Addressing the Chaos of Custom Mode

[goldtrotter]

I used to play Custom Mode all the time. But it's chaos has now brimmed to a point that I almost never do it, and instead play Ranked Practice. Not to mention that role lists in Custom Mode are almost always chaotic and unbalanced, lists such as 4 serial killers 4 werewolves 4 jesters and 3 town. While there's no clear way to fix the making of broken lists, many other methods can be implemented to tone down the other chaotic problems Custom Mode faces.

A Repicking Limit
There needs to be a limit on how many times you can repick. Right now in custom, everyone just automatically repicks. Even after repicking a host they dislike the list of, immediately after that host is repicked they just vote to repick again. It seems what everyone does is they simply keep voting to repick until they become host themself.

If there was a repicking limit, after the limit was hit, the /repick command would be disabled. This way, instead of people just repicking for the hell of it, people will be much more conservative with the command. They would probably start thinking about the role list they wanted and trying to compromise because they can't just repick like crazy.

How long would the limit last?
In this game, the lobby is not exclusive, and instead open-ended. This means there is only ever one lobby per game mode, no more. So this brings up the question of, if the repicking limit is surpassed and the /repick command is disabled, how long would it remain disabled? Well, there is a rule that states that you are not allowed to repick until there are 7 players in the lobby. So, what I am thinking is that the repicking limit would reset if the amount of people in the lobby dips to 7 players or below.

Now, this leaves the issue that people could try to reset the limit by leaving. This would be hard to do without organization, but nevertheless there should still be something done to prevent it from even being a possibility. My idea was that when you leave the lobby too much, instead of being prevented from rejoining it for 15 seconds, it should be instead 1 minute. However, I think this 1 minute barrier should only apply to Custom Mode, and for all other modes the barrier should remain at 15 seconds.

[Djaouida]

Repicking has been mentioned by the devs on their 'fixing list' per se. Given the fact repick was added to repick AFK hosts and not for players to repick the host cause they don't like the role-list.
Safe to assume this won't be addressed for a while yet, given its pretty low priority imo.

[kyuss420]

cutom mode = repick for 20 minutes and still end up with a shit role list

[Kikigiri]

Yeah, I think a lobby would be best. I'd go a step further and have current open custom rooms for game modes you have access to shown on the front page (possibly flipping through them, or just when that mode is selected.) That is, reduce them to a little color-coded box that flips through rooms currently being filled up.

Right now it is very hard to get people into custom, especially Coven Custom, and multiple rooms would make it harder. Putting them on the front page so people can see that an interesting custom room is open would make it work better.

[goldtrotter]

I think the best option would probably be a lobby-picking system, and remove the repick system entirely.

Example: you click "play" on custom, and it will open a gui that shows different lobbies with different setups. It would show a live image of the setup, and people can either join a game they want to, or create their own lobby. If you are in a lobby, and it is empty for 300 seconds, it automatically closes. If the host doesn't click "start" within 10 seconds of the lobby becoming full (given that it stays full), it should automatically repick them and automatically start to prevent lobby idling trolling. Players who leave a custom game should not be given a 15 second wait period, unless they're trying to join the same game. There should also be a filtering system so that you can filter out specific roles or role lists from the selection window.

Here's an example of what I mean that i made in ms paint: https://i.imgur.com/sqb3NIZ.png
Edit: i forgot to make a "create a new lobby" button, but you get the point.

The problem with this is that most lobbies would be vacant and there would only ever be a few at a time active, which would defeat the whole point. However, what you have suggested is already possible with parties. If someone fills up a party with 15 people and joins a game mode, they will get their own exclusive lobby. Now I'm not sure if the party owner would be guaranteed to be host. Usually they end up joining first and becoming host, but I'm not sure if this would hold true 100% of the time, but this sort of thing can be remedied easily by the developers.