[WAD]SM-6 anti-ship

Matrix Games Forums

Forums Register Login Photo Gallery Member List Search Calendars FAQ

My Profile Inbox Address Book My Subscription My Forums Log Out

[WAD]SM-6 anti-ship

View related threads: (in this forum | in all forums)

Logged in as: Guest

Users viewing this topic: none

Printable Version

All Forums >> [New Releases from Matrix Games] >> Command: Modern Operations series >> [WAD]SM-6 anti-ship

Page: [1]

Message

<< Older Topic Newer Topic >>

[WAD]SM-6 anti-ship - 7/5/2017 10:56:44 PM

mikeCK

Posts: 565
Joined: 5/20/2008
Status: offline

Recently the US navy targeted and sunk a retired frigate by hitting it with an SM-6 SAM. I guess it had been modified to target ships as well as its traditional Anti-air/missile/ballistic missile targets. Now I remember an option existing to "allow ships to be targeted by SAMs" so I'm assuming I CAN attack an enemy ship with an SM-6, but what result? I'm curious if anyone has attempted to attack a group of ships with the SM-6 and how well it works. The thing flies at Mach 3.5 and has a tremdous range so it's very tempting. I'm interested of the game modeling of a SAM affects its ability to be jammed by a ship and damage. Does it work in the game basically?

I haven't had an opportunity to try it so I'm just curious if others have had success

< Message edited by mikmyk -- 7/6/2017 3:07:16 PM >

Post #: 1

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/5/2017 11:51:05 PM

Dysta

Posts: 1909
Joined: 8/8/2015
Status: offline

Yes, you need to manually add SM-6 Block IA weapon record to VLS cells, and then turn on SAM attack surface units in doctrine.

It's indeed very fast at mid-corse that reached a bit above Mach 4, but the bad thing is the terminal phase is a rapid diving, acting like a slightly slower version of ASBM, so the accuracy might by an issue (hitting a 30m length or smaller boats will sometimes miss). Warhead size is also an issue, hitting 2000 tons ship could only achieve around 10% of damage, and even less when bigger.

At least it can be a very rapid missile that could act as a supplemental ARM, use limited damage to blind/cripple the target when you have to, but I'd probably save them for AAM, which is SM-6 originally designed to do.

EDIT: There's an updated scenario at the next comment.

< Message edited by Dysta -- 7/6/2017 10:56:42 AM >

_____________________________

(in reply to mikeCK)

Post #: 2

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/6/2017 3:04:35 AM

mikeCK

Posts: 565
Joined: 5/20/2008
Status: offline

Great! Thank you

Apparently the blast fragmentation warhead is very good at damaging all the delicate electronic gadgetry found all over the ships even if it doesn't make a big hole. I'm guessing that the game modeling simply determines an overall damage percentage as opposed to determine the loss of individual systems. Maybe the missile in real life is pretty good at achieving "mission kills" as opposed to actually sinking the ship

(in reply to Dysta)

Post #: 3

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/6/2017 3:49:18 AM

Dysta

Posts: 1909
Joined: 8/8/2015
Status: offline

I guess so. But the frag warhead could works better for sinking unarmored small boats, or an individual target that isn't escorted with other sensor-rigged warships. Given by its use in 2020s, CEC will be a conmon trend so hard-killing enemy weapon mounts and sensors could hardly eliminate the threat entirely.

If it can pre-detonate the frag like AAM and SAM does, it will be a very good crowd-control weapon on the surface, and countering missile boats effectively. If better, the accompanying F-35 should provide precision vector to make SM-6 hit the specific part of the ship, to maximumize the mission-kill effect.

EDIT: Upon further test SM-6 against warships, there's a twisted result: Russian S-300V could handle SM-6 saturation strike, but British Type-45 and Chinese Type 055 are getting blasted. I found that SA-20's favored Target Altitude is 90000ft, higher than Aster-30's 65000ft and HQ-9B's 80000ft, so to make Russian ship launched the SAM earlier than other 2 ships.

It turns out the British destroyer has the best long-range sensor to find SM-6, but use the worst missiles to defend with!

I find this intercepting mechanism is very questionable, why must these SAMs have to met with target's height first? Why not able to pre-acquire SM-6's flight route so to maximize the intercept distance? Since intercepting ballistic missile warhead is easier because of the ABM's guess-route mechanism, why not working the same with other ASMs that using the ASBM flight pattern?

I've uploaded the updated scenario again:

Attachment (1)

< Message edited by Dysta -- 7/6/2017 10:56:03 AM >

_____________________________

(in reply to mikeCK)

Post #: 4

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/9/2017 5:51:01 PM

mikeCK

Posts: 565
Joined: 5/20/2008
Status: offline

I don't know about the interception matrix. Does anyone know what the flight pattern in with an Sm-6 targeting a ship? Does it skim or just take direct path? I would assume the latter since it designed as a SAM/AMM

(in reply to Dysta)

Post #: 5

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/9/2017 6:06:29 PM

Dysta

Posts: 1909
Joined: 8/8/2015
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: mikeCK

I don't know about the interception matrix. Does anyone know what the flight pattern in with an Sm-6 targeting a ship? Does it skim or just take direct path? I would assume the latter since it designed as a SAM/AMM

In game it flys like a ballistic missile, rapidly gain height from VLS to the maximum altitude, and then rapidly dive downward to the target. It had to fly that way so SM-6 can have maximum range, and the terminal guidance should be provided by CEC-capable aircrafts.

_____________________________

(in reply to mikeCK)

Post #: 6

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/9/2017 6:21:27 PM

ExNusquam

Posts: 513
Joined: 3/4/2014
From: Washington, D.C.
Status: offline

For those of you commenting on the small size of the warhead - remember that the number of weapons required to put a modern ship out of action (mission kill) is usually quite low. This chart is from this excellent paper on ASM effectiveness; the chart compares Exocet Missile Equivalents (EME) vs. Full Load Displacement for ships out of action (OOA) and sunk. You'll note that the OOA line barely goes above 1 EME for a 6000-ton surface combatant - and the slope is very flat at that point.

This graph is backed up with historical data from WWII indicating that firepower kills occur with very few effective weapon hits, and ships were far better armored in that time. There's a table in Hughes' Fleet Tactics and Coastal Combat (page 157 for those that can find it) that shows that it took on average 1.65 1000-lb bombs to achieve a firepower kill on a 15,000-ton surface combatant, and only 2.6 1000-lb bombs for the same effect on a 45,000-ton vessel. Whichever side lands effective hits first will have a huge advantage in any future naval conflict - and the SM-6 enables that.

(in reply to mikeCK)

Post #: 7

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/9/2017 7:48:49 PM

Dysta

Posts: 1909
Joined: 8/8/2015
Status: offline

This I won't disagree with, I was thinking if the fragmentation warhead that intent to tear aircrafts, have the same as heavier and explosive penetrator warhead. Maybe the near hypersonic diving speed is the answer to the penetration part. Once it's punch through the deck, it could matter less differences.

_____________________________

(in reply to ExNusquam)

Post #: 8

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/9/2017 11:37:48 PM

mikeCK

Posts: 565
Joined: 5/20/2008
Status: offline

I believe that the Exocet missile that sank the British ship in the falklands war actually failed to detonate. The damage was from the missile
Mass impact and unspent fuel.

(in reply to Dysta)

Post #: 9

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/9/2017 11:42:56 PM

Cik

Posts: 671
Joined: 10/5/2016
Status: offline

there was also a ship sunk by a bomb that failed to detonate, probably due to arming delay.

giant metal object moving at high speeds are deadly - regardless of warhead type.

granted, bombs are probably carrying significantly more mass as they hit you, so that's a factor. but still.

(in reply to mikeCK)

Post #: 10

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/11/2017 9:26:43 PM

StellarRat

Posts: 188
Joined: 9/14/2009
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Dysta

I guess so. But the frag warhead could works better for sinking unarmored small boats...

My reading tells me that most modern military ships could be considered "unarmored".

(in reply to Dysta)

Post #: 11

RE: SM-6 anti-ship - 7/15/2017 10:28:14 PM

glappkaeft

Posts: 3
Joined: 1/28/2017
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Cik
there was also a ship sunk by a bomb that failed to detonate, probably due to arming delay.

That sound like an garbled account of the sinking of HMS Antelope that was hit with two bombs that failed to detonate. The reason it sank was that one of the bombs detonated on the fourth attempt to disarm it, setting of the missile magazines.

(in reply to Cik)

Post #: 12