Re: Detection

>>  I want tension as ships close.  I want a period of "Is that a
>> dreadnought or a heavy cruiser pretending to be a dreadnought".
>> I want my opponent to possibly wonder, is everything on the
>> board is is something sitting, weapons and systems down, waiting
>> for me to blunder into it much as Weber does in his books.
>> Sure, a ship lights off its drive and we get clues.	If we know
>> our opponent and we see contact BR549 accelerating at thrust 2
>> we can make a fair guess there is a capital ship in the group.
>That's fine.  Tension is good.  But total surprise should be only
>possible if someone is totally asleep at the wheel.

I look at it akin to submarine warfare. Certain things (engines,
movement
against the background of stars, active sensors, etc) are detectable by
passive sensors. Turn on your active sensors and you can start lighting
up
targets and getting _real_ information - but you're also standing out
like a
lighthouse on a moonless night.

Of course there's also things like directional sensors, "painting" with
a
laser (a very directional sensor) etc..

---
Jeremy Sadler jsadler@earthling.net
Unofficial Stargrunt II Web Site http://stargrunt.virtualave.net