The counter is have friends protect you. Seems simple.

How about you stop being ******* renters and join a real alliance that can actually defend the space you claim?

Problem solved.

A" solution" would imply that there is a problem in the first place. The only "problem" with AFK cloakers is the one you are creating for yourself by running away from them.

if you were hotdropped, then he wasn't AFK, now was he?

Get in a fleet with your allies (y'know, those people who are supposedly your friends?), get in your voice coms (you have voice coms, right?), have some people in Sabers sitting around fondling their autocannons, and bait that sucker out. Then shoot him. If he lights a cyno, shoot him anyway. If he dosn't do anything then you win anyway, because he's AFK.

I mean, I'm a semi-bear new to this 0.0 thing, but cloakies don't bother me one bit. They just make me ping dscan more for probes and fly something with a decent insurance payout that I can replace if things go welp-shaped.

See post #11 to see how wrong you are.

I dont get bottled up by afk cloakers while you do. Who is doing badly here?

Who said I do? I'm normally the one doing the AFK cloaking thanks.
I also don't really participate in activities where AFK cloaking is going to affect me. I have many other ways to generate ISK.

For a Goon, they probably aren't that much of a problem either since if they aren't dumb, you can just move to another system.
Try thinking of someone OTHER than yourself for a change.

Now what about alliances that only have 2-3 systems? One player can place massive threat on all their systems in one go.... For virtually no effort or risk, vs a massive amount of effort to TRY to find and destroy/bait them or guarding all your ratters to try and defend against them.

Please try showing how that is in ANY WAY balanced. Quite simply it isn't.

Even with the ideas suggested for the de-cloak pulse every hour, a AFK cloaker can still lock down a system for a while for the cheap cheap price of 35mil (one SB), while the victim alliance is likely to have lost 100mil + in income they didn't get during the same period.

They were for the 5 hours before they attacked me.

How is it an issue when people are making their isk while the afk cloaker just sits there and does nothing?

It is only the falt of the bears if they fail to organise themselves and just cower in station.

If you act like that, your fabricated "problem" goes away.

I have been afk cloaked. And I have done afk cloaking. I also run around in w-space.

Remove local. w-space is perfectly viable without instant intel on who's there. Honestly, spamming d-scan every few seconds is impractical. The odds of you catching a covert cloaker on dscan are pretty small. You might see probes if they aren't very experienced. The good ones will have all your sites already bookmarked.

Don't fly what you can't afford to replace. In nul or w-space I suggest to modify that to say don't fly what you can't easily replace. If losing a T1 BC is too much for you, you may want to go back to hisec missioning for a while and build up a war chest.

You will lose ships. That is a part of life in nul. Plan for it and mitigate the risks.

Where are you getting that 30 day figure from? Training plan for a fresh alt, please. I can't see how you could make a 30 day covops alt that's actually a threat in that time. Enough skills to sit in local under a regular cloak, maybe, but that's harmless. To actually stalk someone and light a cyno? You need cloaking IV, racial frigate V, covops I, CFT I (CFT V for covert cynos...)

Then, it seems to me, the problem is with cynos and hotdropping, and not cloaking. The most immediate counter-strategy that comes to my mind is to fit a cyno to the bait ratting ship and bridge in a fleet to counter the dropped gank fleet. Then they drop another fleet through a cyno, etc etc. Then the node crashes.

And you think a scanner tool is going to save you from a cyno drop from hell?

Or anywhere in nullsec where friendlies lie. Most juicy systems for afk cloaking are down long, long pipes, where you only need to be seen once for everyone to know what you're flying.

The proposition of a solution implies a problem. There exists no problem with AFK cloakers. AFK cloakers by definition are AFK and cannot hurt you.

I still think you're Riverini but if you aren't then admitting that you got run out of nullsec by people who are afk is p funny.

Look up. See that thing flying above your head? That was the point of Lyris' post.

So you admit the problem is not that he is AFK cloaking, but that he might at any time attack you. How exactly is this different from being in a wormhole, or being in high-security space right before a suicide gank is perpetrated against you? In fact, how is it any different from being in nullsec with a local that's all blue, right prior to being the victim of an awox attack? Your problem seems to be with the fact that you cannot, ever, guarantee safety in EVE. This is an intended feature.

You can make more doing Incursions than you can doing L4s. You can make more owning a Tech moon than you can with Incursions. You can make more with marketeering than you can with a Tech moon. You can make more with a scam than you can with marketeering. You can make more with RMT than with most scams. You can make more with GM powers than you can with RMT. You can make more as a Dev than you can with GM powers. You can make more as the CEO of CCP hf than you can as a Dev. Where does the buck stop? You seem bitter overall that things aren't going exactly the way you'd like them.

These threads make me want to START AFK cloaking.

Please tell your Alliance to grow a collective wang and deal with it. A high sec miner isn't safe, why should you be given free ISK at zero risk.

You know that the AFK cloaker is there; this alerts you to the possibility of risk. You can ignore that risk, or you can go elsewhere. You are actually in a much more advantageous position compared to being a random guy in highsec whom might find himself suddenly under attack by a couple of 10 Hour Hero characters (10-hour old dudes in destroyers), or someone in nullsec suddenly under attack by an awox.

And it takes a finite amount of time for a hot-drop to happen anyway. The titan pilot/supercap fleet/Blackops has to select the bridge to/jump to menu option, hit the relevant item, then if it's a bridging the ships in the fleet have to use the bridge - then they all have to load grid. Really, there's enough time for a properly paranoid victim of a drop to figure out what's happening. They might not be able to do anything about it if their ship is fat and slow, or they're a dumb bot (serves them right if they are), but a cyno != a doomsday.

At least, not since they took that stupid feature out years before I started playing EvE.

We can't help it if we have admirers.

let me break it down for you

why should the cloak ship be subject to a threat if the ship itself is not a threat?

he's AFK...

SAY IT WITH ME NOW!
AFK

he's no threat, he is not deriving any benefit from being there, hes not playing the game, he's not doing ANYTHING
yet because you are a gutless coward you feel he should be subject to a higher risk than he poses to you simply because he has the nerve to be in the same local as your royal highness

no, hell no
learn to play or go the **** away, I for one am sick of knee jerk nerfs and other stupidity thrown at the game lately because of crybabies like you and your main

so then not letting them in your system isn't an option?

this was the tool I was referring to

afk cloakers do not simply spawn into your system, they need to travel just like everyone else.
a quick look at the stats on evekill will tell you covops ships are not indestructible, people pop em all the time

you have the tools, thats why your demand for a fix to your personal problems is not a fix or a worthy topic of discussion.

covops have to transit around the universe just like everyone else, they have to log in and log out, they dock and undock
they enter and exit your precious system with gates

the cloaks benefit is to grant you immunity from detection, thats the whole point, without that feature its useless, and it comes at a hefty cost even on a covops ship.

if you can't control access to your system, then its not really your system is it?

Cloaked ships are only the threat of a threat apart from being able to relay system Intel.

Every ship in Eve has a d-scan. Use it. I just finished running a cosmic anon in 0.0 with one cloaked ship in systematic and another docked. D-scan. Cloaked ships don't stop activity, fear does.

The Apostle left nullsec because he was unwilling to jump next door to the system with the afk cloaker to do his ratting. Logic isn't going to be effective.

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=174513#post174513
Read it quick before he edits it.

Sanctum nerf happened, AFK cloakies moved in and my income disappeared. Got to the point where I couldn't afford to lose ships anymore so stopped roaming. Couldn't rat, couldn't mine, couldn't roam. So I left.

But yes. That, and the combination of JB nerf and Sanctum nerf.... And I'll bet my 10 ice roids to your 5 Brutix's that many did the same thing.

The Apostle- Of course I know cloaked ships don't show on d-scan. Neither can cloaked ships take any offensive action. A cloaked ship is only dangerous once decloaked. Then they show up on d-scan if close or in overview if dangerously close. A true AFk cloaker won't even pass on Intel being afk. I do just fine in systems with cloaked vessels because I watch my d-scan for ships that decloak and can actually engage. Any ship that can engage has to decloak first. Also cyno'd in ships will spike local. I just don't see the problem. There's no need to avoid somebody that can't attack. They can only attack once you can see them too on d-scan or overview or local spike from covert cyno.

You losing the argument doesn't mean I'm attacking you. Let's tone down the hyperbole a bit.

The Apostle - Sounds to me like you're more complaining about the cloaking modules being in this game than afk cloakers. That's just something we all have to deal with in lowsec and null. Stay on your toes and unless you are in something that gets into warp horribly slow, you should be alright. We're not talking about highsec here.

Even ships specced to lower their target time after decloaking still have to target you. A ship exiting a cyno still has to target you.

Cloaks are working as intended. Like every other situation in EVE, tactics and a sharp pilot that's quick to react will often be ok. If you're worried about cloaked ships that aren't afk, maybe you should avoid systems with any people in them or just stay out of nullsec.

Maybe I'm different, but threats don't bother me, the enacted threat does. That's when I leave. If I die to a ship that dropped his cloak and was able to target and scram me, I accept that as a part of the risks of being in lowsec / nullsec. No big deal.

I do understand there is a point to be made about cloakers can't be found. Again, neither can they do anything while cloaked, afk or not, other than follow somebody and relay intel. I just don't see the need to counter somebody that can't do anything while they are cloaked. If it really is a huge issue, bait them and have a close fleet on standby. Most cloaky ships can be at least held and withstood long enough to get a neighboring fleet to you.

Apostle, if you had just braved the unknown and ratted with the AFK cloaker in system you could have continued to make ISK. Now you're sentenced to spend the rest of your days cowering in highsec. What do people always say? No risk, no reward? I don't think you belonged in 0.0 ..and now you have a thread about removing all PVP from highsec. Are you sure this is the right game for you?

As for the 'well he probably doesn't have a fleet on call', how are you meant to know this?

bla bla bla

There are many tools at your disposal to deal with such a things

Let me help you in big letters, to make it easy:




THIS IS THE WRONG SECTION OF THE FORUMS TO DISCUSS GAME CHANGE IDEAS.


WE HAVE ANOTHER SECTION FOR THAT.

Right, so it doesn't matter who says it to you, you refuse to see any side but your own and anything outside that is obviously false, even so far as to ignore the people who actually make the game.

Did you notice how few people are supporting the 4 of you mainly defending this in 12+ pages of posting?

TWELVE pages, and its just you 4, ignoring every fact presented to you, including dev comments and actual counters, and you still don't see that you could possibly be making a mountain out of a molehill?

This forum is less than a month old, are they to respond with a red and blue tag to every topic even if they've been over it 1000 times before on the old forums, now they are somehow beholden to you and yours to respond to your every beck and call?

So here you sit, insulting the helpful community thats trying to show you that you are not in fact treading over new ground and that everything you are saying and suggesting has both been said and suggested before, by a great number of people.

Do you really think that over 8 years somebody else hasn't said "Man I hate this cloaked dude in my system", and that somehow your stand with your 3 friends against 12 pages of people telling you that nobody cares will make a difference?

Stealthbombers also have no tank at all, if your botting program was any good, or you weren't afk yourself, you'd just turn your guns on the offending stealth bomber and watch him go up in smoke.

QFT

Carebears are NOT entitled to nullsec space free of intruders, if you want risk free PvE go back to highsec.

absolutely nothing wrong with parking a cloaky in someones system, especially when it extracts delicious carebear tears.

No an argument has been presented, you've chosen to ignore it:


Can you prove 100% that the person in your local is AFK?

Now i think you're on drugs.

[If anybody else reading this can figure out what the hell happened and help a brother out I sure would appreciate it.

IDK maybe he comes from a country where you aren't presumed innocent until proven other wise, or I'm just missing something, or I don't understand moonspeak and he's off calculating the cosmic flux of th e universe.

I feel like i was in a conversation and the other guy in it suddenly out of the blue went "AH HA!" then turned around and walked away humming to himself.

Can you prove 100% that the person in your local is AFK?

You got it. Finally.

Any TESTie who whines about AFK cloakers is just asking to be trolled to no end by the rest of the alliance. I personally have never had a problem with AFK cloakers, if someone is parked in a ratting system I just find a different system to rat in until they leave.

Also anyone who rats in 6VDT or 7BX is just asking to get ganked.

Thanks to having a large npc pocket fountain is well infested with pirates looking for ratters to gank, yet you never see TEST whining about afk cloakers (even though on any given day several of our ratting systems will have afk cloakers in them).

Virtually all of the afk cloaker whine seems to come from lolrenters.

So wait, what if he's not afk and just generally an insomniac and stays up for days at a time?

You sound more like you want to nerf cloaking, is that true?

Also whats wrong with all the effective counters proposed in this thread?

19 pages and cloakies still working exactly as intended. Yawn.

No. Because one side is immune to valid arguments because they want to remove cloaking but don't want to come out and say it (because they are unable to explain why such a change should happen).

Yes they did. That is the result of the suggestions they provide.
GǪfor no adequately explained or even remotely useful reason whatsoever.

The fact that you've kept this ridiculous thread going for 23 pages is pretty convincing evidence that it's you who's trolling.

When cloaked, you cannot do anything to hurt anyone.

Here is the "AFK cloaker" debate distilled to its most basic principle.

Everything beyond it is just noise.

to the op and any 1 else that thinks afk cloakys need fixing/a counter

"A possible solution to AFK cloaky alts "

the clue is there they are afk so u have nothing to worry about

they are away from keyboard so they cant hurt u u silly nuby

Its local that casues "the issue" so it is very much part of the topic.

You would not even know they were in system if it wasn't for that red little square and people wouldn't cower in fear of something that may or may not happen rather than adapting to counter it.

Adequately defend your space and a cloaked ship has plenty of risk. If you're so lazy you don't have gatecamps 23/7 into your ratting systems, why should the cloaker be penalized?

The other week I spent 3 hours scouting a POS in my cov ops holding a position for a warp in. Your idea makes this impossible.

As for risk, how about the risk free ratting that the foolpoof intel tool that is local provides making it just about impossible to catch people unawares?

the argument that nobody should be 100% safe is complete crap

http://www.fatal-ascension.com/killboard/?a=kill_detail&kll_id=48204

What's that? A carebear ship defending itself? Gee thought that wasn't possible. Now kindly explain why AFK cloakies are a problem again? Seems to me your argument (as usual) boils down to "AFK cloakies are a problem for me"

Tbh Apostle I've only been posting to see if I can get this thread to 1000 posts, after the first two pages the rest of it is bascially saying the same thing.

if they are cloaked they are not a problem, when they uncloak you can see them on the D-Scan, when they uncloak next to you fight back??? .

none of this thread is relevant as there is no problem..............

The fact that you can AFK without a cloak and have the same psychological warfare effect on someone, points to the fact it's not a cloaking issue.

Never flown a dramiel have we?

So if they are AFK they can be found and destroyed. Just like any other ship