Ok, since some people suggested some idea I got too about hacking, let's put my own little wishlist here. Mostly, we all feel that hacking is an interesting, yet too limited tool. There is only a few thing we can do, and they are too easily countered. First, my idea is to bring two different kind of hacking tools: Viral hacking, and control hacking. Control hacking tool This is the hacking tool we know, just with a little improvements: - Terminal/turret: A hacked terminal or turret doesn't reset it's ownership if destroyed, it must be hacked back. It reset, or the base has to flip ownership - Vehicle: A hacked vehicle randomly ejects one of its gunner out of the vehicle, he cannot jump back in the vehicle during the next three seconds. Players in a vehicle that is under a hack attemps recieve an alert sound so they can move to try to stop the hacking - SCU/Generator: An infiltrator with the control hacking tool is the only soldier that don't suffer penalities when stabilizing a SCU/Generator hacked by a viral hacking tool (see below) - Explosives: Can hack them to gain control over them - Ammo pack: Can hack them to gain control over them Viral hacking tool This hacking tool doesn't try to control, but rather disrupt the normal behavior of the target by infecting it with a virus. All infiltrators can see if something is infected. An infiltrator with a viral hacking tool can hack it back to clear the virus. - Terminal: A hacked terminal can be set either to explose 3s after its next use, or automaticaly spot every player using it. - Turret: A turret can be hacked so it explode if it reach it's maximum heat - Vehicle: A vehicle infected by a virus has the same symptoms that infantry hit by an EMP... disabled UI and scrambled display - SCU/Generator: A hacked SCU/Generator takes three times longer to stabilize unless hacked by another infiltrator with a control hacking tool - Explosives: Hacked explosives never explode unless destroyed - Ammo pack: Hacked packs keep laying around but don't provide any ammo
Interesting. While what we need is more depth in general, this wouldn't be a bad idea. That being, I think that it would be better if you only had one hacking tool and could choose the hack you use instead of separate tools.
Well, I try to keep my imagination withing the limits of what could be done with a reasonable budget. What we would need the most is to have a meaningful use on the battlefield, like... hacking forcefield that give access to shorter paths to the capture points. However, that kind of idea would need to revamp ALL the bases to be introduced in the game, reason which I don't suggest it. I don't think that SOE have such a budget for only 1/6 of the players (the infiltrators)
EMP effect on vehicles? Those cameras are run by electricity, It should disable cameras for about 15 seconds. And vehicle hacking: Hit E to hack: 60 seconds Max rank: 4: 70 3: 80 2: 100 1: 120 Alarm sounds inside. Also: A stealth way to take over bases w/ a hacking minigame and if you fail, Auto demand reinforcements, Auto turrets spawn w/ 3x health.
I can see that you were putting some thought into this. Here is what I have issues with in regards to what you posted. If a terminal/turret is destroyed, why would it still be hacked? We aren't talking about it being damaged, we are talking about it being replaced "from scratch". In combat situations with small numbers, it would be far too easy to steal enemy sunders - especially defenders. Sunders really are practically the only vehicle we are talking about here. No other vehicle is going to be in a fixe location. Any vehicle with a driver just needs to move 10 feet to stop this kind of hacking event if they are getting some kind of warning sound. Sure they would have to keep rolling, but, essentially, the only vehicle that would be defenseless long enough to "hack" would be a sunder or possibly a flash. Do you pay the nanite cost for taking possession of a "hacked" vehicle? Your faction hasn't paid any points for it. You can't take weapons off a fallen enemy soldier that you defeated, why would be able to take advantage of an enemy vehicle without playing nanites? SEE the part about the nanite charge for vehicles above, the same applies here. By-the-way, how do you get close enough to hack explosives without setting them off? (it is typically an Engineers job to defuse explosives) I understand your objective, but I am not even sure if it is possible to destroy a deployed ammo pack. So I don't think it should be able to be hacked. This would turn the Terminal into a spotting tool. If they added this feature, I would think that it would need to be another gadget for the Infiltrator spotting tool slot. Explosives cost nanites. What would be nanite charge be for turning something into an explosive? Why would a Terminal function like an explosive without explosives being deployed on it? (I can potentially see why one would think that a turret could be rigged to explode - still there is the nanite cost associated with explosives). What is the nanite cost for this? (once again you are talking about FX that cost nanites). Based on how EMPs work, the effect would not destroy a vehicle. If this was allowed to cause the other effects of an EMP, I'm assuming the time limit would only be the normal FX time of an emp grenade. Why wouldn't it require an infiltrator to have a Control Hacking tool instead of a Viral Hacking tool to fix the damage done by a Viral Hacking tool? Would it take 3 times longer to "infect" the SCU/Generator with the Viral Hacking tool than it would to set it for destruction? This seems to be very OP to me. The generators/SCU are currently set so that any class can destroy or stop the self-destruct. The only action that takes a specific class is to repair them once they are destroyed. This make it virtually impossible for defenders to stop a besieged generator/SCU from being destroyed. As above, if you get close enough to hack them it would set-off. Defusing and removal of explosives is more of an Engineers job. You might as well destroy the explosives for the objective points. No reason to leave anything cluttering the battlefield that isn't assisting or there to cause damage to anyone. Having it stay there eats up processing time that slows down everyone's game performance.
I just want generator hacking (would take like 30 seconds to flip it to your side, doesn't work on SCU's, gen symbol flashes during the hack) and I want hacked things to remain owned by my faction after they get destroyed, the only way to revert it is by hacking it back. Those things alone would already make the infiltrator more important.
hacking makes undoing your programing fiasco requires the enemy to do a puzzle..... only another infiltrator with certs spent on de-hacking this stuff can skip the puzzle
SOE has previously said that flipping vehicle ownership via hacking probably won't happen due to the effort required in changing the vehicle colors. It was an easy color swap in PS1, but the vehs are so much more complex in PS2. I do salivate when I see all the immobile tanks spamming a base. I think the EMP effect could be fun and easy to implement. Hacking the veh causes a 60 second EMP effect. Hacking an AMS flips the terminals for 60 seconds. PS1 had the T-REK, which could also fire an emp-like bolt. That could be a fun upgrade for the sensor dart. An alt-fire EMP AV mode. I would like a reason to sometimes use the sensor dart. The motion spotter is so much more useful currently.
I don't know why you speak of putting a nanite costs on everything related to an explosion. Rockets explode, no cost, UBGL rounds explose, no cost. And they don't need something such difficult than infiltrate an enemy base... just to stay close to an ammo pack. I also never talked about take control of sunderers of other vehicles, it would be far more powerful. The hacking with the CHT only force a gunner to get out a few second, it doesn't make you able to use the vehicle. For the delay when hacking something with the VHT, don't forget that infiltrators can hack it without an additionnal delay. If you can't secure the room long enough, bring an infiltrator to stabilize it, that's exactly the point we seek for: making the infiltrator more needed on the battlefield. For the defusing being an engineer job... engineer has already a bit too much of things he can do, compared to anything else. But I sure see your point. Perhaps it's a bad idea.
Because they cost nanites. That's why. Some of the games resources are balanced through the use of the nanite system. Allowing Infiltrators to gain nanites through hacking is balance breaking. And you can clearly see that I brought them up with everything that cost nanites and not just vehicles. I am glad that we both agree that hacking vehicles to gain control of them is too powerful, but you must understand that what you said was "hacking" the vehicle. When someone is ejected from a turret, it is because you have hacked it and gained control of it for your side - the enemy isn't ejected until you have hacked full "control" of the turret. There is no way that I would know that you were not implying that you control of the vehicle was part of the hacking process as it is an assumed part of hacking. Are you now saying that it would only force out someone manning a weapon in a vehicle? but none of the other passengers? Is it only forcing out the people in secondary weapon seats (one that is a gunner but not a driver seat - that my have weapons)? Based on what you have said, then I will stick with my other comments in regards to vehicle "hacking". Some of them you don't disagree with. I stand by those that you do disagree with. I will add, that this would make sunder gunners swap to the driver seat or change to a passenger seat or simply jump out to fight you. Would hacking stop as soon as someone left a sunder weapon seat? What would happen if there were two gunners and one moved out of the gunner sear, or if a single gunner swapped from one gunner sear to the other one? Which would be ejected from a heavy tank the driver or the gunner? What if their was only one player in a heavy tank and they swapped seats while you were hacking it? No. It's what you seek. I think it would be balance breaking to make it so that an infiltrator can infect a generator or SCU with a virus so that it would take an opposing infiltrator to remove the virus. I think that making it take additional time is even more balance-breaking. I do not feel that infiltrators are underpowered. I think that giving them any of the additional powers that you suggest would make infiltrators over-powered, and I listed my reasons why. Thank you for understanding my point in regards to Engineers and explosive removal/manipulation.
For forced ejection out of vehicles, I clearly said "one of its gunners". Eject the driver would be a bit too much IMHO, if the vehicle is actualy being shot at by something else.
Personally, I don't see (most of) the ideas in this thread as granting us cloakers additional powers. Rather, I see it as expanding the abilities we already have, in order to increase depth and necessity to our team. I'll use the example of AMS terminal hacking here (temporary or otherwise). We can already hack terminals, so I see no problem with stretching that ability to include AMS terminals. If an AMS terminal can only be reclaimed by another cloaker, then that means that people will be more inclined to run as a helpful, stealthy infiltrator in order to 1: Disrupt the enemy from pulling MAXes or resupplying from a Sunderer and 2: Prevent enemy infiltrators from disrupting their ability to pull MAXes and resupply from that Sunderer. This is just an example, and it's only my two-cents on the matter. By no means is anyone obligated to agree xD
