Theme Test Market

[zoraster]

What prevents D1 mass claim of partners? Scum may claim to be partners, but if their partner is lynched, they die the next day, obviously. And every time scum makes a kill, they confirm a town member as town. Likewise on any lynch on a town member.

[IceGuy]

If I remember correctly, there was a Lovers Mafia (or a similar name) which had lovers; because of what zoraster said there is little difference regarding how it plays out.

[zoraster]

well, actually there's a huge difference in how it plays out because this basically gives town a HUGE leg up. Mafia have to essentially spend two nights killing someone, and yet for every lynch town makes they either get (a) someone confirmed or (b) a mafia to lynch the next day.

I haven't run the numbers, but even with a large setup, you'd run into an auto town victory fairly quickly.

[IceGuy]

well, actually there's a huge difference in how it plays out because this basically gives town a HUGE leg up. Mafia have to essentially spend two nights killing someone, and yet for every lynch town makes they either get (a) someone confirmed or (b) a mafia to lynch the next day.

I haven't run the numbers, but even with a large setup, you'd run into an auto town victory fairly quickly.

What I meant with this was: Once one partner dies, the one will die soon after - either of an NK because they're confirmed as town, or of a lynch because they're confirmed as scum.

Of course this affects balance, game length and the like.

[izakthegoomba]

Yeah, I thought that might be the case. Making them lovers would obviously fix the confirming problem, but would do nothing about a D1 massclaim. Possibly it could be fixed by giving scum an X-shot Masons and Mafia-style power? If they can name a mason duo, they kill both of them, but if they get it wrong the mafioso using it dies.

[callforjudgement]

It's worth mentioning that when the lovers version was run, it was broken twice, first via getting people to paraphrase their entire QT discussion (on the basis that town and scum discussion would look rather different, and the scum would have to fake something plausible at short notice), and later using QT timestamps. Mods could simply ban the second method of breaking the setup, but I'm not sure much can be done about the first.

[izakthegoomba]

That could be an issue. I personally wouldn't try to break a game, because it does just that - breaks it, and makes it no fun for anyone involved. But I know other people

lack ethics

feel differently.

[callforjudgement]

I enjoy breaking games, but typically I try to do it in Mafia Discussion rather than once the game's actually started. Saves a lot of time and annoyance that way :)

[izakthegoomba]

Yeah, I'd enjoy breaking games in theory, but I wouldn't want a game I was playing in to get broken, whether it was in my favour or not.

[Umbrage]

OK, I just came up with an idea a few minutes ago. Apologies if this has been done before.

Modkill Mafia

It's nightless and vanilla. The key is that there are a set of rules the mod creates before the game. These rules are random post restrictions, forbidding certain words, or ways of voting, all things that players do in a typical mafia game. The scum know what these rules are, the town does not. Each player has a set of lives, around 5 or so. Every time a player breaks one of the rules, they lose a life. If they lose all lives, they are modkilled and removed from the game. Players can lynch normally. When a player breaks a rule, the offending post is pointed out, and the number of the rule is stated, but not the rule itself. A player can only lose one life per RL day, no matter how many rules they break or how many times they break a rule.

The town has to figure out what the rules are and who already knows them. The scum have to look like they're figuring out the rules and try and get the town to break as many rules as possible. Standard majority win conditions apply.

What do you think? Could something like this be balanced?

[izakthegoomba]

That would make for a crazy bastard game. But it would be somewhat diluted now you've outed your master plan.

[Staeg]

That would make for a crazy bastard game. But it would be somewhat diluted now you've outed your master plan.

There's no master plan. Everyone knows that there's these rules in place, it's the whole point of the game.

[izakthegoomba]

But it could have been even better if he hadn't told us the full story...

OR MAYBE HE HASN'T?

[IceGuy]

An idea I've been kicking around in my head...

Judge, Jury and Executioner

Day:

Every player has three votes. Day ends when three players have been hammered. Those three players are "defendants".

Night:

The Mafia does not have a kill, but sends one of the defendants to the judge, one to the jury, and one to the executioner.
- The

Judge

is a single player who either acquits the defendant or sentences them to death. When the game starts, the "Judge" attribute is guaranteed to be in the hands of a pro-town player. If they're killed, they need to name a replacement (which can be Mafia).
- The

Jury

is made of random players who get a QT for the night and can sentence the defendant to death with a simple majority, otherwise he is acquitted.
- The

Executioner

is like the Judge, except chosen by the Mafia every night.

Town and defendants don't get told which defendant got which treatment, only the kills at the end are revealed.

The idea behind this is to blur the lines between lynches and NKs. Of course it will need some refining (endgame rules, power roles and the like).

Thoughts.

[Staeg]

Can the executioner be mafia?
How many people are there in the jury?

[IceGuy]

Can the executioner be mafia?

Yes.

How many people are there in the jury?

I'm thinking number of alive players divided by two, rounded down to the nearest odd number.

Also, jurors are selected from all players except defendants, judge and executioner.

When fewer than 9 players remain, the jury is dropped and there are only two defendants.

With 4 or less players, normal lynching mechanics apply.

[callforjudgement]

Is the identity of the executioner public? (If not, this is just a standard NK with complex flavour, out of a set chosen by the town.)

[IceGuy]

Is the identity of the executioner public? (If not, this is just a standard NK with complex flavour, out of a set chosen by the town.)

The identity is not public, but keep in mind:

Also, jurors are selected from all players except defendants, judge and executioner.

[callforjudgement]

Slightly less say in the jury would be a minor penalty for scum to pay to guarantee their NK.

[IceGuy]

Slightly less say in the jury would be a minor penalty for scum to pay to guarantee their NK.

No, I meant that you can PoE the executioner.

[quadz08]

Ice, that's a really, really interesting concept. I would love to help you design and/or mod that setup.

[Amrun]

Like that idea, Umbrage.

[IceGuy]

Judge, Jury and Executioner

Any more thoughts on this? If replies are generally positive and nobody spots a game-breaking flaw, I'll design a setup and solicit reviewers.

[Pine]

How do you intend to handle things when endgame approaches, and finding warm bodies to fill all three roles is hard? Specifically, the Jury cannot be composed of people who are Judge or Executioner. The possibilities for no-wins, awkward mechanics, and weird interactions increase the fewer players there are.

By all means, don't reveal your decisions/thoughts on my (or anyone else's) comment here. Discuss it with your co-designer(s).

+1 to concept

[IceGuy]

How do you intend to handle things when endgame approaches, and finding warm bodies to fill all three roles is hard? Specifically, the Jury cannot be composed of people who are Judge or Executioner. The possibilities for no-wins, awkward mechanics, and weird interactions increase the fewer players there are.

By all means, don't reveal your decisions/thoughts on my (or anyone else's) comment here. Discuss it with your co-designer(s).

Well, that stuff would need to be public knowledge anyway, and I already detailed endgame rules above:

When fewer than 9 players remain, the jury is dropped and there are only two defendants.

With 4 or less players, normal lynching mechanics apply.