Traitor objectives, and how to fix them

[bandit]

BIG IMPORTANT FUCKING NOTE: This is not a thread about the game being too lenient or too harsh. It is not a thread about traitors being nerfed or buffed. It is about the steal objectives. If you turn this into a shitflinging fest about any of the above I swear to fucking God.

Traitor steal objectives are largely a huge fucking joke. There have been some steps to improve this -- alarms on the captain's laser, the pull request about stealing the nuke, exchanging documents -- but most of them remain a joke. Here are some of the worst ones, and my ideas as to make them more challenging and fun for everyone involved.

RCD

The problem: Every objective in EVA used to have some level of difficulty due to EVA's security, but thanks to design and policy changes (AIs not being allowed to bolt), EVA is now an absolute joke to get into. Furthermore, you can lathe RCDs. And furthermore, the RCD being locked down makes a lot of engineering projects harder and means that the RCD never sees non-traitorous use, so the answer isn't to just make it harder to get to.

The solution: Maybe a traitor would have to modify the RCD in some way? Probably involving hacking, and would have to be fairly obvious if spotted with it, but could have more destructive use. An illegal upgrade?

JETPACK

The problem: Same as above, plus this can be ordered from mining, plus voidpacks.

The solution: ...A captain-unique jetpack, like what happened with magboots? A jetpack filled with plasma, to knock out two bad objectives in one?

CORGI MEAT

The problem: Corgis are now cheap as fuck -- cargo can order a corgi crate and often does, and more importantly, science regularly shits out dozens of corgis if they find the cannon.

The solution: Make Ian produce unique meat, and change it to Ian's meat. Or maybe add corgi pelts and have Ian's pelt. This makes sense from both a difficulty/YOU MONSTER perspective, and from a fluff perspective (Ian is the station's beloved pet, killing it will strike a blow to morale, but any old corgi will do?)

UNUSED SLIME EXTRACT

The problem: Xenobiology is sitting on dozens of these literally from roundstart. Literally nobody cares if you take one. Also, why just any old slime extract?

The solution: Change it to an unused GOLD slime extract. There are obvious reasons the Syndicate would want those. There is an actual non-metagaming reason for security to care if someone has them in their backpack. And they're easy enough to get with the current mutation probabilities that it won't be too hard.

Additional Ideas for new steal objectives:/

- It'd be cool if gibtonite was a traitor objective. More reasonable than asking for X bars of gold or diamonds, and it has the added difficulty of getting it off the station undetected. Plus, more reasons for traitors to go to the asteroid are always fun.

- Some of the worst AI boards? Oxytox, antimov, etc.? You can research these too, right, allowing for more forms of sabotage? Obviously this will also encourage traitors to USE them.

[Amelius]

> Not having a 'steal the clown/mime's mask without harming them' objective, failing if you yourself deal more than 20 damage to them.

> Not having ridiculous objectives like 'steal the PA' (complete with a free traitor item that, when the PA is fully disconnected, can put it all in a bluespace portal for stealing).

> Not having beyond the impossible objectives such as 'keep singuloth from escaping' that will make you look like you're trying to release it rather than keep it safe.

> Not having an objective to siphon off a couple hundred cargo points with a special item that, when used, will slowly siphon available points into a bank (cargo tech/QM/HoP exclusive, preferably).

> Not having an autosuccess objective to 'confuse the crew', along with the equipment to fake different antagonist types, along with a special uplink that provides you with everything you'd need to pretend to be a xeno/wizard/traitor/nukeop/etc, but each of the items has no combat functionality (e.g. faux nuke op hardsuits would have no damage resistance, wizard outfits would allow you to cast a random single spell only on a long CD, etc.

> Not adding an objective to emag several high-sec places, e.g. the AI sat door / the permabrig / armory / interior tcomms / the Cap's office etc.

And so on. Plenty of interesting objectives are feasible, we're just too uninspired to do 'em.

[bandit]

> Not having a 'steal the clown/mime's mask without harming them' objective, failing if you yourself deal more than 20 damage to them.

Impossible to track

> Not having ridiculous objectives like 'steal the PA' (complete with a free traitor item that, when the PA is fully disconnected, can put it all in a bluespace portal for stealing).

This is awesome and should be added

> Not having beyond the impossible objectives such as 'keep singuloth from escaping' that will make you look like you're trying to release it rather than keep it safe.

Ayy victims gets some of these

> Not having an objective to siphon off a couple hundred cargo points with a special item that, when used, will slowly siphon available points into a bank (cargo tech/QM/HoP exclusive, preferably).

Also a cool idea but I don't think we do exclusive-to-jobs objectives

> Not having an autosuccess objective to 'confuse the crew', along with the equipment to fake different antagonist types, along with a special uplink that provides you with everything you'd need to pretend to be a xeno/wizard/traitor/nukeop/etc, but each of the items has no combat functionality (e.g. faux nuke op hardsuits would have no damage resistance, wizard outfits would allow you to cast a random single spell only on a long CD, etc.

Unnecessarily complicated

> Not adding an objective to emag several high-sec places, e.g. the AI sat door / the permabrig / armory / interior tcomms / the Cap's office etc.

Objectives that require a specific traitor item are a Bad Idea

[PKPenguin321]

There are some decent ideas here, but a lot of them have serious issues...

CORGI MEAT

The problem: Corgis are now cheap as fuck -- cargo can order a corgi crate and often does, and more importantly, science regularly shits out dozens of corgis if they find the cannon.

The solution: Make Ian produce unique meat, and change it to Ian's meat. Or maybe add corgi pelts and have Ian's pelt. This makes sense from both a difficulty/YOU MONSTER perspective, and from a fluff perspective (Ian is the station's beloved pet, killing it will strike a blow to morale, but any old corgi will do?)

Nope, no thanks. As it stands, policy changed to make it so you can't be killed over killing a pet. Ian is trivially easy to murder and even easier to butcher (even a random shard of glass will do). This objective died with the ages and, if anything, should be removed.

UNUSED SLIME EXTRACT

The problem: Xenobiology is sitting on dozens of these literally from roundstart. Literally nobody cares if you take one. Also, why just any old slime extract?

The solution: Change it to an unused GOLD slime extract. There are obvious reasons the Syndicate would want those. There is an actual non-metagaming reason for security to care if someone has them in their backpack. And they're easy enough to get with the current mutation probabilities that it won't be too hard.

Nope. This kind of thing has been discussed, and any objective that requires one department to do work (generally science) in a specific and particular way that CANNOT be accomplished otherwise is an awful, terrible game mechanic. It's the same reason things like xray laser guns aren't steal objectives. And before you say "You could just breed your own," goldslimes are entirely RNG based and getting them takes a very decent amount of time. Breaking into xenobio and essentially being forced to do xenobiology isn't fun.

Additional Ideas for new steal objectives:/

- It'd be cool if gibtonite was a traitor objective. More reasonable than asking for X bars of gold or diamonds, and it has the added difficulty of getting it off the station undetected. Plus, more reasons for traitors to go to the asteroid are always fun.

Once again: Acquiring gibtonite is more of a miner's job, and getting it forces the traitor to do mining. Not to mention gibtonite cannot be concealed in any way (cannot be dragged, cannot be placed into backpacks or BoHs, cannot be placed into lockers or crates), meaning that this is the kind of objective that will always be done only after the shuttle is less than five minutes away.

[lumipharon]

With slimes, it would only make sense to steal a grey slime extract, since that lets you make new grey slimes and by extension, all slimes.
Of course, grey slimes are also the most common so eh.

[John_Oxford]

I personally think Adding syndicate factions would be a good idea.

Everyround, all the the traitors are randomly given a faction

Example:

MII3 is a steath based syndicate faction, so the objectives would be something along the lines of

You are Bill Rowe! The Traitor!
Objective 1: Take pictures of various secret documents hidden on secure locations around the station
Objective 2: Remain COMPLETELY undetected (Admin Overwatch is needed for this)
Objective 3: Neutralize Mcgallo Pickloo, The Clown, and assume his identity.

MII3 would have they're own uplink page, entirely different from other traitors uplinks. And have a total of 30 TC
All of their items will be some what expensive, but not inanely expensive, to somewhat encourage them to try to play steath.
Their items would entirely be steath based, no ordering singularity beacons or 5 minibombs.


Then you have a faction like the Gorlax Marauders.

You are Bill Rowe! The Traitor!
Objective 1: Destroy at least 25% of the station
Objective 2: Kill at least 7 crew members (Based on population)
Objective 3: Cause as much mayhem and chaos as possible
Objective 4: Die a Glorious Death

Their uplink would have 15 TC
Their items will be quite cheap, to make up for the lack of TC
The uplink would contain no steath items, and several chaos inducing traitor items (See: Bombs, Guns, Armor, Explosions, Essentially making the station a Micheal Bay movie)

But of course, the station would need something to combat this with. I wonder what that could be......

cough cough cough gunsmithing cough cough cough




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Ooooorrrr.

Every traitor starts with 50 TC
All Chaos Items are stupidly expensive
All Steath items are stupidly cheap

Forces the "PLAY FUCKING STEATH, YOU ARE 007" playstyle, but still.

[PKPenguin321]

snip

neat i guess but not in the scope of this thread at all, this is literally just tossing around some steal objectives

[Cik]

the factions aren't a bad idea and have a lore precedent, it might be better if you can pick which one you are though; it would kind of suck to get shafted with a faction you don't enjoy after waiting weeks for antag.

even if you made it chooseable i'd still bet on seeing a pretty decent spread between stealth <----> antistealth(?) and you could have a faction that's kind of all around for people who want to do a little of both.

i'd also support more TC with a little rebalancing of item costs. i do think some of the more niche stealth equipment should be cheaper, and maybe the entry level weapons, too.

i just don't want a huge proliferation of syndibombs; as it is engineering can't even fix the maybe one or two that will reliably go off in a decentpop traitor round; if every traitor could get one or two it would start being pretty nightmarish, like singulo level destruction every round.

Spoiler:

ok jeez offtopic sorry

i do think the steal objectives need work though, the RCD and ian should probably be removed and replaced by something else as the zeitgeist around them has shifted noticeably. i think maybe making some of the HOS's equipment objectives wouldn't be amiss, like the CE's magboots.

i don't know, do we need more steal objectives than we already have? i think they're enough as is, so just replace corgimeat and RCD and we're good i think.

[PKPenguin321]

Relevant to this thread: Removes corgi meat as an objective

[RG4]

O

I genuinely like this idea because it makes sense the other Syndie corps are fucking around with nanotransen.

[Miauw]

objectives in general are p shitty
traitors are supposed to make the round fun but the issue is that its often hard to think of cool shit to do so rip ;-;

[lumipharon]

I honestly can't remember the last time a traitor actively tried to kill me as their objective, minus bombings from maint etc.

That's kind of sad.

[Scott]

I agree with the OP. Linking the mentioned PR

[Celdur]

Well, personally I think an antags objectives are secondary to their main hidden objective of "making the round interesting", so antags should know that they aren't just limited to doing their objective and then pretending to not exist.

That said though, objectives should motivate antags to do the impossible, and get creative in trying to achieve that, or else you just get a bunch of murderboners and other shitters.
The thing is, there are only so many things to go after, and items lose or gain importance over time because of feature creep.

I think objectives that involve players will never become obsolete, and I can think of a few objectives that take it a bit further.
Like for example, on top of a simple kill objectives for some dude no one will know is missing, how about having to take out a whole department.
Or maybe make it more interesting by tipping security on some of the targets that traitors might possibly have to take out on the centcom alert printout at the start.
And one thing that really should change, is the murder objectives against assistants, because they are often impossible to find and just lead to singulo's being released and whatnot.

As for other objectives, think about stuff that are high profile and people would miss.
Active AI is one of the harder targets, and a creative antag can have a lot of fun with that.
Maybe something like stealing comms boards. probably would have to remove them from tech storage to make it work though.
I mean, people could still eventually print them from R&D, but that would take time and is way less interesting.
Or perhaps just taking out comms or specific hubs could be a thing, not sure if that can be checked for.
If so, you could also have an objective of taking out the mining hub, which would take more antags to the asteroid.
The gravgen could be another thing as an objective, somehow.
Stealing limbs could be fun, now that that's on the way.

A more drastic change could be having antag objectives that involve antag item handouts.
Like maybe some kind of information download console you can beam in, and then the objective would be to "download" stuff from a certain location on the station.
So you'd have to sort of make sure no one can get there, and guard the thing as it finishes.
Maybe it'd just be something you plug into a console, and the objective would be a specific console like the HoP's ID console or the CE's power console etc.
Maybe something about injecting x amount of people with disloyalty implants, that cause people to become sort of like the wizard rounds "survivor" antag.
stuff like that.

[Ikarrus]

Not having objectives and encouraging people to make their own fun sounds like a good idea in theory, but in reality most people are uncreative hacks, so what we end up with for the most part are murderboners or "wasted" traitor slots.

I don't think having objectives make any significant impact on traitor creativity. People who want to ignore them will continue do so, but many players would benefit from having a goal to work towards.

[Cik]

i think a neat thing to do would have a 'computer bug' objective, and even an item that would allow you to remote control terminals/download things from them. the ninja objective of downloading or erasing R&D research could easily become a general traitor objective. say you have to bug the RD's cyborg console, and you automatically get the item to do it with, but then make the item also purchasable from uplinks and give a limited sort of control over the computer that's bugged. they should be removable though.. somehow. but anyway it would be pretty neat as afaik you cannot signaller most computers.

anyway you could get a few objectives just from that, from various important consoles.

[John_Oxford]

Essentially, whats needed is a entire revamp of ALL the traitor objectives, and ALL the traitor items, including things like
*Tech based objectives, stealing the AI, stealing RnD levels
*File Trade Off/Pick up Objectives
*More creative kill objectives
*More creative steal objectives
*Removing RCD and Ian Objectives
*Buffing Steath Traitor items, also making them a hell of alot cheaper, but including things like gloves laced with neurotoxin or gas canisters filled with nanobots or shit like that
*Making Chaos Traitor items INSANELY FUCKING STATION ENDING powerfull, but have it be the only thing you could buy from your uplink, if you happened to want to do that.

[Cik]

i don't know if it's possible but it might be necessary to have some of these be only in certain population #, once the population hits 40+ RND is a thing that happens almost every round. in 20pop though it's less certain.

[Bombadil]

FYI: Gibtonite can be put in bags of holding unless something got changed