Patch When? #1 - Dev Diary - Cloaks

[Egon Bigmemes]

so are you refunding cloak disruptors, or what

[Couden]

So cloak is now must have on silent 5ker?

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[Sombs]

All that would have been required to do is to make cloaks drop the energy core instead of shields. I appreciate the effort but I don't think this change is going to have the wanted effect.

Maybe this could become a separate type of cloaking modules? Keep the old ones but change them to eat power core so buttcloaking is generally not possible anymore, but people still have their "defensive cloaks" for escaping, while these new "ambush cloaks" remain a new option?

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[HormoonVrijeKoe]

I do like this change ! Looking forward to more of these posts !!!
PS: just ignore the negativity, you guys are doing great in my opinion !

[Lusitano]

All that would have been required to do is to make cloaks drop the energy core instead of shields. I appreciate the effort but I don't think this change is going to have the wanted effect.

agree. this is way better solution to end buttcloaking, and leave all the rest as it was.

[Chenzo-]

Art by @Kauket

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Hello! This and more upcoming Patch When posts are intended as a sort of preview for the new patch features, hopefully dropping the number of posts asking stuff questions like "Why is my cloak randomly going off?", "Why are my Jump Drive coordinates from 2015 not working?" or "Why did my BC randomly die while still at 20% HP?"


Well, today we are going over the first thing on the menu:

Spoiler

CLOAKS

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The cloaks by their very nature are intended to make other players unable to interact with the cloaked player. While this still holds true in their newer version, it is very much not as drastic as it used to be. This cloak rework involves quite a number of changes aimed at making them less about butt-cloaking (you know who you are) and annoying people with that annoying bleep that you can't get rid of without a piece of specialised equipment. They now involve some decision making and (limited) counterplay.

Requirements simplification:

Cloaks will no longer use storage space to determine if a ship is capable of using it, leading to some weird outliers. They will be simply be hard-locked to specific ship classes:

• Cloak Mk1 - Fighters, Bombers, Freighters
  
• Cloak Mk2 - Gunboats, Cruisers
  
• Cloak Mk3 - Battlecruisers, Battleships
  
• Cloak Mk4 - Transports
  

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Means of Detection:

Easily one of the most impactful changes: Cloaks now go offline if a non-grouped player gets within a certain radius of you. The radius of the detection is currently as follows for human cloaks (obviously subject to change):

• Cloak Mk1 - 1500m
  
• Cloak Mk2 - 3000m
  
• Cloak Mk3 - 4500m
  
• Cloak Mk4 - 3000m
  

Here we can see a sneaky Outcast being detected by a random Zoner passing by. This does mean that the very concept of butt-cloaking is going away for good, as while you CAN get into a superior position using cloaks, you can't just unload your cerbs/siege guns on an enemy that just so happened not to have a Cloak Disruptor on them.



"But wait, didn't you say 'non-grouped players'? What about them?" - Excellent question! The answer is that they receive a sound notification very similar to the cloak alert that currently graces our ears. Except we just use the cloak sounds instead.



Yes, now we can cancel that otolaryngologist appointment! Moving on, we have:

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Fuel Usage:

Now we get to the second big change: Cloaks no longer have a static lifespan upon activation. Instead, they work similarly to how invisibility cloak worked in Crysis games: Standing still lets you conserve your batteries for a LONG time, roughly an hour, whereas running (cruising) drains your reserves drastically, and using a TL drops the cloak lifespan to single-digit seconds. The way it works behind the scenes is we're using a quadratic formula, where X is the ship's speed:

fuelUsage = ax^2 + bx + c

Most cloaks are set in a way where standing still on a full bank lasts you 60 minutes, impulse(+thruster for mk1) lasts you 20-25, and cruising lasts you below 10 minutes. That way you have to decide if you want to traverse a larger distance, but moving at a lower speed, or if you want to sprint, but compromise your ability to maintain the cloak for longer.

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The Bugfixes:

Sadly, the Fun Police also found out about the changes being made and demanded a fix for the semi-transparency bug, so it had to go. Goodnight, sweet prince. The bugfix for missiles tracking cloaked ships is also coming back after being reverted shortly after deploying a few months back.

Some of you may have noticed how I only talked about human cloaks. Alien cloaks have separate 'stats' to them, but you'll have to wait until the patch to see for yourself what quirks hey might have!

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Hope you enjoyed this first instalment in the series! Next one on the list is Docking Bays, coming Very Soon™!
* Sooner than the patch, I swear

Aingar,

From my personal interaction you have never once been unfair to anyone and your code fixes, help and patience are up there are top of the field.

You’re also the dude that codes stuff really well so again, Kudos.

This one however, feels like a LOT of work has gone into a solution to a problem which could have been fixed much easier.

Upon uncloaking, you have zero energy for 30+ seconds- Problem solved?

I do like the cargo space not being eaten by cloaks too, that’s very cool. Also the use less fuel when not moving etc, very cool.

The whole point of a cloak is to be undetectable, so you uncloak when you get close kinda ruins it.. Well, not kinda- Entirely.

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[Toaster]

Getting automatically uncloaked by proximity means you can't just sit there in cloak and go AFK for an hour but have to actually keep an eye on things and maybe even move once in a while to maintain minimum distance. It gives others an actual chance to find you without having to splurge on a cloak disruptor, wasting a perfectly good countermeasure slot in the process.

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Olivia Sable

[Chenzo-]

Getting automatically uncloaked by proximity means you can't just sit there in cloak and go AFK for an hour but have to actually keep an eye on things and maybe even move once in a while to maintain minimum distance. It gives others an actual chance to find you without having to splurge on a cloak disruptor, wasting a perfectly good countermeasure slot in the process.

Who cloaks and goes AFK? Cloaks are for hiding or getting past hostile players un noticed…

Even if for some reason a AFK person cloaked was to exist, who cares? They’re AFK, they can’t do anything…

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[Kauket]

Getting automatically uncloaked by proximity means you can't just sit there in cloak and go AFK for an hour but have to actually keep an eye on things and maybe even move once in a while to maintain minimum distance. It gives others an actual chance to find you without having to splurge on a cloak disruptor, wasting a perfectly good countermeasure slot in the process.

Who cloaks and goes AFK? Cloaks are for hiding or getting past hostile un noticed…

Even if for some reason a AFK cloaked was to exist, who cares? They’re AFK, they can’t do anything…

To eavesdrop/spy.

[Chenzo-]

Getting automatically uncloaked by proximity means you can't just sit there in cloak and go AFK for an hour but have to actually keep an eye on things and maybe even move once in a while to maintain minimum distance. It gives others an actual chance to find you without having to splurge on a cloak disruptor, wasting a perfectly good countermeasure slot in the process.

Who cloaks and goes AFK? Cloaks are for hiding or getting past hostile un noticed…

Even if for some reason a AFK cloaked was to exist, who cares? They’re AFK, they can’t do anything…

To eavesdrop/spy.

But then they’re AFK so no harm done?

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