[WW] STARSHIP R.SCOTT II - Game over!

[Remus West]

IMO, the alien and symbiont part of this are right where they need to be, although others think the alien is too overpowered.

The Alien mother may be over powered but the Alien team without her is way way underpowered. They become the wolves without the ability to remove dangerous players through night kills. My game was very much over on the first night when Isgrimnur was scanned and I was converted. At that point it just became a matter of trying to start fights between people and pray someone was stupid enough to kill the hacker AND the LSS since nothing else would have given me a chance and I had no way to do either myself.

[Grundbegriff]

IMO, the alien and symbiont part of this are right where they need to be, although others think the alien is too overpowered.

The Alien mother may be over powered but the Alien team without her is way way underpowered. They become the wolves without the ability to remove dangerous players through night kills. My game was very much over on the first night when Isgrimnur was scanned and I was converted. At that point it just became a matter of trying to start fights between people and pray someone was stupid enough to kill the hacker AND the LSS since nothing else would have given me a chance and I had no way to do either myself.

I agree with this point.

I also agree with Chaosraven that Brendan's proposed mechanism smacks of evil genius. Voting against a teammate as a way to achieve/confirm conversion to the opposing team is fittingly insidious. The details would have to be worked out to ensure that the mechanism doesn't spin out of control or lend itself to manipulation. But for sure, this ruleset needs some means of hiding the actual state of the game.

As soon as everyone knows the actual populations, it devolves into a (rather entertaining, hideously frustrating) faction war.

One way to gimp the Mama would be to set a maximum Alien population. Perhaps she shouldn't be able to convert unless currentAlienCount < 3.

One way to enhance her offspring would be to give each a special but minor ability. At any given moment, the Mama may spawn if aliens < 3, the firstborn may scan for the Symbiont, and the runt (if any) can exploit the 3-Alien Hive Mind to kill at night. Whenever the pop drops below 3, the Mama may turn another player. A side effect of this mechanism would be that if someone suddenly turns up dead, everyone will know (regardless of the LSS's shenanigans) that there must currently be 3 bugs.

[stessier]

IMO, the alien and symbiont part of this are right where they need to be, although others think the alien is too overpowered.

The Alien mother may be over powered but the Alien team without her is way way underpowered. They become the wolves without the ability to remove dangerous players through night kills. My game was very much over on the first night when Isgrimnur was scanned and I was converted. At that point it just became a matter of trying to start fights between people and pray someone was stupid enough to kill the hacker AND the LSS since nothing else would have given me a chance and I had no way to do either myself.

I agree with this point.

I also agree with Chaosraven that Brendan's proposed mechanism smacks of evil genius. Voting against a teammate as a way to achieve/confirm conversion to the opposing team is fittingly insidious. The details would have to be worked out to ensure that the mechanism doesn't spin out of control or lend itself to manipulation. But for sure, this ruleset needs some means of hiding the actual state of the game.

As soon as everyone knows the actual populations, it devolves into a (rather entertaining, hideously frustrating) faction war.

One way to gimp the Mama would be to set a maximum Alien population. Perhaps she shouldn't be able to convert unless currentAlienCount < 3.

One way to enhance her offspring would be to give each a special but minor ability. At any given moment, the Mama may spawn if aliens < 3, the firstborn may scan for the Symbiont, and the runt (if any) can exploit the 3-Alien Hive Mind to kill at night. Whenever the pop drops below 3, the Mama may turn another player. A side effect of this mechanism would be that if someone suddenly turns up dead, everyone will know (regardless of the LSS's shenanigans) that there must currently be 3 bugs.

I am intrigued by your theory and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

[Grundbegriff]

To give that enhanced Alien mechanism time to play out-- and to give faction changes some time to have consequences-- I would also consider adding more gamedays (maybe 14 instead of 6) and cutting the realtime duration of those days in half. The days take too long, and the bickering grows old. So shorten the days and complicate the reasons for bickering!

For faction swaps, I think one member of each human team, and only one, should be susceptible to conversion (as proposed above by someone), with the following qualifiers:
(1) He doesn't know he's vulnerable until his first swap. After that, he's in the driver's seat.
(2) His swap is triggered not just when he votes against a teammate, but when he's on a successful vote against a teammate. (Having to place the actual killing vote might be too high a threshold, and might be complicated by meta-differences in timezone, schedule, etc.)
(3) He can swap back by successfully voting against one of his new teammates.

If there were two players in this situation, would (3) allow for unwanted exploits? Or would it generate desirable coolness?

[stessier]

To give that enhanced Alien mechanism time to play out-- and to give faction changes some time to have consequences-- I would also consider adding more gamedays (maybe 14 instead of 6) and cutting the realtime duration of those days in half. The days take too long, and the bickering grows old. So shorten the days and complicate the reasons for bickering!

For faction swaps, I think one member of each human team, and only one, should be susceptible to conversion (as proposed above by someone), with the following qualifiers:
(1) He doesn't know he's vulnerable until his first swap. After that, he's in the driver's seat.
(2) His swap is triggered not just when he votes against a teammate, but when he's on a successful vote against a teammate. (Having to place the actual killing vote might be too high a threshold, and might be complicated by meta-differences in timezone, schedule, etc.)
(3) He can swap back by successfully voting against one of his new teammates.

If there were two players in this situation, would (3) allow for unwanted exploits? Or would it generate desirable coolness?

I think (3) is a pre-requisite for that mechanic to work. The Player has to be able to switch back and forth otherwise grid lock will occur.

I'm not so sold on the hidden aspect of it though. If you don't know you can switch sides, there is zero incentive to vote for your own. Why take the 1 in whatever chance that you are the lucky one who can win with either team? It would be much safer to play it straight and win with the team you start with.

[Grundbegriff]

(1) He doesn't know he's vulnerable until his first swap. After that, he's in the driver's seat.

I'm not so sold on the hidden aspect of it though. If you don't know you can switch sides, there is zero incentive to vote for your own. Why take the 1 in whatever chance that you are the lucky one who can win with either team? It would be much safer to play it straight and win with the team you start with.

Good point. Why not let him scheme from the outset... knowing that his equal-but-opposite counterpart might be scheming, too, in a way that will negate his efforts.

[Remus West]

one thing I brought up to Scoop in PM was giving the converts the ability to kill if the Mother dies. It gives the information that the Mother is gone but it doesn't reveal how many young there are (in itself, the number of days before killings start could easily clue people in). It does allow for the Aliens to protect themselves the same way the wolves do in a traditional game.

Also, Aliens kills would need to be tempered based on the Faction numbers. Hand one faction to much of an advantage and they screw themselves.

[Grundbegriff]

one thing I brought up to Scoop in PM was giving the converts the ability to kill if the Mother dies. It gives the information that the Mother is gone but it doesn't reveal how many young there are (in itself, the number of days before killings start could easily clue people in). It does allow for the Aliens to protect themselves the same way the wolves do in a traditional game.

With the generational concept {Mama, Elder, Runt}, if the Mama is killed, the other/others could be promoted a notch. The Elder could become the new matriarch. The runt, if extant, could become the new Elder.

Also, Aliens kills would need to be tempered based on the Faction numbers. Hand one faction to much of an advantage and they screw themselves.

Good point. One way to achieve this would be as follows:

(a) Team Alien can only kill of currentAlienPop = 3.
(b) A kill attempt fails if the alignment of the target is the same as the alignment of the Aliens' previous kill.

That effectively turns the failed kill into an alignment scan which might be put to nefarious use by day.

[Remus West]

You misunderstand. I did not mean as part of the generational thing. I meant the ability to kill being a replacement for the convert ability. It is not as strong but keeps the Aliens from being entirely neutered. As for tempering the kills I meant that the Aliens would need to be careful regarding their kills since the balance of power keeps the factions fighting and thus serves them. If all they do is kill Corp players then the Convicts can be free to hunt aliens.

[Grundbegriff]

You misunderstand. I did not mean as part of the generational thing. I meant the ability to kill being a replacement for the convert ability. It is not as strong but keeps the Aliens from being entirely neutered. As for tempering the kills I meant that the Aliens would need to be careful regarding their kills since the balance of power keeps the factions fighting and thus serves them. If all they do is kill Corp players then the Convicts can be free to hunt aliens.

Oh, I see. When Mama is alive, Mama can convert. When Mama is dead, converts acquire power to kill nightly. Maybe an alignment scan and a kill (one power each for the first two converts), so that the Convert(s) could more effectively manipulate the situation. Since they cannot communicate, one Alien would be responsible for thinning the ranks, and the other for understanding the population. The two would have to collaborate in the open somehow.

[Remus West]

You misunderstand. I did not mean as part of the generational thing. I meant the ability to kill being a replacement for the convert ability. It is not as strong but keeps the Aliens from being entirely neutered. As for tempering the kills I meant that the Aliens would need to be careful regarding their kills since the balance of power keeps the factions fighting and thus serves them. If all they do is kill Corp players then the Convicts can be free to hunt aliens.

Oh, I see. When Mama is alive, Mama can convert. When Mama is dead, converts acquire power to kill nightly. Maybe an alignment scan and a kill (one power each for the first two converts), so that the Convert(s) could more effectively manipulate the situation. Since they cannot communicate, one Alien would be responsible for thinning the ranks, and the other for understanding the population. The two would have to collaborate in the open somehow.

oooh. I like that twist.

[stessier]

The Children don't know each other though. Maybe some kind of Sibling Link identifies them to each other if their Mama is killed?


I wonder if Scoop is gonna even want to run the game we've come up with.

[Scoop20906]

Wow, adjusting this rulez is becoming much more difficult than I thought.

I find myself want to change things but worrying I'm ruining the overall concept I had at the onset. I'm going to try and put together a updated set this weekend for discussion.

Also, someone of the comments has lead me down the road to another setting which has me very excited as well.

Unfortunately, tuning the rulez to fit are also difficult as well. I was up last night trying to get it down on paper so I'd stop thinking about it.

Being unable to sleep because Im thinking about forum game rulez.... thats bad, isn't it?

[Newcastle]

Being unable to sleep because Im thinking about forum game rulez.... thats bad, isn't it?

when I was a real lurker here at OO, i came upon these WW games. I hadnt really read them, but i knew they were around. I decided to jump into one of them to see what i was like. BIG FRIGGING MISTAKE (to do before bedtime). When i tried to go to bed, my mind was spinning with who's the werewolf? what side is joe on? what would i vote? I could hardly sleep because i was trying to figure out the puzzle that was within the game. Since then, I can now sleep easily even if i spend a good chunk of time reading the thread prior to bed time. But it was wicked. And I am still working on my list of proposed ideas.

[Lagom Lite]

Being unable to sleep because Im thinking about forum game rulez.... thats bad, isn't it?

So do all who live to see such times.

[Chaosraven]

Being unable to sleep because Im thinking about forum game rulez.... thats bad, isn't it?

So do all who live to see such times.

You have no idea.

[stessier]

Same same.

First time I played, it seemed like I was up for months. It's better now, but if I get a really good role, I can still have sleepless nights spinning out impossible scenarios and crazy schemes.

Running helps quite a bit. Nothing else to do out there by yourself, might as well work out game kinks.

[Lassr]

guess we all went through that. Not being able to sleep wondering if I'm missing something vital. I started to get burn out and then finally just decided, normal life first and then stop in to play the game when I have time. No more creating the time to play by neglecting something else.

I really like the ideas being thrown around.

[Semaj]

Lol, when I am home... esp the early games... I would sit at ye old computer and read everything everyone wrote like 4 or 5 times and reply to every message made. Hence Semajulation or however you write it.

i've since decided to not really pay huge amount of time or thought to it. I go out and forget about ti completely and more or less only pay attention when I am here.

Helped a lot with sanity.

[Grundbegriff]

i've since decided to not really pay huge amount of time or thought to it. I go out and forget about ti completely and more or less only pay attention when I am here.

QFT

[Semaj]

You know what I meant