z coordinates of enemy mercs/equipment do not appear to be taken into account based on my experience (stand next to a tall tower with an enemy on it and they show up when scanned)

... through spinning in a circle, the scan arc is 360 degrees.

so scan area = pi * r^2 where r is the listed scan distance.


..... is that what you're trying to figure out?

What? Scanner is a pie-slice at a given radius of a given arc in degrees centered on the user. By spinning in a circle, those slices make a full circle. The area of a circle is pi r squared. [[[EDIT: Ignore the following, it is incorrect]]] You just gave the area of a square with 200m sides...

Too many big words in this thread.

STHAP

http://exploration.grc.nasa.gov/education/rocket/Images/volumenose.gif

note the edit...

anyway, it's not a 2d cone either. a 2d cone would be a triangle. a cone is just a triangle spinning like a top in 3d. but that is wrong too. the reason it is a 'pie slice' is because it is based on a scan radius... so the maximum extent from you will follow a circle (sweep of a set-length line segment about a point in 2d). otherwise you are saying that it is scanning further at the 'legs' of the triangular scan area than in the center where you are actually pointing.

but regardless... do this in your head. or draw it on paper. spin an isosoles (sp...) triangle 360 degrees around one point. when you spin it, the area overlapped makes a perfect circle.

No worries. But absolutely nothing to test dude. I gave you the formula and it is quite simple.

Was confused because a 'cone' is a 3d object, not the 'pie slice' (?) that i think you meant. In the pic you linked, the area of the scanner is the area behind the curved segment. Which is a segment of a circle . There is absolutely nothing to indicate in any way shape or form that triangles have anything to do with it.

But that can't be correct - that's almost 126 kilometers of effective scan area.....

now if you wanted to be really cool you could figure out the 4-dimensional 'green space' of area secured by a scanner in seconds per meters squared per percentage of relevant dB bandwidth covered assuming immediate re-scan upon cooldown completion over a 360 degree arc.

yep, i just made that up. but doable and would point to 'most useful scanner'.

good Lord I need to go to bed.

But that can't be correct - that's almost 126 kilometers of effective scan area.....

3D volumes are rather large.

Even a mere 10 meter by 10 meter cube is a cubic kilometer, and we are talking about a donut (spinning the cone) which extends out 200 meters in our case.

meters squared, not meters.

the area of a 100 x 100m banquet hall is 10,000 m^2 ... which has nothing to do with 10 kilometers.

I'm talking about the -total- scan area of everything this thing can cover.

]We can't assume volume because the scanner has no z axis, though. So it has to be surface area.

and that's what you're getting. 126,000 m^2. which is appropriate.

Are we making this assumption for easier mathematical analysis? Because it must have some Z axis if it can scan targets of a higher elevation, which would make the donut more of a pillar that extends to the flight ceiling.

But that can't be right - that would be ENORMOUS compared to just 200 meters of scan distance. That'd be almost 16,000,000 meters.

Are we making this assumption for easier mathematical analysis? Because it must have some Z axis if it can scan targets of a higher elevation, which would make the donut more of a pillar that extends to the flight ceiling.

Ah, well then assuming a circle, pi*(200m)^2=125,664m^2 is completely correct for surface area.

no dude, you're doing the math twice... incorrect. 200m scan radius = 3.14* 200m*200m = ~125,000 m^2. That's it. that is the final answer. you don't then multiply that again by anything.

And no-one thinks this is bat **** insane considering it's precision being 28db???

nope. cuz of the cooldown. note the 4-dimensional area by relevant bandwidth percentages teaser I mentioned before.

and you also have to consider how much of any given area is actually relevant to key terrain tactically. so a lot of area scanned is just a waste.

use the a-45 quantum.

Right but under those same circumstances a Duvolle Quantum Active Scanner has a target visibility of 25 seconds and a cooldown of 15 seconds with an effective scan area (using that formula) of 31,416 meters squared. Meaning that anything within it's effective scan area is permanently on the map, no matter what, provided the person scanning is continuously scanning (which considering it's duration is a mere two seconds that's not much to ask for).

Suffice to say, for eight seconds you could still see a Scout trying to get -ANYWHERE- on the Line Harvest map just by standing on the table top (square platform in the center). Cool-down sucks but you can easily determine where someone is going during an eight second window.

I'm personally on the fence for now, but I am consoled in that only you and your squad can use the results, not everyone on the team. Still... That's a third of the team, potentially, with our current sizes.

now it gets down to a matter of taste. in most cases, the 15s cooldown on the duv is shittier than the 11s on the a-45 because you want to scan, kill, and re-scan for new spawns... especially if you have a whole squad doing killing you want faster refresh for new spawns. and not much is actually going to fall under your 36db threshold. 200m is less desirable because it falls outside your radar - still useful, but less so. scouts are gimped atm and scout hunting is its own subset and honestly not that worth it. your a-45 is going to pick up non-scout light frames without damps. if they have damps, less of a threat in combat. if they drop equipment, your a-45 picks THAT up so you know someone is there. also there are fitting drawbacks to the duv that make it not worth it, and isk expense if you care.

realistically they're not going to be perfectly in sync like that. 99% of scouts aren't enough of a threat in the compound to warrant gimping your refresh speed. and/or ability to maximize your fitting in other ways

z coordinates not taken into account. thus scan area is on a plane. it's either pi * r^2 ... or if you don't feel like spinning in a circle it is:

pi * r^2 * (scanangle / 360)

This thread has a distinct lack of graphs...

Didn't spend time prettying it up but here you go:

http://i.imgur.com/nXOd3aD.png

ohh that was good!!

... third dimention for time/area?

Would have to make a separate graph. If I try to input 5 seconds as a target visibility it won't even show up on the graph.

thats the point

if that flux scanner loses all its time scanning such a large area whats the point

I dont think Area is the primary factor... time/area, whats the point of waving your scaner like a pink sparkly baton if results only stay up half a second

Why are you trying to calculate this anyways?

The proto flux has a long cooldown so it's balanced compared to the shorter range of the other scans. Being able to scan the whole field is nice, but not if you can't do it all the time, or have it last long enough for it to actually be useful.

However, I have been wondering about the scan width at max of the regular flux compared to the basic scanner. For instance, is the flux actually better because at long ranges it covers the same area as a normal scanner?

30 degrees at 150 meters = ? width
60 degrees at 100 meters = ? width

Oh gosh, now that I think of it...the proto flux...

90 degrees at 200 meters...that has to be huge.

It actually makes a lot of sense when you've got an enemy red lined. You can use the Flux scanner to pick out which of the front line objectives they're going for, or even if they're bypassing it entirely, and that eight second window is more than enough time for you to get an understanding of which direction they're intending to go.

Cross that with it's innate ability to give snipers targets and it's a powerful little tool that makes the 25 second cool down worth it, especially considering it can pick out the soft targets (scouts) a good distance away so you have time to react. All it takes is one sniper round, so might as well.

This is true as of now, but add in the warpoints for canned kills and those extra seconds start to matter.
You can do a 360 scan and get the idea of disposion fine... you can do that with a basic scanner, albit at a shorter range

True. Suppose I will be switching to the Quantum pretty soon, especially in maps that have an Outpost given their small range.

Though, as another discussion brought up this issue, I think they need to tune down the Scan Duration on these things to make it less exploitable by turning really fast.