Traitors + Miscreants.

[Clarks]

Traitors rate was briefly upped, before a storm of complaints had it turned down again and made somewhat variable.

When the chance to be traitor was higher traitors were less shy of being overt or starting a short-lived rampage. You could take some chances and not feel that you had wasted your precious traitor round, because they came in so much more often. It made rounds livelier
There were some complete station wipes, but that was mostly caused by artistic toolboxes found in every other surplus crate.

Playing security is incredibly boring most of the time, because there is nobody to catch, or nobody doing obvious traitorous stuff.
Yes, you can issue tickets or do some strong-armed arrest, but throwing people in the brig over minor infractions is very close to griefing; and really only fun when you gloat over some hot headed shithead.

I suppose miscreants are a way to make rounds more eventful, but in reality people either ignore their objective or pursue it in the least imaginative possible way. There's always some dude screaming that he'll destroy all footballs unless we pay a ransom. Who cares? Or spitting painfully horrid rap lines.
To be done half right requires some novelty and some effort. Most miscreant objectives are made up after some fun gimmick that one guy made made in the past. This stuff doesn't work when it repeats every few rounds.

Let's up traitor rates again. Restore "die a glorious death" as an objective, people took this one seriously and went out with a blast. Not every traitor needs to live the whole 40, 70 minutes. And those who die early are often more fun than the stealthy ones that never cause a ruckus.
Miscreants... I really don't know. In theory they are fun, in practice I much prefer spontaneous gimmick -like David Ryder's- or having my own little fights with scrubs like Farthing, Jay or Walter. Maybe it's better to turn a blind admin eye to people doing "bad" things than it is to script miscreants like they currently are.
Or maybe, give extra hardmode objectives to some traitors. Even if they are always Maybe instead of Success, they are a success when people go berserker on the radio.

[Sundance]

When the chance to be traitor was higher traitors were less shy of being overt or starting a short-lived rampage

Utterly untrue. The whole reason why traitor count was put back from overdrive mode was because there were just too many traitors murdering too many people. Oh you want to be a QM and do some trading? Fuck you! Here's a Pipebomb! Oh you want to do some chemistry and finally learn how to make the anti-fart serum? Fuck you! Here's some sarin!
My point is that having the traitor count that high kinda fucked over the people who wanted to actually spend a round doing something "productive"

Miscreants are a step in the right direction, but there needs to be more of something similar, like a traitor hardmode. Sure, add more "Die a glorious death" objectives. Infact add more traitor objectives, there is a depressing lack of hostage situations and actual hacking.

[Weavel]

The lack of hostages is due to the lack of a realistic way to take a hostage. There's no pulling a gun to convince someone to enter a room or play along, they just try disarm you. There's no luring someone into a trap, they run or scream and then ten people descend to beat your face in.

On the actual topic I have a mixes view on it; as Sundance said it made it very hard to simply play a normal game, but at the same time there is a serious lull in baddie activities. Maybe a slight increase would be good? The last increase was Shroom, wouldn't hurt to test it again.

[Shoddy]

( the following has a bunch of lines to make it easier to read)
This is a good thread to discuss my feelings on traitors.

Back in... What was it 2011 we still had zeta? There were 3 types of baddies mainly that went on each round, the traitor, the changeling, the wizard.

In the past 2 years or so with the merging of zeta to the main station and the vampire being added with the new mixed mode, things have gotten a lot more boring.
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My favorite objective of all time was: die a glorious death and set off the zeta nuke.
This was removed; the zeta station was merged to main station, so we couldn't have that objective anymore.
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with Mixed, all 4 main antagonists can be in a round at the same time, on paper Mixed is a good idea, but in practice... vampires trump all, wizards trump changelings, and everyone trumps the traitor, the traitor who used to be the bread and butter of the game is now the weakest and the most boring to play.
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Every single round I get traitor objectives I completely ignore them because it is the usual *murder X*... oh and get us 7 pairs of sunglasses while you're at it!
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that and most of the equipment traitors get is specifically JUST for murder, radio jammer, sleepy pen, radbow, cyalume saber, advanced laser gun, artistic toolbox, fake QM teleporter, stimulants for a rampage, butchers knife, bowling kit, etc.
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I’m kind of hesitant to suggest this but on the next map it would be great if we had zeta back. Mixed could do with some fiddling and we need way more interesting objectives for traitors.
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Am I wrong here or is there only like, 4 objectives for traitors: Kill someone, get money (that you cannot use on cool stuff because then you wouldn't have money), collect some dummy's jumpsuit out of his locker, and steal 9 pairs of sunglasses and 3 tasers.
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In conclusion: Traitors need new objectives, interesting new objectives, Zeta like objectives, I think everyone who has been around when zeta was there would agree that it was one of the most (if not the most) interesting objective to do.

[ThoseDernSquirrels]

The lack of hostages is due to the lack of a realistic way to take a hostage. There's no pulling a gun to convince someone to enter a room or play along, they just try disarm you. There's no luring someone into a trap, they run or scream and then ten people descend to beat your face in.

Well, coming from BS12, I always wished that LLJK/Goon had the "gun modes." It allowed you to either take a hostage with a gun in your hand (captive mode), and it allowed you to tinker what your hostage could do, ie walk, run, handle items. Then there was just plain old "shoot" mode where you just clicked a tile and a bullet exploded out of your gun.

[Captain_Bravo]

When the chance to be traitor was higher traitors were less shy of being overt or starting a short-lived rampage

Utterly untrue.

Sundance. "Less Shy" means more likely. You are agreeing with him. Christ.

[Chike101]

The lack of hostages is due to the lack of a realistic way to take a hostage. There's no pulling a gun to convince someone to enter a room or play along, they just try disarm you. There's no luring someone into a trap, they run or scream and then ten people descend to beat your face in.

Well, coming from BS12, I always wished that LLJK/Goon had the "gun modes." It allowed you to either take a hostage with a gun in your hand (captive mode), and it allowed you to tinker what your hostage could do, ie walk, run, handle items. Then there was just plain old "shoot" mode where you just clicked a tile and a bullet exploded out of your gun.

After some fuckery on Bay, I know what this is, and yes, it's great. This is a GOOD way to do it.

"Hello sir, welcome to security how may I help you?"
"Yeah, I have an appointment with the Head of Security"
"At what time is that?"
Chike aims the revolver at The Mallcop!
".357, asshole! Don't say a word and let me in!"

[atomic1fire]

Here's a though, instead of overcomplicating things with an extra icon like baystation, why not combine it with the existing help/harm system.

Harm intent: Dumb Pubbie raises the zip gun in the air.
Help Intent: Dumb Pubbie lowers the zip gun torward the ground.

examining someone would show whether or not their gun is raised.

Basically you can walk around with a gun pointed down, or raise it up and tell everyone you plan on shooting it.

Pointing at a crewmen while holding a gun should also tell them you are pointing a gun at them.

e.g Dumb pubbie points the taser at Detective Fowled Up.

Det Fowled up: WATCH WHERE YOU ARE POINTING THAT THING, YOU DUMB PUBBIE.

Maybe a keyboard shortcut could be used to instant point at anyone the mouse is currently pointing at. e.g like that examine thing.

Just little in game things that add RP without adding player effort. (plus force players to think that pointing at things while holding a gun in their active hand is a stupid idea.)

[Lantern]

I would like to see a mild increase in traitor numbers, and maybe have late joins again. The hostage thing also sounds really awesome, but, if you take someone hostage, there is a good chance that no one but the AI will care. I mean, if security plays along it would be fine, but there are some rounds where either security dosnt do their job, or just isn't there.

[Lantern]

Here's a though, instead of overcomplicating things with an extra icon like baystation, why not combine it with the existing help/harm system.

Harm intent: Dumb Pubbie raises the zip gun in the air.
Help Intent: Dumb Pubbie lowers the zip gun torward the ground.

examining someone would show whether or not their gun is raised.

Basically you can walk around with a gun pointed down, or raise it up and tell everyone you plan on shooting it.

Pointing at a crewmen while holding a gun should also tell them you are pointing a gun at them.

e.g Dumb pubbie points the taser at Detective Fowled Up.

Det Fowled up: WATCH WHERE YOU ARE POINTING THAT THING, YOU DUMB PUBBIE.

Maybe a keyboard shortcut could be used to instant point at anyone the mouse is currently pointing at. e.g like that examine thing.

Just little in game things that add RP without adding player effort. (plus force players to think that pointing at things while holding a gun in their active hand is a stupid idea.)

I like the idea, but wouldn't the inherent game lag make it to where the person being held up will just take off running before the hostage taker can get a shot off?

[Marquesas]

My point is that having the traitor count that high kinda fucked over the people who wanted to actually spend a round doing something "productive"

I'm not quite confident that this is true anymore, what Clarks said actually holds here - Surplus crates are an often ordered traitor item, especially by those who not only 'want to', but also 'can' be successful. With it being a lot less rampage oriented, it should have a significantly less devastating effect on the round.

As it is, we're currently back to donut traitor rates, I mean I can hardly believe a 30-people station needs 2 traitors and that's it.

with Mixed, all 4 main antagonists can be in a round at the same time, on paper Mixed is a good idea, but in practice... vampires trump all, wizards trump changelings, and everyone trumps the traitor, the traitor who used to be the bread and butter of the game is now the weakest and the most boring to play.

Vampires need a nerf, but wizards DO NOT trump changelings, unless the poor sap happens to be caught in a fireball, and the traitor is really a matter of skill and creativity, obviously you lack this.

[Captain_Bravo]

Yeah, that is completely true. My last wizard round was irrecovably fucked over by an asshole changeling who hunted me down every time I'd teleport away, constantly, despite repeated magic missiling and cluwnings. He eventually got me with neurotoxin, which slowly killed me on the wizard shuttle.

[Weavel]

obviously you lack this.

this was utterly unnecesary, stop turning every thread into telling everyone they are shit ok thanks

i agree with you otherwise, changeling is easier to play than wizard in a long-run situation, and really for 30 players we should have 3 antagonists at minimum.
1 baddie per 15 dudes is beyond lame

[Shoddy]

I have an idea, why not give traitors continual work?

Objective #1: Assassinate Hailey Batron, the geneticist.
Objective #2: Recently detonation of Goonhub installation 458 was averted when the crew retained a certain nuclear authentication disk and fought off agents sent in a "non recoverable" highly important mission, recover this disk, you will find your PDA has a free "pinpointer" in the telecom black market.
Objective #3: Bug Renatha Hopburn, the Head of Personnel, we believe they may be a Nanotrasen agent transmitting identities of whom they suspect are our agents, we will listen on the bug if they try to radio in the ID's of any of our agents and activate the killswitch hidden inside it.

Traitor #2's objectives.
Objective #1: Syndicate high command believes that Nanotrasen is working on a new unknown prototype, infiltrate the science division and "relieve" the Research Director of his annual summary audio drive to Centcom regarding testing of this prototype which is believed to have been shipped to unknown location so not to be stolen. obtain by any means possible, good luck agent.

a possibly interesting thing, Updated assignments


how this works is...

Traitor #2 has just obtained the super secret proto drive and confirms this by scanning it on to his PDA, he is then given an updated list of instructions perhaps along the lines of


*ALERT* urgent update

We have intercepted radio transmissions that implicate one of our agents has defected, track down and kill (x)

When traitors complete their objectives they will be given new work, or an urgent assignment that has a time limit to completion, Syndicate high overlord command always needs more work done to overthrow Nanotrasen

Why is this a good idea? it keeps the round going, whenever a traitor finishes his objectives he decides to either blend in for the rest of the round or go overkill, this system of updating the agents will give them continual work to do, always a risk of being caught and its a lot more super spy, don't you think?

also perhaps reward agents for good work? great job agent: your main objective is complete, please enjoy this supplementary of 2 telecrystals

[Archenteron]

Perhaps give miscreants ~3 telecrystals to acquire HonkCo Clowning Around Inc. mischieveous but nonharmful/hard to acquire items like boxes of handcuffs, spraybottles of lube, fake moustaches, Fat Stacks of Cash for bribing/drug-buying purposes, pre-emagged misc. robots, superfart DNA injectors, a Decoy Heisenbee to harass the heads by kidnapping/attacking, stuff like that.