I agree with you on everything, Julius, but I break those rules a lot of the time.

Excellent

Points 2, 3, and 5 are the most important bits in the guide i feel (in terms of how often and how seriously they are broken).

I disagree with 6 though. I think on some issues there's a good reason for secrecy. Random chance as well (though i'll agree not in the more common roles like doc or cop).

Added up with a small subtitle because a lot of people might otherwise not realize what manifesto means

Can you give an example of when breaking 6 worked well? Or when random chance was necessary for a role to work?

I think, building off of your food example, that if the people were told the specific formula for foraging for more food, they would find a way to abuse it. Mechanics are always there to add a challenge, at least most of the time, and so if you gave people all the info about the mechanic, its purpose would most likely be defeated. But I still agree with it for the most part, but I think it's okay to hide subtle things.

Necessary? No probably not. It's probably never necessary

I'd like to add balancing the game on the go to that. Mods might give out extra powers to the scum if they are unlucky at first or something. This should never ever happen. An example of this is here, where the mafia are given an extra kill because the SK died early. But this essentially punishes the town for being good enough to kill the SK on day 1 itself, because the mafia can coordinate their 2 kills and cause more damage.

So yeah. No offense meant to the host, but that is something I definitely do not agree with.

Also modkilling people if they criticize the mod/setup. But I think that's only ever happened once.

Time to sleep.

Also modkilling people if they criticize the mod/setup. But I think that's only ever happened once.

I think I know what you're referring to.

Good grief. Neither of those things should ever happen. But my list isn't meant to be exhaustive.

Quoted from Ashrzr:

Mechanics are always there to add a challenge

I think the challenge is to use the mechanics to your advantage, not to try to figure out the intricacies of a formula, which is probably impossible unless there's a huge amount of data collected. If a mechanic is sound abuse is not possible.

For example, in a Cold War Mafia I hosted some countries were nuclear powers, and if one attacked another the victim had the choice of just dying, or ending the game immediately and causing everyone to lose. This was public information. If a faction seemed certain to win then they had to be very careful and maybe not use their kill at all, which was an interesting aspect. It also enhanced the feeling of paranoia in the game.

[This message has been edited by Julius999 (edited 03-26-2011 @ 04:42 PM).]

I think the challenge is to use the mechanics to your advantage, not to try to figure out the intricacies of a formula, which is probably impossible unless there's a huge amount of data collected. If a mechanic is sound abuse is not possible.

Yeah that's pretty much what I mean. If people are given stuff such as the formula, then obviously they'll have the drive to use that info to their advantage, taking out a lot of the challenge because it's then too easy to use to their advantage.

I disagree. A good mechanic can't just be exploited as easy as saying so. It shouldn't be like do a, b and c and you find scum. Ideally it should be another factor to take into account and juggle. For example, maybe someone's claimed a useful town role but it's known that they're consuming extra rations and bringing the town closer to starvation? Are the people pushing that lynch more than they otherwise would townies anxious about running out or scum eager to off that role?

I don't think I've ever seen a mechanic that doesn't really on some sort of random chance, formula, etc. And even if not all mechanics work that way, it doesn't take away from the fact that if formulas are at work, they shouldn't be revealed. I feel like we're talking about two different things and speaking past each other.

Sort of, because I disagree with your premise that a formula needs to be involved. Why would it? In fact, none of the mechanics in games I've hosted have done:

1. Nuclear powers, mentioned above.
2. A system called "International Influence" where you lost your vote for the day if you didn't post for 48 hours without giving prior warning.
3. A system in Bartimaeus Mafia where some players could bid for the services of a mercenary, who could use his earnings to buy useful tools. I was really pleased with the way ferret played the mercenary role.
4. A food system where everyone ate 1 ration each day until the starting supply was exhausted. If the game didn't end within one Day/Night cycle of that happening everyone starved and lost. The only way to get more food was to cannibalise dead people. Interestingly, although cannibalism had no adverse in-game effects the players decided unanimously not to do it even when food was running perilously low. Rot may remember this one.
5. Submitting suggested night actions to the Demons in Bartimaeus Mafia, who were forced to choose one if available. Different actions used up different amounts of their energy and if they ran out of energy they died. I was slightly worried the Demon roles wouldn't be fun to play but I think it worked quite well.

I prefer game mechanics to revolve around the way the players interact with each other, and make these decisions more complex. Even the food system was geared this way, as I hoped it would make people more bloodthirsty.

Ok, sure, not all mechanics rely on a formula, but for the ones that do, the formula shouldn't be revealed. Ok, done. *closes book* We agree, then. Good debate, Julius.

I disagree

What is Mafia? & Basic Play

If you're interested in the history of it, I believe mafia began as a card game about werewolves. But since you probably aren't, I'll skip to the version of the game we play here at HGMM (HG Main Mafia).

---

Mafia is a forum game that plays out like a sort of interactive, multiplayer mystery novel. In a typical game there are the mafia players (Bad) and the Town players (Good). At the beginning of the game you will secretly be assigned a role that puts you on one of the two teams. These roles may have special powers of attributes like the ability to survive a kill or investigate someone's alignment.

The object of the game if you are on the mafia team, is to kill off the townie players until there are at least as many mafia players as there are town players. If you're on the town side, your objective is to kill every last mafia player.

To do this, the game is split into two phases; day and night. During the day, all players discuss the game in a thread and try to determine who is scum (an evil character) based on logical deductions. When they reach a consensus and more than 50% of the players agree, the target player is lynched and his identity is made public.

The game then shifts into the night phase. Now players are not allowed to talk with each other, and may perform their secret actions as specified by their roles. What powers each person gets (or doesn't get) varies game to game, but you can almost always be sure that the mafia team will have a killing power.

The game continues in this pattern until one side claims victory. In some more advanced games there may be opposing mafia factions, a lone killer (known as a Serial Killer, or SK), or even a brainwashing cult, but only rarely will the game function in an abnormal way.

---

The basic idea behind the game is a fight between the informed minority and the uninformed majority. The mafia is the informed minority because there are always less of them, except they have the ability to communicate with each other privately by email. They also have the advantage of knowing who each other is. The town is the uninformed majority because intially there are always more of them, but they are given no information as to who the other players are.

So if you're interested, join a game! We eagerly welcome newbies and will gladly help you get accustomed to how the games work. The best way to learn is just by playing a game, but if you want a more solid start feel free to read some of the guides here or even reading a ongoing/finished game to get a feel for it.

Hope to see ya play.

(and just as a personal note of mine; mafia games are the easiest way to get used to heaven hopping and being a bigger part of the HG community. Don't be shy!)

[This message has been edited by THYMOLE (edited 03-27-2011 @ 04:59 PM).]

Looks good. Sorry, I'll put up the rest of my guide on Tuesday, maybe tomorrow. I just have it written down on the campus terminal.

Whatever you do just make sure the whole thing is in one post

The mafia is the uninformed minority because there are always less of them

You mean informed minority.

We eagerly welcome noobies and

Newbies.

Otherwise, sounds fine.

Damnit

i knew i'd screw that phrase up.


and i always rant about newbies v. noobs.

Stupid me

BB Code is screwed up.

There is a list of Rot's terminology here at TCF. I won't be pasting this here as I haven't gotten his permission to do so. To view the thread you need to make an account at TCF, and considering I've had mine for two years without contributing anything, I'm rather sure they won't mind if you do so as well.

Keep in mind that Rot's terminology is quite different than the mainstream roles. While most of what is applied in this forum remains the same, some of the roles he and others have coined are rather strange but are explained fine in that thread.

In my opinion the more esoteric roles should not be included in any guide here. For someone reading a guide for actual guidance it's bad to be told that there's a 'standard' role called Mind Flayer. Guides on roles should include the basics, and any hosts who want something more elaborate should make an actual decision rather than nabbing a weird combo role from some list.

Xzy, I don't think most of us have an account there so we can't view it.

To view the thread you need to make an account

For someone reading a guide for actual guidance it's bad to be told that there's a 'standard' role called Mind Flayer.

Yes, I agree with this.

Unless you make a guide to weird roles. Something that the likes of Ash and Rot might want to do.

Also, I need opinions on whether I should include OMGUS and WIFOM in the scum tell guide?

I find them to be unreliable

For someone reading a guide for actual guidance it's bad to be told that there's a 'standard' role called Mind Flayer.

True, but to neglect the existence of a mind flayer esque role wouldn't be ideal either

Putting out the basic idea and giving some variations would be better.

I agree with the weird role ideas.

Also, I agree with Thymole about WIFOM and OMGUS. WIFOM arguments tend to be right and I mostly consider them to be a valid argument. OMGUS is just a noob tactic, not a scum tactic.

Fine I just wanted to get it to 10 somehow.

And even experienced people can go OMGUS, see Ashrzr against Thymole in Cold War Mafia right now.

I'm also doing Scum Play and Fake claiming, I will be doing the Dos of Fake Claiming tonight. The Don'ts will obviously be implicit.

I'm going to write a blurb on making Serial Killers for mods...

hey just a question, the links do work for you guys right?

And even experienced people can go OMGUS, see Ashrzr against Thymole in Cold War Mafia right now.

Huh?

1) Thymole said I'm scummy for speculating.
2) He shifted suspicion off of you onto me.

That's not "Oh My God U Suck". That's "Oh My God Ur Scummy."

I thought OMGUS meant "Oh My God You're Scummy"?

It's Oh My God U Suck, IIRC.

Oh, I never knew.

You didn't?

OMGUS Herr

GTFO of my guide thread.

(just in case you needed an in context example)

WIFOM can't be proven, Ash. That's the point in WIFOM - a sufficiently knowledgeable player could have set the situation up so people would accept X to be true.

A bad example: Player Y dies. Player Z says he couldn't possibly have killed Y, as B was the obvious choice. Granted, Y was unconfirmed but is a stronger player than B.

People should always argue against WIFOM to coax out better arguments. If you don't you could easily let scum make a big play.

I'm not sure what exactly Xzy is implying (maybe he's saying the same thing as I'm going to), but nowadays I find that WIFOM is being overused to lynch people instead of actually analyzing behavior. Also scum can create WIFOM situations very easily for other people (see IWAV in Newbie mafia), so it can't strictly be a scum tell.

I agree to an extent. For example, say Herr was tracked to killing TME. TME is a newb, and even kind of inactive these days, so he wouldn't be high on the list to kill. It turns out TME is a cop. Herr could use the argument that he wouldn't want to kill a newb when scum, but what if there was a Mafia Investigator that found TME to be a cop? The Town doesn't know this, and Herr could use it to his advantage as a WIFOM argument.

That's something I wouldn't trust.

But say, for example, that Herr was tracked to killing TME who was mafia. With an SK already dead, and Herr saying that he would be stupid to kill one of his own mafia partners, I'd accept that WIFOM argument.

hey just a question, the links do work for you guys right?

Only the Flavour Guide link works.

A good idea might be a 'Probabilities and Statistics for Dummies' kind of guide, as a lot of people have problems with statistics and probabilities in general, and a basic understanding is often required as shown in the Eveelution mafia where there were issues surrounding people not getting stones which I had to then dispel with my awesome excel spreadsheet .

I've no idea what the issue with that was anyways, isn't it kinda clear that if you ask 12 people to pick from 14 numbers, there's nearly bound to be doubles/triples etc. of the same pick.

According to me mafia need only be played with the most basic of statistics. What you came up with in the Pokemon mafia was way beyond what was needed really. Also what's been happening in Newbie mafia, all you need to know is that whether you lynch or not, town will lose at the same point. Whether there's a 22% chance of catching scum or 10% is immaterial.

All the links work for me.

The thing is, even the most basic statistics and probabilities can be difficult to understand for some people, just look at how successfully the media can misrepresent a simple statistic/probability and blow an issue completely out of proportion if they wish.

The other week I was reading comments on a article about withdrawals from cash machines (exciting I know ) and there were quite a few people that really couldn't grasp the idea that the average (I assume they meant mean) withdrawal could be £67.50 as a cash machine only dispatches in £5 denominations.

I'm not getting at anyone here, but people having even a basic understanding of statistics is a real issue these days, hell I'll admit it, it gets confusing sometimes unless I sit down and look at it properly.

OK, link

FF 4.0 - only flavour works

IE - all work

[This message has been edited by Maffia (edited 03-28-2011 @ 02:06 PM).]

@OP

Use "copy link location on the link-image of to easily grab the post URL.

All current links work on Firefox 3.6.16 so I don't understand where the problem is.

My settings are 25 posts/page, what about yours?

And I didn't sign in for the IE test, and IIRC default setting is now 50 posts/page.

[This message has been edited by Maffia (edited 03-28-2011 @ 02:09 PM).]

50 posts per page mine,

And all the four links works on my FF 4.0

That's what I was looking at.

The URL specifies how many posts are shown, but profiles won't accept a different number

In my case it is n=50

OK, looks like we've narrowed that down, this is what I think the link for What is Mafia? & Basic Play - by THYMOLE should be:

http://www.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=st&fn=50&tn=215&st=65#post66

Got by clicking

[This message has been edited by Maffia (edited 03-28-2011 @ 02:29 PM).]