Total antagonist rework (or just merc/raider/wiz/ninja)

[kyres1]

Complaint number one of many veterans on the server is how security does not only have fun, they take fun from the majority of the station and secure the fun, preventing it from being shared with puny non-combatant staff. Only security must have the valids, right? Ironically, the same people call for antagonists starting conflict or antagonising the crew in some way, shape or form. It is a self-defeating mindset that only has one fix!

Enter: a total (and probably relatively simple) antagonist rework!

What I mean by this is removing the term “antagonist.” Not outlawing the word or trying to remove it from the community, but rewording things. Turning it into a new role along the lines of “event character” or “special role,” rather than something outright antagonistic. What will that do? Well, for one, you won’t be incentivized to involve only the protectors of the station and nobody else, or slaughter them ruthlessly before being able to.

Beyond simple pedantics like that, there’s really big things that could be done. Currently antagging is really straightforward, laughably so. You gear up. You leave your hidey hole. You fight until you die, hopefully around 2:00, everyone goes home. This is every round, and the only antagonist role that does not fall under this is usually traitor. Well, how do we fix that repetition?

Traitor is unique as it pits legitimate crew characters against one another and permits for crew-based interaction in a non-canon capacity. It is an essential gamemode that must stay for these reasons, and doesn’t require a major rework. Raising starting TC to 50 would fix any problems it could literally ever have.

Rev is a solid gamemode on its own, though rough to make gimmicks with. It should remain the same, though it seriously needs some gimmick templates provided to players.

Cult is a very unique gamemode mechanically. Nothing can really be added or taken away to this besides a player-selected deity and set agenda by a cult leader designated at roundstart. Same situation as rev.

Vampire is a weird one. It is definitely worth keeping on its own, after thinking on it.

Changeling, well, I can't comment on this. If it were up to me this incredibly broken and unplayable gamemode would have been removed a long time ago. Why it exists in its current state is a question for an entirely separate thread.

Malf is completely fine. The source of its problems are its players and the massive freedom granted to them as you're essentially God. That isn't blaming anybody - it's more so saying it's incredibly hard to think of a good plan for malf, and it often suffers for it.

Here’s the cool stuff.

Mercenary and raider die entirely. These are merged into a single team-noncrew gamemode where players can pick and choose whatever equipment from either team they desire, whichever means of entry they desire AND MORE COOL AND NOT NECESSARILY ANTAGONISTIC STUFF to accommodate literally any gimmick one could imagine.

Wizard and ninja die entirely. These are merged into a single solo-noncrew gamemode where players can pick and choose whatever equipment from either team they desire, whichever means of entry they desire AND MORE COOL AND NOT NECESSARILY ANTAGONISTIC STUFF to accommodate literally any gimmick one could imagine.

For mixed gamemodes like crossfire/visitors, the antagonists would share the same spawnpoint and plan accordingly. For cases where they would want privacy in preparation from one another, they can take themselves through a teleporter that places them out of vision while the other prepares, before they themselves prepare.

The issues with this are basically, “Won’t the affected gamemodes get boring?” Well, we can easily affect this by making community-made gimmicks available ingame from a contract DB of sorts. An OOC uplink, even. Staff could all work together to piece together maybe 15 starter gimmicks and players can make the rest. This will be no different, if not better than the current way things are, which is just “You’re a wizard,” or “You’re a pirate.”

As for implementation, it's pretty straightforward outside of how the referenced OOC "game plan" list would work and how uplinks would be available to either wizards or raiders.

[driecg36]

I think as long as you limit the gear crossover, this is excellent. By that I mean I don't want a ninja/wizard hybrid running around zapping everyone with both magic and energy shurikens.

I absolutely want antags to not always be antags, however. I personally think this should be a random roll, where someone is either supposed to be hostile, neutral, or in favor to the station. (Favor only applies to gamemodes with multiple antags, and would work best with this suggestion https://forums.aurorastation.org/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=8720&start=30)

[VTCobaltblood]

I think this suggestion is very good, and should emphasize more that singular and grouped special role modes do not have to be antagonistic.

I imagine the special roles spawning on an entirely OOC base with a system similar to cargo orders, which should contain most items in the game and a restricted amount of points. These points will not be TC, but rather something abstract, akin to loadout points, except the selection is WAY wider and you get much more of them. Items in that order system may include everything from a box of clown mask to a traitor uplink to your own merc shuttle.

The OOC contracts should come with a pre-determined set of gear which you automatically "buy" from the system, with some leftover points for extra flavor.

[Ornias]

Beyond simple pedantics like that, there’s really big things that could be done. Currently antagging is really straightforward, laughably so. You gear up. You leave your hidey hole. You fight until you die, hopefully around 2:00, everyone goes home. This is every round, and the only antagonist role that does not fall under this is usually traitor. Well, how do we fix that repetition?

This is a massive oversimplification. The idea that the only way an antagonist can play is by going into a firefight bloodmatch with security for two hours is wrong. We've all seen good antagonists. We all know they can be done. Bad antagging is straightforward. Good antagging requires requires thinking about this new character you're creating, how to make things interesting for everyone, and how your character would act.

 

Mercenary and raider die entirely. These are merged into a single team-noncrew gamemode where players can pick and choose whatever equipment from either team they desire, whichever means of entry they desire AND MORE COOL AND NOT NECESSARILY ANTAGONISTIC STUFF to accommodate literally any gimmick one could imagine.

Wizard and ninja die entirely. These are merged into a single solo-noncrew gamemode where players can pick and choose whatever equipment from either team they desire, whichever means of entry they desire AND MORE COOL AND NOT NECESSARILY ANTAGONISTIC STUFF to accommodate literally any gimmick one could imagine.

For mixed gamemodes like crossfire/visitors, the antagonists would share the same spawnpoint and plan accordingly. For cases where they would want privacy in preparation from one another, they can take themselves through a teleporter that places them out of vision while the other prepares, before they themselves prepare.

I question what integrating these gamemodes will do for people.

Mercenary is stronger than raider, and this isn't a mistake. Raider has a small advantage in the fact that it's slightly more inherantly unpredictable, but mercenary is better in terms of equipment. Integrating these two will damage that dichotomy, and just create Merc+. A vast majority of people will purchase what they think is strongest, not what is most interesting. They will not use this to make gimmicks, they will use this to win.

Further, I don't see the non-antagonistic side. For a variety of reasons I'll explain in a moment, I don't like non-antagonisting antags as a concept, but even aside from that, what advantage would this give to creating more peaceful scenarios? Mercs pretty much ONLY have weapons and illegal tools available to them, raiders already have a tonne of non-antag stuff to use. We don't see peaceraiders that often, so why would we think that giving these few peaceraiders access to more powerful weaponry would do anything for them?

Same with wizard and ninja, only even more issues arise there. Ninja and wizard do not mesh. They are both high-mobility, and both outside-antagonists, but that's where their similarities end. They have different weaknesses, different abilities. They both have recovery times, but ninjas is more large-scale and wizards is more small-scale. How would these two mesh? Especially in terms of theme, appearance, abilities.

I do like the mixed gamemodes idea. Antagonists cooperating to create really interesting stories is where this game shines.

 

The issues with this are basically, “Won’t the affected gamemodes get boring?” Well, we can easily affect this by making community-made gimmicks available ingame from a contract DB of sorts. An OOC uplink, even. Staff could all work together to piece together maybe 15 starter gimmicks and players can make the rest. This will be no different, if not better than the current way things are, which is just “You’re a wizard,” or “You’re a pirate.”

People who only see "you're a wizard" or "you're a pirate" shouldn't be playing antag. Giving people premade gimmicks to follow won't suddenly make them better antagonists. It will make them formulaic ones.

We hardly see the contracts used at all, and I expect that the new database would be much different. And even if it did, giving people templates to follow, even if people don't have to follow them, is boring. It creates stock scenarios, it means that people are playing as characters that they don't really understand working for goals they don't really get. And if they were non-antagonistic goals, well, that would get boring. Far, far more boring than our current gamemodes.

Ultimately, I don't see how this is conductive to involving non-security, nor do I think that making antagonists less antagonistic is a desirable path to this goal. I want more non-antag events. I want non-antag event characters. I do not want them to be supernatural. I want them to be traders, I want them to be VIPs, I want them to be diplomats and comms workers and IT men and safety inspectors and everything inbetween. I want them to be canon. But non-antagonistic antagonist play is rarely interesting. And when it is, it's because the player playing the non-antagonistic individual is good at it, and could do just as well playing as an antagonist. And because they're alien in the universe - because they're unknowable aliens, because they're mysterious invaders, because they're high-tech infiltrators, the only want we can connect with them in the short two-hour space is through antagonistic play. This cannot be remedied with our antagonists - it is an integral part of them. -1

[Sytic]

I'm all for involving more crew and having less hostile antagonists, its just, wouldn't this become more of a hassle for the administrative side of things? For when these event characters decide "Right, fuck it, lets kill 'em all." such as a hostile Traitor or the like, wouldn't they have a much easier time powergaming to victory? Seems like it'd be a hassle for admins to handle, although a cool idea.

You essentially have to trust people not to be a dick, but "one bad apple spoils the bunch". Let's take an example.

Detective Joe Bob goes up against NinjaWizard Dick "Dastardly" Richards. Richards decides to be a dick, and kill a bunch of dudes. This flies under the radar or maybe the shoddy excuse somehow got them out of it, but in any case, Richards gets away. Joe Bob, who got held hostage immediately after trying to talk to the interesting event character, and was later executed by him, is a little pissed. Why should HIS round be sacrificed for this other player? So in the future, Joe Bob walks up to NinjaWizard Bane Johns, and pulls a gun on him in order to halt an intruder. Bane Johns is now kinda pissed, his gimmick was ruined and he realizes in the future, he shouldn't wait to have his fun be stomped, either.

This starts a chain reaction, where neither party wants to have their fun ruined or the potential of their fun ruined. "But if this kind of thing happens, the admins will solve it! It will count as powergame!" In this scenario? Definitely. Then again, how far do you go? How far is it where eventually you decide that, an antag using a certain loadout, or an antag killing a person in tons of different scenarios, is just entirely unacceptable? Where is the line in the sand where killing a security team with a specific loadout and tools is not powergame, but fair play? And if any combination of loadout or tools is not powergame, but merely an event character's actions can be classified as powergame, what stops an event character from choosing an antagonistic outlook every round in order to completely trash the existing Security team? And if THAT is more of a problem, when is antagonistic actions okay, and not okay, under this suggestion? And when does this stop being FUN for either Security, the Antagonist, On-Station characters or the playerbase as a whole?

(+1 to more different-kinds-of antagonist types at once tho, as well as +1 to more traitor TC)

[Butterrobber202]

Preferably the amount of weapons should stay the same. Even if this is impletmented I’m still gonna be hostile the majority of the time because FUCK peaceantagging.

[Doxxmedearly]

We don't see peaceraiders that often, so why would we think that giving these few peaceraiders access to more powerful weaponry would do anything for them?

Even if this is impletmented I’m still gonna be hostile the majority of the time because FUCK peaceantagging.

This is why. A lot of the vocal part of the server rips into anyone who tries to make an interesting round that doesn't involve death and dismemberment (And then wonder why security chases after them and tries to keep people safe in their departments). When you try to come in with a gimmick of being peaceful (Even if your intentions are to go loud later), people will always attempt to poke holes in your story immediately; it happens on merc, heist, and (unfortunately) rev. Not saying there shouldn't be investigations or skepticism, but most people will know what you're up to and try to justify any way to prepare for you or avoid you. Security will stalk you. And then if you don't kill, there's no shortage of OOC salt, which works to deter people from trying different things. Not that violence/killing based gimmicks and antags are bad! But right now they feel like the ONLY option.

 

The issues with this are basically, “Won’t the affected gamemodes get boring?” Well, we can easily affect this by making community-made gimmicks available ingame from a contract DB of sorts. An OOC uplink, even. Staff could all work together to piece together maybe 15 starter gimmicks and players can make the rest.

I like this idea just as something to implement, but I don't think this solves the question posed. As Ornias said, it will make things formulaic. Honestly, if people want better antags, then they have to be more patient with players who are trying to learn the ropes and create gimmicks, so they can get practice in. There's a reason we see the same people as antags a lot of the time; we're pretty unforgiving as a community to people trying to learn antaggery.

Ultimately, an interesting idea. It's something I agree we need to work on, and it's a solid base to work with. I think Sytic poses some good thoughts, and I want to see those discussed. (Also god please more TC, please more different antags at the same time)

edited to clarify my thoughts

[Kaed]

I am against much of this idea on general principle. You wish to water down distinct antagonists into just variants of each other, try to encourage people who want to just be a special snowflake and walk around being magical or whatever to do that. I see you indicating that we should dispense entirely with the word 'antagonist' and use a more general term, so that people will feel safer doing that.

Not a chance, buster. I can tell you for sure I would never code in something like this. I somewhat suspect that even burger would be reluctant to do it. The problem with antagonist 'always being the same' is not the fundamental nature of 'antagonism' being flawed and that we should attempt a paradigm shift to 'special roles' would just further water down things down. If you want to give them more tools that give the abilities to still be an opposing force without murderizing everyone's face, sure, that's workable. Perhaps write a guide of some kind that offers alternatives to going murderbone hostile while still being a bad guy. But trying to blend antagonists together and take away their actual unique flavors and identities?

That's a terrible idea, as far as I'm concerned. Antagonists exist to antagonist. Trying to move away from that to encourage and we'll have more incidents involving people playing their normal character, except a wizard now. Or other things that make everyone roll their eyes and complain.

[Itanimulli]

I agree on the priciple that so many gimmicks are just rehashes of the same thing, and that's literally the gripe people like kaed and burger have with most roundtypes.

[AmoryBlaine]

Bump.

[Butterrobber202]

tbh I'd like it if Rev Heads earned TC to equip their Comrades with based on the number of people globally recruited.

e.g. "o nice you recruited 3 people, have 10 TC."

[AmoryBlaine]

On 21/04/2019 at 14:23, Butterrobber202 said:

tbh I'd like it if Rev Heads earned TC to equip their Comrades with based on the number of people globally recruited.

e.g. "o nice you recruited 3 people, have 10 TC."

A better idea is giving rev heads the 'knowledge' of how to construct better versions of constructable weapons like the spear, home-made pistol and metal armor. The idea of giving revs special weapons as per an uplink detracts from the idea of the revolution being anything more than a cover for some larger evil, greatly affecting how the gamemode would be percieved overall.

[Mogelix]

I dislike and disagree with most if not all of your opinions regarding security, antagplay and round structure, but totally believe in freedom for antags to be what they want to be instead of 'lol your a pirate buy a chameleon kit if you don't wanna instantly be seen as a intruder'. give them the choice of how and what their antag will be.

[Itanimulli]

I think a person's personal touch is what makes a round great.

No round has been good by rehashing what others do, because the end goal is usually meta'd before it can be completed. I would like to see the vast amount of freedom this could potentially bring. A test-merge, perhaps.