Quote:
Originally Posted by ShadoWolfe
town gets hurt worse than wolves do when modkills need to happen, but you want to then also punish them further by taking away their lynch for a phase?
except for very few scenarios, modkills benefit wolves more. both the action (thinning town's numbers), and the cause (an inactive player) benefit wolves and hurt town.
as you said, modkills shouldn't have to happen. so assess it with me. they have to happen because of an MIA player. I say MIA because 5 posts over 48 hours is a very low bar to hit, and failing that means you aren't even playing the game.
So if the game is designed for 9 town and 2 wolves, the modkill in most cases forces that to 8 town and 2 wolves, instantly shifting the balance to wolves.
the only "benefit" to town in the whole thing is that the harm of the cause, (the inactive player that is already hurting town and negatively impacting the entire game), does not compound further by allowing the non-player to give wolves a SECOND free town (thereby thinning the town herd by both the inactive player and the subsequent nightkill). Modkilling only counteracts the compounding effect, but the harm to town is already done.
It makes no sense to add further harm by removing the lynch. By that logic, modkills should never ever happen under any circumstance because then, at least, the lynch control isn't stolen from town.
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I mean to respond to the modkill discussion in general, but I'll just quote this post to save space
this post will also only discuss modkills during a day phase, particularly those that occur towards the end of a day phase. Modkills outside of a day phase are pretty rare anyways. I recall charu once getting modkilled in an anon-game nightphase, and ffa getting nightkilled during the pregame phase, but I think every other modkill that's happened on FFR has been during a day phase, or as the dayphase ends (basically in conjunction with the lynch, like when star and I modkilled tamburini in the most recent Fire Emblem game)
town does not get hurt worse than wolves when modkills happen during a day phase... like the vast majority of the time. This is assuming a modkill does not take the place of the lynch. The vast majority of the time, modkills occur for inactivity on FFR (which btw is the least offensive type of modkill to the integrity of the game. I'll stop with the cutaway thoughts but yeah, its good that inactivity is the main problem, rather than angleshooting or cheating or something)
Because most modkills occur because of inactivity, town eliminates a player who is almost always a ? for the solve, and it harms wolves to lose this regardless of whether the player was a wolf or not in almost all scenarios (the player can be a PR, or be a greencheck from an invest role or something, but I think we can all at least acknowledge what I'm arguing here).
The argument here of the cause (inactivity) benefitting wolves is correct, but the modkill deals with that as effectively as a day-vigi could. It does rob town of a lynch, but that player was likely in the POE, and it thins the POE nearly exclusively as a result.
Wolves win the game by escaping the POE. Granting town what is almost guaranteed to be two shots at killing a wolf (or an evil, for the sake of my following example) when there normally would be one. If anyone recalls the Corporations anon game, a late modkill virtually speedran the game because the 2nd to last threat to town was modkilled, leaving town with a chance to immediately look for the serial killer-esque role, which was immediately found.
Most games are also balanced around odd starting numbers with a day start, with wolves able to kill max 1 player per night. I won't explain the math of this entirely, but modkills (especially when compounding) grant town like an adrenaline shot of early info if they don't take the place of a lynch. Its classic "I'll gladly pay tomorrow for a hamburger today."
also it can incentivize getting modkilled in order to solve a game btw. it is inarguable that, for example, getting modkilled in a game with a f4 as town that is in the POE could benefit town's win% immensely. In this situation it is absolutely tantamount that the modkill take the place of the lynch.
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Lastly, and not related to any of my argument,
I appreciate all discussion around modkills immensely. They're kind of camp-y in the way that art can be so gauche that it becomes artistic. People are kinda fixated on them as a result, I guess. It is interesting to see such discussion around this topic, and I know the main reasoning for it is because of the new rules that appear destined to be written in most/all OPs of games. We do need to figure out a standard where the most people are happy with the result, and discussion is how we do it, so I'm glad to see such engagement on it. Maybe part of it has to do with the game being so drama-free?
Glad to see it regardless of the cause.