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[Kay12]

Yeah, I might've remembered wrong because this time only ./bootstrap worked for building, not 'bootstrap'.

[DrKillPatient]

./bootstrap starts it now, I set it as executable. However:

./bootstrap: 2: autoreconf: not found

Oh dear.

[Kay12]

You should install autoreconf, maybe? One of these things which I have done, but it was a long ago. If you're using Ubuntu, most of the devtools aren't installed by default, I think.

[Atomicnom]

Thanks for the new version, Fox. I've been lurking for a long time, but I am a big fan of what you've done for LCS and I figure I ought to show up on on the boards sooner or later. Congratulations on your graduation and good luck with the zombies.

[Conservative Swine]

This newer version seems almost unplayable. Is it just me?

1. Your crimes are automatically discovered and you become wanted, even if nobody saw you do what you did, instantly.
2. Lower recruitment keeps you from expanding and specializing units.
3. Juice is harder to get without getting killed, constraining leader/recruits from recruiting.
4. People get killed off very easily. That's not necessarily a bad thing. It becomes a bad thing when you can't recruit many people and keep them alive/out of jail long enough to get good at serving the liberal cause.

It's taking forever to get things done.

[Kay12]

1. This isn't, as far as I know, restricted to the recent version in any way. I'm not sure if LCS has ever tracked witnesses. Crack house chaos has been removed though, you'll be wanted for crimes there as well.

2. I haven't ever had any problems with recruitment caps, in this version or earlier ones. As far as I know, the maximum subordinates (not loveslaves etc) is currently 12, which is more than enough for a single Liberal in my opinion.

3. Juice gains have been reduced, true. They used to be too fast in my opinion. However, stealthy actions have went too far - it takes too long to reach the 200 limit where things get serious, and after that, the only stealth actions that increase juice are terrorism, prison breaking and similar drastic (and heat-generating) actions. I'm fine with combat juice gains being lowered, it used to take only a while to get a squad of Elite Liberals with 1000 juice.

4. There used to be a "coarse damage reduction" that split all damage in half. I'm not sure when it was removed, but I'm completely ok with weak beginner Liberals having no plot armor.

[Conservative Swine]

It changed. In the earlier versions I played, you wouldn't get an instant wanted for some crime like B&E if no one saw and alerts weren't raised. Now law enforcement knows instantly, with no witnesses and no alarms going on.

[MicroclineHat]

I ran a few tests on this, and as far as I can tell, if you don't go to yellow alert (suspicious) you won't be wanted for vandalism or theft. However, if you kick in a door, even if there were not witnesses and no alerts, it still shows up on your chart.

These are the only things I've checked specifically, so that still leaves opening cages and a few other things.

~~

3. Juice gains have been reduced, true. They used to be too fast in my opinion. However, stealthy actions have went too far - it takes too long to reach the 200 limit where things get serious, and after that, the only stealth actions that increase juice are terrorism, prison breaking and similar drastic (and heat-generating) actions. I'm fine with combat juice gains being lowered, it used to take only a while to get a squad of Elite Liberals with 1000 juice.

I definitely agree on this one. Even with the combat reductions it's nowhere near balanced. If somebody isn't shooting someone else, it is far too difficult to get juice high enough to do anything of substance. If you want to max out your slots for your persuasion or stealth character with any degree of rapidity, they'll need to recruit a strike team and get "tithe juice" off of them, and having a six person team of m16 wielding psychopaths with three-digit murder counts drives heat up to no end. Even then, that strike force will still get to liberal guardian (or even elite) status in less than half that time just by standing in the door of the AM radio station and yokel grinding.

[Jonathan S. Fox]

It changed. In the earlier versions I played, you wouldn't get an instant wanted for some crime like B&E if no one saw and alerts weren't raised. Now law enforcement knows instantly, with no witnesses and no alarms going on.

There has never been a delay in the police detecting any crimes other than kidnapping. They either detect it or they don't.

In the case of smashing doors, it is always been detected, and that hasn't changed. There's an-site delay before Conservatives becomes suspicious, but no strategic delay before you're changed with the crime.

3. Juice gains have been reduced, true. They used to be too fast in my opinion. However, stealthy actions have went too far - it takes too long to reach the 200 limit where things get serious, and after that, the only stealth actions that increase juice are terrorism, prison breaking and similar drastic (and heat-generating) actions. I'm fine with combat juice gains being lowered, it used to take only a while to get a squad of Elite Liberals with 1000 juice.

I definitely agree on this one. Even with the combat reductions it's nowhere near balanced. If somebody isn't shooting someone else, it is far too difficult to get juice high enough to do anything of substance. If you want to max out your slots for your persuasion or stealth character with any degree of rapidity, they'll need to recruit a strike team and get "tithe juice" off of them, and having a six person team of m16 wielding psychopaths with three-digit murder counts drives heat up to no end. Even then, that strike force will still get to liberal guardian (or even elite) status in less than half that time just by standing in the door of the AM radio station and yokel grinding.

I'm open to suggestions on how to make advancement for non-violent Liberals more viable.

The context is two issues:

1. Most non-violent actions are capped in how high your juice can get before they stop rewarding you.
2. Non-violent actions are significantly slower to gain juice than violent actions.

The reason for these things is because they're much safer than combat, and shouldn't be a secure way to train up juice. Despite the noble intentions, it's neutering non-violent playstyles by making it hard to get high-level characters without building a combat squad.

[MicroclineHat]

Well, we have sleeper agents and regular members already. Would it be possible for there to be some dedicated nonviolent actions for a sort of LCS "public face?" Say, a "public debate" activity that had a chance to raise wisdom as a downside, with a sort of graduated juice gain like with hacking?

[Conservative Swine]

As for police detection: I stand corrected.

As for non-violence: What about linking non-violent character juices to an action's impact on public opinion? For example: Getting some juice for writing articles for the Guardian. The more groundbreaking, the more juice.

Another suggestion: What about some kind of goal system, where a liberal/you(secretly or openly to the player) chooses a goal to pursue and you direct them as you always have. If you reach the goal by the end of a month, you get juice. How much? It depends on what was accomplished. The goals could be chosen based on that liberals abilities/skills?

[Kay12]

The way I'd work with non-violent site actions would be... um... I think I'd increase the juice gains from the relatively safe machinery smashing and cage breaking, but keep it capped at 200. Terrorism is pretty hardcore already, maybe it should give out more than the current 100 juice. Prison guards are fairly easy kills, but now that the prison is multi-level (see trunk), rescuing Liberals from the death row using brute force will almost certainly result in a SWAT situation before the squad makes it out. I'd still increase the juice gains from prison busting. Jury tampering, cable/AM takeovers should always result in *some* juice, in my opinion. Maybe 50 if juice <500 and 25, 10 or something like that afterwards.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and I'm not sure how much juice haxxoring the supercomputer gives, because I never managed to do it. It's nearly impossible - a site filled with the toughest NPCs (agents, of course) and dogs with extra-good disguise detection. Doors cause alarms if bashed. Any alarm will cause the computer to go to safe mode. Computer itself requires epic skills. Getting to the computer is hard, getting to the files is a luxury, and getting out with stolen files is almost epic and will infuriate the CIA. This should give a LOT of juice.

MORE EDIT: Oh, and almost forgot, I would like if the playstyles weren't so divided between violent/non-violent. If someone comes up with a good way to handle stealth combat etc, I'm in.

[Soadreqm]

I got to the supercomputer in my last game. Had already maxed out juice by messing with the safes in Corp HQ and CEO house, though. It was two mutants with insanely good stats and maxed-out disguise, with decent ranks in stealth. The dogs still spotted me half the time, but I could bluff my way out pretty much without error, letting me try over and over again.

[Kay12]

Checked the source, it's 100 juice. Should be more, seeing that it's nearly impossible if the map is even remotely difficult. Compare to nuclear plant terrorism, which gives equal juice, but is much easier in all respects (easier monsters, less likely to get spotted, can still pull it off after alarm) and, arguably, is more effective for the Liberal cause (immense, immediate boost to public opinion without long-term side effects like CIA raids).

[Soadreqm]

What are the effects of publishing the data disk, by the way? Is it any better than the "secret documents you can pick off the floor in the CIA HQ?