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Range and Altitude
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 03, 2019 2:11 pm    Post subject: Range and Altitude Reply with quote

I've never been fully comfortable with the weapon ranges for ground vehicles, especially for line-of-sight energy weapons, especially after reading other sci-fi genres where energy weapons like power guns (from the Hammer's Slammers series) have an effectively unlimited range, subject only to the shooter's accuracy and whether or not it the blast hits something on the way.

For example, I can't find any clear reasoning for why an AT-AT's powerful laser cannon would suddenly stop functioning at 3 kilometers. This gets even more ridiculous when ground-level anti-vehicle artillery weapons have listed ranges out to 15-20 kilometers.

Then there is that strange distance reading from ESB: "Distance to power generators?" "17.28." That range makes no sense by the WEG stats if the distance is in kilometers, and is ridiculously short for meters.

However, I did recently stumble across an interesting table...

If you crunch the AT-AT's height (as calculated by the Star Wars Technical Commentaries), and assume the power generators are in the 10-20 meter height range, combined with a relatively flat terrain over the curvature of an Earth-sized sphere, then 17.28 kilometers is roughly the point where the power generator would be visible over the horizon from the AT-AT's cockpit.

For a long while, I've been wrangling with the idea of allowing weapons to have greater range if they are in an elevated position ("have the high ground"), as well as allowing ground based weaponry to engage airborne targets at much greater ranges (which in turn adds to the utility of ground vehicles and "nape of the earth" flying, as it allows said vehicles to make use of the planet itself for cover).

I'm not quite sure how I want to resolve this, but I did at least want to get the idea out there for people to discuss.
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Bren
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 03, 2019 10:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm can recall a time when the maximum range of a vehicle laser weapon even came up in play. The max range for small arms has come up a number of times especially for characters who pack holdout blasters or heavy blaster pistols.


I'm curious is the maximum range issue more of a pet peeve or is it part of an overall goal of adding greater realism in your space opera?
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Whill
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 03, 2019 11:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Planets come in many different sizes, so distance-to-horizon would vary greatly per planet. And the Hoth diameter is known so you could calculate distance to horizon for Hoth. I'm pretty sure that the AT-AT was closer than 17.28km to their target when that statement was made, and yes they were farther than 17.28m. In the films they just sprinkle in numbers (with no units) that just sound good. I wouldn't read too much into it. We simply don't know what the units are because the writers don't really care what the units are for a lot of numbers.

Star Wars is necessarily like other sci-fi in a lot of ways. Fictional blaster bolts may just peter out after a distance long before distance to horizon. Star Wars is not hard sci-fi.
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CRMcNeill
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Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.

PostPosted: Wed Jul 03, 2019 11:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bren wrote:
I'm can recall a time when the maximum range of a vehicle laser weapon even came up in play. The max range for small arms has come up a number of times especially for characters who pack holdout blasters or heavy blaster pistols.

I'm curious is the maximum range issue more of a pet peeve or is it part of an overall goal of adding greater realism in your space opera?

Something of a mixture of both. TBH, I'm not really sold on the idea of redoing all the various weapon ranges, but I do like the idea of allowing aerial and anti-air weaponry to be able to shoot further because of the advantages of line of sight.

If I do decide not to go this route, I'll most likely just stick with my (A) Marksman skill, and allow gunners to hit at Extreme Range as generated by their skill level.
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Naaman
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 5:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Honestly, I'm happy with blasters having an "absolute" maximum range based on how much energy the bolt is carrying, and an effective range for the same reason, but which is necessarily shorter than the "absolute" range.

Consider a solid object that was really hot traveling through the air. The air itself is going to convect heat out of that object. Now, imagine that the heat/energy is what is powering the object: the more heat that is lost, the less power/energy there is at impact.

The brake system in a car works on this principle. The pads create friction against the rotors, which heats up the rotors, converting the vehicle's momentum into heat. Air around the rotors convects heat out of the rotors and the car slows down. If the rotors absorb heat faster than the air can dissipate it, the car will not slow down.

So, once a blaster bolt leaves the barrel, the atmosphere itself will begin to suck the power/heat/energy right out of it, thus limiting its deadly/effective range.

There could also be a concept wherein a blaster bolt needs a certain amount of cohesive energy to remain coherent. Below this theoretical threshold (which could vary depending on the size/scale/application of the weapon) the blaster bolt's energy just cannot deliver a meaningful effect.

Some flashlights, for example, require a battery to have at least a certain amount of charge to power up at all. Without at least x amount of charge, instead of getting a weak light, you get no light. But the battery still has enough juice to power a more common flashlight or something like a remote. A blster bolt traveling through the air could be like one of those high powered flash lights: once enough energy has been lost, the bolt itself fizzles out (possibly suddenly), or otherwise lacks the power to deal any damage at all.

So from a sci-fi physics standpoint, I'm happy to allow for definitive limits on how far a blaster bolt can travel before it becomes effectively inert.

Having said all that, if you are looking for a way to calculate an increased range based on elevation, you my find that Pythagoras has an idea that could point you in the right direction.
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 9:17 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Rather than getting into something math-intensive, I'd prefer to have a basic rule-of-thumb to account for, say, placing a gun or a sensor station on top of a hill or mountain as opposed to down on the flats.
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MrNexx
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 9:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

CRMcNeill wrote:
Rather than getting into something math-intensive, I'd prefer to have a basic rule-of-thumb to account for, say, placing a gun or a sensor station on top of a hill or mountain as opposed to down on the flats.


a2+b2=c2?

It's a bit of a flip answer, but what about always measuring the a (where a >= b), then worrying only about LOS?

So, if my gun emplacement has a range of 1km, and I've put it 500m up, I can effectively fire when they reach 1km from the base of b, not actually 1km from me?
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CRMcNeill
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Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.

PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 10:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

That's... not exactly helpful. Example?
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MrNexx
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 11:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Picture a right triangle. Point A is at the bottom left; B is 1-1000m directly above point A, C is to the right of A, 1000m away. The three points create a right triangle.

If your weapon has a range of 1000m, normally you would not be able to hit a point at C if you were at B; C would be more than 1000m away from B. It would be beyond the effective range of the weapon.

You COULD calculate out where on AC is exactly 1000m from B; you'd find the place where AB^2+AC1^2=BC1^2=1000m. That would exactly support the maximum range listed, with no accounting for elevation.

Or, to make it easy (i.e. a rule of thumb), you assume elevation increases effective range such that, if AC is greater than or equal to AB, and AC is less than or equal to 1000, then BC is a valid firing range, even though BC is greater than 1000.

This assumes a clear line of sight along BC; if there is an obstruction, then you obviously can't shoot from B to C with a direct fire weapon.
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CRMcNeill
Director of Engineering
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Location: Redding System, California Sector, on the I-5 Hyperspace Route.

PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 11:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

MrNexx wrote:
You COULD calculate out where on AC is exactly 1000m from B; you'd find the place where AB^2+AC1^2=BC1^2=1000m. That would exactly support the maximum range listed, with no accounting for elevation.

I'd prefer some variation on this, where an increase in altitude came with a percentage increase in both Sensor Range and the Long Range value for weapons (assuming they can reach that far in the first place). Obviously, the percentage would need to slope off pretty rapidly, since there's only so high you get above ground level before you run into diminishing returns.
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Bren
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 12:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

CRMcNeill wrote:
I'd prefer some variation on this, where an increase in altitude came with a percentage increase in both Sensor Range and the Long Range value for weapons (assuming they can reach that far in the first place). Obviously, the percentage would need to slope off pretty rapidly, since there's only so high you get above ground level before you run into diminishing returns.
Hmmm...there must be a formula somwhere that one could use for this.... Laughing

Try this calculator.
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wildfire
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 2:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've always just assumed the maximum range wasn't how far a weapon could fire just how far it could fire with a reasonable chance of hitting what the gunner was aiming at taking into account fire control, weapon stabilization, planetary atmosphere, barrel drop etc.

I've always allowed a truly heroic skill roll to push the range if a player wanted to but it tends not to come up.

I also tends not to have battles on flat open terrain most of the time, battles like Hoth are exceptions, normally terrain breaks up lines of fire.

Then I also played the TNE version of Traveller back in the day with all that that implies with regards to gearheading Smile
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 3:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

wildfire wrote:
I've always just assumed the maximum range wasn't how far a weapon could fire just how far it could fire with a reasonable chance of hitting what the gunner was aiming at taking into account fire control, weapon stabilization, planetary atmosphere, barrel drop etc.

I've always allowed a truly heroic skill roll to push the range if a player wanted to but it tends not to come up.

I tied it to a homebrew Advanced Skill that allows a shooter to go beyond Long Range to Extreme Range, with the maximum dictated by how high they roll on their (A) Marksman skill.

Quote:
I also tends not to have battles on flat open terrain most of the time, battles like Hoth are exceptions, normally terrain breaks up lines of fire.

True. I'm mostly looking at this from a perspective of stat-writing, giving differing ranges to weapons and/or sensors based on relative altitude.
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Naaman
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PostPosted: Thu Jul 04, 2019 8:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Why not just add some percentage of the elevation to the weapon's maximum range?
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