Improving the Spy traitor

[Katzen]

It's nice to have a "resourceful" traitor where you can get gear a hard mode traitor can't but have to be sneaky. I like spy but there are a lot of negative comments about it.

A spy starts with nothing but their list of targets. Their ability to execute on this list depends massively on job due to lack of access. A bunch of stuff is reasonably obtainable but the rewards will vary. Getting enough decent items to play as the equivalent of a 12TC traitor is a lot of work and a number of powerful items are totally off limits.

There's a few problems
- The equipment on offer can be nearly useless
- Risk/reward are all over the place. Take the HoS ID into the armory for a Fake Moustache
- Finding objectives/items can be difficult
- Having to turn in items is an annoyance
- Acquiring and turning in rewards can use a lot of your time

Also have been thinking about possible imbalance of starting access and feast/famine with successful spies snowballing and the others trailing off with a couple of items.

Possible solutions

Use a weighting system to estimate the value of the item vs the target and destination.
This can't be strict or it would make things worse but we could at least ensure riskier things give better rewards and avoid too low a selection of rewards,
This can avoid a poor selection of rewards and keep risk/reward more sensible.

Better objective information
There is a PR open for destinations: https://github.com/goonstation/goonstation/pull/2459
Finding people/monkeys could be easier, give all (potentially) mobile objectives the last seen at information?

Remove turn in destinations except for high reward or very easy to find items
Could require some balance

Give every spy a bit of utility. Start with a free omnitool?
Breaking and entering is hard if your job makes it hard to get to insuls and tools

Choose between taking a reward or TC
This would minimise "bad" options but has balance implications even with a reduced uplink so you can't just buy a cloak and csaber.
Downside is that it might increase objective completion at the expense of people using weird items outside of the good stuff. Could limit the number of times you can trade in.

[Rilor]

Someone should get working on this, like now, because currently spy thief is little better than hardmode traitor with how unpredicatble the stuff you get is and the difficulty of actually getting the items.

[Frank_Stein]

I'd like some kind of tracking ability that helps guide you to the location of the objective or drop off point.

Maybe show spies which objectives were being tracked and they could do some subterfuge with that

[Katzen]

Checked the code and from what I can see, there is currently value picking for rewards but it's purely based off what type of objective it is. Honestly I thought the rewards scaled up with time so I am surprised they are so random.

Reward TC value go Tier 1: 0-4, Tier 2: 3-6, Tier 3: 5-8 and finally Tier 4: 7-99.

Limbs are tier 3 or 2.
Personal items are tier 4 or 1-3.
Photo items are always tier 1.
Big station objects (not portable) are tier 1-2
Random station items are tier 1-2.

Blocked items:
Shotgun
Power Sink
Cyalume Saber
Syndicate Hat
Clown Mask
Speed Injector
Faustian Bargain Kit
Maneater Seed
Chainsaw
Trash Compactor Cart
Syndicate Device Analyzer
Power Gloves
Conversion Chamber
Butcher's Knife
.38 AP ammo box

[Boxta]

Basically, have a point system for each item reward pair
Trinkets would be 4 pt
Limbs 5 pt
Nondragable objects 3 PT
Photos 3 Pt
Random Items, 2 PT
Ids, 2 PT
Ids would also have a special system based on the ranking of the ID at round start, Civilian class jobs would be a bonus 2 points, then med 3 points, then sci 4pt, sec, 5 pt, command, 6pt, these vaules would be added on to the base two, so at minimum youd get atleast 4pt
Then, have each rewardable item have its own point vaule, and randomly chooes one of the items with the total point vaule for the object, for the reward
Since the max point vaule would be 8pt, give the strongest things that vaule and go from there

[Frank_Stein]

I think it would be neat to have grouped objectives

Like, 5 related items to be stolen that would give a secondary reward once the full list had been turned in, with all Spies that had contributed collecting a part of a reward.

For instance, the group reward could be a gun with the amount of ammo given higher the more goals you met

[Katzen]

I don't think contributing goals fits the theme of antags. Spies were originally meant to get a goal of eliminating each other once and target scanners once they collected enough items, that seems to have been disabled and I'm guessing either it was never finished or people didn't like antags being directed to fight each other rather than the crew.

My idea of balance is combining target difficulty, objective difficulty and destination difficulty with a range used for the reward value to keep it unpredictable.

Objective difficulty sets the base value range of the reward. A photo is always going to be easy even if it is the HoS.
Target difficulty provides a boost where the target would be expected to be riskier.
Destination difficulty is the smallest boost but adds a little something if the area should be harder to get to.

[Lady Birb]

Spies were originally meant to get a goal of eliminating each other once and target scanners once they collected enough items, that seems to have been disabled and I'm guessing either it was never finished or people didn't like antags being directed to fight each other rather than the crew.

That was removed because it would always result in one spy teaming up with security and getting every single item they need handed to them in 10 minutes then murdering all the spies that are still trying to get their equipment.

Antag vs antag just doesn't work.

[Sundance]

I also don't think contributing goals would be a good idea. Although, I would be for the idea that spies could be grouped together in that they're not against each other per se?

As in, say you have 6 spies, it could be that 1-2 of those spies are neutral to you (you are not their target)?
Or it could be that 1 spy actually needs you alive? Or you could have a grand backstabbing moment where Spy A is neutral to Spy B, but Spy A is Spy B's target?

Basically, make their final goal of "eliminate all other spies" a little less murdery and more complex. It would make for great moments where you have Spy B about to murder Spy A, only to be taken out by another Spy C whose objective is to save Spy A, only to be betrayed by Spy A in the final moments. A real spiderman pointing at spiderman meme moment.

As for the tiered suggestion - yes, this is a good idea. Too many items are easily got for too good an item.

I'd also recommend removing the cloner/cloner related stuff as an option to thieve here. Every spy round without fail immediately shows its cards when something cloner related just so happens to disappear - "It's SPIES" yells the goober MD. Depending on the time of the round, it sometimes causes a shuttle call. I just feel it goes against the grain of spies working in the background.

On final note: yes, i'd also like a tracker ability, to point towards an area or player rather than the abysmal current system.

Perhaps, instead of it implicitly using a navigation pointer like the pinpointer, it could use a pinging system. Click the player/place on the PDA and the PDA will beep "North" or "Southeast". This means a spy will need to go somewhere secluded or make sure nobodies in the room, making them even more spy-like in their actions.

[Katzen]

Could keep high profile items or targets to a time gate. Maybe the 25 minute refresh? Would probably also lock out limbs due to being way too obvious. Main issue would be that 25 minutes sounds like a long time, 10-15 would be better.

Was thinking of having things ramp up over time, which is what I thought actually happened. Spy objectives would give mild gear for the first 25 minutes to let them gear up/get access and avoid blowing their cover and then it would properly let them lose.

But I question if this is actually a good idea as the randomness is fun. There is no set way for a SS13 round to play out and being too strict would make it less fun.

[Boxta]

I dont think spys should be "Let Loose", they are not supposed to be a rampaging traitor, atleast in my thinksing. They should be more geared to silently killing a limb owner or similar, with things like the silenced pistol and fibre wire. Id like to see better rewards for limbs, and more commonly as rewards the following: Fibre Wire, Silenced Pistol, Signal Jammer, Chamelioum jumpsuit, Cloaking device, holo disgusier. These would better gear a spy to silently take down a target and steal whatever, without anyone ever noticing.
Perhaps they should also start with a pair of insulated chamelium gloves
Basically they can change into any glove but keep their insulatedness
Prints and forenstic stuff would change along with the glove

[Frank_Stein]

Spies could use more unique spy gear, namely stuff that looks like normal stuff.

Night Vision Sunglasses
Lipstick Derringer
Shoe Knife

[Katzen]

I dont think spys should be "Let Loose", they are not supposed to be a rampaging traitor, atleast in my thinksing. They should be more geared to silently killing a limb owner or similar, with things like the silenced pistol and fibre wire.

We can say this but it won't change non RP and will just frustrate people who didn't roll a regular traitor. Spies are mainly quiet because they spend most of their time getting gear.

Saying that I do agree with you about wanting spies to be sneakier, which is why I'm thinking about changing the loot composition of the first wave to be around utility.
If we could get spies using voice changer, signal jammer etc then it would be great.

Spy unique item stuff, sunglasses were on my traitor list. X Ray specs.
Just thought of face changing mask. It's a face slot (obv) that changes your appearance to copy someone else, polymorph style. Then you can do some Mission Impossible stuff without poly/dna changer.

[Salami Sam]

Can we get more booby traps, ala Spy vs Spy? I'd like to set up a trap on various objective items to whack my opponents with a giant hammer, or perhaps capture them in a bear trap or net.

[Mouse]

Bring back random rewards and the bit where the more items you claim the better rewards you get.  Incentivize spies to steal as many things on the list as they can.