Finishing the Hat (Numbers and Balance)

[Frank]

Following up:

1. Eliminated the requirement for the Black Widow to have votes in order to investigate.
2. Completed the Cable PM.
3. Added Psylocke, pro-Town role, PM, and adjusted Deadpool's PM accordingly.
4. Eliminated the protection against recruitment afforded by Iron Man's presence.
5. Changed The Punisher per your suggestion.
6. Adjusted Maria Hill's PM per the above.
7. Added Domino, pro-Town role-block preventer
8. Added Songbird, pro-Scum role-blocker

---

TO DO:

1. New power for She-Hulk
2. Determine balancing for recruitment
3. Final balancing

[sachertorte]

I still think Cable is messed up.

[Frank]

OK, so here's where we stand. I think if we can answer the four questions in this post, we can probably declare the game more or less finished. Then I can set up the spoiler area and send PMs.

1. Need to fix Cable
Your point is VERY well taken. His powers should be changed. To what? Making him a simple Watcher who gets only the who and not the what is pretty much crippling him to the point where he's almost not worth having. Making him a Tracker is similarly worthless and it overlaps with a Town role, preventing him from effectively false-claiming.

What about some kind of weird hybrid: he Watches a player. If anyone visits that player, he learns who it is. If no one visits that player, he gains basic role information on his target (the same information that would be revealed at death - name, alignment, basic category of power [investigative, protective, aggressive, other]).

I kind of like this. What do you think?

2. Need powers for She-Hulk
I hate this role and I hate that I have to fill it because otherwise someone who wants to play can't. I'm tempted to go back to the one-shot vote charge, make her Iron Man's deputy lynch-setter, and make her unrecruitable. This would be pretty lame, but I don't think it would massively upset the balance.

She could be a bodyguard (she dies in the place of her target). If I do this, I'm definitely eliminating Spider Man's Spider Sense. The bodyguard thing is useful to Scum, particularly with Captain America's power considered, but we could adjust for that somehow. Thoughts? Which do you like better, given the current balance: a basically useless vote-charger or a somewhat more useful bodyguard?

3. Discussion of Domino
OK. I've been thinking about this a lot. There are 13 technically recruitable roles (12 if She-Hulk is not recruitable). Of the 13, five have powers that would be definitely useful to Scum if recruited: Penance, Lady Deathstrike, Spider Man, Justice, and She-Hulk (whichever power we give her, but only IF she is recruitable at all). Black Widow, Venom, Deadpool, Psylocke, and Bullseye (5) have completely useless powers if they are recruited. Of the remaining three, two (Bishop and Goblin) are only marginally useful if recruited, since they lack full control of their own abilities). So right now, if Domino does not have a power that is useful for recruitment (ie, if she can't offer the ability to get around protections), that's up to 11 out of 15 initial roles (the 5 useless ones plus Domino, Goblin and Bishop, and potentially three unrecruitable players) who do not offer any real power if recruited.

Is this problematic? I guess maybe it's not; maybe the point is that recruitment already strengthens the Scum in terms of numbers and voting power, and it needn't strengthen them in terms of powers, too.

Let me know what you think. If you still think Domino's power is too dangerous as currently written in light of the above, I'll change it.

4. Final Question About Recruitment
Should recruited Scum have the power to execute the Scum Night kill? If they don't, then would Scum really benefit much from a successful recruitment?

[sachertorte]

Making him a simple Watcher who gets only the who and not the what is pretty much crippling him to the point where he's almost not worth having.
I very much disagree. On Night one Cable will likely watch Iron Man. Let's say he sees two people. What will he conclude? It is very likely that at least one of the two have PROTECTIVE powers. It is unlikely that either is a Town Roleblocker, killer, or Tracker. One is likely to be a watcher and the other is likely to be a protector.
I think classical watcher is an incredibly powerful role for scum. Telling them outright role is even more so.


What about some kind of weird hybrid: he Watches a player. If anyone visits that player, he learns who it is. If no one visits that player, he gains basic role information on his target (the same information that would be revealed at death - name, alignment, basic category of power [investigative, protective, aggressive, other]).
I don't think it is necessary. But it isn't unheard of either. I tend toward scum investigators being overpowered since scum can coordinate. I also think if you want a classical scum investigator you should stick with that. Hybridization is too powerful.

2. Need powers for She-Hulk
I hate this role and I hate that I have to fill it because otherwise someone who wants to play can't. I'm tempted to go back to the one-shot vote charge, make her Iron Man's deputy lynch-setter, and make her unrecruitable. This would be pretty lame, but I don't think it would massively upset the balance.

She could be a bodyguard (she dies in the place of her target). If I do this, I'm definitely eliminating Spider Man's Spider Sense. The bodyguard thing is useful to Scum, particularly with Captain America's power considered, but we could adjust for that somehow. Thoughts? Which do you like better, given the current balance: a basically useless vote-charger or a somewhat more useful bodyguard?
She could be Green and very very large.
I don't know. Balancing scum powers is hard enough. Balancing Town powers when everyone is non-vanilla AND scum can recruit is terribly difficult. Is there a 'good' character who is canonically anti-Captain America. It would make sense for that character to be unrecruitable. I think having one be unrecruitable isn't so bad.

Is this problematic? I guess maybe it's not; maybe the point is that recruitment already strengthens the Scum in terms of numbers and voting power, and it needn't strengthen them in terms of powers, too.
Not a problem. The power of recruitment is a scum player who is only scum for part of the game. All the data from previous days is void... for EVERYONE. That is incredibly debilitating to town. I can't even recall if we ever had a game where scum could recruit a power role.
I very much fall on the side of 'weak powers for scum upon recruit' is safest. Do you really want the game to hinge on whether or not scum recruit a useful power?

4. Final Question About Recruitment
Should recruited Scum have the power to execute the Scum Night kill? If they don't, then would Scum really benefit much from a successful recruitment?
Obviously scum still benefit from a recruitment, but lack of night kill does make the impact less severe. It isn't as though scum can't win with only the recruitee standing. It simply is more difficult. BUT! With the M-1 rule, and town powers turning into scum too, I think it makes a nice balance. I am pro-recruitee can't kill. Scum still get the recruitee's vote, and that is quite big, especially for this game.

[sachertorte]

Domino:
I feel the role makes more sense as a roleblocker blocker. That is, your target can't be roleblocked.
If you extend this to protections, then you are saying. "Your target can't be stopped by a protection." Which is not beneficial to Town, but is very beneficial to scum.
Leaving it at roleblock block only makes the role more balanced. I still think it is better for scum (coordination makes the role more powerful!), without being ridiculous.

I'm starting to have a new outlook on all-power games. Truthfully, most of the town roles need to be weak, otherwise Town will win handily. But with recruitment even weak powers are quite strong in scum hands. I really don't know what to do with that.
But recruitment aside, my feeling is that an all-power game has two modes. Either will scum win very quickly (lose one or fewer scum), or Town will win in an endgame situation. I think it is very unlikely for scum to win in a long game. And if scum wins in a fast game, everyone will think scum were over powered. I'm not sure what to make of this, but I'm starting to think that this is the case.

[Frank]

All right, you've convinced me on the subject of Domino. PM changed. I also like the idea of the recruit not being able to Night kill. I think it will give the Scum a tough decision to make - are the numbers worth it? You'll have to give up your Night kill and all your actions to get the recruit, who will really struggle to win in a late-game situation with no kill. I might be tempted to just use the damn thing on Iron Man Night One and wipe him the hell out right off the bat... or save it for someone like Black Widow, where either you get her turned or you get her dead.

I'm less convinced about Cable. I agree that the original conception is overpowered, but I do think he needs to be juiced a bit in order to give the Scum some sort of chance. I mean, the Punisher is really just a goon with a special ability that takes a minimum of two Nights to execute and that really doesn't have a huge chance of success. The role-blocker is just a role-blocker, and is even slightly weaker than a typical role-blocker due to the existence of Domino. Captain America admittedly has two very powerful abilities, but otherwise this Scum team (minus Cable) isn't particularly incredible.

The hybrid Watcher/Investigator role is interesting because it forces our Cable to choose: try to target someone who won't be targeted, so you get basic information about them? Or try to Watch someone who WILL be targeted, in the hopes that you might narrow down the Doc pool? I just feel like they need something to make this role something other than a throwaway.

She-Hulk sucks. I can't believe I'm letting the whole game get dragged down by this one stupid role. In about an hour I'm going to flip a coin and just go with it. Dammitall.

[sachertorte]

I'm not strongly against Cable being hybrid. If we had approached it the other way, making him a classical scum investigator first, then hybridizing, then that would be making him LESS powerful, since other actions can interfere with intent. By creating him as a watcher first, then adding the investigation consolation prize, the perception is that he is made MORE powerful.
In reality, he is stronger than a watcher and weaker (sort of) than an investigator, which is what I think you wanted.

[Pleonast]

I agree with sach about no vanilla games. I try to avoid the situation in my Conspiracy games by greatly increasing the number of scum (typically about half players town and half scum), then splitting the scum into multiple factions and giving some win conditions that partially overlap with town.

In this setup, town could win very quickly by building a confirmed pool, especially now that Black Widow doesn't need vote charging. The main thing making it unlikely is lack of town coordination--but that simply delays the town win until later in the game.

How is scum going to win this game? I see two tactics they can take. 1) Kill the confirming and confirmed players before the confirmed pool is too large. 2) Hope the godfathers (Capt Am and recruited) can slip into the confirmed pool and cause mislynches in the end game.

In a no vanilla game, tactic 1 is difficult because of all the town roles who can track/watch/protect etc. Tactic 2 is not unnecessarily hard, except that the town will still likely have roles to track/watch the killing godfather and/or reinvestigate the recruit.

[sachertorte]

I was looking at the Town list and I don't see anything too scary for the scum. Many of the roles are quite innocuous, especially before recruitment.

I did notice that the PFK goblin win condition is slanted pro-scum rather than pro-SK. I think a 1-1 tie between SK and scum should go to SK, not scum as it is currently stated.

[Frank]

Pleo, do you have any ideas for the She-Hulk role that would suit the balance here? I'm just about at my wit's end.

I think it's sort of interesting: sach has appeared to be concerned that the Scum are overpowered; Pleo appears concerned that the Town is. Maybe the truth is right in the middle, and we have a perfectly balanced game (heh).

I am trying to run some scenarios that result in a Scum win. Some of what will happen depends on Bullseye. If he takes out a confirmable Town role (say he takes out Iron Man Night One, which is possible if he wants to be Town and doesn't want to risk bombing a Doctor or Cop), that will be a big boon to the Scum.

I do have one possible suggestion if we're afraid things are leaning Scumward, which is to remove the protection shared by the two players who become Venom. Under certain circumstances, this could be HUGELY problematic. If Venom binds with Penance, you have a two-man Masonry that cannot die as long as Penance gets four votes a Day.

I think the biggest risk to the Scum is that the Town will block/avoid multiple kills. The Scum need to keep getting in their Night kill on a regular basis in order to win this game. Right now, Penance, Venom, Spider Man, and Goblin all have ways to avert kills one way or another.

Actually, here's a proposal:

1. Remove Venom's protective ability AND Spider Man's protective ability (which I've been wanting to get rid of since we started).
2. Make She-Hulk a Bodyguard (takes the kill in place of someone else).
3. Change M-1 back to M.
4. Make Cable a hybrid Watcher/Investigator.
5. Allow recruited Scum to Night kill, but only if they are the last Scum remaining.

I am not totally sure, but I think this might generate a working setup.

[Pleonast]

(Gah! yellow on gray does not make for easy reading.)

I think I'm worried about an overpowered town because of how the balance has gone in the last few games I've run, plus my recent stint as scum. Plus, if you want effective advice, you need view points on multiple sides.

I agree about scum needing to make the regular kills (that was the highest priority of scum kills in CiaS's game, which is one reason why the investigator survived). However, I think scum has the tools to mitigate this. If they watch their intended victim, they will know who protected or was watching the target and can take action against them the next Night.

I think the game is balanced reasonably well. Well enough to run. I just see the huge ticking confirmation bomb Black Widow will be able to drop mid-game, which will mean game over in favor of the town, unless the scum have done everything right (no missed kills, one scum in the confirmed pool, some of the weak masons killed, some of the weak investigators killed, etc).

[Frank]

Heh. I think it's funny - from your perspective, Town probably seemed overpowered in Space Hijack, didn't it? Whereas from my perspective, the opposite was true. I think most of these games are more balanced than we give them credit for being in the aftermath.

Except for Arkham. That game was wildly imbalanced. Just sayin'

[Pleonast]

For She-Hulk, maybe something like: she has power that is charged by hammering the lynch on non-town. I don't know the character, so I'll someone else make a suggestion. Because of the method of charging, it will naturally be less useful to scum if she's recruited. I wouldn't make it too powerful a power, because she could publicly reveal the mechanism and the town might let her always do the hammering.

[Frank]

Pleo, that's cool. Note the implementation in the She-Hulk section, somewhat modified but I think pretty interesting.

And with that, I think we're going to have to call it a game. I'm moving all of the spoiler information to the spoiler boards, which are here:

psychopathgame.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=game18spoilers336
PASSWORD: sallyfloyd

In about a half hour, I'm going to start sending PMs. I hope it's balanced, but at some point you just have to toss it out there and see what happens. Thanks to everyone for helping work this out; I think it'll be fun, whatever else may be.

[sachertorte]

Dec 10, 2009 11:31:20 GMT -5 Pleonast said:

I just see the huge ticking confirmation bomb Black Widow will be able to drop mid-game, which will mean game over in favor of the town, unless the scum have done everything right (no missed kills, one scum in the confirmed pool, some of the weak masons killed, some of the weak investigators killed, etc).

This I might agree with. Detectives are a swingy role. Do we really want the game to hinge on whether or not the Detective survives to Day 4? On the other hand, simply surviving to Day 4 isn't really sufficient. The Widow needs to investigate people who ALSO survive to Day 4.
Plus there is recruitment!
One thing that you might want to change is not tieing Recruitment AND Godfather to one scum. If CA dies quickly, that would be a HUGE swing for Town. The Detective becomes extremely valuable in that the GF is dead AND recruitment is gone. Though I guess Town won't know that recruitment is gone... but still.

Overall I think it is okay.