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Mafia Philosophy

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X-shot passive roles would obviously be a different scenario, but if things haven't changed around here in my absence, those are far more common on other sites.
 
For a Vig/Granny/Bomb VS Mafia scenario, it depends on how the mafia win condition is worded; the perfect mafia win condition is, in my opinion "you win when all members of the town (and other factions who may oppose the mafia) are dead or nothing can stop this from happening".

Thing is, while we tried to make our games more complex and interesting, we forgot the basics; what mafia really needed to do to win, ever since the game was created, is essentially killng off the entire town; the "equal or outnumber" thing (which is known as "mafia gaining parity/town losing parity" btw) is just the point where this is technically always achieved from a maths standpoint, in a simple game. Mafia gaining parity should not be an auto mafia win if the setup has roles that let the town (who lost the game) get parity back.

Now, the basics were so basic we forgot to make clear what would happen in a scenario where everyone dies; if we don't want to hand either faction the win, we have to add the "at least one member of your faction is alive at the end of the game" clause in the wincons. While I'm not really against it (it sounds strange to have town and mafia win together), I would either call that a draw or a win for everyone; both factions worked to achieve that point and giving them both a loss is just unfair to everyone.

Last thing I'd like to add, as a host, in a vig (infinite or X-shot) VS lone mafia scenario, I'd enforce the tie no matter what; playing it out because one of the players may not input their night action is NOT the correct way to go; it's the least you can do out of respect for all the people who died and whose win/loss depends on the remaining players; if we were to play these scenarios out, scenarios in which not using your action is never optimal (biggest blunder possible, even playing against wincon I'd say!) then we might as well let games continue even after scum gain parity with no way back (because, you never know, they may vote each other off and hand town the win! /sarcasm).
 
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Win for mafia, in spirit, really boils down to "Last man standing." If the game reaches a point where nothing and no one can prevent you from achieving this, you have won. Everyone dying is essentially a stalemate, although really, if the Town let it get that far they really deserve to lose.
 
Win for mafia, in spirit, really boils down to "Last man standing." If the game reaches a point where nothing and no one can prevent you from achieving this, you have won. Everyone dying is essentially a stalemate, although really, if the Town let it get that far they really deserve to lose.
In the same sense, that's what win for town really boils down to in spirit.
By the same logic, the mafia let it get that far too and they really deserve to lose as well.
 
The existence of independants... especially ones such as the cerial serial killer, do throw the last man standing concept out the window....
Depends on the indep. The benign ones like Survivor don't count as threats to the town or the mafia. While those like the Serial Killer are threats to everybody and the other factions' wincons are supposed to include exterminating them.
 
I would argue that while they're no threat to anyone, if town = Mafia but there is also an indep such as survivor or lyncher the indep counts towards town numbers because it's still theoretically possible for town to lynch Mafia of the indep votes too.
 
In the same sense, that's what win for town really boils down to in spirit.
By the same logic, the mafia let it get that far too and they really deserve to lose as well.
I disagree - boiling down to one remaining mafioso isn't unusual or shameful, and mafia wins in scenarios with only one remaining mafioso all the time. By comparison, this one unusual scenario is one of the only times when town could conceivably avoid losing with only one townie left. One townie left under normal circumstances is auto-loss.
 
I would argue that while they're no threat to anyone, if town = Mafia but there is also an indep such as survivor or lyncher the indep counts towards town numbers because it's still theoretically possible for town to lynch Mafia of the indep votes too.
In that situation, the indep is essentially a kingmaker (can decide the game's outcome without any benefit for themselves). In such situations I just prefer to ignore the kingmaker. I also like making benign indeps voteless to avoid such situations.
I disagree - boiling down to one remaining mafioso isn't unusual or shameful, and mafia wins in scenarios with only one remaining mafioso all the time. By comparison, this one unusual scenario is one of the only times when town could conceivably avoid losing with only one townie left. One townie left under normal circumstances is auto-loss.
"Under normal circumstances" - you said it yourself.
Just because it would be an auto loss under normal circumstances doesn't mean that it should be an auto loss in this case. Or that town deserves more punishment than mafia for reaching this point; it's a stalemate, that's what it is; punishing town and rewarding mafia is unfair.
 
I said it was a stalemate, though. I just added a light slap on the wrist to town at the end (because, again, getting down to only one surviving mafioso is perfectly normal and happens more often than not, but getting down to just one surviving townie means you've completely squandered the one and only advantage your faction has: numbers).
 
In that situation, the indep is essentially a kingmaker (can decide the game's outcome without any benefit for themselves). In such situations I just prefer to ignore the kingmaker. I also like making benign indeps voteless to avoid such situations.
But they're not a kingmaker in this scenario. Say we have 3 town and 3 Mafia plus one survivor/lyncher. The survivor has to survive to the end of the game, so while optimum play is to lynch a townie they may jump on the wagon of a mafioso by accident. If they do that, it's possible for town to achieve a majority if the kill misses or hits the indep, but the indep still has to survive. In the event of a lyncher, they could theoretically vote for a mafioso because they know that their lynchee wagon wouldn't gain steam and so optimum play for them would be to prolong the game by lynching the Mafia. If they don't, the game will end and they lose. Thus, they're not kingmakers because their decisions during that day impact their chances of winning.
 
But they're not a kingmaker in this scenario. Say we have 3 town and 3 Mafia plus one survivor/lyncher. The survivor has to survive to the end of the game, so while optimum play is to lynch a townie they may jump on the wagon of a mafioso by accident. If they do that, it's possible for town to achieve a majority if the kill misses or hits the indep, but the indep still has to survive. In the event of a lyncher, they could theoretically vote for a mafioso because they know that their lynchee wagon wouldn't gain steam and so optimum play for them would be to prolong the game by lynching the Mafia. If they don't, the game will end and they lose. Thus, they're not kingmakers because their decisions during that day impact their chances of winning.
If the survivor is known he doesn't have to scumside; depends on whether your perception of optimal includes "in the least time possible".
Fair point about the lyncher, whose actions impact their chances of winning; not that sure we can go by the same logic for survivor, though.
 
I was thinking an unknown survivor. If they lynch town in this scenario, game over, they win. If they lynch scum, they are at risk of being shot or lynched in the coming phases. However, it's still possible for them to make a mistake and lynch scum.
 
I was thinking an unknown survivor. If they lynch town in this scenario, game over, they win. If they lynch scum, they are at risk of being shot or lynched in the coming phases. However, it's still possible for them to make a mistake and lynch scum.
Or to take them off the equation and call them and the mafia winners; because both factions' wincons are about eliminating only each other, and mafia can achieve this by itself while town cannot.

I still prefer to make survivors voteless to avoid such situations, though.
 
I still prefer to make survivors voteless to avoid such situations, though.
One the one hand, I agree. On the other, I hate being voteless and even as a survivor my vote is a weapon to help me survive. Perhaps a "you cannot vote once LYLO has been reached" would be a better clause.
 
One the one hand, I agree. On the other, I hate being voteless and even as a survivor my vote is a weapon to help me survive. Perhaps a "you cannot vote once LYLO has been reached" would be a better clause.
But the voteless modifier is a weapon to prove the survivor's not lying by itself.
It is a fine clause... but if we get to clauses that specific, why not make it "you win when LYLO is reached" since they won't be influencing the game from that point and just win?
 
I had a role once that turned a Serial Killer into a Vanilla... though there was no SO in that game.
 
Question: Would a role that can affect other roles be bastard?

For example, a gun neutralizer... That can turn serial killers into survivors, And vigilantes, paranoid gun owners, grannys, etc into vanillas?
It depends on your definition of "Bastard". Personally, I would classify SK -> Survivor as Bastard because it changes their wincon, but not the rest. Others would classify neither or both as Bastard.

Question: How do people define Bastard games?
 
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