Remove Extended from the Secret rotation

[Frances]

Pretty simple.

 

• 1. Secret is a gamemode people vote for because they want something antaggy but surprising to happen. When secret turns out to be extended, the people who voted in secret for the action usually end up being disappointed, and a lot of secret-extended rounds end with a 2:00 transfer due to general boredom.
  
  
  
  2. People who want to play extended but vote for secret are basically taking a chance with secret, because extended never gets voted in. These people are voting for the 20-30% chance the round might not end in a fiery blaze of glory, and it's not really ideal when you want to engage in quiet roleplay but don't really have any guarantee you won't get assblasted by a wizard.

 

This leads to a sub-optimal situation where everyone is voting secret 90% of the time without it really being what anybody wants.

If we remove extended from the secret rotation, we get two things:

 

• 1. Secret rounds come with a guarantee of something antaggy to happen, which removes the disappointment of secret-extended.
  
  2. As the antagging becomes more consistent and frequent, people will actually start voting for extended again, much like how it happened in the past. People who prefer extended rounds will then be free to join without the fear of random assblasting.

 

Overall, the amount of action on the server would remain the same, but people could at least know whether they're heading into an antag or extended round, which I think as a whole is a clarification most people would be happy to receive.

[jackfractal]

I like this plan. I've always thought that a lot of votes boil down to 'extended' vs 'antag' rather than one round-type over another. If extended gets any traction, the other votes tend to pile into the antag round-type that has the largest amount of votes.

[Frances]

I tend to see things this way:

• Most people tend to prefer either extended or antag roundtypes, with preferences sometimes varying depending on the person's mood
• When people see too much of a roundtype, they vote for the other (the extended break after nuke was a common one)

 

The server already has a natural balance of extended-vs-antag which should be able to maintain itself. But it'd be much better for clarity if we could actually know what type of game we're heading into (and no, I don't think anyone who wants extended gets pleasantly surprised by random antags, nor that anyone who wants antags gets pleasantly surprised by a lack thereof.)

[Guest]

The server already has a natural balance of extended-vs-antag which should be able to maintain itself. But it'd be much better for clarity if we could actually know what type of game we're heading into (and no, I don't think anyone who wants extended gets pleasantly surprised by random antags, nor that anyone who wants antags gets pleasantly surprised by a lack thereof.)

 

Isn't this the point of secret? It prevents a lot of the initial metagame you get from picking a singular mode which has rather self-explanatory antags.

I'm against the idea of removing extended from secret, though, because dead hour secret would only get autotraitor.

[witchbells]

No. Jesus fucking Christ in hell, no.

[Susan]

Signature is relevant.

[Frances]

Isn't this the point of secret? It prevents a lot of the initial metagame you get from picking a singular mode which has rather self-explanatory antags.

I'm against the idea of removing extended from secret, though, because dead hour secret would only get autotraitor.

Yeah, secret prevents us from anticipating a specific type of antag. And it's a fun surprise, but I don't see what removing extended does on that front. There isn't really any metagaming that can be done against "antags in general" that people won't do just because "it might be extended".

As for dead hour secret, once again, I'm asking... is it actually an enjoyable surprise to vote for secret and find out the secret is... that nothing at all would happen?

 

No. Jesus fucking Christ in hell, no.

why lol

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Extended is already our second most played game mode according to Scopes' data. Removing it from secret would get rid of the disappointment from people who either want it and it isn't, and those that don't want it and is.

[Jboy2000000]

Second most only because of secret. Tell me, how many times in this YEAR, Im being generous with that, have you seen extended be voted in, without an event? If you cut extended from the game all together, because thats the only way extended gets played anymore unless admins promise an event, and events always devolve in the station being filled with self-antags who can get away with it for event reasons and go be mad. In all honesty, this play is becoming a little TG.

[Thundy]

The server already has a natural balance of extended-vs-antag which should be able to maintain itself. But it'd be much better for clarity if we could actually know what type of game we're heading into (and no, I don't think anyone who wants extended gets pleasantly surprised by random antags, nor that anyone who wants antags gets pleasantly surprised by a lack thereof.)

 

Isn't this the point of secret? It prevents a lot of the initial metagame you get from picking a singular mode which has rather self-explanatory antags.

I'm against the idea of removing extended from secret, though, because dead hour secret would only get autotraitor.

 

I understand what you mean about dead hour, however there must be a balance between these two ideas. Extended being removed is a good idea in my opinion as I have felt the annoyance of voting secret and getting extended. "Secretly extended."

If people are meta gaming because they know the game type, that is a problem with the people playing and should be addressed separately. Don't punish everyone because some people tell "ermergud captain ish Ling" over comms at the beginning of round.

Could there be a compromise? Some sort of thing to vote where the result is EITHER a random antag OR extended, with it being split down the middle? Even have rounds where we turn off random encounters, like carp, drones and radiation?

[Frances]

Second most only because of secret. Tell me, how many times in this YEAR, Im being generous with that, have you seen extended be voted in, without an event? If you cut extended from the game all together, because thats the only way extended gets played anymore unless admins promise an event, and events always devolve in the station being filled with self-antags who can get away with it for event reasons and go be mad. In all honesty, this play is becoming a little TG.

It's exactly this kind of thinking that got people not to vote for extended anymore. They expect it not to win, so they vote for secret in the hope that secret becomes as uneventful as possible. Remove secret, secret no longer wins every vote due to half the voters hoping to get a specific gamemode out of it, and extended actually gets selected in a way that we actually know when it's extended or not.

Trust me, there's a reasonable amount of people that do want to play extended. The reason why I'm suggesting this change is because I'm one of them.

[jackfractal]

Part of the issue with secret extended is that, because it's secret and there might be antags, people don't get up to the kind of shenanigans that people get up to on voted extended rounds.

You're not going to start some kind of large project, or plan some kind of major social event, in a round where there may be Nuke Ops knocking on your door. I know the idea with Secret is that you do start all your long term extended style plans and then Suddenly Antags and it's all surprising and you get really invested and stuff.

I know that's what is supposed to happen, but it doesn't.

What happens is that nothing happens. Everyone just stands around as people brace for an impact that never comes.

Maybe that makes everyone a 'bad roleplayer' or whatever, but it's how I always see it play out.

Edited August 17, 2015 by Guest

[Frances]

What happens is that nothing happens. Everyone just stands around as people brace for an impact that never comes.

That's probably the best way to describe the problem I could ever think of.

Secret-extended and extended aren't the same. From both the arguments I've already heard and the few that have been presented here so far, I feel like most people that want to protect secret-extended are somehow afraid that secret without extended would get even worse, as there would no longer be any extended rounds, ever.

But these secret-extended rounds aren't "extended". You don't know what's gonna happen. You can't really get invested in them anymore, because the possibility of antags is always there. People who love antags get disappointed because their secret rounds are calm, and people who love extended get disappointed because their secret rounds have antags.

Voted extended is muuuuch better than secret-extended for that reason. The whole point of extended is "I want to play a relatively calm office simulator" (occasional griefers and chucklefucks aside). Not knowing when you can do that or not is kinda terrible.

[Jboy2000000]

Alright, I think Im finally starting to see what you're thinking here. I don't know if it'll work in process, but oh well. Would the opposite spectrum work? As it is now, extended has the same chance of being picked as any other game mode save nuke and auto-traitor, would making extended more regular work? Since theres more of a chance its extended, people might start to do their big extended projects because theres a good chance it could be extended anyway. If its extended, people see how gun extended can be that way, and maybe vote for it in the future, and if it's not, people will see those projects stop, and then antag likers will get what they want, and maybe people will think "huh, that person had a good idea. Maybe we should vote extended later and see if we can actually do that."

[Frances]

As it is now, extended has the same chance of being picked as any other game mode save nuke and auto-traitor, would making extended more regular work? Since theres more of a chance its extended, people might start to do their big extended projects because theres a good chance it could be extended anyway. If its extended, people see how gun extended can be that way, and maybe vote for it in the future, and if it's not, people will see those projects stop, and then antag likers will get what they want, and maybe people will think "huh, that person had a good idea. Maybe we should vote extended later and see if we can actually do that."

Extended has a slightly higher chance of being picked in secret over other gamemodes, which I believe is partly the reason why we're seeing so much secret.

The way this basically goes is: extended gets picked by secret a lot, people see a lot of extended rounds in secret, thus people don't feel like voting for extended because they're already getting a lot of it.

Increasing the chance of extended being picked by secret would only exacerbate the problem even further. It wouldn't make secret any more convenient, but would simply encourage people to abandon it for selective antag gamemodes, which to me seems like a loss.

[Jboy2000000]

Does extended have a higher chance? I remember, distinctly, a while back Skull said extended was bumped up in secret, because secret had some kind of number based picking. Extended and Nuke used to be One, meaning least, everything else was a three, and auto-traitor was Five, being the most likely, and the update back then bumped it up to three.

[NebulaFlare]

I'm on the fence. I enjoy the general extended round which is a refreshing break from total chaos, and I see secret more of a mix of secret and chair RP.

Secret is more mellow. There is the calm before the storm, before the antag makes their appearance. And voting for secret opposed to the antag, is in my humble definition, a hodgepodge of chair-RP and action. You don't have to partake in the antag shenanigans if you really don't want to (unless it flies out of control into a proverbial shit-storm).

I think the bigger issue is, people don't know how to enjoy extended. Especially the influx of a lot of newer faces. The high-action rounds are almost always picked, and then there's general annoyance that it's not always played up to par.

Personally, the only time I dislike extended is if I play security-related roles. Because security in extended is a snorefest. But several times I would play in research, engineering, or civilian, and have no clue what the roundtype is in secret. Then again, I'm probably baised because lately, I've played strictly security...

Ok ok, Tl;dr. I would say remove extended, IF AND ONLY IF we have 25+ readied up. The same amount needed for secret nuke. If it's >25, keep extended in. Because secretly extended will dissolve into total chaos without antags, and we miss out what makes extended enjoyable. Besides, extended is best done when there are a controlled number of participants.

[Frances]

I think the bigger issue is, people don't know how to enjoy extended. Especially the influx of a lot of newer faces. The high-action rounds are almost always picked, and then there's general annoyance that it's not always played up to par.

People have always gotten annoyed at antags, especially in nuke, rp-rev, cult, and to a lesser extent ling. These are the people who play these gamemodes reluctantly, not because they enjoy them a lot.

I'm actually making this suggestion because I'd like to see more good extended, though. Not because I want less of it. I basically realized that I have different characters I play depending on whether it's extended or antags, and it gets frustrating when you're in the mindset that you want to antag (or see antaggy things) and nothing happens, or when you want to have a calm round and antaggy things happen. Which is why I think we'd greatly benefit from being able to anticipate both more clearly.

 

Does extended have a higher chance? I remember, distinctly, a while back Skull said extended was bumped up in secret, because secret had some kind of number based picking. Extended and Nuke used to be One, meaning least, everything else was a three, and auto-traitor was Five, being the most likely, and the update back then bumped it up to three.

IIRC, the numbers now go: Nuke=1, Everything else=2, Extended=3.

[EvilBrage]

I'm not too sure I like the idea of completely removing extended from the secret rotation - but I also don't think it should be weighted more heavily than any other game mode.

[VoltageHero]

The thing is this, secret is the most voted game-mod, and ends up being the picked game mode. Removing extended from the rotation won't just remove it from the list, it will end up making it one of those modes that rarely get picked.

How often is extended actually voted for, outside of event times? Not very often, in reality. Sure, some people might not like extended, but others do. That said, without extended being the rotation, the only thing that will be there will be constant antag rounds.

You may say "oh, that'll influence to pick extended". No, it won't. The reason that it worked before, was being Aurora was getting 20-30 players, most of the time. Aurora is a rather popular server, and with that, comes more people who are interested in antag rounds, than extended.

Also, I'm not sure if Extended is chosen more highly. Probably want to get somebody to confirm that.

This idea shouldn't happen. It would lower the times extended is played, even further. Antag rounds have their time, and it's often, so why remove extended?

[Ryfer]

Also, I'm not sure if Extended is chosen more highly. Probably want to get somebody to confirm that.

 

I remember it being spoken about in msay, Frances is right on the numbers. It's likely for extended to be picked over most other gamemodes. Wasn't that way originally, but a change made a couple months back. Should be bumped back down, actually lowered to 1 imo.

[spacevoidagent]

I support this because I vote Secret, hoping for antags, not extended. If I wanted extended, I would have voted for it.

[the_furry]

i dont support this for alot of the reasons why people already said

[rrrrrr]

i vote secret for antags. when it turns out to be extended i feel tricked, cheated and lied to. if your punk ass wants to play extended, vote extended.

[Conservatron]

secret is for antags

extended go home