BlackVoid's Mini Normal Review

[Nexus]

Hello!

Thanks for joining my queue! Please let me know, via return PM:

1. That you'll be ready to run your game when you get to the top of the list
2. How many players your game will have (13 or under for a mini; 14 or over for a large)
3. Whether or not you want the setup distribution to be open or closed, and what it would be - e.g. 10:3/9:3:1 etc. See this post for details.
4. Who your backup/co-mod will be, if you have one (compulsory for larges)
5. What, if any, other modding experience and/or commitments you have

Also, in order to ensure that Normal games stay "normal", we require that setups be evaluated. When it is ready, please forward your full setup to me, including the following:

1. Your opening posts (rules and flavor, if any). Remember: your opening post
   must
   contain a copy of your Vanilla Townie role, which will be public knowledge to all game participants
2. The complete text of all role PMs
3. Any hidden moderator information (this includes any possible result PMs)

As soon as they are available, your game will be assigned to a panel of reviewers who will check/discuss your game in a private topic with you. When they are satisfied that your game fits within the boundaries of MafiaScum's definition of Normal, they will let me know. Until I receive that go-ahead from them, your game will not enter the sign-up phase, even if you reach the top of the moderating queue.Once you've been approved, please post the role distribution in the PT so a co-/backup mod can take over in an emergency.Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks, and good luck

1. I'll be ready to run the game.
2. It is a 13 player game.
3. I want the setup distribution to be public. It is 10 town against 3 mafia.
4. No backup or co-mod.
5. First time modding. No other commitments.

Setup (10:3)

7 vanilla townies
1 1-shot weak friendly neighbor
1 1-shot vig
1 watcher

vs

2 goons
1 mafia neighborizer

Opening posts:

Mini Normal X: Chocolate mafia.

(Flavor will include pictures of chocolate-based desserts)

Still playing:

(Alive players here)

No longer in the game:

(Dead players here)

Links:

Start of each day etc.

Rules and public info:

Boilerplate game rules, 2 week days, 48 hour nights, 48 hours before prod, 24 hours before replacement. Daytalk. 3 mafia vs 10 town.

Sample Role PM:

Spoiler: Vanilla Townie

Vanilla Townie

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Vanilla Townie.

Abilities:

• Your weapon is your vote, you have no night actions.

Win condition:

• You win when all mafia have been eliminated and there is at least one town player alive.

Confirm through PM by replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

Rest of the role PMs:

Spoiler: 1-shot Weak Friendly Neighbor

Town 1-shot Weak Friendly Neighbor

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Town 1-shot Weak Friendly Neighbor.

Abilities:

• Once during the game at night, you can target another player and I'll mod-confirm you as Town to that player. If your target is mafia-aligned, you die.

Win condition:

• You win when all mafia have been eliminated and there is at least one town player alive.

Confirm through PM by replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

Spoiler: 1-shot Vig

Town 1-shot Vigilante

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Town 1-shot Vigilante.

Abilities:

• Once during the game at night, you may target a player to kill.

Win condition:

• You win when all mafia have been eliminated and there is at least one town player alive.

Confirm through PM by replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

Spoiler: Watcher

Town Watcher

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Town Watcher.

Abilities:

• Each night you can target a player to watch and learn who visited them that night.

Win condition:

• You win when all mafia have been eliminated and there is at least one town player alive.

Confirm through PM by replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

Spoiler: Goon

Mafia Goon

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Mafia Goon.

Abilities:

• You share a Private Topic (Mafia PT) with your fellow mafia; (partner's names) which is always open.
  
• You have a factional night-kill meaning that each night one of you may night-kill a player.

Win condition:

• You win if at least one member of the mafia is alive and all town players are dead.

Confirm through PM replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

Spoiler: Neighborizer

Mafia Neighborizer

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Mafia Neighborizer.

Abilities:

• You share a Private Topic (Mafia PT) with your fellow mafia; (partner's names) which is always open.
  
• You have a factional night-kill meaning that each night one of you may night-kill a player.
  
• You have a Private Topic (Player's Neighborhood) which is always open. Each night, you can target a player. I will add them to your neighborhood topic at the end of that night.

Win condition:

• You win if at least one member of the mafia is alive and all town players are dead.

Confirm through PM by replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

Mod info/result PMs:
When the friendly neighbor targets a player, the target get this message in their role PM: "I am mod-confirming that [player] is town."

The watcher will get results in this format: "[Their target's name] was visited by [visitor's name] (and [visitor's name], etc.)

Other comments: The general idea with the weak friendly neighbor is that I wanted a way to get a two-way confirmation for two town players (which would be the ideal role usage) which differs from a cop and is more like a Mason Recuiter. Except, I wanted to weaken it a bit by not allowing out-of-thread discussion so I created a new role with existing roles and modifiers. The one-shot vig ideally would hold onto their shot unless the game gets to evens which happens if the friendly neighbor decides to target scum. Only way town gets punished with one less mislynch is if either of those players use their roles sub-optimally. There is one scenario where mafia could kill the vig the same night the weak friendly neighbor targets scum where town lose a mislynch and I haven't quite figured out how to fix that. Thought of using a backup vig but I'll already pretty much have four confirmed townies if everyone claims on D2 and having one more makes me worry that poe would be too easy. Also, if everyone dies, it's a draw which would happen if the vig holds onto their shot and is endgamed in 3-way lylo. I saw a lot of MD discussion regarding neighborhoods being negative utility or scum favored so I decided to just flat-out make it a scum power role so mafia can use it for private manipulation or role fishing as they see fit.

[BlackVoid]

Hi guys.

[Firebringer]

This setup doesn't look too bad.
My only concern just looking at it is that town will auto think that one of the neigborizers is scum because normally there isn't two town neighborizors, but I kind of get feel that is the point?

[Firebringer]

I think you need format your opening posts better.
Unless that is just placeholder, then disregard that.

[BlackVoid]

There aren't two neighborizers. One is a friendly neighbor who basically selects a target and I'll mod-confirm them as town to their target. They don't get a private topic. There's only going to be one private topic in the game (other than the mafia topic of course).

[BlackVoid]

Yeah, I'll try to use a nice font and center the heading in the actual thread. But the content is pretty much what I posted.

[Firebringer]

There aren't two neighborizers. One is a friendly neighbor who basically selects a target and I'll mod-confirm them as town to their target. They don't get a private topic. There's only going to be one private topic in the game (other than the mafia topic of course).

Ohhh I complete went over that.
I thought he was a weak friendly neighborizer (Which now that I think about it is a masonizer), I am a idiot.

Anyways, from a balance perspective, I think this is a bit scum-sided (Not OP as shit, but still a bit)
The weak friendly neighbor can die early, the vigilante shoots town, and then you have basically possibly three dead in one night leaving you much closer to LYLO and fewer lynches available.

It would probably be better if the friendly neighbor was just a friendly neighbor in this.

[Firebringer]

Yeah, I'll try to use a nice font and center the heading in the actual thread. But the content is pretty much what I posted.

If you can, please post them in here, I have seen normal mods post drastically different styles in their opening posts and I think normal queue would kind of like to semi-standard look so its easier for us to examine post games.

[BlackVoid]

Three dead in one night happens when the weak friendly neighbor targets scum. Which means as long as they crumb right, it's a guaranteed scum lynch the following day.

But I see what you mean. By "just a friendly neighbor" are you suggesting a 1-shot or a full role? My current weak friendly neighbor is a 1-shot role.

As for the formatting, yeah I'll post it here. Hang on for a sec.

[Firebringer]

Three dead in one night happens when the weak friendly neighbor targets scum. Which means as long as they crumb right, it's a guaranteed scum lynch the following day.

But I see what you mean. By "just a friendly neighbor" are you suggesting a 1-shot or a full role? My current weak friendly neighbor is a 1-shot role.

I mean yeah, that is if they crumb it right, and the players pick up on the crumb well. And that players assume that the player didn't die from vigilante or mafia kill.

I don't see much difference in 1 shot Friendly Neighbor and a Full Friendly Neighbor in setups tbh.
If the friendly neighbor targets scum night 1, the scum either has to confirm them the next day or gets pressured for it if Neighbor calls them out on it. I guess theres a difference if Friendly Neighbor targets someone who is going to die. Probably a 2 shot Friendly Neighbor is okay.

[BlackVoid]

Mini Normal ####: Chocolate Mafia

Still Playing

1. Player 1
   
2. Player 2
   
3. Player 3
   
4. Player 4
   
5. Player 5
   
6. Player 6
   
7. Player 7
   
8. Player 8
   
9. Player 9
   
10. Player 10
    
11. Player 11
    
12. Player 12
    
13. Player 13

Eliminated

1. No one yet

Links

D1: Start

[BlackVoid]

Rules & Public Info

Boilerplate game rules, 2 week days, 48 hour nights, 48 hours before prod, 24 hours before replacement.

Daytalk.

3 mafia

vs

10 town

. Mafia members can perform kill in addition to any role usage.

Sample Role PM

Vanilla Townie

Welcome [Player Name] to Mini Normal X. You are a Vanilla Townie.

Abilities:

• Your weapon is your vote, you have no night actions.

Win condition:

• You win when all mafia have been eliminated and there is at least one town player alive.

Confirm through PM by replying with your Role and Alignment. Game thread is here.

[Regfan]

I would add an actual rulelist inside the OP rather than a link to a boilerplate; you can just copy and amend one of the rulelist from a mod you like.

Balance wise I agree with Fire in that it's slightly scum sided. I dislike the interaction between the 1shot vig and the 1shot friendly neighbor, if the latter uses their power on town then it's never optimal for the vig to have shot and this is something they'll be unaware of and thus probably shoot N1. I'd either amend the weak friendly neighbor, change the vig to 2shot or even both.

Interaction wise does the Mafia neighbourize visit re; watcher? Does the friendly neighbor?

[Empking]

Rules are cool. PMs are cool. I think the set-up is balanced - I would actually go for being too town-favoured than otherwise - although a little swingy. The interaction of confirmed-innocents and a Watcher s a little smelly, but I think a fair trade.

[Regfan]

I'd also reword the Mafia win condition.

[Regfan]

@Empking - There's not enough reliable town power here to balance mafia having daytalk; in the current setup vig shooting is a hindrance (Moves odds to evens except one small thing happens). Pretty much a 2 masons without daytalk or nighttalk (Possibility of 0) & watcher as towns only power.

[Regfan]

Problem with the boilerplate rule list link is it doesn't definitively explain what happens in certain instances; what defines a majority, if majority hasn't been reached by deadline is it a no Lynch?

[BlackVoid]

Okay so, regarding rules, can I just add a line:

1. A lynch (or no lynch) occurs when a simple majority is reached. If deadline is reached without a simple majority, a no lynch occurs.

or am I missing other stuff? Typically if I'm player, I hate reading rulelists that are a whole page of obvious stuff so I wanted to get just the essentials down.

Regarding the weak friendly neighbor and vig, how would you like it if I changed the vig to 2-shot and left the weak friendly neighbor as is?

What's wrong with the scum wincon?

[BlackVoid]

I was going back and forth on how to word the scum wincon for a while actually.

I ideally wanted it so that the mafia kill takes precedence over the vig kill but I checked normal guidelines on the wiki and it seems that all kills have to resolve simultaneously. So, if I wanted the wincon as I phrased it, I'd have to account for the possibility of a draw. (I didn't want to do the 50% wincon because I didn't feel it was in the spirit of what I felt a mafia game was supposed to be: one team eliminating the other entirely.) So, I settled on allowing the possibility of a draw and balanced the game around that.

[BlackVoid]

@Regfan - vig is also essentially a named townie though. If they claim vig, given that there isn't a lot of power, the town can treat them as confirmed town just through setup spec. And if mafia claim PRs, the vig has the ability to prove their role and town can no lynch before or after.

[BlackVoid]

I was also throwing around the idea of having a backup vig. Vig is a strong role but swingy based on skill level but if multiple townies are responsible for it, that would more closely reflect the skill of the town. So, if the vig dies, someone else would become the 1-shot vig.

[Regfan]

I too typically skim through a rulelist and don't pay too mcuh attention to it as a player but it's fairly neccesary for new players to have there, it's also good to have some of the rules in the OP so it's easily accessible for others to look at.

Current scum win condition relies on zero townies being alive which kind of means they have to play through the days/nights even with majority, just needs rephrasing.

Yeah I'd be much more okay with this being changed to a 2-shot vig, I think it'll actually mean that role will become more useful than harmful (re; taking it to evens most of the time). Only other problem I see with the setup is something that Empking brought up in that this could very easily turn into one of the clears claiming, watcher going on them and mafia shooting the player and losing a member due to it, not the worst thing but it's...annoying to happen as a player more than anything. "As for the named townie via mass-claim even without shooting", I disagree especially when town are considering the neighbourizer as potential town power, I also think they wouldn't rule out the possibility of both being town.

[Regfan]

Starting work in a second but I'll give you some more thoughts in a few hours.

I'm not really a fan of the backup vig type idea though.

[BlackVoid]

Re: Wincon - so should I just add a line saying "or nothing can prevent it from happening?"

Re: Ruleset - I'll try and skim through finished normal games and find an experienced mod and copy their ruleset then in a bit.

Re: Vig - I'm changing it to 2-shot then.

Re: watcher - I really wanted some way of letting the mafia know that there is a watcher so that they are discouraged from shooting the most threatening townies but I can't find a way to do that. Thoughts?

[Regfan]

The following win condition should suffice. "You win when you have at least one member alive and the Town have been eliminated or nothing can prevent this from occurring."

Yeah, most people just steal a good rulelist from a mod they respect.

Also couldn't think of a way of letting mafia know a watcher exists. Maybe making it so the watcher cannot target the same player two nights in a row is a decent middle ground? So they can't just sit on a singular clear. Mafia still may end up shooting the player the night the watcher is on them but it's less of a given with that.