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(For the purposes of this topic, a survivor is any indy role that has no affiliation with a faction and simply needs to survive until another achieves their win condition in order to win themselves, sharing it with the other faction in question)

Survivors. Whether you love 'em, hate 'em, or just don't care, they exist and probably aren't going anywhere.
On other sites, from my experience, they usually don't have a lot going for them. Maybe they're ODTG bulletproof, can self-save a limited number of times, or redirect actions away from themselves, but that's usually it.

The problem, as I see it, is that they can move LyLo and MyLo forward a day, but don't actually have to do so, completely altering the flow of the game at the whim of whoever rolled survivor. And other than this, due to having no allegiance to anyone, so they're just a third wheel to the game that can almost just out and go inactive in order to win, especially with roster instead of hammer voting, where leaving them alive or killing them really only boils down to personal preference, and if you think they'll side with your enemies or not when push comes to shove.
Not to mention that, if you ask me, a vanilla survivor is just boring to play at best, and frustrating at worst, since the potential of being spite-killed near the game's end for not siding one way is always there, no matter how you play.

As a survivor, you don't have any reason to care about any other players in the game, just saving your own hide and possibly blitzing with scum to end the game faster, if that's your thing.
I find the lack of a defined role in a game, other than to pad out the roster size without adding another goodie, baddie, or indy with an actual purpose, leaves the survivor little more than an annoyance ranging from them getting killed and losing the game N1 from an unlucky random kill, to ultimately handing the win out to a faction with no particular regard to how well they'd played.
You don't even have to care about the flow of the game. If the baddies or goodies are winning, or if they're all utterly insane, it doesn't matter. Just that nobody gets bored and either kills you at night or pushes for your lynch.

But what do all of you think? Do you enjoy the element of chaos such roles bring to a game? Or is there some other reason to enjoy playing as or against such roles that I'm just not getting?
I personally think a good indy/neutral role is at the very least anti-goodie if not outright pro baddie, but perhaps many of you disagree? I'd love to hear why.

This post has been edited by Machina: Feb 14 2018, 09:32 PM

I think it get irritating for all involved whenever a player still has control of others in the game but cant win or cant lose. Irritating for the player as they have to go through the motions of pretending to care about the game any longer. Irritating for everyone else as the players decisions could be erratic depending on the lolz or how spiteful they are

I was going to write a long and detailed post on how I mostly agree but have a sticking point, but then I realized that I was misunderstanding what you were defining as a "survivor" role. I was thinking more along the lines of a neutral kingmaker role that *must* affiliate with a faction to win rather than allowing whichever faction to win based on the possibility of action/inaction.

As to a simple survivor role I can't say I personally see much of a benefit from a balancing standpoint in most games. To be fair, I have run some nutzen games with many factions in the past (See MtG Mafia sometime...) and may care more about theoretical balancing than a large chunk of the population here (thank you to those that have assisted me in the past with such monstrosities...) but in over 80% of games (the other ~20% being game types that I haven't participated in or theorycrafted on) the survivor indy throws predictability to the wind. When planning a game with a survivor indy role as defined in this thread (regardless of other abilities) you can't treat them as a separate faction, nor can you possibly balance the game with them assumed to side with any one faction as they will (by definition) tip that balance in favor of "their" faction. This makes balancing both the indy role and the other factions considerably more difficult.

To be fair to any and everyone involved, this sort of thing is not the most obvious out the gate and will often be very attractive to certain game designers...so I'm still not sure I can say it is a bad thing for the game as a whole... I think I'll have to say that in the games that I prefer to theorycraft and create I wouldn't want to try to use a survivor role and not go beyond that.

I should also mention that everything I've said is sort of null in non-standard games like Amber, where the neutral indies do very much serve a point.

But, at the same time, that's not a sort of game archetype you play if you want balance over chaos. Amber III wore its crazy nature on its sleeve, but it worked, at least from my experience, and from what people have said about the past games.

I have voted somewhat differently. Mainly because as a player I seldom get to play indy and usually get NKed early even if my wincon is not directly opposite of the others (looking at you Yuli for NKing me as Croc ).

For a classical game, I don't think survivor roles are beneficial because they can completely disrupt any kind of balance near the end-game. Lone indies should end the game or leave (though even the latter case, there may be disruptions needing care e.g. majority wincons). I prefer to use last standing as a backup wincon for indies and that may in some cases evolve into 1vs1 ties.
In hybrids (aside Amber) I have used this type of wincon whenever stopping the game for an Indy win disregards 10 other players having a good strategy that ultimately fails because of some lucky kills or lynches paving the way for Indy win.

So, yeah, I'd like to play as such a role, even just to repair my Mafia win records but in truth I find this but a minor nuisance as there are higher things on my black list such as Indies needing to be lynched in order to win.

This post has been edited by araver: Feb 16 2018, 10:28 AM

QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 04:27 PM)

I have voted somewhat differently. Mainly because as a player I seldom get to play indy and usually get NKed early even if my wincon is not directly opposite of the others (looking at you Yuli for NKing me as Croc ).

My bad, had to re-read it, my wincon as Croc was actually to RID Kill Yuli as Hook, so him taking me out made perfect sense. I had remembered only my last standing backup wincon from that game. Carry on

QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 09:51 AM)

QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 04:27 PM) I have voted somewhat differently. Mainly because as a player I seldom get to play indy and usually get NKed early even if my wincon is not directly opposite of the others (looking at you Yuli for NKing me as Croc ). My bad, had to re-read it, my wincon as Croc was actually to RID Kill Yuli as Hook, so him taking me out made perfect sense. I had remembered only my last standing backup wincon from that game. Carry on

Haha, I was going to comment on that. I had spied you as Croc and knew you were gunning for my role.

Whats bad, though, is that I don't remember that game at all. In fact, I don't remember a lot of the old games.

As for the Surviving Indy debate, I think they're fine. I do prefer some method of preventing outing. Not mod-killing, because that gets into a lot of gray area. It's hard to balance without breaking the game. I think the baddie ability to sacrifice the NK for 2 RID kills is a pretty good balance.

QUOTE (Yuli @ Feb 16 2018, 08:26 PM)

QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 09:51 AM) QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 04:27 PM) I have voted somewhat differently. Mainly because as a player I seldom get to play indy and usually get NKed early even if my wincon is not directly opposite of the others (looking at you Yuli for NKing me as Croc ). My bad, had to re-read it, my wincon as Croc was actually to RID Kill Yuli as Hook, so him taking me out made perfect sense. I had remembered only my last standing backup wincon from that game. Carry on Haha, I was going to comment on that. I had spied you as Croc and knew you were gunning for my role. Whats bad, though, is that I don't remember that game at all. In fact, I don't remember a lot of the old games. As for the Surviving Indy debate, I think they're fine. I do prefer some method of preventing outing. Not mod-killing, because that gets into a lot of gray area. It's hard to balance without breaking the game. I think the baddie ability to sacrifice the NK for 2 RID kills is a pretty good balance.

Why exactly would any baddies in their right mind RID kill someone who can move Lylo and Mylo a day ahead?

QUOTE (Machina @ Feb 16 2018, 09:05 PM)

QUOTE (Yuli @ Feb 16 2018, 08:26 PM) QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 09:51 AM) QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 04:27 PM) I have voted somewhat differently. Mainly because as a player I seldom get to play indy and usually get NKed early even if my wincon is not directly opposite of the others (looking at you Yuli for NKing me as Croc ). My bad, had to re-read it, my wincon as Croc was actually to RID Kill Yuli as Hook, so him taking me out made perfect sense. I had remembered only my last standing backup wincon from that game. Carry on Haha, I was going to comment on that. I had spied you as Croc and knew you were gunning for my role. Whats bad, though, is that I don't remember that game at all. In fact, I don't remember a lot of the old games. As for the Surviving Indy debate, I think they're fine. I do prefer some method of preventing outing. Not mod-killing, because that gets into a lot of gray area. It's hard to balance without breaking the game. I think the baddie ability to sacrifice the NK for 2 RID kills is a pretty good balance. Why exactly would any baddies in their right mind RID kill someone who can move Lylo and Mylo a day ahead?

I'm not certain on the terms "Lylo" and "Mylo", but unless they have some correlation with counting toward majority, the case where it brings the baddies to immediate majority or into an unstoppable majority (e.g., 3v3 with no vote manip/goodie kills) would be a good candidate. Also considering all of the cases where indies have a secret ability and/or wincon. Especially a secret wincon. I imagine those cases are discounted by this particular case study, however.

QUOTE (Yuli @ Feb 20 2018, 06:51 AM)

I'm not certain on the terms "Lylo" and "Mylo", but unless they have some correlation with counting toward majority, the case where it brings the baddies to immediate majority or into an unstoppable majority (e.g., 3v3 with no vote manip/goodie kills) would be a good candidate.  Also considering all of the cases where indies have a secret ability and/or wincon.  Especially a secret wincon.  I imagine those cases are discounted by this particular case study, however.

Lylo - lynch right or lose
Mylo - mislynch and lose

Although the sound the same there is a subtle difference, on a Mylo you can survive 1 more cycle by not lynching then it becomes a Lylo

QUOTE (Yuli @ Feb 19 2018, 01:51 PM)

QUOTE (Machina @ Feb 16 2018, 09:05 PM) QUOTE (Yuli @ Feb 16 2018, 08:26 PM) QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 09:51 AM) QUOTE (araver @ Feb 16 2018, 04:27 PM) I have voted somewhat differently. Mainly because as a player I seldom get to play indy and usually get NKed early even if my wincon is not directly opposite of the others (looking at you Yuli for NKing me as Croc ). My bad, had to re-read it, my wincon as Croc was actually to RID Kill Yuli as Hook, so him taking me out made perfect sense. I had remembered only my last standing backup wincon from that game. Carry on Haha, I was going to comment on that. I had spied you as Croc and knew you were gunning for my role. Whats bad, though, is that I don't remember that game at all. In fact, I don't remember a lot of the old games. As for the Surviving Indy debate, I think they're fine. I do prefer some method of preventing outing. Not mod-killing, because that gets into a lot of gray area. It's hard to balance without breaking the game. I think the baddie ability to sacrifice the NK for 2 RID kills is a pretty good balance. Why exactly would any baddies in their right mind RID kill someone who can move Lylo and Mylo a day ahead? I'm not certain on the terms "Lylo" and "Mylo", but unless they have some correlation with counting toward majority, the case where it brings the baddies to immediate majority or into an unstoppable majority (e.g., 3v3 with no vote manip/goodie kills) would be a good candidate. Also considering all of the cases where indies have a secret ability and/or wincon. Especially a secret wincon. I imagine those cases are discounted by this particular case study, however.

LyLo = Lynch or Lose
MyLo = Mislynch and Lose
(Both from a goodie PoV)

Again, why would baddies kill someone who can (and often should out of their own self-interest) contribute to that majority, over someone who absolutely cannot? Just kill a goodie and it's 3v2v1.
Though why the survivor didn't side with baddies the previous day begs the question of why they're not taking the immediate win it would have provided.
The only reason baddies should ever kill a true survivor is if they have reason to believe said survivor will side goodie beyond the point of simple self-preservation.
Honestly, a survivor indy really should side baddie the moment it gives them an unbreakable majority in almost all cases, unless there's a vigilante role or other way for the goodies to spite kill them, assuming they're actually playing to win. You win when the game ends, so the faster you can bring that about, the better. Because the longer a game takes, the higher the chance you'll get killed.

On secret wincons, I honestly think secrets in general are flat-out bad game design, but that's both likely to be an unpopular opinion and it's not what this particular topic is about.