On Wed, Jun 24, 2015 at 2:28 PM, Grimmund <grimmund@gmail.com> wrote:

On Wed, Jun 24, 2015 at 11:42 AM, Richard Aiken <raikenclw@gmail.com> wrote:

> [umbrella sensor hide]
> won't help you at all against detection via visual occlusion (the fact that
> your ship+umbrella will be blacking out a section of the starfield from the
> opponent's POV).]

> Basically, in space if you can see it, you can shoot it. And you can almost
> always see it.

Yes. Presumably, distant occlusion is harder to spot (smaller black
dot) than a nearby ship.

OTOH, if you're fighting over it, presumably, the local government has
reasonable resources.

[snip of reasonable resources]

You could do a version of the CT canon black globe strike: come out of jump in the out-system on a ballistic course toward Interesting Point, deploy your umbrella and drift. It would take a *while* to close in and the closer you got the more likely it would be that your re-focused heat sig would cross the horizon of an outlying passive sensor. But you could probably do quite a bit of snooping before that point.

Richard Aiken

"Never insult anyone by accident." Robert A. Heinlein

"A word to the wise ain't necessary -- it's the stupid ones that need the advice." - Bill Cosby

"We know a little about a lot of things; just enough to make us dangerous." Dean Winchester