Electronic Warfare

This article describes the system that handles detection and evasion.

Hide and evasion factors
Almost all objects in space have a hide factor. The hide factor is a threshold that sensors need to exceed before the object becomes visible. The hide factor is used to determine if ships should be visible and for calculating their evasion factor, for Asset and Jump Point Discovery, and to modulate the lock-on time in Missile Lock-on. The hide factor for ships can be modified by installing outfits.

Ships also have an evasion factor. The evasion factor is a function of the hide factor and the ship's current speed. The evasion factor interacts with turrets. All turrets have a tracking value that determines how good the turret is at leading its target. The target's evasion value effectively lowers the tracking value, so that faster targets are more difficult to hit than slower ones. The hide factor also determines how close a scanning ship must be to fully identify another ship. If the ship is moving fast, it will appear as "unknown" to ships that are too far away.

Detection factor
All ships have a detection factor. The detection factor increases the distance at which the ship's sensors overcome other objects' hide factors, and other ships' evasion factors. The detection factor depends on the ship type and on installed outfits.