Theme Test Market

[Seol]

I'm working on a variant I call "Lights Out" Mafia, based on the mechanics of early IRL variants I've read about. The basic twist is that the game doesn't go to night after a lynch, it only goes to night when the town votes "lights out". Dead roles aren't revealed until night falls.

I have two possible themes I'm thinking of using - one based in a late-19th-century London coffeehouse, and one set in a series of 14-year-old-girls' birthday sleepover parties.

Thoughts?

[Seol]

I'm working on a variant I call "Lights Out" Mafia, based on the mechanics of early IRL variants I've read about. The basic twist is that the game doesn't go to night after a lynch, it only goes to night when the town votes "lights out". Dead roles aren't revealed until night falls.

Thoughts?

Well, once there are two confirmed town, they can lynch everyone else and probably win. Once there are more confirmed town than scum, they can lynch everyone else and certainly win.

I'm working on mechanics to deal with that. Possibly a non-role-revelation, but instead only revealing how many scum are left (so true confrimation is harder to achieve), possibly defining the win as only if you're alive at the end (so people won't go along with the mass sacrifice strategy).

[Seol]

I know video games have been done quite a bit, but I've got some ideas for a

Super Smash Bros. Melee

mafia. If it has been done before, let me know. If there is a mod out there who doesn't want to participate, but wouldn't mind helping me out to make sure I'm not going overboard with the roles, I'd be much obliged. Kind of curious if people would be interested. PM me and I'll save you a spot.

I'd be in for that - it basically amounts to a "Nintendo Greatest Hits" mafia which would rock.

I have two possible themes I'm thinking of using - one based in a late-19th-century London coffeehouse, and one set in a series of 14-year-old-girls' birthday sleepover parties.

I like the second if I could be the creepy pedop...uh...I mean...the first one.

No creepy paedophiles. Well, there are in the late-19th-century coffeehouse, but not in the sleepover game.

Hmmm, I'm trying to think whether the whole "don't go to night automatically" could work or not, and how to balance it. Most of my ideas result in a game dramatically different to how we usually think of Mafia - but that's the point of theme games, no?

[Seol]

If you can't find enough characters for Wallace & Gromit Mafia, you could always do an Aardman Mafia. Then you'll definitely have enough characters to choose from.

Oooh, I wanna be Morph!

edit: That game should probably feature an arsonist. :/

[Seol]

So I'm kicking around a "Firefly Mafia" setup... I'd need a co-mod, of course, because of my modding history.

Whaddya think?

So, what... you can see what happens at night, due to everyone's enormous glowing butts?

Or do you mean themed on the Whedon series?

[Seol]

I'm working on a variant I call "Lights Out" Mafia, based on the mechanics of early IRL variants I've read about. The basic twist is that the game doesn't go to night after a lynch, it only goes to night when the town votes "lights out". Dead roles aren't revealed until night falls.

Thoughts?

Well, once there are two confirmed town, they can lynch everyone else and probably win. Once there are more confirmed town than scum, they can lynch everyone else and certainly win.

I'm working on mechanics to deal with that. Possibly a non-role-revelation, but instead only revealing how many scum are left (so true confrimation is harder to achieve), possibly defining the win as only if you're alive at the end (so people won't go along with the mass sacrifice strategy).

OK, I've thought it through and the basic rules changes are as follows:

The win condition for town is "All scum are dead, the town votes no lynch (go to Night), and you are still alive". The win condition for Mafia is "All non-Mafia are dead, and you are still alive".

Roles are not revealed until night falls, meaning the town needs to no-lynch both to check their progress and in order to win.

This makes winning much harder, obviously - very few winners at the end of the game - but it means sacrificial gambits of any kind simply don't work (as if you're dead, you lose, no matter how much good you do in the process - it's no longer a team game in the same way Princeton Mafia is). I think that's enough to makes the game fundamentally balanced.

[Seol]

I don't like the above suggestion: Mafia is a team game and a requirement that you have to urvive destroys that.

It is still a team game - the town is united by a common cause - but as an analog to a real situation,

no-one should ever be happy being lynched

. That they are is a curiosity of the workings of the game.

This variation is quite different to regular Mafia - it's not exactly the same game. Many principles survive the translation, but some don't. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

Surely the simpler solution is to have just townies and mafia - that way they can never be confirmed town. Plus it is always preferable to have a simpler set-up with novel mechanics.

It probably will be a very stripped-back setup for the first run, but if possible I want the concept to be extendable, rather than just a one-off gimmick. So... maybe. Perhaps I'll run the first game with "big wins" (your team wins, you survive) and "little wins" (your team wins but you're dead) and see how that goes.

[Seol]

if I were playing to win, I'd do the minimum to not get lynched, not step out on a limb, not make myself a target, etc...

How do you think you'd act if the Mafia really did invade your town and lynch-mob justice was invoked?

...that said, the game may be overly prone to encouraging lurky behaviour. Obviously, due to the game's fundamental mechanics, the result of any deadlines would be No Lynch, Lights Out. Maybe, seeing as we're talking multiple lynches per day, a constant week's deadline (starting at the time of the most recent lynch) would be appropriate.

Except that nobody seems to like the mechanic.

[Seol]

...that said, the game may be overly prone to encouraging lurky behaviour. Obviously, due to the game's fundamental mechanics, the result of any deadlines would be No Lynch, Lights Out. Maybe, seeing as we're talking multiple lynches per day, a constant week's deadline (starting at the time of the most recent lynch) would be appropriate.

Except that nobody seems to like the mechanic.

I like that idea

a lot

. If you have a plain (mafia+townies) set-up, the town have little to gain from a night, so forcing them constantly to lynch on pain of losing a townie would definitely keep the momentum of the game up.

They do have

something

to gain from Night, information-wise, in that the roles of the dead aren't revealed until night falls - this is the fundamental dilemma of the game.

Anyway, that's enough battering-out of a setup - what's the procedure for a large theme game? It's Free Market, right - does that mean there isn't a queue?

[Seol]

Nope, just as long as you have the modding credintials, have your setup-reviewed by someone, and appoint a comod, Phebous will give you the mod powers. And if you need a co-mod, just ask. I've been in that buisness lately.

We have lift-off, then. I'll have to wait for my mini to finish first, which will give me time to prepare the flavour (why did I have the genius idea of writing all linking scenes in rhyming couplets in iambic pentameter? can't just hack

them

out in ten minutes...) and write up the brand-spanking new ruleset.

[Seol]

I prefer traditional ballad form. Much easier.

Yeah, I realise that

now

.

[Seol]

Hotel Mafia? Explain.

Sesame Street Mafia sounds pretty cool, and I bet I know who'd enjoy

that

one immensely...

[Seol]

Mechanical variations? Cool.

12-man or full-size?

[Seol]

I hope I am posting this in the right place.

I have an idea for a "Dream Team" Mafia where self-selected Mafia teams would have to submit applications detailing a plan of action. A "jury of peers" consisting of myself (ah just kidding) or (rather) a few people would review the plans, and select the best mafia team/strategy to be the "Dream Team" Mafia.

No slacker scum, no scum "winging it."

Uber-devious scum. La scum de la scum.

Other than that, it should run with standard Townie roles.

So, wouldn't the town just keep lynching the most experienced players, since they are the most likely ones to come up with a really good plan?

I thought of that. Part of the strategy would be for the Dream Team to pick players that no one would think would want to band together. Besides, the Town wouldn't want to sacrifice its most experienced players...

Interesting -

My bro's running something similar at Misetings when his turn in the queue comes up. Two team captains - one town, one anti-town, take it in turns to pick players for roles. Any roles. The scum team captain can use his first pick to put the biggest retard imaginable as a vigilante or put the best analyst in the scum. The town team captain (myself) can put the cracks-like-an-eggshell, transparent-as-Sue-Richards as the Mafia godfather. It runs both ways. Only goes as far as the picks, though.

[Seol]

Won't people just be lynched in order of stupidity?

The Mafia team captain gets to make picks too. Some of those might be for scum players.

[Seol]

Still means you can catch at least half the mafia by lynching the worst players first.

And probably half the town power roles too, plus the "worst players" probably covers 40% of the people in the game.

This is Misetings, after all.

[Seol]

If the scum captain is picking town power roles, he's not picking scum. Even if only 75% of the scum are in the worst 40% of players, no one other than those 40% are going to be in any danger of being lynched until late in the game.

Perhaps, but generally there are more nightkills than lynches, so it'll take until lategame - or even endgame - to lynch that 40%. Plus I think the scum captain will use most of his early picks on the scum, but it's after those first three or four picks he can start work on crippling the power roles as best he can.

Plus, some of those have to be worse than others. (I assume you can't announce that you'll pick by alphabet, or something?)

That's a matter of opinion - at least, about who's the worst.

[Seol]

makeovers. pillowfights. truth or dare. yep, it's sleepover season. yay!

except, you know what teenage girls are like, don't you? i wouldn't be surprised if amidst the hours spent with popcorn giggling at cute guys in generic hollywood romantic comedies, there was a bit of murdering going on. well, you know what they say - fight fire with fire! or in this case, fight stabbings with hangings.

and of course, what with this being a party and all, you're gonna stay up all night until you're really partied out.

LIGHTS OUT MAFIA 2 - THE SLEEPOVER SLAUGHTERS

heralds the triumphant return of the lights out mechanic - which means you get as many lynches each day as you want. the twists being, 1) you don't find out who the dead guys' roles until night falls, and 2) you only get a week to decide the lynch, or it goes to night.

for those who played last time, there are some developments - the survivor mechanic (have to be alive to win) is gone, and the game is not mountainous - there are power roles. slightly different power roles to normal though, and this is still (rolewise) a low power game. semi-open setup too - it's still 4 mafia, 16 town, no fancy alignments.

edit: brite to mod obv.

[Seol]

Theme mini.

Heroes.

Smalltown style.

Any interest?

[Seol]

Smalltown is a variation on open setup. Everyone has a role name and ability, and it is known who has what role and exactly how that role works. Alignment is separately and randomly determined. Check out the previous two Smalltowns to get a better idea.

[Seol]

Given that I'm a total nobody on these forums I don't have any particular intention of using this theme, but has anyone ever modded a roleclaim-themed game? By that I mean a game where all of the roles are funny/very good roleclaims that have been used in previous games on this site (all of them would have to have been fake roleclaims, though).

I did something similar when I did my first big game at Misetings - I had about half-a-dozen "cameos", which were the rolenames of various memorable roles (and a fake rolelcaim) from prior games.

The theme has potential but I really doubt there are enough memorable fakeclaims. The flying pumpkin is the only one that springs to mind that's even close to universally recognised.

[Seol]

Heh, and I'm working on an insanity Mafia too, albeit focussing primarily on amnesiacs, delusionals and variations thereon. A popular concept, apparently.

[Seol]

Freedom of movement? My vision's a bit of a spiritual successor to Covert Ops (where there's a gameplay theme - in Covert Ops, the shifting of the nightgame into the daygame and in-thread discussion; whereas in Insanity the concept is incomplete understanding of roles within a framework that allows one to divine full role functionality over time), and yes, it's a bitch to balance (but moreso drafting than balancing: coming up with functional roles for the setup) - but I'm not quite sure what you mean by "freedom of movement" here.