[Logged] Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic

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[Logged] Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/2/2020 4:04:55 PM

JuliasW

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I was trying to set up a Naval Laser Directed Energy Weapon (LDEW) scenario, using the AFSB 15 Ponce experimental LPD which is equipped with a 150kw laser. But the weapons is entirely unrealisitc, its modelled like a sci fi film, with instant kills against hostile missiles and airframes.

It instantly kills a 10,000Kg Helicopter, as it does incoming Harpoon missiles. A laser would require some dwell time to do any damage. It could rattle and damage a seeking sensor within a few seconds, but do little physical impact to missile, which would carry on with its same mass and kinematics direction. And a Helicopter sensors would only be dazzled and damaged, but the airframe would not be damaged by a 150Kw laser. (Noting that blinding pilots with laser is against international treaties.)

I thought this was supposed to be reasonably realistic, and not a cartoon game ?

< Message edited by apache85 -- 6/9/2020 3:52:43 AM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 2:58:39 AM

Rory Noonan

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Thanks for the feedback. We're interested in constant improvements to the simulation, so there's no need to be provocative--you can just talk to us like normal people and we'll listen to what you have to say.

Something that has been discussed recently is how we can model the effects of lasers with more fidelity; we have a few options on the table but the more suggestions and contributions we can get the better the end result will be.

What exact changes do you propose?

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 4:20:26 AM

HalfLifeExpert

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I think the pieces are there to model lasers knocking out sensors. They could make missiles go 'blind' which is currently modeled. They could have a chance of destroying the Mark 1 Eyeball sensor on manned systems, and maybe frying the avionics, causing the same effect as when an aircraft loses all it's engines.

I think that's a good way to approach it.

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 4:31:46 AM

Rory Noonan

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That's essentially what we came up with; however the result of the engines being destroyed is that the aircraft is destroyed entirely in the simulation which appears to be the point of issue for JuliasW.

At the moment dwell time is standardised to 2s for damage to be applied, and improving granularity there is something we're actively looking at. The final result is either going to be sensor damage or systems damage to the point that the aircraft is destroyed in the sim.

Destroying the Mk1 eyeball is an interesting option; I think for ships and ground units that could work (but would that then mean the entire crew is blinded?) but for aircraft I think that would very quickly equate to a destroyed aircraft--landing an aircraft completely blind is probably not going to end well, even if it does get back to base.

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 4:48:20 AM

HalfLifeExpert

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Yeah I mean, with lasers naturally being limited to Line of sight shots, you want to effectively kill anything that's close enough to be engaged. Blinding the missile will in most cases deliver the same practical result as blowing it up. Same with frying the avionics on a modern warplanes or blinding the pilot on a manned aircraft.

In a situation with actual shooting, a laser that doesn't effectively destroy a target (be it blowing up, losing its fly y wire controls, blinding it's operator or warhead seeker), is not going to be of any real help.

All of these are effectively modelled right now in a very simplified way, and I think OP is simply over thinking what he is seeing on screen. The 'instant killing' of a helicopter for instance is what I see to be a simplification of the flight control systems being heavily damaged by the laser, thus making the helo fall like a rock.

Also, when talking about small explosive targets like a missile, modern and soon to be deployed lasers will have the energy to detonate the warhead prematurely, which would sort of resemble sci fi.

< Message edited by HalfLifeExpert -- 6/3/2020 4:52:53 AM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 8:03:56 AM

Dimitris

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It's often easy to overlook how many single points of failure there are in an aircraft or helicopter, particularly a small one. Disable the cockpit/crew (quite likely with a HEL, especially if it's a frontal shot)? Plane goes down. Damage the engine sufficiently? Plane goes down. Hit the flight controls? Plane is out of control, goes down. Hit the fuel path? Unless there is a redundant (and widely spaced from the primary, unlike in e.g. the F-105) the plane goes down. Hit any of the fuel tanks? Significant risk of fire and the plane blowing up. Damage the tail rotor in a helo? It either goes down or, best case, crash-lands nearby. Hit any of the external stores, or the internal weapons bay? Risk of spectacular explosion and complete loss of aircraft (we don't model this ATM but probably should, it happened occasionally in WW2). The list goes on.

< Message edited by Dimitris -- 6/3/2020 9:43:52 AM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 10:25:26 AM

gennyo

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quote:

At the moment dwell time is standardised to 2s for damage to be applied

And now I know why the short range CO2 laser won't save my unit from incoming AAMs everytime...

As a "Professional" Anime style (or even Kami style) player of C:MO, I could say that laser acts nothing near what I saw in the animes

. I saw so many fighters won't come down after 2 or 3 shots, AAMs or ASMs slamming into target still in the shine of multiple laser beams, etc. THESE WON'T HAPPEN IN THAT MANY ANIMES.

To me, laser weapons helps a lot but not completely invincible, and maybe some more tweak not complete overhual of the model will help to add some more reality into the simulation, like scattering of laser in lower altitube (maybe a lower PoH for sea-skimming missiles because of water vapor near sea surface?).

P.S. Want some real anime style action? arm your aircrafts with EMP blasters (DB# 3086), and delivers 10000 DPs with >90% PoH to any target it shoots. That's more than anything except MOABs and Nukes, and I feel like X Gundam (That Crazy Lunar Based Microwave Blasters).

I know it's EMP but O-EMP bombs won't melt my planes like that instantly.

< Message edited by gennyo -- 6/3/2020 10:40:16 AM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 10:34:49 AM

ultradave

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quote:

ORIGINAL: apache85

That's essentially what we came up with; however the result of the engines being destroyed is that the aircraft is destroyed entirely in the simulation which appears to be the point of issue for JuliasW.

That may be JuliasW's point, however rudely made, however I don't see this as any kind of issue at all. It's not any different than a kill of an aircraft by any kind of kinetic weapon in the game, as the game represents it.

Hit a plane with a missile - what really happened? Did the missile fly up the exhaust, in which case, yeah, pretty much a fireball. But a proximity detonation that shreds engine and control surfaces, the plane falters, stalls, spirals down smoking. None of which is shown in game. Which is fine. It's a kill. Kill the pilot with cannon fire, the plane goes out of control and crashes, all of which are represented by a little explosion marker (and now sometimes a downed pilot). Same thing. It's a kill. A CWIS that hits a Harpoon just enough to disable it - kill icon. We don't see it sputter out, spin and hit the ocean.

All of which is fine - this is a high level view of the situation.

All of those could apply equally to a laser shot doing similar damage, and also represented by the little explosion graphic (which represents a kill, not an explosion, right?)

Now I"m not up on the lethality of what power laser can do what, but a laser shot that can do any damage to a modern airframe - aircraft, helicopter, missile - has a pretty decent chance of knocking it down. There are multiple points of failure of all of these. Modern weapons systems are not like B-17s or B-24s from WW2!

Dave

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/3/2020 11:34:34 AM

JuliasW

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Many apologies, I have caused some offence in my language.

It because of the deep fidelity I see in the rest of the game, that I am rather surprised, and disputing in the modelling of lasers.

I would think it is open source knowledge that a laser dwell time, of a few seconds, could disable sensitive exposed sensors. However a laser energy cannot disrupt the mass kinematics of an object,or detroy it. Sensors are exposed, but other avionics or munition through some 3mm of metal or so. So it's an energy impact, and basic physics. Destruction, or blinding, of a sensor, results in the missile or vehicle continuing on its same trajectory. Similar to When I am dazzled by oncoming traffic, I don't panic, I may slow, but certainly don't manoeuvre etc. So a realistic impact upon an incoming missile being that it can no longer manoeuvre in the terminal phase, after two seconds shot on its sensors. It would however most likely continue on its same trajectory.

An aircraft avionics system, and flight controls, would already electromagnetically shielded, especially military aircraft exposed to high RF levels. So lasers would have to impact a lot more than 150kw energy through a shielded airframe to have an impact on its dynamics. Knocking out its EO andIR sensors easy, not so obvious the aircraft flight controls behind RF and mechanical shielding. So I would suggest more likely dazzle, and distract impact upon aircraft operations, and many multiples of 10s seconds to actually disable the motion of major aircraft.

Keeping a focused beam on a highly manoeuvrable target, is an order of magnitude more difficult than cueing off a guided missile, its more like maintaining a continous gun sight lock on that same 2cm square, over 2nm away. Some serious tracking. The you tube videos do show lasers disabling small UAVs, after many seconds of continuous dwell time.

Note I think you need to be very careful and suggesting blinding Mark one eyeball. That is against international treaties on any act of deliberate blinding of combatents.

Those are just my suggestions and views. Sorry if I have caused offence. I just feel their is a little more depth and research in the representation of laser weapons to be considered here.

< Message edited by JuliasW -- 6/3/2020 11:51:22 AM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/4/2020 10:11:51 PM

Zanthra

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Most aircraft are said in game to have an armor if None. This makes sense regarding guns and missiles where the explosive force tears through aluminum like paper, but is not great representation for lasers. Perhaps a change to the laser damage calculation to consider all targets heavially armored regardless of the DB value?

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/5/2020 6:46:43 AM

Rain08

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Another thing is that laser dazzlers can take down missiles with no issue (see '#3611 - 5P-42 Filin laser-dazzler'). IIRC laser dazzlers were supposedly fixed, but I saw instances of AMRAAMs being taken down (B1146.2 - DB485).

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/6/2020 8:20:19 PM

Dimitris

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Rain08
Another thing is that laser dazzlers can take down missiles with no issue (see '#3611 - 5P-42 Filin laser-dazzler'). IIRC laser dazzlers were supposedly fixed, but I saw instances of AMRAAMs being taken down (B1146.2 - DB485).

Great, let's pile different issues on a single thread so that tracking and resolving them efficiently becomes orders of magnitude harder for the dev team

< Message edited by Dimitris -- 6/6/2020 9:03:53 PM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/7/2020 3:10:41 PM

Tookatee

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I think the OP may want to familiarize themselves with the AN/SEQ-3, the laser weapon previously equipped on the USS Ponce that their talking about. They make the statement that the weapon is only a 150kw laser, however the weapon system is capable of dialing up it's power to 33,000w. This is how it burns through and detonates/destroys critical areas of weapons systems or vehicles, being capable of causing a complete loss of the platform should the operator be told to target a specific part of the vehicle (fuel tank, onboard weapons, control surfaces, engines, etc.) as the AN/SEQ-3 has more than enough power to heat through the metal exterior of most air-frames or the weapons they may carry.

And so, while you don't have the targeting fidelity to choose which component on a platform the laser targets and illuminates (yet), CMO does properly abstract the effects that the AN/SEQ-3, a high power laser system, would have should it be tasked with destroying a target within it's envelope. And just in case you don't believe me, here's footage the DOD released of the AN/SEQ-3 being tested against a variety of targets.

< Message edited by Tookatee -- 6/13/2020 3:43:54 PM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 6/8/2020 8:28:45 AM

JuliasW

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Oh do please provide the source for that 30,000 kW!!!
For 2 seconds engagement that is 60,000,000 joules of energy, 60Megawatts, that has to be stored, even assuming 100% efficiency. A typical destroyer ship gas turbine generates some 5 to 10 Megawatts in total, and is only 40% efficient. Noting that the rolls Royce AG9140 generates 4MW. So if by some Sci Fi battery you could capture and store those quantities of energy, you would only be able to fire every 20 seconds or so. So not so good when two missiles coming at you.

Heating up some exposed ordance on a boat, to make it explode. OK. Not particularly impressive. Blowing a slow UAV of sky out, yes impressive, after a few seconds against a sensitive motor or control. But that is Not a missile, coming at you at mach 1.5. Yes laser directed weapons are coming, and will be utilised for small asymmetric threats. Hardly for Electromagnetically hardened aircraft or incoming missile volleys, any time soon.

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/24/2020 9:49:17 AM

MaxDemian

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A 150kW laser should be able to take down a helicopter in a few seconds of exposure, according to this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-miBH10bdCs
Featured in the video is the HEL-TVD with a 100kW class laser weapon.

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/25/2020 3:56:47 PM

JuliasW

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OMG, are you really taking a CGI marketing video on YouTube as a statement of fact !

We really need some basic science lessons being taught, otherwise we end up people believing in gravity bombing between spaceships, because they saw it on Star Wars.

Do some basic maths !

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/25/2020 4:28:04 PM

thewood1

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Dude, I'm still not quite sure what the point is for your rant, but I'm sure you're not winning over many people to your cause.

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/25/2020 4:53:21 PM

BDukes

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quote:

ORIGINAL: thewood1

Dude, I'm still not quite sure what the point is for your rant, but I'm sure you're not winning over many people to your cause.

Not fired up here. I think because his name. I miss Orange Julius in American mall. Anybody else?

This is just a forum. Let it be.

< Message edited by BDukes -- 10/25/2020 6:51:45 PM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/25/2020 5:56:34 PM

ultradave

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quote:

ORIGINAL: JuliasW

We really need some basic science lessons being taught, otherwise we end up people believing in gravity bombing between spaceships, because they saw it on Star Wars.
Do some basic maths !

What basic maths specifically? I'd be more than happy to, as I have quite an extensive education and 40 years of experience in science and engineering. It's not clear what basic maths you're asking me to do.

The complaint seems to be that the damage to units from lasers is too high, or if not too high, it happens too fast. Is that correct?

If that IS correct, the developers need some open sources that provide hard data on effects of lasers, by power level, against various targets, or SOME way to evaluate how effective a particular laser system is at mission killing certain targets. I'm not saying they didn't already have this and based the game results on that. It seems most likely they did or otherwise, knowing how meticulous they are, they wouldn't have even included the new weapons and their effect. However, that info may be in a bit of short supply, being new and not used in actual combat much, if at all.

I'm sure everyone here would actually be very interested in such data, developers and users alike, if provided without the condescending insults. ( you've provided no data - just your opinion, and then insult the rest for not providing data as well )

Summarizing - hard data from open sources is what the developers need. If you provide it, I'm SURE it will be well received. It always is and they are the most responsive developers I've ever seen.

Dave

< Message edited by ultradave -- 10/25/2020 7:37:30 PM >

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/25/2020 7:08:04 PM

thewood1

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But what about science?

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RE: Naval Laser Weapon is entirely unrealistic - 10/26/2020 12:32:49 AM

14yellow14

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Maybe this helps:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/30500/that-big-mystery-object-northrop-is-barging-from-redondo-beach-is-a-high-power-laser

I think there should be different categories of lasers that can attack and destroy targets according to that power.

Less powerful lasers like 150kw that are only effective against small UAV targets and like a dazzler against larger ones.

< Message edited by 14yellow14 -- 10/26/2020 12:36:44 AM >

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