Nuke Ops and Bounties: How to Balance this

[Guest]

I suggest you think of an alternative reason to kidnap or kill people. For example, Nuke ops get an order to capture person X because they have intel Syndicate needs, or get an order to take X scientists from the station and then sell them to a foreign corporation, or kill the Captain, etc.

There is no good reason why anyone not heads of staff would have such a large bounty. Having a large bounty also means the player will always suspect they are the primary target and act accordingly, it's hard not to meta with that knowledge.

But this is my a bit more complicated idea:

2. Don't drop the bounty system, just revise it.
    
    
   
4. Instead of bounty, put high-medium-low priority on it, depending on the roles and wishes of the persons in question.
    
   
6. Contractors recive bounty based on priority, because:
   
   • Someone like captain, head of staff or IAA would have high priority for kidnapping or killing (even though I fucking hate being the #no1 target during traitor, I still support it as long as its done well). They have indirect access to high profile intel and have caused major damage to the syndicate by their work.
     
   • Scientists, engineers and medical doctors would have medium priority, because of their knowledge of tech, station systems and medical stuff.
     
   • Everyone else would have low priority because of the minor damages they did to the syndicate.
     
   • People who don't want to be targeted all the time can ask for their priority to be lowered (like Mo'Taki) or heightened if they like to be ganked all the time.
   • Security gets fucked either way, so they might as well be excluded.

[*]The system should distinguish Traitor and Ops objectives:

• Ambitious nuke ops target high priority crew, less ambitious ones kidnap medium ones. This is to avoid mass gank, as higher ones will always take safety and will be able to defend themselves and medium ones wont get murdered for no reason at all.
• Ambitious Traitors target medium ones for kidnapping* and lower ones for kills, because low ones are larger in number, thus less likely to get targeted.

[*]Stealing ID's for non-agressive antags. Stealing IDs and keeping them to the end of the round will allow them to sell information.

 

*Kidnapping during traitor round would be simply capturing someone and keeping them on station when the shuttle leaves. At that moment, Syndicate swoops in and collects the personnel by teleporting them onboard (since they are stationary and their location is known).

[LordFowl]

The thing is, a set bounty on people does not hinder character development in a round type that only gets picked like once every few days. It's nothing more than an optional thing, that's it.

My point was not that it hinders character development in any way, rather that it hinders controlled character development expressly through bounties.

My main and only qualm with this system is if it disables the optional bounty system that Incognito has set up, which it won't by force, but may by his choice. That allows controlled character development through bounty systems. Randomized bounties don't. (But they don't hinder character development in any other way; just in bounties)

And to the idea of bounties being changed from monetary values to priorities, that's not a bad idea.

[NebulaFlare]

*Kidnapping during traitor round would be simply capturing someone and keeping them on station when the shuttle leaves. At that moment, Syndicate swoops in and collects the personnel by teleporting them onboard (since they are stationary and their location is known).

 

I'm a teeny bit wary for this idea. During dead hour auto-tator, it's extremely easy for traitors to isolate and kidnap a crewmember. Even if NT is endlessly plagued by syndicate, isn't it safe enough to assume their space territory is very well guarded? Syndie operatives require high tech to stealth toward the station. Bluespace teleportation becomes less accurate as the distance increases - and it needs to be re-calibrated each time the station moves.

Best idea I can think of, is if a syndicate agent is disguised as a cleanup crew.But then, they'd have to smuggle a person off the station, past the Odin, and through the checkpoint. I dunno...

[Guest]

So, we're giving Nuke Ops their antag objectives back?

I mean, supposedly we removed the usual antag objectives to prevent antags from playing for greentext only and so they can have more freedom to get creative, right?

However, with this sudden focus on bounties it feels like we're just giving them a new objective.An objective which I personally find less exciting than getting "That fukken disk".

Assuming this is also going to apply to regular traitors, wouldnt we just be replacing the assasination objective with a kidnap objective?

Also, expanding on what Nebula said about dead hour traitor rounds. Not only is it very easy to kidnap someone there, they can go on for more than 6 hours. Do you want to play 6 hours of your character being buckled to a chair in the incinerator room? Because I dont. At least you can respawn as someone else if the traitor kills you.

[Guest]

*Kidnapping during traitor round would be simply capturing someone and keeping them on station when the shuttle leaves. At that moment, Syndicate swoops in and collects the personnel by teleporting them onboard (since they are stationary and their location is known).

 

I'm a teeny bit wary for this idea. During dead hour auto-tator, it's extremely easy for traitors to isolate and kidnap a crewmember. Even if NT is endlessly plagued by syndicate, isn't it safe enough to assume their space territory is very well guarded? Syndie operatives require high tech to stealth toward the station. Bluespace teleportation becomes less accurate as the distance increases - and it needs to be re-calibrated each time the station moves.

Best idea I can think of, is if a syndicate agent is disguised as a cleanup crew.But then, they'd have to smuggle a person off the station, past the Odin, and through the checkpoint. I dunno...

 

Don't nuke ops get close to the station undetected either way? Don't they have a teleporter? It's just a matter of time really, if it could be done quickly enough, they could avoid the cleanup crew and the drones. Also, so far, I think the bounty system didn't encourage traitors to go after bounties a lot and even this lame kidnapping would be better than random bombings all the time, imo.

Edited February 11, 2015 by Guest

[Baka]

Again.

This is not objectives. This is an optional random list for players to browse and choose at their own will.

[NebulaFlare]

I don't think the goal is to re-add obejctives. I'm supportive of giving a list of ideas for optional objectives. The list can be utilized by rookies, or just completely ignored. It's just something to give people an idea of what to do with all this cool, fun gear. Write out all the tasks, stuff they can steal, etc.

Example, if I ever get the chance, I'm going to stage kidnapping the entire station by cutting it off from centcomm. That would be fun. I have no idea how I will do this, but it's an option. That would be a great idea to toss into the pile of suggestions.

 

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Don't nuke ops get close to the station undetected either way? Don't they have a teleporter? It's just a matter of time really, if it could be done quickly enough, they could avoid the cleanup crew and the drones. Also, so far, I think the bounty system didn't encourage traitors to go after bounties a lot and even this lame kidnapping would be better than random bombings all the time, imo.

 

I'd like to think they have to prepare a great deal for such an infiltration, and justifying it for one bounty isn't worth the cost. Killing would be okay, if they can figure out a way to sneak a photo or recording past the checkpoint.

It's just...it's dead hour. It's too easy. Even kill bounties would be much too easy to accomplish. Logically yes, they'd use the graveyard shift to their advantage, but, I dunno. NT should at least offer some form of protection for their crew. If it was this easy, Syndicate would be stealing entire stations left and right.

I'm just thinking back to experience when Karima was almost kidnapped during auto-tator dead hour. There were 4 crewmembers. Karima, the traitor, the SSD CE, and the engineer-taking-a-break-as-a-librarian. He would have nearly succeeded if it weren't for karima breaking free and screaming for help.

The reasoning I'm going off on, is that there is no way to secure a bounty off the station, without going through a checkpoint. Any other method is a near death-sentence. You'll be out in space, in some unforsaken corner, unless you manage to come across a ship or radio station with air. You're going to have to smuggle a person off. Steal an item? Hide it in your bag. Kill a person? take a photo as proof you did it. Kidnap a person? If they discover the means of transport, Syndicate are going to be walking straight into a trap of ERT.

I would much rather prefer people get creative. For example, if they kidnapped the person and then used the teleporter to send them off someplace off-the-grid for holding. Or, if they drafted up an elaborate diagnosis that the target is ill, and must be secured in medical at the Odin....only to be drugged asleep and whisked away. There needs to be something more than, building an undetectable saferoom, stripping the target of all means of communication and tracking devices, buckle cuff them to a chair, and await for their transport. Because I'm certain that is what is going to happen, and it kills the arpee.

[canon35]

I'd love to see a teleporter item that has one use, synced only to a special beacon in the syndicate ship. Clicking on someone with it would auto-matically send them there after 20 seconds or so.

[Guest]

I would much rather prefer people get creative. For example, if they kidnapped the person and then used the teleporter to send them off someplace off-the-grid for holding. Or, if they drafted up an elaborate diagnosis that the target is ill, and must be secured in medical at the Odin....only to be drugged asleep and whisked away. There needs to be something more than, building an undetectable saferoom, stripping the target of all means of communication and tracking devices, buckle cuff them to a chair, and await for their transport. Because I'm certain that is what is going to happen, and it kills the arpee.

 

I get where you're coming from. Franky, I'm sick of people trying to take Elena hostage every traitor shift or so. This was more as a replacement for the broken bounty system, where Karima has 100,000 bounty for no reason. Tagging her into the low priority group would solve the problem as risk/pay benifit would be much lower, as she would have as much chance of being targeted as any other player.

When it comes to dead hour, there is nothing stopping the person from getting jack shit by doing the bounty then.This was also more concerning nuke ops than traitors, since taking targets out that way is much more challanging in general.

All in all, the bounty system isn't even being used that much and to the extent it is, its same people over and over again. Its mostly useless, with its only plus being people punishing each other for shit behavior, like passive agressive vigilantism. The randomization at the start of the round would work, maybe by generating them the same way CentComm syndicate report is. Also sending them to the PDA's of all syndicates. But like Baka said, this is not about objectives, as most people would follow them through.