Claoked Decloakers

[Bill Whitmore]

I was going to post this in the bug tracker database but I want to make sure I understand the system in use and if it is in fact a bug.

Premise:
   In my current game, I am pretty sure I am playing against a Stealth Master so I unlocked the Decloaker to guard key wormholes to try to keep his cloaked ships from entering and building up in my systems.

Problem:
   The Decloaker is itself a cloaking unit but it always opens fire on ships that enter the system. Since it is always revealing itself, the cloaking ability really does nothing and I have to rebuild them after every major battle.  I tried to do to them what is done with most cloaking ships I don't want attacking and power them down so they would stop shooting at the enemy but I was unable to do so as they cannot be powered down.

Mechanics:
   Why can't the Decloaker be powered down? Is there some mechanical aspect I am not understanding that prevents the Decloaker from powering down? Would powering it down remove its detecting capability, too, removing the whole point of having them to begin with?

My first instinct was to post this as a bug or feature request but I wanted to make sure I wasn't missing something inherent in the cloaking or power down mechanics that was causing this before doing so.

Thanks

[Kahuna]

Use Mark I Scout Starships for decloaking until this gets fixed. Since Mark I Scout Starships decloak and are unlocked by default using 1000 knowledge to unlock Decloakers is pointless.

Suggestions:
-Make it possible to put them into stand down mode so they can decloak enemies without being decloaked themselves.
-Change their hull type from Composite to Scout and reduce their health from 2 million to 1 million. (Effective health vs Missile Frigates from 333333 (2million/6) to effective health of 333333 vs triangles (1million/3))

-Reduce Stealth Tachyon Beam Emitters' (turret) knowledge cost from 1500 to 250 or 500.

[Tridus]

If you just want to guard wormholes in key systems against cloaked ships, Military Command Stations are nice. Mk 1 has a pretty large range (smaller than the Decloaker, but larger than the Tachyon Beam Emitter or Scout Starship), is already unlocked, and if it does get attacked has at least some means to defend itself by translocating enemies away from itself (and helps your other defenses by increasing attack power 20% for everything of yours).

For really key systems, mk II has double the radius, a 50% attack boost, and adds engine damage. Mk III has planet-wide decloaking, doubles the attack power of everything in the system, does engine damage, and paralyzes enemy ships.

[keith.lamothe]

The Decloaker is kind of a strange unit.  Realistically it should probably just have its guns removed.

But if you want cloaked tachyon emission on a wormhole, the Stealth Tachyon Beam Emitter (if I remember the name correctly) is what you want.

[MaxAstro]

I actually like decloakers as they are because I use them for fleet support.  Their guns are not trivial (not amazing, but they contribute) and grouping them with your fleet helps keep them alive.  Their tachyon range is also ~huge~, which to me justifies their knowledge cost.  It ensures that my long-range units have time to shoot on anything they decloak before it gets to me.

That said, it is a bit weird that they have cloaking at all, to be honest.  It would definitely make more sense if they could be put into "hold fire" mode and still decloak things.  Either that or lose cloaking entirely, to reinforce their role as fleet support.

I could also see them being rebalanced as a "cloak-killer" either by giving them multi-shot and a high bonus against swarmers and ultra-light (since that covers most cloaking units) or by somehow giving them a weapon that does extra damage against units with the cloaking ability.

[Bill Whitmore]

I think it bugs me more because it doesn't do what I thought it would do.  It has a huge Tachyon range and it's cloaked. By all accounts, it LOOKS like it can sit passively in a system and reveal all incoming cloaked ships and, in case any slip through, scout a given system better than just about any other mobile unit in the game for hidden ships and stay hidden while doing it. In actual fact, it has a hard time doing that since it shoots at the first thing it can, breaks it's own cloak and gets destroyed. It has much more value to me revealing all cloaked ships than adding <1% to my fleets firepower already on the scene so I would rather it didn't shoot.

Stealth Tachyon Beam Emitters could work but as was pointed out they have higher K costs and have less flexibility in that they are immobile. I forgot about Scout Starships having Tachyon, but the range is small enough that using it for anything other than wormhole defense would not make much since. Since I am playing against a Stealth Master, the Decloakers ability to also follow my fleet on an attack and reveal enemy ships at long range in enemy systems makes it the best option for my situation.

Anyways, enough about why I would want to use the Decloaker and back to discussing the unit itself.

I think the easiest and most consistent fix would be to just add the option to enter stand down mode the same way other cloaked units do to prevent them from shooting and revealing themselves.

I really like the idea of making them cloaker killers like MaxAstro suggested.

[Qatu]

 When you press z while the ship is selected, there are 2 circles, the inner one is gun range the outer one is decloak range. Put the wormhole between the 2 circles, and it wont shoot, so you'll have a cloaked decloaker.

edit: In a game with few chokepoints, half can go on defense wihle half accompany the offensive. That's really cheap in knowledge and very effective.

[Toranth]

When you press z while the ship is selected, there are 2 circles, the inner one is gun range the outer one is decloak range. Put the wormhole between the 2 circles, and it wont shoot, so you'll have a cloaked decloaker.

Unfortunately, Decloakers are considered a "Military ship" and will auto-FRD, meaning they rush headlong into danger and die.

[keith.lamothe]

When you press z while the ship is selected, there are 2 circles, the inner one is gun range the outer one is decloak range. Put the wormhole between the 2 circles, and it wont shoot, so you'll have a cloaked decloaker.

Unfortunately, Decloakers are considered a "Military ship" and will auto-FRD, meaning they rush headlong into danger and die.

If you have auto-frd military on.  If you do you can put the decloakers in a specific control group and set the suppress-auto-frd-military toggle on that control group.

Which is all way more complicated than it should need to be, etc, but there it is.

[Toranth]

When you press z while the ship is selected, there are 2 circles, the inner one is gun range the outer one is decloak range. Put the wormhole between the 2 circles, and it wont shoot, so you'll have a cloaked decloaker.

Unfortunately, Decloakers are considered a "Military ship" and will auto-FRD, meaning they rush headlong into danger and die.

If you have auto-frd military on.  If you do you can put the decloakers in a specific control group and set the suppress-auto-frd-military toggle on that control group.

Which is all way more complicated than it should need to be, etc, but there it is.

This got really awkward when trying to have Decloakers covering multiple systems.  Either you needed to build them all in the same place, assign then group, then deploy... or have half your hotkeys devoted to do-nothing Decloakers.

These days I just unlock Mil-IIIs and let them handle it.  That's a lot simpler and the Mil-III's come with pretty awesome guns, too.

[TechSY730]

You can add a ship to a control group using ctrl+shift+N, and it will add those ships to control group N even if there are ships in N that are on another planet. Thus, the old ships won't be replaced in that control group.


That said, now that all ships no longer get an energy use reduction in stand down mode, there is no reason why any auxiliary support effects should toggle with it. Only attack, repair, constructing, assist construction, gravity, self-damage to regen allies (regen golem), self-degeneration, and tractor should toggle with stand down mode. The rest (notably including, but not limited to, boosting and tachyon beams) should stay on.
This would also help out eye bots, btw.


(Speaking of repair and assist construction, I have another case where engineers will try to assist something it can't repair and can't help construct something anymore. I'll post a save in a new bug report tonight tomorrow)

[Shrugging Khan]

Or just give us a Control Menu option that lets the player determine which ship functions go off-line when switching to stand-down mode.

[KDR_11k]

Are tachyon emitters perhaps UP? The Decloaker does decloaking much better so why get emitters?

Overall I'd like Total Annihilation-style fire mode settings:
- Don't shoot unless given an explicit attack order
- Fire when uncloaked (makes sense for all units due to cloaker starships)
- Fire at any aggressive target (the current behavior)
- Fire at any target (including powered down AI units)

[Kahuna]

The "unlocked by default" Tachyon Emitters are ok since they're.. well.. unlocked by default. But 1500 Knowledge for the Stealthed ones? LOL.. unlocking Decloakers AND Mark II Scout Starships cost 1250 Knowledge in total.

[Qatu]

 The anti-stealth turrets are really good on maps with lots of chokepoints or for people who play with auto-frd military if the AI has eyebots/infiltrators or other high threat cloaked ships.