yes.. you read right, this is Policy Review... for Mafia.
I've talked to Mekkah many times about how people are simply messing small things in Mafia games which end up ruining what could've been a great game. We finally decided to post a thread where everyone can talk about these issues and prospective hosts can get tips and tricks for when they design their very own game.
Do note that all of this is for discussion. However, I do expect you to think about what you are saying before you say it. If someone just talks bullshit in this thread or cracks stupid/unnecessary jokes, don't expect us to take it kindly.
FYI, all this is from a discussion between me and Mekkah and isn't just my opinion but rather both of ours.
Anyway, without wasting more time, lets get into these:
Moles / Charles Dickens' type roles
This is a huge no. There simply is no place for sure overpowered roles in mafia games anymore. On Smogon, people play under one major assumption, that the host does not lie.
Moles simply allow the mafia to gain an entry into the village, an entry they should have to work to attain. They weaken a village which simply by statistics is not a favorite to win anyway.
I know that Brain and me were actually responsible for introducing the first Charles Dickens type character in a mafia game when we did Apoc but you have to realize, it was a new concept then. It was meant more as a test than anything else. Additionally, we tried our best to nerf it. With it needing a new story each time as well as being limited to only Dickens' characters (so if it ever died, all the people it covered up were going to be exposed). Plus, it really wasn't supposed to run into the wolf on N0 due to a perfect rand target.
What I'd like to say is, just don't do this. If you want something that gives inaccurate results, try a Paranoid Cop or something, make it with the person doing the inspecting not the person being inspected. Even in that case, I'd leave a hint that all results may not be 100% accurate.
If you still want to keep moles in the game, there ARE ways to balance it out. Make sure there are enough ways for them to exposed and they could turn into a fair role.
NPC's
Now, as of recent games you'll see the number of NPC's has been increasing like mad. When we brought this idea into play in Apocalypse, it was just for a small number of roles. You can't have 10 people getting revived in a game, thats just stupid. I'd suggest you attempt to limit NPC's to a maximum of 3-4.
Additionally, you'd do well to do what we did with "Marge" in Apoc. Basically, if I give Mekkah a rogue role, I'd also tell him "the NPC you'd turn into is Superman, if it dies, your lose your power". This would surely not be inspect-able by anyone so its just information for Mekkah. This way, you don't have a "pool" of extra NPC's just lying around like you have had in many games.
What we'd done in Apoc was say Shiv was assigned to Batman and Mekkah was assigned to Superman. If both Superman and Shiv died, thus rendering both Mekkah and Batman useless, we'd assign that to Mekkah. Thats still "fair". You just don't want to have 10 NPC's which kinda end up ruining games.
A good side-effect is, with lesser NPC's, lesser people try and "act" like an NPC. This forces people to become more active and post more. For example, with 2 of our aliases in YCI mafia, we simply kept them as an NPC and one of them was never touched right until the end. Now if there were lesser NPC's, I'm sure we'd have to be posting more and thus making the game way more interesting. Mekkah put it well:
<@Mekkah> main reasoning is that NPCs encourage people being quiet
<@Mekkah> and a game isnt as fun with quiet people
<@Mekkah> and this way finding quiet people becomes a guessing game
Neutrals
Okay guys, I've hosted games myself, I know its really tempting to have a bunch of wicked neutrals wrecking shit up. However, the only people who enjoy that is the neutrals themselves and the game hosts (hell i've been in both positions many times). The rest of the people don't take kindly to it at all.
Neutrals are supposed to have minor effects on the game. They aren't supposed to be the characters the game revolves around. Do remember, this game is called mafia, not neutral.
More on the topic of neutrals, stronger neutrals are actually better in terms of gameplay when compared to weaker neutrals. A wolf needs to do many things to win, he tries to take out the strongest people while helping the weakest, this helps keep the game in check and balance it out.
However, a weak neutral is simply along for the ride. He knows he doesn't have to do much to win, just chill and do whatever the hell he wants to. For example, dak in YCI mafia had a very straightforward role, one which really required no skill at all. He allied with the Milkmen and once he heard of me and Jackal being wolf, he thought it would be "cooler" to sell the Milkmen out and help us (not that i didn't like it but still). People who don't have to do anything to win are actually the most dangerous, they simply have nothing to lose.
Just remember, the harmless ones are actually the most harmful.
CWC's
Right, I honestly think the concept of CWC's is great. However, its been implemented completely wrong. CWC's like "Post ______ in the thread each day to get 1 point" is absolutely useless unless the character actually needs something like that.
I'd love to see creative CWC's which actually make people work towards things. Be it a side-goal, a simple quest, anything, it has to require some work other than posting. Hell, it could even be something that challenges a person's knowledge about the game. For example a CWC like "10 points to guess the number of villagers in the game by night 6, you get 2 guesses" may be useless in terms of gameplay but it actually requires the guy to go out and figure out how the village is structured. It brings skill into the picture.
Here are mekkah's views on the matter:
<@Mekkah> CWCs are not explored yet enough to make extremely fine guidelines for them
<@Mekkah> personally i think they should be used to encourage thinking for yourself
<@Mekkah> you have to force peopl to break loose from "just send in my night actions and vote for what my leader hip/thunda/mekkah/avatar/dak says"
<@Mekkah> that may involve going agiansrt your team's wishes, but not something as extreme like wasting skynet on a user that had no undoable actions
<@Mekkah> good examples of CWC are for example
<@Mekkah> neutrals winning/losing
<@Mekkah> having the highest amount of kills in the game
<@Mekkah> people complaining about being silenced (this one's for comedy but still)
<@Mekkah> or flavour-wise a certain role interaction
<@Mekkah> like terminator wanting skynet dead
<@Mekkah> CWC is kind of like making everyone a mini neutral
<@Mekkah> another good use of CWC is giving every faction one man with the same CWC
<@Mekkah> this encourages team work across factions
<@Mekkah> very small team work though
<@Mekkah> but again it's highly experimental
Now, moving onto some more definite stuff:
Host Interference
As a host, you really need to keep a lid on things. I always tried answering most questions with "maybe" because even if you don't want to, you end up giving a LOT away.
You want to have a solid game with priorities, role interactions, everything decided beforehand. I hate it when hosts just decide stuff on-the-go because no matter what you think, you ARE biased.
So, before you want to host a game, make sure you can keep quiet about things and also that you have a solid game ready in which no real decisions would ever need to be made.
(Note: By role interactions I mean stuff like say uhh, BNC being RPSI champ (thus being unlynchable) when dak died. You need to figure out what'd happen BEFOREHAND. Does he keep his power or lose it? It could also be a specific role targeting another one which causes a weird question or two to come up.)
Impersonation
This is probably the most important thing here. Here's the deal:
You guys have two identities in each game, one being your Smogon identity and the other being your Alias. You have two ways to express yourself or even conceal stuff, you simply do NOT need a third.
Impersonating another user will lead you to be permanently banned from mafia games, there's no two ways here. Even creating a new account completely to talk to people about the game without letting out your smogon identity will do the same.
Do NOT do this shit.
Lastly, a more administrative thing:
Blacklist
We will be implementing a "blacklist" for all mafia games soon. The concept is like this, if you join a game and don't bother to care about it, the host can notify us and if we deem it correct, you will be blacklisted.
From there on out, other hosts may choose to not take you in their game, even if you have Priority One. A couple of games where you weren't inactive or a period of say a month - 2 months (whichever comes first) and you'll be taken off this list.
If people complain about you while you are already on the blacklist, you may end up being banned from mafia. NOBODY is exempt from this rule, not even "friends". If a host doesn't inform us of people doing this and we find out, the host is liable for them.
Do note that playing badly does not qualify, this is mostly for people who just didn't care and simply ate up a spot in the game.
Mekkah might have another idea to handle this but I'll let him post about that.
Anyway, thats all we had, please feel free to give comments / suggestions and even bring up more topics you think are relevant.
I've talked to Mekkah many times about how people are simply messing small things in Mafia games which end up ruining what could've been a great game. We finally decided to post a thread where everyone can talk about these issues and prospective hosts can get tips and tricks for when they design their very own game.
Do note that all of this is for discussion. However, I do expect you to think about what you are saying before you say it. If someone just talks bullshit in this thread or cracks stupid/unnecessary jokes, don't expect us to take it kindly.
FYI, all this is from a discussion between me and Mekkah and isn't just my opinion but rather both of ours.
Anyway, without wasting more time, lets get into these:
Moles / Charles Dickens' type roles
This is a huge no. There simply is no place for sure overpowered roles in mafia games anymore. On Smogon, people play under one major assumption, that the host does not lie.
Moles simply allow the mafia to gain an entry into the village, an entry they should have to work to attain. They weaken a village which simply by statistics is not a favorite to win anyway.
I know that Brain and me were actually responsible for introducing the first Charles Dickens type character in a mafia game when we did Apoc but you have to realize, it was a new concept then. It was meant more as a test than anything else. Additionally, we tried our best to nerf it. With it needing a new story each time as well as being limited to only Dickens' characters (so if it ever died, all the people it covered up were going to be exposed). Plus, it really wasn't supposed to run into the wolf on N0 due to a perfect rand target.
What I'd like to say is, just don't do this. If you want something that gives inaccurate results, try a Paranoid Cop or something, make it with the person doing the inspecting not the person being inspected. Even in that case, I'd leave a hint that all results may not be 100% accurate.
If you still want to keep moles in the game, there ARE ways to balance it out. Make sure there are enough ways for them to exposed and they could turn into a fair role.
NPC's
Now, as of recent games you'll see the number of NPC's has been increasing like mad. When we brought this idea into play in Apocalypse, it was just for a small number of roles. You can't have 10 people getting revived in a game, thats just stupid. I'd suggest you attempt to limit NPC's to a maximum of 3-4.
Additionally, you'd do well to do what we did with "Marge" in Apoc. Basically, if I give Mekkah a rogue role, I'd also tell him "the NPC you'd turn into is Superman, if it dies, your lose your power". This would surely not be inspect-able by anyone so its just information for Mekkah. This way, you don't have a "pool" of extra NPC's just lying around like you have had in many games.
What we'd done in Apoc was say Shiv was assigned to Batman and Mekkah was assigned to Superman. If both Superman and Shiv died, thus rendering both Mekkah and Batman useless, we'd assign that to Mekkah. Thats still "fair". You just don't want to have 10 NPC's which kinda end up ruining games.
A good side-effect is, with lesser NPC's, lesser people try and "act" like an NPC. This forces people to become more active and post more. For example, with 2 of our aliases in YCI mafia, we simply kept them as an NPC and one of them was never touched right until the end. Now if there were lesser NPC's, I'm sure we'd have to be posting more and thus making the game way more interesting. Mekkah put it well:
<@Mekkah> main reasoning is that NPCs encourage people being quiet
<@Mekkah> and a game isnt as fun with quiet people
<@Mekkah> and this way finding quiet people becomes a guessing game
Neutrals
Okay guys, I've hosted games myself, I know its really tempting to have a bunch of wicked neutrals wrecking shit up. However, the only people who enjoy that is the neutrals themselves and the game hosts (hell i've been in both positions many times). The rest of the people don't take kindly to it at all.
Neutrals are supposed to have minor effects on the game. They aren't supposed to be the characters the game revolves around. Do remember, this game is called mafia, not neutral.
More on the topic of neutrals, stronger neutrals are actually better in terms of gameplay when compared to weaker neutrals. A wolf needs to do many things to win, he tries to take out the strongest people while helping the weakest, this helps keep the game in check and balance it out.
However, a weak neutral is simply along for the ride. He knows he doesn't have to do much to win, just chill and do whatever the hell he wants to. For example, dak in YCI mafia had a very straightforward role, one which really required no skill at all. He allied with the Milkmen and once he heard of me and Jackal being wolf, he thought it would be "cooler" to sell the Milkmen out and help us (not that i didn't like it but still). People who don't have to do anything to win are actually the most dangerous, they simply have nothing to lose.
Just remember, the harmless ones are actually the most harmful.
CWC's
Right, I honestly think the concept of CWC's is great. However, its been implemented completely wrong. CWC's like "Post ______ in the thread each day to get 1 point" is absolutely useless unless the character actually needs something like that.
I'd love to see creative CWC's which actually make people work towards things. Be it a side-goal, a simple quest, anything, it has to require some work other than posting. Hell, it could even be something that challenges a person's knowledge about the game. For example a CWC like "10 points to guess the number of villagers in the game by night 6, you get 2 guesses" may be useless in terms of gameplay but it actually requires the guy to go out and figure out how the village is structured. It brings skill into the picture.
Here are mekkah's views on the matter:
<@Mekkah> CWCs are not explored yet enough to make extremely fine guidelines for them
<@Mekkah> personally i think they should be used to encourage thinking for yourself
<@Mekkah> you have to force peopl to break loose from "just send in my night actions and vote for what my leader hip/thunda/mekkah/avatar/dak says"
<@Mekkah> that may involve going agiansrt your team's wishes, but not something as extreme like wasting skynet on a user that had no undoable actions
<@Mekkah> good examples of CWC are for example
<@Mekkah> neutrals winning/losing
<@Mekkah> having the highest amount of kills in the game
<@Mekkah> people complaining about being silenced (this one's for comedy but still)
<@Mekkah> or flavour-wise a certain role interaction
<@Mekkah> like terminator wanting skynet dead
<@Mekkah> CWC is kind of like making everyone a mini neutral
<@Mekkah> another good use of CWC is giving every faction one man with the same CWC
<@Mekkah> this encourages team work across factions
<@Mekkah> very small team work though
<@Mekkah> but again it's highly experimental
Now, moving onto some more definite stuff:
Host Interference
As a host, you really need to keep a lid on things. I always tried answering most questions with "maybe" because even if you don't want to, you end up giving a LOT away.
You want to have a solid game with priorities, role interactions, everything decided beforehand. I hate it when hosts just decide stuff on-the-go because no matter what you think, you ARE biased.
So, before you want to host a game, make sure you can keep quiet about things and also that you have a solid game ready in which no real decisions would ever need to be made.
(Note: By role interactions I mean stuff like say uhh, BNC being RPSI champ (thus being unlynchable) when dak died. You need to figure out what'd happen BEFOREHAND. Does he keep his power or lose it? It could also be a specific role targeting another one which causes a weird question or two to come up.)
Impersonation
This is probably the most important thing here. Here's the deal:
You guys have two identities in each game, one being your Smogon identity and the other being your Alias. You have two ways to express yourself or even conceal stuff, you simply do NOT need a third.
Impersonating another user will lead you to be permanently banned from mafia games, there's no two ways here. Even creating a new account completely to talk to people about the game without letting out your smogon identity will do the same.
Do NOT do this shit.
Lastly, a more administrative thing:
Blacklist
We will be implementing a "blacklist" for all mafia games soon. The concept is like this, if you join a game and don't bother to care about it, the host can notify us and if we deem it correct, you will be blacklisted.
From there on out, other hosts may choose to not take you in their game, even if you have Priority One. A couple of games where you weren't inactive or a period of say a month - 2 months (whichever comes first) and you'll be taken off this list.
If people complain about you while you are already on the blacklist, you may end up being banned from mafia. NOBODY is exempt from this rule, not even "friends". If a host doesn't inform us of people doing this and we find out, the host is liable for them.
Do note that playing badly does not qualify, this is mostly for people who just didn't care and simply ate up a spot in the game.
Mekkah might have another idea to handle this but I'll let him post about that.
Anyway, thats all we had, please feel free to give comments / suggestions and even bring up more topics you think are relevant.
