The start of balance discussions

[Achilles]

Piggy backing off of Venusupreme's idea, what if:

Jailor cannot jail the same person twice.

Effects: This stops permanent role blocks or permanently protecting another Town member. This will make a Jailor think twice about randomly jailing someone on N1. This forces the Jailor to make a permanent decision on executing or not since they can't just jail again the following night.

I'd like to talk specifically about this change please. The Jailor is arguably the most powerful Town role in the game, that is part of why it is unique. Currently the Jailor can roleblock like an Escort, protect like a Doctor and kill like a Vigilante with an Unstoppable attack. And given that it is unique and the way its abilities work, no one dares to counter claim Jailor.

I think that limiting the Jailor's power in this way keeps the theme of the Jailor intact and while it is a nerf it isn't a catastrophic nerf to the core of what a Jailor does. It is more about nerfing their ability to permanently roleblock and forcing them to make smarter and tougher decisions on who they want to Jail. Potentially never being able to Jail the same person again is too much and a multi-day waiting period would be more appropriate. I'd like to hash out the potential of this change with the community so please convert discussion to this topic until resolved.

[Ben4lyfe]

Piggy backing off of Venusupreme's idea, what if:

Jailor cannot jail the same person twice.

Effects: This stops permanent role blocks or permanently protecting another Town member. This will make a Jailor think twice about randomly jailing someone on N1. This forces the Jailor to make a permanent decision on executing or not since they can't just jail again the following night.

I'd like to talk specifically about this change please. The Jailor is arguably the most powerful Town role in the game, that is part of why it is unique. Currently the Jailor can roleblock like an Escort, protect like a Doctor and kill like a Vigilante with an Unstoppable attack. And given that it is unique and the way its abilities work, no one dares to counter claim Jailor.

I think that limiting the Jailor's power in this way keeps the theme of the Jailor intact and while it is a nerf it isn't a catastrophic nerf to the core of what a Jailor does. It is more about nerfing their ability to permanently roleblock and forcing them to make smarter and tougher decisions on who they want to Jail. Potentially never being able to Jail the same person again is too much and a multi-day waiting period would be more appropriate. I'd like to hash out the potential of this change with the community so please convert discussion to this topic until resolved.

Honestly a fair change in my opinion, instead of never again be just the next night. I think the same idea as pirate would work well where they cant pirate the same person they pirated the night before.

Like Hagg1s very eloquently stated.

[BS4125]

Piggy backing off of Venusupreme's idea, what if:

Jailor cannot jail the same person twice.

Effects: This stops permanent role blocks or permanently protecting another Town member. This will make a Jailor think twice about randomly jailing someone on N1. This forces the Jailor to make a permanent decision on executing or not since they can't just jail again the following night.

I'd like to talk specifically about this change please. The Jailor is arguably the most powerful Town role in the game, that is part of why it is unique. Currently the Jailor can roleblock like an Escort, protect like a Doctor and kill like a Vigilante with an Unstoppable attack. And given that it is unique and the way its abilities work, no one dares to counter claim Jailor.

I think that limiting the Jailor's power in this way keeps the theme of the Jailor intact and while it is a nerf it isn't a catastrophic nerf to the core of what a Jailor does. It is more about nerfing their ability to permanently roleblock and forcing them to make smarter and tougher decisions on who they want to Jail. Potentially never being able to Jail the same person again is too much and a multi-day waiting period would be more appropriate. I'd like to hash out the potential of this change with the community so please convert discussion to this topic until resolved.

I'd say its definitely is a good start to nerfing Jailor as it hinders its use of being a protective role and a roleblocker, which both aren't it's intended purpose

Though because Jailor is so powerful it's best if it loses one of these abilities, whether that be not protecting or not rb'ing those in jail. Another reasonable nerf could be to reduce the no. executions down to two, but all in all this is a good start

Also would like to forward that Vigilante shouldn't commit suicide from shooting a Town member as compared to the Jailor's killing capability alone, its power is greatly weaker

[Achilles]

Piggy backing off of Venusupreme's idea, what if:

Jailor cannot jail the same person twice.

Effects: This stops permanent role blocks or permanently protecting another Town member. This will make a Jailor think twice about randomly jailing someone on N1. This forces the Jailor to make a permanent decision on executing or not since they can't just jail again the following night.

I'd like to talk specifically about this change please. The Jailor is arguably the most powerful Town role in the game, that is part of why it is unique. Currently the Jailor can roleblock like an Escort, protect like a Doctor and kill like a Vigilante with an Unstoppable attack. And given that it is unique and the way its abilities work, no one dares to counter claim Jailor.

I think that limiting the Jailor's power in this way keeps the theme of the Jailor intact and while it is a nerf it isn't a catastrophic nerf to the core of what a Jailor does. It is more about nerfing their ability to permanently roleblock and forcing them to make smarter and tougher decisions on who they want to Jail. Potentially never being able to Jail the same person again is too much and a multi-day waiting period would be more appropriate. I'd like to hash out the potential of this change with the community so please convert discussion to this topic until resolved.

I'd say its definitely is a good start to nerfing Jailor as it hinders its use of being a protective role and a roleblocker, which both aren't it's intended purpose

Though because Jailor is so powerful it's best if it loses one of these abilities, whether that be not protecting or not rb'ing those in jail. Another reasonable nerf could be to reduce the no. executions down to two, but all in all this is a good start

Also would like to forward that Vigilante shouldn't commit suicide from shooting a Town member as compared to the Jailor's killing capability alone, its power is greatly weaker

I could see lowering their executions down to 2 as well along with the Pirate like limitation.

[MysticMismagius]

While this doesn't necessarily make lowering the amount of executions a bad idea, do note that currently, the punishment for an incorrect execution is that Jailor loses all its executions. Meaning that the fewer executions it has, the less it has to potentially lose for fucking up.

To address BS4215's comment, would people be open to swapping the punishments for Vigi and Jailor? So, if Vigi shoots a townie, he merely puts away his gun, whereas if Jailor executes a Townie, he commits suicide for it. This makes the stakes of each role more in line with their power, and mitigates the issue of Jailor having one less execute making its current punishment mean less.

Although I don't think all of these should be implemented at once: reducing Jailor's executions down to 2 and giving it Pirate-like restrictions on who it can jail and making it commit suicide for killing a townie seems like a bit too much of a nerf, especially since there are other roles that are a much bigger problem.

[Achilles]

Harsher penalties for killing town is another great idea for tuning the balance of the Jailor.

[BS4125]

I could see the limit of two executions working for ranked where there's a set number of evils/neutrals. For AA I could see this significantly hindering town's ability to win with the potential for 1-14 evil roles that could be present in a game with a jailor.

Compared to other TK roles that could roll though I'd say its reasonable
Vigilante can't pierce basic defence and may end up killing Town; Veteran could alert thrice without killing anyone

Jailor's kills however are safe an usually accurate so limiting it's executions would be fair
Plus we shouldn't really balance around the All Any game mode anyway

[BS4125]

While this doesn't necessarily make lowering the amount of executions a bad idea, do note that currently, the punishment for an incorrect execution is that Jailor loses all its executions. Meaning that the fewer executions it has, the less it has to potentially lose for fucking up.

To address BS4215's comment, would people be open to swapping the punishments for Vigi and Jailor? So, if Vigi shoots a townie, he merely puts away his gun, whereas if Jailor executes a Townie, he commits suicide for it. This makes the stakes of each role more in line with their power, and mitigates the issue of Jailor having one less execute making its current punishment mean less.

Although I don't think all of these should be implemented at once: reducing Jailor's executions down to 2 and giving it Pirate-like restrictions on who it can jail and making it commit suicide for killing a townie seems like a bit too much of a nerf, especially since there are other roles that are a much bigger problem.

Great idea, with that said Pirate-like restrictions and committing suicide upon killing a townie would probably the most reasonable nerf for Jailor

[Flavorable]

I could see the limit of two executions working for ranked where there's a set number of evils/neutrals. For AA I could see this significantly hindering town's ability to win with the potential for 1-14 evil roles that could be present in a game with a jailor.

Compared to other TK roles that could roll though I'd say its reasonable
Vigilante can't pierce basic defence and may end up killing Town; Veteran could alert thrice without killing anyone

Jailor's kills however are safe an usually accurate so limiting it's executions would be fair
Plus we shouldn't really balance around the All Any game mode anyway

Accuracy has nothing to do with the role. A shitty Jailor has the same chance of killing a town as a shitty vigi does. Once this happens, both roles lose their core functionality. Difference is Jailor stays alive and can continue roleblocking/protecting where vigi dies and town loses votes.

So have Jailor commit suicide if they execute town and keep them at 3 executes - same as vigi.

I disagree that accommodating a certain game mode around changes to a role = balancing the role around said game mode.

I highly agree with this (and Haggis' former) post about Jailor.

While people might feel the balancing roles specifically for Ranked is the most important thing, the roles still need to be at least somewhat workable in other modes as well, or possibly have some role changes not effect gamemodes where it would be counter-productive.

[BS4125]

Accuracy has nothing to do with the role. A shitty Jailor has the same chance of killing a town as a shitty vigi does. Once this happens, both roles lose their core functionality. Difference is Jailor stays alive and can continue roleblocking/protecting where vigi dies and town loses votes.

So have Jailor commit suicide if they execute town and keep them at 3 executes - same as vigi.

I disagree that accommodating a certain game mode around changes to a role = balancing the role around said game mode.

I was more meaning accuracy from the context of the Vig being less accurate in targeting players that are able to be killed. When both in the hands of bad players they have the same chance of killing Town yes, but at least Jailor can ask questions and possibly deduct whether their target is scummy or not

Ok true. Jailor has functionality outside of its ability to kill, however its a TK role and really shouldn't be allowed to jail after killing a townie if its soul purpose isn't to kill, because it can't.

I agree too that allowing Vigilante to live afterwards is kind of pointless as all it would be is an extra Town vote. I would say to allow the Vig to kill after shooting a townie as a buff, but then again that doesn't discourage players from randomly shooting others as there's no cost for friendly fire

Not sure if how I implied that last point either, I was just saying that roles should be optimally balanced around the structure in ranked as that's the default game mode. Obviously it'd be impractical to change a role in a way that makes it useless in another game mode, but in this context a single execution reduction from the Jailor wouldn't effect All Any games greatly as the change is small anyway

[ScarfVendetta]

So have Jailor commit suicide if they execute town and keep them at 3 executes - same as vigi.

I disagree that accommodating a certain game mode around changes to a role = balancing the role around said game mode.

I support this change for Jailor to commit suicide upon executing a townie, along with the inability to jail the same player on consecutive nights.

The harsher penalty acts as a stronger deterrent for using their executions except for when they are certain the jailee is evil or feel that it's worth the risk. This would also give evils a different method for neutralising the Jailor that would bypass TP/LO; by tricking the Jailor into executing a townie.

[alvac2012]

Ok.
1. Jailor is meant to be op. That's why there's always a jailor for town and it's unique. Second, I think that ret should be removed from ranked or should be significantly nerfed. I do not think that Jailor needs a nerf. Retri requires a nerf and Mafia needs a buff.
2. I like the mafia buffs so far. Perhaps Hypnotist can be added to the mafia roles as well.
3. I don't like that spies legit don't do anything besides bug and see maf visits. It feels like you're not actually making a difference in the game as spy. Perhaps spy gets back the ability to see whispers? Would allow bm'rs to get away with a bit more as well.
4. Mafioso should not get an unstoppable attack. That's TOO Op. Perhaps mafioso gets to protect himself once? This way he's not thematically more op than GF, but you could shield yourself and GF attacks that night (so it's not op). This way you can fight back against vigi's when they come to shoot you.

[DragonClaw66]

Harsher penalties for killing town is another great idea for tuning the balance of the Jailor.

I've never really been a fan of making a Town role commit suicide for killing another Town member, so how about this: if a Jailor executes a Townie, they can no longer jail. It's nowhere as severe as death, however, it heavily incentivizes players to think much more carefully about their execution decisions. This along with lowering total executions to two would, in my opinion, leave the Jailor in a strong spot, but not one where they can carry as hard as they used to.

Note: I also think Vigilante suicide should be removed.

[Brilliand]

I think never letting the Jailor jail the same person again adds an interesting dynamic to the game. A one-night cooldown... doesn't, really. It's just an inconvenience, and it still allows the Jailor to roleblock-test someone, cripple their effectiveness for a while, and then execute them; this would just happen more slowly, with less than 100% efficiency.

I would not be in favor of a multi-night cooldown, though. That's too confusing to be worth the benefits.

As someone who cares about balance in All Any, I would prefer to nerf the Jailor down to being no more powerful overall than the other Town roles. (But I realize that probably isn't going to happen.)

I should mention that some people in Role Ideas have proposed making the Ranked rolelist randomly spawn either a Jailor or a Retributionist, but not both.

Are you referring to a Town Power slot?

Yes.

[SwampRabbit]

Hey everyone,

Along with the coming Town Traitor game modes we are looking at doing a balancing patch when we take ranked into off-season. This will allow us to test the balance changes and propose ranked practice role lists for what will be the fifth season of ranked. The goal of this post is to open up communication and brainstorm on potential changes while we are still early in the process so that there will be time to make adjustments. Please feel free to discuss any thoughts you may have about issues with the current meta and what you would like to see going into Season 5.

Current Thoughts
Town is stronger than Mafia, especially at higher ELOs.

Here are some Mafia buffs I have been brainstorming.

(emphasis added)

So I apologize to the coven players and the all-any players who are offended that we are focusing this thread on the ranked role list. I suppose we figured since the thread was about testing changes for the 5th ranked season that ranked players should have a say in it and that how the proposed changes would impact ranked games should be considered.

Of course changes to some roles will have an impact on other game modes, but can we all stop pretending that Chaos All Any and Coven All Any have any concerns at all about game balance.

Also, the only coven game modes that have random mafia is ALL-ANY (unbalanced by design) and mafia returns which is not very popular. Jailor is not even on the role list for Coven VIP and Coven Lovers--the two most popular coven game modes other than CAA. So, let's stop pretending that random mafia changes and changes the jailor are going to change the balance of any coven game modes (except jailor will impact CRP, the nonexistent coven ranked, and the unpopular mafia returns modes).


To Achilles, I appreciate you taking the time to discuss proposed changes with the player base, so please listen to your player base. I have played over 8500 ranked games over the past 5 years. If you balance this game in terms of players with low experience at ranked or to those that are banned for giving up when they see they are assigned mafia so just GT to make the game end faster (as is the one who is proposing the jailor be made useless), you will turn it into a 100% win rate for mafia from gold level and above.

We do not have access to the actual stats, but you do. I played through every ranked season, and this current role list is so incredibly balanced. Please look at ranked games stats where town does not spawn a retributionist. Based on more than 8500 ranked games, I say confidently that when retri does not spawn, mafia wins only slightly lower percentage of games than town does. The ranked mode is not as unbalanced as non-ranked players and those who have barely played ranked cry that it is.

Also when you are looking at stats, if this is recorded, look at the average length in days of ranked games. At higher elos, I would say the average game length is 4 days for town wins and 6 for mafia win. When you are talking about nerfing town roles preventing them from doing anything on n1, you are effectively guaranteeing a town loss because on d3 of ranked games, barring mafia mishaps and NK who refuses to kill, evils have won the game by d3, 6 v 6, or when there is a ww evils outnumber town by d3. Town cannot vote them out without a mayor revealed (or gamethrowing evils).

That being said, there are some mafia roles that could use some changing to make them more interesting to play because they are boring and a framer is useless in a spy game or when there is no sheriff (Maybe make it so that framer cannot spawn in non-sheriff games and framer visits are invisible to spies).

The only town roles that could use buffing are #1 the retri--let them revive disguisers and maybe make some other modification to it as well (but bringing back a town body who is unable to perform its basic game role is a bad idea imo), and make framer visits invisible to spy.

The LO does NOT need nerfed. The jailor does NOT need nerfed.

[SwampRabbit]

I'd like to talk specifically about this change please. The Jailor is arguably the most powerful Town role in the game, that is part of why it is unique. Currently the Jailor can roleblock like an Escort, protect like a Doctor and kill like a Vigilante with an Unstoppable attack. And given that it is unique and the way its abilities work, no one dares to counter claim Jailor.

And this is why you need to be talking more to ranked players. I cannot recall a game where at least 1 person did not counter claim jailor and mafia tricks town surprisingly often into lynching the real jailor on d2 or d3.

[Hilliam2Wobbes]

wow disguiser might be op after that change

for retri... what if they acted as a town aligned amnesiac? It would nerf having an extra townie to vote and the ability to confirm mediums.

[saixos]

Another first time forums poster + ranked enthusiast chiming in.

I've read through the entire thread, and so far it seems as though:

• People dislike the mafioso change
• People like the framer suggestions a lot
• People are happy with the disguiser change
• People are unhappy with the proposed retri change

I agree with the previous thoughts on mafioso, framer and disguiser. I also agree that forger could use some love, while it isn't the weakest mafia role it is certainly the most frustrating to play as it effectively functions as a budget janitor.

I personally feel that the proposed changes to retri would not solve its issues. A previous comment outlined just how powerful retri is and all of its functions. Simply reviving a disguiser once every now and then would do little to impact the power of the role - and also how boring it is to play. Retri generally just revives someone to prove themselves and acts as a "townie" for the rest of the game. The suggestion I enjoyed the most was to make a resurrected target die if the retributionist dies. This would allow for the most interesting dynamics with fake claims, trying to hide the retri's identity, and provide evils with a bit more claim space. Causing a resurrected target to be permanently blackmailed/muted might also be a possibility/alternative in terms of preventing too many confirmed roles. I think the biggest impact of retri though is shifting the tipping point by a crucial night, and allowing evils to get a 2 for 1 kill in the event of a resurrection would be very beneficial I think.

On the jailor suggestion, I am iffy about the suggestion. Forcing jailor to suicide on missed execution is definitely not the right idea, it would not have enough of an effect. I feel some alternative should be investigated, but I personally would be in favor of leaving jailor untouched for now.

To target the jailor meta, I feel you need to target the TP/LO meta. If jailor is no longer the optimal target to TP/LO, players will adapt by TP/LOing someone else. This already occurs frequently in my games, where jailor will not come out N1 and instead a different player is the TP/LO target. I feel that nerfing LO is not the right call, LO's current power is mostly artificially inflated by the meta and if the meta vanishes LO's power would be significantly lower. I think the framer buff wouldn't have enough of an effect, but buffing mafioso/GF would be too powerful.

I would suggest that when arso douses a target, he also douses everyone who visits his target that night. Arso is still the weakest of the NK roles and generally seen as the least fun to play. While this sounds OP at first, I think once players adapt to it it would be just around the right power level, and allow for some very interesting dynamics with arso thinking about which targets to douse in greater detail. I think if you want to target TP/LO meta, do it through NE/NK.

[killstrikers]

Retributionist nerf suggestion:

Retributionist dies the day after they resurrect another player. I mean, rets after they revive someone essentially become a "vanilla townie" anyways.

"You have passed away from giving your life force to another town member!"
"You have died!"

[JahMakin]

Piggy backing off of Venusupreme's idea, what if:

Jailor cannot jail the same person twice.

Effects: This stops permanent role blocks or permanently protecting another Town member. This will make a Jailor think twice about randomly jailing someone on N1. This forces the Jailor to make a permanent decision on executing or not since they can't just jail again the following night.

The Jailor doesn't need re-balancing.

And at the highest level, town sure as hell doesn't need jailor to win the game unless it's SK + Witch(who can pretty much only work with evils due to their win condition).

[JahMakin]

I could see the limit of two executions working for ranked where there's a set number of evils/neutrals. For AA I could see this significantly hindering town's ability to win with the potential for 1-14 evil roles that could be present in a game with a jailor.

Compared to other TK roles that could roll though I'd say its reasonable
Vigilante can't pierce basic defence and may end up killing Town; Veteran could alert thrice without killing anyone

Jailor's kills however are safe an usually accurate so limiting it's executions would be fair
Plus we shouldn't really balance around the All Any game mode anyway

Accuracy has nothing to do with the role. A shitty Jailor has the same chance of killing a town as a shitty vigi does. Once this happens, both roles lose their core functionality. Difference is Jailor stays alive and can continue roleblocking/protecting where vigi dies and town loses votes.

So have Jailor commit suicide if they execute town and keep them at 3 executes - same as vigi.

I disagree that accommodating a certain game mode around changes to a role = balancing the role around said game mode.

Jailor can die N1 and town is still favored to win. The Jailor isn't the problem.

[JahMakin]

So have Jailor commit suicide if they execute town and keep them at 3 executes - same as vigi.

I disagree that accommodating a certain game mode around changes to a role = balancing the role around said game mode.

I support this change for Jailor to commit suicide upon executing a townie, along with the inability to jail the same player on consecutive nights.

The harsher penalty acts as a stronger deterrent for using their executions except for when they are certain the jailee is evil or feel that it's worth the risk. This would also give evils a different method for neutralising the Jailor that would bypass TP/LO; by tricking the Jailor into executing a townie.

Deterring the jailor from making a mistake favors the town, not the evils.
The inability to jail the same player twice in a row is game-breaking in the end-game. Circumstances where the jailor needs to find the mafioso or GF to save the game become null and void.

[JahMakin]

Remove the useless mafia role from ranked: Framer
Remove the overpowered town role from ranked: Retributionist

Add an elo incentive to winning as NK.

Reduce the odds of getting Consigliere/Disguiser/Forger, buff the odds of getting Consort/BMer/Janitor.

[killstrikers]

Jailor nerf suggestion:

Jailor not only loses exes from killing an innocent town member, but they also cannot jail the night after that as additional punishment.

As far as jailing consecutive nights in a row goes, keeping the max to 2 nights seems like a fair alternative as compared to removing the ability to jail consecutively altogether.

[CrimsonKatana]

Killstrikers there is really no need to further punish the jailor after a misexecution because if town is playing against a good mafia then a misexecution probably means a loss anyways