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space-wizards
Add syndicate sleeper agents random event
revival of #23896
About the PR
adds a sleeper agent event which selects 1-2 people to be traitors, raising the alert level to blue (if it's green), and sending an announcement saying that an enemy communication has been intercepted
Why / Balance
adds more game variety
someone who has gained command's trust as a non-traitor then suddenly becomes a traitor can cause very interesting scenarios and conflict
Technical details
adds AlertLevelInterceptionRule which is a gamerule that sets the station's alert level to the given Prototype if the alert level is green
Media
https://github.com/space-wizards/space-station-14/assets/45323883/dcb6c44f-7213-4d6b-8ce2-5a34ea111d1e
- [X] I have added screenshots/videos to this PR showcasing its changes ingame, or this PR does not require an ingame showcase
Changelog :cl: Vasilis, Dutch-VanDerLinde
- add: A new event has been added, syndicate sleeper agents, which raises the alert level and selects 1-2 players to be traitors rarely throughout the round.
does there really need to be a limit on the occurrences? if multiple loneops or ninjas can happen... don't really see the harm in multiple sleeper agent triggers with a decent enough reoccurenceDelay? it'd be the only event that currently has a max chance of occurring a single time
tweaks, instead of only being able to happen once it takes an hour to happen again and it can occur as early as 25 minutes now
So it is essentially a late-join syndicate that tells the whole station that there are syndicates on any round type? That feels like it could easily ruin the balance for non-syndicate rounds. ope, that person behind the captain just became a syndicate and is now rushing the Nukies in an elite suit and e-sword in trade for the captain's pistol.
Gaining the trust of command and then betraying them after you become an antag 30 minutes in is... meh. You lose the fun of lying to gain their trust and tricking them into a private place. You lose a lot of time to plan too, resulting in a lot more boring shuttle bombings from people who were working on a project and were then randomly selected to be antag after the shift is almost finished.
I feel like it should be an automatic yellow instead, because sec are going to start immediately going ballistic if it isn't blue already and search everyone. but overall good PR
how are enemy communications a structural threat though
it will be confusing, especially on MRP, where CE will be the main pal after the captain according to the alert procedure
I feel like it should be an automatic yellow instead, because sec are going to start immediately going ballistic if it isn't blue already and search everyone. but overall good PR
yellow does not make any sense
i like the idea, but i dislike the automatic code blue
knowing there's traitors aboard isn't really that dangerous of information, compared to nukies since
- you don't know who the traitors are
- traitors have varying objectives
to be honest, it'll most likely be code blue already by the time this event happens
It would be cool if it was only like a 70% chance to trigger agents and 30% just does nothing in order to confuse security.
It would be cool if it was only like a 70% chance to trigger agents and 30% just does nothing in order to confuse security.
yeah i tried to do this originally either 0 traitors get selected, or 1-2 traitors get selected but it didn't seem to work so i just made it 1-2
I think the Automatic Code Blue is perfectly fine, Announcements do often get overlooked but having blue both gives security the ability to be more vigilant and saves command the time of walking over to the comms console.
yeah i feel like if it won't set the alert automatically, command will just set it immediately, so why not
This only will select from those with tot selected, right? The pool of who can be tot is too low as-is, especially on MRP.
This means more traitors more often: in traitor rounds it means more in general, in non-tot rounds it means traitors. Given events have been buffed to occur once every few minutes, this runs the risk of making a char with tot enabled having a drastically higher chance of being antag.
This also encourages rollers to prepare for being made into a traitor even if they missed the five-minute enrollment.
IMO: make this be anyone on the station with a tot-possible role is able to be a tot with this.
This only will select from those with tot selected, right? The pool of who can be tot is too low as-is, especially on MRP.
Yes only with the traitor preference
if you dont want to be traitor it shouldnt pick you shrimple as
As said I'm worried the problem is the inverse: it means you're more likely to become a traitor if you have it selected.
I'm not personally a fan of volunteering for antag status as-is (if you're playing a social deduction game it sort of ruins the point if you metaknowledge that half the crew are literally never antag) but it makes no sense here where it's not a round progression antag role.
Sidebar, another issue: this will cause more shuttlebombs and late-round shitter behaviour. Which is unwelcome on MRP from my research.
A roundstart traitor is going to have on average something like 2x more time to complete their objectives than a midround traitor.
Suggested mitigations:
- Midround tots should have less TC than roundstart tots
- Midround tots should have easier objectives than roundstart tots
- Midround tots should have less objectives than roundstart tots
This would make event tots be equivalent to event nukies - a weaker "tribute act" to the main game mode intended to spice up the round.
Sidebar, another issue: this will cause more shuttlebombs and late-round shitter behaviour. Which is unwelcome on MRP from my research.
A roundstart traitor is going to have on average something like 2x more time to complete their objectives than a midround traitor.
Yes, this is for every midround antag
Ninjas will have less time to complete their objectives because they spawn midround
Ideally, when dynamic comes this event should only happen if the station is doing well (so the traitor(s) that get selected aren't picked when the station is exploding)
Yes, midrounds always have less time. This means that design and balance of midround-only antags (ninja, loneop, pizza critter (TBC), ~exterminator~) factors that in.
Just dropping one to two full-strength tots in randomly I think causes balance problems.
Another question: can an II, HR, regular rev, someone with zombie disease etc get tot as well? Can a Closet Skeleton? Rat King?
A regular rev suddenly getting 20TC would be a huge buff to Revs. for example.
Yes, midrounds always have less time. This means that design and balance of midround-only antags (ninja, loneop, pizza critter (TBC), ~exterminator~) factors that in.
Just dropping one to two full-strength tots in randomly I think causes balance problems.
Another problem: can an II, HR, regular rev, someone with zombie disease etc get tot as well? Can a Closet Skeleton? Rat King?
A regular rev suddenly getting 20TC would be a huge buff to Revs. for example.
People who are already antags shouldn't be selected for sleeper agents if selection code is working correctly
Perhaps the traitors should be nerfed slightly, they get less TC but easier and less destructive objectives
Perhaps the traitors should be nerfed slightly, they get less TC but easier and less destructive objectives
Should we differentiate them in the end screen? Like 'sleeper agent' instead of 'traitor'?
it'd be neat if the ninja could call this in as a threat via the comms console, only like 2 other mid-rounds can be called in from ninja so we'd get some nice variety from that
Perhaps the traitors should be nerfed slightly, they get less TC but easier and less destructive objectives
Should we differentiate them in the end screen? Like 'sleeper agent' instead of 'traitor'?
They're still syndies so not really any purpose to that
it'd be neat if the ninja could call this in as a threat via the comms console, only like 2 other mid-rounds can be called in from ninja so we'd get some nice variety from that
Not sure, rev and dragon are minor antagonists compared to syndies
rev without abusing bugs has next to no killing power, more of an annoyance than an antag
dragon can be round ending if robust, syndies can fumble or troll everyone