Well, my idea of an "armored prow" that acted as a big umbrella and radiators trailing (to vent the needed heat the ship cannot vent because of the surface it can't use for that purpose). As for the sensors... it's not as simple. Sure, you can deploy all the sensors you can craft.. but then you have to maintain them, and even if they are much less obvious regarding emissions, they are hardly stealthy and usually static, so unless the system has little to no contact with the outside, most sensors will get identified eventually. Not only because the incoming and outcoming ships (mostly merchants, but some will be covert intelligene missions), but because the servicing has to be done eventually (and anything farthest than Jupiter in our system can't really use solar panels, it requires some energy packs). And we are talking about massive amounts of sensors, the ice ring around the Solar System was about 54 AUs (1 AU = distance from the Sun to Earth, or 8 Light Minutes...) from the Sun, that means... about 36643.54 AU of surface... assuming any given sensor can cover with 99% efficiency half an AU (radious), you would need 36.644 sensors or so, just for the outside perimeter of the system! Adding a second sphere at 44 AUs means another 24.329 sensor platforms... a third at 34 AUs add 14.527 more... So three perimeters mean around 75.000 sensor platforms!!! Of course, these are just "armchair calculations", but the amount of resources needed to make sure nothing gets unnoticed to a system seems to me out of scale :/ Space is extremely vast. Point is, you don't work with "vectors" that are lines, but "vectors" that are cones of probability (once you know the speed, mass and bearing, you can determine the places it can be given the time imposed by distance), the same way it's done with subs, I imagine.
You need far fewer sensors than that, because their detection radius is much larger. I mean, the Voyager 1 probe detected a Shuttle OMS (ie, orbital correction) burn, while Voyager 1 was somewhere around Saturn. That's an 8+AU detection radius for 1970s tech! And modern sensors are multiple orders of magnitude more sensitive, while also being much less maintenance-hungry. Sure, you would still have to refuel them, unless the deep-space sensors are statites (a satellite that uses a solar sail for maintaining position). Subs can change direction more easily, but yeah, the basic concept is the same. In space, the shape is more of a trumpet than a cone. And if someone is maneuvering, you're just about guaranteed to see their drive plume, it's only more energy than the entire planet Earth generates.
IF you are pointing in the right direction. IF they aren't behind something. IF they aren't in the "shadow" of a bigger energy source. And only AFTER several minutes at any reasonable distance, or hours at system distances.
In a setting where people are moving asteroids around, you'd damn well better believe that everyone in the system is not only looking in all directions, but sharing all their data. If only to prevent the next Chixulub dinosaur-killer. They'd need to be behind something from EVERY sensor, not just the ones on your ship. Because you'd better believe that Spaceguard shares all the data from their network of observatories watching for some asshole who rounds pi to 3 and turns his mining claim into the next Dinosaur Killer. 'Coming out of the sun' doesn't work very well, considering that we detect planets around another star when said planet passes in front of the star. Light-speed lag is a pain in the ass, but you get used to it.
You mean like how everyone is constantly monitoring air traffic currently to prevent the next weaponized commuter plane? What happens if a MIG turns their transponder off or what happens if a Malaysian Boeing flies over the Bay of Bengal? I mean, is everyone constantly watching, or do they have a transponder system where everyone is constantly telling everyone else where they are. The latter seems more likely, less duplication of work, and less military-grade sensors in the hands of civilians.
Since most space sensors are passive (I mean, we're basically talking about a thermal imager or near-IR camera), transponders don't really work well. Even more so when you don't have every rock in the system located. I mean, a ~10m diameter rock is enough to cause Tunguska. Barringer impactor was about 100m in diameter. Chicxulub was about 10km in diameter. Also, just due to their shape, asteroids get their orbits modified from reflected sunlight and radiated heat. So their exact orbits are not predictable for more than a few months at a time. As far as 'military grade sensors' go, well, all you really need is a modern 20megapixel cellphone camera chip or two. High end, but not particularly expensive or classified. The thermal imager is the more expensive part, and that's still something that a private citizen can buy for about $5000 (or less). I don't believe the thermal imager I'm thinking about is an export-restricted item, and it's pretty high-end. Besides, we're talking about Spaceguard. They have a small tax on every kg that goes into orbit to fund their stuff, and their job is to look for moving rocks (to prevent 9-11-2201 from being city-destroying).
Which isn't actually answering the question regarding whether it's feasible to accurately monitor every object and area in space across each of the human sphere's solar systems with uncoordinated efforts spread across all currently present space faring vessel such that an object designed to avoid detection can not only be detected, but also discerned for what it is, and have its trajectory analysed with sufficient amount of time and accuracy that it can be intercepted by space-to-space artillery. What I mean is, that it's more likely the you'll rely on passive monitoring of known and plausible asteroid approach vectors (you wouldn't monitor vectors that would be caught by Jupiter too closely, for instance) through government satellites and rely on detection of human traffic based off of transponders that continually transmit the host space vessel's location to everyone listening (similar to civilian air traffic transponders), and then as AdmiralJCJF noted rely on patrol vessels to search for intrusion.
And totally ignores the fact that we are in a setting where different factions control different systems and certainly do NOT share unfiltered data on their warships. As well as assuming that monitoring is perfect and without any gaps or weaknesses.
Well, the shuttle was not really trying to hide itself (nor was designed to) xD. Anyway, and being more serious, the idea is not only to keep watch over the system, but to do so accurately: that means having pickets close to points you can redeploy fast enough... Defending a system is kinda like trying to guard a frontier in a 4X game, but with nearly perfect approaches. If we consider Infinity's transportation systems, however (black holes), I'd say that it would be kinda like the 5th Element's entry to our system: most of the needed sensors will be on a path, specially for the entry of the system. So yeah, unless somehow a new FTL jump system that lets ships enter from anywhere, the amount of sensors is not nearly as crazy as I said before. Anyway, I think we are making some "porting" from the miniatures tabletop to space: Camo levels and ODD are "easily" defeated by MSV 2-3, and when sizde is not a problem and you can fit several sensors at once, plus you want to know "something happens", fit enough satellites with MSV3 equivalents should not be that hard (and if you see a "white noise" area, you know something is going on, since you suddenly lost all visibility over a section... like a sentry suddenly not answering). In a way, it is: the question is not "if" the incoming ship will be detected, but "when". The trick for the one trying to hide is to achieve a "when" that is answered by "too late" to be intercepted. I'd say that the standard is to keep tabs on anything moving, overlay it with "identified stuff" and "IFF says...", whatever is left warrants a close look. And while it will be time-intensive, whatever is not "hiding" will be controlled sooner or later, considering a stray asteroid can take months to travel from Mars to Earth, for example (unless it's been accelerated, in which case it will raise flags). I think it depends on the system, on Earth, Paradiso, Svalarheima and possibly Dawn you are quite right, but I doubt YJ or PanO's main holdings will suffer that problem. And even so, on Earth and Paradiso is quite likely that there are 3rd party sensors, surely O-12's... since they control the Circulars anyway, the will need to have sensors on all jumping points too.
Any system with inhabited planets will have a Spaceguard looking for rocks on their way to said inhabited planet(s). This data will likely be shared with all spaceships. Hell, it might be using all spaceships (or at least all ships with the requisite sensors) for additional sensors, depending on how the Spaceguard laws are written. Because any rock moving around is a navigation hazard. Yes, warships are going to want the option to turn that stuff off. If I were an evil bastard (and I have been accused of such), I'd make it so that anyone with the sensors to assist Spaceguard that isn't sharing data doesn't get access to Spaceguard data. Most military ships are going to be packing a telescope array that is going to make Mauna Loa/Mauna Kea look like a bunch of pikers, after all, so losing Spaceguard data in combat isn't going to be a problem (my assumed design for a spaceship has somewhere north of 20x 1m telescopes, on a roughly 100m baseline. Which means that a military ship effectively has a 100m diameter telescope on it that can look in multiple directions simultaneously!). There are multiple orders of magnitude (thousands of times) more asteroids large enough to cause Tunguska to Barringer impacts than there are civilian ships. Even assuming cheap spaceships. So relying on transponders isn't really an option. It's OK for shipping, but utterly inadequate for preventing 9-11-2201. Whether it's a balkanized system like Earth-Sol or a single-power system like Yu Jing, it's going to have Spaceguard, and Spaceguard will share information with everyone. I figure Spaceguard will offer bounties on moving rocks, so you can get some operating funds from intercepting rocks. More funds if you have the mining equipment, since there's always something valuable in a rock. Well, maybe not nickle-iron. There's probably enough nickle-iron in the solar system to make steel something you have to pay someone to take off your hands!
And right there is your error I think. I don't think Yu Jing warships are getting dick all from NeoTerra "Spaceguard".
There may be a middle ground there, like with current GPS... after all if a YJ frigate gets knocked out by a rock while passing through a PanO system it’s a material loss for the StateEmpire but can be twisted easily into a propaganda coup about the Hyperpower’s inability to assure safe navigation in their own systems. More likely you share data during peacetime, and either cut it off or render the data inaccurate once war breaks out.
Fair, but like GPS there's no incentive to provide full coverage where that would interfere with military secrets. And I dare say that Yu Jing warships don't get much permission to pass beyond the gate at PanOceania systems.
Svalarheima has both YJ and PanO claims, land and military... So... I'd vote for the third option of having O-12 play nanny for the little rascals, so they both HAVE TO provide their sensor data to O-12, who shares the full picture. Mind you, for warships and the like there, it's just a "big whale coming in this vector, safety perimieter is X thousands of klicks", and share of what they detect. In those systems, you don't want stealth as much as you want to keep your cargo deliveries to not be obvious, so you can keep the enemy from knowing how much tonnage of resources you have dirtside (and that includes personnel, food, ammo, etc...).
YJ Heavy Destroyer and PanO platform squadron (let's call them Corvettes) accelerate towards each other. Both deploy assets, at this stage it occurs to me that the larger engine on the Frigate allows it to probably carry proportionately more assets, perhaps the basis for YJ doctrine? Jamming assets attempt to reduce targeting capabilities on both sides, and both sides deploy missiles homing in on them to destroy said assets. Those missiles are probably on assets themselves; weapon buses are harder to jam overall and missiles have their own acceleration so you can stick a rack of them on a small drone, mayyyybe a piloted asset to prevent hacking? Probably not. As each side attempts to reduce each others targeting capabilities and also preserve their own, at some point, one or both enter effective targeting range and main weapons fire begins in earnest. Possibly at this point the superior range combatant slows, attempting to maintain distance? The other continues acceleration and evasive manoeuvres in an attempt to get into range sooner. At this point a main weapon hit is merely a matter of time, whoever can evade fire and maintain PDs for longer outlasts and lands a strike. At this point, the power of the impact is likely to be such that the battle is done, I don't imagine second passes happen.
Not really, having bigger engines in space means having greater Acceleration limit... for the ship. Carrying squishy meatbags inside means there are hard limits at the point where the human body cannot resist the amount of gravities involved... and it doesn't matter if you have a gravity generator/compensator inside a ship, unless we go the "magic" route engines usually output more than those gizmos, so those are what limit the acceleration imparted. And of course having a compensator means a hit there turns the ship's innards totally red. Aside from the CA, those could go red, green or whatevs they have flooding their veins XD Again it depends... unlike of planetary warfare, in space whatever you fire will go in that direction nearly forever (doubly so for things shot at fractions of the speed of light), so it's more of a matter of saturating the place where you estimate the target will be when the projectiles arrive while you maneuver to avoid being done the same thing... all that with information that can be several seconds to hours old, meaning that you are seeing the past (even if it's some seconds). I'd say that it's at that point where assets engage each other, with the ship that maneuevered the best having some advantage. If you are good and the target is horrible, your assets can be end with the enemy ship at range... at which point the engagement is already decided. Now, if we are talking about engagements without seconds of lag for the enemy's movements to reach you, then we are at what is called "knife range" in space battles. There, anything goes and the biggest, meanest ship with more armor and biggest cannons wins. So those ships want knife range, and the lighter ones want to avoid it.
If Infinity has some sort of SpaceGuard, as Section9 suggests, and it seems reasonable that there would be something. (Currently NASA tracks probably more than 18,000 satellite and satellite pieces in orbit around the Earth. They even put out a pdf magazine called 'Orbital Debris Quarterly News') And if that SpaceGuard put sensors everywhere, even requiring sensors on civilian vehicles. I wouldn't be surprised if those sensor packages had some deep code to ignore data from some very specific IR profiles, and not report those sightings. Rendering the spaceship 'invisible' (cybermask for spaceships?) Of course the whole thing could be spoiled by an amateur astronomer that happened to look at the right place at the right time. However it works, I would think that a large component of a ship's stealthy nature will depend on information warfare.
Yep, mostly a "I'm not a warship using a fake transponder and covered on foam to disguise the profile, just an innocent cago ship".
