Terminology:Sensors
 Terminology
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Sensors is the general term for systems allowing a vessel to detect other objects in space.
Contents
Usage in Vegastrike
Sensors are present as upgrade kits available for purchase on some bases; some ships and other units (such as bases or missiles) may also have built-in sensor systems.
What does it do
Sensors detect and recognize other objects as well as provide missile targetting. Military sensors also may have Terminology:ITTS capability; in this case they only provide targetting data - to actually have a weapon aimed automatically, its hardpoint must have autotracking system installed.
Tracks of the objects harder to pinpoint than usual - such as ships with active ECM systems and nebulae - has noticeable jitter.
Available Sensor Types
Currently, possible types of sensor functionality (i.e. recognized for units and upgrades in unit.csv) are:
| Type | Projection | Friend-or-Foe | Object Recognition | Threat Assessment | comment |
| 0 (FALSE) | Spherical | no | no | no | all tracks look the same way |
| 1 (TRUE) | Spherical | yes | no | no | |
| THREAT | Spherical | yes | no | yes | |
| BUBBLE_THREAT | Bubble | yes | yes | yes | Rlaan sensors are designed like that |
| PLANE | Plane | yes | no | no | |
| PLANE_THREAT | Plane | yes | yes | yes | good for short-range fighting |
Displayed Projections
There are several different display modes, currently fixed for given sensor hardware:
- Spherical (Wing Commander style) - two circles, for fore and aft hemispheres. Allows easy orientation on a chosen track, but doesn't show distance at all.
- Bubble - the same, but tracks are displayed as circles, blown more or less to represent objects' velocity. Terminology:Rlaan sensors are designed like this.
- Plane (Elite style) - cylindrical projection, showing the place of a track in the unit's "horizontal" plane (thus making ranges obvious) and "height" from it.
Advanced functions
Track color-coding by Threat Assessment has priority over Object Recognition, and that over Friend-or-Foe. I.e. if all 3 are present, all missiles are colored the same way, and all planets are colored the same way, no matter to whom they belong.
Friend-or-Foe
Friend-or-Foe is a basic target assessment capability which discerns (and color-codes):
| Capital Ship Ship |
friend | enemy | neutral |
| or has lock | this includes unarmed enemies if Threat Assessment is present | ||
| Cargo Container | Cargo | ||
| anything else | normal | ||
Object Recognition
Object Recognition shows tracks color-coded by object type:
| Star Nebula |
star | |
| Planet Dead Planet |
planet | |
| Base | base | enemy |
| if it has lock | ||
| Jump Point | jump | |
| anything else | normal | |
Threat Assessment
Threat Assessment shows tracks color-coded for missiles and blinking for objects that has lock on the player's ship - the greater its perceived threat, the faster is blinking:
| Missile | missile |
Threat level:
| Missile | High | |||
| Capital Ship | Medium if hostile |
Low otherwise |
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| Ship | Medium if has turrets |
Low otherwise |
None if unarmed | |
| anything else | Low -Hey, cap'n, this cargo box locks on us! -Well, it can't be worse than a heavy fighter. |
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