Skygazer's Micro Normal review, June 2019

[Something_Smart]

I feel like the increase in town power after one scum dies is too much. The tracker starts getting innos (innos that can't be killed no less, unless scum kill another uncleared player in the doctor), the FV becomes basically confirmed town (I don't think any but the most tinfoil-y players would expect scum multitasking FV), and the mailman, if alive, has to stop using their power and become hella suspicious for doing so.

A day 2 scum lynch can lead to scum autoloss if the tracker, tracker's inno, and FV all live to D3.

Whereas, on the flip side of the coin, if town mislynches D1 and D2 their power pretty much doesn't help them at all, unless the tracker or doctor gets lucky.

What's the point of the fruit vendor? It seems like its only purpose is to become confirmed town after a scumflip, which antisynergizes like hell with the tracker.

[Something_Smart]

I was toying with tracker -> traffic analyst.

That would definitely fix the problem I brought up but it might make it too townsided.

I do think RC is right that it's probably in the realm of balanced, but imo it's likely to not be very fun for the losing team.

[Something_Smart]

Negative, I'd think. The whole point of traffic analyst is that if you could communicate with someone in the past, but you can't anymore, you won't come up positive.

[Something_Smart]

It's exactly the same, there's no way the TA's results after N2 are useful

[Something_Smart]

It's comparable to cop 9p, except that the cop stops working after a scumflip, but sometimes their clears can't be killed.

I think it's probably fairly balanced. Could be rough for town if the TA gets N1'd, but that's kinda unavoidable in setups with strong roles.

If you wanted to make it a bit more townsided, you could change it to macho 2-shot traffic analyst and regular doctor. It's exactly the same functionally, but the macho flip confirms the existence of a protective so the doctor will probably be conftowned based on claim (unless scum CC protective).

[Something_Smart]

You could add the fruit vendor back, that would add another potential conftown if a scum dies early and the TA becomes useless.

[Something_Smart]

You could also put in a 1-shot BP; that would increase the odds of two no-kill nights (although it would also lead to confusion over why there was no kill)

[Something_Smart]

Idk, the whole point of traffic analyst is that it gets more reliable innos than guilties, and even then only early on. It's not as though the mailman will be locked as town, I don't think.

If you don't like the scum mailman, you could just do a scum/town neighbor pair. That would still render one scum TA-immune.

[Something_Smart]

Honestly, mailman hasn't seen enough play to be able to judge that. I think I've only ever played with it once (Undertale) and it never came into play publicly, and I've only ever seen it a few times, in normal games or otherwise.

It's pretty hard to predict how it might play out. You might be right, and I do know that traffic analysts are often included in games with town roles that serve as millers for it.

[Something_Smart]

If you don't want to go the ways I'm brainstorming, that's okay, but I'm thinking of something like:
town macho traffic analyst
town doctor
town 1-shot BP
town neighbor
VT x3
mafia goon
mafia neighbor

Not sure if that's balanced but it's definitely in an interesting place, if you like the ideas.

[Something_Smart]

The reason I switched it from simple doctor to macho TA in my setup was just because as the number of VT's go down, the odds that the doctor can actually save one of them go down.

Weirdly, your setup's pretty similar to the old one but I lean more scumsided on it. Maybe the mailman was messing with my head, although in the previous setup the mailman only had an excuse for a N1 guilty.

Also, scum/town neighborhood has a high potential for pocketing.

[Something_Smart]

Probably the only interaction that's townsided in my setup is if the traffic analyst gets an inno on the BP, so yeah I think I do agree there.

You could probably remove the BP and have it be okay, but I do kinda like the potential for two no-kill nights if town plays really well. It would be nice if there were some way to make it so the doctor can't save the BP, but they still have four VT's they can save.

Maybe:

town traffic analyst
town simple doctor
town 1-shot BP
VT x4
mafia goon
mafia 1-shot neighborizer?

[Something_Smart]

fuck that really rewards the traffic analyst for outting D1 because rolestopper protects the TA and prevents them from getting RB'd

Yeah. I don't like that aspect of it.

That setup really should be broken but I'm hurting my brain trying to think of how it is

[Something_Smart]

I don't really think the roleblocker fits at all with the rolestopper.

You'd probably get what you're going for by just making it a doctor. It's unlikely that the rolestopper (who will target towny people) and the traffic analyst (who will target null/scummy people) will target the same player.

[Something_Smart]

Back and forth is how you make good setups

Why did you decide to use BG over doc?

[Something_Smart]

Idk your setup feels like mechanically it works but the roles don't really fit together that well, like yeah mailman's a miller for the TA but they also kinda self clear after a scum is dead because their action is confirmable.

[Something_Smart]

i dig this but my main concern is i feel like the high potential for no kills could get pretty unfun/demotivating esp w two in a row

Well, that's the thing about micros. You have to balance no-kills as worth very little unless they have the potential to come in pairs.

And given that bodyguard mechanically amounts to an extra confirmed town most of the time, putting in a different protective is usually a lot more interesting...

[Something_Smart]

You're right though. Back-to-back no-kills is terrible for scum morale.

[Something_Smart]

What's wrong with making the traffic analyst macho and just having a doctor?

[Something_Smart]

I don't know if mailman is clearable on setup spec given that we almost just made it scum

Did you intend for the MD to be multitasking? It makes sense for it to be... but I don't want to run into bullshit like we tried to do in Jazz Mafia where we tried to confirm that LUV was really a voyeur, which would have cleared him unless multitasking.

[Something_Smart]

I mean, you're allowed to reveal setup info in the rules. You can always just say "if scum have any visiting PR's, they will be multitasking." Yeah people would read into that and assume there is one, but that's kind of unavoidable if you want to warn town about multitasking.

[Something_Smart]

I don't like the hint idea. If you want to give info to town like that, just make them informed. Making the mailman informed would also give them something to say in their message.

[Something_Smart]

Also, heckin bamboozled, I was the secondary reviewer the whole time :3

In other words, I'm just a consultant I'd like to hear from RC and see how he feels about all this. All this informed business may be a bit much.

[Something_Smart]

Yeah true. No multitasking is probably fine.

[Something_Smart]

Non-multitasking scum just irks me in general, but it makes sense here with the traffic analyst.

I think this is pretty good. Let's see what RC thinks.

[Something_Smart]

Would it be better with simple doctor?

[Something_Smart]

That's just a worse cop 9p, though. I'm guessing the problem is that the macho confirms the doctor.

We could make the traffic analyst ascetic instead.

[Something_Smart]

Barring an extraordinarily mechanics-ignorant town or a scum strong investigative CC, neighborizer shouldn't be lynched. Leaves two hard clears, a couple of potential soft clears pending setup spec and claims, and plenty of room for confusion.

Only thing I don't like is that MD can get clears after a scumflip... maybe a N1 MD?

[Something_Smart]

Like, scum lynch D1 could be auto, even with N1 MD. Neighborizer gets a clear, MD gets a clear, people trust both claims because setup spec, game over.

This is why I brought up traffic analyst before Maybe you could make it a 1-shot combined neighborizer traffic analyst although I think NAR says that would always get a guilty

[Something_Smart]

Cop tracker vs rolecop is one of the worse newbie setups ngl. And I'm not worried about MD guilties, I'm worried about MD clears. (Although I don't think town will ever let an MD guilty live to endgame if they didn't claim ahead of time.)

[Something_Smart]

I guess I'd be okay with reducing the MD to N1, given that the autowin scenario is pretty unlikely and requires scum to play really badly.

But I really don't like D1 town lynch, D2 scum lynch, D3 town has a cop clear and tracker clear and autowins. I want to prevent that.

[Something_Smart]

That's interesting. A ton of negative feedback because the TA is useless if a scum is dead and almost useless if no scum is dead but the masons are still alive.

I think communication between the neighborizer and their target is pretty important here, though, so you may just want to ditch the encryptor and go full daytalk.

Or add a town encryptor. That would be spicy, actually.

[Something_Smart]

Oh man, now I really want to make the goon an encryptor.

[Something_Smart]

That's too good for town though.

It may be townsided even without it. May want to duck the traffic analyst back to one-shot.

Actually maybe you could pull off making the traffic analyst N2 and the goon an encryptor.

[Something_Smart]

by the time this review is over i'll have like 10 setups that r vaguely balanced w slight flaws

Yeah no kidding. This has to be one of my favorite reviews of all time.

[Something_Smart]

Yeah after I think.

Town encryptor claims and probably gets townlocked after a scumflip, but one scum can also claim encryptor and it may be believed. With two encryptors scum will be neighborizer hunting from D1.

It's unlikely for both scum to be guiltied, and if they are, both guilties come out in LYLO.

It's probably a bit townsided, but honestly I think it will be fun and that outweighs that. If scum get neighborized N1 they can counterclaim a guilty on the neighborizer if they get to the thread first, etc etc.

[Something_Smart]

Yeah, the neighborized non-encryptors won't be cleared. The scum encryptors WILL have to explain why they didn't claim D1, though they can still get out of that.

RC it is time for your voice of reason to check our silliness

[Something_Smart]

What do you find unacceptable about it?

[Something_Smart]

That's probably fine, it's likely MD will use their shot N1 unless they really think they'll survive to D3.

I do like that other idea though I'll sign off as your reviewer if you run it as a theme, but I guess if you actually want to we gotta keep this topic closed until then.

[Something_Smart]

as a side-note my game in the large theme queue has flavor based around the evil NRG led by the nefarious implosion trying to get skyg's game pulled from the normal queue and it's completely unrelated to this review

For the record whether or not I end up playing in it, you have my permission to use me as in the flavor as a villain if you want

Ngl, whenever I include myself in flavor it's always as a villain

[Something_Smart]

For the record I don't see why encryptor was clarified to encrypt all PT's if something like this is not runnable, but I do see where RCis coming from

That sounds fine though, if you ever want to come back to any of the ideas we discussed in here I'll be happy to pull this back out and keep working on it.