[BUG] Rb 04E cannot be hit by CIWS

[MBot]

Rb 04E cannot be hit by ship-borne guns. It seems as if the missile has no hitbox.

[QuiGon]

Yeah, this makes the RB-04E vastly superior to all the other anti-ship missiles we have (RBS-15, AGM-84 Harpoon, JF-17 AShM). Definitely needs to be fixed!

[GeneralMav24]

Just was checking to see if this was reported, I can sink tons of ships since it wont hit them with CIWS ive not tested it but I wonder if the AI ones are the same

[MBot]

Bump. According to ED this seems to be on Heatblur to fix. I would not classify this as [ART]. Actually this makes the Rb 04E vastly overpowered.

[Silhou]

19 hours ago, MBot said:

Bump. According to ED this seems to be on Heatblur to fix. I would not classify this as [ART]. Actually this makes the Rb 04E vastly overpowered.

Hey! It is already tracked internally, but thanks a lot for the heads-up

[QuiGon]

On 8/7/2023 at 8:03 PM, MBot said:

Bump. According to ED this seems to be on Heatblur to fix. I would not classify this as [ART]. Actually this makes the Rb 04E vastly overpowered.

Is this still an issue? Coincidentally I just tested this 4 days ago against the Roosevelt carrier (without escorts) and the RB-04s didn't reach it as the carrier took them both out with its RIM-116 RAM missiles (carrier set to average skill level).

Edited August 9, 2023 by QuiGon

[MBot]

3 hours ago, QuiGon said:

Is this still an issue? Coincidentally I just tested this 4 days ago against the Roosevelt carrier (without escorts) and the RB-04s didn't reach it as the carrier took them both out with its RIM-116 RAM missiles (carrier set to average skill level).

 

Yes I re-tested it. The missing hitbox (or whatever the true issue is) only seems to affect guns, not missiles. Not that too many SAMs in DCS will engage Rb 04E in the first place. It's cruising altitude of 9-10 m seems to be below the minimum engagement altitude defined in DCS for most SAMs. So for example between SM-2 not properly engaging and Phalanx going through it, even the AEGIS cruisers are currently completely defenseless against the mighty Swedish AIr Force. It's quite comical

[Naquaii]

43 minutes ago, MBot said:

Yes I re-tested it. The missing hitbox (or whatever the true issue is) only seems to affect guns, not missiles. Not that too many SAMs in DCS will engage Rb 04E in the first place. It's cruising altitude of 9-10 m seems to be below the minimum engagement altitude defined in DCS for most SAMs. So for example between SM-2 not properly engaging and Phalanx going through it, even the AEGIS cruisers are currently completely defenseless against the mighty Swedish AIr Force. It's quite comical

It should of course be possible to down it with close in defensive systems, which seems too hard atm. It's more correct though that long range SAM systems have a difficult time, that's the exact reason for the missiles being sea skimming.

[MBot]

53 minutes ago, Naquaii said:

It's more correct though that long range SAM systems have a difficult time, that's the exact reason for the missiles being sea skimming.

Sure it is difficult, but should the Rb 04E really be the least interceptable anti-ship missile in DCS? If the Swedes really found the holy grail of anti-shipping in 1975, you do have to wonder why navies to this day continue to use SAMs as primary means to defend against missile attack. If all it takes to defeat a warship is to fly a missile at 10 m, AEGIS would not be deployed on 110+ ships today.

Just to put Rb 04E into historical perspective a bit. The Swedish Air Force was expecting to fight mostly transports and second-line units. The Soviet Baltic fleet's most numerous and capable units where Krivak class guided missile frigates with SA-N-4 and a few Kashin class DDGs and a Kynda CG with SA-N-1. All the "good" stuff of the Soviet Navy was with Northern and Pacific Fleet dealing with NATO.

I guess it really comes down to the rather crude game mechanics, which Rb 04E happens to exploit to the max (even if not intentionally). SAMs have a defined minimal engagement altitude value and they will not engage a target that is below it (or explode if the target dives below). I highly doubt that there is such a hard and specific boundary between engaging and not engaging in real life. I think the SM-2 in DCS has a set minimum target altitude of 10 m. The Rb 04E happens to cruise between 9 and 10 meters. Each time the Rb 04E dips below 10 m, the SM-2 explodes mid-air. This makes the missile uninterceptable by the Ticonderoga and Arleigh Burke in DCS.

rb04_vs_aegis.trk

Edited August 9, 2023 by MBot

[Naquaii]

20 minutes ago, MBot said:

Sure it is difficult, but should the Rb 04E really be the least interceptable anti-ship missile in DCS? If the Swedes really found the holy grail of anti-shipping in 1975, you do have to wonder why navies to this day continue to use SAMs as primary means to defend against missile attack. If all it takes to defeat a warship is to fly a missile at 10 m, AEGIS would not be deployed on 110+ ships today.

 

If you turn it around those same ships would then not also have CIWS if that was true.

Like I said initially, it's too hard for CIWS to shoot it down currently, it should be easier than the RBS-15. And I don't really have an issue with long range SAMs having a hard time like I mentioned but that's not saying I think it should be impossible, just unlikely.

That said what you're describing about the SM-2 exploding due to the missile dipping would be a DCS issue, not an issue with the Rb-04. I'd suggest the solution there would be in the SAM modelling, not with the Rb-04.

[QuiGon]

44 minutes ago, MBot said:

 If all it takes to defeat a warship is to fly a missile at 10 m, AEGIS would not be deployed on 110+ ships today.

rb04_vs_aegis.trk 162.21 kB · 0 downloads

I just took a look at your track file. You're using the Ticonderoga as a target, which (in DCS) does not have RIM-116 RAM as part of its defense system, unlike the Arleigh Burke or Roosevelt. It seems like the RIM-116 is currently the only weapon system in DCS that can intercept the RB-04 successfully (and very reliably even).

[MBot]

Just out of curiosity I just had a quick look at the game data. The only naval SAMs in DCS which are currently capable to engage Rb 04E are SeaRAM with a set minimum target altitude of -1 m and HQ-16 with 5 m. Sea Sparrow should in principle also work with a set minimum target altitude of 1 m but it wont engage Rb 04E for some other reason.

SM-2, Tor and S-300F have set minimum target altitude of 10 meters and will therefore not be able to engage Rb 04E which cruises between 9 and 10 meters. All the other SAMs are higher. So except for the Supercarriers and the Chinese frigate, Rb 04E is currently uninterceptable in DCS.

 

Edited August 9, 2023 by MBot

[QuiGon]

3 minutes ago, MBot said:

Just out of curiosity I just had a quick look at the game data. The only naval SAMs in DCS which are currently capable to engage Rb 04E are SeaRAM with a set minimum target altitude of -1 m and HQ-16 with 5 m. Sea Sparrow should in principle also work with a set minimum target altitude of 1 m but it wont engage Rb 04E for some other reason.

SM-2, Tor and S-300F have set minimum target altitude of 10 meters and will therefore not be able to engage Rb 04E which cruises between 9 and 10 meters. All the other SAMs are higher. So except for the Supercarriers and the Chinese frigate, Rb 04E is currently uninterceptable in DCS.

Awesome find! That answers so many questions I've had about this for a while!!

So, now the question is where the issue is. Is the RB-04 flying too low or are SAMs not going low enough?

Edited August 9, 2023 by QuiGon

[MBot]

2 minutes ago, QuiGon said:

So, now the question is where the issue is. Is the RB-04 flying too low or are SAMs not going low enough?

It's the hen and egg question of bug reporting in DCS. If I make a bug report to ED that SAMs can't engage Rb 04E, they will say that Heatblur should fix it (if the report ever even gets looked at in the black hole that is ED bug reporting). If I report it to Heatblur, they say that it is an ED modeling issue. It is an all too common situation unfortunately. I have little hope that this will be looked at by anyone unfortunately..

[QuiGon]

12 minutes ago, MBot said:

It's the hen and egg question of bug reporting in DCS. If I make a bug report to ED that SAMs can't engage Rb 04E, they will say that Heatblur should fix it (if the report ever even gets looked at in the black hole that is ED bug reporting). If I report it to Heatblur, they say that it is an ED modeling issue. It is an all too common situation unfortunately. I have little hope that this will be looked at by anyone unfortunately..

Unfortunately there's quite some truth in that...

Btw, is the RB-15 flying at a higher altitude or why is it easier to intercept than the RB-04?

Edited August 9, 2023 by QuiGon

[MYSE1234]

The Rb04 is working as it should altitude wise, so it's 100% on the SAMs as far as I'm concerned. 

[MBot]

6 minutes ago, MYSE1234 said:

The Rb04 is working as it should altitude wise, so it's 100% on the SAMs as far as I'm concerned. 

While that is true, there is also a practical side to it. That engagements are successful if the target is 0.1m above a threshold or fail if it is 0.1m below it, is due to a simplified simulation model. I think it is extremely unlikely that ED will change this. Asking ED to lower the altitude thresholds of SAMs (which to that degree of precision are rather artificial anyway) because Heatblur's missile happens to fly a couple of cm below the threshold, is very unlikely to result in any ED movement. Therefore insisting on a specific cruise altitude, even if it is factually correct, will continue to result in an unrealistic outcome.

The question therefore is, would it be so wrong to increase the Rb 04E cruise altitude by let's say 1 meter, on order for it to be consistently above the discreet 10 m threshold of a number of important SAMs, if such change would result in a more realistic outcome in an imperfect model? I don't mean this as a rhetorical question. I am not sure myself.

[Naquaii]

11 minutes ago, MBot said:

While that is true, there is also a practical side to it. That engagements are successful if the target is 0.1m above a threshold or fail if it is 0.1m below it, is due to a simplified simulation model. I think it is extremely unlikely that ED will change this. Asking ED to lower the altitude thresholds of SAMs (which to that degree of precision are rather artificial anyway) because Heatblur's missile happens to fly a couple of cm below the threshold, is very unlikely to result in any ED movement. Therefore insisting on a specific cruise altitude, even if it is factually correct, will continue to result in an unrealistic outcome.

The question therefore is, would it be so wrong to increase the Rb 04E cruise altitude by let's say 1 meter, on order for it to be consistently above the discreet 10 m threshold of a number of important SAMs, if such change would result in a more realistic outcome in an imperfect model? I don't mean this as a rhetorical question. I am not sure myself.

Imo it would then be better to lower the flight height to slightly under it, say 9-9,5 meters to not have them engage with missiles blowing up all the time. Increasing the flight height to make it easy for long range sams to shoot it down would be less realistic than it is now.

And then focus on making shorter range systems like RAM, Sea Sparrow, SA-N-9 have a chance against it. As well as gun CIWS ofc.

[QuiGon]

1 minute ago, Naquaii said:

As well as gun CIWS ofc.

So what's the reason that the gun CIWS doesn't work against the RB-04? Is it an issue with the damage model of the RB-04, as it's probably not an altitude issue?

[Naquaii]

Just now, QuiGon said:

So what's the reason that the gun CIWS doesn't work against the RB-04? Is it an issue with the damage model of the RB-04, as it's probably not an altitude issue?

I'm guessing it's an art thing, that the damage box is too small. That tracks with gun CIWS having an issue while missiles having a better chance.

[MBot]

43 minutes ago, Naquaii said:

Imo it would then be better to lower the flight height to slightly under it, say 9-9,5 meters to not have them engage with missiles blowing up all the time. Increasing the flight height to make it easy for long range sams to shoot it down would be less realistic than it is now.

And then focus on making shorter range systems like RAM, Sea Sparrow, SA-N-9 have a chance against it. As well as gun CIWS ofc.

First let me say that I highly appreciate that you continue to engage in this discussion. Hopefully we will be able to reach a more satisfactory solution.

But I think you are mistaken regarding the ability of "long range" SAMs to engage sea skimmers. Here for example is a video of SM-2 engaging a GQM-163 supersonic sea skimming target. According to wiki the GQM-163 cruises at 9 m.

 

 

[Naquaii]

38 minutes ago, MBot said:

First let me say that I highly appreciate that you continue to engage in this discussion. Hopefully we will be able to reach a more satisfactory solution.

But I think you are mistaken regarding the ability of "long range" SAMs to engage sea skimmers. Here for example is a video of SM-2 engaging a GQM-163 supersonic sea skimming target. According to wiki the GQM-163 cruises at 9 m.

 

 

Ok, so first, there's quite a few blocks of the SM-2, the ones we have in DCS are likely at least a few decades older than the one in the video. The newer blocks and types of standard missiles in part have improvements for exactly this scenario. Again, I'm not saying they can't. I'm saying they're not optimal for it, especially the older variants. This is exactly why most ships equipped with long range air defences also have shorter ranged systems.

If by increasing the flight altitude to allow it to intercept the missile with a high probability I'm against it. If we can increase the height to remove the issue with the missiles exploding due to lost track without massively increasing the p-kill against the missile I'd have no issue with it.

Edited August 9, 2023 by Naquaii

[LazyBoot]

3 hours ago, QuiGon said:

Btw, is the RB-15 flying at a higher altitude or why is it easier to intercept than the RB-04?

The RB-15 in DCS also flies low enough that most ship SAMs struggle to intercept until it gets to CIWS range.

[MBot]

7 hours ago, Naquaii said:

Ok, so first, there's quite a few blocks of the SM-2, the ones we have in DCS are likely at least a few decades older than the one in the video. The newer blocks and types of standard missiles in part have improvements for exactly this scenario. Again, I'm not saying they can't. I'm saying they're not optimal for it, especially the older variants. This is exactly why most ships equipped with long range air defences also have shorter ranged systems.

Unfortunately this is getting way beyond the fidelity of the naval envorinment in DCS. We only have a very generic SM-2, the Perry class has SM-2 instead of SM-1, the naval S-300 situation is a complete mess, most Russian naval SAMs are mere copies of the land units, the fire control radars are not correct etc. In any case, RIM-66M SM-2 Block III introduced fuze improvements for low altitute targets and entered service in 1988. That is 2 years after the introduction of the first Ticonderoga VLS and 3 years before the first Arleigh Burke we have in DCS. I think it is safe to say that these ships are designed to defend their fleet against contemporary threats (including sea skimmers from 1975).

I will just say that I think it is wrong to see such potent wessel as Ticonderoga and Arleigh Burke depending entierly in last-ditch CIWS to defend themself against Rb-04.

[Naquaii]

8 hours ago, LazyBoot said:

The RB-15 in DCS also flies low enough that most ship SAMs struggle to intercept until it gets to CIWS range.

The RBS-15F is a much later missile and much more of an extreme sea skimmer than the Rb-04 so that's no unreasonable.

 

1 hour ago, MBot said:

Unfortunately this is getting way beyond the fidelity of the naval envorinment in DCS. We only have a very generic SM-2, the Perry class has SM-2 instead of SM-1, the naval S-300 situation is a complete mess, most Russian naval SAMs are mere copies of the land units, the fire control radars are not correct etc. In any case, RIM-66M SM-2 Block III introduced fuze improvements for low altitute targets and entered service in 1988. That is 2 years after the introduction of the first Ticonderoga VLS and 3 years before the first Arleigh Burke we have in DCS. I think it is safe to say that these ships are designed to defend their fleet against contemporary threats (including sea skimmers from 1975).

I will just say that I think it is wrong to see such potent wessel as Ticonderoga and Arleigh Burke depending entierly in last-ditch CIWS to defend themself against Rb-04.

And yet they continued to improve that exact thing. There's also a reason for many allied ships using Standard having complementary systems like the ESSM as well.

But again, like I've mentioned above, I'm not saying they should be completely ineffective against something like the RB 04, especially as that missile is not that extreme of a sea skimmer like the RBS 15F. The problem is that if you increase the height above the minimum engagement height of long range SAM systems on ships in DCS they'd become way to good at downing them. In some cases those systems shoot down every single missile launched at them unless you completely saturate them which is more unrealistic than them having issues with them.

Edited August 10, 2023 by Naquaii