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Pacify Me With Lore: Ecm Edition


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#1 Hunka Junk

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 12:03 PM

Its the 33rd century, and ECM gets developed. You know what happens next? Every mech in the mechosphere has an ECM hanging off their rear-view mirror.

But then I look at Mr Mechopedia. It says something like only 11 mechs have variants with ECM (maybe it was higher like 15?).

That totally does not make sense.

I know the microwave in the kitchen of the belly of the direwolf interferes with ECM, but why doesn't every other mech ever created have one? Or at least the option.

Edited by Hunka Junk, 28 August 2016 - 12:04 PM.


#2 JC Daxion

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 12:15 PM

View PostHunka Junk, on 28 August 2016 - 12:03 PM, said:


I know the microwave in the kitchen of the belly of the direwolf interferes with ECM, but why doesn't every other mech ever created have one? Or at least the option.




Because most mech warriors aren't *&**&#@ Posted Image


(i kid)

Edited by JC Daxion, 29 August 2016 - 06:52 PM.


#3 Aleksandr Sergeyevich Kerensky

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 01:24 PM

Sorry... But this might be in the wrong section?

This post might be better suited for General Discussion?

#4 Koniving

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 04:14 PM

View PostHunka Junk, on 28 August 2016 - 12:03 PM, said:

Its the 33rd century, and ECM gets developed. You know what happens next? Every mech in the mechosphere has an ECM hanging off their rear-view mirror.

But then I look at Mr Mechopedia. It says something like only 11 mechs have variants with ECM (maybe it was higher like 15?).

That totally does not make sense.

I know the microwave in the kitchen of the belly of the direwolf interferes with ECM, but why doesn't every other mech ever created have one? Or at least the option.


Battletechnology the mag has many articles written by William H Keith, the first BT novelist. One is that the battlefields of the future are heavily laden in ECM (much like the "Particle" from Universal Century universe of Gundam). This dampens sensors, etc. Between this and economic costs, things like missiles started getting dumber, cheaper, etc...

However that is a general view from the pre-and-up-to-SLDF days.

Back in 2700s, we had ECM in the form of Guardian. Its key features including ghost targets, its jamming being undetectable, and it's ability to disrupt advanced missile and computer systems as well as communications. Its most important role is as a counter to double blind rules Beagle Active Probe which is a god-mode Jesus Box.

At some point it went extinct. Like many technologies. Hunted to extermination during a Succession War; the sort of war where children were crushed under the feet of mechs because it was amusing, where churches were destroyed because "I never understood them anyway", and an after battle pass time is to stack bodies in fun ways to create "art". Without Uncle Kerensky and the SLDF around, the factions just destroyed whatever they could. When losing, they would destroy their own stuff to make sure the enemy couldn't get it.

Attempts were made by Liao to recreate it but the result was a 7 ton piece of equipment with half the range and partial BAP functionality.

Then the Helm Memory Core. Grey Death Legion distributed the tech out to free merchants. Factions bought that knowledge up. Liao got the ECM stuff... and only Liao. If you wanted it you'd have to steal it and reverse engineer it!

All mechs are meant to have the option if you could get one.
Thing is of the 3 mechs to each of 80,000 worlds, maybe 1,000 mechs have it.
Of 240,000 mechs, maybe 1,000 actually have it (3045).

Also Guardian ECM isn't terribly useful in lore. It does nothing to SRMs, Streaks, or LRMs. It only affects missiles with Artemis -- and only because Those missiles use communication -- and Arrow IV. It affects Narc Enabled SRMs, narc-enabled LRMs, Homing LRMs (Tag-guided), and that is pretty much it. The real use is disrupting communication and deception.

#5 Tarl Cabot

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 04:40 PM

And behind the scenes Comstar was doing everything it could to prevent advances in technology or recovering SL technology from getting into anyone else's hands other than their own. Remember, Comstar had regiments of Star League Era battlemechs and the associated tech, which was used for the battle of Tukayyid.

As for ECM being developed, it is more like an advanced ECM was developed and was used by the Star League forces.


Quote

Guardian ECM

While electronic countermeasure systems had been in use for centuries in the Inner Sphere, towards the end of the Age of War these systems had become ubiquitous, making it much harder for units to find and target each other until it was too late. In an effort to combat this fog of war, the Star League developed the Beagle Active Probe to cut through the haze of electronic jamming and locate units quicker and sooner than before. However the League soon became concerned that it's Member States would acquire the Beagle and use it against them, leading to the development of the Guardian ECM Suite.

The Guardian ECM Suite proved to be a powerful electronic warfare device, jamming the Beagle and other advanced electronic systems, but maintaining the system proved too hard for the Great Houses after the fall of the Star League. The system went extinct in the Inner Sphere in 2845, until it was eventually recovered by the Capellan Confederation in 3045.


#6 TooDumbToQuit

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 07:00 PM

Interesting story in the 1980's about our at the time "Red Team" pilots. They were tired of being told that the Soviets had no "advance" equipment to pick up radar etc. So they went out and bought a bunch of $98.00 radar detectors and hot wired them into their fighters.

Totally off the wall I know but it makes me think, when these books were first written, how much tech did WE have?

#7 Rerednaw

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Posted 28 August 2016 - 08:16 PM

View PostLikeUntoGod, on 28 August 2016 - 07:00 PM, said:

Interesting story in the 1980's about our at the time "Red Team" pilots. They were tired of being told that the Soviets had no "advance" equipment to pick up radar etc. So they went out and bought a bunch of $98.00 radar detectors and hot wired them into their fighters.

Totally off the wall I know but it makes me think, when these books were first written, how much tech did WE have?


ECM in the 80's? Oiy quite a bit. A-10 excelled as a wild weasel. I think the core theme of everything being lostech just carried over. When you focused on keeping the engine and the guns working...spinning rims and more delicate ECM gear kinda fell to the wayside, plus advanced ECM suites require a higher degree of skill to maintain. IDK just my opinion....

Edited by Rerednaw, 28 August 2016 - 08:17 PM.


#8 S 0 L E N Y A

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 12:13 AM

The catch-all garbage can explanation: lost tech

#9 The Basilisk

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 12:52 AM

The difference between basic ECM (just pump up certain wave lengts with EM radiation) and the advanced guardian ECM equipment is like the difference between WW2 basic radar and todays high resolution, multi frequncy, computer assisted, combined, multifrequency pulse + CW, Radar/Lidar equipment.

Like Koniving said the electronic warfare equipment and development of EW equipment and counter EW equipment during the age of war (2398 - 2550) became so intense that the best way often seemed to be the most straight forward.

So lots of the Battletech verse Battletechnology seems to be an odd fusion of lowtech and very hightech equipment.
A fact the US and UDSSR armed forces know all too well is that every technological advancement relatively to your foe will only hold for so long. But how would you conquer straight forward brute force (nukes) ? (thats the reason for the BATTLEMECH)
If you refuse to use orbital bombing, nukes, biological, chemical or nanotech warfare, because you want to leave something standing to conquer what kind of weapons are there left ?
Right soldiers, tanks and fighter planes (Aerospace fighters and milion tonn space battleships not to be forgotten)

A Battlemech is the epitome of this philosophy.
A walking tank able to navigate most terrain without problems, so rugged and sturdy even a downed Mech can be rebuild in a few days to fight again. Powered by a high pressure, high temperature, plasma fusion reactor it can move and (if energy based) fire for months while having as much firepower at its disposal like a nowerdays Navy missile destroyer (you know those with railguns and laser anti air point defence and tactical missiles and stuff, sounds familliar, yes?)
Without more than basic automisation (EW and CEW immunity remember?) and only requiring a minimum of maintenance crew (1 to 3 techs) and a pilot it is idealy suited to be carried between the stars to fight on distant worlds.

The reapearance of ECM and other forms of EW equipment during StarLeague days (2570 - 2780) is actually the expression of a re-emergin of asymetrical warfare between the Starleague and its lower tech rimworlds.

#10 The Basilisk

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 01:29 AM

View PostBoogie138, on 29 August 2016 - 12:13 AM, said:

The catch-all garbage can explanation: lost tech


Los tech isn't a garbage explenation at all.
Look for the romans or ancient greeks.
They knew the earth to a spherical object ~5000 years ago, they build continent wide messenging and traffic infrastructure, waste water and fresh water systems that took care of 100k ppl metropoles.
1200 a.d. ppl where happy to be able to compute the correct angle of a rainwater gutter.

Same things happend all over earth thousends of times with the decline of large empires or cultures.
It is even happening right ths moment.
Look down to south africa. In the 70s it had one of the most andvanced medical facilitys in the world.
They even where able to build own nuklear plants, had some of the best universitys of the planet and where quite advanced in biosieces. 40 years later.....well go and see for yourself.

There are so many "older" technologys (materialsiences especially) that had to be reinvented over and over again because they got neglected and Lostech when ever a newer material emerged seemingly replacing the old.

An other (a bit hillarious) example of Lostech is the decline of VHS analog Video technology. Earths last plant producing Videorecorders went down in spring 2016 because the couldn't get some parts of the sound head/video head.
Sure the tech is outdated but its still the most durable form to record stuff.
Hard drives aren't very durable (up to 40 y but mostly fare below that treshhold more like 10) and Flash drives are far from beeing durable. DVDs, blueray discs or CDs are even more sensitive.

#11 Hunka Junk

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 04:21 AM

So, by lore only Liao has ECM, but everybody has Beagles?

And sorry if I this is in the wrong section, but my first mech was the Arctic Cheetah.

With no idea about anything, I quickly decided that every mech I bought would have an ECM and jump jets.

Little did I know that I'd started with one of the decidedly small number of mechs that can run both ECM and Jump Jets.

God-Mode Jesus Box

That would be a great name for band.

#12 Wintercycle

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 05:09 AM

That total warfare that the Successor States (named very aptly) indulged in, down and to the point where one planet pointed out that the Ares Conventions which were meant to stop people from nuking just every planet actually made warfare a legal privilege for people with power really did a number on all sorts of technology, as has been pointed out.

I digress, though. Yeah, uh, BAP and ECM -- both Capellan rediscoveries. Circa 3045+. I'm going to hedge a little bet here that ECM is harder to produce and with so many pilots _not_ used to having their sensors fried have an atavistic need to see the other guy before they can kill them... well. I would wager hundreds of years of not being able to be sneaky (aside from the ComGuard) did something that the Clans haven't figured out yet. Combat pragmatism whilst being just as a stuck in their ways, for the Inner Sphere.

...unless you take one look at exactly how sneaky, occasionally insane and small the Capellan Confederation is, and you start to understand why they usually have the most experimental technology.

#13 Rogue Jedi

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 09:16 AM

View PostThe Basilisk, on 29 August 2016 - 01:29 AM, said:

An other (a bit hillarious) example of Lostech is the decline of VHS analog Video technology. Earths last plant producing Videorecorders went down in spring 2016 because the couldn't get some parts of the sound head/video head.
Sure the tech is outdated but its still the most durable form to record stuff.
Hard drives aren't very durable (up to 40 y but mostly fare below that treshhold more like 10) and Flash drives are far from beeing durable. DVDs, blueray discs or CDs are even more sensitive.


I understand your point but VHS is far from the best recording method, it is magnetic tape, 1 EMP and it is wiped, store it near a strong magnet and it is wiped, the quality degrades over time, much the same as magnetic hard drives.

VHS had some superior qualities and some inferior qualities, the data on a professionally produced and safely stored CD/DVD (unlike an early generation writeable DVD) will last much longer without degradation (100-200 years) than a professionally produced and safely stored VHS tape recording (5-20 years), CD/DVD takes up much less space, and in the case of a DVD can hold much more data, is safe from EMP, is less heat sensitive, and is much less sensitive to magnetism.

one of my favourites for "real life" lost tech is Damascus Steel, modern "damascus" has little in common with the geniune historical Damascus Steel, which had a combination of properties which no modern metal has been able to match, sure there are harder blends, or types that match or exceed its durability or flexibility but there is no modern steel which is equal, let alone superior in every way.
knowledge of how to make it has literally been lost

#14 TooDumbToQuit

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 09:43 AM

For 100's of years in Britain, they were amazed at what the Romans built, they thought they must be Gods.

#15 Koniving

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 09:44 AM

I've yet to see a CD/DVD survive your basic fridge magnet without corruption.
Though that point remains. Consider the decline of film photography. Now imagine in 200 years, will anyone even know what a dark room is or recall Polaroid as a camera that had film that developed in your hand? And if there were just 50 years of war during which the digital age targeted retrograde technologies? It isn't far off.

--------

View PostHunka Junk, on 29 August 2016 - 04:21 AM, said:

So, by lore only Liao has ECM, but everybody has Beagles?

And sorry if I this is in the wrong section, but my first mech was the Arctic Cheetah.

With no idea about anything, I quickly decided that every mech I bought would have an ECM and jump jets.

Little did I know that I'd started with one of the decidedly small number of mechs that can run both ECM and Jump Jets.

God-Mode Jesus Box

That would be a great name for band.

Edit: Android auto correct has some weird solutions for correctly spelled proper nouns....

Looking into Beagles the only people that have them aside from the Liao are the Davion, due to theft and salvage and the Marik-comissioned, due to trade for XL engines which before the helm memory core if you wanted XL engines or double heatsinks the faction that could hook you up with both was the Mariks!

Consider this, all "M" variants are Marik-comissioned/made. Cicada 3m, Griffin 3m, Shadow hawk 5M. What do they all have in common? XL engines and double heatsinks. Don't get me wrong some factions had some DHS or XL engines left over from the SLDF or the first two Succession Wars, but not really the ability to manufacture them.

Even Marik lost the ability due to a campaign against the technology, however unlike most factions Marik stayed out of most of the fighting and as such lost very little tech or resources. Instead they profited by selling their stuff both for funds and for better diplomatic terms with its neighbors.

There is a reason most mechs have standard engines and single heatsinks.

On the Capellan Confederation (Liao), remember that they cannot produce assault mechs (not that there are much more than 12% of the IS's total mechs being assault in the first place) and possess a single manufacturing facility for Heavy Mechs... which doesn't actually manufacture new mechs but strips parts of three or four different mechs and slaps them together to create the Cataphract. Even then it requires salvaging Marauders from the Davions! No Marauder salvage, no Cataphract, no heavy mechs to replenish the front lines.

On the offense they send their best... on foot. You won't even know you've been tampered with so when they do send vehicles and a couple of mechs, Murphy's Law will come true in all the worst ways possible for you.

On the defense, Liao is known for its mechs being compared to the undead. In a prolonged battle a mech may be defeated only to get back to its feet with a new pilot. The policy where the only Citizens are those who earn it helps to ensure that the common people will fight, even if it means pulling the pilot's corpse from the seat and starting the mech back up to get back into the fray. One battle had a child as young as 7 do this, the pilot before him was his mother, whom took over the Urban mech just minutes before, who in turn just shoved the previous pilot aside. If the mech still has the ability to move, even if it no longer has any discernable weaponry, it will be put back into the fight if possible.

(post-edit note:. The BAP during play with double blind rules in Megamek, when it was finally successful, could identify targets over 3,000 meters away, through walls and barriers and targets on foot around 900 meters away including a series of troops hidden inside buildings, a few ac/2 carriers I had in basement floors and the four mobile mech taser teams I had in waiting in ambush, one of which the target with BAP almost entered range for. The other player was surprised at how surrounded some of his other mechs actually were since I kept my forces waiting in ambush. All 50+ powered units were exposed to a single BAP user, and this lasted for two turns due to back to back successes (20 seconds). His third successful roll didn't matter, however, due to me powering up a unit at 210 meters and putting him in my second ECM Mech's field by rushing at him. It's good he wasn't going full speed in this urban jungle, or he would have discovered my unpowered mech before I could react; even then it is lucky that initiative failed me to allow me to act first and him to react to me in our simultaneous turn match. The ensuing charge attack was also glorious, as I managed to ram his only BAP user into a building with a force so hard that his leg and arm were both crippled and my ECM pilot was killed; my mech still functional and jamming despite the pilot's death, giving me the time I needed to get a battle armor team over there to kill the enemy pilot, destroy the mech and replace the pilot for my unarmed ECM Raven.

Edited by Koniving, 29 August 2016 - 10:07 AM.


#16 Spike Brave

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 03:29 PM

While the topic of why ECM is, or isn't, available has been covered well, I believe there is a little missing from a discussion of all the lore. The first, and perhaps most import issue, is that BattleMech sensor don't work in MWO like they work in BattleTech. First of all their is no target info sharing without the use of C3 equipment. So in BattleTech no shouts of hold locks. Also Mechwarrior are assumed to be watching thier entire sensor suite, so you may not show on radar, but thermal, seismic, or visual will get you.

Secondly, missles don't not work the same way. The only lock on is streak systems. So lrms go to the place you aimed with very slight course corrections and they might sort of follow the laser pointer if you have Artemis. If it's the late 3050's, you bought very expensive semi-guided lrms, and have a TAG pointer they will sort of follow that too.

Finally, and most importantly in my opinion, alot of the best MechWarriors are extremely skilled in the use of the eyeball MK1. A lot of the most exciting battles in fiction simply involved people who where sharp eyed, situtationaly aware, and a good shot. They didn't rely on a red triangle. They used visual input.

Edited by Spike Brave, 29 August 2016 - 03:29 PM.


#17 Void Angel

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 03:45 PM

View PostHunka Junk, on 28 August 2016 - 12:03 PM, said:

Its the 33rd century, and ECM gets developed. You know what happens next? Every mech in the mechosphere has an ECM hanging off their rear-view mirror.

But then I look at Mr Mechopedia. It says something like only 11 mechs have variants with ECM (maybe it was higher like 15?).

That totally does not make sense.

I know the microwave in the kitchen of the belly of the direwolf interferes with ECM, but why doesn't every other mech ever created have one? Or at least the option.

In what I'm told are the words of one of the tabletop game's designers, "stop bringing your science into my science fiction!"

#18 Void Angel

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 04:06 PM

As far as the translation of ECM into game mechanics - MWO's ECM system as such is far less powerful in and of itself than it was in Tabletop. The tabletop ECM system affected sensor spotting, very similarly to MWO; it also disrupts effects like TAG and Artemis whose line of sight passes through the ECM system's area of effect. So not only does the tabletop ECM disrupt sensors and jam target information sharing (C3 computers) within its active radius, it also creates a sensor shadow behind that area of effect.

The reason people are confused about this - and why ECM is more powerful relatively than tabletop - comes from the different way that MWO (and every single Mechwarrior game since MW2) handle sensor locking. In MWO, your sensors relay your sensor information to your team, and you can select a primary target for your sensors start to gather information about. This roughly equates to a free C3 computer network, but I digress - the important point here is that while visual spotting works exactly like tabletop, LRMs and Streaks use the lock-on mechanic. This means that you cannot use visual spotting to effectively fire these weapons in MWO. Tabletop does not require a specific sensor lock: the to-hit rolls handle whether or not you hit - spotting is just whether or not you can detect and shoot at them.

The point of all this is that while ECM is a much less robust system in MWO, the differences in the game format make what it still does in MWO more valuable, particularly the situational awarenes jamming.

#19 Hunka Junk

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 04:11 PM

OK then for all the money:

What was the strategy/decision-making process that led to the mechs that have ECM in MWO winning the ECM prize?

#20 Spike Brave

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Posted 29 August 2016 - 04:55 PM

View PostHunka Junk, on 29 August 2016 - 04:11 PM, said:

OK then for all the money:

What was the strategy/decision-making process that led to the mechs that have ECM in MWO winning the ECM prize?


Lore. They are using canon builds from the TROs and various other sourcebooks.





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