The criteria for night ops was first and foremost to remain unseen. As in completely unseen, nobody lays eyes on you and recognizes you as a human being at any point during the night. We're talking way back in the &T days and when the dedicated forums first began to appear.
I'd like to state that I feel partially responsible for the shift to how many view the scene today as I quickly learned that the skill could be used to acquire things and back then I had no problems with it. My posts eventually used the format of "this is what I'm wearing, this is what I'm planning to do, this is how I prepared, here's how the night went, here's my after action review."
That wasn't the original idea either though, believe it or not.
We literally just went out and tried to see how far we could make it into the night unseen. Threw on whatever you had that blended in the best; any light, low-profile equipment that you thought you'd need, and in our case we all had to sneak out of our houses because we were still kids living at home. You might make it a whopping half-block away at first because it seems impossible, you're scared, and have no idea how to continue without getting caught. So you return home.
At home, you try to see if there's another way. After thinking on it, you try again later. You sneak out another night with new ideas and you start adapting. Maybe this time you make it two blocks away before you're stuck. Back home you went!
Eventually as you were able to move unseen further and further away, more and more options would present themselves. You didn't necessarily need a designated target to explore because the entire process was one of exploration anyway. Running into people and security measures became a puzzle, a challenge to overcome. It might take you hours just to get around that one thing.
It's every bit as ridiculous as it sounds. You have to do everything in your power to avoid people altogether and when you go into that mindset, you start taking absurdly difficult routes on a physical level. It takes a lot of effort to make any meaningful progress this way and you have to be in pretty good shape.
By no means is this the forum standard today. That's not to say things are lesser, it's far more accessible. Back then it was not fucking easy. Just thinking back on some of the moments I've had nearly makes my heart want to start pounding again. However, I see no room to criticize anyone wanting to attempt this approach. In fact, I say instead to try to challenge yourself and give it a go yourself. If you're the guy living right in the middle of massive, dense apartments loaded with people everywhere then sure - you won't be starting from home. Try driving/riding/etc. somewhere remotely and beginning from there. If you can't...
Sorry.What you get out of this approach is a massive refinement in your skills. You have to, your entire body becomes tuned into the night. You'll learn to continue under massive stress. It's not easy! I never considered myself an expert in this style, there are no experts. You just do the best you can, learn your limitations, and attempt to overcome them. It's a continual process. Highly, highly rewarding.
I hope some of you will try it sometime.