Theme Test Market

[Dasquian]

Yeah, I thought about that. But the mafia could bump off their top competitors in the night, and there's scope for unique roles to play on the mechanic (rigging matches, being able to train, or something...). It'd definitely need a lot of thought though, I'm sure there'd be a lot of ways to break it.

[Norinel]

And assuming skill is transitive and there are no vigs or other pro-town ways to affect the lynch, the mafia can just kill enough players so that one of their own is the highest so that person can't die.

You might want to make skill nontransitive, or resolutions semirandom, or have multiple different stats that can affect things in different ways so that given any two players, there's at least a possibility that either can win. Maybe something with skill in various weapons and allowing for a weapon selection by one of the duelists?

[Dasquian]

Ooh, that's a great idea. Epees and pistols, and make sure each mafia is on the bottom rung of at least one of the two duelling methods

[Wacky]

How about resolving by:

Dice rolling... you do 3+[6d...rolls a 5] damage. He does 4+[6d...rolls a 3] damage. You kill him.

Or something...

Ninja combat?

And you don't need to have ranks go from 1 to NumberOfPlayers... you could have ti go to NumberOfPlayers + 5 or something.

[PolarBoy]

Ooh, I like the idea of Mafia being really bad at dueling. That would be why they have to backstab people at night. Lynching would become a trial of honor. I really, really, like this idea. Probably also have investigative type roles that can learn about a given player's dueling skill. I don't think totally intransitive skill is necessarily good for the game though. I think that generally players would fit within a pecking order, but then you'd have a couple of wrenches thrown into the mix. Like have a character who's very skilled, but becomes a slobbering idiot around a woman, so he loses any duel against a female character. Or maybe a role that, a limited number of times, can win a duel automatically, regardless of skill. I don't think it would be a good idea to make the duel itself a subgame like Ninja Combat. Just seems like it would make the game too much about individual tactics.

[CaptainBlicero]

I've got a fairly basic dueling mechanic set up for the hopefully-soon-to-be-rolled-out Feudal Japan Mafia. It's mostly chance-based, but it works on top of the existing lynch system, instead of replacing it (you can "call out" any player who impugns your family honor). I'd definitely be interested to see an entire Mafia based on dueling, though. En guarde!

[Dasquian]

The basic psychology I'm expecting to see with the duelling mechanic is that there'd be some players who couldn't afford to lead a bandwagon or be lynched, because they know they suck, and some who have nothing to fear from bandwagons (and hence are prime mafia targets), and some who know they're roughly in the middle and have to work out which lynches they can afford to start and who they don't mind being bandwagonned by

I would be up for Feudal Japan mafia too, I hope it has ninjas ;p

[Norinel]

(Double post, sorry; the second has more stuff)

[Norinel]

On the duelling thing, since I misinterpreted the original post, you could probably say the challenged one chooses a weapon if you want to go with my weapon selection idea. I think it'd also be cool for each member of the mafia to be the best at one weapon but mediocre to bad at the others.

And while we're talking about freaky mechanics, here's one I've had some interesting ideas for that's inspired by Pokémafia, called something like Magical Items or Artifacts or something: (Depending on what other theme I go for)

Instead of having night actions based on the player or Pokémon or whatever, they're based on magical items; each player starts with one and knows its power. During the night, everyone can use one of their items and give one or more of them (anonymously) to other player(s). The catch is that, for the most part, these items are one use per player, so once it's used once, you have to give it to someone else for it to do anyone any good.

[Phoebus]

Just floating by some more ideas...

I am aware Corsato is working on a myth mafia. I am wondering how many people would be interested in a mafia series based on myths of different civilisations? There are so many characters and incidents to draw from, that I can promise it won't get boring or very repetitive but how conducive are the players to a series (I

do

know that HHGG is quite popular around here)

Also, any thoughts on an Agatha Christie Mafia? Drawing from characters, methods of death, cases, detectives from across all of her novels?

[Dragon Phoenix]

I'd play Asterix, myth and Agatha Christie mafia. Lots of potential.

[vIQleS]

I see a lot of potential, and scope for being creative in a mythology mafia...

I'd play...

[PolarBoy]

Norinel, I've been thinking a little bit about the same thing. Have you ever seen "Xiao-Lin Showdown"? I was thinking it would be cool to combine the dueling idea and the magical artifacts thing into a mafia game or mutation based on the series.

[Norinel]

Actually, I haven't. Looks like a theme almost tailor-made to those two concepts. I was thinking something more along the lines of classical fantasy or Arabian Nights-style.

(And I wouldn't consider a game with artifacts and duelling a MafiaMutation, but that's just me.)

[PolarBoy]

Well I wasn't considering the idea a mutation based on those things, but based on a change of goals. Two or more teams trying to aqquire a certain number of artifacts, or some such. Not sure about the specifics. May be a very bad idea actually.

[Yaw]

I'd be interested in the Ender's Game, feudal Japan, mythology, and artifact ideas. Not quite sure about melchizedek's scheduled night idea -- I think it has potential, but it looks a bit too complex for me at the moment.

[Fuldu]

I think the mythology theme is an excellent one, simply from the standpoint of being afforded an opportunity to commit deicide.

[Kerplunk]

I had this idea for a Themed Mini. The scenery is a street is some unfamous town, with 4 houses. In each house lives one family, each family has three members. The roles are pretty standard, mafia (with night-communication), cop, doc, etc. And the days are also standard.

But... at night the players who are family, thus the players who live in the same house can talk at night with each other. They don't know ofcourse what their familymembers are. Also the mafia can talk with each other (so they have to be careful they don't email their nightchoice discussion to a familymember!). I agree that it isn't very realistic, but I hope it will be fun!

What do you think of this setup? Does it contribute anything to the game? Or are there some unforeseen things that would give the mafia or the town a big advantage?

Thanks.

[Phoebus]

Kerplunk,
How far in on your idea are you?
I'm not at home at the moment but by the fourth of April or so, I'll send something along in your email. You might find it interesting. It's not a mini but I supose both of us might get ideas...

-P-

[shadyforce]

It's a very interesting idea and I think it just might work. Though, if a lot of powerful town roles landed in the same house and they managed to confirm each other's innocence, then they are in very good shape.

I'd also be interested in what happens if 2 mafia end up in the same house, and how they will get on with and prehaps manipulate the third.

[Mr. Flay]

We were kicking around the idea of a 'Usual Suspects' mafia last night - anyone ever seen this done?

::edit:: upon further reflection, there doesn't seem to be nearly enough 'good guy' roles in this movie to make a good Mafia game. Anyone else who is more clever than I is welcome to give it a try, I'm releasing the idea to the wild...

[Kerplunk]

Phoebus, only what I posted sofar I have worked out. The roles I haven't yet, but I do have the names for the families of the houses. I'm very curious what I'm going to find in my mailbox.

shadyforce, didn't thought about confirmable roles being in one house. They could investigate each other or something and confirm themselves. Yeah, that should be avoided, thanks for the comment. I think I will randomize the players into the different, but I will certainly take a look what roles go together in one house.

And Mr. Flay, what a great movie! One of my topfavourites. But I don't think you should let people play it if they've not seen the movie yet. That would spoil too much of the fun of seeing the movie.

[FrogGurl]

Oh yeah, Usual Suspects mafia would be great. Also one of my all time favorite movies. Trying to think of how you'd get enough rolls for more than a mini, though. But yeah, make seeing the movie a requirement. There's too much that could easially come up during play that would a) be a huge spoiler b) not make much sense if you haven't seen it. Also, it's not like you'd be forcing them to do something horrible. Just spend 2 hours watching a really great movie.

[mneme]

FWIW....I'm kicking around ideas for a <a href="http://www.studiofoglio.com/girlgenius.html">Girl Genius</a> mafia.

I don't really anticiipate having problems finding either players or roles (the game rather writes itself, really; the question is whether I want to run it at it's natural 20, or pad it a bit to 30ish).

[gslamm]

A 30 player game will be very hard to fill, while you'll probably need more than 20 players to complete a 20 player game.

XXXenopile would be a better game.