Topic: Info on 2.5.4.12 cloak vs seeking weapons

[TarMinyatur]

Remiak, you must consider that SFC forces seeking weapons to try to retain lock-on even if conditions improve for the seeker. The ECM yo-yo hasn't been removed, it constantly exists in the cloaker's favor. The interval for this check is undocumented. It seems to be every second or two. Otherwise, missiles chasing a cloaked ship at a constant range would never lose lock-on if they passed the initial retention check.

That being said, there is something odd about how the AI's missiles seem to have a better chance of retaining lock-on than I do when firing at a cloaked AI. It could simply be bad luck. More data is needed.

P.S. What I said earlier about flash-cubes being the way to do damage...that's not at all true. Plasma and missiles have almost no chance to hit even a high speed (19+) cloaked target. They disappear almost as soon as I press "Z". This is against the AI. Multiplayer could be different.

[Lepton1]

yeah, Tar I think that most of your view of the cloak seems based on the AI being cloaked, not you.  Try more with you being cloaked and I think you will have closer to Remiak's experience.  I think something hinky may be going on.

[Mantis]

Quote:

The bottom line, if you roll the die thousands of time and keep a running total of the values, you should have a result converging towards 3.5 time the number of roll made.
Hence the expected result (hope???) of a six sided die should be 3.5.

I think this is an apples to oranges. The numbers on the die in this case can be considered arbitrary, although ordered. The die is just a random number generator. You could just as easily have each face be a letter. I believe multiplying the die number by the percentage chance of the role is not correct in this situation. A situation where multiplying a number by the percentage for an "expected number"  would be where there is a 15 percent chance of one widget, a 25 percent chance of two widgets, etc. Then you could have an expected number of widgets after given event occuring y times.

The running totals of the values, and thus the expected value, is not relevant (sp?) in this situation, the distribution is. My guess is that OP's six-sided die is the random() function or something like it, with 0.000... to 0.1666... being a 1 and the like. After one thousand "roles", you should have 33% retain (or loss?) and 66% loss (or retain?), ignoring the rounding and other factors, given that 2 is the magic number.

I apologize to all for getting this thread off topic      

[Remiak]

Hi TarMinyatur,

You are right about seeking weapons loosing lock , this has been there since the first release of SFC2, I remember a few years ago when I cloaked and saw all those drones disappear, it is even in the user manual in the tactic proposed to the Roms against the Mirak "If the Mirak becomes too prolific with their missile use, cloak and watch them all disappear..."
They did and still do loose track sometimes, and I do not know the details of how/what conditions are required for this to occur.

The concept of yo-yo existed in SFB because there were chances of loosing/retraining  lock, now it is 100% sure so you do not yo-yo. You either reached a result of one and lock was broken or you did not and lock was kept.

As the chance is 100% to remain lock at the equation's result  of 2,3,3,4,5,6+ there is no yo-yo other than going to a result of 1-, then you do not yo-yo eihter as the chance to loose lock is 100% if the equation  is resulting with a one or less.

Thanks  

[Remiak]

Quote:

Quote:

The bottom line, if you roll the die thousands of time and keep a running total of the values, you should have a result converging towards 3.5 time the number of roll made.
Hence the expected result (hope???) of a six sided die should be 3.5.

I think this is an apples to oranges. The numbers on the die in this case can be considered arbitrary, although ordered. The die is just a random number generator. You could just as easily have each face be a letter. I believe multiplying the die number by the percentage chance of the role is not correct in this situation. A situation where multiplying a number by the percentage for an "expected number"  would be where there is a 15 percent chance of one widget, a 25 percent chance of two widgets, etc. Then you could have an expected number of widgets after given event occuring y times.

The running totals of the values, and thus the expected value, is not relevant (sp?) in this situation, the distribution is. My guess is that OP's six-sided die is the random() function or something like it, with 0.000... to 0.1666... being a 1 and the like. After one thousand "roles", you should have 33% retain (or loss?) and 66% loss (or retain?), ignoring the rounding and other factors, given that 2 is the magic number.

I apologize to all for getting this thread off topic      

Macman,

You are not off topic, in fact you are in the center of it. The real issue is not  the yo-yo or any other tactics that were used in SFB.
It is the statistics that were brought from SFB to SFC while changing the numbers.
if my understandind is correct, there is no random calculation in the determination of the cloak removing the lock of a ship.
It is boolean, in similar situation the result is always the same either the lock is lost or kept, not a probability between and excluding 0 and 1(0% and 100%).

So, sadly  there is no random function used there.
There is a fixed equation that ends with the magic number of 2 or more  to keep lock and 1 or less to break lock.
Nothing random there.
Now, my point was that the experience we would expect from a 6 sided die is as many 1s as 2s, 3s,4s,5s and 6s.
The expected result should be 3.5. Half the roll (1,2 and 3s) would be under and half above (the 4,5 and 6s).

To obtain the magic number of 2 in the equation, the assumption made is that the rolls have been replaced by a fixed value of 2.
I suggest it should either be real random 1 to 6 (may be to complicated) or be the middle value of 3.5 not 2. Using 2 is a decision that I do not understand yet.    

When we look at it, let's say hypotetically, the number is changed and a 3 result in a loss of lock. That means a cloaking ship at speed up to 8 could hope to break lock, instead of speed 0 only.
Once more, making no other changes, would that really make the device over the top?

I am just hoping to have the ROM avoid to do a emergency decell each time he cloaks....we are flying eagles, hawks, condors, falcons....not sitting ducks

Thanks    

[Scipio_66]

I don't get it.  You guys are playing a different game than me.  Really.  I have no trouble shedding missiles or plasma when I cloak with the new patch.  In the past, they (almost) always hit me if they were launched before I finished my fade.  For full damage.  The only time I was ever able to get a missile to lose lock in the old cloak was when I was able to outrun it for 10 to 20 seconds after fade (meaning I didn't really need to cloak).  I now routinely watch R torps vanish even though they were luanched at range 10.  BIG improvement!

To summarize:

Before patch  Missiles and plasma (virtually) always hit me for full damage if they were launched before I finished fade out.
After patch  Missiles and plasma (virutally) always lose lock if I finish fade before they impact.  The only time I've ever been hit by either with the new cloak is when a scatterpack opened on me just after I finished fade out.  (I should have been fling in F-11 mode, and phasered the shuttle before "going under".)  Even still, I ntoice that I took much less damage than expected.  I presume the damage reduction chart now works.

Before patch  Direct fire weapons double and add 5 to the range, but still hit for full damage.  Phasers killed you at range 0, and you may as well not even cloak against disruptors.
After patch Direct fire weaons double and add 5 to the range, and then strike for reduced damage.  I am much more able to withstand close range fire while under cloak.  (And then 'surface' under a weasel and punish the idiot for staying so close to a plasma armed ship.)

A shorter summary:
Before patch: Cloak bad
After patch: Cloak good.

I have seen no circumstances under which the old cloak is better than the new cloak.  Of course there are still many times and many opponents at/against which it is better not to cloak.  Just as was the case in SFB.


-S'Cipio the puzzled

[Lepton1]

OK here are some simple results with the AI cloaking vs two slow drones.

 Code:

Range  15    13    5    5    10 
Speed  10    10   10  15   10
retain  2    2    3    4    3
lock   no    no    no   no   no

 

All drones disappeared quite quickly as cloaked ship achieved full cloak and message of No Lock on the HUD.  As you can see in all instances lock should have been maintained, but was not.  Now of course FS will say lock was maintained and that is true as none of the drones disappeared instantly on the fade out. The drones did continue on and disappeared one by one.  So the question is what does lock really mean for seeking weapons?  It seems if full cloak is achieved before drones come into some critical range, then drones will fade out one by one as per pre- 2.5.4.10.  BUT if full cloak is not achieve soon enough, drones will hit as loss of lock via this formula is very hard to achieve.  It hardly seems to make sense to say that lock on was maintained in the first instance via the retain values if the range and time is sufficient that the cloaker may complete the cloak cycle and the seekers are not within the critical range to find their target.  While it may be true that lock-on was maintained it means nothing unless your seekers are right on top of the target such that they may strike their target before full cloak is achieved and before the seekers disappear one by one.

BTW it seems very hard to get an AI to drone you as a cloaker from a sufficient range to benefit from achieving the full cloak.  It just won't do it.  In my tests, I fired drones as I saw the AI cloaking as how else might I have done it.  If you are the cloaker, you are most likely to cloak after drones or plasma are fired.  These are two very different things obviously. So this may also account for some of the differences experienced between the two possible test cases.  

[3dot14]

I understand Cloak is different from SFB, that cloak is not as good as some want it to be, that cloak is not a magic switch to void all weapons (even in SFC3 style cloak, cloak is still dangerous. tho admittedly not as close as this, of until you get detected.)...

But I really cannot understand how is could be WORSE... since AFAIK, no ship has an increase of cloaking power requirement...

BTW if we need concrete data, the only way would be to test between to humans. I am on GSA right now (Weds,  6:30pm EST) if anyone has time, just come on up...

[Remiak]

Quote:
 

A shorter summary:
Before patch: Cloak bad
After patch: Cloak good.

I have seen no circumstances under which the old cloak is better than the new cloak.  Of course there are still many times and many opponents at/against which it is better not to cloak.  Just as was the case in SFB.


-S'Cipio the puzzled  

Hi S'Cipio,
Nice to hear from you.
The discussion has to be about PvP not PvAI.
Do you think I can stop and cloak in a my Rom ship against your equivalent Gorn unit and be at an advantage by doing so.
In most cases by the time I fade in, I will be in troubles.

My best chance will remain in fighting the plasma ballet without using the cloak.
The cloak may not be an added value in PvP unless fighting a begginer.

I will give an exemple of the old cloak in use: I was flying a Rom XFF that can cloak fly at 31 and charge weapons. At speed 31, all lock were lost, seaking wepaons could not be lauched at me, I was very manoeuverable and hard to catch. with the new cloak I have to stop. Another exemple is when jumping in our PFs to fly them at full speed.
The only weapons that really got to me before was those MIRV, they never lost lock and got to my XFF so i had to use mines or outrun them. Normal drones lost lock.

Anyways, I am not asking to change the specs of the cloak, just to allow lock break without emergency decelleration needed so some speed other than 0 by putting back the normal number of 3.5 instead of the arbritrary 2.

Thanks  

[TarMinyatur]

There is a clear discrepancy on how the AI can break lock-ons and how a player can.

I flew a R-SEL which can do speed 19 easily while cloaked. I flew against and AI Z-CD with slow missiles. I would wait for the Z-CD to fire its missiles then cloak. It routinely took about 15 seconds to break all the missiles' lock-ons. Sometimes one or two would follow me for 30 seconds.

Next I flew a Z-MDC against an AI cloaker. It would fly at speed 21 all the time. When it recloaked after firing its Plas-G, my missiles would almost always be eliminated in under 5 seconds. I never had a missile follow the cloaked ship for more than 10 seconds.

There's a double standard.

I assume that the second scenario applies to multiplayer.

[TarMinyatur]

Quote:

I will give an example of the old cloak in use: I was flying a Rom XFF that can cloak, fly at 31, and charge weapons. At speed 31, all lock-ons were lost, seeking weapons could not be lauched at me, I was very maneuverable, and hard to catch. With the new cloak I have to stop.

Remiak, I don't understand. Why must you stop? Are people firing seeking-weapons at you while you are cloaked? They should not be able to, as far as I know. If they fire at you as you phase-in, then you are in no worse shape than pre-2.5.4.12. With 2.5.4.12, there is an extra layer of defense. The attacker has to pass the new lock-on test (which is admittedly guaranteed for any ship moving faster than about 8).

[Scipio_66]

Quote:
The real issue is not the yo-yo or any other tactics that were used in SFB.  It is the statistics that were brought from SFB to SFC while changing the numbers. if my understandind is correct, there is no random calculation in the determination of the cloak removing the lock of a ship. It is boolean, in similar situation the result is always the same either the lock is lost or kept, not a probability between and excluding 0 and 1(0% and 100%).

<snip>
There is a fixed equation that ends with the magic number of 2 or more to keep lock and 1 or less to break lock.

Are you sure you aren't reversing your odds here?  Using the SFB formula, a point-blank ship with no speed or ECM modifiers *keeps* lock on a 2 or less, and *loses* lock on a 3 or more.  Not the other way around.

This would also be more in keeping with the results I am seeing in game.  If your interpretration was used, I'd never break lock on anything much.  As it is, I routinely shed plasma torps even when I hit X while traveling at speeds in the low 20's.  For a long time I thought lock break was automatic under the new cloak once fade was complete, but Dave assured us in a post that  there was a chance for lock to be retained.    I have since that time had lock-retention very rarely, but enough to know it is possible.

Unless something reeeeaallllly weird happened in the PPD/Cloak fix.  I'll admit I was out of the country when that fix came in and I just got back, so I haven't downloaded it yet.  I'll do that when I get home tonight.

-S'Cipio

[Scipio_66]

Quote:
Hi S'Cipio,

Nice to hear from you.
The discussion has to be about PvP not PvAI.
Do you think I can stop and cloak in a my Rom ship against your equivalent Gorn unit and be at an advantage by doing so.
In most cases by the time I fade in, I will be in troubles.

My best chance will remain in fighting the plasma ballet without using the cloak.
The cloak may not be an added value in PvP unless fighting a begginer.

Hi!  Nice to talk to you again as well.

I wouldn't expect you to stop against a Gorn opponent.  I'd expect you to use the cloak as a tool during those rare moments in a long plasma ballet when we both nudge over for a good shot and both realize we are going to get hit.  Then you have a tool I don't.  I turn and try to minimize the damage, whereas you stay on my tail and attempt to shed all the damage.  In my games I seem able to shed the incoming plasma.  No need to stay cloaked long enough for your ship to slow down much, press X again as soon as the danger is past.

Quote:

I will give an exemple of the old cloak in use: I was flying a Rom XFF that can cloak fly at 31 and charge weapons. At speed 31, all lock were lost, seaking wepaons could not be lauched at me, I was very
manoeuverable and hard to catch. with the new cloak I have to stop.

31 while cloaked?  OK, setting aside another reason I hate X ships.  (:-P)  Why do you have to stop?  The cloak doesn't cost any more power to use.  You can still go 31 while under cloak.   Even if the new cloak works as badly as you suspect, you are still as good at outrunning the weapons on the board as a non-cloaked ship (or dropping a t-bomb out the shuttle hatch) but you have the advantage that no new seeking weapons may be fired until you choose to uncloak.

To be clear, my experiences so far with the new cloak have come from days of playing as Romulan, not against Romulan.  I wanted to play with the new toy and my SFB roots were showing.  (Shhh!!! Don't tell the Bruce.)

Iu'll play some more tonight, with the PPD/Cloak fix installed.  If I'm wrong I'm wrong, it is possible my games have given me atypical results.  But so far I simply haven't seen any ssurprising difficulty in shedding seeking weapons with the new cloak.  And I love the newly instituded damage reduction table.

-S'Cipio  

[Remiak]

Quote:

Quote:
The real issue is not the yo-yo or any other tactics that were used in SFB.  It is the statistics that were brought from SFB to SFC while changing the numbers. if my understandind is correct, there is no random calculation in the determination of the cloak removing the lock of a ship. It is boolean, in similar situation the result is always the same either the lock is lost or kept, not a probability between and excluding 0 and 1(0% and 100%).

<snip>
There is a fixed equation that ends with the magic number of 2 or more to keep lock and 1 or less to break lock.

Are you sure you aren't reversing your odds here?  Using the SFB formula, a point-blank ship with no speed or ECM modifiers *keeps* lock on a 2 or less, and *loses* lock on a 3 or more.  Not the other way around.

This would also be more in keeping with the results I am seeing in game.  If your interpretration was used, I'd never break lock on anything much.  As it is, I routinely shed plasma torps even when I hit X while traveling at speeds in the low 20's.  For a long time I thought lock break was automatic under the new cloak once fade was complete, but Dave assured us in a post that  there was a chance for lock to be retained.    I have since that time had lock-retention very rarely, but enough to know it is possible.

Unless something reeeeaallllly weird happened in the PPD/Cloak fix.  I'll admit I was out of the country when that fix came in and I just got back, so I haven't downloaded it yet.  I'll do that when I get home tonight.

-S'Cipio  

My understanding is the following:

6 (your working sensor value) - 4 (cloak shift ) = 2
there are 3 other factors that I voluntary remove here to keep things simple (the ecm,speed and range factors)

Now the player trying to maintain lock has to roll under or equal to the 2.
In the patch, all rolls are assumed to be 2. So we have a lock that is kept.

Now if the roll was assumed to be a 3.5, the lock would be lost in the same conditions.

6 - 4 = 2 would be below the roll of 3.5. So to get to maitain a lock one would need a 2 factor in favor of the hunter given from speed/range /ecm to get a 3.5 that was under the 4.

So the magic equation would become:
6 - 4 - ecm factor +- range factor  +- speed factor  = 4 for lock to be kept.

The roll is not showing in the formula but is assumed at 2 so if the equation results in a 2,3,4,5 or 6 the simulated roll of 2 is below and lock is kept.
If the simulated roll was 3.5 it would need a equation to give a 4, 5, 6 to have a simulated roll below the equation's result.

Am I confusing you even more or does that make sense to you?
Thanks      

[Remiak]

Scippy,
I do not have to stop but if I do not your lock may be kept even if I am cloaked and I will not know it.
If I fly at speed 19+ the equation gets a boost of 6.
 It becomes:
6 - 4 - (ECM factor) + range factor + 6 (speed factor) >= 2 to retain lock on
so
8 - ecm shift - range factor = 1 is needed to break lock.
AS an exemple to loose the lock I must be at maximum range (over 41) to get the shift of 6 and must have a 1 shift of ecm on you...if you put some eccm It is imossible to break a lock at high speed. if I have to slow down, you will be closer and the range factor will go down....so basically to break lock a emergency decelleration may well be needed.

Thanks

     

[3dot14]

I know cloak is probably not as strong as you would've liked. (or as it was in SFB, or even as advertised...(btw Firesoul clearly stated his formula is not tested in OP. And we have no Taldren official fomula. Keep that in mind!))

But THIS IS A HUGE IMPROVEMENT on 2538. And cloak is not meant to be used ALL THE TIME...

I stand by that regardless of what the test data show... (Yes, remiak, even after the tests. )

[Scipio_66]

Quote:

My understanding is the following:

6 (your working sensor value) - 4 (cloak shift ) = 2
there are 3 other factors that I voluntary remove here to keep things simple (the ecm,speed and range factors)

Now the player trying to maintain lock has to roll under or equal to the 2.
In the patch, all rolls are assumed to be 2. So we have a lock that is kept.

Now if the roll was assumed to be a 3.5, the lock would be lost in the same conditions.
 

I don't think your understanding is correct.  I just ran the following test.

I took a R-KE against a G-CS, and kept a speed of 29 at all times.  I lowered the cloak cost to 1 so that I'd only have to slow down to speed 28 when I cloaked.

I closed with the G-CS to a range of 6 and he fired his torps.  I hit the cloak button and kept my speed at 28.  I did not use ECM.  All his torps lost their lock as soon as I completed my fade and fizzled out of existence.  Given your understanding, all three should have hit me.  None of them do.

I'd love to show you this in a film, but I've discovered something really weird.  In the film, when I should cloak, my ship does not show as cloaking.  When the torps should wink out of existance, they continue tracking.  When they hit me, they score zero damage despite the fact that an R torp at this range should really hurt.  (Yes, a later probe indicates that they were real torps, and shows them partially recharged.)  Very weird.

How repeatable is this?  I started the game again and got the same result.  All torps winked out of existence despite my high speed (28) and close range (under 10).  The film in the film room showed the same weirdness; I don't show as cloaked and the torps I saw vanish in the game show as hitting me for no damage in the film.

Even using the SFB forumula, the R torp should have hit me, so the odds don't work the way I thought either.  This is still consistent with what I have experienced in my games however.  Seeking weapons nearly always lose their lock once I complete my fade.

-S'Cipio the confused.

[Lepton1]

Look scippy, get the correct patch then come talk to us.  The whole damn thing changed from .10 to .12.  Jeez.  That's what we have been talking about.  LOL!!

[FireSoul]

Quote:
But THIS IS A HUGE IMPROVEMENT on 2538. And cloak is not meant to be used ALL THE TIME...
 

A SFB Romulan player once told me.. (he's usually an annoying bastard, but he was right on this one..)
"About the cloak.. it's not knowing when to use it. It's knowing when not to use it."

[FireSoul]

Quote:
Look scippy, get the correct patch then come talk to us.  The whole damn thing changed from .10 to .12.  Jeez.  That's what we have been talking about.  LOL!!  

agreed. use .12.