Munition:SGM-H-2-Cyclone

The SGM-H-2 Cyclone, commonly referred to as an "S2H," is the most common missile in most ANS missile fleet archetypes. They provide very good PD penetration, which more than makes up for their increased cost over the non-hybrid SGM-2. Like it's larger cousin the SGM-H-3 Atlatl, the S2H has access to several unique designs enabled by the extremely high speed of hybrids, particularly the HEKP warhead and TTGI tunings. Compared to the S3H, the S2H can be carried in greater numbers due to the VLS-2 being more space-efficient than the VLS-3, meaning a VLS-2 fully loaded with S2H can bring a greater punch (for an accordingly higher price) than the same mount equipped with a VLS-3 loaded with S3H. This leads most ANS missile archetypes to use medium investment S2H paired with high investment S3H, though some fleet archetypes do go all-in on either S2H or S3H.

Wiki infobox about the missile with stats and flavor text?

Design Considerations

The S2H is the most generalist missile in ANS's arsenal. They generally cost between 10-20 points apiece, though lower and higher investment S2H are used. Seekers vary widely to meet the desired price. Terminal maneuvers are typically either no terminals or weave; HEKP missiles almost always use no terminals to get consistent hits down the length of the ship.

Warhead

Anti-ship warheads can be HE Shaped or HEKP depending on desired price. HE Shaped is more points efficient, while HEKP is able to DT break and can deliver large amounts of damage much quicker. This incentivizes initial salvos of HE Shaped missiles to bring components down to low HP, followed by HEKP missiles to grey the components. The warhead mix across an entire fleet is generally at most 1 HEKP for every 1 HE Shaped, and most cruise missile fleets run closer to 1 HEKP for every 2 HE Shaped.

Anti-craft warheads are almost always HE Shaped using the ADASH tuning. HE Frag is almost never used as it struggles to kill more than one target, thus giving little benefit while not providing the dual-purpose role of ADASH. In contrast HE Frag SGM-2 and S3H can kill multiple targets, so those are preferred when multi-kill is desired.

Stages

As a hybrid, the S2H has a slow first stage (the "cruise" stage) and a fast second stage (the "sprint" stage). The staging is triggered when ANY of the following occur:

• A range-capable seeker (e.g. ACT, EO, CMD) sees a target AND the missile is within staging range of the target AND no higher priority seeker sees a target
• A direction-only seeker (e.g. ARAD, HOJ, SAH, WAKE) sees a target AND no higher priority seeker sees a target
• All seekers and reject validators are jammed (e.g. ACTr/[CMD] will not stage when radar jammed unless also command jammed)

Staging behavior can be tuned to cause the missile to wobble after staging, generally called the "min-angle trick" due to using quirks with the minimum angle setting on direct missiles. This allows direct hybrids to get the effects of weave terminals without needing to pay for it.

The cruise stage on S2H is generally tuned to have minimum maneuverability, with the fastest speed that attains the desired range. Cruise S2H typically have 20+km range, while direct S2H typically use max speed as the 13.234km range is more than enough for any direct missile.

The sprint stage on S2H has a wide variety of tunings, though generally they bias towards speed/range and away from maneuver. Speed on the sprint stage costs points. Note that direction-only seekers force a minimum range (e.g. ARAD forces the sprint stage to have at least 3km range, preferably more).

The high speed of the sprint stage allows for "TTGI" missile tunings where a speed above ~680 m/s with a Fixed ACT seeker causes the missile to lock the first target it sees and never switch. This effectively allows an "inverse WAKE" effect where TTGI missiles are able to ignore chaff when a target is coming towards the missile. See the main missile page for a description of the TTGI mechanic.

Common Missile Designs

Missile designs for S2H are not very standardized except for ADASH. As speed in the sprint stage costs points, there is rarely an optimal tuning, and instead you can increase or decrease speed to accordingly increase/decrease PD penetration and cost.

Cruise Missile Designs

TTGI Types

These designs use a sprint stage above ~680 m/s to cause a Fixed ACT seeker to home on the first target it sees. ACT is the basic design, and cheap backups/validators are often added to improve performance in niche cases.

• ACT
• ACT/WAKE
• ACT/[WAKE]
• ACT/HOJ
• (Rarely) ACT/[CMD]

Cap Yub Types

These designs are intended to be launched at the enemy natural objectives (called "cap yub") to kill the shuttle attempting to capture it. These are especially common on frontline backpacks.

• ACT/[EO]
• Any TTGI type
• (Rarely) EO/backup

Generalist Cruise Types

• Any TTGI type
• ARAD/ACT
• ACT/[ARAD]
• ACT/[EO]
• Non-TTGI ACT/[WAKE]

Direct Missile Designs

Generalist Direct Types

• CMD/backup
• ACTr/[CMD]
• (Rarely) ACT/[CMD] TTGI
• EO/backup
• ACT/[EO]
• ACT/[ARAD]

SAH Direct Types

Typically used on frigate hybrid spam fleets.

• SAH/backup
• SAH/[ARAD]
• SAH/[WAKE]
• SAH/[CMD]

ADASH types

These are specific tunings designed to directly impact craft with an HE Shaped warhead. This allows them to be dual-purpose anti-craft (AD) and anti-ship (ASH) and are the most common anti-craft missile on ANS. All ADASH missiles use a CMD primary seeker (typically CMD/WAKE) and require a bullseye lock to successfully hit the craft. Seekers other than CMD cannot hit craft due to built-in inaccuracy in the seeker.

• ADASH Block V - Larger warhead anti-bomber
• ADASH Block VII - Smaller warhead anti-everything

Common S2H Fleet Archetypes

• Frontline backpacks (especially ADASH)
• Esper (Hemlock-likes) - cruise + beam CH
• Yesgod - direct CL
• Yub frigates
• Direct frigates
• Sprinter bombers - direct sprinters