Mafiascum.net

My chief complaint with lynchproof scum is that it has the potential to function too similarly, or identically, to jester, which is one of the flagged roles as bastard enough to require disclosure. In Krazy's design, and assuming traitor is defined as usual also in your design, the lynchproof scum can't win alone, yet grants a boon to their team when lynched, so they can function like a jester against a town that is not on notice that a player might desire their own lynch. In a 3:2 LyLo with VT, VT, VT, Goon, Lynchproof Traitor, the scum are just as interested in a Lynchproof Traitor lynch as they are in a VT lynch. The Lynchproof Traitor can exploit play patterns to ensure their own lynch more easily than they can push a mislynch. The Traitor can invert a professed townread they had on a VT all game and shitpush it in the ugliest fashion, and regardless of how easy it is to see through someone doing that with the express desire of getting voted, the town needs to at least be on notice that a Mafiosi could possibly crave that in an endgaming way (obviously I can't go as so far as saying a setup that incentivizes a Goon to dive into center stage to take attention off of a Godfather is bastard, but that's qualitatively different). Otherwise town has no chance of detecting they're dealing with a jester mechanic.
I appreciate that the mechanic can be balanced to 50% but "bastard" versus "nonbastard" is about expectations and what type of lynching goals can be allowed/not allowed. Allowed: somebody in the game who advances their wincon by lynching literally anybody (SK) Disallowed: Someone who advances their wincon if they manged to lynch a certain slot d1 but that same thing isn't true d2 (cult leader). Disallowed: Someone who advances their wincon by lynching themselves. A 99x multivoting jester who flips a coin to either succeed or lose all votes and reveal her role on lynch is balanced but fitting the pattern of what needs to be flagged.
In both games I've seen this it thankfully triggered before LyLo. If you can/could design the role in such a way that lynching the lynchproof scum makes progress towards the town wincon, even if it's considerably less progress than other scums, but unambiguously always progress, then I could be ok with it. At LyLo-x you have some information generated and also and extra NK so the tradeoff is unclear at various X whether it's good or bad. At LyLo it's always straight jester.

I will just, cede all points and resign the mechanics topic because I care much less. It is definitely not a point that's specific to traitors, it comes up with lots of theme game mechanics and I don't feel nearly as strongly about it.

So now I get to defend the setup from Mastina

In post 33, mastina wrote:So the town in this game has:
A rolestopper.
A jailkeeper.
A bodyguard.
Plus the lynched roles.
A bulletproof Oracle.
Some form of Vig (even if that was just 1x but I suspect otherwise)
An IC.
A 3 man neighborhood which from setup perspective is PAINFULLY obvious to the town as being a masonry.
AND MORE.
Almost all of which are upgradeable.

Against a gated rolecop and what amounts to a shitty Superdaint-Janitor.
With a traitor whose recruitment method we don't know.

There's only one appropriate response:

In post 28, mastina wrote:

In post 27, mastina wrote:

In post 26, mastina wrote:BTW jjh I wrote a jingle for this game, but it is something which I will need to sing.

Since I can only sing when alone on a computer, that probably means not tonight, but.
You have a treat to look forward to.

This jingle will reference how our only power is a nerfed rolecop, my role requires me to die, we don't have a proper third scummate and have no clue how our traitor operates, and the town by contrast has a fucking bulletproof oracle (bulletproof of THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE TOWN ROLE IF USED WITH EVEN A MODICUM OF COMPETENCY), a full town rolestopper, and a Vig of some sort, plus a neighborhood which is a masonry, with UPGRADING TOWN ROLES ON TOP OF THAT when zero scum roles interact with the upgrade mechanic, AMONG THE VERY LONG LIST OF ISSUES THIS GAME.

My jingle once I post it will be the only good thing to have come from this. Fucking. Game.

So as promised, I recorded the jingle. I haven't given it a title yet, am open to feedback.
My first thought was something along the lines of 'bovine defecation', but that doesn't roll off the tongue too well. I'd prefer something shorter, saaaayyy, two syllables instead of six.
Let me know if you have any thoughts after you give it a listen:

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm
Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin' bullshit.

You know what this game iiisss?
It's a stinking pile of shiiiiiit!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm
Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin' bullshit.

Fake trumpet solo!

Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm
Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm

Badum Badum BADADADADA
Badum Badum BADUMMMM
Badum Badum BADADADADA
Badum Badum BADUMMMM

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm
Badum Badum Badadadada
Badum Badum Badummmm

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is stinkin'

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

This game is bullshit,
So fuck this game I'm outttt...

Just sharing this for the pleasure of the dead thread.

In post 76, jjh927 wrote:So now I get to defend the setup from Mastina

It's still not balanced.
Conditional deathproof traitor is literally the entirety of the scum's power.
The ENTIRETY of the scum's power, is a role that they know NOTHING about.

We knew there was a traitor.
We knew fuckall about the traitor. Not who they were, not how to recruit them, not even that we COULD recruit them.

My role REQUIRED me to die--and the deathproof traitor is ALSO incentivized to die. Two scum REQUIRED to die to use their roles. Did you not think about what it means for all but one scum, to be REQUIRED to eat a lynch/nightkill, in order for their roles to come into affect? Yes, one of said scum would survive said role coming into affect, but it's still them requiring to eat a death, when the scum want deaths to be on town players.

Deathproof scum being lynched, is worse than town being lynched.
Janitoring scum being lynched, is worse than town being lynched.
Deathproof scum being nightkilled, is worse than town being nightkilled.
Janitoring scum being nightkilled, is worse than town being nightkilled.

Scum were incentivized BY THEIR ROLES to eat lynch and/or vig and/or their own factional nightkill.
That is a lynch which isn't on a town player, or a vig that isn't on a town player, or a factional nightkill that isn't on a town player.

Then on top of that--town has the strongest possible town investigative in the game with laughable restrictions.
Being macho means fuckall, the role is still brokenly powerful. Scum killing it is a free shot, sure...
...IF they can get a shot off on it.
Because, again.
They are incentivized, as scum, to eat deaths, AS SCUM, that should be aimed at town.
And then on top of that--jailkeepers might not save the oracle if protecting the oracle, but can block the scum's nightkill.
Rolestoppers, if you go by Normal standards, can block the scum's nightkill--Macho means protective actions fail, but rolestopper isn't classified as a protective action, it is classified as a roleblocking action that roleblocks everyone else targeting the macho player.
That, not to mention the town roles on top of that.
Another protective who can protect anyone other than the macho player.
A neighborhood which was PAINFULLY obvious via ridiculously easy to deduce setup spec was a masonry instead of a neighborhood. (Anyone with half a brain could tell that all three members of the neighborhood were town, Xtoxm was dead on the money with his setup spec and reasoning for believing the members to be town because he nailed it through simple logic.) Like, the town thinking the members aren't town is pure stupidity on their parts to be frank.
There's whatever alimidia (apparently an investigative of some sort?) and Turkey (who is apparently not actually the traitor) are.
There's an IC.

There was never a realm scum really had a chance at winning this game from a role-design perspective. The town had a BOATLOAD of tools at their disposal. The scum had fuckall in terms of tools.
The scum lacked information, as the "informed" minority.
The scum lacked interaction with the mechanic the setup is based around, whereas the town roles were built and based around it.
The scum were incentivized to eat lynches/nightkills rather than to lynch town/nightkill town/have town be vigged, in order to utilize their roles.

The scum, simply put, didn't have any of the tools at their disposal, that make scum be scum.
Scum have the tools of being the informed minority (we lacked information) and being able to remove players from the game during the night (there were multiple killstopping roles in the game and the scum's own roles were MEANT TO DRAW KILLS).

The roles I mentioned in my post might not be the ones in the setup.
The sentiment behind my song stands.

Scum could never win this game even if Suji didn't vig two scum basically in a row--because the town has tools which give them far, far more information than what the scum have at their disposal, have multiple kill-denial methods, and the scum's normal tools weren't at their disposal.

Giving scum a conditional deathproof traitor, does no counterbalance the detrimental nature of the game to the scum.

Like, was popsofctown a bad nightkill?
No, a rolestopper in most games is a DAMN fucking good nightkill.
Was Xtoxm a bad nightkill?
No, a jailkeeper "neighbor"(read, mason) that upgrades the town's roles, in most games, is a DAMN fucking good nightkill.
Was Sujimichi a bad nightkill?
No, a Vig, in most games, is a DAMN fucking good nightkill.

But the scum have too fucking many players to nightkill, and not enough nights to kill them all, especially not when so many of those nightkills very easily could have not gone according to plan.

We can't nightkill them all, we can't reliably steer the vig into vigging them all, and we can't get the town to lynch them all.

The town had multiple roles capable of basically confirming themselves as town.
The town had multiple ways of PoEing the scum.
And the scum had one role that could MAYBE give them an edge, POSSIBLY, if used in a very specific way in a very narrow window.

I feel like my rant is fucking justified here.

I won't deny that Sujimichi is a god at vigging; that's undeniable. This isn't the first time Sujimichi has made clutch vigs.
And I won't deny that multiple town players have played well--Xtoxm did, Suji did, and Something_Smart's slot has done so the whole game.
So like--the town still has earned the win and scum did nothing to deserve the win and everything to deserve the loss on play.

But like.
That doesn't excuse the setup.

It is in no way even remotely close to balanced and is TREMENDOUSLY townsided.

To put it another way:
Even if every town player aside from Something_Smart that was alive, were a VT or even strictly-100%-negative-utility role that couldn't help the town in any way shape or form even remotely.

I'd still call the setup townsided by a reasonable margin, even with Something_Smart being macho.

That they are probably not lying about having roles even if they're fibbing about the exact nature of their roles, just serves to tip the scales even further.

There's a reason that the town was expecting strong scum roles like a fucking full scum strongman--Eve's BP being deathproof traitor scum (and thus, not a town role) and SS's slot inverting macho<->bulletproof and whatever other lies there are, don't do enough for people's expectations to not be there.

The town had SUCH strong roles, that they are very right to suspect scum had strong roles.
Except we didn't.
We had a negative utility role and a role of situational utility that was also more negative utility to the groupscum than it was positive utility. The Deathproof Traitor is, in of itself, a NET NEUTRAL role overall, if I'm being GENEROUS; a role that could have equal good and bad for the scumteam in its use (but a heavy lean towards it being more bad).

Yet the setup was balanced with the expectation that said role would be incredibly strong for the scumteam, that it would be a huge net benefit for them, that the scum would with that role alone be super-brokenly strong, so the town got to load up on things to counterbalance a role that was just not thought out with how its implementation would have consequences on the scumteam's ability to function as a scumteam.

I'm not mad about the inevitable loss; I don't give a damn about it. If the game were 9 VTs + a town vig, versus three goons, then I'd have proudly ate the loss to the town anyway because Suji is a god and deserves the win and wasn't the only town player to play good.

But I don't think calling the game even remotely close to balanced is in any way remotely accurate. It just outright wasn't.

More than that--it's just not fun.

I'll happily play a game that's unbalanced if it is in any way, shape, or form, fun.

But this mechanic isn't.
It's not fun to the scum.
I doubt Eve is having fun with this role.
I most certainly wasn't having fun as scum; the only fun I had was that which I created with the song.
And I actually wouldn't be surprised for the town to also not be having fun, for much the reasons popsofctown mentioned. The role of the deathproof traitor just isn't fun for them to play around, and this game having the mechanics it does, just isn't very conductive to fun, though maybe I'm mistaken there. (I wasn't town so I can't speak to if town is having fun, but I can tell you that if I were town here, I probably wouldn't be enjoying the game much more than I did as scum.)

If something's unbalanced but still enjoyable, it's something I can accept.
If something's balanced but not really enjoyable, probably not ideal, but I can still accept it.
But when something is incredibly unbalanced AND incredibly unfun.

I feel like I'm in my fucking right to rant about it.

Is there only 2 nontraitor scum because that's pretty absurd if that's the case

what exactly is eves role and why isnt the game over if shes a traitor
i want to see the full setup before commenting on balance, but i can totally see why you're frustrated mastina, would deffo feel the same way in a 2p scum team vs all the power town has
assuming all of scum power to be in a traitor is not a natural thought process

Hey!

I have a lot of fun with the Vigilante role, but it causes me so much stress. The first time I had that role I was originally going to kill mastina, but stressed over it during the night and correctly realized she was town and switched to scum instead. Now I got to do the reverse.

Thanks for the game. I really enjoy playing with all of you.

Roles:
Scum:




Town:

Honestly, I probably should have made the neighbourhood trio's abilities only work when the stone was active, like a few other roles in the game, and have them power up at level 5 to no longer need the stone rather than having a buffed ability

SUJIMICHI

I think this setup was at least a little townsided but it might be somewhere between where jjh thinks it is and where mastina thinks it is.

i think its significantly townsided
deathproof scum just feels really bad to play against as town tho. the death proof activity is not THAT high a probability event, but its happened in this game, and looks like its going to happen again

is eve able to kill at night now or no?

Yeah Eve got the nightkill for being last scum but not PT access

In post 88, jjh927 wrote:Yeah Eve got the nightkill for being last scum but not PT access

Ah ok particle of sanity there.

In post 85, popsofctown wrote:SUJIMICHI

Hi!

Sujimichi you were my strongest townread this game

Then I diededed and you started shooting people

I guess that is what happens when they kill my strongest townread as well. I seem to have a bit of a temper.

Scum should have had a way of manipulating the stone levels significantly, like one-shot setting them to zero. And I should have gated more town roles behind the stones for needing their actions, so that there wasn't so much ability to stop kills.
But the oracle was balanced. I agree it's in a townsided setup, but it is not the cause of the issue. The main problem is that town have too much ability to stop kills. Gating the hood such that only one of the bodyguard, roleblocker, and tracker could function at once would have solved that. And that and the reset of a stone level would have been all it would take to balance this, but I designed parts of this setup too far apart and tbh made the setup design more difficult to balance by linking things to the stones.

I think eve gave up prematurely, wake and alim both were lynchable