On Medium (and Ret)

[orangeandblack5]

Medium and Ret:

I saw some posts mentioning these roles because they also allow dead to living interaction, and that some players view this mechanic in general as bad. We know that Ret is one of the most problematic roles, and it is slotted for a redesign now that Unity is out. We do need to get some bug fixes in for Unity first though. As for Medium it is in a similar spot to Ret almost. Many players either view it as wildy underpowered, or overpowered. Medium is another role that is on our radar for a potential redesign.

Let me start by saying that I think that Medium is in an okay spot right now in the context of Town of Salem. It hasn't been something that I would have suggested get changed with any sort of high priority, but it appears the dev team is at least considering the possibility.

And that's pretty exciting.

First off, the main issues I have with Medium:

• One Medium is not super strong and is easy to counterclaim. Two Mediums turn both into confirmed Town, making the pair significantly stronger than the single role in a way no other role can really self-combo (excepting perhaps protective chains, which are another topic worth discussing another day)

• Medium devalues the Mafia's main weapon - the nightkill. Old Retributionist was worse, sure, but the entire reason the Mafia can kill in the first place is so they can remove voices that could help bring about their downfall. Medium means the people you kill to silence can keep on talking.

• If the Mafia want to silence the dead, even killing the Medium still doesn't accomplish that, because the Medium can just seance to pass along info even after you kill them too! This is by far one of the most underrated abilities in the entire game and means that, when Medium spawns, the dead are effectively impossible to silence no matter what the scum do.

• The kinds of players that only stick around while they're dead because there could be a Medium will be much happier if neither role exists and they can just leave and start another game as soon as they are dead. Removing these interactions with dead players simply allows more people to spend more time playing more games, a net benefit for everyone. In other words, you no longer need to worry about the current gray area of people who leave while they're dead, and can just encourage it with no qualms. Ideally, you could just leave games while dead, and if your team won it would be counted as such on your profile after the game ended, with the appropriate amount of MP being added to your account.

• Many people find Medium very boring to begin with.

And for these downsides it doesn't bring a lot of positive value to the game - it takes zero brainpower to just pass along pertinent info that other players are telling you to pass on, and just about the only choice you have to actively make is who to seance after you have died. Other roles like Spy may suffer from this passivity worse, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't also look at how to fix it here.

So yeah, I for one would be all for removing all dead interaction and just encouraging people that want to get right back into the action to just go queue up for another game.

As for what to do with this role - well, role design has never been my forte, but it's very clear to me that any sort of Medium change that removes its ability to interact with the dead would be nothing short of replacing the role entirely, and luckily there is an entire subforum filled with literally thousands of ideas to that extent. Some of them are probably even good! I'll give it some thought, and if I think of anything I think really fits I'll edit it in. Interested to hear what others would suggest if the devs do go through with this rework.

So sure, I don't think I'd necessarily call the Medium change on its own high-priority - but as long as we're re-evaluating whether or not dead interaction has a place in this game at all, might as well look at it.

[Brilliand]

The devs already have a good idea for the retri rework picked out - the "light-side Necromancer".

As for the Medium, I ran a quick search in the Role Ideas subforum and found this idea that looked good: Medium rework by DragonClaw66

In summary, his idea is to take away the Medium's ability to actually chat with the dead, and instead let them pick a dead townie at night to get all the information that person "should" be telling the Medium (according to the game). This technically isn't dead interaction, but it's very similar in flavor to what the Medium currently does.

[orangeandblack5]

The devs already have a good idea for the retri rework picked out - the "light-side Necromancer".

Did not that involve interacting with dead players?

Because that kinda defeats the purpose of reworking the role if it still causes a good chunk of the same issues imo

[Brilliand]

Did not that involve interacting with dead players?

I'm uncertain. There were ideas tossed around to either let the dead Townie pick the night action the Retributionist lets them use, or have the Retributionist make that decision; and I don't think the devs clarified which way they will do it.

"Use your role ability at night if the Retributionist picked you" is in any case a very narrow form of dead interaction, if they do go that route. The latter route (Retributionist decides everything) has no dead interaction at all.

[orangeandblack5]

Removing dead interaction is really the largest benefit we can reap while we're looking at these roles, so while I still think a backup is better, I'm not inherently against "steal dead people's abilities"

[Robbytherobot]

It might be much easier to fake claim retri as well, if you claim retri now and you cant bring back a town member, while with this necro rework its more feasible.

[orangeandblack5]

That being said I would still encourage you to not give away all of the scum

It's not against the rules it's just kinda a dick move

Gives evils more of a reason to protect you IMO. If I die, I don't want to wait ~20 minutes for the game to end, I want it to end ASAP so I can move on to my next game.

Basically why this change is good

[kyuss420]

are they gonna rework necromancer to do the same thing?

[Brilliand]

are they gonna rework necromancer to do the same thing?

Which same thing?

[kyuss420]

are they gonna rework necromancer to do the same thing?

Which same thing?

well, necromancer doesnt see the results of the TI it controlled, which is what everyone is assuming the reworked ret will do. It doesnt place the trap of the dead trapper (even if trapper died n1 and had a trap ready to be placed). It doesnt transport anyone when a trans is used.

In fact the only use necromancer has, is if a TP or killing role is in the graveyard, and arguably an escort... and even then, whoever was protected by a necro TP is usually outed and lynched the next day...

So basically if ret was reworked into a town necromancer, the only use it would have is if TPs or vigi is dead. giving janitor more to think about with his limited 3 cleans. A necromancer that can never hold a necromonicon, is a very underwhelming role, almost even more boring than being a ret now.

But am in total support of reworking the necromancer, if they are making this change to ret.

[OreoNyan]

I actually enjoy playing Medium and interacting while dead. It’s hard to really have a conversation during live gameplay but dead chat is a way to meet other players, and you can get into some fun mind games when dead maf start discussing their teammates or if there’s a disguiser. I wouldn’t mind retro being less overpowered but I love medium the way it is!

[Amythyr]

First of all, i don't have any issue with medium. I don't think it is overpowered,nor do i think it is underpowered. Evils can equally get themselves confirmed as medium. In fact i have done so before.
I actually think that it is a good thing that medium makes dead to stay. It promotes a good practice. Game should never be centered around finding ways to appease people. This is a team game and medium actually promotes team aspect of the game.
You don't need a power to enjoy the game. I do find scumreading aspect of the game most crucial one. To do that, you don't need any powers.
This will be my only post in this thread. So quoting me isn't going to work as i posted here not to argue, but instead to express my opinion.

[Matty89190]

• Medium devalues the Mafia's main weapon - the nightkill. Retributionist is worse, sure, but the entire reason the Mafia can kill in the first place is so they can remove voices that could help bring about their downfall. Medium means the people you kill to silence can keep on talking.

This is just, like, wrong?

As an evil, if I'm killing, reason number one is probably to stop any further uses of the townie's ability. Reason two is removing a townie vote from the pool and inch us closer to the all-important majority. Silencing a voice would probably come third on the list.

As for this notion as a whole, I think med is fine where it is. In most ranked games (which is what roles really have to be designed around (not here to debate whether or not that's the right philosophy but atm it's just how it is)) the majority of players stay until the end anyway since they like watching how it plays out. For them, a med is a fun bonus.

As for passing on information that otherwise should've been "silenced", at most, any dead townie will have one night of TI results, and them actually being useful is maybe 50% of cases max. Dead chat is hardly a cornucopia of confirming townies/evils. More often than not, nightly med chats in games I've seen consists more of scumreading opinions and the like.

I think med is totally fine where it is. It adds something to an area of the game (the dead) that's otherwise relatively uninteresting (soon to be even more so with resurrections gone, though that is absolutely a change for the better), and the information a med can tap into is never vast enough to be some overpowered trove of intel. The human interaction side of it makes it a fairly fun role to play, too. Lumping med and ret into the same category of needing reworks is nuts; as roles go, med's one of the more well-balanced ones atm.

Plus they all die N1 anyway so it's moot.

[orangeandblack5]

This is just, like, wrong?

No, like, historically speaking, that is literally the reason the Mafia can kill a player each night

The fact it isn't always your personal #1 priority in your own games of Town of Salem doesn't change that

Also, if you've ever played with any truly skilled players, removing their voices is going to be better than going after a certain power role surprisingly often. This is perhaps less relevant in games where everyone's skill is roughly equal, but that doesn't happen a lot.

[Matty89190]

No, like, historically speaking, that is literally the reason the Mafia can kill a player each night

I see your point, but I'm pretty sure the reason the nightkill in the game is to help mafia take majority.

And while in more skilled games dead chats do consist more of scumreads and the like, what can a med do the next day except go "the dead say Giles Corey is sus"? It's hardly a game-breaking input to the discussion. Yes, people might listen to it, but in a high skilled game, the living townies were probably sus of Giles Corey anyway.

As I said before, this is all a bit moot because in ranked games most players stay regardless, so the idea of "removing the thing stopping players from leaving" is a bit redundant. Living-dead interaction is fine as far as med goes and staying around for it isn't an inconvenience to players who stay anyway.

[Brilliand]

I see your point, but I'm pretty sure the reason the nightkill in the game is to help mafia take majority.

Mafia taking majority is not even desirable, exactly. The game is only fun as long as Town has majority. Most Mafia-like games solve that by summarizing any Mafia majority situation as "the game is over, Mafia has won"; and that's a pretty good way to avoid the "unfun" part of the game, but it isn't an ideal in its own right.

[Matty89190]

Mafia taking majority is not even desirable, exactly. The game is only fun as long as Town has majority. Most Mafia-like games solve that by summarizing any Mafia majority situation as "the game is over, Mafia has won"; and that's a pretty good way to avoid the "unfun" part of the game, but it isn't an ideal in its own right.

Yeah I mean by "take majority" I just meant reach a scenario where they have control and have essentially won, but in ToS maf majority is an actual thing anyway.

[orangeandblack5]

I see your point, but I'm pretty sure the reason the nightkill in the game is to help mafia take majority.

Mafia taking majority is not even desirable, exactly. The game is only fun as long as Town has majority. Most Mafia-like games solve that by summarizing any Mafia majority situation as "the game is over, Mafia has won"; and that's a pretty good way to avoid the "unfun" part of the game, but it isn't an ideal in its own right.

Someone hasn't played EIMM (Everyone Is Mafia Mafia) lmao

But while you're absolutely right that seems kinda tangential lol

[OreCreeper]

Imo I don't really think medium's dead interaction ability should be removed. It incentivizes dead people to stay in the game, and especially in Ranked, it makes being killed early a lot less disappointing since it means you can still technically "play the game" even after dying. Dead interaction isn't even that useful of an ability either. Unless a dead TI just happens to find an evil N1 or a lookout dies N1 or something, the dead usually know about the same as the living. Also, medium is like the only current way to find out stoned/cleaned roles right now aside from retri, but that doesn't really count.

[orangeandblack5]

What part of "it's infinitely more engaging to be in another game than stuck in this one dead but with the potential for limited communication" did you disagree with

Because otherwise statements like "It incentivizes dead people to stay in the game" make it sound like you didn't even read my post

[Matty89190]

I mean, I guess I could be in the minority here, but I find it plenty engaging to stay on and watch, especially when I still have a horse in the race (fellow mafia or whatever). Even if I don't, I still have ELO at stake depending on what happens, and it's interesting to see how things play out, what roles people had, etc. Med communication is just a fun bonus on top of that.

As I say, I could be in the minority here, but as mentioned above, the majority of ranked players stay in games until their end, so I don't think I am. If your attention span isn't so much for hanging around, that's fair enough, but I don't think that's something reworks should be based around.

[orangeandblack5]

I also highly doubt I'd ever leave, but if you think a majority of players stick around and genuinely pay attention, I have to ask - do you really think this would still be case if they had the option to leave immediately for free? Right now, there's the possibility of a Medium, there's the possibility of a Retributionist, and there's the fact that staying until the end of the game is the only way to be correctly rewarded for it. Most players stick around one night to check for a Medium/Retri and then go browse the internet or something until the game is finished, as is pretty easily seen by trying to hold a conversation with them in dead chat. Many others just leave anyways. I don't see any reason that you and I not particularly caring should make this a bad idea for the majority of casual players who would appreciate it, nor do I think the other points for removing dead interaction are any less valuable than this one, so I would encourage people only focusing on this specific point to consider all of the benefits.

[Matty89190]

I don't see any reason that you and I not particularly caring should make this a bad idea for the majority of casual players who would appreciate it

The game's balance is built around ranked. Casual players, harsh as it is, are irrelevant.

As for the other "strengths" of removing dead interaction, as I've said above, the medium in its current state is a fine, pretty balance part of the game:

As for passing on information that otherwise should've been "silenced", at most, any dead townie will have one night of TI results, and them actually being useful is maybe 50% of cases max. Dead chat is hardly a cornucopia of confirming townies/evils. More often than not, nightly med chats in games I've seen consists more of scumreading opinions and the like.

I think med is totally fine where it is. It adds something to an area of the game (the dead) that's otherwise relatively uninteresting (soon to be even more so with resurrections gone, though that is absolutely a change for the better), and the information a med can tap into is never vast enough to be some overpowered trove of intel. The human interaction side of it makes it a fairly fun role to play, too. Lumping med and ret into the same category of needing reworks is nuts; as roles go, med's one of the more well-balanced ones atm.

And while in more skilled games dead chats do consist more of scumreads and the like, what can a med do the next day except go "the dead say Giles Corey is sus"? It's hardly a game-breaking input to the discussion. Yes, people might listen to it, but in a high skilled game, the living townies were probably sus of Giles Corey anyway.

Med is fine.

[orangeandblack5]

the medium in its current state is a fine, pretty balance part of the game

Med is fine.

Yes

Let me start by saying that I think that Medium is in an okay spot right now in the context of Town of Salem. It hasn't been something that I would have suggested get changed with any sort of high priority, but it appears the dev team is at least considering the possibility.

Buuuuuuuuuuuuuut

And that's pretty exciting.

First off, the main issues I have with Medium:

• One Medium is not super strong and is easy to counterclaim. Two Mediums (or a Medium and a Retributionist) turn both into confirmed Town, making the pair significantly stronger than the single role in a way no other role can really self-combo (excepting perhaps protective chains, which are another topic worth discussing another day)

• Medium devalues the Mafia's main weapon - the nightkill. Retributionist is worse, sure, but the entire reason the Mafia can kill in the first place is so they can remove voices that could help bring about their downfall. Medium means the people you kill to silence can keep on talking.

• If the Mafia want to silence the dead, even killing the Medium still doesn't accomplish that, because the Medium can just seance to pass along info even after you kill them too! This is by far one of the most underrated abilities in the entire game and means that, when Medium spawns, the dead are effectively impossible to silence no matter what the scum do.

• The kinds of players that only stick around while they're dead because there could be a Medium or Retributionist will be much happier if neither role exists and they can just leave and start another game as soon as they are dead. Removing these interactions with dead players simply allows more people to spend more time playing more games, a net benefit for everyone. In other words, you no longer need to worry about the current gray area of people who leave while they're dead, and can just encourage it with no qualms.

• Many people find Medium very boring to begin with. This is also applicable to Retributionist, albeit not as often.

And for these downsides it doesn't bring a lot of positive value to the game - it takes zero brainpower to just pass along pertinent info that other players are telling you to pass on, and just about the only choice you have to actively make is who to seance after you have died. Other roles like Spy may suffer from this passivity worse, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't also look at how to fix it here.

So yeah, I for one would be all for removing all dead interaction and just encouraging people that want to get right back into the action to just go queue up for another game.

As for what to do with these roles - well, role design has never been my forte, but it's very clear to me that any sort of Medium change that removes its ability to interact with the dead would be nothing short of replacing the role entirely, and luckily there is an entire subforum filled with literally thousands of ideas to that extent. Some of them are probably even good! I'll give it some thought, and if I think of anything I think really fits I'll edit it in. Interested to hear what others would suggest if the devs do go through with this rework.

As for Retri, it suffers from many of the same problems as Medium, but is also incredibly powerful, able to turn back the clock by a day, confirm themselves as Town, and restore a lost power role all alongside bringing back info from the dead chat. Since there do seem to be a lot of players that would benefit if dead interaction was removed in its entirety, I think a fitting replacement for Retributionist could be a simple Universal Backup, able to take for itself any non-unique dead Town member's role. This keeps the important aspect of bolstering Town in areas it has been weakened, while also being a very easy-to-claim role for the Mafia and fixing the large majority of the issues with Retributionist as it is today.

So sure, I don't think I'd necessarily call the Medium change on its own high-priority - but Retri certainly is, and as long as we're re-evaluating whether or not dead interaction has a place in this game at all, might as well look at both.

[orangeandblack5]

Also

The game's balance is built around ranked. Casual players, harsh as it is, are irrelevant.

lol I wish