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This, only with regards to the cloak issue.

We have in this game two cloak systems: regular cloak (under tac) and heavy cloak (under gar).

Let's compare the two.

reg cloak:
* medium energy consumption
* medium signature reduction (sbs with cloak on and stuff dismounted at around 24% sig ?)

heavy cloak:
* high energy consumption
* high signature reduction (sbs with cloak on and stuff dismounted at around 6% sig ?)

so, if you want and you have them both (bios mainly), you can have both in cargo and switch with ctrl-8. That way you can pass the intcamp undetected and switch to the less draining cloak when you're far enough so you can clear the other 2-3k to your minimal setup distance still under cloak.

dogbones: I tried the whole swapping issue in a game and there is no huge bump in signatures. There is no "arming time" for cloaks. besides half the problem is absorbed into the transfer to higher sig system.

orion: to conclude we already have this in the game.

At least if nothing else, could it be possible that if the sfs/sbs have max energy, the E recharge (which goes nowhere) will be used for cloak?

When you run out of E, but still keep on using cloak, the sig will not go all the way back to 100%, but it will stay somewhere inbetween, and this is what I want for roaming sfs with full E, once it starts to shoot, without engaging cloak, the sig will immediately (well with standard decay) go up.

Edit : or as alternative make it so that you have a "recharge consuming only" mode for cloaks

aptest wrote:QUOTE (aptest @ May 4 2010, 11:21 PM) dogbones: I tried the whole swapping issue in a game and there is no huge bump in signatures. There is no "arming time" for cloaks. besides half the problem is absorbed into the transfer to higher sig system.

Whenever you dismount a cloak, its effect is instantly disengaged. Having the another active a moment afterward still results in the cloaking effect increasing from nothing to full cloak for the activation time of the new cloak. You will most certainly get eyed doing it, even if only for a second.

Having a mode where the cloak never consumes more than the ship's native power generation makes sense (possible with it only consuming 90% of the native power generation if the ship isn't fullu charged). You'd need to update the UI and messages about ship state though.

Having your signature depend on how hard the engines are working, however, would be very tricky. As it stands, suppose you are cruising along at a stealthy 50% throttle setting. Your engin is thrusting at 1/2 its maximum so you'd have a lower signature. If you turn, however, your engine instantly goes to full power to change your velocity vector and your signature would go up. There is basically no way to tell your engines to use less that full power for turns (or throttle changes, for that matter: cutting your throttle from 50% to 0% means your engine thrusts at full power till you stop).

It wouldn't be hard to add though: just add a throttle limiter that effectively cuts your engine's acceleration (& your top speed) by whatever fraction you want. As with the variable cloak, you'd need new UI and have to upate the ship state messages.

I'd be happy enough with the functionality and getting the feel by looking at the time counter in the F4 panel.