[Suggestion] Guard towers, and how they could work

[utopiar]

Good to be back to PA since a few months! I like the new gangs. They made me think about security.
I'm hoping, thinking and guessing guard towers will be added in the (near) future...

Here's my two cents on how I hope they'll work:

First, two concepts need to be added:
Re-ad Fog of war outside at night. or a slightly blurred/dimmed version of normal-view. (Dark shaded inmates perhaps?)
Escape-method: climbing/scaling the wall. perhaps with new contraband tied-up-sheets, rope, ladder etc. or even blowing up the wall with a bomb. in short: a reason for an inmate to 'head for the wall'

The watchtower:
Is a placeble 3x3 with with and a searchlight on top. A guard needs to be manning it, for it to function.
Has a high upkeep, high purchaseprice, we shouldnt be able to spam towers
Is OPTIONAL placeable over walls with one side for entrance. Maybe automatch the color of the wall (bricks/concrete)
Should take much more electricity at night, when they switch on at dusk without enough power: 75% chance the searchlights won't work, 25% they ignite for a second and then a blackout occurs.
Has a circular sightline/sphere of influence (but vision is blocked right behind obstacles,)

Guardtower during daytime:
Offers suppresion in their complete sightline.
Shoots rubber bullets or teargass when a fight or riot breaks loose.
Teargas potentially supresses a large group, but has a small chance to infuriate a group into a larger fight/riot. (try teargassing a gangmember..)

Guardtower during nighttime:
Iginites searchlightes at dusk.
'scans' all area without foundation with searchlight, clearing the fog of war. If a prisoner is spotted (please-please-please-please) make an alarm sound. Beam keeps focused on escaping inmate.
Depending on charactertraits the inmate give up or starts running, continueing his original plan +10%speed. -20%succes. Towerguard opens fire while inmate is in range.

Linked concepts:
Freefire also switches to live rounds for guardtower.
Teargassed inmates and guards need to be treated at infirmary. The whole bunch at the same time.
New course: Marksmanship for increased acuracy by Chief of security, maybe at a new 'firing-range' object or even 3day course offmap. ( hitchance +15%)
Blackouts lasting more than 15 minutes increase the startup of escape attempts and tunnels. speed of current tunnels and escapeattempts +20%
Blackouts can occur at random. (rare)
New rare contraband found at guardtower: Teargas. An unmanned guardtower and an inmate with keys or lockpick spells disaster. (inmate potentially insta-uses it when searched)
Combination of escape attempts: tunneling to the pumpstation, breaking the door, heading for the wall.
A chance that a captured inmate is captured offmap and returned to your prison, with a fine. This could help create the 'need' for lethal force.

Optional: new guard type: Towerguard. Not really sure if this is a good idea or not.
For realism I don't know guards irl have a day on the tower and a day in the hallways or they are seperate functions.
For gameplay I see some use for it in the training and equipment part (not all guards have to be marksmen and teargas could be researched like tasers for the towerguards)
Or you could leave the sniperrifle/rubberbulletgun/teargasgrenades at the tower, not on the normal guard, when he leaves.

I think a lot of things have been discussed before or some things might not be (completely) programmable, and some things you might completely disagree on.
But I do hope guardtowers will resemble my idea! One can only hope... and share on the forum..

[Grafando]

I was thinking the same thing man. I like how in-depth you went with your idea, and I like it everything you added.

[Pompier15]

I like your idea and I have something to add to your proposition, it concerns this part :

Optional: new guard type: Towerguard. Not really sure if this is a good idea or not.
For realism I don't know guards irl have a day on the tower and a day in the hallways or they are seperate functions.
For gameplay I see some use for it in the training and equipment part (not all guards have to be marksmen and teargas could be researched like tasers for the towerguards)
Or you could leave the sniperrifle/rubberbulletgun/teargasgrenades at the tower, not on the normal guard, when he leaves

I propose that we could have two option : First mid-game option : a classical guard on the tower will have just an extended vision around the tower and that's make spamming towers not worth.
Second end game option : We'll have a research "sniper formation" and then it unlock the sniper formation, thanks Capitain Obvius. The formation is available only for armed guard. For each sniper in the prison, the height arise much more than a classical armed guard. This will destroy the spamming of tower. We'll have to think about strategical place for the few towers we have. When there is a sniper on the tower, his vision is increased (more than the cassical guard), and the sniper will be able shout every escaping prisonner. When he shout there is a chance to miss his cible, a chance to hurt and a chance to kill him.

After, I maybe going to far, but for counteract this high security system, gangs could coordinate a massive escape by drugging the sniper with some contreband (the day prisonners will try to going into the staffroom or into the tower (even if it's staff only :p) ). When the sniper is drug his capacity to detect prisonners is below 50% for a night.

That's all ^^ Sorry my English is not very good.

[utopiar]

Your English is not bad, Pompier, i understand everything you wrote.

Thank you for your input. You mean two different towers? One for normal guards and an armed version?
Or the ability for an armed guard/sniper to stand in it, or a normal guard?

Second option i like best, you could place them with the deployment screen, and time the occupation of the towers too that way.

The drugging part seem nice, but maybe a bit tricky to implement. Sounds nice, but it would be a big coincidence if you even see what happened, if it does.
Maybe just script it so guards have a hidden 'watchfulness' (double L double S? Can't decide ) status during their shift.

[Pompier15]

I was thinking for only one tower (which cost around 1,000 or 2,000 dollars) and we deploy with the deployment the kind of guard we want. I wonder if a automaticaly deployment like the CCTV could be great but with the 2 kind of guard available for this tower it will be hard.
If drugging is to hard to code, I propose a new system, now in the lundry Prisonners can steal guard/gardener/janitor uniform and when the night fall they disguise themself into staff member. Dirty closes were lelft in the cell and the prisonner is hide from guard tower. But doors will still be closed for him, he has to lockpick them to passing throw. If the prisonner walk to close of a patrolling guard, he will be catch.
And finally the last option for passing throw guard towers : tunnels.

[Karkadinn]

Within the current design guidelines of the game engine, I think it makes more sense to have guard towers as designated, enclosed rooms with special objects and windows, rather than an object that the guard 'mans' like a vehicle. It's a lot more akin to a building than it is to a regular object.

I'm a little concerned that adding towers could make the game too easy. Armed guards are as vulnerable to attack as anyone else in your prison, but a separate tower, no matter how expensive, would most likely be all but impregnable unless a massive riot was going on. Sheer money cost isn't enough to balance it out, since money becomes irrelevant eventually as your prison economy stabilizes. I'd rather see built-in limitations that keep them from being one-size-fits-all security solutions.

Maybe they would be unable to see 'close' distances within a few squares, for example? They should also probably block utilities, like perimeter walls already do.

[Pompier15]

There is the budget, the room (with the classroom formation), the recherche limitations and I was speaking for the more snipers we have the more prisonners are angry. For exemple we can't have 3 snipers without having the maximum riot risques.

but a separate tower, no matter how expensive, would most likely be all but impregnable unless a massive riot was going on.

I was telling for a drugging option which can help to fix this problem.

Within the current design guidelines of the game engine, I think it makes more sense to have guard towers as designated, enclosed rooms with special objects and windows, rather than an object that the guard 'mans' like a vehicle. It's a lot more akin to a building than it is to a regular object.

It could be easy to make a new room indeed but a room is not a tower even if it's isolated. It's not RP. We don't need really to create a vehicle, we just need to create an object with the same properties than the CCTV monitor I think (If the CCTV is a vehicle, I've said nothing).

[Jailer]

Like the idea and well thought out -
Devs stated in their videos that gangs were the last big thing to be added before release - so either they regard this as not such a big thing, or its not being implemented before release (but maybe after?)

[Neddleson]

If you take a look at the spite bank in the game files you'll notice a guard with a cowboy hat, shades and cartridge holders on his shoulders, I assume this is a new 'Marksman' guard that will soon be added into the game.

I think that in order to combat the possible problems with height perspective seeing as towers would be a tall building there could be transparency in order to show and prisoners/objects that are blocked off by the looming tower.

I think that tear gas could also have the potential risk of causing some prisoners (and staff) to suffocate, which like OD'ing would require medical attention in a limited time in order to save them.

Towers could also be a way of preventing contraband from being thrown over into the prison (because who's going to throw a bag of drugs over a prison fence with guards watching).

All in all guard towers have been the feature that I have been anticipating the most for PA, pretty much since late 2013! I really like the detail of this post too

[utopiar]

Thanks Neddleson!
Your idea on the transparacy and the thrown in contraband are good aditions as well, I think.

I'm curious on how (/if/when) they'll put it in the game.. as you said, the height maybe a bit tricky. I wouldn't mind if it was allmost completely top-down view.
Maybe a 3x3towerbase, with a 2x2 standing platform, with a 1x1 roof/searchlight stacked together. (As a general idea) You'd only see a part of the guard below the searchlight.

[Tycoonkoz]

This is my favorite version of guard towers and riot suppression. I really hope the DEVs read this.

[5hifty]

Eh. While guard towers would be nice, I would much prefer my guards becoming uncrap in combat situations before they were worked on. Not like much of this is going to happen - next release might have a campaign mode, but I doubt any new mechanics. Instead of a guard tower, just the simple ability to somewhat control my guards would solve so many problems. Stuff as simple as: attack THAT guy, or STOP attacking that guy would be a game changer.