StaticStorm, on 24 October 2017 - 05:01 PM, said:
It seems like there's a lot of confusion about what affects locking mechanics, and especially when it comes to ECM and countering ECM. Maybe we should ask for a run down from PGI, and see if we could get an updated post about the mechanics.
(It would help us to report things that may not be working properly, if we knew how it should work.)
Let me still see if I have the relevant posts... I should have saved the link from the last time I explained all this. =)
Here's the
Latest Official Word on ECM's general interaction with sensors. Note that sensor ranges are likely to be different now, but this doesn't matter - PGI's numbers are not hard-coded, but the result of how the system works:
ECM does several things: it reduces the effective sensor range of enemy 'mechs against friendly 'mechs in its range by a certain percentage; it disables target information sharing against enemy 'mechs in its range; and it dramatically slows target information acquisition and lock-on for any enemy that is still able to lock a target inside ECM's "bubble" - this last is almost never seen in practice. Normally, ECM is either in effect and blocking locks, or totally canceled.
There are several counters available for ECM, hard and soft. PPC-class weapons will disable it for a few seconds, and NARC cancels ECM jamming
on a target equipped with it (meaning if I'm NARCed my ECM suite stops working) ang burns through any amount of ECM, while UAVs also cancel ECM protection. Otherwise, the basic system of active probes and ECM (in counter-ecm mode) canceling the nearest enemy system is in place.
Active probes do not, if I recall (my game is down right now, so I can't test it - but you can check in the Academy easily enough,) increase lock speed. They increase the rate at which target information accrues at any given range, they counter the nearest jamming enemy ECM within their listed range in
Smurfy, and they increase the equipped 'mech's sensor range by a percentage (25% for both original models, 15% for the Clans' Light Active Probe.) This is an important interaction with ECM, particularly if the ECM player doesn't have the relevant pilot skills selected. If I equip ECM with no skills, and you have an 800m sensor range, I'm only reducing your range by 30% - thus you can detect me on sensors and lock on at 560m. If you have a Clan Active Probe, that bonus is added to your total sensor range before this calculation, so your total effective sensor range against me and anyone under my bubble is 700m. On the other hand, if I had both skill points, my sensor reduction would go back up to the system's traditional value of 75% - your sensor range against me would be a whopping 200m, or 250 with the CAP.
It's been a long time since I hashed all this out, and I can't find my old links, so take some of this with a grain of salt. However, while I might be misremembering a few nuts and bolts, this is in general how ECM systems work.