Player Features and Ideas Discussion

When reaching a new system after jumping through a gate, you are unable to engage your high-slot cloak until you've disengaged the automatic gate jump cloak. In order to warp away safely in gate camps you need to thus be able to rely on timing your cloak effectively in order to escape. With the way the module system in this game works however, there are a few problems associated with this.

It is impossible to determine the ideal time to activate the cloak. I've had times where I can activate it immediately after I align/warp. I've also had times where I try to activate it a full 1.5 seconds after and it still does not activate. This happens due to a combination of latency and the "1 second tick" in which the servers operate. That is acceptable. Data needs time to travel and the server works the way it works, doubt it can/will be changed anytime soon. This doesn't have to be such a problem... it is however, for a few reasons:

1) You cannot spam the cloak to activate it. If we could just spam our hotkey as soon as we align/jump, there would be no issue. However since the game immediately deactivates your cloak if you hit it even 1 extra time after it activated, this solution does not work.

2) You cannot determine when the cloak actually activates. Many times you will attempt activate it, it will actually activate, but that green effect will not show up for another second. In that second you end up hitting the cloak again - thinking it didn't activate - causing it to deactivate.

3) There is no indicator that shows when the cloak is/isn't available to be activated. There is not 1 pixel on screen that indicates to you that you are now decloaked and able to use your modules.

There is a solution to all of this: An indicator that shows the player that their cloak (and other modules as well) are now available. Let's use a gate camp to illustrate this example:
- You jump into a hostile gate camp with a covert ops cloaking ship
- You hit "warp" on a celestial
- You become visible on the overview to the hostiles.

At this point, the server is distributing data to the gate campers which indicates you are no longer cloaked, hence why you appear on the overview. Why can this data not also be available to the player? At the exact moment the player appears available on the overview, there should be some sort of indicator that lets the player know his/her modules can now be activated. This would mean both the gate camp hostiles and the player would receive this information at the same time theoretically. Of course with latency it won't quite be exact.

Here is another thread on this issue:
https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=3245772

The indicator could be a small light that goes from red to green, or something like making the modules semi-transparent when they are unavailable.

Hopefully we can finally see a solution here... right now using cloak as a means of safe travel is a total coin toss.

This is an arbitrary game mechanic, designed to force risk in exchange for possible interaction.

The simple fact, that you can operate your navigational tools freely, points out the flaw. The system receives your input to move, and automatically drops your gate cloak for you.

The actual fact that a gate cloak exists at all, actually points out that some players take longer to issue commands to the ship they are flying. Lag, or other connection issues, which delay the client being ready to function in a new system, can also affect the reaction time once inside the system.

Simple solution?

Let the gate cloak be transferable to the onboard cloak, just like it does for the nav systems.
Expecting players to guess when it is safe to hit a cloak button will always be biased towards the players with better real life internet connections. Whether they are the cloaking ship or the gunship at the gate camp, whoever reacts faster has a definite edge, and that includes this real life aspect as a contributing detail.

How would you suggest adjusting for ISP latency or connection lag? I'd love to hear your recommendations.

As for this idea: Transferring the Gate Cloak to the Cloaking Module would fit as both are available or enable the activation of the "Local Cloak" to override the "Gate Cloak\Invul" while under the "Gate Invul" timer thus transferring control to the Cloaked Pilot.

Hard to take this seriously.

You either been lucky, or you avoid gate camps like the plague. Two out of hundreds translates into less than 1%, and if your latency issues affect your game so rarely, you don't have any worth mentioning. Two out of thousands becomes statistically insignificant.

Spell checker FTW

Pretty much this. I wait til I hear that voice then I press F1 once to activate the cloak (more reliable and less prone to error than mouse clicks).

I have yet to lose a blockade runner to a gatecamp in low-sec.

I think it's just lag, really. That gate cloak deactivates as soon as you make a move if there's any delay then that's just because of the server-client response times.

Added a couple ideas for the indicator.

The first being a color coded light.
The second being the game making the modules semi-transparent to show they are unavailable (thus when you see them become solid again they are available).

This has actually now become an issue with the covert ops cloak on the new sisters of eve ships.
As the default without bonus is 30 seconds and it takes much less than that to jump, it is easy to commence a warp to discover you have 20 seconds left before you can reactivate your cloak.

It becomes warp.. Cloak. .... Land ..... Jump...... Wait 20 seconds or is it 18 or 22 warp .. no!!! and if you counted too quick you die.

30 seconds?? Really?? No indicator, no warning,nasty!

Covert ops delay when greater than the time to land and go through stargate simply is a broken idea.

Makes travel a pain in the ass

My post is referring to the new SOE ships and the way the covert ops cloak is implemented.

The issue is that unless you wait at least 30 seconds on the gate before doing anything it says that the cloak cannot be activated wait another x seconds as the reactivation timer is preventing cloaking.


so you have to wait out the remaining time uncloaked and then dead.

unfortunately it is not consistent on Sisi the timer is Not working right and often not 30 seconds at all.
sometimes count from when you decloak before the gate, sometimes count from when you land. sometimes ... god knows

Problem is that these ships have a 30 second reactivation timer as they have no cloak bonus,not an issue with prototype or advanced cloaks as you cannot warp cloaked.

You cannot also due to the new warp speeds decloak in jump to be ready for the next gate as the time is now too short. so basically you have to guess so a gamble if you live or not.

so every gate you have to allow 40 seconds to be sure, that really messes up travelling long distances and is now far slower than it would have been before the warp changes - should the new SOE ships have existed.

I thought that when you landed on a gate the timer reset, but cannot check on live as none of the stealth bombers blockade runners or covert ops ships are without a bonus to reduce the delay.

I would be very suprised if that was the intention.

You of course have to break gate cloak to activate any equipment just as before.However that's not the issue.

The problem is that the 30 second cloak reactivation timer is not only very long but also inconsistent so when you break Gate cloak you cannot recloak and jump so you will naturally die uncloaked.
Or wait 40 seconds extra on EVERY gate to be safe. Travelling now takes forever.