Use ai on / off for Harm defence

Question

Use ai on / off for Harm defence

walder opened this issue 2 years ago · 12 comments

Described by Flogas on discord:

Hey, I have another remark regarding HARM defence. I think it is a DCS bug but it may be possible to go around it.
It is a problem with "enableEmission" that I mentioned at DCS here https://forum.dcs.world/topic/312725-harm-seeker-sees-radars-in-too-even-when-they-are-turned-off/#comment-5087976. Do note that this only happens in multiplayer.
To summarize : turning a radar off with "enableEmission(false)", as is done by Skynet, will not avoid HARM tracking. Turning AI off as well will do it though. In fact, we can see that the P19 radar stops rotating when we do SetOnOff(false), but not when enableEmission(false).
I'll do some more testing on this and maybe propose an improvement for Skynet.

Solution:
when a SAM is defending against a HARM use the ai off command. This would allow the HARM to miss. Using enable emission in other cases gives more flexibility like beeing able to move units. ai off does not allow for that.

Answer 1 · 2022-11-15T21:04:40.000Z

For testing purposes I modified the script to do "ai off" in the main goDark function, but what you propose here is way better !
If you need me to do some testing I'll be happy to help.

Answer 2 · 2022-11-16T21:22:50.000Z

I won't be at my dcs machine in the next two weeks, I will let you know once I have a build ready. I rarely get time to play dcs these days so having someone testing Skynet on multiplayer would be great👍

Answer 3 · 2023-02-09T22:16:38.000Z

@MacFlorent I added this to the dev branch version, could you test in multiplayer? If ok, I will release shortly. SAMs will only use ai of for harm defence

Answer 4 · 2023-02-10T07:28:11.000Z

Hello, I will test this as soon as possible (probably this weekend) and keep you updated.

Answer 5 · 2023-02-12T21:46:24.000Z

I just did a successful test. HARM defence is working again. Thank you for your great work.

I plan to do some more testingnext week, so you can wait a bit before releasing, or not, as you prefer. I will keep you updated in any case.

Note that since radars are still turned off with enableEmission outside of the HARM defence, they will be visible on the HARM TOO page even when they are turned off. I don't think it's a big issue.

Test 1 (control)

Using release 09.02.2023 1925Z
Step 1
Site is off. Not visible on RWR. Visible on the HARM TOO.
Step 2
Site turns on. Visible on RWR. Still visible on the HARM TOO.
Step 3
HARM fired.
Site turns off. Not visible on RWR. Still visible on the HARM TOO.
HARM kills.

Test 2

Using develop 10.02.2023 1756Z
Step 1
Site is off. Not visible on RWR. Visible on the HARM TOO (not ideal).
Step 2
Site turns on. Visible on RWR. Still visible on the HARM TOO.
Step 3
HARM fired.
Site turns off. Not visible on RWR. Not visible on the HARM TOO (test OK).
HARM misses (test OK).

Answer 6 · 2023-02-14T08:26:52.000Z

Sidenote : the underlying DCS issue has been acknowledged by ED.
https://forum.dcs.world/topic/312725-harm-seeker-sees-radars-in-too-even-when-they-are-turned-off/?do=findComment&comment=5153043

Answer 7 · 2023-02-15T20:52:52.000Z

Thanks, if ED fixes that I will remove the ai on off, seems related the bug where the harm glides to the target and the radar shows up on the HARM seeker.

Answer 8 · 2023-02-16T21:58:08.000Z

I found an issue.
If a HARM is fired at a SAM radar while it is not yet active then :

the radar will not enter HARM defence because it is already off
it will stay off with enableEmission
the HARM will see it and kill it

I did not have time to check the code, but I guess the solution would be to enter HARM defence even if the radar is off.

Answer 9 · 2023-02-22T19:33:59.000Z

So ai off would still be required, basically how skynet worked about a year ago. I hope ed can takle this bug so we can stick to setEmission

Answer 10 · 2023-02-27T13:36:02.000Z

Indeed the core problem here is that with enableEmission, the HARMs still see the radar (in MP only). Going fully back to setAi should be simple enough to do, and to rollback as well. This is what I did in my test correction back in november. It has the big advantage of code simplicity and ease of switching from one technique to the other.

If it were up to me, I would probably do that. With an optional activation even, with the default staying at enableEmission.
Like so :

I can do the modification and PR it if you think it's a good idea. It will probably be a bit more complicated, especially with the need to call setupSAMSitesAndThenActivate again.

Answer 11 · 2023-03-04T19:53:58.000Z

Hello, another info on that. Tested with SA-11 and SA-15.

A player connects to a server while the radars are off (enableEmission off)
They are then turned on, appear on the RWR. But the HARM does not see them.

This is kind of the reverse of problem encountered with the SA-3/SA-3. Still an ED bug of course, not a Skynet issue, and another check in the "hope they will correct that soon" column.

Answer 12 · 2023-03-10T22:09:07.000Z

I did some tests with DCS 2.8.3 and as far as I can tell enableEmission is now working fine. There should be no need to update Skynet for this matter now, and this issue can be closed.