Cloaking

[Iceman]

I just recently played another campaign and I am not sure if the detection had been tweaked on this most recent patch but on the previous patch I lost 2 cloaked klingon scout III's to 2 jem'hadar colony ship III's. It was 1 v 1 on both engagements with both ships having equal crew exp.

Notice that this is an *intended* advantage of Klingon and Dominion non-combat ships! They are armed, and as such, it might not be wise to attack them with a single scout!
The Klinngons and the Dominion need a few of these smallish advantages. Like the other empires have other advantages.

It feels like cloaking is more of a liability and not an advantage at this point.

Are you basing this observation solely on this type of episode, or do you feel it is a universal thing?
I'm asking because other players are confortable with the current state of cloaking. I'd like to understand better why you feel it is a liability.

I understand that you are currently trying to balance the mechanic however I would keep in mind that the klingon and romulan vessels have over all slightly less shields and hull then their counter parts along with the lack of full shield strength after the opening turn.

Notice that cloaking is supposed to be most effective in "swarm" attacks, preferable when the enemy is outnumbered, rather than in 1v1 battles.

I sure its still in adjustment phase at this point, but thought I would let you know what happened and maybe further adjustments to cloaking might be made down the line. However right now I seem to have more success running my fleets without cloaking.

Thanks! Yes, all feedback is welcome, and ways to improve it too. If you have suggestions on changes, please post them.

[Hebrewhammer]

Hi Iceman,

Thanks for the feedback, I recall many threads ago that you said it was possible to setup the game so you could have two enemy fleets close by at the start so as to test fleet engagement with cloaked ships. By any chance do you recall where/how to set this up so I can run some tests or should I just play a game and save it when i have to equal opposing fleets about the engage each other?

[Iceman]

Hi Iceman,

Thanks for the feedback, I recall many threads ago that you said it was possible to setup the game so you could have two enemy fleets close by at the start so as to test fleet engagement with cloaked ships. By any chance do you recall where/how to set this up so I can run some tests or should I just play a game and save it when i have to equal opposing fleets about the engage each other?

Now there is an even better way, the map editor!
Create a tiny map (make a copy of the blank one that is provided with the game) and place the 2 homesystems you want to test close to each other. Edit Homesystems.xml and add ships to each of the civs, as many as you want to test with. Take notes of where each homesystem is (or use F12 in the galaxy screen).
Send a scout to the other civ's homesystem to make contact, declare war and send the fleet there. Watch the fireworks.
If you want to check the battle log to see what's happening during the battle, LMK - but it'll make the battle rounds take [much] longer to resolve.