Remove the Cloaking Device

[Embolism]

I don't see the cloak nearly as much as I used to anyway. I think it's fine as it is.

I kinda think one of the reasons people get so bent out of shape about cloakers is that they see them so rarely these days, they don't know what to do about it.

Please explain how you would deal with a Cloaker without thermals or fancy security equipment. Against most traitor items a regular crew member still has a chance. A Cloak, which renders you immune to melee attacks (and most of the crew don't have access to anything else), is uncounterable by regular crew members.

Sure you can run away if you think a Cloaker is around. That isn't "dealing with it" though, it just reinforces the point that the Cloaker greatly increases your robustness more so than other traitor items for 6 telecrystals.

[Captain_Bravo]

Scream for the AI, run away, and hope he's not subverted? Find the nearest borg?

[jflan17]

I'm REALLY SORRY you got killed by a cloaker, but you really don't have to be so defensive and emotional about it.

And yeah, running away is a plenty good method of dealing with it, because if you are good at running away, they won't catch you - I guess unless you're their target and they have extra incentive to chase you down. But if you're not, they'll weigh chasing you down against their objectives/every other oblivious person they could kill instead. If you're not good at running away, maybe learn to be good at running away? I don't know, man. You could just whine about it, instead, though.

Also - and please don't die of shock - death is part of SS13. You can die just as easily from about a million other traitor items/non-traitor items, so I really don't understand your particular issue with cloaks.

[Captain_Bravo]

Yeah, I mean the amount of times I'll walk through a door and be hit by:

An energy bolt
An amplified vuvuzela shot
Toxic Spit
A magic missile
A swarm of angry bats
Any of the other billion-and-one ways to get instantly taken down, and almost certainly killed

Are pretty goddamned frequent. By pure virtue of the fact that the cloak costs so much, I know that the guy using it probably won't have the money for something like a Cyalume Saber, or a Butcher Knife, or shit like that. The chances of a cloaker killing you are about the same as getting killed by anything else, just deal with it.

[Klayboxx]

Please explain how you would deal with a Cloaker without thermals or fancy security equipment. Against most traitor items a regular crew member still has a chance. A Cloak, which renders you immune to melee attacks (and most of the crew don't have access to anything else), is uncounterable by regular crew members.

Sure you can run away if you think a Cloaker is around. That isn't "dealing with it" though, it just reinforces the point that the Cloaker greatly increases your robustness more so than other traitor items for 6 telecrystals.

Actually there are a lot of situations where cloakers are garbage. If they are stunned or enough damage is done to them, the cloak gets disabled.

So if you know there is a cloaker about, and you see a door open and you have a shootan gun just shoot at the door as soon as it is open. If you don't hit, take evasive action and run out of the door they opened and shoot behind you. If you don't hit, run to an area that there is only one door to a hallway, AKA the air bridge or security. These are great places to catch a cloaker you can't see. Also, if you see signs of a cloaker, dodge and weave as if they have a gun.

They're pretty easy to deal with as long as they use it like most people do.

Also, if you don't have a gun at all, pick up glass and throw it through magic opening doors. I'm pretty sure glass shards do enough damage that two or three hits will turn off the cloak. If not, maybe this will be a nice thing to change.

[Embolism]

I'm REALLY SORRY you got killed by a cloaker, but you really don't have to be so defensive and emotional about it.

And yeah, running away is a plenty good method of dealing with it, because if you are good at running away, they won't catch you - I guess unless you're their target and they have extra incentive to chase you down. But if you're not, they'll weigh chasing you down against their objectives/every other oblivious person they could kill instead. If you're not good at running away, maybe learn to be good at running away? I don't know, man. You could just whine about it, instead, though.

Also - and please don't die of shock - death is part of SS13. You can die just as easily from about a million other traitor items/non-traitor items, so I really don't understand your particular issue with cloaks.

I like how you didn't answer my question at all.

The difference between the Cloak and most other traitor items, for example the Sabre, is that the Sabre does not make you immune to melee attacks: you can still disarm a Saber-wielding traitor, slip them up and make them drop their Sabre, or just get in a lucky stun-punch. Against a Cloak none of these work. If you have no thermals (most of the crew) or a gun (most of the crew), your only option is to run.

[Embolism]

Also, if you don't have a gun at all, pick up glass and throw it through magic opening doors. I'm pretty sure glass shards do enough damage that two or three hits will turn off the cloak. If not, maybe this will be a nice thing to change.

Where would you find two or three pieces of glass shards lying about without bashing down a window? Not really something you can do in a hurry, unless you're saying we should start carrying a backpack full of glass shards when someone screams "CLOAKER" over the radio.

[jflan17]

I like how you didn't answer my question at all.

I guess you didn't know that it isn't my job to teach you how to play SS13. I will give you some advice, though! Try to learn from dying instead of whining like a child.

The difference between the Cloak and most other traitor items, for example the Sabre, is that the Sabre does not make you immune to melee attacks: you can still disarm a Saber-wielding traitor, slip them up and make them drop their Sabre, or just get in a lucky stun-punch. Against a Cloak none of these work. If you have no thermals (most of the crew) or a gun (most of the crew), your only option is to run.

Why are you so obsessed with fighting? If you're not sec and you're not an antag, you should be going out of your way to escape conflict. Staff assistant vigilantes are stupid, as are you.

[Embolism]

Yeah, I mean the amount of times I'll walk through a door and be hit by:

An energy bolt
An amplified vuvuzela shot
Toxic Spit
A magic missile
A swarm of angry bats
Any of the other billion-and-one ways to get instantly taken down, and almost certainly killed

Are pretty goddamned frequent. By pure virtue of the fact that the cloak costs so much, I know that the guy using it probably won't have the money for something like a Cyalume Saber, or a Butcher Knife, or shit like that. The chances of a cloaker killing you are about the same as getting killed by anything else, just deal with it.

The difference between those things and the Cloak is that you can still do something against the user even if you don't have specialised equipment. Of course if you get surprised (as is usually the case) then you have no chance, but with a Cloak even if you know they're there, without relatively rare equipment there is very little you could do about them.

[Klayboxx]

Also, if you don't have a gun at all, pick up glass and throw it through magic opening doors. I'm pretty sure glass shards do enough damage that two or three hits will turn off the cloak. If not, maybe this will be a nice thing to change.

Where would you find two or three pieces of glass shards lying about without bashing down a window? Not really something you can do in a hurry, unless you're saying we should start carrying a backpack full of glass shards when someone screams "CLOAKER" over the radio.

If the room you're in doesn't have shards of glass in it, something is wrong.

But actually yeah shards of glass are really good thrown weapons so it wouldn't hurt to keep one on you if you're worried about it. Also, the point of traitor items is that not EVERYONE can be ready for what you have. If everyone spawned with a stun baton then traitor rounds would be way less fun since everyone is equipped to deal with threats. You're gonna get killed by things in this game you can't do shit about, thats the point. Adapt and overcome.

Also get over the rare equipment thing. There usually isn't a round where I don't end up with a taser gun or baton.

[Embolism]

If the room you're in doesn't have shards of glass in it, something is wrong.

But actually yeah shards of glass are really good thrown weapons so it wouldn't hurt to keep one on you if you're worried about it. Also, the point of traitor items is that not EVERYONE can be ready for what you have. If everyone spawned with a stun baton then traitor rounds would be way less fun since everyone is equipped to deal with threats. You're gonna get killed by things in this game you can't do shit about, thats the point. Adapt and overcome.

Also get over the rare equipment thing. There usually isn't a round where I don't end up with a taser gun or baton.

When you think about it though, every traitor item can conceivably, and do get foiled by regular crew members: a lucky disarm, stun gloves (like half the station has insulated gloves these days it seems) or just the good old fire extinguisher. The thing is, these "everyperson" measures have one thing in common: they're all melee abilities. And the Cloak makes you completely immune to such abilities. Even if you know they're right there, it simply won't work.

When I get assassinated with a sleepypen, blown to pieces by a pipebomb or sliced open by a sabre, I can usually think of what I could've done differently that might've made things different. Against a Cloak, I usually couldn't if I don't already have a taser, phaser or thermals.

With regards to guns and thermals, well; you're the type of player who likes robusting so it's relatively normal for you to actively seek out security equipment without being security (going into the vigilante thing that someone mentioned).

[Klayboxx]

If the room you're in doesn't have shards of glass in it, something is wrong.

But actually yeah shards of glass are really good thrown weapons so it wouldn't hurt to keep one on you if you're worried about it. Also, the point of traitor items is that not EVERYONE can be ready for what you have. If everyone spawned with a stun baton then traitor rounds would be way less fun since everyone is equipped to deal with threats. You're gonna get killed by things in this game you can't do shit about, thats the point. Adapt and overcome.

Also get over the rare equipment thing. There usually isn't a round where I don't end up with a taser gun or baton.

When you think about it though, every traitor item can conceivably, and do get foiled by regular crew members: a lucky disarm, stun gloves (like half the station has insulated gloves these days it seems) or just the good old fire extinguisher. The thing is, these "everyperson" measures have one thing in common: they're all melee abilities. And the Cloak makes you completely immune to such abilities. Even if you know they're right there, it simply won't work.

When I get assassinated with a sleepypen, blown to pieces by a pipebomb or sliced open by a sabre, I can usually think of what I could've done differently that might've made things different. Against a Cloak, I usually couldn't if I don't already have a taser, phaser or thermals.

With regards to guns and thermals, well; you're the type of player who likes robusting so it's relatively normal for you to actively seek out security equipment without being security (going into the vigilante thing that someone mentioned).

Well I'd think that diverse gameplay would be encouraged. Whats the point of different items if your ideal game is where everything can be taken care of the same way?

[Cogwerks]

Personally I think the cloaking device should function like the advanced laser or the radbow - have a slowly self-replenishing charge and make thermals have a similar limitation.

[Readster]

The cloak has always been a hard thing to balance. To people without thermals it's overpowered and too cheap; to people with thermals it's useless and not worth the crystals.

I think it's fine the way it is now but that's just one spaceman's opinion.

[Dauntasa]

What if you made it so that you're only invisible to people who are at least one tile away from you? If you're right next to someone, you're visible to them and they can hit you, but if you stay away they won't know where you are. This would remove the bullshit that you can't actually hit someone who's invisible even if you know where they are, but still let cloakers blindside or shoot people.