Town of Salem Game Forums

The last patch with more than one (usually small) balance change was June 6th, 2017.

This was the release of the Coven expansion.

Since Coven was released the game has been almost exactly the same for close to two full years.

Not only that, but as far as I know there hasn't been an update on the Unity version in over three months.

What are you doing that is taking two whole years to finish???

orangeandblack5 wrote:What are you doing that is taking two whole years to finish???

The Unity Port.

MysticMismagius wrote:

orangeandblack5 wrote:What are you doing that is taking two whole years to finish???

The Unity Port.

Case in point

There has been no significant balance patch of any kind as long as this user has been playing

orangeandblack5 wrote:

MysticMismagius wrote:

orangeandblack5 wrote:What are you doing that is taking two whole years to finish???

The Unity Port.

Case in point

There has been no significant balance patch of any kind as long as this user has been playing

If you’re going to use me as an example, you should know this: while I made my account in 2017, I didn’t actually start playing until about January of 2018. So the statement that there hasn’t been a major balance patch “since I started playing” is not as significant.

I would cite the Arso buff (specifically designed to counter the Jailor meta) and the fact that the game now drops the hammer on you when you leave in Ranked, but depending on your definition of “major” those might not count.

I do understand that.

I also know they lost a dev.

I've been here a long, long time, I'm not getting impatient.

I'm more concerned about the lack of updates (as in announcements) this entire year thus far, although I am concerned that the delays are making things take too long. Two years to port a game is a long time with no substantial updates, and lord knows some of the roles could use some tweaks.

Hopefully the port is far enough along that starting to ramp up changes to the game to keep it fresh and retain player interest over the final stretch is now worth it. That is where I'm coming from.

orangeandblack5 wrote:I do understand that.

I also know they lost a dev.

I've been here a long, long time, I'm not getting impatient.

I'm more concerned about the lack of updates (as in announcements) this entire year thus far, although I am concerned that the delays are making things take too long. Two years to port a game is a long time with no substantial updates, and lord knows some of the roles could use some tweaks.

Hopefully the port is far enough along that starting to ramp up changes to the game to keep it fresh and retain player interest over the final stretch is now worth it. That is where I'm coming from.

That's sorta the point of Unity Port though. The last update that I consider to be "major" was the one where the Jester can haunt abstainers.
But ya gotta understand. Flash is like a ticking time limit for the devs because once Flash is no longer supported, Town of Salem goes bye-bye. Their #1 priority right now is to keep it alive by going to the Unity Port (which looks really nice in their screenshots by the way). It would seem pointless to attract new players with new roles/mechanics/role edits right now when the flash engine won't be around much longer.

At least, that's how I see it. I look forward to the Unity Port cause it honestly looks a lot better and I'd bet it won't be as laggy anymore
Do you look forward to it?

Yes

That's why I'm only starting to get concerned after two years

It really depends on what you call balance changes and whether you believe they are big or small.

I found both the Arson change, for example, quite a big balance change.
I found the sheriff change to be also quite a big balance change.
Vampires being able to kill when they're full: Big balance change.
Jester being able to haunt abstainees as well as guilties: Big balance change.

And three of these were in the last 4 months.

Flavorable wrote:It really depends on what you call balance changes and whether you believe they are big or small.

I found both the Arson change, for example, quite a big balance change.
I found the sheriff change to be also quite a big balance change.
Vampires being able to kill when they're full: Big balance change.
Jester being able to haunt abstainees as well as guilties: Big balance change.

And three of these were in the last 4 months.

not to mention the meta shifting can make things quite new too.

I understand it must be frustrating to not hear about what we are doing, and it could lead one to believe maybe not much is happening, or lead someone to believe we are slacking off. We did used to do monthly update posts on Reddit until we decided to move away from Reddit due to several factors. I am going to be starting to do monthly update posts on these forums starting next month. The monthly update posts I feel did a lot to reinforce/reinstill confidence that we are making progress, and that work is being done. It also opens up great lines of discussion to allow easier and more meaningful interactions with the community. Things got a little crazy there for a while, but I'm glad that I will be starting to do those update posts again.

shapesifter13 wrote:until we decided to move away from Reddit due to several factors.

I would LOVE to hear more about those factors.

Flavorable wrote:It really depends on what you call balance changes and whether you believe they are big or small.

I found both the Arson change, for example, quite a big balance change.
I found the sheriff change to be also quite a big balance change.
Vampires being able to kill when they're full: Big balance change.
Jester being able to haunt abstainees as well as guilties: Big balance change.

And three of these were in the last 4 months.

I've been a master ranked player since season 0 and I don't see how anyone that plays ranked could view those as big balance changes.

The Arso's major issue has always been that it kills too slowly which these buffs don't fix. The Jailor Meta was not a good strategy for town and was easily beaten by a pretty wide variety of evil counter plays. Adding another counter play... sorta helps?

The sheriff has always been one of towns worst roles so making it marginally worse does... not a whole lot?

Vampires aren't in ranked and ranked is the only game mode where balance matters.

The Jester didn't even need balancing and this change likely hurts evils more than it helps. It certainly makes the Jester role more difficult to win with.

The lengths BMG will go to avoid fixing the ret are staggering.

Vampires aren't in ranked and ranked is the only game mode where balance matters.

Personally, I find this to be a common misconception among Ranked players. As strange as it may sound, balancing roles is also important in other gamemodes besides just Ranked.

Flavorable wrote:

Vampires aren't in ranked and ranked is the only game mode where balance matters.

Personally, I find this to be a common misconception among Ranked players. As strange as it may sound, balancing roles is also important in other gamemodes besides just Ranked.

It isn't a misconception. The other game modes are fundamentally broken so balancing the roles within them is not important at all.

PinkiePieStyle2 wrote:

Flavorable wrote:

Vampires aren't in ranked and ranked is the only game mode where balance matters.

Personally, I find this to be a common misconception among Ranked players. As strange as it may sound, balancing roles is also important in other gamemodes besides just Ranked.

It isn't a misconception. The other game modes are fundamentally broken so balancing the roles within them is not important at all.

These two things aren't equivalent, and even if they were, neither of them are universally true (with the exception of All Any, which is chaos in a can and is meant to be that way). One can argue that the role lists for each of the other modes does not lend itself to balance, but that does not mean Ranked is the only mode where balance matters. It simply means that the role lists for the other modes need to be fixed before balancing the roles within those lists can be achieved.

fwogcarf wrote:lazy devs amirite

fwog no
please dont become the new nightsh0w



remember that unity gon be hella class

Google wrote:

fwogcarf wrote:lazy devs amirite

fwog no
please dont become the new nightsh0w

remember that unity gon be hella class

Sure, when it comes out in 80 quintillion years.

shapesifter13 wrote:I am going to be starting to do monthly update posts on these forums starting next month.

That's amazing

Fwogcarf, you are free to have opinions, but if you are going to insult us you will not last long here.

Personally, I'm fine with just these small balance changes we've been getting. New roles would obviously be nice, but I've found these role changes keep me amused with all the new strategies that can be used with each change. Obviously nerfs are not as fun.

Honestly, if you can crank out some balancing every couple of months I'll be perfectly happy until Unity arrives.

ded game is ded

Alicitzen wrote:ded game is ded

Your wise words of infinite wisdom are truly a blessing to us all.

orangeandblack5 wrote:

Alicitzen wrote:ded game is ded

Your wise words of infinite wisdom are truly a blessing to us all.

sayin what we all thinkin
the analytics speak for themselves

Flavorable wrote:It really depends on what you call balance changes and whether you believe they are big or small.

I found both the Arson change, for example, quite a big balance change.
I found the sheriff change to be also quite a big balance change.
Vampires being able to kill when they're full: Big balance change.
Jester being able to haunt abstainees as well as guilties: Big balance change.

And three of these were in the last 4 months.

The Arso change was a bad one.
The Sheriff change was minor.
Vamp change doesn't matter since it's not a Ranked role.
Jester change doesn't matter since it's not a Ranked role.

Since when was Jester “not a ranked role”? I’m pretty sure it appears in 1/3 of all Ranked games.

MysticMismagius wrote:Since when was Jester “not a ranked role”? I’m pretty sure it appears in 1/3 of all Ranked games.

Its NB or NC. You don’t balance the game around roles which shouldn’t exist (in Ranked) in the first place. It should be common sense.