Goonhub
01-10-2013, 09:00 PM
We did a sorta special round of gang tonight, no actual changes to the code but with some admin intervention poked and prodded things a different direction.
-- At the beginning, I publicly listed the names of all gangs, but no information besides that. I thought it would make things easier for coordination, and maybe encourage some recruitment (if someone sees that the GOKU PALS have the coolest name they may go seek them out!)
-- Sec was told that being a Gang Leader was an offense in of itself and warranted incarceration (though they'd need reasonable cause to arrest someone for it). We told sec that if all gang leaders were dead/incarcerated, the "neutrals" would win.
-- One of the gangs was larger than the other surviving gangs combined, so a CentCom report outed the identity of that gang's leader. (I gave him a heads up so he could get his gang to protect him)
What did this accomplish?
- Gangs were much more subtle about recruiting. Only one called out for recruits over the radio, and gang lockers were put in more secretive places.
- Surprisingly though, total gang population was the same as the previous regular round.
- Sec neither felt constrained to uselessness, nor did they go on a rampage. (Part of that may be due to having a good HoS around). There was even an interrogation of a captured gang member where the detective tried to get him to out his gang's leader, really cool.
- One gang had a huge population, as usually happens, but they had a trade-off in bringing a lot of heat on themselves from the very start. Outing the leader when the gang got to a very large size is a good balance, I think: the leader is now in a bit of danger, but they have several gangmembers to protect him now. The idea of this was that the small gangs could be stealthy and agile and still able to compete even when outnumbered.
- The biggest gang managed to kill the opposition leaders, though their own leader was in custody at the time. I called the shuttle (one of the gang leaders was braindead so it wouldn't fire automatically). As the timer ticked down, the last gang swarmed sec en masse to try and free their leader. There was a huge fight between a mob of dudes with improvised weapons vs. the captain and a sec officer (the HoS smartly ran off with the valuable prisoner). They ended up capturing the captain and locking him in a cell. While gloating about how they had taken sec, a vigilante bombed them with the RD's bomb- eek!
- When their captured leader was "exiled," the stragglers in his gang rallied to get final revenge on the captain at the escape arm.
It was a really cool round, really the way I think a lot of people want gang (or rev or spy) to play out. Part of it may have been that we had the right mix of people, including an HoS around. So the suggestions I make from this experience are...
-- The neutral crew "wins" if all gang leaders are dead/incarcerated at the end of the round. Currently if all leaders but one are dead, the shuttle gets called. I'd make it so if all leaders but one are dead/incarcerated the shuttle gets called, allowing for a tense final showdown-- either with the gang trying to free their leader or the crew trying to stop that leader from escaping...
-- If a gang hits X population, their leader's identity gets publicly outed in a Centcom Report. X could be a strict limit (say, 7 members) or a formula (more than all the other gangs' living members combined). This is to provide a slight balance to the current system where one gang snowballs to assured victory.
also just want to resuggest the idea I posted earlier about a gang suffering some penalty if their lockers gets tagged to encourage a bit more tactics too.
-- At the beginning, I publicly listed the names of all gangs, but no information besides that. I thought it would make things easier for coordination, and maybe encourage some recruitment (if someone sees that the GOKU PALS have the coolest name they may go seek them out!)
-- Sec was told that being a Gang Leader was an offense in of itself and warranted incarceration (though they'd need reasonable cause to arrest someone for it). We told sec that if all gang leaders were dead/incarcerated, the "neutrals" would win.
-- One of the gangs was larger than the other surviving gangs combined, so a CentCom report outed the identity of that gang's leader. (I gave him a heads up so he could get his gang to protect him)
What did this accomplish?
- Gangs were much more subtle about recruiting. Only one called out for recruits over the radio, and gang lockers were put in more secretive places.
- Surprisingly though, total gang population was the same as the previous regular round.
- Sec neither felt constrained to uselessness, nor did they go on a rampage. (Part of that may be due to having a good HoS around). There was even an interrogation of a captured gang member where the detective tried to get him to out his gang's leader, really cool.
- One gang had a huge population, as usually happens, but they had a trade-off in bringing a lot of heat on themselves from the very start. Outing the leader when the gang got to a very large size is a good balance, I think: the leader is now in a bit of danger, but they have several gangmembers to protect him now. The idea of this was that the small gangs could be stealthy and agile and still able to compete even when outnumbered.
- The biggest gang managed to kill the opposition leaders, though their own leader was in custody at the time. I called the shuttle (one of the gang leaders was braindead so it wouldn't fire automatically). As the timer ticked down, the last gang swarmed sec en masse to try and free their leader. There was a huge fight between a mob of dudes with improvised weapons vs. the captain and a sec officer (the HoS smartly ran off with the valuable prisoner). They ended up capturing the captain and locking him in a cell. While gloating about how they had taken sec, a vigilante bombed them with the RD's bomb- eek!
- When their captured leader was "exiled," the stragglers in his gang rallied to get final revenge on the captain at the escape arm.
It was a really cool round, really the way I think a lot of people want gang (or rev or spy) to play out. Part of it may have been that we had the right mix of people, including an HoS around. So the suggestions I make from this experience are...
-- The neutral crew "wins" if all gang leaders are dead/incarcerated at the end of the round. Currently if all leaders but one are dead, the shuttle gets called. I'd make it so if all leaders but one are dead/incarcerated the shuttle gets called, allowing for a tense final showdown-- either with the gang trying to free their leader or the crew trying to stop that leader from escaping...
-- If a gang hits X population, their leader's identity gets publicly outed in a Centcom Report. X could be a strict limit (say, 7 members) or a formula (more than all the other gangs' living members combined). This is to provide a slight balance to the current system where one gang snowballs to assured victory.
also just want to resuggest the idea I posted earlier about a gang suffering some penalty if their lockers gets tagged to encourage a bit more tactics too.