Cook a set-up with me: TvM with publicly appointed alliance checker

[Mekkah]

Why
I want to spice up TvM and address some of the issues it has with a design idea, but I might have overlooked something extremely obvious. Kindly help me foresee and/or fix problems in case I ever host a game with it.

The main issue I want to address is:
Village leader meta is optimal, but boring for most players because they have nothing to do. Either they get sheeted and involved in planning, or they don't. If you don't get sheeted, there's a chance you don't get to play the game, unless you are fine with sheeping.

So here's the setup I had in mind:

Mechanics
There's the usual dayvote that kills someone, but there's also a dayvote for granting someone a 1x alliance check. That person, for the next night, will be able to check the alliance of one other person. They will get the result privately.

The person that gets the alliance check will also be added to a DM/sheet with previous alliance checkers, regardless of their own alliance. (optionally, the targets of the checkers can be added as well)

During the dayvote the town also has the option vote to "reset" the sheet. If the majority of players vote for a reset, the next alliance checker will not be added to the existing group, and instead start a new one.

Intentions
The idea is to incorporate village leadership into the game's mechanics, instead of trying to fight it. I believe mafia is at its most interesting when there is public discourse on what should happen next, and I think these ideas encourage that. I'm hoping several people would go around campaigning to be elected alliance checker (I need a better flavor for this), including mafia who would have a lot to win by getting the info from previous checks and report wrong results themselves. In this setup I would never give an incorrect result for these inspects, but I would also never force mafia to out themselves through these. I am hoping that the reset option will help town flush out moles should they believe a mafia got in.

It's possible people will still try to use the tried and true method: clear one person, perhaps have them inspected by multiple sources, and then have them gather mass claims. I might have to include some mechanics to fight that and I have some ideas for that. I probably would not use aliases for this game, so it should be relatively trivial for mafia to pick off an obvtown player.

Questions for you:
- Is the setup clear?
- How would you break the setup?
- And most importantly of all, how would you improve it?

 

[charlieum]

Doesn’t the alliance checker get roleblocked/killed every night to prevent the results? (Unless there is a Watcher, in which case the blocker just dies instantly.)

Can the same person get the alliance check more than once?

Is there a way to turn the mechanic off? Because normally mafia are trying to hunt for the info roles early, but that isn’t really possible here at all.

 

[Laurel]

There needs to be a safeguard as a starting point but overall I like this idea!

 

[Mekkah]

this was partially addressed on discord but just so everyone else knows where we're at

Doesn’t the alliance checker get roleblocked/killed every night to prevent the results? (Unless there is a Watcher, in which case the blocker just dies instantly.)

In my setup right now the mafia is a blob and has an expensive roleblock. However since the game is so centered around this mechanic, perhaps it's better for the alliance checker to be unblockable, or for there to be a drawback to block it. A town safeguard can help amend the problem too of course but it would be unfortunate if they died.

Can the same person get the alliance check more than once?

After thinking about it I think it would be most fun if the same person can only be alliance checker once and can only be alliance checked once. This does introduce a potential handicap for the mafia since if they claim to have used alliance check on someone, someone else could try as well and succeed...but honestly I don't hate that.

Is there a way to turn the mechanic off? Because normally mafia are trying to hunt for the info roles early, but that isn’t really possible here at all.

Since multiple people have brought this up as something that needs to be possible, I suppose the number of total inspects could be limited by either a hard cap on # of inspects, or it could have a night # deadline. Of course the moment town loses majority, the inspect is practically gone, but at that point mafia should win anyway.

 

[dak]

Bring back Nostradamus

 

[AngryPidgeon]

The person that gets the alliance check will also be added to a DM/sheet with previous alliance checkers, regardless of their own alliance. (optionally, the targets of the checkers can be added as well)

Owned by the mod? I feel like town will just ignore these and maintain their own sheets potentially.

But what info would go in this sort of sheet by default? Or would it just be blank and access given to checkers?

 

[Mekkah]

Owned by the mod? I feel like town will just ignore these and maintain their own sheets potentially.

But what info would go in this sort of sheet by default? Or would it just be blank and access given to checkers?

Yeah I 100% expect town to maintain their own info sheets, this would just be the official one. I *think* all the info from previous inspects will be on that sheet, with mafia being able to put fake results on there.

 

[Alice Kazumi]

That's a cool idea. I believe that giving people things to do makes them more invested even if it doesn't completely fix town leader meta. Although they probably didn't play exactly as expected Temple mafia game from Yeti and District mafia game from Zorbees are examples of this.

In my setup right now the mafia is a blob and has an expensive roleblock. However since the game is so centered around this mechanic, perhaps it's better for the alliance checker to be unblockable, or for there to be a drawback to block it. A town safeguard can help amend the problem too of course but it would be unfortunate if they died.

After thinking about it I think it would be most fun if the same person can only be alliance checker once and can only be alliance checked once. This does introduce a potential handicap for the mafia since if they claim to have used alliance check on someone, someone else could try as well and succeed...but honestly I don't hate that.

Since multiple people have brought this up as something that needs to be possible, I suppose the number of total inspects could be limited by either a hard cap on # of inspects, or it could have a night # deadline. Of course the moment town loses majority, the inspect is practically gone, but at that point mafia should win anyway.

It could be only blockeable by some mafia oneshot or the vote cancelled by some mafia role for example. That would fix the issue of town safeguard dying.

I'm making a noc with a similar concept and I arrived at the same conclusion. Limit the number of times someone can carry the role (alliance checker in this case) is more fun for everyone and makes it more challenging rather than just trusting the most townie.

Maybe put an inspect for odd nights and something else like a bodyguard for even nights? I feel like that would make things interesting without overloading investigative roles.