/tg/Station 13

I fucking knew it would be horrible because it's been considered before, and guess what, code word highlighting is awful!

Codewords being highlighted when said at all is dumb, but OVER RADIO is ridiculous hugbox. If traitors are going to gain the extreme advantage of a buddy that makes any kind of murder braindead easy, it shouldn't be braindead easy to obtain. The minimum they should be required is to memorize the few words that code phrases and responses consist of. Now any traitor can just say some dumb phrase over radio with one of the six codewords in it, and every damn traitor notices! This is the buff that traitors never needed. Blood brothers are now even moreso just worse traitors when regular traitors can gain a buddy working with anyone at all.

The worst part is how it makes items redundant. the syndicate encryption keys were great fun if you met the few other traitors who might use them. Now they're all but useless.

Here's my idea- if this quality of life is just common sense, then why not fucking remove codewords? traitors have all too much going for them. basically knowing every other traitor who cooperates from the start of the round and giving them a lingchat is really not necessary.

TL;DR items like the syndie encryption key are fucking useless with these easy codewords and saying a codeword over radio is so mindlessly easy traitors may as well have a chat like lings do. What was once reserved for only observant traitors is now for basically anyone.

it's because traitors never teamed up, and the syndicate encryption key was shit because it literally made it cost money to team up

When the whole point of teaming up was using your entire TC to do something great.

Also, there's always the downside that the snitch traitor is gonna be like "AY BOY SEC THAT'S A TRAITOR" to get sec to lower his sentence from death to a perma.

Lastly, I think we just need to put IAA in the rotation if this bothers you so much.

Traitor vs Traitor modes will make traitors think twice about teaming up.

Lastly Lastly. Even with this update, it's pretty sad how literally no one teams up anyways.

Honestly though I was hyped about this getting merged, but now that it IS merged its boring, uncreative, and kind of immersion breaking. Sure you don’t have someone always hit on your code words normally, but this is just hugbox for traitors. I’ve already gotten a super crate since the merge, which I’ve never gotten before. I honestly hope this gets removed.

the only things you can get from teaming up make murderboning a lot easier so yikies

clearly syndicate members were trained enough to probably automatically take notice of the codewords. at least people use them now, before it was just a way for some metagamer to try to identify that you were a traitor and basically no other traitors would ever notice most of the time. combine this with the fact that experienced traitors would use chat highlighters anyways and it just makes no sense to NOT have this mechanic.

Cobby wrote:the only things you can get from teaming up make murderboning a lot easier so yikies

If the only thing you can think of for this is murdering that's your issue. It was 50/50 if I bothered to set codewords to highlight before, now I'm both seeing them used more, and in less meta-game SHOUT ways. The two standouts for me was running away from security and crawling into botanys backroom when the lawyer shows up. I'm unsure if he is validhunting off security chat or what and we end up codewording. I help him with his assassinate target, he later helps me break out of perma.
Another "I would have missed that codeword" story. I saw the viro was a hero and isolated all the symptoms, and I had all access, so I beat them up a little and threw them in the monkey pen while stealing their work to make a plague. I grabbed a random assistant and threw him in the other holding pen, then used the medical remote to force them to fight to the death. Turns out the random assistant was a traitor, so I ended up sharing access with him. Once he won the fight of course.

confused rock wrote:TL;DR items like the syndie encryption key are fucking useless with these easy codewords

Not really though. Its pretty hard to hold a useful conversation using codewords. At best you could communicate "Hi, I'm a traitor." "Yes, hello, I am also a traitor." Not really comparable to the encryption key at all.

Then you use pda, bazingaed.

confused rock wrote:Then you use pda, bazingaed.

Key obviously long out of date before codeword changes then.

confused rock wrote:Then you use pda, bazingaed.

I see a ton of AI's stealing the monitor encryption key roundstart and checking PDA messages every so often. PDA messages are a deathwish right now

Yeah. Ai's will send pda messages to security. Not very epic

It's not a mistake and makes getting the super crate something that happens more than once a month, and encourages both cooperation and Traitor in-fighting to hunt down other codeword users.
In my opinion this is a very good change as the most common interaction traitors would have with each other is unknowingly killing each other.

Also before this update, the only time I've personally been able to use the codewords in any significant manner was to PDA communicate with another traitor, which I found due to him being called out on the radio for using traitor gear.

cedarbridge wrote: Key obviously long out of date before codeword changes then.

No, then before the key was great as a 2tc item with a good chance of basically giving you a fucking blood brother with tc, only now is it out of date since traitors can get fuckbuddies for free.

Shadowflame909 wrote:Yeah. Ai's will send pda messages to security. Not very epic

Then here’s an idea- if validhunting ais every round is an issue, then maybe be slightly covert about the messages or just tell em to meet you somewhere, then talk with your mouth words as blood brothers have had zero problem doing? Any traitor with half a brain cell can do this shit. I don’t see why not seeing big surplus crates all the time is such a problem when it’s literally just a big surplus crate, not some special item. Why do we keep buffing every single kind of antag except ling and rev?

Reminder that traitors have zero obligation to work with one another, and given the lore can even have incentive to neutralize other syndicate agents.

Nabski wrote:

Cobby wrote:the only things you can get from teaming up make murderboning a lot easier so yikies

If the only thing you can think of for this is murdering that's your issue. It was 50/50 if I bothered to set codewords to highlight before, now I'm both seeing them used more, and in less meta-game SHOUT ways. The two standouts for me was running away from security and crawling into botanys backroom when the lawyer shows up. I'm unsure if he is validhunting off security chat or what and we end up codewording. I help him with his assassinate target, he later helps me break out of perma.
Another "I would have missed that codeword" story. I saw the viro was a hero and isolated all the symptoms, and I had all access, so I beat them up a little and threw them in the monkey pen while stealing their work to make a plague. I grabbed a random assistant and threw him in the other holding pen, then used the medical remote to force them to fight to the death. Turns out the random assistant was a traitor, so I ended up sharing access with him. Once he won the fight of course.

I don't think this completely btfo's my comment.

The game itself does not provide you with anything but murdering tools for teaming up (romerol and mega surplus). Is that a fairer statement?

Well to be fair the current maintainer value is that adding more traitoring tools is unnecessary.

cobby is correct

>be traitor
>other traitor reveals himself over radio via codewords
>immediately hunt him down, kill him, and steal his shit
>free extra traitor items

Pretty sure the mega surplus crate was balanced around the fact that if you betray like that you're making a net loss.

"Well to be fair the current maintainer value is that adding more traitoring tools is unnecessary."

Citation needed, although I will say personally i'm not really interested in more direct harm traitor items.

orange man comments on any traitor item addition, even the non-harmful ones

they don't like traitor items

I have to agree with shadow here, most new traitor items are met with something along the lines of 'it's too similar to what we already have' or 'its just a worse version of what we already have'.
I'm not saying they're wrong but regardless its a consistent sentiment

if it's consistent you should be able to more easily point to an example.

I've only ever used them in their present state to team up with ais simply because malf ais are an incredible boon to have on your side, over the fucking dread of having to fight against one on your own.

Otherwise I don't team up because enemy syndicate are more of a threat than trying to make a friend. They have all the same tools to kill you and your death means they can kill even harder.

>encryption key is bad
Is this a fucking joke

>instant access to every radio channel, easy to overhear if security suspects you
>traitor-only communication that can't be accessed by non-traitors outside of space loot or security obtaining one from a traitor, communicate with your codeword- using buddies easier
>can talk to traitor AIs without needing the other key
>syndie ghost roles can help you
2 tc is a fucking steal for all this good shit

>steal someone else's pda or buy agent ID
>wait for highlighted words to appear in chat
>PM HoS "hey that guy is a traitor he used codeword"
>2 people dead (that guy and pda owner) with 0 effort

Grazyn wrote:>steal someone else's pda or buy agent ID
>wait for highlighted words to appear in chat
>PM HoS "hey that guy is a traitor he used codeword"
>2 people dead (that guy and pda owner) with 0 effort

You could do this before by just knowing what the code words are are you stupid or something

actioninja wrote:

Grazyn wrote:>steal someone else's pda or buy agent ID
>wait for highlighted words to appear in chat
>PM HoS "hey that guy is a traitor he used codeword"
>2 people dead (that guy and pda owner) with 0 effort

You could do this before by just knowing what the code words are are you stupid or something

The whole point of this thread is complaining that something you could already do before is made easier you dimwit

Codewords are memorized, what do they have to do with the PDA or agent ID?

Validing someone because he used a codeword is also dickish and probably toeing the line pretty hard

The trick works when the other guy is actually a traitor and bought antag stuff, your PM will cause him to be searched and the items found, so he'll be immediately executed. You need to send the PM under someone else's name or you will end up executed as well since you just confirmed you are an antag as well.

I've never come across murderboning happening from the fact two traitors find each other, but highlighting is a fairly small concept that helps amplify an already existing system. In my experience it only deepens what traitors can do, because hey, I can potentially find other traitors and have interesting interactions with them. Plus there's always the possibility of getting double crossed etc. I don't really feel it's that nuclear of "holy shit traitors are buffed like crazy".

The fundamental issue with codewords is that it's a two way system, if you spend the time actually memorizing and actively looking for codewords in chat, the other party might not even be caring at all. Basically all I've done is make the codeword system work as intended.

wesoda25 wrote:Honestly though I was hyped about this getting merged, but now that it IS merged its boring, uncreative, and kind of immersion breaking. Sure you don’t have someone always hit on your code words normally, but this is just hugbox for traitors. I’ve already gotten a super crate since the merge, which I’ve never gotten before. I honestly hope this gets removed.

I mean isn't that the point? I hoped that would be the result. If you've never got it before, and I'm assuming you had fun getting it, why would you want that ability taken away? It is hugboxy, but if its hugboxing into more fun, then it's a net positive imo.

Akrilla wrote:

wesoda25 wrote:Honestly though I was hyped about this getting merged, but now that it IS merged its boring, uncreative, and kind of immersion breaking. Sure you don’t have someone always hit on your code words normally, but this is just hugbox for traitors. I’ve already gotten a super crate since the merge, which I’ve never gotten before. I honestly hope this gets removed.

I mean isn't that the point? I hoped that would be the result. If you've never got it before, and I'm assuming you had fun getting it, why would you want that ability taken away? It is hugboxy, but if its hugboxing into more fun, then it's a net positive imo.

If two traitors on a server of 70 people get a super crate, that's 3% of the server that gets to have fun murderboning with it. Making it this much easier to make friends with other traitors unbalances the game unfairly towards traitors. They should have to give up TCs for the encryption key or hope other traitors are paying attention.

Reminder that codewords will be highlighted for everyone, so just because you heard someone say it doesn't mean they are a traitor. Use your codeword responses!

You can just use goonchat's word highlighting feature to do it as well if you really cared that much

The fact that other people are unreliable and that traitors can be sent to kill other traitors makes this somewhat safe to have as a feature. The double cross is always the balancing factor in this. And it makes a lot of traitor gear actually a decent purchase (codespeak manual, syndicate tome, encryption key, working together on contracts).

I like it, and keeps you on the same footing as changelings who are in the same ballpark. Antags that CAN work together but there is ALWAYS the balancing threat of that one objective. Absorb another changeling. It keeps the suspense up.

BeeSting12 wrote: If two traitors on a server of 70 people get a super crate, that's 3% of the server that gets to have fun murderboning with it. Making it this much easier to make friends with other traitors unbalances the game unfairly towards traitors. They should have to give up TCs for the encryption key or hope other traitors are paying attention.

For all the times we see murderboning because people got a super surplus I play pretty often and have NEVER even seen a super surplus lmao, this isn't really valid.

Anonmare wrote:You can just use goonchat's word highlighting feature to do it as well if you really cared that much

But that's the problem, even if *you* use it, the other person won't. It's a two-way system, and requires both parties to care about codewords for it to even be useful. Auto highlights just actually let people use codewords for how they were intended.

You probably don't see the super surplus because it's hot garbage. There are far better combined, coordinated loudouts between the two tots you could do which are far stronger if you know what each of you are doing.