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Cloaking devices are the most sticky and disgusting devices in "fair" play. The closest game i know. (that people are actually playing) close to this mod is a game called evochron mercenary.

One. You buy a cloaking generator that works hell or high water for 180 seconds. There are no cap-ships in evochron.

Two. Star trek online.. You cannot cloak while in a fight. Unless you have a special battle cloak that shuts your shields down. Bonus to damage when you de cloak for surprise attack effect.

Three. Neverwinter Nights. (the most abused cloak called Hide, in, plain.sight or HIPS. I personally put a cool down timer on my servers HIPS usage because for melee fighters to compete fairly.. they would have to make sure of mage powers.. damage shields.. area of effects. A mage could be screwed if his spell doesn't finish when the target HIPS.. Infact if a wizard cast an area of effext spell like hellball.. the ball will rubber band back to the caster.. and then much rage would ensue.

There are other examples however with the current system in place and the fact that cloaks are beginning to saturate the mod as is. its apparent how the system leaves out the.. natural abilities of ....well Nomads.



Subject: Nomad Cloaks.

In rp

watch this or play single player.

instances for the cloak to exist appears in Liberty and Rhineland technology. The rhiendland cloaks looks nomad..with purple arching energy.. the osirus cloak looks more unique and more -human-.

Other servers.

other servers as early as 2006 offered cloaking fighters, specific ships, and nomad vessels that could cloak, but the community has shrunk and specialized over time. Comparing how 88flak or crossfire has done their cloaks doesn't speak to Discos balance aspect as.. quite frankly those other mods reach and run differently and are designed for different players.

The vast majority cloak and shut down the shields as the only balancing point. no fuel used.. again however.. fighters. im unaware of any capships in these mods that cloak.

The past

Long long time ago.. freelancer modding treated clocking devices and cloak modding as cheat modding. WITHOUT the glory of flhook however.. they were right. People could do.. alot of.. serious and terrible crap that made multiplay a serious pain int he butt.

Since FLhook anti cloak, anti cheat, anti jerk is a reality. Though when i was a simple server policeman. all i did was ban anyone who cheat modded. and i wore the button out every weekend some NOOB HAD TO THINK HE WAS SO DAMN SMART TO AMKE HIS STARFLIER CLOAK AND POOP ENEMY RHEINLAND BATTLESHIPS.

But I digress.

We have cloaks... for humans. .... and I am always asked. (not exsagerating) as to when we will get in on this ..thing..

So i have crafted this perposal against the grain of my previous server administration headaches. Im a good Mommy nom. I want my nom kids to have all the best in which to continue to do our job as Scary evil blue aliens.


The Nomad cloak:

Model A: Tied to the ID. Cloak on: shuts down shields and gun energy. Unlimited duration. Disruptable?

-makes offensive use difficult
-makes defensive use likely


Model B: Tied to the ID. Cloak on: Shuts down shields. Duration Depends on Gun energy. Disruptable?

-offensive use likely
-defensive use likely


Model C: Tied to a generator, uses special nomad components, Burns a fuel? Similar to the human cloak.

-offensive use highly likely
-defensive use highly likely
-Adding a nomad "gas station".


Model D: Tied to id,Cloak On: Cuts shields, Unlimited duration. Cloak off: Stalls Cruise, begins 180+ timer cool down before reactivation.
Disruptable?
100% shields needed to start?

-Surprise attack tool forces a commit to a fight.
-Defensively weak if engaged.

In how I've seen the cloak used in common encounters of an unlawful nature is that they can help you get the hell out when you need to.

This however... isn't so much a concern for the nomad RP, because their minds are separate from their ships. (at this point) being blown up is often a factor in our assaults or when being attacked. Therefore to bring the nomads into a terrorizing force. We need a cloak that can facilitate a strike and give those being attacked (if their fast and organised) a way to fight us off.

This is why I like Model D.

If there is going to be additional countermeasures to cloaks like disruption from CD or.. somehow being able to cooldown or keep the cloak off if the shields are below 50% (ie Engaged) this can keep us from running from a fight if the above is satisfied IE if we OURSELVES are surprised attacked.. we cant just cloak.

I would like the devs to review this seriously as a Dev did ask me to perpose it. I was going to regaurdless.. however.. well. when you have faction members, fans?, community, AND a few devs wondering. well. why not bring it up?

that does sound like a good idea i mean Nomads can almost all cloak in the story line or be cloaked near a batteship so if Nomads were the first to use Cloaks why dont they have them built in i mean it would make sense since none of there "Equipment" is actualy " Equipment" more of a "Growth"

Interesting in theory, but in the end it'd just cause certain people to abuse such tech for PvP whoring. I'm in favor of the Nommies getting a cloak of their own, tied to the ID (can be handled through the tech nerf plugin) that can simply be bought, but is statwise equal to the human version, aside from availability. I do not see Nomads needing to maintain playerbases.

Those would need to burn fuel like anyone other. Assign Liquid Cardamine as fuel source. Assign Liquid Cardamine for sale on all Nom bases. Would be my suggestion.

Like Doleo says

Quote:just cause certain people to abuse such tech for PvP whoring.

,

Why for someone "chosen" had that type of cloak and others no? ... no point

' Wrote:Interesting in theory, but in the end it'd just cause certain people to abuse such tech for PvP whoring. I'm in favor of the Nommies getting a cloak of their own, tied to the ID (can be handled through the tech nerf plugin) that can simply be bought, but is statwise equal to the human version, aside from availability. I do not see Nomads needing to maintain playerbases.

Those would need to burn fuel like anyone other. Assign Liquid Cardamine as fuel source. Assign Liquid Cardamine for sale on all Nom bases. Would be my suggestion.

This is good suggestion, indeed saving time not to build base and not to build base module, not to supply base without needing to grind resources for cloak, with 100% availability and 100% security without the chance to get your cloak source destroyed. This is already ton advantages for the Nomad players.
My bet- give nomad players(1) non-destructible base(2) that requires no supply(3)- already 3 advantages.
And then give nomads small nomad transp- or wild one with 2000 cargo and good offensive features- cloaks should need humans- different kind of pilots and goods- considerably less then the human cloaks but with a way more different types of goods- so it would make the nomad players actually to work for their cloaks like the other players , they cost money and are buy-able- a way too simple for them showing again that they got more advantages and are more "elite" then the normal players.

Good idea!

Nomads should get a own cloak.

And Osiris should get the vanilla cloak! inmo all human capital ships should get vanilla Osiris cloak, and nomads a own cloak. but nevermind...

Bases have no IFF, so why can't Nomad players just be like everyone else and build themselves cloaks on some random base? This is happening all over around.

Also just turn any cloak mounted on nomad ship into nomad cloak automatically or by console command like /possess or something. And we're fairly done. It will give nomads a nomad-like cloak that looks and works like all other's cloaks but eats liquid Cardi and something else like MOX (new commodity?) to work good with heavy cloaks.

Problem of giving nomads an advantage: infinite whine will appear shortly ending up in this advantage being removed anyway, so why to bother, let it be equal.

' Wrote:Model A: Tied to the ID. Cloak on: shuts down shields and gun energy. Unlimited duration. Disruptable?

-makes offensive use difficult
-makes defensive use likely

I support model A. In that way the cloak will do what it have to do: to remove you from the battle without giving you seconds to keep fighting. It make sense the nomad cloak to shut down nearly all vital "nerver systems" of the nomad: removing the protective micro organisms (aka shield) , stops the "blood stream" of the nomad (aka all guns cant fire plasma flows).
I like how this can be implemented in the RP.

' Wrote:Assign Liquid Cardamine as fuel source. Assign Liquid Cardamine for sale on all Nom bases. Would be my suggestion.

You can ask Huggi how many times I proposed the nomad cloaks to drain Liquid Cardmine. We all know that nomads wont receive something special but what is a good idea to make the nomad cloaks unique or original/different from the human equipment is the Fuel Drain Formula.

How about if the drain rate for Liquid Cardmine is 1 per 10 sec? In that way a standart fighter can be invisible for ~1min which is still not enough to keep a proper RP. Something like that would be great.


. The nomad body/shells are surrounded by micro organisms that can allow the alien to imitate the surrounding space just like chameleon. The nomads always had these "cells" given by Dom K'vosh. Right now the nomads are closed faction which means control of the faction's equipment is always a priority. Abusements and mistakes could lead to players removed from the faction and yet...so far nobody was kicked away because whoever joins is most of the time a good player.

Quote:And then give nomads small nomad transp- or wild one with 2000 cargo and good offensive features

Are you really serious about your own thoughts? A nomad...TRANSPORT. The nomads building bases is totaly wrong. They have all their super natural bases already constructed from where a secret technology can be taken. They ALREADY have that technology. Why would they want to rebuild it again?

To be sincere;

Nomads are a special faction. They should be special. It is like playing the "Borg" in Star Trek Online or playing Jon Irenicus in Baldur's Gate 2.

They are the main antagonist, no matter how much the initial dev team tried to change it to some French house (no offense). Therefore, them having a special treatment with special regulations to limit their abuse should always be the case.

Some poeple have grudge against the Nomad faction because they weren't invited / accepted regarding their RP, and willing to turn it into another normal faction.

Trying to put Nomad faction in the same shoes of a regular trading faction by saying "let them build a base and produce cloaks" is plain stupid. Sorry.

It is as stupid and as delusional as saying "Wha? Sony has more people and resources but pays taxes, so should a suicide bomber!!one11!".

Give the god darn aliens what they deserve coming from the F.IN GAME'S CORE DESIGN.

And stop being jealous (For those who are. If you ask, no one is, but I personally met people who actually are through my years in Disco)

And for those who didn't get an acceptance to the restricted Keepers faction: Get.Over.It.

' Wrote:Some poeple have grudge against the Nomad faction because they weren't invited / accepted regarding their RP, and willing to turn it into another normal faction.

Yes, that's the reason. Totally not balance nor faction activity issues. I do have a grudge against people who claim everyone has grudges against someone though.

Let me describe a situation. It was not fun when a group of 2-3 nomad lf uberpwnzors come in, can't be killed, not because of skill but because of just how stupidly overpowered the ship is. And so they buzz around you until the end of time, and if the Nomad players doing that *do* have an OORP grudge against you (I can name a couple from the old Keeper faction who had a personal problem with a group of players - and in the end they got their other non-Nomad faction disbanded for it, but that didn't stop them from abusing nomad gb turret scorps and other tech specifically for the purpose of annoying the other faction before tech nerf, but I digress) from abusing their power. It was not fun when the same happened in nomad bombers before the bomber nerf. There was nothing anyone could do against it aside from well known cheese tactics like overwhelming missile spam or battleship base hugging, or just calling in everybody in the vicinity to join the fight.

Rather than treating closed factions like sacred cows, or having a failed idea of "this faction deserves overpowered gear because of <insert reason>", it's time to slowly open them up and get rid of their assorted elitism. You do NOT need to fly overpowered ships or gear for your RP or whatever. Doing so will only invite people to form overwhelming groups against you to counter your edge, ruining your fun, ruining the nomad faction's activity, and then we come back to square one with the devs being blamed in the end anyway.

In fact, I still claim it would be for the best if some kind of an open nomad ID was provided for indies, that would be restricted to omicron systems... would finally let the Order fight actual Nomads instead of BHG core or NPCs all day long.

As to the cloak: I am for Aet's idea. Nomad cloak, buyable on their bases, still uses fuel. No balance edge except for easier availability. It's a great advantage anyway considering that you don't need to spend copious amounts of time/money to make them whenever you get blown up with them.