Theme Test Market

[Gamma Emerald]

My suggestion would be giving scum some way to override any strategies

[Varsoon]

Yeah I think a mix of a couple different approaches may work here.

[Varsoon]

Speaking of, would people want to play that sort of a game?
Would you be willing to outbid other players to put sabotages on players you think are scum/avoid getting sabotaged yourself?

[Sickofit1138]

Speaking of, would people want to play that sort of a game?
Would you be willing to outbid other players to put sabotages on players you think are scum/avoid getting sabotaged yourself?

I would be interested, sounds like a fun time

[TheGoldenParadox]

Would anyone want to play a game of Mafia based on The Three Body Problem / Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy?

[Gamma Emerald]

never heard of it

[Varsoon]

Would there be any interest in playing a series of games that are 5p LYLO with 3 town, 2 scum?

I was considering this the other night--I really enjoy when games are in LYLO and I want to run some smaller setups.
The idea would be that 5 players would sign up and play in a series of 5p LYLO games, each with its own theme. Players would play until everyone has had a chance at being scum or once 5 total games have been played.
I could even do multiple of these simultaneously and privately, so it could be three of them going at once, with the same rotation of themes.
Another consideration I had would be not outting player's alignments/roles after the game had ended, as to keep subsequent games more interesting and less game-solvey.
I was thinking I could knock out a lot of smaller theme ideas by running a 'procedurally generated' sort of game where I make a new theme game for each new game run.

What do ya'll think?

[Maestro]

Would anyone be interesting in games based on either Fire Emblem 6, Fire Emblem 7, or the Tellius Games (and maybe Sacred Stones)? I’m pretty sure there are but I still want to put it out there that I have ideas for them, albeit extremely nebulous

Yea, I would be. I love the fire emblem series, so I wouldn't mind playing or helping review flavor.

There have been several run on site before; you could easily find them in the archives, I would think. Could be time for another, and I'd be willing to play or help design, probably would prefer the latter since I've got some ideas.

[Maestro]

Players would play until everyone has had a chance at being scum or once 5 total games have been played.

Definitely not the first option there!

I did something like this while back, I think, a series of linked games with the same playerlist. It went fine? Make sure you get a dedicated group, though, because it may not seem like a commitment but that's before the cathartic release at the end of Game 1 where everybody (just me?) went "aaah... time to relax- wait, but WHA- oh right, I have more games to do here"

I kinda want to reread those games too, because I remember them being informative...

[Varsoon]

@Maestro: I vaguely remember playing in a series of 3p LYLO games here: https://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=84&t=27133
I think I could find dedicated players for at least one set of 5.

[Gamma Emerald]

Would anyone be interesting in games based on either Fire Emblem 6, Fire Emblem 7, or the Tellius Games (and maybe Sacred Stones)? I’m pretty sure there are but I still want to put it out there that I have ideas for them, albeit extremely nebulous

Yea, I would be. I love the fire emblem series, so I wouldn't mind playing or helping review flavor.

There have been several run on site before; you could easily find them in the archives, I would think. Could be time for another, and I'd be willing to play or help design, probably would prefer the latter since I've got some ideas.

I still have the Fire Emblem game in mind and have an idea for an interesting mechanic, but I have something else I wanna do before that one.

[callforjudgement]

Would there be any interest in playing a series of games that are 5p LYLO with 3 town, 2 scum?

I was considering this the other night--I really enjoy when games are in LYLO and I want to run some smaller setups.
The idea would be that 5 players would sign up and play in a series of 5p LYLO games, each with its own theme. Players would play until everyone has had a chance at being scum or once 5 total games have been played.
I could even do multiple of these simultaneously and privately, so it could be three of them going at once, with the same rotation of themes.
Another consideration I had would be not outting player's alignments/roles after the game had ended, as to keep subsequent games more interesting and less game-solvey.
I was thinking I could knock out a lot of smaller theme ideas by running a 'procedurally generated' sort of game where I make a new theme game for each new game run.

What do ya'll think?

I think this would work better using a setup with an EV higher than 2/15. As it is, it wouldn't surprise me if scum won every 5p lylo there was; it's a very hard setup for town to win.

3:2 lylos in real games normally have information that was obtained on prior days through night actions and/or claims. You could improve the EV to 1/6 by making one of the townies Named (which would simulate this), but it's still rather low.

[Varsoon]

I'd likely be balancing roles/night actions around 3:2 lylos with that in mind.

[mhsmith0]

off the cuff, the simplest thing to do w/ 3-2 lylo games in order to avoid lolbalance is to make them nightless

[Elbirn]

So uh

It would be a ways off, but would there be any interest in a Twilight Zone mafia? Possibly U-Pick?

Edit: actually forget the upick, I dont expect people to remember characters from a 60 year old tv show. But yeah, this.

[Maestro]

@Elbirn: I'd love to have a hand in that setup. Sounds like an awesome idea.

/out didn't realize hydra aren't allowed

I've thought about this a lot recently, and realized that all my problems with hydrae could be solved by effectively leveying a "post restriction" of sorts. If you really want to play in a hydra, it should be your goal to eliminate essentially anything that makes you different from a normal player, so as not to disrupt the game for others. That could possibly be achieved via any number of tactics: group PT where you all try to format/voice posts the same way before making them (this would imply no post "signing"), cohesive discussion between heads outside of the game, never in-thread, maaaybe only one person logs in and posts from the account and always from a different browser (that only has auto-login for the hydra itself) to eliminate as many opportunities as possible for an alt-slip?

There are options, but as it is, hydrae fundamentally change how players interact, and IMO the majority of the time they do so negatively. If you want to have a hydra in a game of mine (or a game I play in), I'd want it to be understood that it's your responsibility to minimize all of that. I understand that I can't expect that as a player, so I don't sign up for games with hydra and I /out if a hydra joins after me. It's just my personal preference, but as a mod I have an obligation to work with my values, IMO. If you feel like you'd enjoy that potential challenge, feel free to discuss your plan with me via PM and sign up with your hydra - this goes for all future games of mine as well, in case anybody reads my posts.

/derail

I've done an all-hydra game in the past (which went as well as you'd expect), but I'm throwing this out there if anybody's interested: a game with a Perfect Hydra or two. Think about it: hydrae who have to work to be a cohesive mind-melded mafia player on top of hunting Scum or pretending to hunt Scum... does that sound awful or appealing? I've never liked hydrae, and this isn't the place to go into that, but I'm trying to be open-minded here and see what we could discover about the phenomenon.

[wgeurts]

Stellaris Mafia?
Evolution Mafia 2?
Pokémon Mafia 2?
Everything Is A Lie Finale?
Raymond E Feists' Magician Mafia?
Roleplay Game Themed Mafia?

[Gamma Emerald]

Everything Is A Lie Finale?

Kinda late, someone continued the legacy
everything else why not?

[wgeurts]

Everything Is A Lie Finale?

Kinda late, someone continued the legacy
everything else why not?

Yeah but it wasn't a wgeurts™ game.

I'm feeling creative so if there's particular interest in any particular theme I'm willing to crack out some Varsoon'esque game design.

[Varsoon]

Yes.
YES
And if you're gonna theme it, do something you love

[Nancy Drew 39]

@Elbirn: I'd love to have a hand in that setup. Sounds like an awesome idea.

/out didn't realize hydra aren't allowed

I've thought about this a lot recently, and realized that all my problems with hydrae could be solved by effectively leveying a "post restriction" of sorts. If you really want to play in a hydra, it should be your goal to eliminate essentially anything that makes you different from a normal player, so as not to disrupt the game for others. That could possibly be achieved via any number of tactics: group PT where you all try to format/voice posts the same way before making them (this would imply no post "signing"), cohesive discussion between heads outside of the game, never in-thread, maaaybe only one person logs in and posts from the account and always from a different browser (that only has auto-login for the hydra itself) to eliminate as many opportunities as possible for an alt-slip?

There are options, but as it is, hydrae fundamentally change how players interact, and IMO the majority of the time they do so negatively. If you want to have a hydra in a game of mine (or a game I play in), I'd want it to be understood that it's your responsibility to minimize all of that. I understand that I can't expect that as a player, so I don't sign up for games with hydra and I /out if a hydra joins after me. It's just my personal preference, but as a mod I have an obligation to work with my values, IMO. If you feel like you'd enjoy that potential challenge, feel free to discuss your plan with me via PM and sign up with your hydra - this goes for all future games of mine as well, in case anybody reads my posts.

/derail

I've done an all-hydra game in the past (which went as well as you'd expect), but I'm throwing this out there if anybody's interested: a game with a Perfect Hydra or two. Think about it: hydrae who have to work to be a cohesive mind-melded mafia player on top of hunting Scum or pretending to hunt Scum... does that sound awful or appealing? I've never liked hydrae, and this isn't the place to go into that, but I'm trying to be open-minded here and see what we could discover about the phenomenon.

The whole point of hydraing is to make it easier on people with less time and your conception, actually requires even more work than that of a single player. Yes, you still maintain the advantage of 2 heads forming reads/play/whatever but otherwise, I see this as rather stifling.

[Maestro]

You may see “the point” as “less work for me!” but my counterpoint is that it’s

more

work for others and that it fundamentally changes Mafia, often for the worse. If you don’t want to respond to those points, that’s fine, but it just means this isn’t the game for you. I’d argue being in a game with a hydra is stifling.

[Nancy Drew 39]

You may see “the point” as “less work for me!” but my counterpoint is that it’s

more

work for others and that it fundamentally changes Mafia, often for the worse. If you don’t want to respond to those points, that’s fine, but it just means this isn’t the game for you. I’d argue being in a game with a hydra is stifling.

The most important thing in making accurate reads is to be able to disearn which head is speaking, especially if you’re a believer in meta, which I am. Perhaps, your idea makes more sense in an anonymous game then but needing to coordinate posts, makes them seem fake and rehearsed - something normally associated with scum behaviour.

You have a specific way of looking at hydras and while I do see the merits in your approach, I see even more problems then the more natural way, I propose. Your obsession with this idea of what constitutes the “perfect” hydra, is at the main root of the problem as I see it. Single players are very far from perfect, it seems unfair, unrealistic and suboptimal, to insist that hydras be.

[Maestro]

Your

obsession

with this idea of what constitutes the “perfect” hydra [ ... ]

Let's just agree to disagree!

[Maestro]

bumpity