[MERGED PR] Remove a few items from spy thief reward pool

[warcrimes]

But this is not how a lot of players would feel when they roll spy, they'd rather be a traitor with 12 TC to spend. I don't think a poll would show any preference for spy at the moment. It would probably be rated pretty low as an antagonist.

This is valid, however that's not a metric for balance.
The game is designed with various different round types providing different experiences.
The most-requested antag role, by far, is Wraith.
The most-detested antag role to see in successive rounds, by far, is Wraith.

It follows that "What antags want" is a very poor way to measure what should be done to improve the round, even for those same antags. I'd argue it's the opposite, actually.
They're not the main characters of this game. They're an expendable hazard played by a player, but nonetheless are there to be a *surmountable* obstacle to the crew. Antag victories should feel simultaneously satisfying to the antag, and frustratingly embarassing to the crew, imo- There's nothing fun or interesting about a well-equipped juggernaut crushing the competition.

The rounds people remember most tend to be their hardmode traitor gimmick rounds, where given nothing but a pair of hands and a mission to destroy society, clowns learn to turn pies and zip guns into lethal depopulation tools.

We generally restrict items from spy mode if they are: non-functional in that gamemode, an exclusive gimmick thing (like the hat and boots which exist only for OOC flexing), or because they would be *too kind* to the spy, like a surplus crate.
If spy mode is lacking to the point that it's not an engaging role to take on, power creep is not the answer.

[Frank_Stein]

But this is not how a lot of players would feel when they roll spy, they'd rather be a traitor with 12 TC to spend. I don't think a poll would show any preference for spy at the moment. It would probably be rated pretty low as an antagonist.

Sure getting traitor isn't a guarantee of an OP round where you do what you want but I think we need to do further work to make people happy they get spy rather than feeling it is a handicap.

I actually prefer spy to traitor. I think it's better paced, there's more player guidance, and it isn't geared towards slaughter while still having it as an option. 
During Spy I always know exactly what I could be doing and that's going after items that sound interesting or can be obtained by means available to me.

They're not the main characters of this game. They're an expendable hazard played by a player, but nonetheless are there to be a *surmountable* obstacle to the crew. Antag victories should feel simultaneously satisfying to the antag, and frustratingly embarassing to the crew, imo- There's nothing fun or interesting about a well-equipped juggernaut crushing the competition.

Very much this.

[KikiMofo]

Yeah about what Warcrimes said. The whole "They are not the main characters" part specifically is how I've always seen SS13. Some people think just because they are the antag they are the star of the show and if something goes wrong they get angry about it.
SS13 is a game where everyone on the station is the main character for their own story but everyone is a red shirt on Star Trek so their story can just suddenly end with no warning.

[Katzen]

I think we are losing the point and drastically overestimating the significance of the change. ​This scrutiny is not given when mundane items are added and dilute the pool.

But that is irrelevant now the PR has been modified due to feedback. It now only removes the Boom Boots and Banana Grenade. I think the other items should stay if people feel they have value and it might genuinely have a balance impact to remove all of them, although I didn't expect there to be an appetite to remove them all.

Speaking of, I realize there may not be awareness of how rewards currently work. They are not totally random, there are 5 types of objective which it picks a specific number of targets for, these objectives have a predetermined quality of reward (limbs have a high minimum value, random items tend to be low value) and some adjustment to improve the reward based on target/low random chance. The rewards come from 4 brackets of TC value. A banana grenade is in the low TC bracket, if it's removed from the pool it will be picking a different 1-4 TC cost item. This will certainly be a more useful item but it's not going to pick a katana or deluxe mindslave.

[RichardGere]

It follows that "What antags want" is a very poor way to measure what should be done to improve the round, even for those same antags. I'd argue it's the opposite, actually.
They're not the main characters of this game. They're an expendable hazard played by a player, but nonetheless are there to be a *surmountable* obstacle to the crew. Antag victories should feel simultaneously satisfying to the antag, and frustratingly embarassing to the crew, imo- There's nothing fun or interesting about a well-equipped juggernaut crushing the competition.

The rounds people remember most tend to be their hardmode traitor gimmick rounds, where given nothing but a pair of hands and a mission to destroy society, clowns learn to turn pies and zip guns into lethal depopulation tools.

We generally restrict items from spy mode if they are: non-functional in that gamemode, an exclusive gimmick thing (like the hat and boots which exist only for OOC flexing), or because they would be *too kind* to the spy, like a surplus crate.
If spy mode is lacking to the point that it's not an engaging role to take on, power creep is not the answer.

Good take imo. Also I'd like to point out that surplus crates are currently available as bounty rewards (and have been for years), but looking at the code it looks like it's some leftover from the old spy gamemode that just hasn't been fixed yet. Maybe it should be removed as a reward?

[Katzen]

Yeah for sure. I don't think there is any justification for that much snowball potential. Added their removal to the PR.

Not clear to me if they were meant to be blocked by that, spy is conspirator and that's not the only item blocked by it so I understood it was for that mode.
The buylist does seem to be outdated and I think it needs a clean up. You shouldn't need to block for modes that use exclusive items like revs.

[warcrimes]

I think we are losing the point and drastically overestimating the significance of the change. This scrutiny is not given when mundane items are added and dilute the pool.

I'll admit I am just kinda using this as a useful example so I can grandstand about game design yeah, but hey it's an audience, congrats on making an interesting thread lol - and yes generally we are a lot more lenient about balance for patches that *add* content because ultimately more content = more game, and we can always trim and balance it later. When it comes time to actually trim those things is usually when we get ornery, but that's less-often visible to players. 

I'll review the changes later today on github hopefully