"Prisoner"

**Luca Balsa**, also known as the **"Prisoner"**, is a Decode/Assist Hybrid Type and Difficulty 2 Survivor available for purchase after completion of the prologue. He is one of **43** playable Survivors added to Identity V.

—Luca Balsa (Deduction Star 2020)

## Appearance

Luca is a tall, slender doll with fair skin, messy brown hair is pulled into a short ponytail, with strands of hair sticking up from his head, thin, arched brown eyebrows, and warm grey eyes cross-stitched with black thread, the left of which is swollen purple, with a purplish-grey bruised eyelid obscuring half of his left eye. A tiny fang sticks out the left corner of his grinning mouth, revealing white teeth.

He wears a slightly stained prisoner's shirt with a high collar and long, tapered sleeves, skinny jeans, and a leather belt with two satchels attached, in the left of which a hammer, some wire, rope, and a screwdriver are visible, and in the right of which a small wrench is visible. He also wears buckled leather boots with matching boot garters buckled up to his knees, and around his neck is a large metal shackle with a broken chain dangling from it. He also wears stained, filthy light grey cotton gloves with haphazard white stitching and thick cuffs. White linen bandages wrap around his neck and left forearm. A tear is visible in his left forearm, showing cotton stuffing.

## Gameplay

The "Prisoner" is a decode/assist-type Survivor who specializes in decoding more than one Cipher Machine at once with speed, connecting two of them together, allowing their progress to be shared. He is also equipped with a small electric stun ability, starting each round with one, which can be recharged at a Cipher Machine that is being connected. When the Hunter stays in the area of a connected Cipher Machine being decoded by the "Prisoner" for too long, they will be stunned, though the Hunter develops resistance to the stun until completely immune to it. He is also able to automatically share gate opening progress between the two gates. His decoding speed is also increased when decoding a connected Cipher Machine, and if he fails a calibration, the amount of time he is frozen in place is reduced. However, the distance of his detection of the Hunter is greatly decreased, causing him to be easily Terror Shocked if not careful.

### External Traits

Below is a list of "Prisoner”'s intrinsic traits. For more in-depth information, please check the individual pages.

 Circuit Control | *The "Prisoner" is extremely familiar with the electric circuits under the Manor. He can change the connection status of the wires to alter the connection of the Cipher Machines. Once connected, the transmission of Decoding Progress between Cipher Machines is enabled.*
***How to Use**: Tap item to use. The "Prisoner" envisions the distribution of Cipher Machines in his head and changes the wiring to adjust the connection status between Cipher Machines.*
***Connection**: The "Prisoner" can connect two inactive Cipher Machines and form a **Connection**, with a cooldown of **30** seconds. Each "Prisoner" can only generate 1 Connection, and there can only be 2 Cipher Machines on each Connection. All Survivors will be able to see the Connection.*
*When Survivors decode a Cipher Machine on a Connection, they can transmit a certain percentage of their Decoding Progress to another Cipher Machine. During the transmission, their own Decoding Progress will be decreased by the same transmission percentage.*
 "Conductor" | ***Charge**: An incident changed the Prisoner's body composition and made him a "Conductor" capable of accumulating electric charges. When the "Prisoner" decodes a Cipher Machine in a Connection, an **electrical area** will be formed as a result of electrical charges focusing around the Cipher Machine. When Hunters enter such an area for a long time, they will be electrocuted and stunned. With each electrocution, the Hunter's resistance to electric charges is permanently increased so that the stun duration of the Hunter will decrease until it drops to **0**. When a Connection becomes invalid or destroyed, the electrical area will disappear with it.*
***Enhanced Charge**: Due to his unique body composition, the "Prisoner" will recharge when he enters the electrical area. Once the recharge is completed, he can release **severe electric currents** 1 time. The severe electric currents will send an Electric Shock towards Hunters nearby and stun them for **1** seconds.*
 Super Circuit | *To play it safe, the "Prisoner" set up a connection between the two Exit Gates in advance. While the Exit Gates are opened, the coded lock will connect automatically, allowing transmission of the Decoding Progress between the two coded locks.*
 Obession | *The decoding speed of the "Prisoner" is increased by **10%** when decoding a Cipher Machine on a connection. Once a calibration fails, his rigid time is decreased by **30%**.*
*However, such obsession also weakens the Prisoner's perception of his surroundings, such that the distance of his detection of the Hunters is decreased by **20%**.*

### Tips

**Please press "Expand" to see tips about playing as and against this Survivor.**

#### As "Prisoner"

* **"Prisoner"** player should connect the cipher he's on to the cipher with another decoder or survivors who struggle to kite as this at least allows them to change cipher quicker, moving their position.
* Similarly to Enchantress, his Enhanced Charge range is shorter than Xie Bi'an (White Wu Chang) and The Feaster's Charged Attack range. Apply the same tactic from Enchantress (Stop running to use the ability) to nullify this.
* The gate decoding speed transmission is highly situation to use. It's recommended to not use this at all if there's no reason to.
	+ Communicating with other survivors can help determine the situation better.
	+ Take note however that the hunter can still cut the connector but you cannot reconnect it. Transfer as much progress as you can before it gets cut off if the situation needs gate opening transmission.
* Despite the Enhanced Charge ability, you should avoid getting pursued at all cost just like other decoders, as you can only use the ability once every 60 seconds.
* The penalty of smaller hunter detection radius can be nullified through communication.
	+ Bringing the persona talent Cold can also help, especially on darker maps.
* In some cases, it may be worth it to connect a cipher while kiting to bait the hunter in cutting it off, buying yourself more time to move out of the area to other kiting routes.
	+ This is situation and requires a moment where the hunter is guaranteed to cannot get you for a few seconds and you must be near the cipher machine to activate the charge and force hunter to destroy it.
* When priming a cipher, you should connect the cipher but not transmit progress. This provides an additional 5% decoding speed due to decoding on a connected cipher.
	+ If the other cipher is the one being primed, you can send progress if there is someone on the other side or if it is very close to being finished. Otherwise, it may be more beneficial to just prime the cipher you are at, even if there is less progress.
* **"Prisoner"** benefits well when paired with Explorer as Explorer's treasure can be used to transfer decoding progress immediately.
* It is not recommended to have multiple **"Prisoners"**, especially without communication as the connector of each other will block the cipher machines for the connector of another **"Prisoner"**.
* In term of Persona build, it is recommended to build the persona solely for self-survival. Despite the game stating that he can suit a bit for assisting, it is situational and you're more likely to get pursued yourself than going to assist other people. Additionally, the assist most likely refers to cipher progress instead of supporting a kite or rescue.

#### Against "Prisoner"

* As stated before, Xie Bi'an (White Wu Chang) and The Feaster's attack range are longer than **"Prisoner"**'s Enhanced Charge ability.
* Unlike other decoders (Except Mechanic), the cipher **"Prisoner"** is on tends to be the one that shakes less due to having to transfer decoding progress to other survivors.
* Be careful which cipher machine to teleport to. You may teleport to the cipher machine where there's just a connector and no survivor at all, wasting your ability.
* You're more likely to face this survivor on larger maps such as Moonlit River Park. Despite the higher loss of decoding progress transmission, it makes "Prisoner" less likely to be found and the ability to activate primed cipher from anywhere is more powerful in larger maps due to the longer amount of time for travelling.
* If you're in a situation where you're defending a gate from everyone, cut out the gate connector. This is so that **"Prisoner"** cannot transfer the decoding speed and throw your effort away and since **"Prisoner"** cannot reconnect the gate connector, you don't have to worry about it anymore once you cut the connector off.
* Pick a hunter with high mobility such as Wu Chang, "Undead" etc. can force **"Prisoner"** to repeatedly reconnect the connector but not make use of it.
	+ This still depends on the players' playstyle on the hunter (Except "Undead" who is already forced to control cipher machines). This benefits the most with an aggressive cipher controlling playstyle.

### Character Statistics

**Press "Expand" to see the character's statistics.**

Movements
* Running Speed: 3.8 m/s
* Walking Speed: 2.11 m/s
* Crouch Walking Speed: 1.14 m/s
* Crawling Speed: 0.44 m/s

Decoding
* Duration of decoding Cipher Machines (with a Connection): 73.64 sec
* Regressed decoding progress from electric shock: 1.0%
* Duration of inability to decode from electric shock: 1.4 sec
* Time spent opening Exit Gate: 18.0 sec

Interactions
* Time spent dropping pallets: 0.73 sec
* Time spent vaulting over pallets at high speed: 1.17 sec
* Time spent vaulting over pallets at medium speed: 1.63 sec
* Time spent vaulting over pallets at low speed: 2.07 sec
* Time spent vaulting over windows at high speed: 0.87 sec
* Time spent vaulting over windows at low speed: 1.27 sec
* Time spent going through chests: 10.0 sec

Healing
* Time spent healing injured Survivors: 15.0 sec
* Time spent being healed by others: 15.0 sec
* Self-healing time after knockdown: 30.0 sec

Others
* Duration of footprint: 4.0 sec
* Duration of speed boost after being hit: 2.0 sec
* Duration of struggle while being held up: 16.0 sec
* Rocket Chair countdown time: 60.0 sec
* Time spent being rescued from Rocket Chairs: 1.0 sec

## Concept / Design Notes

### Social Media

The former Luca Balsa was friendly and friendly in the eyes of most people, and he was not wary of others. No one knows where he came from, and no one has ever met his family, but it is clear that he was very well educated, had high self-esteem, and was curious about various scientific inventions.

As a matter of course, he joined the most famous inventor in the city and became an invention assistant.

Luca is highly regarded by the great inventor, and many people are optimistic that he will inherit the mantle of the great inventor, but everything came to an abrupt end after an academic dispute.

The Great Inventor claimed that Luca had privately sold his research results to competitors, calling him an ungrateful traitor, while Luca called the Great Inventor a thief who had no talent.

The truth of the facts is unknown. A laboratory electrical accident killed the great inventor, and Luca suffered irreversible brain damage and was charged with murder.

Luca was sentenced to hang, but was pardoned at the last moment for some reason.

But everything can't go back to the past. His memory has deteriorated and his concentration is not as good as before. He can no longer engage in scientific research, and his family property has also been used to pay huge compensation to the widow of the great inventor.

However, Luca did not give up his determination to practice his original invention, but it required a lot of money, so after he received the invitation letter with huge reward conditions, he decided to take the risk.

———————————

Combined with Luca's character setting of "been in prison", the shackles on the neck and thin prison uniforms in sketch 1 are more in line with our expectations. Therefore, we refined on the basis of 2, and reduced the exaggerated facial expressions a bit, and got sketch 2.

According to the setting of "Inventor", Luca's tool types need to be richer, so we iterated on Sketch 2. At the same time, his demeanor characteristics have been modified to distinguish him from other characters.

The optimized sketch 3 has been in line with the setting as a whole, but the sense of the times is not enough, it looks a bit like a modern person. By adjusting the material and reflectivity of the tools (gloves, screwdrivers, etc.), Luca finally became the final draft picture 4, ready to settle in the manor~

## Change Log

13th May, 2021
* Buff: Prisoner can use Severe Electric Current at the beginning of the game.
* Buff: Progress lost when transmitting to the cipher machines has now been reduced from 10-20% to 5%-15%.

15th September, 2022
* Buff: The "Prisoner's" Severe Electric Current will recharge outside the electrical area (60 seconds to full charge outside the electrical area and 7.7 seconds to full charge inside the electrical area).
* Buff: The "Prisoner's" decoding speed is increased by 5%. When decoding a Cipher Machine on a connection, the Prisoner's decoding speed is increased to 10%.

20th April, 2023
* Nerf: Increased the charging time for the Prisoner's Severe Electric Current from 60 seconds to 75 seconds.

## Trivia

* "Prisoner" shares his title with a pre-existing costume for Smiley Face.
* "Prisoner" is currently the only survivor in which only one eye follows the blinking animation, instead of both or none, with the blackened eye remaining open forever.
	+ In pre-release footage showcasing his abilities and design, both of **Prisoner's** eyes are seen blinking.
* "Prisoner" is based on Nikola Tesla, a Serbian-American inventor with heavy contributions to progression in utilizing electricity.
	+ "Prisoner"'s birthday is on July 10th, which is Tesla's birthday.
	+ "Prisoner"'s mentor, Alva, shares his name with the middle name of Thomas Edison. Tesla worked under Edison for a short time before the two became rivals.
* "Prisoner" is ambidextrous. He is shown in official media for the series, as well as in personal animations in the game itself, constantly switching which hand he uses as his dominant hand for tasks. This is another reference to Tesla, as Tesla was ambidextrous.
* According to the Official Identity V Museum, "Prisoner" is 175 cm tall (5'8).
* In several different language versions of his first letter, "Prisoner" uses the name Lucas Balzac.

## Other Languages

 🇺🇸 | English
 español | Español(Spanish) | "Prisionero" (Luca Balsa)
 🇮🇩 | Bahasa Indonesia
 🇲🇾 | Bahasa Melayu
 🇻🇳 | Tiếng Việt(Vietnamese) | "Tù Nhân" (Luca Balsa)

## References

1. ↑  Chinese wiki website confirms the voice actor. https://wiki.biligame.com/dwrg/%E2%80%9C%E5%9B%9A%E5%BE%92%E2%80%9D
2. ↑ as Paranormal Detective in Truth & Inference 5th Anniversary Limited Offline Pack
3. ↑  Can drink Dovlin
4. ↑  He is in episode 2 of Identity V Stage Play as Luca Balsa
5. ↑ https://id5.163.com/news/official/20200317/26476\_869613.html
6. ↑ https://weibo.com/6140485374/Iz27PqYfB