruiser's batteries were never put out of action, but it quickly lost comms as it came under fire from Japanese 127mm HE shells.

With aircraft I don't find this as much of an issue. If an aircraft is hit so badly it loses comms, it tends to either be destroyed or is so damaged it can't partake in combat anymore and immediately returns to base.

When I'm writing scenarios, I usually set them with the Communications Disruption option checked. I personally like how Command adds various realism factors. However, this does lead to the frustrating situation when a ship loses its radios that it will blindly continue doing whatever the last thing was you ordered it to do, whether or not this makes any sense.

I wonder if there is any way around this issue. In real life, if two ships were in a battle group and one lost its radios, but it was only a couple of miles away, wouldn't someone get out the old semaphore flags and start hoisting them up so you could send some limited messages? Or use a searchlight to flash out Morse code? Or something?

Just curious...what are you actually supposed to do if this happens in a battle? Or after a battle is over and it would be reasonable to ask higher ups for new instructions? And how could this be modeled in Command?

Something you could do to alleviate damaged ships continuing with their previous mission is to add a port/naval base and use the ship withdraw settings (found under doctrine). Having a port would give them somewhere to return to after damage thresholds are met rather then continuing on with their previous mission. If having a named port doesn't make sense for the scenario, you can go the board game and call the port "Off Map Bases" or something similar.

I concur with this suggestion. Even without using comms disruption, I always have bases for ships in the scenario. Comms lost or not, having done a lot of experiments test firing salvoes of ASMs at various aircraft carriers, it seems like it would make no sense for a ship with 25% damage to continue partaking in an operation. Even 25% usually entails complete loss of defensive and offensive weapon systems. 50% and 75% are basically just thresholds for remaining afloat for X more amount of time before sinking.

FYI my tests consisted of firing SSM-1Bs, ASM-2s, or ASM-3s at Liaoning.

As mentioned above I've had ships take light damage from a single ASM. This usually results in less than 1% damage, and comms tend to be intact. I would assume the 5% threshold might be able to force a ship to return to base if comms are lost, despite weapon systems and sensors being intact, but I'd need to test it out.

Note that even without having a ship that is particularly homeported somewhere close by, for example, maybe your scenario has an Arleigh Burke deployed in the Middle East but homeported in Norfolk, you could have a closer base that might be used in emergencies (maybe Port of Djibouti). For the AI side, you could even have civilian ports in neutral countries, a la Graf Spee.