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Messages - Psawhn

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61
Artwork / Re: Models Needed
« on: May 04, 2008, 01:09:17 am »
I'm sure they dream of constantly getting offered completed and textured models they don't need. :)

62
Design / Interception Discussion
« on: May 04, 2008, 12:58:03 am »
This is mainly about the proposed interception on the wiki: http://ufoai.ninex.info/wiki/index.php/Gameplay_Proposals/UFO_Interceptions. I think that this discussion would be more accessible here on the forums than in the talk page for the wiki article.

I really like the proposed system, and is very close to what I had in mind when I dreamed of what the interception system should be like. I do want to make a few additions.

Targeting/Tasks
In the geoscape, craft are able to target almost any other geoscape object. Their task would be context sensitive to the type of object, and for UFOs their mission. For example:

-A PHALANX interceptor targeting a UFO would intercept that UFO group.
-A PHALANX dropship targeting a ground mission will deliver troops to the ground mission.
-A UFO targetting a waypoint will generate an event based off its mission at that waypoint. (There could be provisions for a distinction between nav waypoints and target waypoints, sort of like X-COM)
-A PHALANX interceptor targetting a ground mission would provide TARCAP, or possibly even tactical recon or close air support.
-And importantly: any craft targeting a friendly craft will provide escort. I feel this is flexible enough to allow small UFOs to escort larger UFOs, Interceptors to escort Dropships, and even to set up a wingman-like system where interceptors escort other interceptors.

During an air battle, these targeting mechanics work the same way. A craft targeting a friendly craft will provide escort, and targeting an enemy craft is obvious. Any craft involved in combat, but is tasked to an unrelated mission, will ignore other craft and proceed to their destination unless an enemy craft comes within weapons range.

When a craft leaves combat, it resume its task unless its target is gone. If a craft retreated from battle it will proceed to its home base.

Air Combat Maneuvering / AI
All craft in combat follow a simple AI to maneuver in combat, and all combat is essentially 2D. The player gives generic commands, and the craft will follow its orders. Most of the time a craft will head directly to its target at cruising speed, but with variations:
-A craft targeting an enemy craft will attempt to get behind its target. It will do this by flying an intercept course to its target, until it is at the maximum range of all of its enabled weapons. If within this range, the craft will orient itself directly facing its target, and adjust its speed to stay at this range.
-A craft being fired upon by a missile will attempt to 'beam' the closest missile detected. (If the missile is not detected it will not attempt to evade.) This means that it will turn so that the missile is 90 degrees to its left or its right. This gives more time for ECM to affect the missile, and makes the missile travel a longer path with tight corners (in case the craft can defeat the missile kinematically.) A craft retreating from battle will fly directly away from the nearest missile instead of trying to evade it.
-A craft with a combat waypoint (the player uses the target command in the collapsible waypoint) will fly towards the waypoint. When it reaches the waypoint, it will resume its geoscape-assigned task (escort, target, intercept, other).


Aerodynamics
All craft and missiles use the same aerodynamic model. They have the following stats:
Max. Speed, Drag, Acceleration, Turn rate, Fuel, Max G force.
The AI will specify a speed it wants to go, and the craft will use its acceleration value or drag value to get to the target speed.
A craft will always head in the direction it faces. When turning, it will lose speed as a function of its drag, turn rate, and current speed.
Human interceptors will be limited in G forces to 9, but alien and combat UAVs may have higher limits, and recon UAVs and dropships may have lower values.
UFOs will likely have high drag and acceleration, missiles low drag but high acceleration, and human craft moderate drag and high acceleration.
Missiles use the same aerodynamic model. They always fly an intercept course to their target. If they run out of fuel, they will continue pursuing their target, but their speed will drop relative to its drag (as well as losing speed in turns). If the speed drops below a certain value the missile is removed from combat.


Weapons
Because the craft maneuver around, their weapons need not have 360-degree firing arcs. Direct-fire weapons like guns, PBWs, and rockets will have an arc of 15-30 degrees, and missiles and turrets could have a much larger firing arc. A weapon will always fire if its target is within range and within the firing arc, as long as the weapon has ammo and is enabled.

Weapons have five factors to their accuracy: Base accuracy, pilot skill, target pilot's skill, ECM, and ECCM. Each weapon will have a different weighting for each factor. The Base accuracy is the intrinsic accuracy of the weapon (guns would be low, missiles high). Pilot's skill would be relatively high for guns, and low for guided missiles, for example. ECM and ECCM are modified based on the player's research, and are also factors for guns (targeting computers) as well as missiles.)
For direct weapons, all factors are applied when it fires.
For missiles, base accuracy and pilot skill are applied at the time of firing, and ECM and ECCM are applied constantly over the missile's flight. Tgt's skill is applied at the moment the missile hits. If the missile fails its to-hit check at any of the stages, the missile stops tracking and goes dumb. If the target was evading the missile, it instantly knows it has evaded the missile and resumes its task.

Weapon damage vs. HPs and Armour are calculated the same way as in the ground war.

Armour and HP
Armour will use the same system as body armour for troops: damage is reduced based on weapon types, and applied to HP. Armour failure is not modelled.
Craft have 3 separate types of HP: Systems, Structure, and AM Containment. System and structural HP use the same damage values from calculations, and damage will be applied to a craft's system before it is applied to a craft's structure. This allows the following mechanics:
Damage applied to a craft reduce its performance linearly, up to half the speed and turning rate at the maximum systems damage.
A craft with full damage to its systems will crash land. This represents the state at which its controls, powerplant, and aerodynamic performance will no longer keep it in the sky. Pilots will eject and crew in dropships will start to bail out, until the craft crashes into the ground. A crash-landed UFO will create a crash site.
Further damage to a crashing craft will be applied to its structural HP. If the damage exceeds its structural HP, a craft disintegrates in mid-air, and any crew or aliens still in the craft they are killed, and a disintegrating UFO does not create a crash site. This allows 'critical hits' of alien weapons on human craft to kill unarmoured craft with no chance of the pilot ejecting, and multiple missile hits on a crash-landing craft will destroy the craft (possibly killing troops in dropships.)
I like having a difference between damage sufficient to crash a ship, and craft simply exploding. This also allows a more important aspect to armouring ships: pilots and crew have a better chance to survive aerial combat, not just a simple "the fighter lasts 20 more seconds against aliens before it explodes."

Craft and ships that use antimatter also have a separate HP value for antimatter containment. Damage calculations are applied again to this (possibly with additional or different armour values) to allow chances for an AM containment breach before the craft sustains enough damage to crash land.


Interface: BTAxis' proposed interface is pretty much all that's needed. A player can assign a craft to target an enemy, a combat waypoint, or a friendly craft to escort. A player can also give orders on the geoscape to craft in combat, which most of the time will cause the craft to leave combat as it goes to its new target.



With the exception of weapons' firing arcs and accuracies, I feel that my ideas are expansions on BTAxis' original concept, rather than changes. I also think that these changes will add considerably to the immersiveness and 'fun-factor' of the aerial warfare aspect of the game. I also do not think that these additions will add much to the development work - the ground work for most of these aspects must be implemented anyway, and I've only offered my ideas on how it could be taken slightly more in depth. Some ideas (like an escort command) I think will ease the task of forcing UFOs to create flotillas, as well as creating more strategies for players (escorting dropships, pseudo-wingmen.)

63
Artwork / Re: UAV Model
« on: May 03, 2008, 08:55:30 pm »
I decided not to change anything, except to bring the aft down a bit to bring it in line with the rest of the fuselage.

https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/licensed/ufo_uav_final.blend

The texture is packed within the .blend file. Just click on the little package icon underneath the picture to unpack the .tga image, or go through Image -> Unpack Image or Image -> Save As.

I've also gone with CC-Attrib, which I feel is less restrictive and better than GPL for art and models.

64
Artwork / Re: UAV Model
« on: May 03, 2008, 06:38:29 pm »
I had in mind a reconnaissance craft when I designed this - you can see the black dome for the camera (I should add some more visible sensor packages, mainly white spheres and stuff) I don't really think it has the payload capacity for weapons. Certainly not internally.

I also didn't design it with VTOL capability, either.  From what I remember of the descriptions, it's actually the UN that takes care of the UAVs, and all the Phalanx commander does is ask for a base to be set up at a specified location.

I just realized it could probably be launched from a flatbed truck, either railgun or rocket assisted, then recovered in a nearby field. This UAV can be only 4-5 metres long. The smaller size would make it much more mobile than a larger craft with VTOL - all you need to do is helicopter out a couple trucks for the launch platform and command station, maybe some extra fuel, and you've got a new operating base.

65
Artwork / UAV Model
« on: May 03, 2008, 07:17:43 am »
I had a conventional UAV model floating around my hard drive for another purpose, and I figured I might as well retool it as well as try out some new texturing techniques.

(Thumbnails are clickable)



The UAV has divertless intakes (like on the F-22/35) and a swing-wing design, which should allow it to have rapid deployment at supersonic speeds, then a long loiter time. The exhaust nozzle shows that the engine has a high bypass ratio, for higher efficiency.

Hammer away on the crits, Winter. :D

Edit: The polycount's 800 triangles.

66
Artwork / Re: MIMIR Telescope/Carrier Animation
« on: May 03, 2008, 02:15:43 am »
I was thinking about that, but even though the space telescope can only focus at infinity, objects would still have to be exceedingly close (within several kilometres) before the object would be visibly blurry, I think.

67
Artwork / Re: MIMIR Telescope/Carrier Animation
« on: May 02, 2008, 10:53:44 pm »
There shouldn't be anything different between this zoom in and the previous ones. The shot's blurry because I had to enlarge the picture to be seen more easily by smaller resolutions - the rendered image itself is enlarged 4x. The camera's zoomed to Blender's max, so I would have to rerender the entire shot at a higher resolution, probably putting my laptop out for a day or two, or move the camera physically closer, which may introduce some awkward movements and further reduce the correlation between the two shots.

I'm trying to maintain a balance between technical realism, astronomical realism, and artistic necessities, and the last one tends not to mix well with the previous two. :)
Without rerendering anything, the loss in resolution may be explained by the fact that both the lit side of the Earth and the Moon actually are in the picture at all, and in space those things are bright, which would probably need 2080s techonology for the telescope to even operate in those conditions. The filters and settings allowing it to take a shot without the image being hopelessly overexposed might reduce the resolution. Combined with that, this is a wide-angle shot, not a narrow-field shot used to take pictures of galaxies.

Truthfully, I think that if the telescope were looking at the settings needed to view planets and galaxies, I think the carrier would show up only as a very long streak in a single image. :)

68
Artwork / Re: MIMIR Telescope/Carrier Animation
« on: May 02, 2008, 02:32:11 am »
Not many changes, actually. The big circle was removed, and I adjusted the times. Now it goes from 02:08 to 03:57. I had to develop a new method of making the numbers (Blender doesn't yet have an easy way of doing things like that), but now I can pretty much pop up any range of numbers, using HH:MM:SS convention quickly, for any length of time, for any range of values.

I thought of adding a date, but Alien Origins aren't researched at any set date.

https://webdisk.ucalgary.ca/~djetowns/public_html/misc_files/UFO_AI/MIMIR_final15_0001_0940.avi

69
Design / Re: 2 questions on human aircraft designs
« on: April 26, 2008, 08:08:06 am »
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i dont think you will ever get rid of human pilots.

look at star wars Grin
That's actually the direct result of Burnside's Zeroth Law of Space Combat. ;)


I'm still not convinced a pilot is 100% obsolete in the near future. :)
I also don't remember admitting that the AI would be making tactical decisions on its own.

I did realize, though, that I was mixing up my arguments between AI-craft in real life, and AI-craft in this game. In real life, having a human on station is much more appealing, but they'll probably be deferred to ground control or forward operators, leaving the risky stuff to the bots. You'll almost definitely need a human in the chain, though, for some jobs like being a forward air controller for close air support of troops on the ground.

But back to game-based AIs.

A FUO need not have an AWACS-sized craft. Modern AESA radars are probably enough to handle the data link so a one- or two-seat fighter is probably all that's needed. It doesn't need banks and banks of circutry, especially if most of the commands are simple vectors and instructions. (Probably a lot like an RTS) Even if the back-seater needed to see a live TV feed and directly control one of the UAVs, he can easily have the controls to do so with current technology. There's already talk of using the F-22's AESA radar as a datalink supplement, and using them as AWACS.

A fighter travelling at Mach 4 can cover 12 km, the range of the Sparrowhawk, in 9 seconds. Modern infra-red search and tracking systems, like the one on the Mig-35, can provide solutions for airborne targets at 15 km. Furthermore, at this stage of a merge, both the human and AI pilot would be looking for the target in a rather narrow area, knowing the target's altitude and bearing. In all the art of UFOs they've had nice, bright, white-green plumes from their antimatter engines, possibly increasing the range at which you can spot one. Any advancements in telescopic imaging will benefit humans with helmed-mounted sights just as much as an AI.

Assuming a head-to-head merge, at a range of 15km, and both craft at a speed of Mach 4, the craft will pass each other in 5.5 seconds.  Let's assume that the missile has to be launched at least 2 seconds before the merge, so the pilot has 3.5 seconds. That's more than enough time for a trained pilot to get a missile shot off, especially with helmet-off-boresight technology - all he has to do is look at the target to lock on to it. In fact, it would still be a waiting game for the pilot: Well before the enemy gets into range, he'd have his HOBS activated, weapons armed, and thumb on the pickle, waiting for the tone that lets him know the weapon has a solid lock. After that, you're looking at around 140ms or less for the reaction time of a trained human responding to an audio signal. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaction_time).
This is what I mean that the AI will not be significantly faster. In the 140 milliseconds it takes for the human to press the trigger, versus the AI launching the missile right away, the craft get 380 metres closer to eachother.

3) Ahh, I forgot about some of those. There's definitely a scope on the kind of decisions those can make, but definitely for things such as accidentally shooting airliners (image recognition) an AI would beat a human on the draw.

4) In the scope of the game, I realized one kind of luring into traps (SAMs) would be done on the geoscape. In dogfights, it depends on which combat model we're using. The current model is just lobbing guns and missiles at eachother from thousands of miles until at least one craft blows up. Future models will probably involve much more depth and strategy. Alien psychology has very little to do with things like that, either: Either the alien follows the bait or it doesn't. Using strategy is also even more important when you have the disadvantage in technology, too, because you can't afford to use more 'conventional' tactics.

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How many pilots have to get killed before one gets an opportunity to exploit?
I could say: "How many millions of dollars worth of aircraft do we have to lose in engagements a human could have taken advantage of?" ;) Still, your argument will happen more often.

I expect the ejection seat is probably the heaviest part of human-specific fighter components. The second heaviest would be armouring. Life support and pressurization equipment is shared with the engine, and actually need not be too heavy.
Backup systems: Ahh, you're right in that getting rid of these will save a lot of weight and cost. The question then becomes how much are you spending on your AI fighter? A lot of those backup systems will save your craft from crashing from non combat-related problems, as well as combat damage. Better capabilities, like speed and maneuverability, also add to the cost, not to mention the sensors (probably the most expensive parts.)

The wasted space from a cockpit and canopy isn't all that much. In fact, if you tore off the canopy on modern supersonic fighters and filled the cockpit in so it were flush, but left the rest of the plane as it was, you'd actually increase the drag of the fighter at transonic speeds, due to the area-rule. It's easy enough to design around that, but I thought it's kinda interesting.

It sounds like the kind of craft you're advocating is cheap and expendable, designed to only last a few missions. The sensors and computers would probably be mounted on pods that could be jettisoned for recovery, and the airframe would not be protected against fatigue. I don't know exactly how to make the engine, required for the high speeds, inexpensive enough, though, and the ability to sustain high-g turns can't come cheaply, either. I'd probably still put backup systems on my AI-only machines.

As long as we're talking specific to the game, though, I definitely can evoke Burnside's Zeroth Law. If players can track specific pilots, then they have the ability to develop attachments to veterans just like the ground troops. Specific human pilots can also level up with experience, unlike a learning AI whose upgrades will spread to every fighter nearly instantly.

I'll also point out again that none of the craft at the beginning of the game were designed with knowledge of the aliens' capabilities in mind, and the Stiletto is the only craft in the world designed with the possibility of going up against ETs, and it's 60 years old. There's also a proposal by BTAxis in the wiki about a better dogfighting system (which I love, but I'm going to post my own topic suggesting some variations), so we can expect the current system, based solely on attrition, to disappear.

70
Design / Re: 2 questions on human aircraft designs
« on: April 24, 2008, 08:48:57 pm »
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Sorry, but this is no useful information. Every divebomber can outdive a Zero.

And nearly every allied fighter/fighter-bomber can outdive a Zero. The Zero is an extremely light and agile construction without plating. In contrast to that, all allied aircrafts where pretty heavy and with stronger structure.
The pilot didn't survive by diving away, but by turning into each Zero as it made a run on him. I don't remember the exact reason he couldn't simply dive away, but I suspect that if he did, at least one of the Zeros could shoot him down before he would have been out of range.


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In fact, my information about g-forces in regard of the Phoenix and the F4 are from a little video clip, commented by an 'expert'. The F4 was a UAV (you know these orange-red colour), a target for a Phoenix. And thereby this expert explained, that the F4 turns with 6g, but the Phoenix hit it with a 16g turn.

Furthermore, a couple of texts talk about that issue. They point out, that the F-16 was the first plane which can stand 9g and all others can stand maximal 6g or 7g.
I'm sure I've read many times that dogfighting missiles, like the Sidewinder, have to pull 40 to 50 g in order to hit a maneuvering target. And I did just read that the F-16 was the first US fighter to be designed to withstand 9g.

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The range of the Global Hawk is TWICE the range of an U2!
I think that has a lot to do with its increased wing aspect ratio, a more efficient engine, and the ability to fly at a leisurely pace.

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I assume, you need perhaps 3 cubic meters for a human pilot in the best place of the plane (in the front, central).

As all modern fighters use fly-by-wire and autopilots, there's nearly no additional tech to install for an AI pilot.
You're right that there'd be nothing additional to install for an AI pilot. I think 3 cubic metres is a bit much, though.
For a pilot, you'd need: a canopy, air conditioner, emergency oxygen tanks, and a pressurized cockpit with room for an ejection seat, avionic controls and displays, maps & other gear, and the pilot. All that probably fits in the volume directly below the canopy. I can't see anything to contradict that in this cutaway of an F-35B http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/images/AIR_F-35B_Cutaway_lg.jpg.

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My you please quote the text, as I cannot find that. It seems to me, the only arguments for the Stiletto are - it is cheap and 'available'.
From here: http://ufoai.ninex.info/wiki/index.php/Aircraft/Stiletto-class_Interceptor. The first brief is dated 2026, and later Navarre mentions in the Addendum that "It's hard to believe we built these little things in 2026." Navarre confirms its agility: "What we have here is probably the most manoeuvrable aircraft ever built..." We also know only PHALANX designed and built it, because the report is an internal report, plus Navarre wonders why no one ever knew what kind of gold they were sitting on.

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That's exactly the point. Standard fighter tactics from nowadays are almost useless against UFOs - as no long-range missiles work...
My point is that the very first interceptor designed to go up against the known capabilities of UFOs is the Dragon, followed by the Stingray, which incorporate alien technologies. The Saracen was designed to go up against Terran fighters, and the Stiletto was designed to be the best it could be against anything.
Those tactics you give are also specific to the current gameplay mechanics, and they'll definitely change sooner or later.

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Imho is your tactic with an foreward human 'UAV observer' not better, than the use of complete AI pilots.
I don't quite get what you're saying here, but I do think a forward UAV operator probably is the best compromise between the two worlds.

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Yes, the UFOs behave in the atmosphere in dimensions of human technology. There's no information about g-compensation for UFOs - but it's certain, that they use some kind of gravity technology. This technology could lead to g-compensation which would the UFOs allow much more maneuvers (plus: aliens could stand more g-forces than humans).
I'm not so certain they have g-dampeners, at least not ones powerful enough to provide a force of more than two to three g. Such technology is also very applicable in creating a linear accelerator that can propel nonmagnetic uncharged objects, yet both the missile launcher and particle beams use electromagnetic acceleration. The only gravity technology that I know of that the aliens use are jump drives and sensors.

Yes, the aliens can survive higher forces than humans, but their UFOs are very inefficient aerodynamically, and do have to obey the same aerodynamic laws as our fighters. A high speed turn will still slow down their ships considerably, tempered by the fact that their engines have much more power. Our fighters turn hard at high speed because of the air, UFOs turn hard at high speed despite the air.

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Well, there's a little bug in UFO:AI. Your base radar works 100% correct. The UFO is despite all ECM exactly on the position where we expect it thanks to our radar.

The result is, we're back to the 70s - a time in which the interceptors had to be guided by the base to their targets.
The scale of the geoscape easily allows 'exactly where we expect it to be' to encompass an area measuring at least tens of km on a side, possibly up to hundreds of km. Its location is probably a best guess by the radar operators, despite the fuzzy returns and ECM.

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Well, this system was installed in the B1A. They removed it by the upgrade to B1B - as this system is heavy and not so reliable compared to ejection seats. The F-111 still has such a system, but I don't know any modern aircraft with these systems.
The B-1B has a slower top speed and different mission profile, too, making it less vital for an ejection pod. Few modern aircraft travel past mach 2, and so likely do not need the ejection seat. I expect in the future it would become more reliable and attractive for hypersonic craft.

71
Design / Re: 2 questions on human aircraft designs
« on: April 24, 2008, 02:29:51 am »
I don't think you're getting my argument that the simple act of any airplane or missile turning will cause that object to lose speed. The harder you turn, the more speed you lose. The faster you go, the more speed you lose while turning.

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Of course - and as state-of-the-art interceptors reach 9g, no missile can hurt them - as they reach 16 just at ignition...  Roll Eyes
Of course, the Phoenix can turn around at 16g.
I did point out that in the final stage of a missile's flight, it will probably pull over 50g to try to hit its target. (I'm not so sure about the Phoenix - it's a big, heavy, missile designed to hit cruise missiles and bombers. Smaller missiles like the Sidewinder definitely pull more G's.)
Also, longer range missiles like the Phoenix and AMRAAM, unless fired from closer range, run out of fuel long before they reach their targets. That 16g acceleration, which increases as it runs out of fuel, is used to get the missile to a high altitude at high speed. They have to coast to the target after that. For quite a bit of their range, if your target simply makes a 1.5g bank and turns the other way, they'll outrun your missile.

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Do you really believe that?

G-suits are no modern invention - even the pilots of the F100 Super Sabre had them - 1954 (in contrast to the MIG-pilots). Also the F4 Phantom hat G-Suits, but the plane could only stand 6g.

No plane of WW2 could stand 9g.
I'm fairly certain I remember watching a Dogfights! episode about a Divebomber in the Pacific facing up to a few Japanese Zeros, and surviving because he repeatedly pulled high G turns in order to meet each one head-on. You're right it might not have been 9 g, but I'm very sure it was 6g or more, and his rear gunner kept passing out from the turns.
I'm also sure the F-4 could survive more than a 6g turn, but I can't find anything except a snippet claiming a very brief 11g jink to evade a SAM.

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The Global Hawk is an aircraft for long-term surveillance - and not designed for high velocities. And for this mission, this shape and dimensions of the wings are optimal.
Yes, the shape is that of a high-altitude glider (very long, thin wings), and isn't all that much smaller than another high-altitude, long range reconnaissance aircraft, the U-2. Its wingspan is actually longer than the U-2.

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Further: The size has no meaning and AI pilots save a lot of stuff inside the aircraft (pressurized cabin, live support system).
Actually, that's just about all you'll save by removing the pilot. You still need the engines, control surfaces, landing gear, internal gun magazine, hydraulics, computers, radar, fuel tanks, backup generator, and probably more. If you want the airplane to carry missiles, it needs a powerful enough engine in order to actually carry the weight. If you want to download live TV feed from the sensors, you need an antenna of a certain size and power. The longer you want to be able to fly it, the more fuel you need.

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Absurd. You cannot 'wish' the stiletto to be the super-interceptor. It is the oldest interceptor from human's arsenal - and no use against bigger and faster UFOs. There's no way to upgrade the stiletto to the level of the Dragon interceptor - which will replace it.
Where did this come from? I never said anything about the Stiletto being a superior design. My point was that the Saracen is a human design for human needs - so it is not a throw-away fighter by any means. The Stiletto is designed in the 2020's as a very maneuverable fighter to combat a completely unknown alien force. Neither were expected to have a mission life of 5 missions. Personally, if I were looking at lifetimes like that, I'd just use SAM batteries.

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Today, at a speed of mach 2 you cannot simply alter your course - as even slight turns cause high g-forces. The production of g-forces is always the result of speed and turnaround. And at mach 4, it is much worse. There's nearly no chance to avoid missiles.
Yes, at higher speeds you get more acceleration at lower degrees-per-second turns. This is one reason turns at high speeds are wider and take longer to complete. However, you also get a lot more drag at high speed. That's another reason turning at high speed is tricky - if you turn too hard, you'd point the other way very quickly, but now you're travelling very slowly.

And what do you mean by no chance to avoid missiles? If I'm going mach 4, and you're going mach 4, and we both have a similar compliment of long range mach 6 missiles, then I'll simply launch my missile before you do and turn the other way. Now I'm heading away, probably at mach 3 because I lost a little speed in the turn. If I shot my missile and turned away from a far enough distance, any missile you launch will run out of fuel and crash before it reaches me. If you chase me to get in range of your own missiles, my missile will kill you first. Of course, if you simply turn away, then my own missile will run out of fuel before it hits you. In that case, we start all over again.

Of course, that's just one scenario. Maybe you have a wingman and I don't, in which case I'd probably just run away because no amount of agility will help me survive if you're playing smart. An AI-controlled plane pulling 12g's might survive one missile, but definitely not a second missile. Maybe I have a wingman, in which case I can try to lead you into a situation where he can shoot you with a missile, but you can't shoot either of us. Maybe I'd try to play chicken, getting into the range where I'm guaranteed a missile kill (but conversely, any missile you launch also kills me). Maybe I'd try to lead you into a friendly SAM battery. There are plenty of tactics I can use that give me an advantage without needing the extreme endurance a human pilot can't cope with.

Of course, as soon as you're controlling an antimatter-propelled UFO with advanced ECM and ECCM, firing hypersonic antimatter missiles at my little terran fighter with short-range TV-imaging missiles, then the game changes. In which case, if I were the commander, I should be shot if I keep trying to face your UFOs head-on with my little fighters. I need to use better strategies and tactics than you to get the upper hand.

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And BTW: If you need a computer for combat - an AI pilot - why use a human pilot at all?
I'd use the computer for the things it's best at - calculating bomb release times, computing gun sight vectors, and missile hit probabilities. It's not so good for luring opponents into traps, reacting to unusual situations, and making tactical decisions.

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The alien materials are not that advanced in UFO:AI. The Gallileo probe entered the atmosphere at an altitude where the atmosphere is much less dense than on earth (at an altitude of 10-20 km). Further: The probe was made to 2/3 of heat shield and one millimeter away from its course and the probe gets destroyed.
The Galileo probe entered the atmosphere at interplanetary speed - 47.4km/s. On Earth, the speed of sound at sea level is 0.34029 km/s, so that makes the probe travelling around Mach 140. The Jovian atmosphere is mostly hydrogen, though, so it'd be travelling at a lower Mach number than that. The fastest atmospheric speed alien materials can expect are reentry speeds - about 7.7km/s if entering from LEO, or about 11km/s if entering directly from Lunar orbit. That's Mach 23 and Mach 32, respectively. Well, actually the alien's engines let them slow down more before entering the atmosphere, so their limit could very well be lower than that.

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Pure speculation. There's nearly no use for your flexibility. It's simply that way: 'Go to these coordinates and intercept the enemy'.
What if the enemy isn't exactly where those coordinates say it is? How does it determine which of the radar contacts it has actually is the enemy? Which strategy does it use to engage the enemy? What if the enemy behaves differently from what the AI and its programmers expected? There's a lot more to fighter combat than simply trucking missiles out to a point and launching them at any radar contact that comes near.

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Any kinetic impact would comletely detroy any human aircraft. Plus, the rest of the antimatter will react with normal material and detonate - with several kilotonnes TNT. This additional effekt of the alien antimatter rocket-launcher is described in the UFO-wiki.
The missile simply does not contain enough antimatter to make that large an explosion. The wiki says nothing about that - the closest it gets to is saying "even a proximity detonation of the antimatter fuel is enough to take out a fighter jet," which leaves wide interpretations on how close this proximity detonation is. What's likely is that most of the fuel has been expended by the time the missile reaches its target, leaving just enough to turn the casing into hot shrapnel.
There's very little difference between this hot shrapnel and modern missile shrapnel, except that modern is probably Mach 4 and alien is twice that. That's only four times the kinetic energy, assuming the same mass of shrapnel.

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Furthermore - no human will survive a dropout at mach 4 at an altitude of 10,000 meters. Even today no one survies a dropout at mach 2.
Then jettison the entire cockpit. The B-1, a supersonic bomber, already does that.

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Design / Re: 2 questions on human aircraft designs
« on: April 23, 2008, 06:46:37 pm »
I'd consider the U2 to be a closer analogue to the Globalhawk, because they're both recon craft. Interestingly, the UAV is shorter, but has a wider wingspan than the U2-R. The RQ-4 is also longer than the SU-25 (but shorter than the A-10), but has half the wingspan of both.
Looking at that cross-section I posted, the elimination of the satellite antenna won't actually decrease the craft's length all that much. There's only so much room on the bottom to put sensor gear, and reducing the length might make it too cramped.


Maybe you and I have different definitions of self-sufficient AI. I treat that as not needing a human in the loop at all, and making tactical desisions (which enemies to engage, etc) on its own. The AI used in either a forward controller mode, or from ground-based installations, would be mostly self-sufficient - enough to engage in combat maneuvers on its own. The human is there so they don't accidentally shoot down an airliner or bomb friendly troops on the ground, in addition to being able to use better strategies and tactics. (It's more like an RTS than a flight sim for the human operators)

The role of a Forward UAV Operator would likely be a cross between flight lead of human wingman, and a Forward Air Controller for close air support. The unmanned vehicles will be the same size as any other modern fighter, possibly even just a regular fighter with no one in the cockpit to save cost. If the FUO needs more fighters, he'd have to request a flight be launched from the nearest airbase, and those aircraft would check in once within range. He'd give generic orders to fighters he controls, much like in an RTS. He'd have the options, though, to directly see the data from any of its sensors, and possibly take direct control if needed.

The arguments against short range UCAVs are the same as any short range fighters. Plus, the smaller a UAV, the better it would be just to send a SAM up there instead. I'm expecting these UCAVs to have similar survivability to any human-piloted craft in the same situation.


Also, you're right in that the detonation of an AM missile likely gives a burst of radiation, but there's barely enough fuel in the thing to keep it going at hypersonic speeds. Modern missiles actually use the shrapnel from its explosion to kill the jet, (and the jet rarely explodes in the air - it more falls out of the sky). The AM missile will be the same effect, except the shrapnel is going much faster.

 

73
Design / Re: 2 questions on human aircraft designs
« on: April 22, 2008, 11:05:29 pm »
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1. The missile AIM-54 Phoenix (for the F14 Tomcat) got in service in 1974. This missile can fly 16 g at a top speed of more than 4,800 kph. G-forces are no problems for AI aircrafts.

The only time the missile flies at 16g is when it is fired - and in that case it will be destroyed in minutes anyway... so I don't see how that helps the point. ;)
Incidentally, that 16g is acceleration in the direction of flight. A better argument would have been the 50g acceleration missiles can undergo in the terminal phase of their interception. But again, that lasts for only seconds. The way to evade a missile is not only to try to lose lock, but to try to make it run out of speed before it hits you. If that missile keeps turning at that 50gs, it will run out of speed in a matter of seconds. (Also note how small a missile is compared to the fighter that launches it.)

2. WW2 fighters could also pull 9g turns. The difference between that and modern fighters is that now we have G-suits to help the pilot keep consciousness, and the better engine lets it retain more speed longer. Incidentally, the Stiletto was/is designed only 20 years in the future, and likely the Saracen will be older than 10 years (possibly even 30-40 years, much like F-15s/F-16s today) at the time of the game.

3. An AI-plane wouldn't be all that much smaller. Look at some modern UAVs, like the Globalhawk. What takes up the most space in an aircraft today are fuel tanks, engines, and other systems. In the Globalhawk, the space saved by removing the cockpit is actually used again in the satellite dish: http://www.strategie.com.pl/teksty/technika/bezpilotowe2/Global_Hawk-1.jpg. That space could be reclaimed by using a solid-state antenna the entire length of the airframe, but that cross-section shows just how much space is saved.

4. That is the best argument against needing airframes that last a long time. You're absolutely right that the life expectancy of interceptors against UFOs is probably in the single-digits, maybe the double digits with improved avionics. The only argument against that is that only the Stiletto is designed to go up against alien craft. The Saracen is a pure terran design for terran needs. (Also, the Stiletto was first flown in 2026. With a modern development cycle, it would have to be in the early concept stages within the next decade to meet that schedule.)


5. By performance, I meant aeronautic performance. Even if the airplane could pull and survive over 9 gs, it could be tactically unsound to do so. (ie: You'll lose a lot of altitude and airspeed) Also, especially in the case of two hypersonic vehicles approaching head-on, both sides would need sensors and computers to process that data anyway, plus they will initially start at over hundreds of miles apart, which leaves plenty of time to launch missiles. (And dropping bombs at mach 4: A human will likely designate the target ahead of time, fly over the target, and the computer drops the bombs at the right time. That's already how it's done today. Reaction time will have no part to play in that.) The only time you need instant reactions in this case is if you want a head-on guns kill - and that's probably a 10 second opportunity in a 10-minute fight.

Alien materials will be enough to protect a missile from hypersonic speeds, so there's no need of worrying about it burning up. (The Galilleo probe was also entering at interplanetary speeds, much higher than the AM missiles will get to unless launched from orbit)

Again, you're right that the question becomes "why risk a human pilot at all?" I think the answer is that alien ECM and jamming will hamper the effectiveness of a remote ground operator and the cost and performance of a purely AI-controlled aircraft will not differ significantly from a sensor-fusion design with a human pilot - so in the end the flexibility of having a human tactician onboard outweighs the combat and moral/political advantages of a purely AI-controlled pilot.

In addition, the pilot will likely survive being shot down. The particle beams and AM missile kill only by kinetic impact, so unless the cockpit is hit the pilot can eject and survive to give a debreifing.

In retrospect, perhaps the best method is a combination. A human pilot controls a flight of AI 'wingmen,' which take the risks and get shot at. The closer range limits the effects of jamming on the UCAVs, and the human is present to examine the situation and think tactically.

And, at the end, I could probably evoke Ken Burnside's Zeroth Law of Space Combat: People react better to human beings than silicon chips. :)


Doctor J:

The 2-mission life expectancy you give is only based on current game mechanics, which is simplified and buggy (1hp ships). The final game will probably be different. In comparison, Interceptors in the first X-COM would always survive unless you put them in range of Battleships or TerrorShips. It's up to the developers how far along this continuum they want to place things.

Plus, there are already plans for SAM sites, if they're not implemented already.

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Design / Re: 2 questions on human aircraft designs
« on: April 11, 2008, 10:15:32 pm »
Something to note: current fighter craft are also structurally limited to 9 g. (Less if they have heavy bombs mounted and stuff). Also, aerodynamically, a high speed turn bleeds off a lot of airspeed. Sure, your 'robot' pilot could take 14 g's, but the plane will fall apart after a dozen missions (even with advanced composite materials and the like), and running out of speed could get it shot down just as easily. (The agility of missiles will always exceed that of any fighter craft). It could very well be that the performance advantage of an AI pilot is low enough that the intelligence of an onboard human tactician is worthwhile, especially when fighting an unknown enemy. This especially becomes important when going against antimatter missiles - there's no way that even an advanced antimatter-powered hybrid craft can outmaneuver the missile, so it's better to just go with ECM to try to fool the missile into missing. (Tactical positioning has less importance when your missile can turn around and hit someone behind you.)

In space, combat is even more different. Orbital maneuvering has many, many quirks. I can't really get my head around what orbital combat will look like. (Imagine: Going 'slower' actually reduces your orbit and makes you faster.) Deep space combat is a different beast yet again.

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Artwork / Re: MIMIR Telescope/Carrier Animation
« on: March 07, 2008, 08:23:22 pm »
I figured that the carrier was already heading towards the horizon as soon as it jumped in. After disappearing behind the horizon, it still had a good 30-60 minutes of deceleration time. But there's already the problem that in the wide-angle shot, the carrier's apparent size is simply too large for the craft to actually disappear behind the earth instead of plunging straight into the atmosphere.

...actually, I just realized the best solution might be to make the carrier move parallel to the horizon, instead of heading towards it. That definitely helps solve the problems of apparent size vs. realistic distances. The video can also still be realtime, because relative velocities at orbital speeds emphasize the luck and ranges of the encounter, without making it unrealistic. (It also takes it away from that stupid weird star shape near the horizon)

I can definitely get rid of the big circle, too. Its original intent was just another way to distinguish the zoomed-in shot from the wide-angle shot.

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