Mini Normal 1951 [Game Over]

[Apple Jack]

So maybe MU is too easy?

[Alisae]

I wouldn't say its too easy?
I think MU games are actually a lot harder and players are a lot better

[Apple Jack]

Idk about mu but here townies are downgrading their town meta so they can play better as scum.

[Chisa Yukizome]

for the most part that doesn't happen afaik

I'm sure there are some who do but they suck

also honestly that should probably be a rule but it's literally unenforcable

[Chisa Yukizome]

by they suck I don't mean skill just a general derogative

[Toranaga]

this game is actually incredibly townsided. if town plays well, they should win:

ascetic inno child is conf town
jailkeeper can be conf town and implicate scum
2-shot vig can definitely conf town and shred into POE
watcher can be conf town and implicate scum

commuter and JK can negate the wolves NK...

inno child, jailkeeper and watcher are not roles that are supposed to endgame as town and wolves need to get rid of the last 2 100%

all mafia had was checking TWICE if a player was a PR (which ofc can give mafia a nice little claim to go deep) and a non consecutive strongman to counter jailkeeper. town had 6 power roles (!) with 4 possibly or always conf town themselves in a 13er.

this was super unbalanced in favor of town.

[UC Voyager]

WELL YOU GUYS MADE ME CLAIM DAY ONE

[mastina]

also honestly that should probably be a rule but it's literally unenforcable

It

is

a rule. Subject: Forum Rules and Guidelines

Game Specific Rules

Mafia Rules

Breaking rules, not posting, or certain other behavior may result in a modkill or replacement in affected games; rules regarding this should be (and generally are) included up front by the Game Moderator. Some rules apply to most games, and should be assumed to hold unless the Game Moderator explicitly says otherwise. These are:

1. Do not bring outside influences into the game - this includes threats, bribes, wagers, promises, "trust tells", alliances, etc.

[acidphoenix]

ah

unfortunately the latter half still applies

[mastina]

jailkeeper can be conf town and implicate scum
watcher can be conf town and implicate scum

Both of these are wrong.
Jailkeeper is not a role which is ever conftown this game--least of all, because of the commuter. The commuter introduces the level of doubt as to the source of any failed nightkill. Furthermore, the jailkeeper can falsely clear scum or falsely be framed as scum via the strongman.
Watcher might implicate scum, but the most obvious choice it fails on (no watching the innocent child), and it is also not a role immune to being thought of as scum.

commuter and JK can negate the wolves NK...

Exactly! There is an ambiguity involved. That's a NERF, not a boost. There's a reason that jailkeeper-bulletproof is one of the worse newbie setups. Newbies simply have no clue what the source of the failed kill is and thus no idea what to make of it. Same principle.

inno child, jailkeeper and watcher are not roles that are supposed to endgame as town and wolves need to get rid of the last 2 100%

The innocent child could be killed without consequence at any time. No watch. No track. No jailkeep. No nothing. The ascetic was there for good reason. Jailkeeper is a role which is only conditionally powerful, in particular, if there's only one scum left. Before then, it is virtually worthless because its ability to stop death is incredibly limited (especially with the strongman).

The one and only role which did have that need for death would be the watcher. The watcher was the strongest town role in this game, hands down, no questions asked...yet it was just about the ONLY significantly strong role town could make great use of. Again, role synergy or rather the lack thereof is a thing. Innocent child is strong on its own. Vig is strong on its own. Jailkeeper can be strong on its own. Watcher is strong on its own. Commuter is

okay

but not really strong. But with all the gates on them, and put together. You're left with a town where they don't have good odds of actually producing useful information. The jailkeeper is likely to be borderline negative utility for the town (blocking key town roles from performing actions, not stopping scum). The vig is disproportionately likely to hit town. The IC is likely to get promptly killed off, and if they fail to claim the ascetic, likely cause town to waste a jailkeep and/or watch attempting to save someone who can't be saved.

And so on and so forth.

all mafia had was checking TWICE if a player was a PR (which ofc can give mafia a nice little claim to go deep) and a non consecutive strongman to counter jailkeeper.

"All mafia had was this role which was a ridiculously good safeclaim yet which gave them info they desperately needed plus a role which shut down one of the roles I am griping about". Yeah seems about right!

town had 6 power roles (!) with 4 possibly or always conf town themselves in a 13er.

Not six. Five. Neighborizer is considered net-zero, net-null, absolutely worthless zero value for town. It is not factored into balance at all.

And scum had two decent/strong PRs of their own.
Strongman is the strongest scum role in existence, possible exception roleblocker but even then strongman likely wins out in terms of disproportionately damaging the town.
Neapolitan is effectively a rolecop, except one which was designed to mirror town roles (town roles were 2x this game, so too was the neapolitan to match the town roles) and give scum a safeclaim which fit well within the setup. (Because town lacked any real investigative power, a neapolitan would make sense as town because neapolitans are cop-lites.)

Two scum power roles.
Versus effectively five town power roles.

Given that normal balance standards for a 10-3 game would be 7-3-3 (or 6-4-3) VT-PR-scum, this is right in the zone.
Add two extra town roles, and you add in two scum roles. Equivalent exchange.

Is it how I would design a game, no. Is that level of swing in a game something I would prefer, also no. But it is definitively still

balanced

, because scum and town have equal odds at winning.

[reaverb]

mastina I feel like we didn't have enough power to counter power role but since it's mafia scum seeing how people play here it's not that hard to trick town

Scum do not, I repeat, do NOT need a counter to every town power role.
Towns need power roles to win. Because mountainous games are hilariously, hilariously scumsided.
....

I think you would find it interesting to play a game on a site where the "game is townsided" players are coming from. MafiaUniverse has been mentioned a couple times, mtgssalvation forums are a site that has similar day lengths to mafiascum that seems to have a similar town winrate to MU from what I've seen.

Generally, Townies are much better at catching scum just on post/words than this one was. I don't have any numbers but this game you'll notice in this game every NK was based on somebody having a power role that cleared them. On other sites that's a lot less common - normally the first couple NKs are players who simply became obviously Townies that Town was never going to lynch through their posts. Even going into endgame this game, no player was off the table for lynching here.

I also disagree with your evaluation for some of Town's power roles. As the simplest example, I think that adding 1 town pr and 1 scum pr is town-sided - for example, the mafia ninja existed only as a counter to the Town Watcher, yet Town Watcher was still (theoretically) able to help Town.

[mastina]

I don't have any numbers but this game you'll notice in this game every NK was based on somebody having a power role that cleared them.

And that is not a site standard. It is nonexistent outside the Normal Queue. (Well, virtually nonexistent.) Site standard is exactly what you mention: killing town players who are a combination of obvtown/charismatic/accurate in reads. (I call it the town triple threat.)

As the simplest example, I think that adding 1 town pr and 1 scum pr is town-sided - for example, the mafia ninja existed only as a counter to the Town Watcher, yet Town Watcher was still (theoretically) able to help Town.

Quite the opposite, actually. Adding mafia power equivalent to adding town power tips the scales in favor of scum unless you're very, very,

very

careful about it.

[mastina]

(Yes I know I said equivalent exchange but it's not an exact formula. It's not add one town PR then add a scum PR so much as it is that loosely if you have extras on one side you need extras on the other side. Extras on town side need extras on scum side; extras on scum side need STRONG extras on town side.)

[mastina]

(So it's not quite equivalent exchange per se so much as it is exchange "mediocre town<->weak scum", "strong town<->mediocre scum", "REALLY strong town<->strong scum" as far as extras go, thereabouts.)

[Toranaga]

jailkeeper can be conf town and implicate scum
watcher can be conf town and implicate scum

Both of these are wrong.
Jailkeeper is not a role which is ever conftown this game--least of all, because of the commuter. The commuter introduces the level of doubt as to the source of any failed nightkill. Furthermore, the jailkeeper can falsely clear scum or falsely be framed as scum via the strongman.
Watcher might implicate scum, but the most obvious choice it fails on (no watching the innocent child), and it is also not a role immune to being thought of as scum.

commuter and JK can negate the wolves NK...

Exactly! There is an ambiguity involved. That's a NERF, not a boost. There's a reason that jailkeeper-bulletproof is one of the worse newbie setups. Newbies simply have no clue what the source of the failed kill is and thus no idea what to make of it. Same principle.

inno child, jailkeeper and watcher are not roles that are supposed to endgame as town and wolves need to get rid of the last 2 100%

The innocent child could be killed without consequence at any time. No watch. No track. No jailkeep. No nothing. The ascetic was there for good reason. Jailkeeper is a role which is only conditionally powerful, in particular, if there's only one scum left. Before then, it is virtually worthless because its ability to stop death is incredibly limited (especially with the strongman).

The one and only role which did have that need for death would be the watcher. The watcher was the strongest town role in this game, hands down, no questions asked...yet it was just about the ONLY significantly strong role town could make great use of. Again, role synergy or rather the lack thereof is a thing. Innocent child is strong on its own. Vig is strong on its own. Jailkeeper can be strong on its own. Watcher is strong on its own. Commuter is

okay

but not really strong. But with all the gates on them, and put together. You're left with a town where they don't have good odds of actually producing useful information. The jailkeeper is likely to be borderline negative utility for the town (blocking key town roles from performing actions, not stopping scum). The vig is disproportionately likely to hit town. The IC is likely to get promptly killed off, and if they fail to claim the ascetic, likely cause town to waste a jailkeep and/or watch attempting to save someone who can't be saved.

And so on and so forth.

all mafia had was checking TWICE if a player was a PR (which ofc can give mafia a nice little claim to go deep) and a non consecutive strongman to counter jailkeeper.

"All mafia had was this role which was a ridiculously good safeclaim yet which gave them info they desperately needed plus a role which shut down one of the roles I am griping about". Yeah seems about right!

town had 6 power roles (!) with 4 possibly or always conf town themselves in a 13er.

Not six. Five. Neighborizer is considered net-zero, net-null, absolutely worthless zero value for town. It is not factored into balance at all.

And scum had two decent/strong PRs of their own.
Strongman is the strongest scum role in existence, possible exception roleblocker but even then strongman likely wins out in terms of disproportionately damaging the town.
Neapolitan is effectively a rolecop, except one which was designed to mirror town roles (town roles were 2x this game, so too was the neapolitan to match the town roles) and give scum a safeclaim which fit well within the setup. (Because town lacked any real investigative power, a neapolitan would make sense as town because neapolitans are cop-lites.)

Two scum power roles.
Versus effectively five town power roles.

Given that normal balance standards for a 10-3 game would be 7-3-3 (or 6-4-3) VT-PR-scum, this is right in the zone.
Add two extra town roles, and you add in two scum roles. Equivalent exchange.

Is it how I would design a game, no. Is that level of swing in a game something I would prefer, also no. But it is definitively still

balanced

, because scum and town have equal odds at winning.

jailkeeper wasn't lynched in this game because he claimed that role on d1. and then at night the wolfteam killed him. he would also not get lynched d2 regardless of how scummy people were reading him. he would conftown by either JKing the NK, or JKing the wolf that does the NK - yes, with the exception of the ascetic IC and the strongman - because there were no other protection roles in the game. he would also conftown as soon as wolf strongman flipped, because there were no other protection roles in the game. all it takes for town is read into the mechanics, yes?

watcher wouldn't watch the IC until after IC claims. in this game, jailkeeper claimed and got the n1 NK and the only reason scum wasn't outed by the watcher is because the watcher forgot he was that role.

you seem to be downplaying just how many of these roles were claimable and could be mechanically confirmed. yes, there are situations in which one town PR would get in the way or otherwise get a confusing NA, but this game could literally be done by d2 if I paint a scenario where town plays well too.

watcher was 100% overkill...

[mastina]

jailkeeper wasn't lynched in this game because he claimed that role on d1.

And lol for that because that's an absolutely shitty reason to shut down the lynch of a player. Jailkeeper is an incredibly common scum role. It is also an incredibly common fakeclaim of a scum roleblocker. A town choosing to not lynch a jailkeeper claim is free to make that choice but they make it at their own discretion with a significant chance of having it bite them in the ass down the road.

and then at night the wolfteam killed him.

Which, again, is lol. Scum killing roles rather than threats isn't the setup's fault. It's the scum's fault for not shooting threats.

he would also not get lynched d2 regardless of how scummy people were reading him.

Again. Players. Not setup. The players choose not to lynch someone, they choose not to lynch that someone. Role, setup, has nothing to do with that.

he would conftown by either JKing the NK, or JKing the wolf that does the NK - yes, with the exception of the ascetic IC and the strongman - because there were no other protection roles in the game.

1: There was a commuter. The commuter introduces ambiguity.
2: You can't discard the existence of roles while simultaneously acknowledging the existence of those roles. In this case, you can't ignore that there was in fact a significant chance of wasting the jailkeep on the ascetic IC.
3: On that same line, you can't ignore that the strongman is a complete and total counter to the jailkeeper on both of its halves, bypassing BOTH the block AND the protect portions of the role.
4: The odds of hitting a player which causes a kill to fail from either method are incredibly low, especially with three scum alive.
5: Even if successful, the Jailkeeper has no proof they were the one to cause the failed kill.

he would also conftown as soon as wolf strongman flipped, because there were no other protection roles in the game.

That is a player assumption. Not a setup assumption.

all it takes for town is read into the mechanics, yes?

All it takes is for town to

correctly

read into the mechanics, sure. But I just showed you at least five ways where town is very likely to read into them WRONG. The number of ways setup spec could and would/does go wrong VASTLY outweighs/outnumbers the number of ways setup spec can go right. There's one way for the speculation to be right. There are dozens of ways for the speculation to be wrong, many of which are incredibly -EV for the town if they have those wrong ideas as their working theories.

watcher wouldn't watch the IC until after IC claims. in this game, jailkeeper claimed and got the n1 NK and the only reason scum wasn't outed by the watcher is because the watcher forgot he was that role.

And if that had happened, the scum would have had a two-for-one trade: jailkeeper dead, watcher dead, for the price of one scum dead. That's a trade which scum come out ahead in.

you seem to be downplaying just how many of these roles were claimable and could be mechanically confirmed.

Role != alignment. If you think it does you will lose game after game after game. Mechanically confirmed roles are not alignment confirmed roles. This is a guiding principle of play on mafiascum. If people want to incorrectly assume a role is town, they're free to make that mistake. But it is exactly that: a mistake. See also, the neapolitan scum had this game. That role was mechanically able to confirm itself fairly easily. By outing accurate results, its targets would confirm that yes it was saying, speaking, the truth. And mechanically a lack of investigatives this game outside the neapolitan would indicate the neapolitan would be town, yes? Except it WASN'T town.

Claimable roles mean shit. If you think they mean something, you will be burned. Time and time again, you will lose game after game. Because they aren't. It's a player-based decision to think so. Not a design-based perspective.

[Tchill13]

It didn't really help town that their watcher forget he was a watcher. no offense whymafia

Or he played super scummy or a townie decided to gamethrow.

Fuck off. I admit my fault, but the fact that you decided to fucking tunnel the whole game didn't help matters. Nobody besides you and TChill even though I was scummy. I just ... happened to forget. It was a horrible mistake and I acknowledge that

to be fair you were scummy for multiple reasons but i pretty much knew i was in trouble in days 2 and 3 since you stayed around and i was gonna be hesitant to move from it. I was certain you were scum after my vote breakdown post of you and tacos. Srry.

[Tchill13]

- Find a play style that works for you and stick with it.

- Reread games you've played in months after the fact. There is so much you can learn about mistakes you made, stuff you missed, how people reacted now that you know the entire setup.

I think if you do those two things, you will find your game improving by leaps and bounds

best advice so far. i'm gonna follow it.

[Tchill13]

he didn't realize he was a watcher

just like i didn't realize i was a vig

??? no comment lmao.

[Tchill13]

whymafia the players i enjoy and learn the most from are Mulch, boon and robb (not tunneling robb). Alisae seems to know what she's talking about by my familiarity there doesn't exist. I suggest paying attention to those 3 players though. Very different play styles to view too.

[UC Voyager]

man...i just remembered. we didn't reach our goal of 150 pages

[Tchill13]

Somehow I need to figure out how to ignore people lying. I shouldn’t have to but it’s happening almost every game. I really wish people would just do better.

in a perfect world LAL makes sense and should work. This isn't a perfect world though and you HAVE to keep that in mind as much as it kills you. that's how i do it at least.

[Tchill13]

lmao after reading post game idgaf about this game. Lot of missed opportunities. oh well gg.

[Tchill13]

Idk about mu but here townies are downgrading their town meta so they can play better as scum.

i've seen this post from diffferent ppl.

my first thought is if you don't try your hardset to win every game as either alignment you shouldn't be playing. I would think both games would develop in a similar manner. If i am getting better at scum hunting I should in turn learn what not to do as scum.

because you throw this in with unexperienced players (such as myself) that are really trying and see scummy play from other townies doing this "holding back" it will lead to a lot of losses on lack of effort.

i think a player named vedith made the most sense on this topic. The only ppl trying to look towny are scum. As town You don't win by looking towny you win by lynching scum, scum hunting. So when a player comes off as just looking towny because he's "holding back" i'm gonna be willing to lynch him almost every time.

As scum you just have to "scum hunt" but it has to make sense, from my understanding at least. Most players that i've seen that I consider "bad" as scum is ppl that just try to look towny, or ppl that don't make near as much sense as scum "scum hunting" compared to when they're town. So they dumb down their reasoning as town and their scum game benefits.

So when ppl are "holding back" to benefit their scum game I'd almost consider it game thrwoing. What can you do though?

i just hate that ppl do this. Someone commented in one of my early games that my town game would benefit my scum game through play style alone. I didn't intend that and i try just as hard as both i've just found a play style i believe is sufficient as both alignments which was totally by just playing the game and unintentional. Of course i've only played for a few months and ik i have a lot to learn

this is just an issue that's been bothering me which resulted in the longish post.

[Mulch]

Hi teech