Cloaking takes away the fun

Nice session. Just going to point out an observation though related to the big picture.

You're not dying to HESH. A2G spam. Maxes even. These are all overpowered things. More powerful than an infiltrator. Imbalanced and very asymetrical. But you're not dying to this stuff. When you do die, you die to the very folks you are fighting against. Not this overpowered stuff.

Why?

The answer here I think gets into the other infuriating part about the cloak. The reason the OP made this whole thread. The part about FUN.

One of the reasons the infiltrator cloak is so infuriating is you do not have a choice in the matter. HESH or A2G can be mitigated with cover. You can choose NOT to engage that MAX you know is in the next room. Or engage him on your terms.

With the cloak it's going to be: Surprise! You are getting this experience even if you do not want to.

Yeah, I died once to an Airhammer, if I recall, and it was actually because a friendly ran towards me while I was crouching cloaked (and I watched it in almost slow motion). Dude was hovering so low that he died right after killing me though.

That's one of the reasons Infils are so powerful, though, they can straight up avoid a lot of the BS in general; which I think is perfectly fine, but it's harder to avoid it when you can be seen and spotted (lol mini-map tracking + dorito saying 'shoot me' over your head) and while you can sneak past it as Infil, other classes can struggle to do so at times. I was even at a few bases that had a tonne of vehicles just chilling on hills, uncontested (and overpop, of course), but they can't fire at what they can't see.

Even better, what this doesn't show is how awful some of these fights were. From experience, at those fights I would have probably gone like 1 kd as any other class, they were that bad. Luckily I could be a **** and just snipe from invisibility.

https://ps2.fisu.pw/killboard/?name=TRminator2

I'm not a great player by any means, but whenever I pulled infil in a good spot I felt like I got a killstreak handed to me. Most times I pulled infil it's 6-20 killstreak for me. Even managed to kill pro infils because noone, not even good infil mains can see or hear a Sensor shield 5 invisible guy running around.

Also notice half my deaths are from SMG infils or snipers, lol.


The best way to counter infiltrator... is to play infiltrator. Wait for them to decloak, open fire as they're shooting at someone, guaranteed kill. Don't let them play the game, because they'll do the same BS to you too.

I get what you're saying, been to the 70/30% overpops where we just get shelled by tanks and A2G and can do nothing about it.

With every other class I just die non-stop if I go out, but infils can just hide in plain sight and get 5+ kills before getting shot.

After using Adrenaline Pump + Nano-armor cloak + Sensor shield 5 + Suppressed Vandal/auto-scout, I feel like an invisible heavy sprinting at mach 5. Try it my dude, appreciate the fair and balanced experience!

Almost like something that can't be anticipated at all and controlling the way you play is annoying... oh wait!

Why do you think I mostly main LA and Infil these days?

Lots of insightful and interesting thoughts here, but you can talk until you pass out they will not listen or change anything. I've been reading these posts for years. All we can do is hope

lol we should report your post so someone has to read it

infils still ruining the game logging out

I played SMG Infiltrator recently for the first time since I got my new computer. Yeah, thats still broken. I really only die to it when I am playing Sniper Infiltrator, but it just feels broken whenever I use it. Stalkers are annoying because you can't find them without a darklight. I always have to bait them into doing something stupid like thinking they can attack me from behind or switching to a knife before I can get them. Sniper Infiltrators don't really bother me much because I don't really die to them as any class other than Infiltrator. I only die to them as other classes when I am being shot at by someone else.

So... Finally reached the end of this thread. All these walls of text.

Let me just drop this: Any mental wonderchild claiming that cloak systems of any kind need a 2 second or longer delay like minor cloak has either never tried minor cloak or just wants the cloak nerfed into total uselessness. I mean, minor cloak is not something you stumble over that often, is it? Get killed a hundred times by several classes, how many of them have minor cloak? Yeah, exactly that many: None! Because that implant is garbage. And you want to nerf the cloak into garbage. And again: Once Infiltrator would be nerfed beyond repair, you would just complain about the next best thing killing you. And probably nerf that into the ground as well.

Each class here has their specific role:
MAXes and HAs butt their heads together, LAs flank from above and the sides with high mobility, medics, hopefully, not always, catch up and pick up the fallen to cut the distance from spawnpoint to back into action to zero, engineers fortify certain points of interest with automated firepower or obstacles as well as drop ammo packs.

And infiltrators? They pop a recon dart to aid the other classes, sneak up on the enemy and catch them from behind, go behind enemy lines to cause chaos or infiltrate their terminal system and de-fang a base of its turrets. Otherwise they assert area of denial by sniping down ahead of the others.

People would cry even harder if infiltrators would wear the colors or even helmets of enemy empires with nonsensical nicknames over their heads instead of cloaking.

One can make suggestions to counter the class, it is never enough. From searchlights for construction to giving the infiltrator something else to do by handing him an unarmed spotting drone... No! Certain people feel so threatened in their 'entertainment' of mindlessly banging their heads together with the other classes, nothing but total destruction of the infiltrator class would please them.

And again, if that would be over, they would demand that the next thing would be nerfed into the ground that kills them after that until there is only one class left and we all only wield the same gun, same sidearm, same knife, same grenade and remember when there was diversity of playstyles.

And all the folks complaining about cloaked vehicles? It takes quite some time to fill up an ANT with cortium so you can pull something like that off and even then it is not forever. And of course, that cloak is no protection against something so basic as TANK MINES! Don't want to be run over? There are countermeasures. It is not the enemy's fault you don't freaking use them to protect yourself. A cloaked Flash won't stay cloaked forever and once it hits a mine, it is done for. Although I must agree with most people bringin up the argument that certain infantry units like the MAX should result in an instant kill for both the MAX AND the Flash due to the sheer size and weight of the MAX unit.

Again, to counter all "Don't you L2P me, bro!" arguments: If you claim to know all these things and don't apply them, do NOT blame the ones making a profit of your own laziness. That cloaked infiltrator finishing off a wounded enemy gets on your nerves? Could as well be a third enemy coming around the corner, maybe a HA switching on the overshield after you killed their comrades. And you are complaining about the infiltrator? What should the people say that died to you while that infiltrator just sat there? He lived, he stole their kill and they are lying in the dirt.

Thing is, infiltrator MUST stray a bit from the group. You don't want to run in front of your allies and be in their line of fire. You don't want to stand in front of your allies and be their invisible meatshield. If there is a ~45 degree difference between you, your allies and the enemy, that would be just fine. 90 degrees would be just perfect. It takes time to alter the aim around in case your allied forces bite the dust and even IF you have to venture on alone and the others catch up, that is valuable ground you can make and place mines at tactical bottlenecks. I challenge everyone to say rather than the enemy killing you and the allied infiltrator killing the wounded enemy and pressing further you want the infiltrator to die along with you and you are all back to square one. That would be just utter BS. You didn't make it, so others have to bite the dust as well or have to bite the dust for you?

Sometimes sacrifices are unavoidable. Can be me, can be my allies. Hopefully there are medics around doing their job. Despite our best efforts, no one can save everyone in an MMO shooter. And the days of old where two armies smash their heads together on an open field are over.

Yes, playing as an infiltrator can mean that there are shady tactics involved in order to delay the enemy even further. Every second I delay the enemy to join in an actual important fight is one second I help the faction having an advantage. The more people I annoy and make them look for me and my sunderer, the higher the advantage. The dirtier I play, the more enraged these people are and make it into a personal vendetta. And if you want to hate me for playing that class, then congratulations! I don't care.
This is a game of war. This is not a game of pure sportsmanship. There is spawncamping on either side, there are overpops, there are faction overpops, there are measures and counter measures. The universe doesn't care if an infiltrator kills you or you kill the infiltrator.

You want rules of engagement? Well, there are none. Deal with it like the rest of us. Once I see flashlights brought out, I know it's time to get out of Dodge. If that comes sooner rather than later, my hard luck, your good fortune.

TLDR: Don't shame the enemy for your own laziness and don't try to guilt trip infiltrators.

post ur char, let's see how effective u actually are at doing wat u say, enuff of this bs **** talking and advice with no evidence

I have to post nothing, for I have to prove nothing. My characters are at no point part of this discussion. And if you think otherwise, I question your intentions.

And you are thus completely and utterly useless to the conversation. Grow a pair and actually put your money where you mouth is; if you don't want to post your char to remain anonymous, record some footage of you not being some baby player getting a kill every few mins against half afk players.

Because my experience is so vastly different than yours, both as an Infil and against, and the trash examples, takes, rehotoric, and 'advice' you put forward further cement my suspicions that you are pretty bad at this game; why would I listen to a single thing you say, when I can do it all better, and you aren't even close to my level?

There's a mental wonder child alright. Since I'm the one promoting the 2 second delay on decloaking and not the 8 second delay before cloaking you must be talking to me mostly.

Now I could down your textwall and point out all its flaws, but rest assured that its all of this magnitude of wrong. You are comparing apples and oranges.

And as we all know we can add anything to the game because of the beautiful mantra of "people will adapt" right? Or are you telling us you are incapable of adapting to such a change? You are a hypocrite first class, shaming everyone else at not being able to deal with a broken part of the game.

I'm currently play extensively infiltrator and I think it totally deserves a nerf... dealing vs an infiltrator offer no real counterplay.
The only counter is a flash light that give away the position of the non infiltrator player and attract more enemy fire.
If you don't want to nerf the infiltrator you need at least to provide a tool to counter the cloak.
Something like a non-cloaking field generator.

A nice example comes to mind killing one guy with an emissary and storming at the surprised second enemy, knifing him down. Sadly, I don't record my game. Moments like this would be fine trophies to remember by. You are to some degree correct: Who am I to talk here and don't back up my talk? But I do have the right to an opinion and a right to voice it, have I not?

Oh, I could adapt to that change as well. I just won't play infiltrator anymore. I would go back to the second class I play with passion: Engineer. What good would be an audible decloak everyone within 20 meters can hear, when I am incapable of firing? We are not talking about firing and not being able to because of cloak, we are talking about not being able to because of decloak. For two seconds you want to bind infiltrator hands to their backs, putting them into a disadvantage. It takes the brain what? One second to recognize the sound and you heard it to the right so you turn to the right, where he still decloaks. "Hi, could you wait until I-" BAM! Nope, he could not wait until the infiltrator is ready.

If your suggested 2 seconds would be implemented, people would either play only sniper to be mostly out of harms way or avoid playing the infiltrator class altogether. You could as well remove the class then. Good job! Playstyle diversity reduced. Now what to nerf into the ground next? I'm sorry if you feel so offended, but I'm telling you: This is a bad idea and it would lead to bad results, taking fun out of the game for people trying out this class. And you can call me all names in the book and it wouldn't change that this is a bad idea.

There have been plenty of suggestions already. Darklight-lampposts or darklight searchlights to limit their movement, giving the infiltrator an unarmed drone to keep him busy outside the fight and merely spot, all not good enough.

Sounds like you are talking about SMG and Stalker Infiltrators. Yes, that would benefit the game, a decloaking field. It should probably be unEMPable. That'd be fair.

Heres the problem though. While this is a good idea, we need less ideas like it. We need less physical tools to find and counter Infiltrators because it requires most of the playerbase to specialize in order to feel like you can counter Infiltrators. It's the same problem as AA. A Basilisk does nothing to it, and thats the default weapon. It does barely anything to anything solo, so you always need 2 of them to out damage anything, and even if you do have 2, its not going to net you a kill on anything substantial 9/10 of the times. Its not a jack of all trades, master of none. So in order to make it worth it to give up a slot to specialize against a foe, you need to add a new slot solely for specialization, and there can be one against every class. There. Now you can specialize against one of any class without having to give up something to deal with only one class.

I have a few clips I can share with you that I recorded over a like 2 days. Then I forgot to clip anything else I did and I stopped clipping the interactions that helped give evidence to my claims, but I digress.

Also, let me tell you another one of my fabulous stories on how I dealt with a Stalker Infiltrator while we were being overpopped and spawn camped at Mao.

There were tanks, MAXes, and Infantry hammering down on our spawn room, and I was getting out of the spawn as Engineer and using my underbarrel spam on them. (Btw, underbarrel spam needs a buff in resupply speed so you can stand on an ammo pack and constantly spam it. You have to stand around and wait way too long to get another thing, especially when you can't get LOS against an enemy because you are getting overpopped and spawn camped.) Anyways, I was solo'ing a Valk with my Warden, and then I died to a Sunderer, a sniper, and a Galaxy. I respawned to go back and do more damage, and I ran out of the back spawn shields and saw a Stalker decloak. I switched to my underbarrel and fired in the area. In hindsight, there may have been 2 Stalkers, because then the Stalker appeared near me with an Amaterasu, and I died before I could switch back. He got to me too fast for there to have been just the one Stalker, but maybe he was the only one. Well, I never bought a Darklight, so I went back out to where I died, knowing full well he was in the area. There was a tank there, so I shot at it with the underbarrel to get his attention. I suspected the Infiltrator will try to attack me when I am busy, so I shot at it again to do a more considerable amount of damage for the tank to look at me. Well, he did, and was trying to aim at me. I ran between two long boxes for cover, I heard the Infiltrator switch to his knife, the tank shot at me, the Infiltrator ran around the same side of the two long crates and decloaked, I had turned around, and I smoked him before he could get to me.

I outthought the Infiltrator in this scenario, and this dude was streaking too.

You outplayed the player, not the class. In fact, you even admitted to the problem of the infil in the middle where not only could you not track it, but you aren't even sure if there were two or just one and it killed you before you could even react. I bait people all the time into leaving their better positions, or thinking i'm not paying attention to sounds or mini-map, and that goes for every class.

My problem is singular in regards to cloak - there is too much of a clientside advantage to using it. Being able to pop in and out of cloak near instantly makes fighting them absolutely annoying, but it's being killed or losing half your health before your computer even renders the infil or it's de-cloak noise that is the main issue.

I'm not opposed to buffing them, as i've said, in other ways to compensate for losing such a strong advantage, but make no mistake, cloaking is by far the best ivi ability in the game and could use some nerfs regardless.

And a big difference is that I can bring proof of my claims, I can show you how it's impossible to react to infils before they de-cloak. I can show you how much easier and how strong infil is through stats and gameplay, compared to how much effort I put in for other classes. I don't know if you really think that example of yours proves anything, when it actually further demonstrates what i'm talking about. All it really does is show you have more patience and (not meant to be an insult) your ignorance leads you to thinking you are actually in control of a lot of those situations.

So let me break the important parts of your example down from a (most likely, since you don't want to share) better ivi player. First, dying to a sniper; happens, especially if you don't know they are there (which you most likely didn't because lol invisibility and long range weps) and were probably just standing still on an ammo pack for resupply; bad play in general, and anyone who got the drop on you would probably have killed you anyway, so we can mostly ignore that.

Second, the stalker infil. Already said some of this, but the very fact that you even knew an Infil was in the area, and still got clientsided either by that very same infil (demonstrates the problem of in-combat cloaking, how hard it is to track, and then still get clientsided) or if there was another infil just chilling by (demonstrates how braindead and easy it is to hide in 'plain' sight and turn 1v1s into 2v1s, even if the player is paying attention and playing correctly, and still clientside players), and in either case both gave you no time to react.

Third, baiting the player/infil was a pretty good idea. The thing is though, not only did the Infil fk up by switching to his knife and making noise, but they also decloaked (made more noise) while not in LoS. At that point, it might as well have been literally any other class, albeit with -100 shields.

In the same way that even the most uneducated and inexperienced person on the planet has a right to their opinion and to voice it, yes. If you want to be taken seriously though, you need to bring some evidence of what you are saying, especially when it goes against what other (most likely better and more knowledgeable) people are saying.

But you are wrong. I didn't "die before I could react." I died because I shot at where he was like 3 seconds ago, even though I saw him move for a few frames. I assumed he didn't see me, switched to underbarrel, shot at his general area, and missed, and while I focused too hard on that area, he was running towards me to Amaterasu me. I was in the process of loading my underbarrel again, and it takes time to switch back to the regular firing mode. So I did have time to react, but only if I didn't checkmate myself by reloading AND being in the wrong firemode option, aka grenade launcher. Saying they are hard to track is true, but thats mostly when you are tunnel visioned.

And sorry, I should have been more specific. I didn't die to the sniper. I died to the Galaxy. The sniper was firing at me, but couldn't kill me. He may have hit me once, but I was shuffling too hard for him to truly hurt me. I kept stopping to bait his shot, then zigzag when he was ready to take it. I can feel when they are about to pull the trigger, and you can judge when they are going to fire by the rechamber time of the weapon and the fact that they are going to lose breath after a few shots, giving you room to work. I also mentioned the sunderer, who did more damage than the sniper, because those were the odds stacked against me, and he was more dangerous than an Infiltrator from range.

And yeah, the player did screw up. He probably assumed I was turned in the other direction, but he decloaked at the other side of the two long pieces of cover, so if he did decloak in point blank range, it would have been a disadvantage to him since I was waiting for him to come. And you'd be surprised about how many Infiltrators decide to equip their power knife to stab you because they think they can. There was a high level Stalker, like BR 101, and he was trying to do me dirty like that. He got me once. Then I knew what he was going to do from then on and didn't have a problem with him. But anyways, if we are going to assume every Infiltrator plays at peak performance and then base the balance of the class on that assumption while not assuming every other class is playing at peak anti-Infiltrator performance, we'd be making an unfair judgement, would we not? The times when an Infiltrator TRULY has an advantage are when he (A) hasn't killed anyone, (B) hasn't cloaked or decloaked within earshot of an anti-Infiltrator, and (C) hasn't fired his class specific weapon or recon in the area. If one of those areas isn't present, you can determine that an Infiltrator is and the area and where.

And I still suggest giving the Infiltrator 250 shields instead of 400. That way, you are actually 2 bullets down and being behind someone matters more. Instead of being able to tank bullets and have your HP left because you are literally only a bullet down, then turn around and headshot someone, you have to be more careful. And if you are actually paying attention enough to react, you can do something about it even if they get the first shot off on you.

You said that you can prove your claims, and I believe that, but I did say I had some clips I could share with you, and I could always get more too. If you give me your Discord, I can send them to you. They may not be sufficient for you, but its how I deal with Infiltrators. Usually works.

If you're tunnel visioning on an Infil, it should be the easiest time to track it? If you can't, even while focusing solely on the infil, then something is wrong, and i'll tell you as even a pretty good player, it's not you it's the class.

Didn't the infil have the ama? Not a power knife? Either way, the first mistake was switching and assuming you wouldn't hear the knife. If they hadn't of done that they could have come behind you and then decloaked once in LOS, which was their second mistake. What i'm saying is that they fked up hard, and at that point they started at a disadvantage and honestly didn't even count as using their abilities or being an Infil. It would be little difference than if it was a heavy and they didn't even activate their OS.

I'm not assuming most infils are a) good or b) playing their best all or nearly all the time. But even in that case, playing 'peak anti-infil' against someone who is playing 'peak infil', for fairness, still puts the non-infil at a massive disadvantage.

If you're at a base that has like 5 players, sure, you can reasonably expect infils in certain places, and even if you can't you are less likely to be jumped in a 1vX due to the Infil. When you actually get into larger fights, no, you basically have to assume that an infil could be on any hill as a sniper, running beside or behind every enemy 20-40m away, or even sitting in a corner with perma invis because lol perma invis. Why? Because not only are infils not limited to singular darts, but you will frequently find multiple infils at a base, and keeping track of everything is impossible. Even knowing an infil is there, what are you going to do if you need to actually push up and aren't just point-holding with a lot of good angles covered? Every other class in the game can't sit out in the open or beside/behind cover and watch you while invisible, with a weapon capable of 1 shotting from range, which makes them actually vulnerable and counterable unlike infil. Now imagine if they had either a significant de-cloak time, or even better, had to switch to and use an item to declaok/cloak. They could still get into positions, they could still find advantageous spots to attack from, and they could still support allies, just not before the enemy even renders them on their screen.

Would do almost nothing for bolters/snipers, NAC would still exist, and clientside from invisibility would still be a thing. Would make shooting at bolters a tiny bit more worthwhile, especially if they removed or nerfed NAC as well, but it's a band-aid solution to a broken mechanic, and i'd rather they directly fix the issue. See: NWA nerf for an example of a band-aid change that really doesn't address the issues, and i'm even in the camp that doesn't mind NWA.

Toune#9537

Whatever you say, man. I don't judge people on the size of certain numbers. If someone talks sense, and can convince me, I will come around. One should not need to post and compare stats to drive an argument. You want to deny people the right to partake in a discussion who don't post their stats? Fine with me. Only shows what kind of person you are at heart. But let's play devil's advocate here. How much a K/D-R does one need to be allowed to talk here from your point of view? Over 1? Over 2? Over 4?