Cadet I/Signature

← Miner defense

Forward deployment →

What is signature?

Signature indicates how visible you are to enemy sensors, using a percentage. A 100% signature means that you can be seen at 100% of the enemy's nominal scan range. Greater than 100% means the enemy will spot you outside of their normal scan range, less than a 100% and you can get closer before being spotted.

You are visible to the opponent when you have "eye". The "eye icon" appears in the bottom right corner of your HUD.

When do I get eyed?

Quite simply, you will be eyed when you get within the "eye threshold".

<math>\text{Eye threshold} = \text{Your signature} \times \text{Enemy scan range}</math>

Example My bomber has a 350% signature. A probe, with a scan range of 1000m (fictional value), is nearby. The probe will be able to detect me at 3.5*1000 → 3500 meters. So if I fly at 3500 meters or closer to the probe I will be detected by the probe and the entire enemy team can see me.

But it's not quite that simple. Ships only have their best scan ranges at the front of their ship. As you move to the side their ability to see you reduces, until at the rear they can only see about 40% as far as to the front.

Items influencing signature

Every ship you fly has a base signature, i.e. what it is when you have no equipment active. There is some equipment that will raise your signature when you equip it, and some which raise your signature when you use it.

Note Anything located in your cargo bays cannot influence your signature.

Mounting your shields and missiles will greatly raise your signature. This is why any stealth fighter, stealth bomber, or troop transport will fly with its shields and missiles in cargo unless the situation requires otherwise. Any ship that doesn't wish to be seen must keep both its shields and missiles in cargo.

Even as a regular bomber you'll want to remain unseen if at all possible. Therefore, keeping your shields and missiles down would seem like a good idea. On the other hand a bbr is likely to undergo heavy fire and fully charged shield would be nice. Therefore, simply unmounting your missiles is a good compromise. In some situations, such as a prolonged bombing run, you can't afford to take a rack of ammo out of cargo (to make room for your missiles) and thus you would launch with missiles mounted. You need to balance between trying to be stealthy (in one of the most unstealthy ships) or having a fully charged shield right at launch.

Note Bios bombers should nearly always launch in stealth mode as they can use their heavy cloak to launch truly devastating stealth attacks. A veteran Bios bbr pilot can get a couple of k into an enemy sector before being detected.

Actions influencing signature

In addition to equipment, performing certain actions will raise your signature.

Firing your weapons and boosting are the two actions that will reveal you to anyone nearby. This is why turret gunners must NEVER fire unless the bomber is detected. Certain operations, such as a Galv run or miner hunt, require that all the pilots restrain from firing their boosters until they are detected - quite different from the usual flying pattern, where if you're going somewhere you're boosting! As soon as the lead fighter is detected he will say so via voice chats and the entire fleet will engage boosters.

Engaging your cloaking device, if you have one, will lower your signature at the cost of energy. Keep in mind that it takes sometime for the cloak to fully charge so you may still be eyed for some time after you use it, and that it takes sometime to unengage and stop using energy.

Knowing your stuff

If you wish to know by how much does an item raise your signature, simply place your mouse over it in the ship's loadout window (F4 in stations only) and the signature will be indicated among all the other properties of the item. The ship loadout window gives you all the information about everything.

Tip: In most ships you should always fly with your F4 cargo screen displayed. It makes equipment and thus signature management easy.

Optional: TEK (Tigereye's Knee Pad) is a program that you can use to explore the core's code. With it you can pick a ship/faction/equipment and see the actual values for your signature, TTK (Time to Kill Values), etc. You do not need this to play the game. But if you are curious and wish to learn more, visit the Allegwiki article on TEK

Making a difference

Keeping your shields and missiles in cargo makes a huge difference. Let's take the example of the stealth fighter. When fully equipped a stealth fighter will have a signature of approximately 200%. However, taking shields and missiles down will reduce the signature to 50%. If you then cloak your sig will reduce to about 12%, enabling you to pass by probes and interceptors as close as 60m.

This is why after destroying their target a pilot unmounts his shields and missiles, cloaks, and flys off as fast as he can - to remain undetected even though he's surrounded by enemy defending ships. You can also use a heavy cloak, taking your signature to levels as low as 7%, almost having to collide with the enemy before being detected.

Using enemy sensors

If you're defending a miner in your scout chances are you won't be detected by the enemy. If you suddenly become detected (an eye appears on your HUD) you know that an enemy scout or stealth fighter has entered the sector and is relatively near. If you really know your stuff and remember the enemy's ships' scan ranges by heart, you can even use your signature to calculate the distance that the enemy is from you. But if you're only human then get ready for combat and call for help, if you feel it's required.

Similarly, if you wish to verify enemy presence in a sector you can raise your signature using your weapons and boosters and see if you become detected. If not there is surely no enemy nearby. If you get an eye the enemy has either a probe, ship or station nearby. This is also useful for certain tasks that require you to remain unseen. For instance, trying to find a spot where you can drop a high sig TP2.

In the forward deployment lesson coming up signature does become important.

Further information

Optional: The next section goes indepth into actual scan ranges, formulas and information. You may skip it. Keep in mind that TEK is your best tool at this stage for doing this on your own.

Here are a few basic scan range figures for you.

Note These are general numbers. Many factions have buffs or nerfs which modify these values by +/- 10%.

Item Scan Range (metres) Garrison 3,600 Starbase 4,500 Techbase 2,400 Adv. Tech base 3,000 Refinery, Outpost, & Teleport 2,400 Scout 2,400 Advanced Scout 3,000 EWS Probe 1 500 EWS Probe 2 600 EWS Probe 3 700 Pulse Probe 5,000 Rescue Probe 1,000

Ship Signature Bomber - Going stealthy 200% Bomber - Going hot 375% HTT 100% Basic Miners & cons 200% Enhanced Miners & cons 175% Advanced Miners & cons 150% Basic fighter (default loadout) 175% Interceptor (cruising) 75% Interceptor (dogfighting) 675% Stealth fighter (low sig) 50% Stealth bomber (cloaked) 30% Scout (dumbs loaded) 150%

Outdated content   CC_05 changed the signature of interceptors to 100%; the core is however not being played due to temporary problems with base models.

Let's examine at what distance ships will spot each other, assuming they all use their "common" loadout. That is, stealth fighters going stealthy, bombers having abs mounted, etc.

	Spotted ship
Scanning ship ⇓	Scout 150%	Fighter 175%	Interceptor 75%	Sf 50%	Bomber 375%	HTT 100%	Gunship 325%	Cloaked sb 30%	Frigate 500%
Scout 2400m	3600	4200	1800	1200	9000	2400	7800	720	12000
Fighter 600m	900	1050	450	300	2250	600	1950	180	3000
Interceptor 400m	600	700	300	200	1500	400	1300	120	2000
Stealth fighter 1600m	2000	2800	1200	800	6000	1600	5200	480	8000
Bomber 1600m	2000	2800	1200	800	6000	1600	5200	480	8000
HTT 1200m	1500	2100	900	600	4500	1200	3900	360	6000
Gunship 1600m	2000	2800	1200	800	6000	1600	5200	480	8000
Stealth bbr 2000m	3000	3500	1500	1000	7500	2000	6500	600	10000
Frigate 2400m	3600	4200	1800	1200	9000	2400	7800	720	12000

← Miner defense

Forward deployment →