Detectives: Thoughts, ideas, balance, Holmes.

[Gamerofthegame]

Paranoia is the game, Jossi.

[JossiRossi]

That's not the correct kind of paranoia. You need to have some certainties. Some things that will always be true. Such as the fact that bodies can not be tempered with. If you remove the certainty of the detective you remove the entire purpose of the detective. He's supposed to be a fact to give the innocents something to rally behind.

[bat sauce]

I still think it's dumb and against the core principle of TTT (don't trust anyone) to have a certified, 100% definitely innocent guy. You might as well disable innocents doing damage to detectives, since no matter what it'll be an "RDM" to kill a detective (unless you're a traitor)

[Officer_BUlbock]

Unless of course the detectives are themselves rdming or accusing people left and right. You're still not going to be put your absolute faith in anyone in the long run, since detectives may be unreliable or prone to initiating ridiculous witch-hunts which just adds to the general crazyness. Plus there won't be many of them at any one time so you're still going to be surrounded by suspects.

[TheCze]

I always thought of TTT like Mafia (not the pc game)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mafia_%28game%29

Actually, I described the game to people as "Mafia as a FPS".

There is also an detective in mafia though nobody knows who he is.

If nobody knows who the detective is he can be more powerful in regards of revealing who is a traitor, but a traitor might act like the detective aswell.
If the detective gives away his identity he get's a high priority target for the traitors.


If the innocents would know who is the detective from the beginning they would all hoard around him. No fun

[Ajunk]

The real life game of mofia and this game are incredibly different, and very incompatible when it comes to sharing rules.

In the real life game, the only way the mass innocents can kill people is by vote and everyone sees everything. The detectives get to check to see if people are mofia on a regular basis, and then try to convince everyone without revealing who they are lest the mofia kill them.

In TTT, each player has the power to kill anyone they want, and it's not turn based. You can also defend yourself. This makes not revealing who you are (as a detective) impractical, and with the joys of PC it would probably easy to prove unless we seriously restricted their abilities. Also, staying hidden as detective doesn't make you more potent. In fact, less so, because nobody will protect you or trust you the same.


The detective is a high value target. Some argue people will just crowd him, but people already behave like that to traitor checkers and other high value places. With everyone around the detective, the traitors can have a fun and interesting kill. Some people talk about paranoia being killed with a detective, but I argue that it's quite the opposite. When the detective goes down, the feeling of safety is gone. It's made very clear the traitors are at work, and that even the most protected individual isn't safe.

[Bad King Urgrain]

I had written a post that said what Ajunk's post said, then I pressed Preview and saw his. So what he said.

[JossiRossi]

I really like this idea, I think it will add something that's missing to the game. My only concern would be is there any way to to balance in some way the inevitability of really bad detectives and AFK ones.

[Ajunk]

Well AFK detectives definitely are a problem, but I feel that dealing with them is a system any stricter than the AFK system we have now would be too much. If it does happen, I suppose it'll just be an unfortunate loss.

Bad detectives still deserve to be detectives, and I don't think we should avoid that. Rounds are filled with bad traitors too, and there's little that can be done about that too. There really is just a lot of luck of the draw in TTT. Furthermore, if a detective's bad, I see him dying really fast.

My main concern is a detective that says "everyone knows I'm innocent, so I'm just going to hide here and shoot everyone on sight because they have no innocent reason to come here". Clearly the innocent's will just be at a loss and the traitors will mop them up and finish the detective themselves if he never comes out, but as an innocent I'd be really pissed off about that. Another concern I have is a detective killing on instinct way too often, and assuming he has the power to do so.


There's always the option of getting to impeach the current detective based off a vote yielding large majority. I think the biggest question with that method is, how will a new one be selected? Perhaps randomly select an innocent after a 2-3 minute delay. I think that might work.


UNRELATED THOUGHT:
So on the topic of "what should the detective do?". I think the detective's powers should be purely based on crime scene investigation. For instance, one kit could identify all the people a person saw in their lifetime complete with timestamps, one kit could identify fingerprints on traitor weapons like used knives or diffused C4, one kit could identify the serial number of the gun used to kill the person and cross reference it with the serial numbers of guns they find. Basically, stuff that REALLY puts the pressure on traitors to be discreet about their killing until the detective is out of the picture. Oh, also, transmit all body information found by the detective to everyone's scoreboard.

I think this solves a number of problems. It harms reckless traitors, encourages innocents moving around, encourages traitors hiding bodies, encourages innocents finding bodies, and encourages teamwork.

[Broseidon, of the Brocean]

I think having ANY players who are confirmed, undeniably innocent right from the get-go would ruin the essence of TTT. When you're innocent, it says "Who can you trust, and who is out to fill you with bullets?" If the first part of that question has an answer, then half the mystique is gone and so is the gameplay. It's fun when all of the innocents distrust each other and sometimes end up killing each other out of paranoia, or isolating themselves and then getting killed by a traitor where nobody is around to see. Having standoffs where multiple people are pointing their guns at each other, not knowing who to expect, is intense, exhilerating, and unique to TTT's gameplay. Do you really want to take that away?

Also keep in mind what average players are most likely to do as detectives. It will probably promote shitty gameplay. People will abuse their detective status, and make the whole rounds center around worshiping them. They'll then feel comfortable fucking with people and shooting at people who they don't really expect, because anyone who shoots back at them will immediately be an assumed traitor or RDMer. People will also make a strategy out of ass-kissing whoever the detectives are, which will severely alter the overall tone of the game.

TTT is also filled with those uncertain moments where you see two people shooting at each other and don't know what to do... you don't know which one to shoot, because there's a 50/50 chance you're either killing a traitor or aiding a traitor. You could try and figure out which one you should help, or you could wait till it ends, and see if the survivor inspects the corpse, runs away, or turns to shoot you. Whereas if a detective is shooting at someone, it's always obvious which one you should help. Obvious = not TTT!

[UnInvincible]

But there's going to be one, at most two detectives. This person is not invincible, in fact they're just going to be a much higher priority target for the traitors. I like this idea because it gives the innocents the incentive to do something during the round, AND it opens up so many more possibilities for traitor strategies. Do you try to take the detective out from a distance, using the rifle or silenced pistol? Or do you hang around him with the innocents and wait for the perfect chance to take him out, making your escape while the innocents are confused? The possibilities are endless.

I like some of Ajunk's detective equipment ideas, but some of them seem kinda complex and more of a hassle to use (let alone code) than they'd be worth. An idea I just came up with could be a radar jammer, so that innocents near the detective don't show up on the traitor's radar. I still think that items that can counter traitor items and crime scene investigating items would be the most useful and would actually make the detective a high priority for the innocents to protect, and for the traitors to kill.

[Ajunk]

lah blah blah blah blah

We're making 1 player innocent, not half the server. His role as the bastion of innocence creates even more tension and paranoia. Who's out to help the detective and who's just pretending so they can get closer? Maybe an innocent leading the detective to a body is actually a traitor leading the detective into a trap. You're obviously terrible at this kind of thing so I'd probably just stop typing if I were you.


Uninvince, having counter-traitor item items kind of asks detectives to pick one or the other, something I really don't think they should be doing. It also kind of hampers the traitor's use of their items until the detective is killed, which is sort of a Catch-22 because they'll need those items most to take him out.

Regarding my ideas, I don't think they're too complex at all. I mean, obviously they do require some thinking (you are a detective), but nothing too extreme. Coding wise, I don't think any of them are particularly difficult to create.

[bat sauce]

We're making 1 player innocent, not half the server. His role as the bastion of innocence creates even more tension and paranoia. Who's out to help the detective and who's just pretending so they can get closer? Maybe an innocent leading the detective to a body is actually a traitor leading the detective into a trap. You're obviously terrible at this kind of thing so I'd probably just stop typing if I were you.

He disagrees with you, therefore he should stop typing. Great logic.

[UnInvincible]

Uninvince, having counter-traitor item items kind of asks detectives to pick one or the other, something I really don't think they should be doing. It also kind of hampers the traitor's use of their items until the detective is killed, which is sort of a Catch-22 because they'll need those items most to take him out.

Regarding my ideas, I don't think they're too complex at all. I mean, obviously they do require some thinking (you are a detective), but nothing too extreme. Coding wise, I don't think any of them are particularly difficult to create.

Yeah but the two counter-traitor items that I've suggested aren't really countering the offensive traitor weapons, they're more like items that assist in protecting the innocents as a whole. I'm suggesting that there's a counter to every single traitor item, maybe just a few. And as for the detective having to choose between the items, it all kinda depends on how BKU would decide to do the detective item system (Points system like traitors? Just a set number to choose from the beginning? Separate items into Counter-Traitor, Investigative and get one of each?).

And now that I look back through your list of ideas the only one that I don't really think would end up being used that often is the cross-referencing weapon checker. It just seems like a detective would end up never finding a matching weapon in a round, or would try asking a suspected traitor for their weapon in order to check it, but since the traitor knows he's the detective it would just end up in a firefight. I do like the fingerprints of traitor weapons idea, and the list of people they'd seen could be useful, but it's a bit unrealistic and could end up being overpowered.

[Tannerbondy]

He disagrees with you, therefore he should stop typing. Great logic.

I'd see your point if it weren't for the fact that your interpretation of Ajunk's logic was way off base.

[Ajunk]

@Uninvince, gotta agree that the weapon serial number checker isn't nearly as useful as the other ones. What if you could also check the fingerprints on weapons to see all the people who've touched it? That way you see the murder weapon, find it, and identify the killer or at least make suspects.

He disagrees with you, therefore he should stop typing. Great logic.

I like how you left out the part where I explained why revealing 1 player's innocence doesn't obliterate all sense of mystery and makes everyone trust and love each other. Great logic.

Seriously, maps have traitor checkers all the time. The game isn't exactly ruined when they're used (in fact, they're made more interesting. I'll say "everyone put citizen on friend he's clean" and set him to kill on my scoreboard because I'm traitor and I want confirmed innocents DEAD).

[UnInvincible]

@Uninvince, gotta agree that the weapon serial number checker isn't nearly as useful as the other ones. What if you could also check the fingerprints on weapons to see all the people who've touched it? That way you see the murder weapon, find it, and identify the killer or at least make suspects.

Yeah that'd probably work a bit better, although I'm still unsure as to how you think this would function. Does it check weapon models that aren't being held by people, like by pressing 'e' on it as you would a body?

[John Mancer]

Detective should totally got some fireproof underwear as an item choice.

[bat sauce]

@Uninvince, gotta agree that the weapon serial number checker isn't nearly as useful as the other ones. What if you could also check the fingerprints on weapons to see all the people who've touched it? That way you see the murder weapon, find it, and identify the killer or at least make suspects.
I like how you left out the part where I explained why revealing 1 player's innocence doesn't obliterate all sense of mystery and makes everyone trust and love each other. Great logic.

Seriously, maps have traitor checkers all the time. The game isn't exactly ruined when they're used (in fact, they're made more interesting. I'll say "everyone put citizen on friend he's clean" and set him to kill on my scoreboard because I'm traitor and I want confirmed innocents DEAD).

Wow, you guys get REALLY upset over nothing.

[UnInvincible]

No, we get really upset when people criticize us or our posts with no reason or completely ignore the validating facts in our posts.

I hear a lot of people act like that, weird.