Cloaking takes away the fun

By that very same logic no nerfs or buffs have ever been justified, though.

No, I never said that much. Nerfing and buffing is required to keep balance, to a degree. But for everything you complain about and want changed, maybe even nerfed into the ground because it is the bane of your existence, there is either a bigger fish or more fish to fry. There will always be someone using something that is more powerful than what you are using or someone using something so obviously cheap just to beat you. However, remember this: this game is a war. Thats exactly what you are supposed to do to win it. Thats gaming. The problem is morality and the variety in it. I understand you guys not liking aspects of the game, specifically Infiltrators and cloaking, and I do think there needs to be a change, but at the end of the day, this is what we have to deal with. What is a virtual death in comparison to the game you like to play? Who is it to make you drop it just because of your hate?

This goes for literally everything in this game, every single thing you don't like in any game. Who is it that it should make you quit? Who is it that it should make you strike? If you don't like a cheap tactic, you either have to beat it or lose to it, and often times, its about your own morality. Do you decide to stoop to their level? Do you decide to stoop lower? Or do you decide to beat them because you are better than they are? Do you decide to use what you like and overcome the obstacle and take delight when you do? Its your choice. Do you go against your own morality?



But yeah, as an Infiltrator main, just make the cloak non-collideable, take away 150 more hp so you have 250 less than every other class, raise the delay to the average ping of the server so that people can actually see you decloak before they die to you, and let the Flash be a little louder when it is cloaked. Blame it on needing to make more power to run the cloak, therefore more excess gas goes through the muffler or something like that. Let vehicle headlights and base spotlights act as darklights, don't let Stalkers have a super deep cloak, and make Infiltrators more visible against a skybox, because thats the logical thing to do, right? I don't know. Is it more logical to blend in to something behind you or nothing behind you? You be the judge of that and balance the game accordingly.

This is the superior change and it is inarguable. It is absolute. If you disagree, you are wrong. Thank you.

Whether you intended to or not, you did. Even though you didn't intend it, it's still a pretty bad take, and i'll get into that through the rest:

Changes are absolutely necessary. Take the most obvious recent one, the x-bow. Regardless of how OP that was, it still didn't invalidate any other mechanic that needed changes to be balanced before it was released. The 'larger fish to fry' still existed, it was just overshadowed by an even bigger one. Just because the dev's take years to make balance changes doesn't mean issues still don't exist.

[Size 60 font, Bolded, Italicized, some obnoxious colour]GAME[/end editing]

Once again, refer to the x-bow. You are supposed to use it, it was extremely cheesy and cheap, and it is still a game of war.

This is more an opinion, but generally mechanics that have low skill floors should also not be very effective or be incredibly niche, and should have a low skill-ceiling; this is not the case with infil as a whole. It is easier to play than other classes and scales higher for pure ivi than any other class in the game.

Again, x-bow; could you do everything you listed there? Yes. Should you have to? No.

I used x-bow because it was the most broken thing recently released and was pretty unanimously agreed to be broken af. However, using your logic you could make a very real case for keeping it 100% as it was, and the one point you had about balancing things is contradicted by the rest of your points.

Alright, this has inspired me to make a new sig

I like the idea of heat seeking missiles still working on cloaked flashes

There is a counter. Just about everything on the field that has wheels, C4 and a turret; and there definitely is a way to kill them, I do it all the time. As I drive them regularly, I am not going to divulge that little tid-bit. I cannot have my play style compromised without them doing a little work. Sadly, as I have mentioned many times. With people who do nothing BUT what they do, you and anyone else who is not a Dedicated specialist, will tend to fall short when fighting against them. I am one of those people who dedicated to the Flash and A.N.T. The reason I got hooked on the Flash, was actually because everyone here at the times said Flashes sucked, horribly. There was even a running joke about them. "If you like your K.D. do not drive a flash." Hilariously the Fury was much, MUCH stronger than it is now back then. I mistakenly believed since there were so many people screaming this sucks, it would be the absolute last thing they would cry about Nerfing. Even if I got good enough to kill a Tank with it. The tank driver would be so ashamed he could not land a SINGLE hit to kill a BIKE that murdered him, the person would never voice it. For YEARS that was exactly the case. People had self-respect and would not broadcast their epic, Horrific Fails... Right up until they did not.

For your average driver, an A.N.T. is only a threat to nonactive vehicles, aircraft, and infantry. The very thing that make them so deadly to infantry is what does them in, in the end... It does not have the firepower to take on anything else directly, even with the Cloak a direct confrontation ends is death most of the time. Personally, I believe the A.N.T. should be able to fire while cloaked because they are so flipping wide or AT THE VERY LEAST BE ABLE TO ATTACK WITH THE HARVESTER PINCERS.... It destroys indestructible crystals, why does it not damage vehicles in some manor?

You can sneeze and hit one cloaked. However, in an Epic battle situation, even if and A.N.T. did not cloak, you would not be able to kill it. Cloaking is more of an Offense tactic at that point. A.N.T.'s are fairly quick and nimble. They have to be to offset their girth. Again, I know this because I often create diversions for my team by de-cloaking right in the middle of the battle field and watch people go nuts trying to kill the lone little A.N.T. even though they were JUST fighting 3 M.B.T.s that they have now lost track of resulting in their death and the deaths of everyone around them, because A.N.T.'s pick up leggy stragglers.

Lastly, there are not that many A.N.T.s running around in general. The stage cannot support more than one or two per area due to crystal spawn times, sometimes less when you have new players calling themselves looking for a quick sure fire cert... Only redeploy and leave their base truck, FULL to the gills..... I swear, I would not mind if we could not siphon from non-active trucks.... Beyond that, driving one can be rather slow pace. I classify myself as one of the best. I have had sessions that ended in the high 90's worth of kills before the stage ended, however it took the better part of 5 HOURS to get those 90-something, compared to friends that gun and run on foot or drive anything else getting 100+... PER HOUR..... A.N.T. life is rather pedestrian. It just seems like they do a ton of damage because they run over groups. I am telling you though.... Groups that continue to spawn at a location where we can get to them are RAAAARE, and our turnaround is DONKEY slow... After I burn through my Cloak, I have had to roam for Crystal for up to 10 minutes to fill my tank.... That is a LOT of down time..... So many will kick A.N.T.'s to the curb on that merit alone. I often run into abandoned trucks on my way to a Cashe.

Well I have been saying the exact same thing for years... I guess I just finally said it in a way that you were able to understand. My goal is not annoyance, it is killing the way I want to. Annoyance is just a side-effect of death, sadly.

I can understand people's hate of a Wraith ANT, because you weren't going to kill an ANT even if it wasn't cloaked, but why the Flash? I don't see how you guys never know when one is coming. If you hear a Flash in the area but don't see a Flash in the area, 9 times out of 10 it is a Wraith Flash. If you listen to the sound of the weapon or even see the Flash killing your teammates, why would you still fail to act? I rarely get roadkilled by a Flash because I am not its first target, therefore I have lots of time to react. If you are its first target, I mean, you are probably dead to getting roadkilled or Renegaded, but anyone else should have the situational awareness to listen to the direction it is coming from and move out of the way.

The reason you can't do this with an ANT is because its so big that you can't move far enough.

Why do we need cloaked vehicles in the first place? And before you respond with fun for the player or something like that; x-bow.
What purpose do cloaked Flashes or Ants serve, and if they are largely not being used for that intended purpose and instead used to cheese kills, why do they exist?

Classy

The cloaked flashes should allow an sniper to get positioned on the open battlefield. I get that purpose.

If you simply put the flash cloak in a weapon slot it would solve the overall problem. Weapon OR cloak, not both. It's still quite capable of cheese but there would at least be some balance.

That my dear friend is an EXILEANT Question! The REAL answer is actually very simple. Stealth vehicles exist, because factions can be so large, so overpowering when it comes to numbers, it will reflect actual war rules. (If you have the same arms and superior numbers, your victory is 80% assured. So UberNoob's new signature speaks the truth.) The one and ONLY thing that can break this law, is the remaining 20%, subterfuge/element of surprise. Whether it be a Stealth Fighter, a Nuke or 3 out of nowhere, or a cloaked vehicle flanking an entire army and living just long enough to distract them so the attacked team can mount an assault of their own, they all serve the same goal, to disrupt the flow of battle and destroy morale. That is the real reason I use A.N.T.'s and flashes. Yes I am the weaker vehicle, and I am not going to dominate the field like a tank would, but I cause mental distress, through paranoia fear and death. I amplify rage, and people play terribly when they are mad. The worse you play, the better chance my team has of winning. As a N.S.O. the only time I win is if I and a few others disrupt the flow of battle and come back from behind; as the main reason I showed up on that team is because the team was underpopulated. I direct the flow of war, I am my team's puppet master. I scout, provide real time up to date battle status far beyond anything a few explosions or defend insignia on a map ever could and with high enough skill can ever do a fair amount of damage with no back up. Every time I manage to stop a surge by either picking them off or cause them to break ranks and wander about to look for me, I am one step closer to helping my team come back.

There is no real wrong way to use a cloaked vehicle; you can only waste potential. They are all weak and have low offense, however there is a way to push their value to levels of syzygy that can break people mentally. Fortunately you can push everything in the game to these levels if you dedicate yourself. I know people who can take on 2 and 3 M.B.T.'s from the seat of a Lighting using H.E.S.H. rounds, kill them, and escape with their lives in tact... Few see passed what is right in front of them. Be thankful for that.

Whatever is strong enough to be used against an over-pop (80:20 % in your example) can, and will, be used by that same 80% against the 20%.

If it is strong enough to do all those things listed against an 80% pop, it's going to be absurdly strong against anything less.

That's the whole reason they are called force multipliers.

Roadkills with flashes are already questionable. Without any changes to that, no, I really don't think the flash needs cloak in any shape or form. It is almost never used as pure transportation, and is almost exclusively used as a way to cheese kills. Further, it has worse rendering than even infil's cloak, and inconsistently goes 100% invisible at odd ranges.

Folks forget this part. Some think all the players on the server are just too stupid to counter infiltrators and that's why they don't.

The concept of something being imbalanced to the point it ruins fun just isn't a thing apparently. I forgive the noobs but veterans who know the imbalances in the game and abuse them instead of avoiding them are just crappy sportsmen and weak players who don't give a crap about the health of the game.

What amazes me is how almost every good infantry player says, yeah, Infils (or at least recon/dildar and bolting) are too strong, and even when they have the stats or gameplay footage to back it up, still get shot down by worse players. Usually it's the opposite, bad players say something is OP and good players say it isn't.

You are actually wrong about that. Yes, you can use an A.N.T. on the dominating side, however most smart people are not going to for glaring reasons. Some of the absolute WORST sessions I have had is me doing my job turning the tide, and the tide STAYS turned. I wound up finishing a 2 hour Alerts with barely over 20 kills.... An A.N.T. or Flash only flourish if there is food. You need your enemy to be bold enough to press and make foolish calls to get your meals. It boils down to wasted potential. If I am ahead in Pop., and my team is waving colors of dominion, I am going to call something that will add to this in the proper way. An M.B.T. can EASILY dismantle Flashes and A.N.T.s and is a strong enough presence to actually be competitive in the mad scramble for kills that usually ensues. A.N.T's have to switch gears. That gear is usually HARVEST TIME.... And direct Confrontation. When you can get no lunch, you have to make your own. Regardless, you would be far better off not pulling these vehicles if you are on the winning side because you have backup.

Your second statement to ol' Jibs was right on the money. And it is for that reason I say: "Infiltrators and Cloaked vehicles are very balanced." I have no problem killing either whether on foot, or riding around.

Thats true, but the reason you dont see 80% of players using a Flash against the 20% is because the 80% pulling tanks is much stronger and more useful. Its also more intimidating.

The cloak does that by itself. It doesn't need to be on a Flash. Let me ask a question. Why does a tank need a shield when it is already a tank?

The answer: it doesn't. But its especially fun.

I think a good use for the cloak would be stealth transport. But deciding to separate the cloak and the weapons is dumb, because why would anyone do that in a war? I understand game balance, but its not inherently game breaking to have weapons on a vehicle that will literally get blown up in one hit by a tank or decimator or c4 or mine, and you can literally get shot off of it. The reason I don't die to Flashes is because of how vulnerable they are to those things, and if you are constantly getting ran over by one, the problem is with your own tactics on how to not die.

I think the Wraith module should be removed and replaced with a class specific option. That way, the Flash gets used by more than just people who want to use the Wraith or who use it as a throwaway vehicle to get to another base.

If you want to make Infiltrators more balanced, change the cloak effect to make them more visible when you are looking for them. I have already suggested random distortions surrounding a moving Infiltrator. Why not also make water and bullet sparks reflect off or distort near a cloaked Infiltrator? That is a whole lot better than mag dumping a corner and then getting wasted. All of this would obviously apply to the Wraith Flash. Boom. Now you and your blind and deaf selves can find it and react to it when you are actually looking for it.

I guess, but that's not what I said. I said the 80% will also be using some of whatever is able to actually fight against a massive out-pop, and that if it is capable of fighting in 80% over-pop, it's far stronger when not fighting massive over-pop.

That's overpop in general. You don't come out of an 80-20% zerg, as the zerg, with more than a couple kills a base, if you're lucky.