Mafia Mafia - Conclusion

[Zepher]

Zepher, the Goon, and the Cult Leader sit around. One of them coughs or something. They don't really have much in common.

"So, how's the Cult going?"

"Eh."

"Hey, Dr. Pill, you heading out?"

"Yeah, what with yesterday's day's title, and also with you shutting down my business, I thought I might go."

"Good bye," says his horse with a smile. "Oh, yeah, I can talk. I just didn't want to be hit on by that weird looking guy."

"What a twist!" exclaims the Cult Leader. "Both funny, and unexpected!"

"Thanks!" says the horse. "We just thought it up, actually! That's why I don't have an avatar."

"Hey, what's One-Armed-Pete doing?" asks the Goon.

"He's building the characters for the next game from the dead body parts from this one," says Zepher. "Don't you remember the set-up at all? The town wanted mafia games to continue, the scum were trying to leave, the original host was killed, blah blah blah."

"Oh yeah..." says the Goon.

"So, if the town won, the games will continue, and we need new characters. I told Pete he could take an arm from someone if he wanted to."

"Thanks, Zepher!" says Two-Armed-Pete, who also has no avatar.

"Serial Killer, scum, witch," says Candice, landing behind some of the facades.

"Witch?!" exclaims the Cult Leader.

"Alright, fine, scum, but I've been waiting to use that joke all game. I can't believe she only died on the last day."

"Last day? So we won?"

"Sure."

The Cult Leader and Goon walk into the sunset... or something. There's no sun in Mafialand. Only shades of gray and an off-white carpet.

"Only one thing left to do now, Candice," says Zepher.

"Make love?"

"Only two things left to do now, Candice," says Zepher. "Dragonator wants a banner."

"Hey, I'm a dragon!"

"Pete, you took the picture with my face all blurry."

"Sorry boss."

"Come here, I'm eating your new arm as punishment."

THE END. TOWN WINS.

MAFIA MAFIA FEATURED:

Zepher/The Host (Zepher) - Your lovely and hungry host.

Dr. Pill - The man with the golden oar.

One-Armed-Pete - Makes the crowd sounds you know and love. Thinks of the children.

Candice the Lynch Dragon - She knows when you are sleeping. She knows where you're awake.

The Cult Leader (Rufus) - Rather mysterious.

The Goon (fhommess) - Grrrrr.

Dearly Departed

The Serial Killer (Walter Kovacs) - Town. Lynched Day One. Candice's first lunch.

The Cop (def) - Town. Killed Night One. Ax to the back for being on the wrong side of the tracks.

The Vanilla Townie (Kristel) - Town. Killed Night One. Decapitated and then planted. Hopefully she'll grow into a tree some day.

The Cultist (Fred Daniel Yam) - Town. Silently swallowed by the great Lynch Dragon.

The Male Lover (LegoDad) - Scum. Snapped up by Candice. Tasted spicy.

The Virgin (Clanure) - Town. Killed Night Two. Finally "got some".

The Jester (CallMePie) - Town. Killed Night Two. Was not lynched.

The Usurper (TrumpetKing) - Scum. Lynched Day Three. Became a viking funeral for the Cop.

The Doctor (Piratedave84) - Town. Killed Night Three. Had the common cold the whole time, couldn't figure out how to cure himself.

First Day Lynch (Jamesn) - Town. Killed Night Three. Exceeded all expectations.

The Godfather (Kadabra) - Scum. Killed Night Three. Gone away on vacation.

The Female Lover (Hinckley) - Town. Killed Night Three. Now resting in pieces with her scummy hubby.

The Snake Charmer (Darth Potato) - Scum. Lynched Day Four. Killed due to lack of charisma.

The Role Cop (KielDaMan) - Town. Lynched Day Four. Suicidal tendencies.

The Serious Roleplayer (Tamamono) - Town. Killed Night Four. Joined the circus.

The Night Action Blacked-Out Dude (Bob) - Town. Killed Night Four. Chopped to bits, no one could identify the body.

The Treestump (Adam) - Town. Lynched-ish Day Five. Combusted.

The Talking Animal (mostlytechnic) - Town. Killed Night Five. Couldn't get any.

The PGO (Purpearljellyblob) - Scum. Lynched Day Six. Lost his head.

The NPC (Esurient) - SK. Lynched Day Six. Candice was not impressed by his demonstration.

The Witch (Waterbrick Down) - Scum. Lynched Day Six. Fed a whole two NPCs.

I've got lots to say, but I'll let y'all go first. Right now, all I've got is:

1) Glad it's over.

2) Tough game to host.

3) I had lots of fun.

4 [most important]) I hope you all had fun too.

Edited June 18, 2013 by Zepher

[fhomess]

An excellent game all around. I had a lot of fun this game and was quite surprised at what happened at the end of the final day. WBD, I was indeed the blocker, so I would've blocked you last night had you not gotten the penalties. I do think the scum and SK played very well, and felt like this was one of the better played games I've been a part of that really could have been won by any team. I made a few mistakes along the way, but overall am happy with how the game went. I'll have more later.

[TrumpetKing]

Wow. This game was confusing for me. Definitely an interesting concept. Congratulations, town! I didn't expect you guys to win at all for a while there. Esurient's move at the end was great, but he didn't need to do it. He could have won regardless. I was the scum's backup, by the way. How did I do? Other than claiming?

Zepher, I'm going to post my thoughts shortly, but I didn't really enjoy this game as much as I hoped. I'll explain more in a little bit.

[XimenaPaulina]

Excellent game by all participants - Town, Scum, and SK alike. I think all sides did what they could to win, and the fact that the win could've gone to either of the three factions and the fact that the game was ultimately decided in the last minute of the last day says a lot about the mechanics of the game - that despite the 'random chance' aspect of the game each side had a realistic shot of winning given their resourcefulness (using the rules to their advantage) and dedication to the game (spending extra hours to get the proper pills).

Congrats to everyone, I'm honestly impressed by how most of the payers did:

Whole scum team - you managed to have the SK side with you (until the last minute) and the fact the you were able to turn the game from a most certain defeat to a probable victory says a lot about your strategy as a team.

Esurient (SK) - you almost pulled-off the victory, and that is enough evidence to say that you played your cards very well in this game. Good job!

Town - even if I was not part of the inner town circle I knew a lot of people stepped-up in this game: Hinckley once again rallying the town early in the game (still can't believe how players could claim to him/trust him so easily! ), Tammo for being the other Town leader to balance things out with Hinckley, and Rufus and fhomess for ultimately winning it for the town. Even vanillas were key to the town like mostlytechnic and Adam. Great job everbody!

[TrumpetKing]

So here are my thoughts.

1. Too many bulletproofs- I feel like there should have been way less ways to get bulletproof, since there weren't a wide range of options to kill at night. Especially after everything had been revealed. It made everything seem like people were just waiting to get bulletproof, and then to vote.

2. The God Pill- I think this pill should have died with the owner. It would be blatantly obvious if the owner was a main lynch target, and he survived the lynch. That could screw a team up.

3. Town Backup- This gave the town WAY too much power. Chances are that I wouldn't have been lynched if this role was nonexistent. It gave the town too much of an upside, and it kind of frustrated me that the role was here at all. A scum one was somewhat justified, but a town one feeds too much information ti the town.

4. The Triple Lynch- I personally think that you should have drawn two names randomly, rather than lynching all three of them. I would have been fine with the lynch if you mentioned the rule about ties in the rules, but you didn't, and that frustrated me, because that handed it to the town.

5. The entire game was too open for me to feel comfortable. There were just way too many possibilities for me to analyze anything to give the scum team a solid plan, and I think trimming the fat a little if yo make a sequel would help a lot.

All in all, it was an interesting game, and I learned how to play pretty well, I feel. But I think there was too much in this game, and it just wasn't enjoyable for me. It was a well-designed idea, and I like open games, but I felt it was too open, in a way. It was a well-thought idea, that could have gone too many ways, and it went in a way that was incredibly crazy. I think you should definitely try again, but maybe try a simpler game, IMO.

[TrumpetKing]

And I'm sorry if all of that came off as rude or nit-picky, because really, that's not my intent, and I think this really wasn't all that bad. I just didn't enjoy it as much as I liked other games.

Another thing that pissed me off, though this is towards the players: When the scum revealed themselves, the thread was incredibly quiet, other than pills or voting. Even if everything is revealed, you should still be discussing things in thread, even if there's nothing to discuss. You could have tried to decide if any of them were the SK, or (as I said in the deadboard), you could have discussed your favorite cupcake flavor for all I care, just discuss something! It gives the dead something to read, and it allows everybody to analyze posts and gather more information, which can be great for any side.

[def]

Thanks for the game, Zepher. I was out pretty early, I don't have much to say, but Esurient: boo!

[XimenaPaulina]

Now I don't get the complaints about the mechanics of the game when it was clearly stated from the very start in the sign-up thread. Zepher couldn't have been clearer with these from the very start. Everybody knew about this highly-night action-based game when they signed-up, now they're complaining about these just because things didn't go their way? Like I said in the deadboard, the losing side will always have some things to complain about, if the scum have won then it would be the townies who will have stern words to the host.

If people were uncomfortable with too many bulletproofs, or having too many 'random chance', etc. in the game from the very start then they shouldn't have signed up in the first place. When you enter a game you should expect and prepare for the worst, and in the end just treat it as a game as it is simply just that - a game.

Another thing that pissed me off, though this is towards the players: When the scum revealed themselves, the thread was incredibly quiet, other than pills or voting. Even if everything is revealed, you should still be discussing things in thread, even if there's nothing to discuss. You could have tried to decide if any of them were the SK, or (as I said in the deadboard), you could have discussed your favorite cupcake flavor for all I care, just discuss something! It gives the dead something to read, and it allows everybody to analyze posts and gather more information, which can be great for any side.

Are you really being serious about this? People should discuss for the "entertainment of the dead and/or outside watchers"? The scum revealed themselves, there was nothing much to be talked about (but in fairness I really applaud fhomess' very intellectual mind games towards WBD in the end). I have been in games where it was eerily silent in the last couple of days, but there are still on-going stuff privately (recent one I remember was EBII), so this is not really something new.

It is up to the players how they play the game, it may not be entertaining to you but you have to respect the way they play.

[mostlytechnic]

Thanks again for a very fun game. Only my second, so I didn't really know a lot going in, but had a blast. Personally, I think the pill cart made it a little TOO crazy (and made the end game too dependent on who was online at the right time - if not for the scum getting the god and lifesavers two days in a row, it would have been an easy town win much faster). Yeah, it got real quiet, but as was already said, what was left to say other than waiting for the voting?

When Hinck came up with the "reveal all the pills" plan, I thought it was a great idea and totally did NOT expect the scum to reveal themselves so fast! Scummos, was that a deliberate plan or was it a backup that happened just cause you were lucky to be online at the right time to grab the good pills? If they'd tried to hide by taking the placebos, the game would have stayed more "normal" and more talkative for longer.

I too was shocked with the fast claims to Hinck. Heck, he was trying to get people NOT to claim to him since he wasn't proven in any way. After someone had said things privately to me and I went to him to see if we were getting the same story (without giving too much away in case he was a very good scum) he even told me I'd said too much by telling him I was vanilla. So it's not anything he was trying for, that's sure. People just like him I guess :)

But all in all, great fun and I was sorta glad in a way it got quiet since I changed real-world jobs and didn't have as much time to hover in the forums... Town got the win and I was killed off for my first time. In a way, I guess I got some finally :)

[Tamamono]

Thanks for hosting, Zepher! It wasn't a perfect game, but I had a lot of fun, and it was exciting even after I died. Good job.

And thank you to Rufus and fhomess for pulling it off all the way 'till the end. Thanks guys! Sorry for putting you in such a pinch. (Also, sorry to Hinck for not trusting him and being an all-around dick to him. I'll make it up to you someday... hopefully. )

I also have to congratulate DarthPotato, WBD, and Purpearl for doing a great job bringing a united town block to its knees. I really didn't think there was a way for you guys to win, and you definitely proved me wrong. Hell, I was proved wrong up until the last second. Very smart and impressive play; I look forward to seeing more excellent scumplay from you guys in the future.

Good job to Trumpet for his scumplay via PM as well, but I've already touched on that in the deadboard.

Not sure what to say about Esurient, honestly. While I'm impressed that you almost pulled off a serial killer win (and was secretly rooting for you for that reason, despite my comments on the deadboard ), I feel like it would have been much better if you'd participated more.

But nobody can say you weren't involved; your last minute votes were sneaky and conniving. You just happened to not be in time both times.

Now a little bit of constructive criticism for Zeph:

So here are my thoughts.

1. Too many bulletproofs- I feel like there should have been way less ways to get bulletproof, since there weren't a wide range of options to kill at night. Especially after everything had been revealed. It made everything seem like people were just waiting to get bulletproof, and then to vote.

Like Kiel said, we did know about these things when we signed up, but it's hard to measure what a game mechanic will be like when it's just down on paper. Too many bulletproofs indeed. I like the idea of a bulletproof SK, but making the inventors bulletproof was unnecessary.

2. The God Pill- I think this pill should have died with the owner. It would be blatantly obvious if the owner was a main lynch target, and he survived the lynch. That could screw a team up.

I honestly hate the god pill; when I heard about it I thought it'd be something akin to the dreaming god (I think Hinck mentioned that?), but anything that screws with lynches that much is overcomplicated.

Plus, while the idea of one "great" pill in a pill game (one pill to rule them all, of course) is a really good one, it sort of turns the game into a race for that pill. Maybe a system with a minigame that's fair to all timezones would have been better?

3. Town Backup- This gave the town WAY too much power. Chances are that I wouldn't have been lynched if this role was nonexistent. It gave the town too much of an upside, and it kind of frustrated me that the role was here at all. A scum one was somewhat justified, but a town one feeds too much information ti the town.

I don't think backups are necessities, but I love them here - and not just because I used them to cleverly take you down, either. Especially in a game where the cop and doctor are fused (and the town had fewer night actions - most notably a watcher/tracker), a way of keeping the night actions around is vital. The backup is perfect.

It also presents interesting situations. Let's say the JOAT dies and he was in the town block. The backup however, is not. Now there's a JOAT who's not in the block, and the process of finding actions continues.

The fact that it was able to serve as a coroner for a time was a definitely interesting twist as well. Two thumbs up for coroners. :thumbup:

In fact, I'd say I'm against scum having backups for anything but killers (having seen what an advantage it can give them, ala Jedi Temple), but I think it was justified here, for balance reasons.

I've kind of adopted def's view of scum actions; there has to be some penalty to them losing a member. They're a group of PRs all united from Day 1 - that's enough of an advantage.

As for you personally not liking it, meh, that's a matter of opinion. I understand where you're coming from - you were having a good game and it was cut short by a night action result. However, look at it this way: you're a good scum PR and you target someone for the night. The tracker tracks you and sees you targeting said person. When asked what your action is, you lie and say you visited someone different. Because the tracker and the guy you told about your action are in contact, the town knows you're lying and you get lynched. Would that make the tracker role unfair? No.

4. The Triple Lynch- I personally think that you should have drawn two names randomly, rather than lynching all three of them. I would have been fine with the lynch if you mentioned the rule about ties in the rules, but you didn't, and that frustrated me, because that handed it to the town.

Of course you don't.

There was no reason for you or for anyone else to assume that a tie became a random lynch. I hate to be this blunt, but there's really no other way to say it. Zepher said no lynch becomes a random lynch, not a tie. While it would have been good if he detailed what happened in the event of a tie, he was perfectly willing to provide information about it. It was a bit late to be asking things like that, since you were dead, but always always always ask the host if you're not 100% on something.

I of course say all this in the best possible way.

5. The entire game was too open for me to feel comfortable. There were just way too many possibilities for me to analyze anything to give the scum team a solid plan, and I think trimming the fat a little if yo make a sequel would help a lot.

I have to agree that in terms of forum games, undisclosed setups are generally best (at least for 20+ players), but then again, we both did sign up for this. Just a different way of playing, I guess.

Wow, that turned into mostly constructive criticism for Trumpetking. Sorry for stealing your constructive criticism, Zeph. I do think you ran an interesting game, though. Thank you!!

[Piratedave84]

Thank you Zepher, this was an awesome game to play and watch!!!!

Personally I don't really have any complaints about the setup, it was pretty clear from the get-go and we were asked for our input when the sign-up thread was posted.

The pills sure kept things interesting; I have to agree that in the end, results and actions had more to do with 'luck' than with strategy but it made the game uncertain; up until the very last minute, it could have went any which way SK, scum or town could have won this game!

Personally, it was (IMO) my best game; I had so much fun compiling results and trying to analyze them (4 out of 7 scums/neutral pegged in my first one and 5 in my second one).

[Hinckley]

Now I don't get the complaints about the mechanics of the game when it was clearly stated from the very start in the sign-up thread. Zepher couldn't have been clearer with these from the very start.

I disagree. Zepher, I wish you would've made the effects of the God Pill open before the game started.

[Piratedave84]

I disagree. Zepher, I wish you would've made the effects of the God Pill open before the game started.

You mean the choices offered when selecing the new rule? if so, I have to agree.

[XimenaPaulina]

Even it was generally an open game set-up, I understand if Zepher wanted to give the God Pill a "mysterious"/unknown effect from the start. Don't get me wrong, I actually didn't like the God Pill's effects since it robbed the town of its most powerful weapon - the lynch votes, but I didn't want to complain about it in the middle of the game since that's part of the "unknowns" of signing up for this game. People may or may not like it, but they have no choice but to deal with it as one of the game mechanics, and I was glad to see that both town and scum sides (or even the SK) were resourceful enough to use it to their advantage.

[Tamamono]

To be honest, I feel like Kiel hits the nail on the head with his approach to this game. Hypocritical as this seems coming from me, it's best to keep an open mind in a new setup like this, and I feel like that's something a lot of us didn't have (myself included, at times).

[jimmynick]

The pills helped the scum last to the end, and I'm pleased with the game (if a little annoyed at scum's excellent strategy). The only thing that ruffles my feathers is the three lynches on Day Six, when the rules clearly said there would be two lynches. If it was a rule that everyone involved in a tie was lynched, that defeats the purpose of one of the God Pill's functions (multiple lynches), I think.

[fhomess]

Sorry... this will be a long post!

Comments on Game Setup

First let me say that I don't think Zepher should get a free pass on the game setup simply because it was open and we signed up for it knowing that. Zepher took feedback, but ultimately the setup was his responsibility. That said, let's not attack Zepher so much as analyze the setup. A host can never fully predict the implications of a setup, and the important thing is that future hosts learn from what worked well and what worked less well.

In my case, I was extremely apprehensive about the setup but wanted to participate anyway, and am very glad I did. I thought the game was going to be very swingy, and expected one side to run away with things. The thing with swingy games is that I typically expect them to swing one way and then STAY that way, but in this game it seemed to swing back and forth more. When the scum first started outing themselves by taking the good pills, I thought they were doomed. What ended up happening was that they were able to swing things completely the other way to the point where I thought we had no chance.

For that reason, I think that despite the swingy nature of the game setup, I believe it was balanced. The pivot was more volatile than a traditional setup, but it went both ways. The JOAT role essentially meant that the town didn't have the typical nightly doctor and nightly investigator. The lack of a tracker/watcher type role was also a weakening effect. The Inventor, on both sides, was weaker in their ability to do anything due to the fact that it took 3 nights to make use of an invention (invent, gift, use). I thought making them unkillable led to interesting lynch decisions and added to the strategies that each team had to consider. That said, I would have liked a way for the town and the scum to kill an inventor at night with some consequence. Perhaps the consequence would be that the player's identity was revealed. Perhaps the consequence was that the team's inventor would have to create an armor piercing bullet and gift it to their team's killer, meaning that it would take a few days after discovery of an inventor to actually night kill him. I thought the SK's role was a good fit for the game, too, and didn't have any problem with the SK being bulletproof.

I think the pill cart added to the swingy nature of the setup, and it was dependent on the right people being on at the right time. This was not an aspect of the pill cart that I liked. That said, both teams used the cart to their advantage and by changing the timing of the cart, I felt like it was fair. I think the scum's decision to out themselves by picking desirable pills was a reasonable strategy. Town PR's outed themselves in the same way, and both decisions wound up helping and hurting both teams.

As for having too many bulletproof abilities in the game, the only night that really mattered was night 5, when the only killable players at night were WBD, myself, and mostlytechnic. Given that there were no watchers or trackers, this was not going to give away any killers. The only real problem with the number of unkillables, IMO, is that the town inventor HAD to be lynched, and if that didn't happen early, then it probably wouldn't happen, and a role claim could still avoid it. Bulletproof townies are pretty powerful, but we've seen them in other games and, for the most part, they haven't thrown off the balance too much.

Comments on Game Play

When Hinck came up with the "reveal all the pills" plan

Grrr....I haven't seen the deadboard (can someone post a link?), but I assume Hinck already knows that I ended up thinking he was almost certainly scum after "stealing" a bunch of ideas from our PM conversation. Along with Rufus' suspicion, that led me to hunt for things that confirmed this belief, and I found them in spades. I believe I suggested to the town block that scum did us a favor by killing him when they did because I was going to spend the next day trying to get him lynched. Sorry, Hinck!

Rufus brought to my attention a rule violation that no longer mattered. Technically, PirateDave didn't edit this post, but the content was changed so in my mind, it was edited from a "spirit of the rules" standpoint. The image that he included of the pill selections was removed from its posted location, making the content of the post meaningless.

I hope WBD understands that my needling him to vote for Esurient on the final day was partially intended to help fill the day with some entertaining banter. The nature of open setups is that towards the end of the game, most player roles and alignments will come out. It's usually the best town strategy after enough time has passed. At that point, there really isn't that much to discuss. While I appreciate that dead players want to be entertained, it's not really what most of us involved in the game play it for. You can tell that by how quickly roleplaying tends to exit the game as the game moves along. That said, I really was hoping to convince WBD that I wasn't the blocker and to take out the SK instead.

I realize I have no idea how to identify an SK. After the scum started outing themselves, I had Esurient as 95% town because he'd been accused by most of the scum team. Naturally, I was ignoring at that time that he could be the SK.

I was really impressed with the scum this game. They made some moves that were really well thought out and could have worked out brilliantly for them if other circumstances hadn't gotten in their way. I'm not sure I would've been as eager to grab the good pills so early in the game, though. Ultimately, the best weapon that non-townies have is hoping to stay secret. It was also pretty impressive to get the SK to side with them. The one thing that I think was unfortunate was that Esurient had to out himself in the vote for Tammo and had to do so too early in the day.

The only thing that ruffles my feathers is the three lynches on Day Six, when the rules clearly said there would be two lynches. If it was a rule that everyone involved in a tie was lynched, that defeats the purpose of one of the God Pill's functions (multiple lynches), I think.

That all members of a tie get lynched was known to the town block several days earlier as someone asked Zepher about it. That said, the alternative is usually that the first to accumulate the required votes for a lynch is the one taken, which would've left WBD alive. In that case, we would've blocked him and then lynched him on Day 6, so it didn't matter. I assumed that Esurient (and therefore the scum team), knew as well due to the way he reacted to my vote. It doesn't defeat the purpose of the God Pill's function (who's to say what the purpose really was anyway) because when I voted for Esurient, my goal was to get purpearljellyblob and esurient lynched along with myself, leaving Rufus and WBD in a draw. The reactions of Esurient and WBD were not something I anticipated. I actually wanted to vote closer to the end of the day but couldn't due to another obligation. The God pill's voting impact added a lot of strategic options to the game, and I think it enhanced the game experience because of that. At times it helped town, and at times it helped scum. As I said above, the game was swingy but balanced. I think it's hard to argue that a game is unbalanced when scum publicly outed themselves by Day 3 and the difference between any of the 3 parties was a last minute vote. Like I said, when I voted I fully expected a Town/Scum draw.

Overall, I felt like this was a well played game on all sides. There were moments when people made mistakes or things didn't work out as planned, but it seemed like there were a lot of people engaged. Perhaps the pill cart and the open nature helped the vanilla's engage more because they had something tangible they could access easily. That's certainly a point in favor of the setup.

[TrumpetKing]

Are you really being serious about this? People should discuss for the "entertainment of the dead and/or outside watchers"? The scum revealed themselves, there was nothing much to be talked about (but in fairness I really applaud fhomess' very intellectual mind games towards WBD in the end). I have been in games where it was eerily silent in the last couple of days, but there are still on-going stuff privately (recent one I remember was EBII), so this is not really something new.

I probably could have left that out. But that doesn't mean that people shouldn't be talking in thread. Fhomess was doing the right thing, and I would have liked to see that earlier too, instead of nothing. Anything is better than nothing. What I meant by the dead reading things, is that it gives us who haven't figured everything out to look at, potentially analyze, and figure out.

[TrumpetKing]

As for you personally not liking it, meh, that's a matter of opinion. I understand where you're coming from - you were having a good game and it was cut short by a night action result. However, look at it this way: you're a good scum PR and you target someone for the night. The tracker tracks you and sees you targeting said person. When asked what your action is, you lie and say you visited someone different. Because the tracker and the guy you told about your action are in contact, the town knows you're lying and you get lynched. Would that make the tracker role unfair? No.

Of course you don't.

There was no reason for you or for anyone else to assume that a tie became a random lynch. I hate to be this blunt, but there's really no other way to say it. Zepher said no lynch becomes a random lynch, not a tie. While it would have been good if he detailed what happened in the event of a tie, he was perfectly willing to provide information about it. It was a bit late to be asking things like that, since you were dead, but always always always ask the host if you're not 100% on something.

If it was a tracker's results, that's fine. I feel like the backup made it too easy for the town to find a scum claim. If it was a tracker that got me lynched, I wouldn't have been as angered about the lynch, because I can justify that. The backup gave too much to the town, in my opinion.

I think it should have been in the rules. The rules strictly said that there would be two lynches, not three. I understand that randomness is only for no-lynches, but when there's a tie, that's usually a no-lynch in a lot of the games I've seen. He should have either done a completely random lynch in that case, or at least made it random between the three. I think the main reason the scum never asked was because the rule was strict. There would be either 2 lynches or 3/4 majority lynch. It was pretty self-explanitory, and ties weren't likely. I personally think a tie should have been mentioned in the rules. Other people differ, but my opinion stays for now.

And I'm not irritated about everything because we lost. Of course a win would be nice, but I'm here to play the game and have fun. I enjoyed this game, but not as much as some if the other games I've played.

[Hinckley]

Even it was generally an open game set-up, I understand if Zepher wanted to give the God Pill a "mysterious"/unknown effect from the start. Don't get me wrong, I actually didn't like the God Pill's effects since it robbed the town of its most powerful weapon - the lynch votes,

I agree with your assessment. I had a blast until the lynch became perpetually broken and the game started relying on the pills and random lynches. The mechanics got in the way of the game. The Scum and Serial Killer did a good job turning the tables on us, considering how the mechanics were set up and then they got screwed by random rules. This was an aggravating, frustrating, fun time. I think it would've been better balance without random lynches and if the God Pill didn't have such a strong effect on the votes. I think if the God Pill had other effects that would've been better or if it had disappeared when there were only a few people left, that would've avoided the game relying on the mechanics and coin flips.

[LegoDad]

Thanks again for letting me play and Congrats to the Town team for pulling it out in the end. I am proud of my scum teammates as they almost turned a sure loss into a win. I was a newb scummo and it really showed, I am very disappointed in how I played as I let my team down and am sorry for that. It was very hard for me to see things through a town's eyes when you know so much more information than they do. Looking forward to another game, though I may wait until it's cooler outside and I can devote a little more time to the game.

[Piratedave84]

Rufus brought to my attention a rule violation that no longer mattered. Technically, PirateDave didn't edit this post, but the content was changed so in my mind, it was edited from a "spirit of the rules" standpoint. The image that he included of the pill selections was removed from its posted location, making the content of the post meaningless.

About that, Rufus also contacted me to ask where the chart was. What has happened there was that a new version (not intended to be shared at that point) had been saved under the same file name and consequently replaced the original file on BS when uploaded. When I realized that, I moved the new file to Flickr not realizing it also meant that the original file was gone as a result. Should penalty votes have been issued, I would have accepted them as it was my error.

More on balance:

We can say all we want about the pills and the randomness but seeing how the game ended and was almost won by all 3 parties, I say the balance was pretty good; random at times but all things considered, it was pretty well balanced.

[Adam]

Thanks for letting me in, Zepher! I had a crapton of fun, even if I was a bit quiet for most of the game.

I have very little in the way of comments or criticisms, but I will echo the opinion that the game relied a bit too much on the pill cart and night actions by the end of the game. That said, the first four days were some of the most fun I've had in mafia!

[Waterbrick Down]

Well, that was a bit of fun Zepher. First off, thank you for allowing me to play and may I congratulate you on pulling off hosting. I know that it is not a responsibility that can be taken lightly and you did a great job of it.

I agree with fhomess in that the pills ended up making the game very swingy as I commented before the game began, but it ended up being very close in the end anyways so I think it's a wash. I'm not sure if it was due to the setup or just how the night actions happened this game, but I felt that the town's ability to basically start a clearing machine (for lack of a better term) by day 4 and to some extent day 3 by pill usage and night actions severely felt out of balance. We, the scum, basically had to come out in the open and start grabbing pills in order to put a stop to the machine otherwise we would have slowly been revealed one by one with no chance. But again, since we came so close to winning, it's hard to say what would have happened if we had just been quiet.

Also, since when has it been custom for a universal back-up to get a choice in terms of what role they back-up? I felt that kind of hampered us, as we couldn't pull off a successful role-claim without either the back-up or the Town PR counter-claiming against us.

I can't say this was my best game as I ended up being pegged suspicious pretty much from Day 2 and only survived due to other members of my team being found more suspicious. I know my scum game isn't very good, but I guess the more times I get practice the better I'll get at it. The rest of my scummy team-mates did a really good job for their first or second time and apart from a few slip-ups I think we did surprisingly well considering the town we were up against.

As to the end. :wall: Esurient and I both unvoted at the exact same time which ended up being our downfall. I tried to rectify it by acquiring enough penalty votes to keep him from being lynched, but realized too late that he was tied with Purpearljellyblob. Fhomess, were you planning on our unvoting at the last moment, because if so, that has got to be one of the most strategic plays I've seen in a long time.

All in all, I had an enjoyable time playing with you all.

[Bob]

This was a rather fun game and was really the first game I religiously "got into", so I did indeed have fun.

The only complaint I have as the Vigilante is that there were too many bulletproof characters and ways to become bulletproof. It sort of makes the Vig handicapped if he can't kill off the Serial Killer and one scum member.

Regardless, thanks for the fun time! I enjoyed myself.