WOLF MAFIA

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OrangeRKN
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by OrangeRKN » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:06 am

Well played TAP, no idea why you made the play at the end for power but it worked I guess!

Thanks for running this Dan. It's certainly achieved it's primary goal of being an active game!

Some thoughts from myself:

Game ending by timeout sucks

The "wolves win by Friday 13th" timeout clause made the endgame frustrating for me, and their win feel cheapened. Had there been no timeout, as we had managed to find the other wolves, Mommy and myself could have kept the seer protection circle going right up until the end and we would have won. So the only reason we didn't win was because of a somewhat arbitrary limit on when the wolves would win by default.

On that note, was there any mechanism to force the wolves to pick targets to kill? What was actually going on with all the nights with no kills? It certainly appeared like the wolves were deliberately avoiding kills to make the village odds smaller and give us nothing to work with, which is pretty much the opposite of how mafia should play (the wolves should always be keen to get as many kills as possible, as their win condition should be matching the village in number, and in making those kills they give information for the village to work with).

On mitigating the seer protection circle aka get rid of the mayor and other options

There are several ways of mitigating the protection circle tactic, so I thought I'd talk about a couple of them:

1) Get rid of the mayor

The mayor is not a standard part of the mafia setup! I find the suggestion of "get rid of the witch doctor" a funny take, because the witch doctor is much more of a standard mafia role than having an elected mayor who is safe from both lynch and night kills and who gets to nominate the candidates for lynch. Get rid of the mayor, and protection circles are a mechanical impossibility.

Getting rid of the mayor is also good for voting. I think the game genuinely just works better when everyone is voting for who to lynch, as voting records are more useful and more interesting wagons and reversals in the vote seem to naturally arise. Also, no mayor election means no need to split the day phase into two votes - instead the lynch vote runs across the whole day. It makes the game simpler and easier to play!

2) Give the wolves a roleblocker role

A roleblocker targets a player in the night phase and prevents them using any power role. For example a roleblocked seer gets back no result, while a doctor's protection is nullified. In the case of a seer and other roles, it is obvious when they have been roleblocked, so the roleblocker's existence is discoverable from their actions.

Against a protection circle a roleblocker is obviously disruptive. Once the seer/doctor are publicly declared, the roleblocker can target the doctor on the night he isn't mayor and so the mafia can kill him off. Public protection circles are easily broken.

In this game specifically, a roleblocker could have started targeting Mommy on day 1 as soon as he declared as seer, and all of his seer attempts could then have been blocked. As soon as I declared as the witch doctor, the wolves could have disrupted the protection circle.

The game is better with no outside communication (including PMs!)

Again this is an area GRcade seems pretty non-standard in - allowing villagers to freely PM each other. With the exception of the wolves, villagers should only be able to communicate about the game in thread. It forces public discussion, forces thread activity, and generally just makes the game more interesting. It also makes seers less overpowered in that they can't slowly establish their own "informed minority" of seered villagers. A seer should be torn between revealing their role and making all their findings public, and staying hidden from everyone to give themselves more time to investigate more people. A seer who can PM trusted others their results in confidence is a seer without any such dilemma.

Having a default no-PM rule also makes roles like lovers more interesting, where the downside of them both dying at the same time is balanced by them being able to communicate via PM.

Roles that change alignment suck

Mafia is a game about examining past behaviour to infer player alignment. When players can start on one side and switch to another (be it the half-wolf role in this game or in the generic case of a recruitment game, as we've seen previously), such deduction becomes largely pointless. Being able to trust in deduction is in large part the appeal of the game, so I really don't like alignment-switching roles.

Roles should get reliably named on death

Half-wolves returning as "human" on death was harsh. When the host lies, it discourages and frustrates the village (and maybe even the wolves!). Death post reveals should be the one thing we can actually trust when it comes to confirming player alignment - otherwise everything becomes questionable and deduction is once again waylaid.

Hidden mechanics largely suck

This wasn't a standard game of mafia. It was somewhat frustrating being told it was a standard game of mafia on signing up, only to discover halfway through the game that it wasn't a standard game of mafia. In retrospect the half-wolf role doesn't change the game too much, but because we didn't know about the role or mechanics of it, it had a much greater effect as everything in the game got called into question. With the game now over I'm left hoping that the next game will actually be a standard game, and I don't think that's what Dan was going for.

Clues are a distraction

Their meaning is unknown until the end of the game, with any theories having no way of being verified, so clues are largely pointless (and mostly just a distraction). Instead they added to the frustration of knowing there were hidden mechanics in play. I think clues are better avoided unless the game is aiming to be a wild experiment in unknown mechanics.

Mommy is mental

Finally, Mommy is a right crazy seer and I am definitely voting to lynch him on the first day of the next game ;)

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Mommy Christmas » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:10 am

OrangeRKN wrote:
Mommy is mental

Finally, Mommy is a right crazy seer and I am definitely voting to lynch him on the first day of the next game ;)


Maybe I'll run the next one...


Now wouldn't that be fun? :nod:

:dread:
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Nun
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Nun » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:11 am

by Nun » Mon Sep 02, 2019 9:47 am
If OR has been truly seered human then he has got to be the alpha. If he's a villager then I will eat my metaphorical hat and run the next mafia game, he's way too contrarian to have good intentions here.

I reckon he has claimed a power role to Mommy to try and save himself.

strawberry float.

My guesses were all over the place this game with the wolves essentially just not posting for the bulk of it. I would definitely have been going after Daz, Hexx and OR for essentially doing the wolves' job of sowing doubt against a seer for basically no reason in the midgame haha

My OR obsession was literally just because I got killed so early which is rare for me in GR games and he was the only person i'd applied pressure to really. I will admit I got irrationally excited reading through the last round of updates Dan so thanks for indulging my tinfoil hat theories even in jest.

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by OrangeRKN » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:13 am

:lol: I was never anything but honest, and Moggy was a right dodgy fellow!

Looking forward to your next game Nun ;)

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Pancake » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:14 am

OrangeRKN wrote:Well played TAP, no idea why you made the play at the end for power but it worked I guess!

Thanks for running this Dan. It's certainly achieved it's primary goal of being an active game!

Some thoughts from myself:

Game ending by timeout sucks

The "wolves win by Friday 13th" timeout clause made the endgame frustrating for me, and their win feel cheapened. Had there been no timeout, as we had managed to find the other wolves, Mommy and myself could have kept the seer protection circle going right up until the end and we would have won. So the only reason we didn't win was because of a somewhat arbitrary limit on when the wolves would win by default.

On that note, was there any mechanism to force the wolves to pick targets to kill? What was actually going on with all the nights with no kills? It certainly appeared like the wolves were deliberately avoiding kills to make the village odds smaller and give us nothing to work with, which is pretty much the opposite of how mafia should play (the wolves should always be keen to get as many kills as possible, as their win condition should be matching the village in number, and in making those kills they give information for the village to work with).

On mitigating the seer protection circle aka get rid of the mayor and other options

There are several ways of mitigating the protection circle tactic, so I thought I'd talk about a couple of them:

1) Get rid of the mayor

The mayor is not a standard part of the mafia setup! I find the suggestion of "get rid of the witch doctor" a funny take, because the witch doctor is much more of a standard mafia role than having an elected mayor who is safe from both lynch and night kills and who gets to nominate the candidates for lynch. Get rid of the mayor, and protection circles are a mechanical impossibility.

Getting rid of the mayor is also good for voting. I think the game genuinely just works better when everyone is voting for who to lynch, as voting records are more useful and more interesting wagons and reversals in the vote seem to naturally arise. Also, no mayor election means no need to split the day phase into two votes - instead the lynch vote runs across the whole day. It makes the game simpler and easier to play!

2) Give the wolves a roleblocker role

A roleblocker targets a player in the night phase and prevents them using any power role. For example a roleblocked seer gets back no result, while a doctor's protection is nullified. In the case of a seer and other roles, it is obvious when they have been roleblocked, so the roleblocker's existence is discoverable from their actions.

Against a protection circle a roleblocker is obviously disruptive. Once the seer/doctor are publicly declared, the roleblocker can target the doctor on the night he isn't mayor and so the mafia can kill him off. Public protection circles are easily broken.

In this game specifically, a roleblocker could have started targeting Mommy on day 1 as soon as he declared as seer, and all of his seer attempts could then have been blocked. As soon as I declared as the witch doctor, the wolves could have disrupted the protection circle.

The game is better with no outside communication (including PMs!)

Again this is an area GRcade seems pretty non-standard in - allowing villagers to freely PM each other. With the exception of the wolves, villagers should only be able to communicate about the game in thread. It forces public discussion, forces thread activity, and generally just makes the game more interesting. It also makes seers less overpowered in that they can't slowly establish their own "informed minority" of seered villagers. A seer should be torn between revealing their role and making all their findings public, and staying hidden from everyone to give themselves more time to investigate more people. A seer who can PM trusted others their results in confidence is a seer without any such dilemma.

Having a default no-PM rule also makes roles like lovers more interesting, where the downside of them both dying at the same time is balanced by them being able to communicate via PM.

Roles that change alignment suck

Mafia is a game about examining past behaviour to infer player alignment. When players can start on one side and switch to another (be it the half-wolf role in this game or in the generic case of a recruitment game, as we've seen previously), such deduction becomes largely pointless. Being able to trust in deduction is in large part the appeal of the game, so I really don't like alignment-switching roles.

Roles should get reliably named on death

Half-wolves returning as "human" on death was harsh. When the host lies, it discourages and frustrates the village (and maybe even the wolves!). Death post reveals should be the one thing we can actually trust when it comes to confirming player alignment - otherwise everything becomes questionable and deduction is once again waylaid.

Hidden mechanics largely suck

This wasn't a standard game of mafia. It was somewhat frustrating being told it was a standard game of mafia on signing up, only to discover halfway through the game that it wasn't a standard game of mafia. In retrospect the half-wolf role doesn't change the game too much, but because we didn't know about the role or mechanics of it, it had a much greater effect as everything in the game got called into question. With the game now over I'm left hoping that the next game will actually be a standard game, and I don't think that's what Dan was going for.

Clues are a distraction

Their meaning is unknown until the end of the game, with any theories having no way of being verified, so clues are largely pointless (and mostly just a distraction). Instead they added to the frustration of knowing there were hidden mechanics in play. I think clues are better avoided unless the game is aiming to be a wild experiment in unknown mechanics.

Mommy is mental

Finally, Mommy is a right crazy seer and I am definitely voting to lynch him on the first day of the next game ;)



OK awesome, now I don't have to type this all out myself because I think you nailed everything I wanted to say.

Also: don't allow dead people to post before the game has officially ended!

We must sound so salty though :lol:

I do think TAP played well on the last day, albeit with a risky strategy, but the time limit ruined our chances.

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Pancake » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:15 am

Drumstick wrote:One last time for gooseberry fools 'n' giggles (from the deadposting thread):

Drumstick wrote:
Drumstick wrote:Hey guys remember when I said we should target the quieter players:
PaperMacheMario wrote:I agree that I don’t think we should just target inactives

Every single one of 'em.

QFT. I agreed with you then and you were damn right.

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by sawyerpip » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:15 am

Wolves - was the low post count a deliberate team strategy from the off or did it just turn out that way?

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Nun
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Nun » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:22 am

OrangeRKN wrote:Well played TAP, no idea why you made the play at the end for power but it worked I guess!

Thanks for running this Dan. It's certainly achieved it's primary goal of being an active game!

Some thoughts from myself:

Game ending by timeout sucks

The "wolves win by Friday 13th" timeout clause made the endgame frustrating for me, and their win feel cheapened. Had there been no timeout, as we had managed to find the other wolves, Mommy and myself could have kept the seer protection circle going right up until the end and we would have won. So the only reason we didn't win was because of a somewhat arbitrary limit on when the wolves would win by default.

On that note, was there any mechanism to force the wolves to pick targets to kill? What was actually going on with all the nights with no kills? It certainly appeared like the wolves were deliberately avoiding kills to make the village odds smaller and give us nothing to work with, which is pretty much the opposite of how mafia should play (the wolves should always be keen to get as many kills as possible, as their win condition should be matching the village in number, and in making those kills they give information for the village to work with).

On mitigating the seer protection circle aka get rid of the mayor and other options

There are several ways of mitigating the protection circle tactic, so I thought I'd talk about a couple of them:

1) Get rid of the mayor

The mayor is not a standard part of the mafia setup! I find the suggestion of "get rid of the witch doctor" a funny take, because the witch doctor is much more of a standard mafia role than having an elected mayor who is safe from both lynch and night kills and who gets to nominate the candidates for lynch. Get rid of the mayor, and protection circles are a mechanical impossibility.

Getting rid of the mayor is also good for voting. I think the game genuinely just works better when everyone is voting for who to lynch, as voting records are more useful and more interesting wagons and reversals in the vote seem to naturally arise. Also, no mayor election means no need to split the day phase into two votes - instead the lynch vote runs across the whole day. It makes the game simpler and easier to play!

2) Give the wolves a roleblocker role

A roleblocker targets a player in the night phase and prevents them using any power role. For example a roleblocked seer gets back no result, while a doctor's protection is nullified. In the case of a seer and other roles, it is obvious when they have been roleblocked, so the roleblocker's existence is discoverable from their actions.

Against a protection circle a roleblocker is obviously disruptive. Once the seer/doctor are publicly declared, the roleblocker can target the doctor on the night he isn't mayor and so the mafia can kill him off. Public protection circles are easily broken.

In this game specifically, a roleblocker could have started targeting Mommy on day 1 as soon as he declared as seer, and all of his seer attempts could then have been blocked. As soon as I declared as the witch doctor, the wolves could have disrupted the protection circle.

The game is better with no outside communication (including PMs!)

Again this is an area GRcade seems pretty non-standard in - allowing villagers to freely PM each other. With the exception of the wolves, villagers should only be able to communicate about the game in thread. It forces public discussion, forces thread activity, and generally just makes the game more interesting. It also makes seers less overpowered in that they can't slowly establish their own "informed minority" of seered villagers. A seer should be torn between revealing their role and making all their findings public, and staying hidden from everyone to give themselves more time to investigate more people. A seer who can PM trusted others their results in confidence is a seer without any such dilemma.

Having a default no-PM rule also makes roles like lovers more interesting, where the downside of them both dying at the same time is balanced by them being able to communicate via PM.

Roles that change alignment suck

Mafia is a game about examining past behaviour to infer player alignment. When players can start on one side and switch to another (be it the half-wolf role in this game or in the generic case of a recruitment game, as we've seen previously), such deduction becomes largely pointless. Being able to trust in deduction is in large part the appeal of the game, so I really don't like alignment-switching roles.

Roles should get reliably named on death

Half-wolves returning as "human" on death was harsh. When the host lies, it discourages and frustrates the village (and maybe even the wolves!). Death post reveals should be the one thing we can actually trust when it comes to confirming player alignment - otherwise everything becomes questionable and deduction is once again waylaid.

Hidden mechanics largely suck

This wasn't a standard game of mafia. It was somewhat frustrating being told it was a standard game of mafia on signing up, only to discover halfway through the game that it wasn't a standard game of mafia. In retrospect the half-wolf role doesn't change the game too much, but because we didn't know about the role or mechanics of it, it had a much greater effect as everything in the game got called into question. With the game now over I'm left hoping that the next game will actually be a standard game, and I don't think that's what Dan was going for.

Clues are a distraction

Their meaning is unknown until the end of the game, with any theories having no way of being verified, so clues are largely pointless (and mostly just a distraction). Instead they added to the frustration of knowing there were hidden mechanics in play. I think clues are better avoided unless the game is aiming to be a wild experiment in unknown mechanics.

Mommy is mental

Finally, Mommy is a right crazy seer and I am definitely voting to lynch him on the first day of the next game ;)

+1 to all this.

I have some ideas to try and shatter seer circles myself without strawberry floating with the balance too hard so we'll see how it goes.

The problem I have is I start a new job October 7th and they block GR so updating during the daytime would be problematic for me if I was to host.

Unless people want to literally go again? I'd be up for hosting another game back to back with this one but I reckon there was some game fatige creeping in at the end here so it might be better to give it some breathing room.

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Nun » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:23 am

Also who was the third half wolf?

Edit: Nvm, just remembered it was Laga

Last edited by Nun on Fri Sep 13, 2019 12:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Jenuall » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:25 am

Final post counts (probably, who knows this could all just be made up! ;) ) for those interested:

╔═══════════════════════════════════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦═══════╦════════╦════════╦════════╦════════╗
║              Player               ║ Day 1 ║ Day 2 ║ Day 3 ║ Day 4 ║ Day 5 ║ Day 6 ║ Day 7 ║ Day 8 ║ Day 9 ║ Day 10 ║ Day 11 ║ Day 12 ║ Day 13 ║
╠═══════════════════════════════════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬═══════╬════════╬════════╬════════╬════════╣
║ Albear                            ║     6 ║     2 ║     3 ║     1 ║     2 ║     3 ║     3 ║     3 ║     0 ║      1 ║      3 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ BID0                              ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Call and Answer                   ║     9 ║     6 ║     1 ║     2 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Captain Kinopio                   ║     0 ║     1 ║    24 ║    31 ║     2 ║     1 ║     4 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      3 ║
║ Clarkman                          ║     9 ║     4 ║     2 ║     2 ║     2 ║     4 ║     1 ║     1 ║     5 ║      4 ║      3 ║      8 ║      0 ║
║ Corazon de Leon                   ║     9 ║     2 ║    15 ║     9 ║    17 ║    16 ║    13 ║     8 ║     6 ║      3 ║      5 ║     10 ║     22 ║
║ Dangerblade (Half-Wolf)           ║    13 ║     7 ║     1 ║     9 ║     2 ║    18 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Drumstick                         ║    41 ║    30 ║     3 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      2 ║
║ Errkal                            ║    22 ║     2 ║     4 ║    20 ║     5 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ FatDaz                            ║     1 ║     2 ║     3 ║    25 ║     7 ║     2 ║    14 ║     1 ║     4 ║      0 ║      9 ║      4 ║      5 ║
║ Hexx                              ║    26 ║    17 ║     0 ║    46 ║    29 ║    12 ║    13 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Hyperion                          ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Ironhide                          ║     1 ║     2 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Jenuall                           ║    63 ║    28 ║    32 ║    28 ║     9 ║     5 ║    14 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Kezzer (Wolf)                     ║     0 ║    10 ║     9 ║    14 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      1 ║
║ Lagamorph                         ║     7 ║     4 ║     2 ║     6 ║     3 ║     3 ║     0 ║     2 ║     2 ║      6 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Mini E                            ║     7 ║    10 ║    15 ║    15 ║     4 ║     5 ║     1 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Moggy                             ║    64 ║    51 ║    47 ║    77 ║    26 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      4 ║
║ Mommy                             ║    84 ║    36 ║    51 ║   139 ║    35 ║    36 ║    38 ║    16 ║    14 ║     10 ║     14 ║      1 ║      3 ║
║ Nun                               ║    30 ║    30 ║     4 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Oblomov Boblomov                  ║    13 ║     7 ║    14 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      2 ║
║ OrangeRKN                         ║    32 ║    23 ║    38 ║    48 ║    20 ║    24 ║    29 ║     8 ║    11 ║      7 ║     13 ║      4 ║     10 ║
║ Pancake                           ║    25 ║    19 ║    22 ║     9 ║    34 ║    30 ║     4 ║     0 ║     0 ║      2 ║     17 ║     13 ║     33 ║
║ PaperMacheMario (Wolf)            ║     4 ║     2 ║     5 ║    15 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Pedz                              ║    24 ║    17 ║    34 ║    28 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Preezy                            ║    19 ║    26 ║     2 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ PsychicSykes (Wolf)               ║     3 ║     2 ║     3 ║     5 ║     0 ║     2 ║     0 ║     1 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Qikz                              ║     2 ║     0 ║     1 ║    12 ║     6 ║     4 ║     1 ║     4 ║     2 ║      2 ║      2 ║      3 ║      4 ║
║ Rhubarb                           ║     0 ║     1 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Rocsteady (Half-Wolf)             ║     7 ║     5 ║     3 ║    12 ║     3 ║     3 ║     9 ║     1 ║     1 ║      3 ║      3 ║      3 ║      1 ║
║ Roonmastor                        ║     1 ║     4 ║     2 ║     3 ║     1 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ That's not a growth               ║     6 ║     2 ║     8 ║     7 ║     0 ║     1 ║     9 ║     4 ║     1 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ The Alchemist Penguin (Dogfather) ║     2 ║     2 ║    10 ║    10 ║     3 ║     2 ║     1 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      4 ║      3 ║      9 ║
║ Tomous                            ║     9 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ VlaSoul (Wolf)                    ║     3 ║     0 ║     0 ║     4 ║     1 ║     2 ║     2 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ Zellery                           ║     1 ║     5 ║     5 ║    21 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║
║ mcjihge2                          ║     2 ║     1 ║     2 ║    11 ║     7 ║     5 ║    10 ║     2 ║     9 ║      2 ║      4 ║      4 ║     16 ║
║ sawyerpip                         ║    18 ║    14 ║    23 ║    33 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║     0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      0 ║      1 ║
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TAP laying low and getting away with it! :datass:

Last edited by Jenuall on Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:29 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Moggy
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Moggy » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:26 am

OrangeRKN wrote::lol: I was never anything but honest, and Moggy was a right dodgy fellow!


I was never dodgy. :lol:

I ended up in an impossible situation where I knew who some of the seers were but it wasn’t public knowledge. That’s usually great as you can work with them and get things done. But I also had Mommy running around like a strawberry floating madman, revealing things all over the place, PMing people without checking with the circle we were developing and on top of all that days and days of circular “yes but you are not proven” shite when I was trying to convey information. I couldn't trust that Mommy wouldn't just reveal everything we knew and so was trying to be the go-between and hoped that might shut him up. Which didn't work at all.

Being lynched was a sweet sweet relief.

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Call and Answer
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Call and Answer » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:31 am

GG wolf pricks.

Mommy being an actual nightmare in thread was entertaining, but sowing confusion and discontent amongst your own teammates isn't a great play. :lol:

I did have a thought about how to make the game more interesting for players assigned regular human roles - basically, guilds. In fiction, every player receives a role PM that identifies them as a classic village tradesman. So for example, a butcher, a baker, a farmer. They'd also be given a list of players who are in the same industry as them - this wouldn't be public, only shared between those players. There would be no special powers associated with these tradesmen roles. I've written a spec version of this in the spoiler below.

You are a Baker. Your family has lived in the village for years, providing fresh bread and tasty treats to the locals. When your father died a few years back, you took ownership of the shop with yeasty zeal.

You now bake from dawn to dusk with your apprentices;
Lagamorph
Moggy
TAP


(Guild sizes could be flexible depending on player count.)

Why this might be a good idea:

- This immediately offers players involvement in a larger meta game, with a potential group ready made to contact and formulate ideas with.

- By encouraging the entire village to PM each other, it eliminates the tactic of PM watching.

- Having multiple known alliances gives wolves a bigger area to hide in out in the thread. A wolf might be included in a guild however, and their role PM would not include any of this data (no human role fluff, no list of guild mates, just standard wolf info - in fiction say that being turned made them lose their memory). This amounts to a situation similar to the card game Spyfall, where the humans could use details about their role to try and draw out bluffing wolves.

Basically, it gives humans more chances to interact and be suspicious of each other, and gives wolves more places to hide while also making it harder to conceal themselves.

I've probably explained that appallingly, but any thoughts?

Edit - and much appreciation to Dan for running the game! Thanks Dan. Than.

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Drumstick
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Drumstick » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:38 am

Some observations:

The Humans HAVE to take it upon themselves to do better recon
As noted, I was very keen on going after the quieter players at the start of the game. As soon as PPM was a confirmed wolf and was revealed as such upon death, his post history in the game should have been perused immediately.

Drumstick wrote:
Mayor Drumstick on Day 1 wrote:Tomous: 5
Lagamorph: 4
That's not a growth: 4
PsychicSykes: 3
PaperMacheMario: 3
mcjihge2: 2
FatDaz: 1
Ironhide: 1
Zellery: 1
Qikz: 1
VlaSoul: 1

Currently looking at this group. Up to five seems (IMO) to be the sweet spot to appear active enough to avoid a cull and not being seen as inactive. In other words, the right amount of activity to fly under the radar.

Kezzer was on 0 at this point. I wonder if the Alpha is in here too.

He was, on 0 posts.

If someone had actually inspected PPM’s post history and come across this post the game could have been so, so different. You guys also spent vital days going after mcjihge2 when it was abundantly clear he was the most clear-cut human left!

Drumstick wrote:mcjihge2 - Nominated PPM for the lynch on 29/08. Also suggested VlaSoul on 30/08.

Both were long before either wolf was seered or came under any real pressure!

OrangeRKN wrote:On mitigating the seer protection circle aka get rid of the mayor and other options

There are several ways of mitigating the protection circle tactic, so I thought I'd talk about a couple of them:

1) Get rid of the mayor

The mayor is not a standard part of the mafia setup! I find the suggestion of "get rid of the witch doctor" a funny take, because the witch doctor is much more of a standard mafia role than having an elected mayor who is safe from both lynch and night kills and who gets to nominate the candidates for lynch. Get rid of the mayor, and protection circles are a mechanical impossibility.

Getting rid of the mayor is also good for voting. I think the game genuinely just works better when everyone is voting for who to lynch, as voting records are more useful and more interesting wagons and reversals in the vote seem to naturally arise. Also, no mayor election means no need to split the day phase into two votes - instead the lynch vote runs across the whole day. It makes the game simpler and easier to play!

I did this in Are You a Supernatural and it worked OK, but generally I think people like the Mayor position.

OrangeRKN wrote:2) Give the wolves a roleblocker role

A roleblocker targets a player in the night phase and prevents them using any power role. For example a roleblocked seer gets back no result, while a doctor's protection is nullified. In the case of a seer and other roles, it is obvious when they have been roleblocked, so the roleblocker's existence is discoverable from their actions.

Against a protection circle a roleblocker is obviously disruptive. Once the seer/doctor are publicly declared, the roleblocker can target the doctor on the night he isn't mayor and so the mafia can kill him off. Public protection circles are easily broken.

In this game specifically, a roleblocker could have started targeting Mommy on day 1 as soon as he declared as seer, and all of his seer attempts could then have been blocked. As soon as I declared as the witch doctor, the wolves could have disrupted the protection circle.

I played in an SONM game which had a roleblocker role in it (amongst other crazy stuff) and it was far too confusing.

OrangeRKN wrote:The game is better with no outside communication (including PMs!)

Again this is an area GRcade seems pretty non-standard in - allowing villagers to freely PM each other. With the exception of the wolves, villagers should only be able to communicate about the game in thread. It forces public discussion, forces thread activity, and generally just makes the game more interesting. It also makes seers less overpowered in that they can't slowly establish their own "informed minority" of seered villagers. A seer should be torn between revealing their role and making all their findings public, and staying hidden from everyone to give themselves more time to investigate more people. A seer who can PM trusted others their results in confidence is a seer without any such dilemma.

We’ve tried that a couple of times and the games weren’t great. Allowing the wolves to chatter away freely but not extending that to the rest of the players seems rather unfair and would potentially unbalance the game.

OrangeRKN wrote:Roles that change alignment suck
Roles should get reliably named on death
Hidden mechanics largely suck
Clues are a distraction
Mommy is mental

Agreed.

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Pancake
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Pancake » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:42 am

Drumstick wrote:Some observations:

The Humans HAVE to take it upon themselves to do better recon
As noted, I was very keen on going after the quieter players at the start of the game. As soon as PPM was a confirmed wolf and was revealed as such upon death, his post history in the game should have been perused immediately.

Drumstick wrote:
Mayor Drumstick on Day 1 wrote:Tomous: 5
Lagamorph: 4
That's not a growth: 4
PsychicSykes: 3
PaperMacheMario: 3
mcjihge2: 2
FatDaz: 1
Ironhide: 1
Zellery: 1
Qikz: 1
VlaSoul: 1

Currently looking at this group. Up to five seems (IMO) to be the sweet spot to appear active enough to avoid a cull and not being seen as inactive. In other words, the right amount of activity to fly under the radar.

Kezzer was on 0 at this point. I wonder if the Alpha is in here too.

He was, on 0 posts.

If someone had actually inspected PPM’s post history and come across this post the game could have been so, so different. You guys also spent vital days going after mcjihge2 when it was abundantly clear he was the most clear-cut human left!

Drumstick wrote:mcjihge2 - Nominated PPM for the lynch on 29/08. Also suggested VlaSoul on 30/08.

Both were long before either wolf was seered or came under any real pressure!


That's all very easy in hindsight but very difficult in the actual game. The list above is a case in point since it contains 3 humans who were still alive at the very end. We could have used the list to target one of them incorrectly.

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Clarkman
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Clarkman » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:48 am

Well run, Dan, and well played TAP.

I don't have an issue with the game mechanics. It is vital to keep things fresh and an end deadline doesn't feel like a huge disposition, particularly considering the nature of a dwindling volume of living players means the thread slows to a crawl anyway.

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Drumstick
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Drumstick » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:49 am

Pancake wrote:That's all very easy in hindsight but very difficult in the actual game. The list above is a case in point since it contains 3 humans who were still alive at the very end. We could have used the list to target one of them incorrectly.

None of that was posted in hindsight, but in real-time in the deadposting thread.

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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by sawyerpip » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:51 am

Pancake wrote:
Drumstick wrote:Some observations:

The Humans HAVE to take it upon themselves to do better recon
As noted, I was very keen on going after the quieter players at the start of the game. As soon as PPM was a confirmed wolf and was revealed as such upon death, his post history in the game should have been perused immediately.

Drumstick wrote:
Mayor Drumstick on Day 1 wrote:Tomous: 5
Lagamorph: 4
That's not a growth: 4
PsychicSykes: 3
PaperMacheMario: 3
mcjihge2: 2
FatDaz: 1
Ironhide: 1
Zellery: 1
Qikz: 1
VlaSoul: 1

Currently looking at this group. Up to five seems (IMO) to be the sweet spot to appear active enough to avoid a cull and not being seen as inactive. In other words, the right amount of activity to fly under the radar.

Kezzer was on 0 at this point. I wonder if the Alpha is in here too.

He was, on 0 posts.

If someone had actually inspected PPM’s post history and come across this post the game could have been so, so different. You guys also spent vital days going after mcjihge2 when it was abundantly clear he was the most clear-cut human left!

Drumstick wrote:mcjihge2 - Nominated PPM for the lynch on 29/08. Also suggested VlaSoul on 30/08.

Both were long before either wolf was seered or came under any real pressure!


That's all very easy in hindsight but very difficult in the actual game. The list above is a case in point since it contains 3 humans who were still alive at the very end. We could have used the list to target one of them incorrectly.


In Drumstick's defence he was doing all this research in the Death thread concurrently with the game going on. And he still wouldn't stop banging on about killing inactives, which explains his early death :lol:

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Kezzer
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Kezzer » Fri Sep 13, 2019 10:58 am

sawyerpip wrote:Wolves - was the low post count a deliberate team strategy from the off or did it just turn out that way?


I am generally a low poster in these games, preferring to absorbe the info and make decisions.

this was the first time playing as a wolf along with VlaSoul and PPM. Luckily we had TAP and Sykes as our more experienced memebers.

I was actually very lucky i didnt get taken out or exposed with the inactive kills

This post is exempt from the No Context Thread.

Tomous wrote:Tell him to take his fake reality out of your virtual reality and strawberry float off


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OrangeRKN
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by OrangeRKN » Fri Sep 13, 2019 11:02 am

Drumstick wrote:The Humans HAVE to take it upon themselves to do better recon


I spent ages going through all of the past votes and highlighting who voted what with their confirmed alignments :(

Drumstick wrote:I did this in Are You a Supernatural and it worked OK, but generally I think people like the Mayor position.


Why do you think people like the mayor position? Is it just because it gives vanilla village players a chance to do be do something interesting in the game/be in a brief position of importance?

Drumstick wrote:I played in an SONM game which had a roleblocker role in it (amongst other crazy stuff) and it was far too confusing.


I don't think roleblocker is a confusing role, but I think SONM's role madness games were certainly confusing in general :lol:

Drumstick wrote:We’ve tried [no PMs] a couple of times and the games weren’t great. Allowing the wolves to chatter away freely but not extending that to the rest of the players seems rather unfair and would potentially unbalance the game.


Disagree on the balance. The game setup is uninformed majority vs informed minority, so I think allowing private communication within the uninformed majority allows for them to develop their own informed minorities, and that's more balance breaking than... them having to post in the thread like normal? I'm not sure what could be balance breaking about banning PMs for the village.

---

I just read through the spectator thread and that was a ride. Loved how many people thought I was the alpha - I wish that had been the case :P

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Moggy
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PostRe: WOLF MAFIA
by Moggy » Fri Sep 13, 2019 11:02 am

sawyerpip wrote:[And he still wouldn't stop banging on about killing inactives, which explains his early death :lol:


He is still banging on about it. :lol:

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