TTV's (and other explosives) during gang rounds

[Frank_Stein]

Yeah if like, you know bombs and you're in a gang and make bombs that sounds fine to me. It's doing it ahead of time with the intention to use it later that I'd describe as metagaming.

Which, to be fair, is a hazard built into gang recruitment in it's current state

[GORE]

So then - just generally,...

Where would you draw the line?
Scientists working on a dangerous pill? Prior to gang-recruitment? That meta-gaming too?

Scientists in general making dangerous chemicals? Even when either just preparing or trying stuff out?

People don't learn to build TTV's usually in rounds when they are traitors.
They train that prior to such a round.

So...how do we differentiate?

[Lady Birb]

So then - just generally,...

Where would you draw the line?
Scientists working on a dangerous pill? Prior to gang-recruitment? That meta-gaming too?

Scientists in general making dangerous chemicals? Even when either just preparing or trying stuff out?

People don't learn to build TTV's usually in rounds when they are traitors.
They train that prior to such a round.

So...how do we differentiate?

When they join a gang immediately after finishing making their nerd superweapon then use it as soon as possible?

[GORE]

So what about scientists?

I have spent rounds a dozen to train to get my chem-mix done faster and faster.
A death-chem-mix mind you.

Sometimes I become an antag later.
Sometimes I do not.

Still I produce them to get'em done quicker next time.

I just feel like there would be a hard time to fairly differentiate.

[Superlagg]

Thing is, all this trying to get gangs to be less destructive and more gang-y is likely gonna end up poorly. Most antag roles have little restriction to their evil-freedom, and when there are restrictions, they generally make thematic sense and are on roles that are forced on the player.

Revs have a clear goal to kill all of security and the heads, and are generally made through an attack from a Revhead. Their restrictions are reasonable, don't do anything that would hurt anyone other than your targets. Aside from that, standard familiar antag stuff applies.

Mindslaves have their goals set by their master, and is also typically forced on the player. Aside from not being allowed to hurt their master, the only major restrictions are those set by the master.

Gangs, it feels like they have a bunch of restrictions that don't really fit the feeling of antagonism. You're supposed to claim areas and hoard garbage, and are presently 0 largely discouraged from killing people. You ask people to join, and they can refuse. You're encouraged to make yourself identifiable as being in a gang, but doing so makes you open to being killed by just about everyone.

While I get that all this is to make it something other than a dull team deathmatch, the whole role feels less like an antagonist and more like an ascended miscreant with license to hurt people.

So yeah if a gang wants to TTV medbay cus they have one and nobody's done it yet, I say to let them and let deadchat salt it out.

[mralexs]

Thing is, all this trying to get gangs to be less destructive and more gang-y is likely gonna end up poorly. Most antag roles have little restriction to their evil-freedom, and when there are restrictions, they generally make thematic sense and are on roles that are forced on the player.

Revs have a clear goal to kill all of security and the heads, and are generally made through an attack from a Revhead. Their restrictions are reasonable, don't do anything that would hurt anyone other than your targets. Aside from that, standard familiar antag stuff applies.

Mindslaves have their goals set by their master, and is also typically forced on the player. Aside from not being allowed to hurt their master, the only major restrictions are those set by the master.

Gangs, it feels like they have a bunch of restrictions that don't really fit the feeling of antagonism. You're supposed to claim areas and hoard garbage, and are presently 0 largely discouraged from killing people. You ask people to join, and they can refuse. You're encouraged to make yourself identifiable as being in a gang, but doing so makes you open to being killed by just about everyone.

While I get that all this is to make it something other than a dull team deathmatch, the whole role feels less like an antagonist and more like an ascended miscreant with license to hurt people.

So yeah if a gang wants to TTV medbay cus they have one and nobody's done it yet, I say to let them and let deadchat salt it out.

This isn't about setting off 1 TTV in medbay, its people in gang setting chains of TTV's across the station

[GORE]

I had plenty of rounds when the AI was observent enough to call out even INDIVIDUALS mass producing TTVs before bad stuff could happen.
Security quickly cracked down on that.

That was nice.

[Frank_Stein]

So what about scientists?

I have spent rounds a dozen to train to get my chem-mix done faster and faster.
A death-chem-mix mind you.

Sometimes I become an antag later.
Sometimes I do not.

Still I produce them to get'em done quicker next time.

I just feel like there would be a hard time to fairly differentiate.

I mean, I've got my opinions on why we have a department that's has a section that's exclusively a bomb factory with little legitimate use outside that, but I think the deeper problem is no one seems to agree what gang mode is about, how much violence should occur, etc.

Imo you're better off removing the mode entirely than trying to micromanage player behavior by implementing clumsy restrictions to their actions.

[Lady Birb]

Imo you're better off removing the mode entirely than trying to micromanage player behavior by implementing clumsy restrictions to their actions.

I agree with this, any gamemode that lets anyone who wants become an antagonist whenever they want will always either immediately devolve into a turbonerd super explosion murder clusterfuck or will have so many restrictions tied to it that it stops being fun to be an antagonist and almost nobody bothers with it. Gang is just a flawed concept for a gamemode and should be either removed or completely reworked from scratch like spy was.

[Leeanei]

if folk aren't becoming antags until they deploy the TTVs that's well and truly against the spirit of gangs. nerds ruin everything.

but the reason gang is unique in all of these difficulties is because people aren't sweating if their own gang members are harmed. rev mode doesn't really have this issue.

from a viewpoint of someone who hasn't played gangs in an age but frequently manipulated them so people in OOC were going "that was a great gang round!" the big key to gangs is melee combat being seen as the best option. as long as folk can make bombs, it really isn't.

[GORE]

I still remember a most recent gang round fondly.

Neo, Keegan - I think Lyn and someone else too. Us four-to-five folks working together.
Cowboy-station with many revolver through admemes was plenty fun.

Hey - we even had a poison liquid spewing artifact in artlab. Managed to poison myself but then spent a few minutes collecting the liquid and getting pills from that ready.
Then we went around the station taking over the bridge; doing joke-calls and heading towards the bar.

Except that I gave Neo a pill; told'im to take it so we can poison ambush folks in the bar. Only that he swallowed the pill and Keegan and I had to keep him alive for the next ten minutes.

Gang fun lives and dies with the team you got.

- - -

Hell; one time I was in a gang alone with NOOT. We had a cozy little hide-out; stayed in contact over comms and had some fun tomfoolery.

Damn - seriously I doubt that TTV's are that much of a problem. I have been nearly online at least ten hours per day over the last week.
Sure; a few bombs get dropped but not every gang round goes like this.

If you are playing at Max-Tide-times and a few gang rounds come up surely one of them may go like this - but that is barely a huge portion of the day.
Honestly I can live with 1 TTV round or 2 a day.

Security is there to crack down on them and I expect security to confiscate those TTV's and then downgrade the ID of anybody who build them.
There are in-game ways to deal with that.

There are still folks around trying to change and overhaul the GANG gamemode.
- - -

Is it really so bad?

Gang lives and dies with the people. That will never change I think. It is a social antag-gamemode. Socialize with your fellow gang-members; be creative and get chaos started.

If I get a gang going I would like to organize crimes - poisonening the bar; taking over QM - monkey-flooding security.
All kinds of fun things can be done and might be done by some.

Still - I can respect bombs - just like I can respect poison or gimmicks.

Rarely you see the same gangs go and bomb stuff like the space-diner. If you find out it is one of these rounds...why not head out of the station for a while?
Not everyone wants to be an antag - but I can respect the desire for people to blow stuff to shreds.

[mralexs]

Even though gang is now really rare, this is still an issue. Should we ahelp players that are obviously using gang to self antag?

[KikiMofo]

Ahelp anything that you think is rule breaking or just general people being annoying for the sake of it.