/tg/Station 13

See title.

I think one of the issues currently with low pop rounds is how bad uplinks scale. At lowpop getting an instant double esword or ebow/revolver/emag into armory/ whatever instantly turns you into a threat that is able to kill the entire station with little effort (yes if you are a noob you can still fail).

I think it would be interesting to actual trial low pop traitors not having an uplink at all. Low pop rounds are long, there is plenty of opportunity to acquire weapons and other gear if you want to kill the station.

Obviously it is still possible to kill everyone but I think it would honestly be more interesting for traitors and crew alike.

Oranges proposed removing most if not all the weapons from the uplink and changing how you unlock items.

As a small scale version of that, keeping items to utility tools isn't a bad start for a low pop uplink, but that doesn't stop the core issue of low pop murderboning. It isn't just the murderman having a traitor weapon, it's a lack of the ability to respond at all to someone taking everyone out. And acquiring a weapon is as easy as a trip to the armory.

Hell, you could kill the whole station with a spear. Because, at the end of the day, the person prepped for murder is prepped for murder, and standard crew on a lowpop shift is not prepped for murder, so they stand no chance. Not even just self defense. Just inadequately prepared to deal with someone who might be alphastriking everyone on the station.

NecromancerAnne wrote:Oranges proposed removing most if not all the weapons from the uplink and changing how you unlock items.

As a small scale version of that, keeping items to utility tools isn't a bad start for a low pop uplink, but that doesn't stop the core issue of low pop murderboning. It isn't just the murderman having a traitor weapon, it's a lack of the ability to respond at all to someone taking everyone out. And acquiring a weapon is as easy as a trip to the armory.

Hell, you could kill the whole station with a spear. Because, at the end of the day, the person prepped for murder is prepped for murder, and standard crew on a lowpop shift is not prepped for murder, so they stand no chance. Not even just self defense. Just inadequately prepared to deal with someone who might be alphastriking everyone on the station.

Yes but that does not mean it should be made even easier with instant access to weapons or other powerful gear. Balance is about nudging things in the right direction, removing low pop uplinks nudges it more in line to what it should be IMO.

It also can strand some roles without the tools they need if inexperienced. Hence my suggestion of a limited uplink over no uplink. We can't assume everyone piloting a role is some grizzled veteren, and the uplink is meant to bridge the gap. The veteren player will have zero issue murderboning if they wished, after all, if they only care for that and know how.

game wont and will never feel "balanced " when there are 3-4 people on server: no traitors? its just greenshift, traitors do nothing cause low pop? its another greenshift, traitor dies by other people? its greenshift again, traitor bones all? its ded server and it gets insta restarted until it rolls greenshift.
bone things are already restricted, i dont see how removing even the slim chance the antag is gonna use the traitor items for wholesome fun (hypnos, emag, etc) and instead force him to just hack into armory and end round because he has nothing else fun to do would improve the server quality maybe just dont join server at 4 AM ? but i believe in libertarian principles and you should be free to do whatever you want, i ll just warn you of the fact that there is always a server on high pop so dont join the dead ones

tlal is right, the game can’t be played with so few players, why should we bother to try and balance it? administration issue

wesoda25 wrote:tlal is right, the game can’t be played with so few players, why should we bother to try and balance it? administration issue

Because it can get a lot better than what it is now.....

Let's just turn every server with less than 12 people into 24/7 mafia rounds until the population climbs back up

CPTANT wrote:

NecromancerAnne wrote:Oranges proposed removing most if not all the weapons from the uplink and changing how you unlock items.

As a small scale version of that, keeping items to utility tools isn't a bad start for a low pop uplink, but that doesn't stop the core issue of low pop murderboning. It isn't just the murderman having a traitor weapon, it's a lack of the ability to respond at all to someone taking everyone out. And acquiring a weapon is as easy as a trip to the armory.

Hell, you could kill the whole station with a spear. Because, at the end of the day, the person prepped for murder is prepped for murder, and standard crew on a lowpop shift is not prepped for murder, so they stand no chance. Not even just self defense. Just inadequately prepared to deal with someone who might be alphastriking everyone on the station.

Yes but that does not mean it should be made even easier with instant access to weapons or other powerful gear. Balance is about nudging things in the right direction, removing low pop uplinks nudges it more in line to what it should be IMO.

You can solve this problem by restricting the most egregious weapons (revolvers, syndiebombs, eswords, etc.) to 15+ or 20+ players.
Taking away the uplink entirely is insane. The uplink is integral to Traitor's identity as a gamemode.

Draquila wrote:
You can solve this problem by restricting the most egregious weapons (revolvers, syndiebombs, eswords, etc.) to 15+ or 20+ players.
Taking away the uplink entirely is insane. The uplink is integral to Traitor's identity as a gamemode.

Why is it insane? The uplink mostly balances the fact that few traitors face an entire station. In lowpop it is simply a lot easier for traitors already.

Part of the fun of the traitor role is being able to use your traitor tools to create interesting stories/funny gimmicks. If we remove the uplink for low pop traitors, then that takes away some of that fun. Out of boredom, those people might end up murderboning with the numerous tools available onstation anyway defeating the point of uplink removal. Lowpop murderbone is piss easy with or without the uplink so I don't see how the benefits outweigh the downsides of this change.

BeeSting12 wrote:Part of the fun of the traitor role is being able to use your traitor tools to create interesting stories/funny gimmicks. If we remove the uplink for low pop traitors, then that takes away some of that fun. Out of boredom, those people might end up murderboning with the numerous tools available onstation anyway defeating the point of uplink removal. Lowpop murderbone is piss easy with or without the uplink so I don't see how the benefits outweigh the downsides of this change.

Fun is subjective. The challenge of having to work around restrictions can be more fun than just getting the solution from the start.

CPTANT wrote:

BeeSting12 wrote:Part of the fun of the traitor role is being able to use your traitor tools to create interesting stories/funny gimmicks. If we remove the uplink for low pop traitors, then that takes away some of that fun. Out of boredom, those people might end up murderboning with the numerous tools available onstation anyway defeating the point of uplink removal. Lowpop murderbone is piss easy with or without the uplink so I don't see how the benefits outweigh the downsides of this change.

Fun is subjective. The challenge of having to work around restrictions can be more fun than just getting the solution from the start.

Yeah but not for everyone. If you want a no TC traitor round then give yourself that challenge and space the TCs roundstart. Don't restrict other people's fun by taking away the whole uplink. If I was going to combat low pop murderbone, I'd just remove the main offenders from the uplink on lowpop. For example, energy sword, desword, sleeping carp, revolver, etc.

CPTANT wrote:Why is it insane? The uplink mostly balances the fact that few traitors face an entire station. In lowpop it is simply a lot easier for traitors already.

Ah, so the following items are complete bullshit and should be removed during lowpop?
- syndicate balloon
- generic chameleon kit
- agent id card
- smuggler's satchel
- codespeak manual (if you're the only traitor and are hostile to the crew then it's useless anyways)
- decoy nuke disk
- extra-bright lantern
- ancient jumpsuit
- syndicate cash briefcase

There's probably some other stuff however I only listed stuff that I believe can't directly lead to harm, give a shit ton of information away to the traitor, or being too good of an utility.

we already have a mechanic that makes the more unbalanced-for-lowpop items unpurchasable in lowpop, just apply that where needed