by SilverCruz » Sat Jun 26, 2021 6:35 pm
Two reasons, from what I've observed.
1 - It's easy.
2 - They find it more interesting than actually playing the game normally.
The first one is exclusively the fault of Ads For Play. BMG says "We gotta stop being free to play to stop bad actors", but then says "Oh, actually, bad actors are fine as long as they give us ad bucks." by introducing Ads For Play. The Facebook requirement is not enough of a deterrent. The ads are not enough of a deterrent. The only way you can stop it from being easy is to completely get rid of Ads For Play, replace it with Ads For Coven Tickets or Ads For Scrolls if you must. Grandson the accounts that exist and have played a game but which don't have Premium accounts so that they can play indefinitely without it, same as the Grandfathers of the Free to Play era, but once that's over, actually lock the damn door. I also sent them an email about Ads For Play weeks ago and never got a response, so... BMG's head seems to be on a fantastic voyage exploring the innermost reaches of its intestinal tract, so far as I've noticed.
The second is just a symptom of the game being boring. I, personally, don't want to go play All Any just to maybe see an Arsonist. I like there being a level of structure to what's going on. That said, Classic and unranked are stale. Classic is intentionally severely lopsided in favor of the town from having only two roles that aren't completely static, one of which can only ever be Vigilante or Veteran, the Serial Killer is a Designated Idiot who can't hide behind the possibility of a different Neutral Killing to stay undercover, and the Mafia has its boring Godfather and Mafioso and a boring Framer, plus the static Executioner and Jester make their plays too predictable. Unranked has more non-static roles, but it's still boring. No Neutral Killing means that the status quo never changes and the Jailor can just always claim on Day 1 because there's never going to be an Arsonist or to a lesser extent Werewolf to fuck them up. Static Executioner means its plays are too predictable, static Witch has no cover to duck behind (can't have a second Witch get lynched, can't rely on the Mafia having a Forger and deciding to forge somebody as a Witch to take heat off you) so it's forced to play hyper-aggressively, plus Framer just feels awful and Hypnotist and Disguiser are insanely self-destructive, the game balance is completely screwed up in general (Jailor is overpowered, Bodyguard is overpowered, Transporter is overpowered, Escort waffles between basically useless and overpowered, Framer is a jobber, Hypnotist and Disguiser are self-sabotaging...), and overall the times this game produces a good experience from trying to play it as intended are really, really drowned out by the times it's completely unfair and uninteresting. Oh, the Godfather got jailed Night 1 and the Mafioso quit without declaring an attack, so the Jailor is going to spam-jail the Godfather until the other Mafia are lynched off. I guess the Mafia just loses now unless the Godfather also quits, but if you quit while you're alive you're a bad person somehow even if not quitting would guarantee your team's failure barring a miracle of the Witch having a Vigilante or an Ambusher managing to get more than one kill without getting instantly lynched.
So yeah. That's the gist of it. I saw a round recently where a very special Ann Hibbins was an Escort. Had the Godfather deadlocked and everything, but was acting so insanely erratic that they got lynched even when it was a standoff of them and a Vigilante with no shots left versus the Godfather and a spent Forger. They could've forced a draw, or even won had they not gotten as many townies lynched as they did and just focused, but they chose not to because they thought it was more interesting than it would've been if they had just played it straight. The problem is they were right. I was a Framer in that game, I got knocked out immediately because I Jailor Claimed on account of being in a foul mood, and the rest of the Mafia managed to land an all-or-nothing attack against the real Jailor, forging them as a Sheriff, because the Doctor bought my claim and went for me on Night 1. Sure, a Lookout caught them, but they managed to shoot the Lookout and sweep that under the rug by forging them as Executioner (though realistically they should've gone for Jester as the forge). It was a messy, stupid round, but Ann Hibbins was right. It was way more interesting because of their disruption than it would've been if the had just deadlocked the Godfather, waited for the Investigator to find the known Forger, then lynched those two off. Of course, being a Framer and therefore benefiting from this nonsense colors my view, but the fact is that what happened in that round was more entertaining than it would've been if Ann Hibbins had been playing optimally.
I'm not saying I condone the actions of that Ann Hibbins, old Socrates, or any other bad actors, but I am saying that as long as they are openly allowed to do this because of Ads For Plays, they will keep doing it. As long as the game is boring and stale and they can't get a better experience out of playing it as intended, they will want to keep doing it. It may not be the only problem, but it is a severe problem that the service just sucks, and that's what BMG needs to fix. A Leaver Buster due for a joint release with the Reconnect Button and Spoony Movie will not fix that. A new game that nobody asked for or wanted will not fix that. Refusing to say more than a sentence a month to people will not fix that. Being afraid of dissatisfaction, labeling it all as "toxic" and refusing to respond to it will not fix that. BMG are not good developers. I'm sure they could be, but they just don't want to even try. They'd rather run away from this game and just let it passively soak ad bucks while they make something else and hope nobody notices the state of that new thing's predecessor.
If any of them read this, then I invite you to prove me wrong. Tell us what you're doing with this game and stop leaving us in the dark. We want to know what's going on.
I know what I'm doing, generally, but I have no grace at all when things start to spin out of control.
I'd like to address the latter part, but I wouldn't know the first thing about that.