Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Exactly, it is quite clearly a buff to ratting. The litany goes as follows:

“AFK cloaking is horrible because it shuts down an entire system for exploitation and the player is not even at his keyboard. Remove it please.”

When it is pointed out that it is a player using local offensively vs. the ratter’s defensive use that is hand-waved away.

When it is pointed out that this will be a buff to ratting income, mining income, and so forth, it is outright denied.

It is also a buff to the safety of those ratting, mining, etc. in NS. As has been pointed out ad nauseam local provides advanced warning, is invulnerable, never wrong. The one sure fire way to not just subvert local, but use it against ratters, miners, etc. is to AFK cloak. This too is simply hand waved away, often with inconsistent arguments about Dev intent.

I agree that AFK cloaking is horrible game play because…well it is not really playing the game. Changing things so that people will play the game is good. But not to the extent that it makes one group benefit at the expense of another group. Yes, ships in space should be at risk. But it’s hilarious seeing the anti-cloak group pretty much come down on the side of less risk for them and more risk for others. They don’t even make a pretense of showing it is unbalanced, they merely claim it is unbalanced…because their ISK/hour. Ratting in a fleet? OMG NO! Moving over a system? OMG NO! That system has a lower true sec value and not as many good anomalies. Researching when that player gets his kills (i.e. trying to determine the TZ he is most active in)? OMG NO! All of these are counters to AFK cloaking, but ISK/hour. If that is not maintained why it is unbalanced.

All this blather about securing one’s space, but when it is suggested that intel systems be moved to in game structures that can be shot. OMG NO! Hey, guys, that is part of securing your space…you know, effort. And for talking a lot about securing space when the bad guy(s) do show up, the first thing they do is….wait for it….wait…… dock up. And stay docked. Wait till he leaves system.

Fortunately I think CCP is going to take a stab at changing this, and in doing so will change local put intel in space as structures we can shoot, and yes, even make cloaks detectable if you sit around too long.

Actually, I did cover that.

The issue becomes that while null sec is valuable, it's not so valuable that it pays for 5 guys to accomplish the same goal that one guy can accomplish solo in high sec, or even really just 2 guys. If you are one of the larger entities that has a defense fleet on standby that will deter hotdrop attempts, then sure, you are fine, and camps never really affected you. If not then you just had the value of space divided by the number of people it takes to operate in it, with no option to make it a combat op to deal with the present threat.


In the latter case of making him huntable and he lights up and wrecks me... He wasn't afk. He is no longer forcing a defensive action 23/7 through passive means. He will most likely not stay in space as his player goes to work or goes to sleep. Active effort trumps passive effort. Getting wrecked checking out a cloaked Sig would not just be a step in the right direction, but a feature of the destination itself.

I don't campaign on a platform of safety. I believe in reasonable risk. I don't find it reasonable that an afk ship should need to be treated like an active enemy fleet at all times because it cannot be proactively dealt with. As with other areas of the game I should be able to send a scout, poke it, and explode it or be exploded if I don't like it.

Cynos are much, much less of a thing with fatigue and jump range nerfs.

There you go again. "It is broken." No proof, no argument, no nothing. There are existing counters.

Oh, and Mike....these things, they are all inter-related. Local, AFK cloaking, even to some degree ISK sinks and sources. You cannot change one part of a system and not expect other parts of that system to be effected.

And one last thing...putting 2 people into a NS system does not cut that system's value in half. Not at all. I'll leave it as an exercise for you to figure out why.

Of course, carebears are hypocrites and liars.

"More effort for thee but not for me."

~Every carebear.

And look, a bit lower down from yours we have Mike, who spent a whole page crying about how we need to stop talking about local because it's "off topic", and he immediately whines about cynos.

They are very literally not capable of honesty.

Okay! Now we're getting somewhere. So, if I manage to convince you that a fleet is a viable counter, then we can go back to looking for alternatives and not drag ISK or ratting into this? Alright, here we go:

imagine you have, say, 12 guys online and active. Not too much to ask for in sov null -- I shall tell you right off the bat that if you can't muster those numbers, you really should consider finding allies or relocating. After all, while skill does factor into the equation, you can't expect to keep holding on to that sov much longer if you're really grossly outnumbered.

So, you have 12 guys on. And you're not one for hunting or gatecamping, so you decide to go rat. Woohoo! You're in sovspace so you've got plenty of anoms and missions and belts to go around. Usually, each of you would grab a marauder and go run his own mission and get filthy rich. Or, as you would have us believe, one lonesome cowboy runs all them anoms while the 11 others sit on their hands waiting for Mr.AFK to come home from work, and when our cowboy is done for the day, he splits the loot in 12.

Did you consider a third option, where the 12 of you grab speedtanked Gila's and start chipping away those anoms as a fleet? You'd run approx. 9 missions in the time it would take you to run just the one on your own, and you split the loot twelveways. Everybody's still getting filthy rich, everybody had a blast. If/when the hunter decloaks, pod him. If he doesn't? \o/ (talk smack in local at his expense)

There is even a fourth option, where maybe some guys in your corp/alliance are avid PvPers that'll happily camp the gates and chokepoints; so chances are you could run your missions in peace and they'd happily come blow stuff up for you, even without asking for a monetary contribution! Because yes, PvP'ers are nice like that. They will consider you "the bait rattlesnake", and all they'd ask is that you fit some tackle. You'll be their hero! (*true story bro*)

So there you go. Instead of going bankrupt in the godforsaken void, you could have some good times with your friends and either (a) earn the same you do now (running missions fasters without gimping your fit) or (b) earn the same you do now (whilst capitalising on your perceived "vulnerability" and getting on killmails as hero bait).

Did you notice both options completely and utterly ignore the neut in local? Without soft targets, your system won't be worth camping and he'll leave eventually.

And Mike ..... I know I'm coming down a bit harsh on you. Slightly off-topic even. But I feel you need to reconsider why you play, and who you play with. Stop being so afraid man-- fleet up with your broskis. Your best bet to defeat the cloaky camper is to show some muscle and convince him it's Your bloody system and you ain't taking no crap from no-one!! If you keep docking up and whining about some big bad dude who's so horribly evil he can't even be bothered to come to his keyboard, well ..... it doesn't command respect now, does it? Give them a few counterdrops, start getting organised but for ****'s sake, get your act together man. Show them who's boss! EARN your right to claim YOUR system and reap its rewards. If you genuinely want your system to be secure, then get off your ass and secure it. Sometimes that means striking back. Sometimes that means striking first. And sometimes, that means letting them throw the first punch just to prove he's wasting his time. Hunters will hunt carebears. That's kind of the definition of a carebear. Solution: don't be one. Grow a pair and stick it to the man. If the Carebear disappears from system, so will the hunter camping him. Now you've got two options to make that carebear go away -- and I'm not prejudiced against either option: you can go to highsec, and be a proud and happy carebear. That's okay son. Or you learn how to defend your space, get some fleets in the air, show some guts. Then, too, the carebear will be gone and you'll wonder why you ever gave a rat's ass about one teenie weenie neut in local.

If this was uncalled for, I apologise. But please do consider what I said. You may actually find the game much more enjoyable when you start participating in the Multiplayer experience.

Wonderful as that all is, it still does not counter the camper, it just makes him decide not to attack for a little while.

Let's say I do have 12 guys, and we decide we don't want to put up with him being there. In any other instance in EVE, we could hunt him down and express our displeasure in a rainbow of ways. But because he is cloaked at a safe, he is immune to our efforts.

Then, many hours later, someone gets on and tries to sneak in some ratting when all of his buddies are not available. So happens that the afk cloaker had a fight with his girlfriend and is also up all night. Since my options are to fly suicidal or not at all, I randomly explode because hunting my aggressor was never an option. Not at all in this instance includes moving systems and such. We are talking about a particular system, for whatever reason up to and including I happen to like the color better than the next jump over.

Moving, Fielding multiple ships, etc... are all actions forced on me by the hostile. If he was present and at risk himself that is appropriate. If he is afk and just projecting threat it is not.

Ccp should not be securing space for me, but neither should they provide invulnerable tools for you to deny that security indefinitely.

I will say it again. PvE playstyles have nothing left to give up. Cloaks as they are leave no "win" scenario for PvE. In order to do anything at all you have to gut your income below high sec levels, or give up on PvE completely, for as long as the cloaker remains. Or else be the big blue doughnut.

All that is being asked is that if PvE gives up their own playstyle to join yours, that there be a way to target the ship forcing that gameplay on them. PvE already gave it all up at this point. There is nothing else to give. It's fight, leave the area, or simply don't play. Fight isn't actually an option as the ship in question is immune to that until it decides not to be. So leave or don't play, with no counter or recourse.

You talk a lot about risk, yet the cloaked ship has none. Before the other guy can pay anything, there has to be something on that side of the table.

I've killed my fair share of actually cloaked ships too.

Apparently they don't convey immunity, rather the belief thereof. A good set of smartbombs tends to bring them and their oft expensive pod right back down to earth.

The core problem with cloak+cyno in nullsec remains that it lowers player activity levels.

Which is ultimately an undesirable game mechanic.

Fuel consuming cloaks is a good fix as it fundamentally impacts on AFK loitering time (currently measured in days if not weeks or months without the need to return to a base) and is inherently tweakable (which gives Devs direct control over loiter times).

Cloaked ships are at least nominally vulnerable at gates (and yay navy maulus).

For shooting local in null sec (since linking the two topics seems unavoidable for some reason). The game has introduced entosis links. I would think using entosis to activate/deactivate local in null sec a good content generator without much in the way of a downside (it would need to be very clear that local was down however).