If someone can’t defend their space then they don’t own it. Pretty simple
Or the fact that a large percentage of null is empty…empty…empty…empt…emp…em…e…
Again, I’ve only seen one or two cases of multiple cloaky campers in multiple adjoined systems in all of my roaming through null. Maybe there are swarms of campers waiting to swoop in once someone starts using a system.
Maybe not, but there have been plenty of people on this or the Main AFK Cloaky thread who have related how they deal with AFK campers. Saying there is no counter is the cheap way out
That said, how do you solve the AFK cloaky camping problem without impacting cloak usage for everyone else? It is only a problem in null, mostly sov-null, so how do you solve that specific problem without hurting all the other legitimate uses of a cloak?
Also, where is it stated that someone must always be at the keyboard while they are logged into Eve?
Can I dock and walk away from my keyboard for hours?
Can I cloak in hi-sec 1000km off a stargate and take my dog for a walk without logging off?
If I’m roaming through null why can’t I cloak up in a safe spot out of d-scan range somewhere and take a nap? It’s not like there are a lot of player stations that will let me dock up for a bit of rest.
CCP will probably add observatories to the game. Probably only deployable in sov null. They will decloak people or something. It is an old idea they had.
But that is such a general comment that it is worthless, if you are talking about AFK cloaky camping then you are talking about a whole different set of tactics and strategies.
We agree it is empty, but many systems have been empty for years and years and year and yea and ye and y…
You are roaming, I don’t know if that is roaming as in looking to blow up stuff, or roaming as in seeing what you can find to do as in exploration. I have no idea. There is no one size fits all to when people decide to use AFK cloaky camping to force someone to leave. I have seen it done in different permutations, from being a solo / small gang being camped by a major alliance to being part of major AU TZ alliance that destroyed a so called major elite alliance when they did it to us.
I think that when they said that there is no counter they were really trying to say that there is no way to hunt them when they are AFK, whereas when people rat and mine while AFK I as a hunter would be very happy.
It is an issue in lowsec, NPC null and sov null. But this is the issue, as I used cloaks myself I am not happy with making cloaks use fuel.
I had two alternatives, my preferred was an AFK flag on the character in local if there was no interaction with the client for an hour. Bear in mind this is not to say that they are not there as such, but more to allow people to have a good idea of when they are active through intelligent observation, in other words it is not totally free intel and it can be gamed, but I am fine with that. I want people out in space doing stuff.
The second was some sort of structure with a wave time affect that had negatives effects or some long build up so could not be used that often but which would decloak the AFK cloaky camper. One it was fired the camper can cloak after the wave has dissipated. This means that you can go probe them down and kill them, or you gain intel when they are active. I would suggest that this structure be one use only and if one is fired the effect has to fully dissipate to be able to fire again.
Eve is the only game which does not force log off people after a certain period of inactivity.
Yes
Yes
Yes
Though I should warn you that at times the client may decloak you, has happened to people including myself, but thankfully for me it only happened when I was cloaked waiting out a cloaky camper. If you have the possibility always find a safe spot and safe log. That is what I did if I went AFK.
A bit of both, mostly the latter. Always solo. I’m not an expert nor do I know all the in & outs and what-have-yous of cloaky camping.
Your idea of an AFK flag isn’t bad, but could be as easily gotten around with a bot script. The structure idea is what I think the eventual fix will most likely look like. That would be a way of fixing the problem at it’s source
Sometimes I need to leave my computer while I am in null. I cloak up at a safe spot. I sometimes come back to many whiny, cowering comments in local about how I am a griefer and prevent people from playing the game. My guess is that only a fraction of these AFK cloak campers have any interest in dropping a cyno on the ratters. Most of them probably have no real interest in the local nullbears at all.
If a cloaky camper is stopping you from krabbing and you haven’t checked the fairly easy to obtain data on when they are active…you are kinda doing it wrong.
And what if it is not easy, an injected character with no kill mails and a creation date matched to your own and no corp change records. This is not exactly difficult to understand.
Of course one can bait them into revealing that. I suppose that this is my one failure as I hate giving easy kills away, so I would use something that I did not care about and they would not drop it. For me it did not bother me using low cost ships and the like, but it matters to other players. So to answer this question:
Because I wanted to do this with other players, and those other players could not handle it.
CCP are supposed to look for bots, of course there is the assumption that they would be checking for bots, I would hope that this would be a good way of clearing botters out. Because if someone is 24/24 7/7 active then it has to be a bot.
In short, zkill gives you a heatmap of player activity - when they are likely to be killing other players. The only way for this information to not be available is if the other player doesn’t kill other players. It could happen, but generally…you can see when people are active.
I have used this when I see a hostile character in system and have strong reason to think they are cloaky camping. I go hit zkill. I look what time it is in game…I look at the heat map and get a good idea if he is going to be active.
I think you ignored that. I am pretty sure that you don’t use your main as an AFK cloaky camping alt. Smart people create a new character with no kills to do this.
Meh…not going to get that worried about an unlikely scenario. And actually, no that has not been my experience. And you don’t have to use the rather expensive approach of using injectors, but instead can simply wait 90 days for the heat map to clear…oh wait that’s kind of costly too.
Still the zkill heatmaps gives many a quick and easy way to check when a player is active. And yet more super low cost intel…
They’ve nerfed cynos.
You have local which gives the resident an advantage to anyone entering system.
Zkill hands you information on a platter.
Yet…here we are, still complaining about cloaks. With a thread re-hashing ideas that are nearly as old as cloaks themselves. We’ve had the good ol’ “POS module” to open the thread. The silly combat probes suggestion…can we get a trifecta of a timer?
And given CCP’s boneheaded idea of scarcity…I think cloaks should get a buff. Lock and shoot while cloaked!!!
I know you think this is a piffling matter and all that, which is why you down play it. What you call an unlikely scenario is what certain AFK cloaky campers do, so no Zkill heatmap, so hardly given to you on a platter.
You say that they nerfed cyno’s, but not the covert cyno’s. Solo players or small groups really cannot deal with BLOP’s and the potential escalation from a force recon with a standard cyno on them for capitals. In my experience of Eve, many small groups get destroyed before they can grow as they are farmed until they give up.
I once got blanket AFK cloaky camped in Stain, with 14 alts placed in each system that I and others used, and the campers even account shared too. I saw the other players with me give up and leave the game or go back to hisec. I was not so much in their TZ, but they made special efforts for me at times.
The issue is that I was trying to develop a small gang in out of the way places to have localised fights with other small groups, something I really enjoyed in 2010. If it is ruined or blocked by this why continue, so much of nullsec stays empty and most people just muck around in hisec because at least they can fly around without this type of play used against them.
So go all sarcastic about it, as you like to do on this subject. But for me one thing I would like to do is go back in Stain and operate like I did in 2010, but I know that it would just be the same AFK boring cloaky camping lame boring game play, and I would rather watch paint dry.
But if that is what Eve is too you then enjoy, most people will not partake of this type of rubbish.
Lighting a cyno requires some preparation. The attackers will have at least 5 minutes preparation time to get everyone ready once they see a possible target. The defenders will have a preparation time of maybe half a minute tops, if the ship hasn’t died by then, if they need to form as a reaction to the cyno.
Unless you think any group of people in null of any size should be required to have ~20 people on standby at all times people are doing things in systems with cloaky campers, just to counter a couple afk people.
This is my issue with afk cloaky camping. The counterplay is there, but it’s so completely disproportional in the required amount of effort that it’s ridiculous.
I get the feeling you’re talking about capital ships. Those may survive until a batphone comes, provided you have a batphone.
Not sure if you’re aware, but this game has subcapital ships too without the millions of EHP to wait out a batphone.
And that helps… how exactly?
I get that if people go AFK in station rather than play the game they cannot be dropped on, but that doesn’t really seem like a good solution to me to be honest.
Im talking about literally anything that can be bridged or cyno’d in.
I mean, we are back to talking about that because, again, except for dropping cloak and cynoing a fleet, theres not really a lot they can do.
If you were Cloaked up waiting to call in your fleet, and there was one of theirs not in station and not on Dscan but in Local, you wouldnt think twice?
Im just bored of this interminal back and forth about something that in the grand scheme really doesnt matter, Im just trying to spice it up a bit.
