Leaving the Hivemind: A discussion

[Arlian]

I've never been a big fan of the existing Hivemind system in general. Speaking purely of my own experience on Classic, the hivemind usually consists of people either backseat gaming saying I should do this or that OR people who constantly beg to be a limb over and over again repeatedly. What's worse is that changeling limbs cost DNA, make you sit around for a minute in hiding waiting to regenerate a limb and the limbs you can produce are IMO some of the weakest parts of the kit. It takes one staff assistant with a vendetta and a fire extinguisher to ruin a hivemind limbs day and then it's back to more "I died, can I get leg / hand / eye?" repeatedly. Oh, and the entire crew now knows there's a changeling on station. I also feel like an asshole if I forcibly silence or eject people from the hivemind, so I tend to not use that feature (I guess I probably should use it more).

That being said, if being in the hivemind was more fun for absorbed players they would probably elect to stay in it over leaving in the hopes of getting cloned. Adding more things to do as a hivemind member and/or incentivizing limbs by buffing them or reducing penalties for creating them are two ideas that spring to mind. I feel like penalising players for choosing to leave the hivemind would be treating the symptoms, not the root problem.