I see 0, I repeat, ZERO, issues with the current cloaking mechanisms, outside of glitches that I am not aware of. I see people mentioning them, but don't know what they are. If it's a glitch, I'm all for fixing it.

That being said....

I cannot fathom the reasons people have issues with the cloak. Used intelligently, the basic, adv, and proto cloaks are devastating. Used poorly, you just sit there and laugh at the poor little cloaked scout as he goes splat. I may come off as being a bit rude here, but I'm under the impression that people are complaining because suddenly scouts aren't the easy kills they were before.

People have mentioned that they'd like flux grenades to disrupt cloaks, allrighty, I can see that, nor would I mind this.

But let's look at the rest of these "complaints"

#1) Decloaking to weapon ready/firing is too fast.

First off, to catch up to my target I have to sprint, which makes me very visible and uses up my cloak energy faster, if I drop below half energy, I have to wait to recloak. Secondly, when I decloak there is a rather loud noise that I've had no issues hearing when fighting other cloaking scouts, or running with team/squad mates. Next, you know why you hear me whisper in your ear, "What are we looking at?" before you get a head full of lead? It's because I've been running behind you, and you have never once bothered to do a quick 360 to see if anyone was sneaking up on you. If people had more situational awareness, or had another squad mate acting as rearguard, I'd have a MUCH harder time ambushing.

Furthermore, once you swap to your weapon you start to decloak and become even more visible. If the guy you are after isn't doing 360s, I'm just rather of the mindset that he was outsmarted and outplayed. Unless someone can tell me otherwise, I have a hard time feeling sympathetic.

Another way to put this is that I could easily kill you without a cloak in this scenario, which I have seen alot of lately. The cloak is to help hide from people further away, and if I see you start to turn, to stand still and crouch to hide.

#2) Damage to cloak.

I am neither for nor against this at this time. A moving cloaked scout is easy to see so I don't exactly see the need to deplete cloak faster or for more shimmer. Also, if you know they're hiding behind a pillar or something just chuck a grenade at 'em, that will kill them fast enough.

#3) Too "easy" to fit a cloak

I'm just going to sit here and say no. I have most of my core skills to lvl 5, and my chosen scouts suits to lvl 5 as well. I can fit mostly Adv tech on an Adv suit, maybe have a very select few proto modules (mostly complex precision modules) and Adv weapons. A player who does not have all lvl 5 core skills and suits, not to mention the skills to reduce CPU/PG of weapons, will not be able to fit a scout as well as I can. Frankly, I have proto skills, and I still have to choose between weapons/modules/other fittings if I want to run with an Adv cloak and have Adv gear, I can't have it all. If I want to stick a proto cloak on a Adv suit then I really have to pick and choose carefully, I have to give up something because those suckers are highly CPU/PG intensive. So I think this is working as intended. I don't mess with proto suits, so I can't really comment on those.

#4) Brick tanked scouts.

Brick tanked scouts were always a bit of an issue, I can see why people would complain about 'em with cloaks tossed on as well. I could see an argument being made that the penalties for armor plates affect suits lighter than say, maybe heavy suits, more. Further I'd say the lighter the suit, the more the penalty affects it.

#5) Cloaks last too long/recharge too fast.

Gonna disagree with this one. Smart usage lets me extend the life of my cloak much longer than I'm seeing other people get out of their cloaks. Hit cloak, dash across open ground, drop cloak for a few moments, then reactivate and continue. Frankly I pulse my cloak, unless I'm in an engagement. I see too many people just use up a entire cloak charge in one go which is downright foolish.


I find it amusing that people claim cloaks are "EZ mode". No, it's a thinking man's tool.

So to reiterate:

People need to up their situational awareness. Blindly rushing around the battlefield is the quickest way to die. Good teamwork is vital. And if you see me on the battlefield, get ready to be beaten to death with your own skull!!!

Final piece of advice. If you are in a group of 4, rushing an objective, and you see all those little blue dots following you start to disappear, and you hear the sounds of a shotgun, you might, just might, want to turn around before you are the last blue dot.