GA Purge

[Superalex11]

According to the GA's card, the purge portion of its protection "removes all harmful effects from a player." While, as in my other thread, this obviously doesn't apply to certain harmful effects (e.g. jester-guilt), cases can be made for those effects not being protected against, or otherwise that those effects don't count. However, I don't think it's controversial to say, for example, that a blackmail is a harmful effect which should be purged from a target.

Well, as I've learned today, a GA's protection does not purge blackmail: https://i.gyazo.com/e1ce5eba742fec8ca83 ... 40d2a0.png -> https://i.gyazo.com/b2d8f69c1d384f54e29 ... c458f3.png

I understand this isn't a bug in the sense of code being "broken" and that as a result it may "intentional" in that the devs didn't program the game to purge blackmails.
But this is certainly a bug in the sense that this is a feature contradictory to the current state of the game (i.e. the card's description of "purge").

[Flavorable]

It's not a bug. You just have a different view of what "harmful" means. The GA is working as intended.

[Superalex11]

You just have a different view of what "harmful" means.

I'm not sure what you think the word "harmful" means if you think an effect resulting in the loss of the ability to speak isn't harmful.


In this game, there are 12 distinct, directly player-caused effects which remain with a player beyond the night:
- Arso's gas/douse (naturally remains until death or self-cleaned by an arso)
- BMer's blackmail (naturally remains until the next night)
- Forger's forge (if the target dies, naturally remains until resurrection)
- GA's vote-protection (naturally remains until the next night/day)
- HM's hex (naturally remains until death)
- Jan's clean (if the target dies, naturally remains indefinitely)
- Medusa's stone (if the target dies, naturally remains indefinitely)
- Necro's decay (naturally remains indefinitely)
- PB's plague (naturally remains indefinitely)
- Poisoner's poison (naturally remains until death)
- Trapper's trap (naturally remains until converted to vamp)
- Vamp's bite/conversion (naturally remains indefinitely)

Of them, all are indisputably disadvantageous (except in extremely rare cases) to the player with that effect (i.e. "harmful" by any reasonable person's standard usage) except for the necro's decay, GA's vote-protection, and the trapper's trap. As it turns out, the GA's protection of its target also protects against (nullifies) all of these except a BMer's blackmail, necro's decay, GA's vote-protection, trapper's trap, and forger's forge (and maybe PB's plague? I'm unsure).

I can understand not protecting a forger's forge, as it could be argued the effect is more on the person's will than on the person itself. I can also understand not protecting a PB's plague, as the plague itself doesn't do anything to the player; it's more an indication of the PB's progression towards converting to pest. Ok, fine.

But then what about the BMer? First, obviously, the effect is negative. Flavor, your case against this being a bug on the grounds that being blackmailed isn't harmful is retarded plain and simple. So ok, what other cases... well, it's not like the forger, since the effect is certainly directly on the player. And it's also not like the PB, since the effect does do something to the player.


Hmm.


Ok, maybe we can look at some potential "effects" not listed above? Maybe those which don't last beyond the night, but still count as effects?
Here's some which could be argued:
- Esc's & cons's roleblock
- Doc's heal
- Bg's protection
- Crus's protection
- Trans's transport
- Framer's frame
- Hypno's message
- CL's control
- Jailor's jail
- Amb's ambush
- Pirate's plunder
- Necro's reanimation

The issue with including these is that they are entirely separate from the category above, and distinctly do not last longer than a single night. So while a GA's protection cannot protect against any of these 12, the fact that all of them cannot be nullified by a GA means that, at minimum, a case can be made for their distinction (and thus exclusion from a GA's protection) on the grounds of the effect being night-only. This case cannot be made for the first 12.



So, Flavor, I would appreciate this thread being moved back to the main Bugs forums so that the devs can see and fix this as appropriate. Or, at least that this thread be given a chance to be understood as a problem, and not thrown away into the heap of complete non-issues.

[Superalex11]

So is that a no-go on the move back?

[Brilliand]

Let's split your list up a bit.

Killing effects:

- Arso's gas/douse (naturally remains until death or self-cleaned by an arso)
- HM's hex (naturally remains until death)
- Poisoner's poison (naturally remains until death)

Effects that require death to work:

- Forger's forge (if the target dies, naturally remains until resurrection)
- Jan's clean (if the target dies, naturally remains indefinitely)
- Medusa's stone (if the target dies, naturally remains indefinitely)
- Necro's decay (naturally remains indefinitely)
- Vamp's bite/conversion (naturally remains indefinitely) [leaves the player alive, but the game treats it as an "attack" for most purposes, and thematically it produces an "undead"]

Annoying effects:

- BMer's blackmail (naturally remains until the next night)
- PB's plague (naturally remains indefinitely) [arguably this is neutral for the player; all it does is help the Plaguebearer achieve his transformation]
- some of the non-lasting effects

Beneficial effects:

- GA's vote-protection (naturally remains until the next night/day)
- Trapper's trap (naturally remains until converted to vamp)
- some of the non-lasting effects

Of them, all are indisputably disadvantageous (except in extremely rare cases) to the player with that effect (i.e. "harmful" by any reasonable person's standard usage) except for the necro's decay, GA's vote-protection, and the trapper's trap. As it turns out, the GA's protection of its target also protects against (nullifies) all of these except a BMer's blackmail, necro's decay, GA's vote-protection, trapper's trap, and forger's forge (and maybe PB's plague? I'm unsure).

It also prevents decay and forging, because those require death, and the GA's heal prevents death, unless that death is caused by the Jester or (full-power) Juggernaut.

I don't think it's true that the purging removes the "requires death" effects per-se, it's just kind of hard to die with a GA watching over you.

So what we have is:
- Killing effects: Directly removed by the purge
- Effects that require death: Indirectly prevented because the GA also provides a heal
- Annoying effects: No interaction
- Beneficial effects: No interaction

Makes perfect sense to me. The GA is there to save lives, not to prevent its target from being inconvenienced.

[Superalex11]

@Brilliand You make a good case, I agree. I now instead believe the description for "Purge" should be updated to indicate that it does not remove all harmful effects (including the many non-lasting non-purged effects), such as blackmail, roleblock, and CL-control, but rather some effects.

[Brilliand]

@Brilliand You make a good case, I agree. I now instead believe the description for "Purge" should be updated to indicate that it does not remove all harmful effects (including the many non-lasting non-purged effects), such as blackmail, roleblock, and CL-control, but rather some effects.

I think it should say "all" something. All "deadly" effects, or all "potentially lethal" effects, perhaps. If it says "some", then players might start thinking that it has a chance of failure.

(I think we've also answered the question of what the devs think "harmful" means.)