Main AFK cloaky thread

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
765

Watching local and docking at the first sign of someone entering is not “taking action”, it’s “running away like cowards”. Hiding behind an intel network run by others is not “taking action”, it’s “being cowards”.

Carebears do not take action, ever. Complaining on the forums is not “taking action”, it’s “crying like a spoiled brat”.

Grant me two sincere questions, Mike:

  1. Do you honestly believe that this constant arguing is going to achieve anything at all?

  2. Do you believe that the crabbers, who demand perfect safety, will benefit from Observatory Arrays?

Thanks!

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766

  1. Most likely not. The Devs come from the same ranks as the gankbears, and laugh off any other playstyle.

  2. I tend to think Observatory Arrays, as presented will be a bad fit or else go too far. On the one hand, if they are alliance level structures that require alliance level resources to put up and maintain then they are out of reach of the bottom rungs of player and will change things only for big alliances. If they allow precise location of cloaks they will indeed become the KILL CLOAKER button other whiners fear. At one end of the spectrum there will be no change because no one will PvE outside of their active influence. As soon as it goes down people will get out of space. If it can’t find them there be no change, if it can find them then it’s a KILL CLOAKER button, and if it’s not available as a personal deployable type structure only the rich will have it.

I support the idea in it’s own right, but I don’t view Local and cloaks being linked in any important way. Regardless of how the Observatory Array turns out, the issues surrounding cloaking and it’s mechanics will still need adjusting.

Having answered your questions, return the favor. How do you reconcile flying properly, staying aware of your surroundings and getting to safety in the presence of hostiles as not taking action while supporting AFK cloaking? One requires constant vigilance and a modicum of effort on the part of the player, the other is utterly passive and completely safe.

767

This is not an answer to my question, Mike. It has less to do with the devs, and more with the delusion of believing that argujng about a topic, which is being argued for years, leads anywhere.

  1. Sounds about right. It is interesting how you defend those who only exist, because they are being protected from natural selection. No offense intended, but evolution would remove such people, simply because they are unable to defend themselves and require protection, or a place to hide. It’s very unhuman, actually.

I return the favour. Fair is fair. :slight_smile:

Looking at local and clicking warp is not equal to “being aware of your surroundings”. This isn’t vigilantism, Mike. it’s looking at a box containing text. Same for intel networks. It’s having a textbox open. There is no effort in that, no actual vigilantism.

Vigilantism demands that there are dangers around, otherwise one would not need to be vigilant. When they dock up, as soon as someone enters the system, then they aren’t vigilant, because before someone entered there was no danger around at all.

it seems extremely weird that you equalize “clicking warp to hide” with “taking action”.

That’s actually interesting, you know? You think they’re vigilant, but it’s the opposite.

I am actually sure you will agree with me, when i tell you that actual vigilantism would be when they stayed outside and looked out for themselves and their surroundings (in space, literally around them), despite the afk cloaker being in system, no?

I have no personal opinion on afk cloaking. From what i see is it the only thing that keeps carebears, who want to play in perfect safety in the second most dangerous space, from playing in perfect safety in the second most dangerous space.

768

Difference in perspective. I don’t know how you can say the question isn’t answered.

I see those being protected from natural selection as those hiding under the perfect safety of the cloak. They are so fragile that even the possibility of having to move around once in a while sends them into panicked declamations of how it’s impossible to hunt when people can hunt you in return. In fact, there are many species that rely on symbiotic relationships for protection and shelter, and this is no different. You have your playstyle, and greatly desire for weaker or defenseless foes to charge under your guns for ‘gud fights’. You have an issue with those that don’t choose to oblige you.

I’m not arguing for change. I’m arguing because the opposing position is completely devoid of logic. I am absolutely willing to accept actual logically consistent points, and have done so more than once over the years. I accept things as they are, it’s the claims that those things are in any way not biased towards one golden child playstyle that gall me. Each time I have returned to this thread it was because the same old debunked arguments were being tossed to a new batch of folks seeking change.

The test of If they had to take action is simple. Go into space with hostiles without a cloak and wander away from your keyboard. Now do the same with a cloak active. Without the cloak you had to take an action to stay safe, with the cloak you did not, or more accurately I suppose you could say you were allowed to take preemptive action that remains persistent indefinitely. Thus without a cloak you have to maintain at least a modicum of vigilance. Sure, it could be worse, you could be hitting Dscan like a rabid ferret every 5 seconds or some BS like that, but in an area of space that’s supposed to be about empire building you should be able to actually build an empire— and the first step in doing that is protecting your citizens from hostiles.

769

I made this point once before. If you make say 1 billion ISK and in doing so, on average, lose 200 million ISK, you are ISK positive. You are still ahead. The caterwauling from the anti-cloak side of the discussion was astounding. It is like these people just do not understand things like cost-benefit analysis.

No, it is a question of not creating more problems to try and fix one problem. Let’s assume cloaking is a problem. What is the cost of fixing them. If:

Cost(do nothing) < Cost(fixing),

then leave cloaks alone. People are quite clearly saying the following:

Nerf cloaks and you adversely effect various activities…that are nowhere on your butthurt list. Are you telling me that all of these activities are problems and all of them need a nerf? If so, fine. But get out there and make the f***ing arguments. Sit down and tell us why a guy hauling all his new T2 modules he just invented needs to have his game nerfed. Why the guy doing exploration needs to have his game nerfed. And do it for all uses of cloaks.

Yes! Lets nerf exploration because of this extreme argument based on complete and utter Bravo Sierra.

They’ll still be here whining like bitches. If I show up in system and roll safes looking for a target of opportunity and they have zero chance of catching me, all that will happen is the whining will change.

No, they’ll complain that their intel network is being attacked, that they have to defend it…or they’ll let others do it for them, and free ride off the efforts of others. This is why those who put in the effort look down on those who free ride, BTW.

Well, in a literal sense it is taking action–i.e. doing something/anything. But if the “action” is dock up and wait for the bad men to go away you are right, it is not much at all.

Now, docking up, getting into that covert ops cloaking ship (oh the f***ing irony) or maybe an interceptor, and putting eyes on those guys, and alerting people to their presence and helping organize a counter fleet…that is something else entirely. But from what I can tell from Mike’s responses…this second kind of action, why that is beyond the pale.

Let me fix this for you.

Without the cloak you had to take an action to stay safe, with the cloak you did not, or more accurately I suppose you could say you were allowed to take preemptive action that remains persistent indefinitely so long as I do nothing but sit a safe spot and scare people because they see me in local.

There, fixed.

770

I see your points. I can address this with logic. It’s actually easy.

First, though, you have to realize that those who hide are those who would never play this game if they can’t play it in perfect safety. I can explain why that is the case.

You also need to realize that the issue is independent of the afk cloaker, because what makes the crabbers dock up is actually a person in local. (i am not advocating for nerfing local, i am pointing out the fact that as soon as someone enters local, the crabbers dock up). It could as well just be a wormhole traveller jumping in. The outcome would be the same: the crabbers dock.

I see mistakes in your thinking.

You say that afk cloakers are the ones who would be naturally selected out and i agree up to a point. That point is the fact that those who hide in station now, will still hide in station then. (“then” being a change that would allow people to hunt afk cloakers). There is zero reason to assume that this would happen (the hunting), because not every afk cloaker is an actual threat.

That’s the thing, really.

The following points are absolutely true:

  • As soon as someone enters local, the crabbers dock up.

  • Every afk cloaker is only an unconfirmed threat, until the threat is actually confirmed.
    There is no way for anyone to tell if the afk cloaker actually has backup behind him, or if he does it just to piss off the crabbers.

  • There are people willing to attempt to confirm that the cloaker is a threat.
    Those afk cloakers who are an empty threat then become confirmed as empty threat. Those afk cloakers who indeed are a threat then become confirmed as actual threat, which leads to a big fight, which is cool.

  • There are people unwilling to attempt confirmation.
    These people treat the the idea of a threat as actual threat, despite not knowing if the actual threat exists. It is the idea that there might be a threat, which causes them to hide in station.

The problem is not local, not the afk cloaker, not anyone jumping in.

The problem is that those who demand that afk cloakers vanish are those who would not hunt the afk cloakers in the first place. Even if the afk cloaker was huntable, he could still have backup behind him. As he could still have backup behind him, they will not try to hunt him and kill him.

You wrongly assume that those who claim they want to be able to hunt them will actually do so. There is zero evidence that this is the case, because they are also unwilling to actually find out if the cloaker is indeed an actual threat, and because the crabbers dock up as soon as anyone enters the crabber’s system without passing through systems covered by intel.

Conclusion:

The actual problem is that cowards demand that there is no actual danger. Remove the cowards, and you remove the problem.

Proof: there are people out there who attempt to confirm if the idea of a threat indeed is an actual threat. THEY are the only ones who actually have ground for complaining about the afk cloaker. Anyone who is not willing to attempt to confirm the threat has NO ground to complain, because these people dock up as soon as anyone enters the system, including a lucky noob who managed to reach it by accident.

Also:

The distinction into “playstyles” is invalid. There is no “perfect safety” playstyle, just like there is no “PvE only” playstyle. There are rules and base mechanics in EVE. It is neither within the rules of the game, nor within the mechanics of the game to play outside of the PvP environment.

The idea of “play styles” has emerged from carebears who, very often, attempt to use individualism as argument to justify their existence. Individuality is not an argument for anything, otherwise it could be used as argument for everything.

Carebears only do one thing: PvE. PvPers on the other hand usually do both. PvPers are inclusive, PvErs are exclusive. This is another reason why no change to afk cloaking would lead to a desired result, unless the result leads to perfect safety. Carebears very often make the mistake to believe that PvPers only PvP, because they themselves only PvE. It’s nonsense. There are no “PvE play styles” in a PvP sandbox. There is the opportunity to PvE, but there is no option to opt out of the rules of the game.

Those who you defend, though, are the same who want to ignore the rules and mechanics of the game. They hide as soon as someone enters local, and stay there even if the person who entered is not an actual afk cloaker, but a rookie in a noobship.

This whole diacussion exists only, because there are people who demand to play in perfect safety. Over the years they came up with all kinds of reasons and arguments, and “we’re not able to hunt them” is the current meta. There are people who bait them, successfully (one way or another) which is just like hunting. There is no serious excuse for not attempting baiting them, at all. The typical carebear excuse is that he is an idea of a threat, therefore they do not undock. They would never undock, though, even if they could hunt him, because he could be an actual threat.

I feel like this went way too far. Fact of the matter is that this is all a scam. Carebears do not ever stop until there is perfect safety. Highsec is the perfect example for that. The meta for complaining simply shifts towards something else, until a nerf happens, which of course will not be enough, because there sti.l isn’t perfect safety.

I’ve been looking at this for years. The carebear issue, not afk cloaking. It is always the same. Always. And maybe i should make this post proper once i had some sleep, because right now it’s a ■■■■■■■ mess. I’ve covered pretty much everything, but it doesn’t really connect together well. I admit that, but i have a good excuse: 22h of being awake, of which i spent around an hour typing this.

Seriously, Mike,see things from the perspective of the carebear being a coward. That’s what they are. Evidence is easily found in this thread, or post, or every thread about their safety. It is not about hunting afk cloakers at all, no. They will not ever do that. Ever. Small alliances have no downsides to afk cloakers, unless (and this is of course true) the afk cloaker is an actually confirmed threat, and there are small alliances who attempt to bait and confirm if he is or isn’t.

Local is fine.
AFK cloaking is fine.
Just get rid of the tiny minority that is complaining, and most problems cease to exkst.

Good night. :slight_smile:

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771

Indeed. In regards to the first one I showed how one could use probability theory and Bayes theorem to arrive at such a conclusion. It would not be absolute, but the probability that the person is AFK could be quite high.

As for the second one, again true. Mike has repeatedly stated that for him treating a possible threat as anything other than an actual threat is stupid and refuses to do anything else.

Again correct. When the anti-cloak side bring up cynos they always argue that the cyno will bring through an unlimited number of ships and since they cannot know how many ships will come through the best course of action is to assume an overwhelming response and to not engage.

Heh…

This I absolutely agree with.

772

It’s quite funny to think of this happening (as you say, it never would). If it actually did happen I can guarantee the first thing WH folks would do is drop a bait cloaky into a viable NS system and have a fleet on the other side of the hole waiting…

773

holy S**t , I don’t look at the forum for a few days and get this sort of response , ok then .

A ceptor is never untouchable , even burning to nowhere they are still at risk because they can be seen and probed . So I am unsure why you would make that point but ok .

Could you please teach the rest of us this how this cloaky gameplay works , as clearly we don’t know as much as yourself ?

774

Man this thread is a cesspit. It just goes round and round.

Personally I think the problem is quite obviously in that both 100% accurate local intel and 100% unbeatable cloack are pretty bad game mechanics.

It is also quite obvious that the playerbase is never going to agree on a solution. The only thing this thread can do is convince CCP that the problem exists. It is a high impact high effort situation to fix. I think one day they finally find the guts to implement a new system. In 5 years time or so, results may vary.

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775

I’m sorry, this is unreasonable. I believe there is no delay between uncloaking and lighting a regular cyno (I’ve only been on the receiving end of these drops, so if there is please correct me). You’re asking a pilot with no warning who’s likely engaged in PvE to unlock his current targets, lock a ship that appeared out of nowhere and kill it before his fleet can bridge through the cyno.

You CAN do this with a regular cyno ship… a corpmate of mine pulled it off the other day. He killed the ship with the cyno only being up for a second or two (not enough for the fleet to bridge). But he had the warning of local, d-scan, and seeing the ship warp on to grid.

Maybe if you added a 10 second delay between uncloaking and activating a regular cyno, then mantra of "just destroy the ship) might work.

776

I think they should just remove cloaks from the game or maybe introduce some sort of afk fatigue mechanic :upside_down_face::rofl:

777

And I find your lack of flexibility unreasonable.

If you’re being camped, do what we do and I can promise you the campers will move on in short order:

  1. Always rat in groups. Yes that affects your ticks, no that’s not something that matters. You’d be AMAZED how fast a cyno ship pops when 3 gank-fit cruisers (or carriers!) light it up. Don’t pop it too fast though, you want them to bridge in. If you’re ratting in carriers, you each keep one tube of SS fighters loaded and ready to launch. If they bridge in carriers, you abandon your DPS fighters and start doing SS in all tubes - because they’ll be fit for dps 9 times out of 10, which gives you a huge advantage.
  2. Have reinforcements on standby. If you have fax alts and similar, have them ready to undock and jump to your counter-cyno.
  3. When they drop on you, kill them. It’s really that simple.

#2 is optional as your reinforcements may all be out ratting. 1 and 3 are not. If you are unable to do 1 and 3, get more friends or go back to lowsec.

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778

I’d suggest you comment on things you actually have a clue about, instead of talking about things you don’t, trying to make it look like you would. Only makes you look like a clueless idiot to all those that have half a clue.

You can probe him and see him, but you won’t catch him.

Plenty of people in here know how it works. It’s the great majority of the “nerf cloaking” people like yourself that don’t have a clue, as evidenced by all the ridiculous “suggestions” on how to fix a play style they know nothing about.

779

Look… It’s almost impossible to lock a covert cyno ship before the cyno is up and the ships bridge in. And that’s with knowing that they’re in system and being prepared to lock and kill them as soon as they uncloak.

Without that warning that they’re present… the “almost” pretty much goes away. And unlike a scram where the uncloaking ship has to wait 5-10 seconds (depending on skills) before they can start to target you, a cyno can be lit immediately after uncloaking.

It’s simply not a realistic defense to lighting a cyno to say “kill them first”. You probably aren’t going to be able to LOCK them… let alone apply any damage… before the cyno goes up. It’s not about how fast they die once you start applying damage… it’s that by the time you begin applying damage the jump to the cyno is already in progress.

As for #3… that’s great in theory. But if the only people who ever ratted or mined were those with the ability to kill any potential droppers a decent percentage of the time… we’d have maybe 3-5 alliances in null who would be ratting.

Which wouldn’t be huge thing I guess… we’d just all be joining Goons or PL or whoever. But the donut would be getting bluer as a result.

780

I can promise you whatever bridges in will be gank fit. Bombers, recons, even blops BBs, they all die incredibly fast. They aren’t built for fighting, they’re built for ganking. So give them a fight and they’ll lose.

You don’t have to destroy their cyno before they jump in, like I said previously it’s better if they do jump in. That gives you a chance to whelp them so they’ll go away.

That warning like… local? When there’s a neut in local, you follow my 3 step program to cloakycamper freedom.

You don’t need to kill the cyno, that’s just the ■■■■ you to put on top of it all. What you need to do is whelp their drop.

Last time bombers bar dropped on us, they dropped somewhere around 50 bombers and at least half a dozen supporting recons. We repelled them with 15 dudes in carriers. They outnumbered us 4 to one and they noped out as fast as they could.

Why? Because our carriers were all ratting in pvp fits.

You fixate on the cyno. Don’t. Fixate on killing their blob. It will die fast, because it’s 100% offensively focused. A 50/50 split between offense and defense, heaven forbid some logistics and you’ll annihilate them. They will never drop on you again, especially if you can cyno in your own reinforcements from somewhere they weren’t expecting.

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781

't was fun posting in here, tbh, but in the end is it obvious that there’s only one side winning this, and it’s not the carebears. :blush:

782

Once again, difference in perspective.

It’s clear that you don’t feel that anyone not interested in a purely battlefield style PvP experience has a valid playstyle. That does not sit well with a sandbox game.

There is no reason why a team of players-- we will call it a corporation, for the sake of discussion-- can’t have individuals that specialize in activities best suited to their temperament and ability. Some might choose to mine or rat, others might choose the defend them. In a sandbox both choices are equally valid. Those that specialize in PvE have, or at least should have, other options than playing your game in your way, because it’s a sandbox that is supposed to allow for many different choices.

It’s a common point in the pro-cloak crowd that null is supposed to be the most dangerous space (or 2nd most dangerous after wormholes, mileage varies)… and it is, in that it has both the strongest NPC’s and fewest restrictions on player aggression. However, that’s just a condition of the space, not it’s purpose. The purpose has always been empire building. That’s why you can put your name on it. The idea is that players would serve all the functions for those that want to live there that the NPC governments do in High Sec. So if you can’t defend your space, what’s the point of owning it in the first place? I suspect that for players like yourself it’s so that they can have other people to play Battlefield in space with. Problem is, we are playing a sandbox game, not a generic pointless shooter.

So take it from the other end. Try viewing the game from the perspective that the carebears aren’t cowards, they just don’t like the kind of gameplay you are trying to force on them. Rather than play it your way and charging ‘bravely’ under your guns for destruction, they employ evasion as their primary defensive tactic so as to allow those among their allies that do enjoy that playstyle to deal with that aspect of the game. This should be a Win for all involved, except that the gankbears are cowards who want to fight but only if their targets are helpless against them.

None of that touches on Cloaks or the ‘logic’ of their current balance however. Other than that you don’t feel that those who don’t play the game your way are worthy of playing the game at all, I still don’t see how you can reconcile considering PvE players cowards while condoning and even supporting those using cloaks to stay safe in space.

783

No one will win this.

Despite dev commentary to the contrary I have personally IRL played with over a dozen people over the years, and personally spoken to a great many more who all signed up for a Space mmoRPG as it was advertised, and left due to the overwhelming tilt to the game in favor of the predatory pvp playstyles. I knew a few who let their subs run out right after they started hiring devs from the big alliances because the writing was on the wall as far as they were concerned.

AFK cloaking is only a very small part of that, but the culture that supports it is largely as Toxic as it gets, and that’s what drives people away.

784

Only one of these groups is on the forums trying to remove the playstyle of the other.

Certainly cloakers want to kill PVE players but they’d never come to the forums asking for PVE to be removed.

PVE players don’t want to be killed, but rather than take in-game steps they chose to try to step outside of the game and have the developers eliminate the cloaker.

That’s the difference.