Mafia Capital (WWC XI): Important Info Here -- READ OPENING POSTS!

[JeenLeen]

I read the last couple pages of this thread and was surprised to learn some of the history of the WW community here. I remember peeking in several years ago and there were lots of games going on.

Anyway, I enjoyed my first game, though sad to die so early, so I hope to sign up for future ones.
If it really starts up again: is it customary only to have one game running at at time?

Seems almost necessary. I had a hard time keeping the different players straight, and it seems like it'd be crazy-hard recalling if someone seemed wolfish in game A vs. game B.

[BasketOfPuppies]

There used to be several games going on at once, but people kept leaving, leading to more people leaving, leading to us having to reach to other sub forums to find enough players.

[kgato503]

...If it really starts up again: is it customary only to have one game running at at time?

Seems almost necessary. I had a hard time keeping the different players straight, and it seems like it'd be crazy-hard recalling if someone seemed wolfish in game A vs. game B.

I'll be honest, I keep a spread sheet for each game, for quick reference. It helps me keep the voting record straight. I'm sure others do similar things.

That being said, as I understand it, there use to be a limit as to how many games were allowed to run at once (I think 2 or 3 active ones at once, with a couple requiting at the same time). While it used to be that slots had to be signed up for, things have been quiet around here. This section of the forums is set up so that new threads require Mod approval, due to the original need to schedule games.

[AvatarVecna]

Mansion Murder Mystery has ended with a Town/Neutral victory. I'll probably start another game recruiting by Friday, unless someone beats me to the punch.

[JeenLeen]

From what I can tell, a new game hasn't started. I have the idea of a game, but between several factors I don't have time to run it nor do I think a newbie like me would do a good job running it.

So I'm presenting a scenario here in hopes somebody finds it fun to run.

Spoiler: Prison Escape

Show

The Prison is considered one of the most impenetrable prisons on the planet, as well as one of the more corrupt. Nobody had ever escaped. But a fortuitous prison riot gave you the opportunity. As the riot commenced, you joined with a group of fellow prisoners. You all managed to steal the clothes of guards, as well as some secreted away money, and now all you have to do is wait until power is restored and you are “rescued” and you’ll be away free.

But, as you waited, a fight broke out as one of your number was recognized as a guard by one of the other prisoners. And not one of the corrupt ones that could be bribed, no, a legit guard. As he was beaten to death, he leaked that other guards were here as well, and the guards have weapons secreted on their persons. The power flickered, and one of the prisoners lay dead, proving the secret just uttered.

Now you know what you have to do. You have to find the remaining guards and kill them, before time runs out and they can out you to the rescue team. Or else you will be taken out one by one by the guards until only they are left to be saved.

As a reversal of a normal werewolf game, in this one the Town are actually bad guys and the Wolves good guys, but otherwise things are the same. And there of course could be a few Neutrals in the group.

Also, like the last game, the Day/Night phases are done mechanically but, in-game, it’s just a few hours passing. The “Night” is when the power flickers out for a few minutes.

Town Roles

Corrupt Guard – you are a guard, but you were in on the riot and helped start it. And you know some of the other guards know it, too, so your only hope is that only prisoners remain. But fortunately, you know the guards’ mannerisms enough that with study you can probably sniff one out. Just a shame you lost your gun in the riot.
During Night Phase, you can scry one person and find out if they are Town, Neutral, or Wolf.

Guard in Withdraw – you are also a corrupt guard, but your bribes were drugs, not cash. And your stash was misplaced and your source killed, so you’re starting to feel withdraw. Like the Corrupt guard, you could usually sniff out a fellow guard, but your senses are a bit off right now.
During Night Phase, you can scry one person. If they are Wolf, you read them as Town. If they are Neutral or Town, you read them as Wolf. If you die while the Corrupt Guard is still alive, you are revealed as the Corrupt Guard; only when both are deceased do you find out which you really were.

Armed Rioter – you managed to secure a gun during the riot. You don’t dare reveal you have a weapon lest they think you are a guard, but you can at least try to finish off a guard when the lights darken.
During Night Phase, you can choose to kill one person or Bane one person (including yourself.)

Snitch – although you got the loyalty of some friends, you are generally distrusted for eavesdropping and sharing info others don’t want shared.
During Night Phase, you can select one person. You know who they targeted (if anyone) and anyone who targeted them.

Smooth Talker – a con man, you manage to get on people’s good side and use that to your advantage. Fortunately, this also means you have an easier time convincing folk not to shive you.
Votes against you count as 1 less, to a minimum of zero.

Thief – you are used to inconveniencing others, usually by taking stuff that belongs to them. It’s not as applicable in this situation as it usually is, but you think you could manage to prevent a guard from snooping around by misplacing their gear.
During Night Phase, you can select one person and negate their Night Power.

Blood Brothers – you and your buddy grew up together, joined the gang together, and did time together. And you’ve got a plan for the future together. But the idea of living without the other doesn’t mesh with the idea of living at all.
The "Secret Lovers" start out in contact with each other, and can thus coordinate more easily than most other members of Town Faction, but if one dies for any reason, so does the other.

Spoiler: Neutral Roles. These might be kept secret, so please only read if you would like to DM

Show

Neutral Roles

Innocent – you’re a prisoner like the others, but you really are innocent. And during the riots, you managed to get proof. Now you just need to survive the night, reveal it to the outside, and you’re golden. But you realize that the corrupt guards will try to stop you, since they are part of why you are in prison.
During Night Phase, you can scry one person and identify them as the Corrupt Guard, Guard in Withdraw, Wolf, or Other.
WIN CONDITION: survive + the Corrupt Guard is killed

The Help – you’re not a prisoner or a guard, just somebody who was working the night shift when all this chaos started. You pretended to be a prisoner so the others would help you, but now you’re in the thick of it. At least you are used to not being noticed. And, hey, if you survive, you get a cut of the money they stole. But you know that other person will rat you out and keep you from the money, so you better off them first.
Votes against you count as 1 less, to a minimum of zero. If you die, you reveal that there is another The Help in the group.
WIN CONDITION: survive + the other The Help is killed

Since the Innocent is Wolf-friendly, probably good to add a Town-friendly Neutral, but I'm not sure who to add.

Wolf Roles

Sadist – you aren’t a corrupt guard, but you enjoy inflicting pain on the prisoners. You took this job to get a chance to indulge your tendencies, as it’s not really evil if you just do it to those who deserve it. Right?
If you are killed during Night Phase, you kill one random non-Wolf who voted for you the Day before (assuming anyone voted for you). If you are killed during Day Phase, you kill one random non-Wolf who voted for you.

Internal Affairs – your job is rooting out corruption, and, wow, was today a bad day to get a call to audit this prison. Besides learning the prison is rife with corruption, you now have to lie to just survive the night.
During Night Phase, you can scry one target. You learn if they are the Corrupt Guard, the Guard in Withdraw, or Other.

Inside Man – you are a prisoner, but you are an informant for some of the clean guards and they protected you during the riot. You’re pretty sure you’ll get out on parole if you help them get through tonight. Your familiarity with the fellow prisoners puts you in a good position to interfere with them without being noticed.
During Night Phase, you can select one person and negate their Night Power.

Good Guy – you’re the one all the prisoners hope wind up as their guard for the day. You are kind, caring, and really want to help rehabilitate the prisoners. You refuse bribes and report on corruption, but on the other hand you are willing to be lenient and not always report a minor offense by the prisoners. In effect, you’re a really good guy.
Votes against you count as 1 less, to a minimum of zero.

[AvatarVecna]

I've actually kinda been sittin' around having zero ideas for what to run, so generating ideas for game scenarios in this thread helps in that regard. A few notes:

Spoiler

Show

Okay so in regards to neutrals, it looks like the plan is to have four? One wolf-friendly, one town-friendly, and two of "The Help" who are anti-each-other. An 8 town/4 neutral/4 wolf split is probably a good-ish game balance (maybe a little wolf-heavy, but that's more feasible in an all-power-role game like this), but getting 16 players can be rough. We'll see how it works out.

The other note, if you're gonna be thinking about game mechanics more frequently, is that the Armed Rioter (or the Soldier, or whatever it's called in various versions)...any power role capable of blocking kills has to be very generally incapable of protecting the same person two nights in a row - this prevents a scenario where the AR just banes themselves over and over and is unkillable during the night. It also encourages taking risks in regards to networking, which honestly needs to happen more frequently if my experience running games is any indication of how often people try such things.

I'll get a recruitment thread started for this game concept, and then probably in a week or so I'll also start a thread for a more...vanilla WW game. Running a standard game and a high-power game will be easier than running two high-power, I think.

EDIT: It'll also give us some mechanical variety.

Anyway, here's the thread for the new game. Thanks for the idea. Unfortunately as part of copypasting your thoughts, I've discovered that some rascal has taken all of your sentences and added an extra space at the beginning. You should hunt down the rascal responsible for this travesty and make them pay.

[Caerulea]

EDIT: It'll also give us some mechanical variety.

I may propose a game which is a bit off normal WW gameplay after your games are done. The description I have so far is a sort of recursive WW with 1 wolf, and two or more additional factions filled with lies and betrayal. I'm not sure how good it'll be.

[AvatarVecna]

I may propose a game which is a bit off normal WW gameplay after your games are done. The description I have so far is a sort of recursive WW with 1 wolf, and two or more additional factions filled with lies and betrayal. I'm not sure how good it'll be.

Sounds like it'll be fun. I'm perfectly fine saving the more vanilla game I was gonna run next for later if other people are wanting to run games.

[flat_footed]

Thread has been approved.

[JeenLeen]

Game Idea, based loosely on the (not great but not terrible) movie Assimilate

Starts Night 1, but because it starts with only 1 wolf (the Infected). Each Night, the wolf can infect one villager; this does not kill them, but turns them into a wolf. Game ends when wolves outnumber town and can do a forced-conversion/kill. No neutrals.

Town is mostly vanilla, but I thought of a few powers. Powers are assigned after Night 1 ends, as it'd break the game if Night 1 ended with the Immune or The Faker being targeted, since they could just out the real infected and then guarantee a town win. "The Faker" might be way too powerful, but the like the idea of wolves getting paranoid about each other and killing their own.

• Immune -- you are immune to infection. You are not aware of this power until you are targeted for infection during the night. You are then revealed as the Immune to the wolves, but you find out which wolf tried to infect you.
• The Faker -- you are able to fake being one of the Infected, although you are actually immune. You are not aware of your Role until you are targeted for an Infection, at which point you are informed. You are still mechanically Town, but have access to the Wolf chat. NOTE: wolves are aware that someone could be faking, and are allowed to vote at any time to try to kill one of their own as the Faker. After death, the Faker is revealed as fake or actually infected.
• Close Friends -- the two of you know each other better than anyone else. Whether lovers, friends, siblings, whatever, you know when something is off. If one of you is Infected, the other is immediately made aware of it. You are aware of your Role, and can communicate with one another.

Also I have an idea of an Insight mechanic to spread paranoia. It's a bit of work for the DM, but pretty simple in execution. Something like:
at the start of each Night Phase, each player gets an Insight into another player. The DM rolls 50+4d10, then rolls d100. The first roll is the target number for a d100 roll. If the d100 is less than or equal to the target number, the player correctly gets a hint that another player is Infected or not. If it is greater, they get an incorrect insight.
Infected, obviously, do not get Insights.

Example:
Player A is randomly assigned Player C as who they get an insight about. The DM rolls 50+4d10 and gets a 60. Then they roll d100. If the result is 60 or less, A is told correctly if C is infected or not. If the results is 61 or higher, they are told the opposite.
Thus, the 50+4d10 result is the chance that the insight is correct. Here, 60% chance.

Might be too powerful to have both Powered Townies and the Insight system, but one or the other could be neat. Or have a power being having an inconsistent Insight, and you choose who you target with it each night but aren't sure if you are right or not. Basically combine Seer and False Seer into one character.

[AvatarVecna]

I'm generally not a fan of random mechanics or cult mechanics, but more for personal reasons than "it just cant work". Would probably wanna do some mock-games to see how well it turns out compared to normal games. Could be interesting, though.

[Caerulea]

I feel like, unless the town got ahead early, it would be very hard to eliminate all the wolves, as eventually there just aren't enough votes unless perfectly coordinated.

[Elenna]

Sounds interesting. Some comments:

• Doesn't the game just end if the Faker gets infected, since they can just look at the wolf chat and then tell everyone who all the wolves are? Definitely seems overpowered.
• Regarding how long the game takes, each night there is one less villager and one more wolf, which means the villagers' numerical advantage disappears faster, but the fact that you start with 1 wolf instead of multiple wolves counteracts that. If you assume 14 players and assume the villagers lynch a villager every time, the game would end in 5 days, as opposed to a classic game with 3 wolves and 11 villagers which would end in 4 days.
• What would the win condition for the Close Friends be?
• I feel like the Insight mechanism would actually be equivalent to some flat percentage chance of a correct insight, although I'm not sure what the percentage is. (Like how if you roll one D100 to set a target number, and then roll another D100 to succeed if it's below the target, it's equivalent to a flat 50% chance of success.) Nothing wrong with that, I guess, but you might as well just say "you have an X% chance of a correct Insight each night".

EDIT: For the Insight mechanism, you basically have
Probability of correct insight = (51/100)*(Probability of 51 being the target) + (52/100)*(Probability of 52 being the target) + ... + (90/100)*(Probability of 90 being the target)
Since all the probabilities are known, this works out to a flat number, which turns out to be 72%.

[Aventine]

Doesn't the game just end if the Faker gets infected, since they can just look at the wolf chat and then tell everyone who all the wolves are? Definitely seems overpowered.

The ability for the infected to vote among themselves to kill off one of their own largely balances it. It's only a guaranteed* loss if there is only one genuine infected; if there are more than one then the faker will be killed and more people will be converted while the known infected are lynched. And if the immune is told who targeted him, then it is also a guaranteed* loss if the immune is hit while there is only one infected.

(*Not actually guaranteed, the singleton infected has a chance to talk their way out of it, causing a mislynch and buying themselves another night to spread the infection)

The much bigger issue is how does town win? Best case scenario they lynch an infected, but then during the night a townie will be converted. Net effect is a townie dies with no change in number of infected. Town has to lynch an infected every day to keep them at one at night and two during the day, then have the infected hit the immune/faker to cause a day phase with only one wolf. One mislynch is survivable, but requires both the immune and the faker to be targeted. Beyond that, any mislynch requires the infected to get paranoid and kill a non-faker.

It would probably be playable, but difficult for town to win.

[Unavenger]

The idea of a D&D themed WW, where the characters are members of a wizard's guild... except that it turns out that some of the other arcane spellcasters have sneaked in, and are trying to take over!

Town roles would be abjurer (doctor), conjurer (lookout), diviner (seer), enchanter (roleblocker), evoker (nightkill), illusionist (use ability of target A on target B) transmuter (transporter), necromancer (medium). Evil roles could be bard (roleblocker), hexblade (framer), spellthief (gain 1-shot of any power used on you so long as you survive it) and sorcerer (1-shot disintegrate attack allows the mafia nightkill to destroy the target, preventing their role from flipping, but sorc must make the kill).

I also have neutral role ideas, but keeping those secret for now...

This idea sound cool?

[AvatarVecna]

The idea of a D&D themed WW, where the characters are members of a wizard's guild... except that it turns out that some of the other arcane spellcasters have sneaked in, and are trying to take over!

Town roles would be abjurer (doctor), conjurer (lookout), diviner (seer), enchanter (roleblocker), evoker (nightkill), illusionist (use ability of target A on target B) transmuter (transporter), necromancer (medium). Evil roles could be bard (roleblocker), hexblade (framer), spellthief (gain 1-shot of any power used on you so long as you survive it) and sorcerer (1-shot disintegrate attack allows the mafia nightkill to destroy the target, preventing their role from flipping, but sorc must make the kill).

I also have neutral role ideas, but keeping those secret for now...

This idea sound cool?

Sounds pretty cool to me.

[Unavenger]

Players are asleep post recruitment threads. [/meme]

[JeenLeen]

After reading feedback, I agree the "Infection" game probably isn't tenable, but I'll respond nonetheless.

Sounds interesting. Some comments:

• Doesn't the game just end if the Faker gets infected, since they can just look at the wolf chat and then tell everyone who all the wolves are? Definitely seems overpowered.

I think I'd do it as no powers assigned until Day 2 starts, so the Faker and the Immune aren't assigned until at least 2 wolves. Because, yeah, otherwise it's a real early end (unless good talk to prevent it).

Regarding how long the game takes, each night there is one less villager and one more wolf, which means the villagers' numerical advantage disappears faster, but the fact that you start with 1 wolf instead of multiple wolves counteracts that. If you assume 14 players and assume the villagers lynch a villager every time, the game would end in 5 days, as opposed to a classic game with 3 wolves and 11 villagers which would end in 4 days.

No real comment here.

What would the win condition for the Close Friends be?
I feel like the Insight mechanism would actually be equivalent to some flat percentage chance of a correct insight, although I'm not sure what the percentage is. (Like how if you roll one D100 to set a target number, and then roll another D100 to succeed if it's below the target, it's equivalent to a flat 50% chance of success.) Nothing wrong with that, I guess, but you might as well just say "you have an X% chance of a correct Insight each night".

EDIT: For the Insight mechanism, you basically have
Probability of correct insight = (51/100)*(Probability of 51 being the target) + (52/100)*(Probability of 52 being the target) + ... + (90/100)*(Probability of 90 being the target)
Since all the probabilities are known, this works out to a flat number, which turns out to be 72%.

Close Friends are Town, so it's just a Power to help the town win.
And good insight on realizing the Insight mechanic was overly complicated. Yeah, probably best to scrap it or do a flat 60% or 70%.

The much bigger issue is how does town win? Best case scenario they lynch an infected, but then during the night a townie will be converted. Net effect is a townie dies with no change in number of infected. Town has to lynch an infected every day to keep them at one at night and two during the day, then have the infected hit the immune/faker to cause a day phase with only one wolf. One mislynch is survivable, but requires both the immune and the faker to be targeted. Beyond that, any mislynch requires the infected to get paranoid and kill a non-faker.

It would probably be playable, but difficult for town to win.

I think this is the big issue I had overlooked. I figured the small number of wolves balanced it well enough, but I see that there'd eventually (and possibly early-on) be at tipping point where the wolves would win unless the town gets lucky. Maybe, if I try to run something like this eventually, I'd just give several players a 100% Insight power. Basically spend time with somebody to figure out if they're infected or not. Then it just comes to if you can convince the rest of the town or not that you're being honest.


EDIT: the LIST keyword really broke my post in some interesting ways. Fixed now.

[AvatarVecna]

Prison Escape has ended in a victory for Town, and two of the four neutrals.

[DeTess]

This was a fun game. Things went rather badly for the wolves due to the formation of a trust group and a very early wolf-kill, but I reckon if either of those hadn't happened they could have strung us along for a while yet, and with the amount of Neutrals, I don't think we had more than 1-2 mislynches to spare.

It was also interesting to play in a different meta from the one I'm used to. I hadn't really done that before (my only other game outside my 'home' forum was was a super high content high activity game with people from all kinds of different forums, so there wasn't really a 'meta'). It was funny to see both the things that were the same (fairly involved and role-madness rule-set, some time spent on the overall 'story' of the game), as well as the differences. Of those differences, the thing that really struck me was the emphasis on wagons when voting. Back at the Shard voting tends to be a lot more guided by people's individual suspicions over which wagons are going strong right now, and voting purely in self-defense is only really considered non-suspicious if that person tried to push one of their actual suspicions first. This might be in part because our games tend to be a little bit more active (though not that much more on average), so in the same 48 hours there's a bit more discussion and room for vote-switching. Another thing that struck me was just how quiet night cycles tend to be. That's not to say I think things are done better at my home forum, but it was interesting to see the difference in approach.

Another thing I just generally liked seeing was that a number of people seemed to be reading me village based on my play-style. However, I play like I did this game whenever I have enough time to commit to analysis posts, irrespective of my alignment. The only alignment indicative action I did this game was the lynching of a wolf :P

Anyway, well played to everyone, and thanks to avatarvecna for running the game

[BasketOfPuppies]

Hey AV you might want to update your sig.

[AvatarVecna]

Relevant to our interests (warning: does a swear).

[JeenLeen]

It was also interesting to play in a different meta from the one I'm used to.

I've found it interesting what behaviors are considered wolfish/townish, and other things of the local meta. I'm getting the logic behind some of it, although some of it isn't the most intuitive to me and I'm going along with it more because I think that's how others interpret things more than I intuitively think that's how I'd act as Town.
It'd be curious to 'learn' the game here then move somewhere else where the meta is different, and thus my conclusions and argumentative defenses are way off.

I'm rather curious how I'll play if actually Town. Was Wolf first game and Neutral the second, so it'd be a new experience.

---

Questions of the meta remind me a bit of back when I played Yugioh, and the big differences between what cards and strategies would be expected at my local gaming spot verses an official tournament. I'll wane off-topic to mention one fun time: my playstyle had a strong anti-burn defense, since one of my good friends who played loved to play burn; in a tournament, one of the players was beating almost everyone because he was playing burn and nobody else had defenses against it, whereas I crushed him.

[kgato503]

I've found it interesting what behaviors are considered wolfish/townish, and other things of the local meta. I'm getting the logic behind some of it, although some of it isn't the most intuitive to me and I'm going along with it more because I think that's how others interpret things more than I intuitively think that's how I'd act as Town.
It'd be curious to 'learn' the game here then move somewhere else where the meta is different, and thus my conclusions and argumentative defenses are way off.

Yeah, my first game I ran afoul of the "You-need-to-vote-D1-or-else-you're-a-wolf" mentality (I was town, but saw no value in most likely killing another villager). Spent a lot of that game having to fight that supposed black mark (interestingly, I don't remember getting as much slack for being a new player as we have been giving recently)(Also, IIRC, the main one giving me grief about it turned out to be a wolf). I always chalked it up to adapting your play to accommodate the fellow players (I'm still not completely happy with that mentality, but I know better than to argue in game, and the information gained from everyone voting can be useful).

Also, random on topic question: I have noticed a lack of use of the Tanner (Neutral whose win condition is to die/be killed, and can be played either as a solo winner or additional winner, depending on Narrator's fancy) role on this forum. Is there a reason for that, or just happenstance of the games I've played in? Obviously, they should not be able to win through auto-lynch, otherwise but I think it brings an interesting dynamic to the game.

[Xihirli]

Yeah for some reason they stopped using tanners a little after I started playing these games.

[AvatarVecna]

Yeah for some reason they stopped using tanners a little after I started playing these games.

FWIW, I was around for a good bit before you joined the community, and roles like this weren't...all that common. Roles with a "win if you die" condition can be all well and good for the party game version, but for a lot of people it encourages them to not play, or to intentionally play badly, in order to attract a kill. It rewards bad play, and in this particular gaming medium, it tends to be "oh I can win without even wasting two weeks thinking about this on and off all day cool I'll just do nothing and meet my win condition", which...isn't an attitude I wanna foster in people right now, exactly. But that's just me!
Of course, maybe a game of all Tanners could be...interesting...

[Xihirli]

Huh. Could have sworn I was the tanner a few times.
((checks back))

Huh, nope. Must have just been me.

[JeenLeen]

FWIW, I was around for a good bit before you joined the community, and roles like this weren't...all that common. Roles with a "win if you die" condition can be all well and good for the party game version, but for a lot of people it encourages them to not play, or to intentionally play badly, in order to attract a kill. It rewards bad play, and in this particular gaming medium, it tends to be "oh I can win without even wasting two weeks thinking about this on and off all day cool I'll just do nothing and meet my win condition", which...isn't an attitude I wanna foster in people right now, exactly. But that's just me!
Of course, maybe a game of all Tanners could be...interesting...

Maybe revising it as being killed by something other than auto-lynch. Or being killed by a night kill (either Town power or wolf night-kill), that is, having to act like a big enough target that someone wants to waste a significant resource on you.

However, I still see it as an odd thing. For one thing, narratively it seems strange. On the other, it would create an odd dynamic where you'd question whether the blatant wolf is a bad wolf or someone trying to get you waste your night-kill on them. Seems... not fun.

---

In general, if the Town wins, is it considered a win for the entire town, even those who died? Likewise for dead wolves if Wolf win?

[DeTess]

In general, if the Town wins, is it considered a win for the entire town, even those who died? Likewise for dead wolves if Wolf win?

Yeah, that's generally the case, as this encourages teamwork and makes a sacrificial play not only possible, but encouraged if it increases the chance of a win for your faction. I think the only time I've seen a game end without the dead members of the winning faction winning was because a Neutral win-con that only counted for the living players was in play.

[Xihirli]

Is the wizard ww thread here or IC?