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AFK Cloaking™: Ideas, Discussion, and Proposals

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Cidanel Afuran
Grant Village
#5541 - 2016-01-19 04:04:44 UTC
Jerghul wrote:
Mags
You are still not grasping implicit threat. Except when Mike says it should be possible to scan down cloaked ships. That implicit threat you seem to understand really well.

A force in being, implicit threat, a pretty big psychological effect is a big thing.

RL? The Tirpitz had filled its bow with cement. Pumped in a few 1000 tons of water to counterbalance flooding, Its Doris turret was knocked out of its fitting...

And remained a sufficient force in being, implicit threat, pretty big psychological effect to tie down 1/3rd of the Royal Navy on the off-chance it might sortie and attack a convoy.

The Royal navy really should have learned to just HTFU.


What implicit threat? If you're in null, I assume you are in a standing defense fleet and on comms 100% of the time, so your corp/alliance mates can come help each other if someone gets dropped, right? What threat is there, exactly? And if you can't/won't do that 100% of the time, why are you in null in the first place?
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#5542 - 2016-01-19 04:15:58 UTC
Cidanel Afuran wrote:
Jerghul wrote:
Mags
You are still not grasping implicit threat. Except when Mike says it should be possible to scan down cloaked ships. That implicit threat you seem to understand really well.

A force in being, implicit threat, a pretty big psychological effect is a big thing.

RL? The Tirpitz had filled its bow with cement. Pumped in a few 1000 tons of water to counterbalance flooding, Its Doris turret was knocked out of its fitting...

And remained a sufficient force in being, implicit threat, pretty big psychological effect to tie down 1/3rd of the Royal Navy on the off-chance it might sortie and attack a convoy.

The Royal navy really should have learned to just HTFU.


What implicit threat? If you're in null, I assume you are in a standing defense fleet and on comms 100% of the time, so your corp/alliance mates can come help each other if someone gets dropped, right? What threat is there, exactly? And if you can't/won't do that 100% of the time, why are you in null in the first place?



On the first 2 you'd be wrong apparently, that kind of effort is simply outrageous to expect of somebody ratting in NS.

"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design."--Friedrich August von Hayek

8 Golden Rules for EVE Online
Jerghul
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#5543 - 2016-01-19 04:26:00 UTC
Morrigan
No mechanism to force an afk cloaky camper to do anything save log on once a day.

Cidadel
The pretty big psychological effect is an acknowledged issues the devs are looking into. Refighting lost battles is really not something you should do in null-sec. Though fine for high sec I suppose.

Null-sec is about sov, corp and alliance wars. So that is what I do there. Afk cloaky camping is fine in wormhole space where there is nothing else to do except spend peak time forming up to run sites anyway. Null sec has more meaningful content and afk cloaky camping is an irritating bug in the game mechanic that detracts from purpose.

Blocked list: Teckos, Sonya, Wander, Baltec1
RuleoftheBone
Brutor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#5544 - 2016-01-19 07:41:21 UTC
Jerghul wrote:
Morrigan
Null sec has more meaningful content and afk cloaky camping is an irritating bug in the game mechanic that detracts from purpose.


Meaningful content for YOU....not everyone else.
Null-sec salty tears about cloaks have been ongoing since I started playing in 2006.
It's no bug that de-cloaks and blows up your ****-fit AFK PVE Ishtar.

And W-space is far more dynamic and interesting game play for the thoughtful creative pilot who is not scared of no local.

Could your crappy alliance survive 5 minutes without local? Of course not.
Don't fear the cloak. Embrace it.....Pirate.
Mag's
Azn Empire
#5545 - 2016-01-19 14:47:50 UTC
Mike Voidstar wrote:
Mag's wrote:
There is no arcane secret. You're making a normal Mike argument. Using all the points that favour your argument and leaving out the ones that do not.

Yes stations are a known. But to base balance on the idea that they can be camped and taken and cloaks safe spots are not known therefore cloaks are OP, is quite frankly ridiculous. Again I think I need to point out to you the name of the module. I still don't think you understand the meaning. Covert Ops.

Prey tell how do I PvP, from a safe spot? Merely hinting at some arcane secret, that only elite pilots like yourself know about, isn't making a point.
Are you suggesting I can kill people from a safe? That I don't in fact ever have to leave that safe? For your argument to even constantly give safe spots a similar safety level, surely I couldn't ever move? But now you wish for me to believe the safe spot is not only safer than a station, but I can PvP from this unassailable position and keep my safety level higher. So prey, do tell.

Or are you suggesting that the PvP on some level you hinted at, is done from a safe spot also whilst AFK? Should we talk about that elephant again? The one you include when it suits?

No, the truth of the matter is, that while I'm sat at a safe spot, I'm close to as safe as a station, but without much of the advantages that brings. Sure I can scan, hardly OP. But as soon as I move to start combat or spying, my safety levels drop. To say otherwise, would be disingenuous.

But it still remains that while I'm cloaked, the safety is a two way street.

Oh and I didn't have a clone there, until I jumped to another one in high sec as the station was being taken. Mag's also has no trade skills whatsoever, but he can chat in local. There was no preparation, none. I didn't even know they were coming for the station till they were there. So guess what I learned from this. Always have a clone in the station you have your stuff in and then you won't lose it. Yeah I can see how that's not safer. Roll

Sure you scan. Hardly OP.... but doing that, or anything else that an enemy has a need or desire to interfere with from a place that is in fact safer, much less as safe or even nearly safe as a station is too much. It does not matter what it is, if it's not available as a station service and someone has a need or desire to interfere with it, that's a form of PvP, and you are doing it from a cloaked safe that cannot be interfered with in any way.

You can take your elephants and go bugger them till you both bleed. I don't care. The issue isn't about local. It's about the inability to hunt people that are using cloaks to adversely impact the play of others from an unassailable position at no real cost to themselves. Either the safety of the cloak needs adjusted, or the range of activity available while using one. I argued for bringing the safety into line, but apparently that breaks titans. So instead we can go with the activity.
So just scan then? OK.

So I can scan and you tell me my safe spot is safer than a station. I can PvP from there by scanning, which you tell me is a form of PvP. Well it's intelligence gathering, done whilst ATK. Done using a module designed for that purpose. Do you remember? Covert Ops?
But to act upon that, doesn't it require I leave that spot? Or are we back to this arcane secret of yours again?

Seeing as we are now in the comedy zone, did you shoot that elephant in your pyjamas?
After you telling me it isn't about local, you then include it in your argument in the next sentence. Mike that sir was comedy gold and I applaud you for making me belly laugh.
You may be dishonest, but at least you're funny with it.

Destination SkillQueue:- It's like assuming the Lions will ignore you in the Savannah, if you're small, fat and look helpless.
Mag's
Azn Empire
#5546 - 2016-01-19 14:50:08 UTC
Jerghul wrote:
Mags
You are still not grasping implicit threat. Except when Mike says it should be possible to scan down cloaked ships. That implicit threat you seem to understand really well.

A force in being, implicit threat, a pretty big psychological effect is a big thing.

What mechanic are they using to interact with you and cause a pretty big psychological effect, whilst they are AFK?

Destination SkillQueue:- It's like assuming the Lions will ignore you in the Savannah, if you're small, fat and look helpless.
Mike Voidstar
Voidstar Free Flight Foundation
#5547 - 2016-01-19 17:25:33 UTC
Mag's wrote:
Mike Voidstar wrote:
Mag's wrote:
There is no arcane secret. You're making a normal Mike argument. Using all the points that favour your argument and leaving out the ones that do not.

Yes stations are a known. But to base balance on the idea that they can be camped and taken and cloaks safe spots are not known therefore cloaks are OP, is quite frankly ridiculous. Again I think I need to point out to you the name of the module. I still don't think you understand the meaning. Covert Ops.

Prey tell how do I PvP, from a safe spot? Merely hinting at some arcane secret, that only elite pilots like yourself know about, isn't making a point.
Are you suggesting I can kill people from a safe? That I don't in fact ever have to leave that safe? For your argument to even constantly give safe spots a similar safety level, surely I couldn't ever move? But now you wish for me to believe the safe spot is not only safer than a station, but I can PvP from this unassailable position and keep my safety level higher. So prey, do tell.

Or are you suggesting that the PvP on some level you hinted at, is done from a safe spot also whilst AFK? Should we talk about that elephant again? The one you include when it suits?

No, the truth of the matter is, that while I'm sat at a safe spot, I'm close to as safe as a station, but without much of the advantages that brings. Sure I can scan, hardly OP. But as soon as I move to start combat or spying, my safety levels drop. To say otherwise, would be disingenuous.

But it still remains that while I'm cloaked, the safety is a two way street.

Oh and I didn't have a clone there, until I jumped to another one in high sec as the station was being taken. Mag's also has no trade skills whatsoever, but he can chat in local. There was no preparation, none. I didn't even know they were coming for the station till they were there. So guess what I learned from this. Always have a clone in the station you have your stuff in and then you won't lose it. Yeah I can see how that's not safer. Roll

Sure you scan. Hardly OP.... but doing that, or anything else that an enemy has a need or desire to interfere with from a place that is in fact safer, much less as safe or even nearly safe as a station is too much. It does not matter what it is, if it's not available as a station service and someone has a need or desire to interfere with it, that's a form of PvP, and you are doing it from a cloaked safe that cannot be interfered with in any way.

You can take your elephants and go bugger them till you both bleed. I don't care. The issue isn't about local. It's about the inability to hunt people that are using cloaks to adversely impact the play of others from an unassailable position at no real cost to themselves. Either the safety of the cloak needs adjusted, or the range of activity available while using one. I argued for bringing the safety into line, but apparently that breaks titans. So instead we can go with the activity.
So just scan then? OK.

So I can scan and you tell me my safe spot is safer than a station. I can PvP from there by scanning, which you tell me is a form of PvP. Well it's intelligence gathering, done whilst ATK. Done using a module designed for that purpose. Do you remember? Covert Ops?
But to act upon that, doesn't it require I leave that spot? Or are we back to this arcane secret of yours again?

Seeing as we are now in the comedy zone, did you shoot that elephant in your pyjamas?
After you telling me it isn't about local, you then include it in your argument in the next sentence. Mike that sir was comedy gold and I applaud you for making me belly laugh.
You may be dishonest, but at least you're funny with it.


Gathering Intel on people can include local, but does not need too. Preparing an ambush for them has nothing to do with local at all. No one needs to know you are there doing something for you to be doing it. No one needs to know about a thing to have a need or desire to stop such things.

If you are doing anything at all that isn't covered under station services from under a cloak you are too safe. Either the safety or activity needs to go. Don't like it? Then it's time to have a real discussion about what is appropriate levels of safety from them.

Blame those that feel a cloak should be a mobile station mounted to your ship, allowing indefinite and total safety even with active hunters in system wasting time trying to flush you out. It really does not matter what the effect is or how little dps you do when they are that safe- if that's an appropriate amount of safety that ship should be as useful as a docked ship until the target delay ends.
Cidanel Afuran
Grant Village
#5548 - 2016-01-19 19:20:54 UTC
Jerghul wrote:
Cidadel
The pretty big psychological effect is an acknowledged issues the devs are looking into. Refighting lost battles is really not something you should do in null-sec. Though fine for high sec I suppose.

Null-sec is about sov, corp and alliance wars. So that is what I do there. Afk cloaky camping is fine in wormhole space where there is nothing else to do except spend peak time forming up to run sites anyway. Null sec has more meaningful content and afk cloaky camping is an irritating bug in the game mechanic that detracts from purpose.


What? Since when is that what WH space is about? Do you play the same game I do?

Fighting battles to defend your space trumps any other activity in null. That comes with the territory of owning space. If you see someone not blue in intel within 10 systems of yourself, there's no excuse to not reship to PvP and fleet up.
Kaarous Aldurald
Black Hydra Consortium.
#5549 - 2016-01-19 21:28:39 UTC
Cidanel Afuran wrote:
Do you play the same game I do?


Neither of them do. See, carebears are creatures of projection, so they think their pipe dream bullshit version of EVE Online is the truth. It's why they get so upset when reality intrudes on their childish pretentions, and why they demand CCP to change the game according to their self delusions.

"Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws."

One of ours, ten of theirs.

Best Meltdown Ever.
Mike Voidstar
Voidstar Free Flight Foundation
#5550 - 2016-01-20 07:04:48 UTC
Cidanel Afuran wrote:
Jerghul wrote:
Cidadel
The pretty big psychological effect is an acknowledged issues the devs are looking into. Refighting lost battles is really not something you should do in null-sec. Though fine for high sec I suppose.

Null-sec is about sov, corp and alliance wars. So that is what I do there. Afk cloaky camping is fine in wormhole space where there is nothing else to do except spend peak time forming up to run sites anyway. Null sec has more meaningful content and afk cloaky camping is an irritating bug in the game mechanic that detracts from purpose.


What? Since when is that what WH space is about? Do you play the same game I do?

Fighting battles to defend your space trumps any other activity in null. That comes with the territory of owning space. If you see someone not blue in intel within 10 systems of yourself, there's no excuse to not reship to PvP and fleet up.


At least there won't be once it's possible to find cloaked ships with whatever mechanism makes that possible. Right now, not so much.
Kaarous Aldurald
Black Hydra Consortium.
#5551 - 2016-01-20 12:46:28 UTC
Mike Voidstar wrote:

At least there won't be once it's possible to find cloaked ships with whatever mechanism makes that possible.


Pixie dust?

"Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws."

One of ours, ten of theirs.

Best Meltdown Ever.
Xcom
Eclipse Strike Unit
Jump On Contact..
#5552 - 2016-01-20 16:23:44 UTC  |  Edited by: Xcom
I honestly were interested in getting some feedback on the proposed suggestion. Any one here wana poke some holes in it?

Link
Mike Voidstar
Voidstar Free Flight Foundation
#5553 - 2016-01-20 16:44:58 UTC
Xcom wrote:
Was thinking hard and factual about how to make a nice cat and mouse kind of minigame for both hunter and hunted. Best way to fix the cloaking problem is to give it a form of counter. It should fix the cloaking problem ones and for all but still make it less powerful to prevent the cloaking aspect of the game to retain its original intended use. Mostly to create a way to at least give the opposing side a fighting chance. To make it proper I'll present it from top to bottom with the ideas and my views of how it fits in with my side of balanced approach.

To start of there should be a proper ship that conducts such an attack, call it the anti-cloaker. Said ship should have the ability to launch charges similar to a stealth bomber. The charges should similar to smart bombs simply decloak any ship in its radius or explosion. Same ship should also be able to have the single intended ability to scan for cloaked ships and only cloaked ships. Should be week and fragile enough to as make it even possible for cov-ops ships to take them down easily and clearly not give them any offensive slots or cloaking ability. Basically a paper thin anti-cloaker that relies on support to operate.

The charge should fly similar to a bomb in a straight line roughly 70km and explode with a proper 50km radius. 70km - 50km should make it impossible to jump through a gate and de-cloak anyone on the other side of said gate instantly. You would need to pick an area of space to de-cloak. A well prepared pilot would still need to deploy the charge where he suspects a cloaked ship and if anyone with a cloak spots a charge would still be able to warp off to avoid being de-cloaked and if de-cloaked even have the chance to get out before anyone would lock and point. Similar to bombs the charges would need to be used sparingly, both as few would fit in the hold and the price of each.

Said ship would also be the sole ship to have the ability to probe down cloaked ships and only spot cloaked ships during probing. Even landing on grid would give you a very vague approximation of your targets location. Even after landing on grid you would need to use charges to weed out your target. To balance this you could land at a minimum of 70km to always give the cloaked pilot the ability to spot any ship on grid and warp of before getting de-cloaked.

This would make it nearly impossible to use said anti-cloaker in large scale combat as they would be easily poped. Even cloaked ships could try to snipe them out as they would cause interference. They would be used to spot any cloaked ships so they would be mostly used passively to counter cloakers that didn't pay much attention. Well prepared groups would be able to use the anti-cloakers in WH space to try avoid getting killed by cloaked enemy's but cloaked ships still be able to avoid them easily. They would mostly be a form of fighting chance to weed out the worst cloaked pilots that basically thought they would be totally safe behind there cloaks.


At a minimum I don't like it because it's too effective at finding cloaks immediately. The point to the system of false positives I suggested was to allow a skilled and attentive pilot the opportunity to evade, and provide time to accomplish goals. A scout would have to decide where the balance of more Intel vs. Discovery and confrontation lies, someone ambushing needs to decide to pull the trigger or get out, ect. The reason I don't like a long scan cycle for that is to provide uncertainty and room for error on both sides. You don't know if you will find him on the first Sig you scan, or the 10th.

The rest is just fluff. I'd simply allow such a ship to see the shimmer of the cloak, but not on the overview. You could target it by clicking in space, but first visually locate it.
Xcom
Eclipse Strike Unit
Jump On Contact..
#5554 - 2016-01-20 17:01:41 UTC  |  Edited by: Xcom
Mike Voidstar wrote:
At a minimum I don't like it because it's too effective at finding cloaks immediately. The point to the system of false positives I suggested was to allow a skilled and attentive pilot the opportunity to evade, and provide time to accomplish goals. A scout would have to decide where the balance of more Intel vs. Discovery and confrontation lies, someone ambushing needs to decide to pull the trigger or get out, ect. The reason I don't like a long scan cycle for that is to provide uncertainty and room for error on both sides. You don't know if you will find him on the first Sig you scan, or the 10th.

The rest is just fluff. I'd simply allow such a ship to see the shimmer of the cloak, but not on the overview. You could target it by clicking in space, but first visually locate it.

You wouldn't ever have any idea where the target would be if you would land anywhere at minimum of 70km when attempting to probe down the target. The target could be anywhere, up down left right. You would need to re-probe and estimate based on multiple scans. Target would be somewhere on grid but you would have no idea until re-scanning and warping to multiple spots within that grid. Still after multiple scan attempts and estimating the location based on multiple warping points you would only know in approximation where your target would be. You would still need to waste expensive charges to de-cloak.
h4kun4
Senkawa Tactical Division
Crimson Citadel
#5555 - 2016-01-20 17:11:25 UTC  |  Edited by: h4kun4
New Idea (sry if it has been posted earlier, i dont really want to read 280 pages or so)

Suggestion:
Drifters roam lowsec and nullsec systems for corpses. They have made ovbservations that cloaked ships are easy targets and most likely don't fight back so they will hunt only for them.
Due to their own very advanced technology the drifters can find cloaked ships, the chance of finding the cloakies increases the longer they stay on the same grid.
So basically there is a chance a spawn of drifter frigates will decloak themselves right on you, decloak you and kill you if you are cloaked in space and inactive, the longer you stay on the same grid the more likely it will get that they catch you. And burning in a plain direction will change nothing because they literally spawn at 0m to you.
They could land on you just 30 seconds after you landed, bad luck, they also could just not find you for a few hours, but if they find you, you have just a few (maybe a random between 5-15?) seconds to react before they have you tackeld.
But where is a risk, there is a reward. You can bait them and wait until they show up, to kill them and they might drop somethig nice (CCP thats your turn).

I think that brings in some lore based shakeup into the game and makes cloakycamping an actual activity.
Cidanel Afuran
Grant Village
#5556 - 2016-01-20 18:02:10 UTC
Mike Voidstar wrote:
At least there won't be once it's possible to find cloaked ships with whatever mechanism makes that possible. Right now, not so much.


Do you even read a post before responding to it, or do you have a list of canned remarks that you just copy/paste?
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#5557 - 2016-01-20 19:21:01 UTC
Xcom wrote:
I honestly were interested in getting some feedback on the proposed suggestion. Any one here wana poke some holes in it?

Link


This is not a new idea. It has been proposed numerous times, but there is one fatal flaw in that is looks only at one side of the issue and as a result in plainly a buff to NS PvE via a reduction in risk and a nerf to cloaks of all sorts and used in more than just resource denial. Further, as Mike notes there is the issue of how fast can a cloaked ship be found. Cloaking devices are supposed to offer a great deal of stealth and come at a cost. The prototype and even the improved cloaking device come with increased lock times and movement constraints and they take up a high slot that can be used for a gun, neut, nos, missile launcher, etc. For the covert ops cloaking devices the lock time in greatly reduced but these ships are generally not that robust and their DPS is below average for other ships in their class (cruisers). This and the very nature of the cloaking device provides some balance to cloaking devices. They cannot shoot you when the cloak is active and you cannot shoot them. Only when the cloak is down are you vulnerable…as are they.

Further, the bomb launcher aspect is not very good in that it will likely find heavy use at gate camps where they will likely be spammed depending on the actual mechanics and the size of the gate camp. Players looking to infiltrate enemy territory should have a reasonable chance of succeeding.

Lastly the entire notion of being attacked when you are least prepared is a complete non-sequitur and a strawman. There is nothing in the game that says players can only attack when their opponent(s) are well prepared. Attacking when they are ill-prepared is actually the smart thing to do. To the extent that a cloak can help a player lurk up on a ratter who is ill prepared for a fight (with his omni-tank and most likely being alone) is actually things working as intended. You are using a stealth device to sneak up on another player/avoid defensive fleets/players and kill the guy who is not prepared for that fight. In Eve you do not want to bring a knife to a gun fight, and it never hurts to bring a bigger gun, more guns, more friends, and shooting them in the game’s version of “the back” or “while they are down” is largely what happens. It is basically saying, “I want this nerfed because it is unfair.”

"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design."--Friedrich August von Hayek

8 Golden Rules for EVE Online
Jerghul
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#5558 - 2016-01-20 23:03:04 UTC
Cidanel Afuran wrote:
Jerghul wrote:
Cidadel
The pretty big psychological effect is an acknowledged issues the devs are looking into. Refighting lost battles is really not something you should do in null-sec. Though fine for high sec I suppose.

Null-sec is about sov, corp and alliance wars. So that is what I do there. Afk cloaky camping is fine in wormhole space where there is nothing else to do except spend peak time forming up to run sites anyway. Null sec has more meaningful content and afk cloaky camping is an irritating bug in the game mechanic that detracts from purpose.


What? Since when is that what WH space is about? Do you play the same game I do?

Fighting battles to defend your space trumps any other activity in null. That comes with the territory of owning space. If you see someone not blue in intel within 10 systems of yourself, there's no excuse to not reship to PvP and fleet up.


Since when is wh space called null-sec?

And to answer your question. I am pretty sure I am not playing the same game you are. Eve being a universe that can be understood at many levels. I am quite accepting of people understanding it at their own pace.

Blocked list: Teckos, Sonya, Wander, Baltec1
Mike Voidstar
Voidstar Free Flight Foundation
#5559 - 2016-01-20 23:29:54 UTC  |  Edited by: Mike Voidstar
Cidanel Afuran wrote:
Mike Voidstar wrote:
At least there won't be once it's possible to find cloaked ships with whatever mechanism makes that possible. Right now, not so much.


Do you even read a post before responding to it, or do you have a list of canned remarks that you just copy/paste?



Well, without a way to flush someone from under a cloak, if you see someone just hanging out in your space all you can do is ignore them or leave that space.
Morrigan LeSante
Perkone
Caldari State
#5560 - 2016-01-21 08:28:07 UTC
Mike Voidstar wrote:
Cidanel Afuran wrote:
Mike Voidstar wrote:
At least there won't be once it's possible to find cloaked ships with whatever mechanism makes that possible. Right now, not so much.


Do you even read a post before responding to it, or do you have a list of canned remarks that you just copy/paste?



Well, without a way to kick someone out of a POS, warp tunnel, station or cloaked if you see someone just hanging out in your space all you can do is ignore them or leave that space.


Fixed that for you.


Homework: Go and find out or work out why the CFC keep ratting in carriers with neutrals in local. Hint: It is because they take certain actions, listed in this very thread to completely neutralise the cloaked ship.