Scanner Power Consumption

[EtherEel]

So I was just laying in 350 antenna blocks.... and noticed, "Holy Cow! 1 million power required to use a scanner of that size ??!" Is there a GOOD reason for the exorbitant consumption rate of a SCANNER ? Did someone try to scan the entire universe and crash a server? Did an exploit-specialist link it to a Missile Computer and produce a real Romulan Plasma Torpedo that destroyed a star?

Seriously, though, for a system as benign (and underused!) as a scanner, the ratio of power use is way out of line.

And while I'm at it: It's my opinion that Scanner use should not disengage your own Cloak or Radar-Jammer. That doesn't make any sense either.

 

[Snk]

Scanners are really useful, actually.

 

[Tobie]

And while I'm at it: It's my opinion that Scanner use should not disengage your own Cloak or Radar-Jammer. That doesn't make any sense either.

Scientifically speaking it makes boatloads of sense. While cloaked you are trying to reduce any "signals" that your ship is emitting that could be used to locate it. The theory behind every active scanning system ever devised is to take something like light, or radio waves, blast it out in all directions (or in one direction in particular if you're fancy), and detect the "reflections" of whatever it is your blasting, bouncing off of objects to "see" them. This will typically make you very easy to detect, and would likely defeat any kind of cloaking device.

An analogy for this would be two people in a pitch black room. They each have "passive scanners" in the form of their ears, and they also have "active scanners" in the form of flashlights. If one of them were to turn on their flashlight to look for the other person in the room, they would also be revealing their own position, no matter how Quiet they are being.

 

[EtherEel]

Yes, I see your point(s) about the Cloak/Jammer. Actually, a bunch of counter-arguments popped into my head as soon as I posted that!

But Can we get back to the explanation of a Scanner's power-consumption?

Snk says Scanners are "really useful" -- care to elucidate? Clearly I already think they are useful or I wouldn't have made one with 350 blocks... in what ways (other than the obvious) are they useful?

 

[Snk]

Snk says Scanners are "really useful" -- care to elucidate? Clearly I already think they are useful or I wouldn't have made one with 350 blocks... in what ways (other than the obvious) are they useful?

I've found them useful in PvP situations. Brings people closer together, so you can find them and kill them easily.

 

[CyberTao]

Scanners are quite widely used, the power cost is so they cannot be used so freely as to render Cloak and Jamming useless (I imagine they wont be able to instantly recloak or jam forever).

 

[EtherEel]

A more logical means of preventing over-frequent scanning for the purpose of decloaking/dejamming would be to simply impose a longer cooldown/recharge time. The enormous power consumption still makes no sense...

 

[Lecic]

Power consumption should be a bit lower, I think. It should be somewhat high, but the current cost is kind of ridiculous.

 

[Winterhome]

(I imagine they wont be able to instantly recloak or jam forever).

This is the single biggest reason why scanners are underpowered.

I say keep the current power consumption while charging, but *also* give Jammers and Cloakers a charge-up time (hold mouse click to charge, then right click to use whatever charge it is for jamming/cloaking - reduce effectiveness and power consumption per tick when not fully charged)

 

[aceface]

yeah i think you should not decloak yourself and also that scanners should not take more power if you are in a bigger ship. i see how this works for jump drive but not scanners.

 

[toasts]

yeah i think you should not decloak yourself and also that scanners should not take more power if you are in a bigger ship. i see how this works for jump drive but not scanners.

You should definitely become decloaked based on what Tobie said. But I do think the scanners power consumption should be independent of the ships size and only dependent on the size of the scanner itself

~Toast

 

[aceface]

You should definitely become decloaked based on what Tobie said. But I do think the scanners power consumption should be independent of the ships size and only dependent on the size of the scanner itself

~Toast

yeah i know, i was thinking of a sort of encryption of the signal to not effect yourself.

 

[Megacrafter127]

yeah i know, i was thinking of a sort of encryption of the signal to not effect yourself.

Encrypting a signal won't work. A spike in the amplitude of a frequency will always be a spike, regardless of what information it carries or how that info is encrypted. If you scan the spectrum without trying to parse it, you'll notice anything.
Edit: That is why it is useful to listen to an enemy's frequencies regardless of weither or not you can decrypt them, simply knowing something is sent when from where (to where) can reveal much about an enemy's command structure.