What do you want to see in stealth?

[Bruttal]

Originally Posted by Justaman

The biggest thing for me, is wanting stealth to be useful beyond having an inventory full of ACE's.

You could not effectively play as that stealthy guy who stealthily stabbed/shot the odd person in the way of his/her objective (to hack something).

Instead you where forced to play an invisible Explodiphile, if you did not want to become so much more of the kill spam.

I never used the DL vision, because I never needed it. Any high rpm/conical fire/large splash damage (chaingun/LMG/shotgun/lasher?) gun was more than enough to find stealthers. If they're within the same range of you as DL vision gives sight(usually a fair bit more than), a simple 360 of bullet spray, wile making sure you hit the obvious nooks and crannies of hiding, never let me down. They would either get hit, or try to run to safety (making them selves rather visible).

And if it didn't, it just meant the guy had run far enough away that DL vision wouldn't have done anything anyway.

That stealther with his pistol and knife is so intimidating.Must. get. DL. Vision.To.Survive!

Can I counter an aircraft's flight with an implant? Can I counter tanks armor with an implant? Can I counter an engineer's turrets with an implant? No? Why should I counter stealth with an implant?

pretty obvious that you played TR and had the ammo to waste

[Justaman]

Originally Posted by Bruttal

pretty obvious that you played TR and had the ammo to waste

Actually, I'm VS. Only played TR once, some time in 04, for about a day. Then NC for a wile, till I finally played VS and stayed with it since.

[Xyntech]

I doubt the dev team will leave cloakers as gimped as they were in PS1. That was just paranoia at the prospect of 'scary invisible ubertroops' and bad design and balancing in general. Tons of games have done a lot more with stealth since then, and PS2's class system indicates to me that the devs will probably be giving at least a healthy amount of attention towards making every class be reasonably useful.

[CutterJohn]

Originally Posted by Xyntech

I doubt the dev team will leave cloakers as gimped as they were in PS1. That was just paranoia at the prospect of 'scary invisible ubertroops' and bad design and balancing in general. Tons of games have done a lot more with stealth since then, and PS2's class system indicates to me that the devs will probably be giving at least a healthy amount of attention towards making every class be reasonably useful.

Those games also limit the invisibility a lot more than PS1 did. The fact that they are permanently invisible is extremely powerful.

[Traak]

Originally Posted by Justaman

Can I counter an aircraft's flight with an implant? Can I counter tanks armor with an implant? Can I counter an engineer's turrets with an implant? No? Why should I counter stealth with an implant?

Good idea. Cloakers should have an anti-armor implant, allowing them to X-ray bullets into tanks and kill the occupants.

[Raka Maru]

It was definitely rough being a Stealther at times... Looking forward to it again.

[Xyntech]

Originally Posted by CutterJohn

Those games also limit the invisibility a lot more than PS1 did. The fact that they are permanently invisible is extremely powerful.

The Cloak and Dagger watch in TF2 allows you to remain invisible forever while you stand still. It also lets you move around while completely invisible (no shimmer), but drains your cloak timer while moving so you have to stand still again to regenerate it.

It can be a powerful tool if used right, but it's mostly used as a noob crutch in TF2. It takes too long to get around and do anything useful in the fast paced matches.

I hope to see PS2 employ more than one variation of cloak. Balance them with strengths and weaknesses. If one method is proving too powerful, by all means nerf it, but buff ones that are underpowered as well.

At the very least, even if they don't have more than one style of cloak, I hope that they give cloakers enough attention to keep them competitive with the other classes. I think they will.

I just feel like PS1 cloakers were balanced against newbie reactions to invisible enemies, and never received the proper attention they needed to keep them effective against skilled players. PS2 has PS1's strengths and weaknesses to draw upon for reference, as well as all of the other variations of stealth found in other games. It should be enough to form a decent, balanced stealth class from the get go, even if it requires some fine tuning later on.

[Tarpeda]

First of all, let's make it clear that infil going kill-whore is an abomination. Primary goal of infil is ...ehm infiltration of enemy lines. And in PS1 if infil wanted to get some kills he just transformed into MAX or used boomers , that's why infil/MAX/combat eng. cert-combo was so popular. Another aspect of infil role was high risk/high reward factor, like bringing router pad inside heavely defended interlink base or drop gen .
So, I want to see infiltrator as a glass cannon that can turn the tide of the battle with abilities helping to infiltrate bases (e.g. audio implant), scout for teammates(something that translate enemy positions to squad radars) and wreck havoc at the rears of the enemies (boomers, shadow turrets, etc.).

[Raka Maru]

The pace was definitely slower as infil. The excitement level was intense however as you were always behind enemy lines trying to accomplish something.

Would like to se an assassin branch in the skill tree to get rid of squad leaders that keep bringing troops in.

Would also like to see several levels of stealth to allow for more deadly gadgets/guns as well.

[Rbstr]

I'd rather have mechanics centred around radar invisibility than visual absence. Combined with a lot more cover than before the radar can be a critically important bit of enemy-locating information - more important, even than being able to see someone.

Make the cloak more like Deus Ex and others where it only lasts a limited time.

[Zulthus]

Originally Posted by Xyntech

I doubt the dev team will leave cloakers as gimped as they were in PS1. That was just paranoia at the prospect of 'scary invisible ubertroops' and bad design and balancing in general. Tons of games have done a lot more with stealth since then, and PS2's class system indicates to me that the devs will probably be giving at least a healthy amount of attention towards making every class be reasonably useful.

Cloakers weren't gimped in the slightest in PS1. If you know how to use the suit you can wreak havoc on your enemies. In what ways did you find them gimped? I think they were very balanced.

[Ailos]

I want to see more options for cover for cloakers. Best example: the ability to hide inside/beside environmental objects. It can be as simple as the cloaker being hard to spot when he's inside bushes, but what I'd love to see is the Metal Gear Solid -style ability to hide inside a cardboard box (or an empty crate of tank ammunition, or something similar). It could provide cloakers with real skills a tactical advantage, while those that are dumb enough to walk around as a tank ammo crate on top of catwalks will be absolutely hilarious prey.

[Justaman]

Originally Posted by Zulthus

Cloakers weren't gimped in the slightest in PS1. If you know how to use the suit you can wreak havoc on your enemies. In what ways did you find them gimped? I think they were very balanced.

What could you do without ACE's that was meaningful and effective?

[Zulthus]

Originally Posted by Justaman

What could you do without ACE's that was meaningful and effective?

Infect vehicles. Jack them. Use them against the enemy. Deconstruct them. Infect turrets. Infect bases. Cat and mouse. Diversions. ACEs are also a very big part of an infiltrator's arsenal, I don't understand your question. Lead people into boomer traps. Trick enemies into your minefields. Sneak into an enemy AMS bubble, place mines, jack it, drive it off, deconstruct it. The infiltrator was one of the most balanced and versatile playstyles. There is no shortage of things to do with it, and it was most certainly not gimped. The infiltrator is meant to sabotage, it isn't meant to be used as a killwhore suit. But hey, people use it as that too, so there's another one. Any questions?

[CutterJohn]

Originally Posted by Tarpeda

First of all, let's make it clear that infil going kill-whore is an abomination. Primary goal of infil is ...ehm infiltration of enemy lines.

And what, pray tell, are you supposed to do once you've infiltrated the enemy lines?

Seeking to kill stuff in a combat game does not equal kill whore.