Iridar posted some very interesting work on Sensor Shield bugs on Reddit today. If your like me, you just assumed Sensor Shield 4 was an improved version of Sensor Shield 3. It turns out they are different animals entirely. When Sensor Shield #4 was released it came with a 20 meter rule, which made proximity to our motion spotters or sensor darts still affect the player if they were close to the radar source (and not crouch walking). However, what we didn't know....Sensor Shield 3 remains unaffected by this rule. Some people say it was affected by the 20 meter rule, some on reddit say it never has been held to the 20 meter rule. Honestly I am not sure on the lifetime status of Sensor Shield #3. All that needs to be said here is the older version Sensor Shield #3 will not respect the 20 meter rule. Which actually makes it better for sneaking around closer to motion spotters. It functions based on the enemies movement alone. If they sprint they will be detected but they can happily walk around your motion spotter or darts without tipping you off at any distance. So be aware this is now publicly known on Reddit, and you may begin to see people taking advantage of the false sense of security you have with your motion spotters and darts I would just encourage everyone to toss the 20 meter rule out the window. Its going to only provide us a false sense of security.
Yeeeeah...I noticed this when SS4 came out. The first thing that caught my eye was the difference in wording so I did some tests. Too bad word got out.
LOL so sneaky. Thats good to know. Honestly its kinda neat that people would have the option to use either one, each has their pluses and minuses. SS3 would be excellent for classes like sneaky ninja heavies who are going to be stomping around, but maybe not necessarily sprinting in a heavily saturated indoor area. The LA could enjoy SS3 with a silenced weapon and the ability to just res-position when needed with their jetpack and fall off radar when the wanted to. On the flip side, a stalker infil with SS4 already knows they can just crouch walk to avoid detection. Our new and improved cloak helps stay unnoticed in that 20 meter detection span, and we could sprint wherever else we wanted to w/o concern. Its nice in a way to have the implants giving more variety and flavor i just wish maybe Daybreak changed the names of SS3 and SS4 to better reflect what the implant does. So SS3 would be like Sensor Shield, and SS4 would be like... Motion Dampener ? As it stands now we have no real indication our radar device is malfunctioning, and it creates the problem of a false sense of security. I suppose the designers intended this drawback however... Everything seems to have drawbacks. Anytime we use radar we sacrifice our stealth and make bright obvious map signatures. It doesn't shock me now that implants trump our tools. The solution from the developers seems to be listen for footsteps and keep alert of your surroundings. I can't really get upset over the implants making radar no longer 100% accurate. Two years ago hardly anyone used radar, now everyone does and other people are being forced to counter it. Unfortunately, (or fortunately for Daybreak) they are countering it with money. XD. Ultimately, I really wish Daybreak would buff smoke grenades to cancel out radar for a short time.
Two years - true, but three years ago Scout Radar Flash didn't even had to be occupied to light up all infantry within 100m Honestly, radars weren't very reliable even without implants, since anyone can just crouch whenever they want to be hidden. This is what I do whenever I'm in range of a Motion Spotter. And I don't really want to be guessing if I'm within 20m of that Motion Spotter or not. One more reason why I think sensor shield isn't worth bothering with.
I thought long and hard about this subject, and experienced a range of emotions over many months. Once you get past the initial disapointment of your tool no longer working 100% or (back then - i assumed only 100% reliable within 20 meters) I began to come to the conclusion that once Radar looses its 100% legitimacy, (which was technically done with crouch walking) you may as well have other in game factors like footsteps, and positioning be what infiltrators use to help make up for the loss in total map awareness. For a game to be interesting we cannot be reliant on 100% usage of radar. From a stealth standpoint radar can be a major drawback... What I mean by that is from the infiltrators POV it gives us away. Daybreak has also buffed our cloak which helps to push infiltrators away from having to crutch so hard on map awareness in order to flank or escape. That being said I understand why Daybreak tried to implement the 20 meter rule....Honestly this feels like it is being overly cautious though. Your right its cheesy that you cannot tell when your 20 meters away from radar and detected. Counter Intelligence SHOULD be built into all off Sensor Shields versions so you know when you have been spotted... marked... or otherwise detected. That should just be a standard quality of life improvement for those using the implants for being stealthy. However even Sensor Shield #3 implant becomes flawed based on the human reaction time when entering into the spotters effective area because you won't have enough time to notice the motion spotter on the mini-map, and begin to walk.. What are the chances of the infil looking on screen at the exact moment when a player enters the spotters effective range, and sees them for the 1-2 seconds it takes for them to change their behavior and begin walking? Far more frequently then you would think. I see it all the time its like little gunshots going off but arrows, and they disappear more quickly then a player spot would. It tells me they are either enemy infils or people with Sensor Shield equipped. Narrow that down by thinking back on if you heard an enemy cloak and the answer is usually clear... Both SS3 and SS4 are flawed in different ways.... Stealth Aids... Wow that sounds dirty should not come down to purchasable implants. We need consumables like smoke nades, or some type of short 1 second cloaky medkit, to clear spots.
Not sure about being built in; DBG's really banking on implants offering small things; it's how they keep the system from being P2W. But I really love your idea about Counter Intelligence telling the player he's been lit up by a radar. I made a suggestion for that on the Issue Tracker. For me, as LA who doesn't have access to on-demand radar detection, it was always about combining as many sources of information as possible to build a complete picture. Sound and visuals are main sources of intelligence for me, minimap just pinpoints the location. I guess it's very different for normal cloakers, who spend more time waiting for enemies to come to them instead of actively hunting for enemies, since the cloak works better when you don't move. Whe I play Stalker infil I just go for knife kills, and I don't care if I die or don't play for the objective.
In my experience the majority of people don't bother to walk let alone crouch even when they notice there is a motion sensor in the area. I really only walk or crouch when I'm playing and infiltrator and even then mostly just as a stalker. I always watch the mini map, even more so when its my motion sensor that's placed.
to be honest, i dont see a big problem in SS3 and SS4 users because there arent so many and if they have it they dont have emp shield and thats a decision which they will regret when they come closer ;P.
Well, the good news is that DBG is aware of the bug, and supposedly fixed it in today's patch. I'm surprised the issue tracker is worth something after all. Even if it took them 3 months.
Good, not to be a downer but its probably a good idea to double check it out. I'm also unsure which version is the patched one. PTS had two updates done to it after I tested SS3 and SS4. The main thing I would test is the Z axis, and also confirm SS4 functionality on flat ground. On my latest PTS session SS4 behaved like SS3 very close to the spotter, and also retained its sprinting privileges beyond 20 meter radius. My concern when reading the wording is that SS4 at 20 meters may not grace other forms of movement walking around as SS3 does. A quick test on perfectly flat ground would clear up the slight ambiguity. It would be nice and far less confusing if SS4 was in fact a flat upgrade to SS3. Honestly from an energy usage standpoint it really should be. The extra cost should enable the sprinting to remain undetected 20 meters away from the spotter, and still provide everything SS3 did. I hope that is the case. I also need to re-test crouch cloaked walking (forward on slopes) showing up. Hopefully they cleared that up too. If not I shall continue to crab-walk. I do know the Z-axis that was affecting stalkers and crouched forward movement was also affecting SS3 and to a larger extent SS4 when sprinting (or moving quickly) up / down inclines.
Exactly my thoughts. Maybe we could test it together? Testing on PTS seems pointless due to ambiguity, and I wouldn't risk multiboxing on live servers. So how about it? I could come to Emerald for the test, we'd go to a secluded area, you'd deploy the spotter and I would move around. Both record a video, then compare them side by side. Just need to schedule the time. Or I could PM you my skype and you could just hit me up whenever you feel like it.
Sure I have the next two days off, so ill be online frequently. Skype or TS will work. My thoughts exactly on the Mutli Boxing.
As a returning infiltrator-only player who has forgotten absolutely everything, but is extremely excited about having stalker cloak now (it wasn't out last time I was around, though I preferred close-mid range infiltrator), what is this 20m rule you're talking about? I'm pretty behind on all the terminology/mechanics behind this game heh.
It's about Sensor Shield implant interactions with motion spotters: This is what Sensor Shield 3 does: Despite official description stating otherwise, Sensor Shield 3 also hides you when jumping. Basically, it makes that Motion Spotters are only able to detect you only when sprinting or flying on a jet pack. Sensor Shield 4 official description: So the "20m rule" is about Sensor Shield 4 making you undetectable even when sprinting, as long as you're 20m+ away from the motion spotter. Unfortunately, Sensor Shield 4 is currently bugged, and does not work within 20m at all. The today's / tomorrow's patch is supposed to fix this. I guess being the returning player you don't know implants or motion spotters are. Check the links for info.
CuteBeaver and I performed some tests to make sure that the Sensor Shield 4 bug was fixed, and to confirm the mechanics behind Motion Spotter and Sensor Shield interactions. The bug was fixed, but we confirmed another bug: Motion Spotter isn't supposed to detect you when you're crouch walking, but it still does when you crouch walk up or down a slope. Strafe crouch walking ("crab walking") or using a Sensor Shield 3 or 4 implant allows to sidestep this issue for now. We also found out some interesting stuff: Motion Spotter detection is based on speed. So as long as you move slow enough, you will not be detected, doesn't matter what kind of movement it is. This isn't very useful on its own, but with Sensor Shield implant you can even fly on the jet pack and still remain undetected, provided you are slow enough.
You need to do voice overs for a video game or something. Anyway, that's an awesome video. Thanks to the both of you for putting in that effort!
Since it's based on speed, can we assume that it's the falling speed you achieve when jumping that sets the sensor off not the act of jumping?
