I never thought item passing was random. I figured some items that started with the scum would then go to the town (maybe randomly decided between townies) and likewise. It was never something that really got discussed in thread, though.
CP: I think you are attempting to put too much emphasis on gameplay mechanics, flavor, game design, etc, over how the game actually played out. The reason I play mafia is for the challenge of winning the game. If I'm scum, I want to fool the town. If I'm town I want to catch scum. If I'm a neutral survivor, I'm going to do what I can to survive to the end of the game. The aspect of mafia that appeals to me (and likely most players) is the actual gameplay--what actually occurs during the game. So for you to quit mafia because the players are actually discussing the gameplay after the game is ridiculous, as that's the reason people play mafia. The flavor/mechanics/game design is an aspect that enriches the game, and provides a framework of how the game is going to play out, but it's not the game itself. The game is an informed minority against an uninformed majority, and that's ultimately what people play for and what people are interested most in discussing.
Having a pair of scum claim masons day 1, and last all the way to day 9 where they end up winning the game for scum is unprecedented. It's going to dominate the post-game discussion, regardless of game design. I think you should take it as a complement that nobody is criticizing the game design. The complete lack of criticism is basically an implied statement that the game was balanced/well designed. Usually you will see a bunch of people in the post game discussing how they got screwed based on some aspect of game design. The fact that nobody is complaining about that, and that everyone seems to agree they had an equal chance to win is a positive statement itself.
I will say I enjoyed the flavor of the game, despite having limited knowledge of Harry Potter. I thought I had a neat role, though the crypto claim and my lack of a false claim made it impossible for me to ever use my XXX post ability, despite that being the one I most wanted to use. One aspect of my role I would have changed (although maybe this was intentional design) was to take away the part where it is publicly declared to the town that there has been an "educational decree". Having claimed the unlynchable aspect of my role, and having used it with a public declaration made it impossible for me to use the XXX post ability because it would have been immediately traced back to me.
Personally, I liked the item mechanic, and I like the direction that games of this nature (HP, Points, Hats) are going. I want mafia to be a game where you have to determine people's intentions based on their posts, their behavior, the choices they make, and not based on a cop's roleclaim, or how well they can fake a town-sounding role. I don't want games where a day 1 massclaim happens, and then you simply lynch the people with the fishiest sounding roles (or games where this could happen). Those games are insanely stacked in the town's favor, unless there is a mafioso with a very townie role, in which case the game is entirely a dice roll on whether or not some game factor outs him or he goes all the way.
I thought the item mechanic was done well in this game, I actually liked it more that hats. The issue I had with hats is that everyone having a "true hat" made the game too much based on people's true hats (roleclaims) rather than how they played or how they used the hats they had. Maybe I'm just bitter I got lynched solely because my true hat was scummy, and that I had to claim my hat without knowing what it did or without any real chance of making up a fake hat claim. Here, there was ambiguity, and having an item was unrelated to your alignment.
I think the purest item-based game I want to see is a game where everyone is vanilla. There is no evaluation of roleclaims. The game is entirely based on behavioral tells and how people utilize the items they come in contact with.
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One thing I was surprised about was that nobody even thought to question my alignment based on my claim of Dolores Umbridge. The scum were clearly all part of Voldemort's team. The town were pretty much all "good" people (with a few ambiguities) in the HP universe. I fully expected someone to bring up some questions in that regard. I also thought the scum may have figured out that I was neutral (was actually hoping this was the case to take NK's out of the equation entirely).
I considered claiming Neutral Survivor instead of town. I knew my claim was going to get people off my back, as it wasn't something you see on scum, but it made me worry that I might end up eating a NK at some point. Thoughts on whether this would have been a good idea or not? I also had a survivor claim built into my crypto if I needed to use it, but decided against it.
Also, Kraj, I'm curious what you thought when you basically got the full run down on my role? What did you think I was in terms of alignment/win condition?
Finally, I hold that the JodoYodo lynch was a good one. I don't think that was a mistake at all. The real mistake the town made was to not continue down that path and lynch the masons after JodoYodo and his group of 3 confirmeds were not the scum. 7 Confirmed townies is truly absurd. We tested the group of 3, but did not test the masons? That was the town's mistake. After armlx turned up town, the masons should have been tested directly afterward.
Also, Kraj, I'm curious what you thought when you basically got the full run down on my role? What did you think I was in terms of alignment/win condition?
I didn't really put much thought into it. There was no way your abilities would be fair on a mafia, so I knew there was no way I could fairly continue playing the game since I had been attacking you at the time. I left it at that, I didn't really put any more effort into figuring you out. But it felt good to learn you were neutral and I wasn't completely wrong in going after you. I must say kudos to you, though, for managing to avoid claiming for far longer than anyone else.
It's very kind of Axelrod to complement me about how well I took having to replace out, but truth be told I was getting rather burned out on the game. I did want to see it through to the end, but in a way it was kind of a relief. The funny thing was I had also replaced into Final Fantasy as the lone mafia member (that I knew of), which made that game a ton of more work than I anticipated, and I was modding a newbie game and Alx2's Prehistoric. Leaving Harry Potter was a bit of a relief, and then I was NKd completely unexpectedly in FF, so then I was like
If we're going to talk about game design and balance I'd say overall things were fairly balanced. The town had a fair number of investigative roles and items, which I think worked out better than having a true cop role. The town lost this game because so many players played just terribly, either making themselves into perfectly reasonable lynch targets or completely failing to use their abilities in any useful way.
The lack of any vig ability at all was very rough on the town, though. I assumed andelijah's role was an infectous vig that would fire randomly without wolfsbane.
I liked the mafia being given the three unforgivable curses in addition to their individual abilities but I think being given an extra kill (and if Voldemort had gotten hold of the Elder Wand this would have been sheer hell on the town) was too much. Especially when the town had no true doc and the main doctor item was given the mafia to start. I'd like to know what sense that made when the town had no vig.
Because of all that I feel this setup actually punished the town for lynching the SK on day 2, which is a big problem.
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I will say I enjoyed the flavor of the game, despite having limited knowledge of Harry Potter. I thought I had a neat role, though the crypto claim and my lack of a false claim made it impossible for me to ever use my XXX post ability, despite that being the one I most wanted to use. One aspect of my role I would have changed (although maybe this was intentional design) was to take away the part where it is publicly declared to the town that there has been an "educational decree". Having claimed the unlynchable aspect of my role, and having used it with a public declaration made it impossible for me to use the XXX post ability because it would have been immediately traced back to me.
In the book (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), Umbridge's decrees become a bit of a problem the characters have to get around (and a bit of a joke really) and they are announced publically like Axelrod did. This was a point where not reading the book might've hurt you, because if you did you would've guessed the results would've been publically published to the town.
No we did not guess you were neutral till I found out on the last day. The mafia's roles were so obviously scummy that we assumed the town had more than draco among them to allow the mafia to have a chance.
Ironically, you turning up survivor scared the **** out of me....We were essentially in a 2 town, 2 scum, survivor game, and in that case usually the survivor (if he knows about it) votes the town player so that the scum can immediately hammer. Well we were worried you'd try exactly that and lynch...the claimed masons. Phew.
Because of all that I feel this setup actually punished the town for lynching the SK on day 2, which is a big problem.
I'd disagree with this. The scum had some major disabilities which cannot be underestimated, mainly that our rolenames were obviously scum. Unlike games like say Douglas Adams, where who knows who the hell is scum, there was no question.
We had 2 false claims, but only one was good, and any early subclaim routine (or worse a cryptoclaim) had a really good chance at outing us.
When the SK died, there was even greater chance for the town to find our rolenames (due to the longer game) and thus screw us. And the main cop item was a constant supply of polyjuice potions, anyone of which a hit on the scum would instantly result in a scumlynch.
And then there were a bunch of almost certainly town names (Harry Potter, Hermione, the Weasleys, Neville too really, as was Dumbledore, Sirius Black) that the scum had to get rid of in addition to the source of the investigations (Kraj/SB).
The town should've investigated the "masons." They had a bajillion opportunities too thanks to the SK dying. Had he been alive, sure the SK might've exposed the masons. But if he hadn't for some reason (he might've gone after all the bigname/power roles we did instead) the town wouldn't have had any time (figure the game wouldn't last past day 6) to check the masons with potions anyhow. Plus even if he shot the mason(s) i think that DYH and Dagger pull through in this scenario. I think the SK dying helped the town.
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Mafia MVP Harry Potter Mafia!
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I love Joboman, Poggy, Niv, and Vezok, because, while they may not be the best players, they still try to win. Having fun is the most important thing to a game, but I've learned that if you don't try to win, then you're ruining everyone else's fun.
Rafael, how could you have come to the conclusion that StormBlind was more likely to be scum than the masons?
I didn't really, but if loran and AI were mafia, I was already dead, there was no point in trying to organize a lynch of loran and AI on this day. It didn't exactly affect the result, as soon as loran identified goat as neutral it was over. You can probably tell from my post that my attack on SB was not the world's most convincing, but the only way we could win at that point was for SB to somehow be mafia.
The critical errors were made well before. The town had already lost by the previous day (I actually wonder why the scum bothered backstabbing Dagger... they didn't know about goat yet, but they only needed one more mislynch at that point and claiming an investigation on someone like me would have been game over).
(I actually wonder why the scum bothered backstabbing Dagger... they didn't know about goat yet, but they only needed one more mislynch at that point and claiming an investigation on someone like me would have been game over).
Well we did know that a mislynch equaled a win, but at the same time, we knew we could always speedlynch the next day if need be and still have the win.
I think that with the town's expectations of the number of mafia, getting rid of Dagger both emboldened the town somewhat and also made it seem very unlikely that there was more than one scum left, thus making the masons basically definite town.
In short, the odds favored us stabbing Dagger (haha..punny) once others pounced as well. Almost guaranteed us the 1 vote that we needed against someone else the following day to speedlynch.
-Alpha
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Lies! -I'm Buffy Summers, town tracker. I used my ability on you and saw that you didn't use any abilities before the game started. My flavor is I was sucked through a mysterious space-time portal and I'm here to kill all the vampires, and my tracking ability is a combination of my Slayer and Native American skills.
As far as I can tell, nobody make any special effort to learn about the setting or what was going on with their roles, and all the usual suspects got lynched who normally do, with the exceptions of DYH and CC, who both got lynched because they didn't put even their normal amount of effort into the game (CC, I don't know why, and DYH, because he was sulky about having to make a cryptoclaim).
I wouldn't say I was "sulky," but that'd explain my lack of activity. As soon as I crypto'd, I was doomed. Seriously, there was nooooo way to come up with a halfway decent false claim on the available info. Not very fun feeling like you have no way to win.
But at least I didn't fall off the face of the planet after posting once.
Quote from cp »
All in all, this game took me from adoring mafia to hating it; I can't imagine ever wanting to play with people who spare so little thought for the game that they don't even bother to experiment with the rules or do anything other than the same completely formulaic, thoughtless approach to the game they always have. And I certainly can't imagine ever wanting to design a game for people like that.
@Loran: You definitely make some points, but I feel that even if the SK out us on a shorter clock at the very least he would have cut some trees. The big problem the town faced in this game was a truckload of lurky/scummy townies and enough claim ambiguity despite the cryptos that middle-of-the-road players like Dagger, you and AI just glided on through. There was plenty of evidence out there to justify stringing you or AI up, there was just always a better target.
I do have to say I find it amusing that CPE's one and only action, which was horribly scummy based on the assumption that you and AI were town (which, as far as I know, he believed), turned out to actually be the best play he could have made.
I didn't really, but if loran and AI were mafia, I was already dead, there was no point in trying to organize a lynch of loran and AI on this day. It didn't exactly affect the result, as soon as loran identified goat as neutral it was over. You can probably tell from my post that my attack on SB was not the world's most convincing, but the only way we could win at that point was for SB to somehow be mafia.
Your attack on SB was god-awful. If I were still in the game I would have to have voted you as the last scum over it. But your reasoning makes sense; if it wasn't SB then the game was over anyway because in no way should GR ever be voting to go to night when the game could end with the lynch.
CC's comment brings up a point that I think is something to learn from this game design-wise: Crappy roles might be good balancing factors, but they aren't fun and they invite bad play and/or low participation from a player base that is already strained. Rita Skeeter did nothing for the game but give Dagger a place to hide; the lousy role encouraged Cubus to try and be clever. CPEs role was just 100% annoying for everyone. Looking at his PM, it appears there was absolutely no redeeming quality about his role to make it the slightest bit fun. No wonder he spent the whole game posting just barely enough to avoid getting replaced. And so on.
One thing I'm curious about is how people feel about how I played my role. My choices were to either investigate a rolename every other night, or give the town collective a role investigation every night but have no control over it. I chose the latter, but it didn't work out very well (given that the first investigation ended up in the mafia's hands, and the others were never aimed at mafia when at least one of mine would have been). So in a situation like this is it better to keep control over an ability if it means overall less power for the town?
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One thing I'm curious about is how people feel about how I played my role. My choices were to either investigate a rolename every other night, or give the town collective a role investigation every night but have no control over it. I chose the latter, but it didn't work out very well (given that the first investigation ended up in the mafia's hands, and the others were never aimed at mafia when at least one of mine would have been). So in a situation like this is it better to keep control over an ability if it means overall less power for the town?
I happen to like how you played it. I wouldn't have ever targetted the same player twice, and once revealed, I might suggest that all players with potions hold onto theirs until the last possible night, but I liked your move.
It spawned more possible investigations, made it harder for the scum to stop these investigations (for example we killed some one since as a newb he was more likely to target a mason and he had given away having a potion. But we knew there was one other potion out there but we didn't know who (i guessed chimp, iirc)).
And if a player didn't use his investigation right away he could be basically ignored by the scum until he decided to use the potion.
All-in-All, role wise, I liked how you played it. I actually probably would never have used the Felix Felicis, but you managed to lucksack into saving armlx from being Imperio'ed. Jerk. So I guess it's all good.
:-P
(Incidentally, Had Lupin Survived say 4 days, that wolfsbane potion mightve been required. which, you know would've hugely hurt the town and helped us. )
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CC's comment brings up a point that I think is something to learn from this game design-wise: Crappy roles might be good balancing factors, but they aren't fun and they invite bad play and/or low participation from a player base that is already strained
I half agree with this. I put one really crappy (two in reality, but one by design) role in SoIaF, and i assigned it to DYH telling him it was a challenge. And i think those with crappy roles should take it as a challenge rather than a handicap, and embrace it. So I'm not against putting those roles into a game. But putting more than 1 or 2 of those roles in a game is probably likely to backfire.
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Mafia MVP Harry Potter Mafia!
Logical Reasoning is dead; Long Live Stupidity
Quote from Seppel »
I love Joboman, Poggy, Niv, and Vezok, because, while they may not be the best players, they still try to win. Having fun is the most important thing to a game, but I've learned that if you don't try to win, then you're ruining everyone else's fun.
All-in-All, role wise, I liked how you played it. I actually probably would never have used the Felix Felicis, but you managed to lucksack into saving armlx from being Imperio'ed. Jerk. So I guess it's all good.
I didn't have much of a choice. With an unknown number of Sacks of Galleons floating around, if Felix Felicis had ended up in the hands of the scum it would have been horrible. (Unlike your fearmongering about the Time Turner ) I suppose you might mean I never should have made it in the first place, and you have a point. But the ability to pardon can act as a pseudo cop if the scum don't see it coming and the ability to protect a player from all harmful night actions is potent. It was too good of a weapon to waste.
And I take umbrage (*snicker*) with the suggestion I "lucksacked" saving armlx; it was a deliberate and calculated decision based on the available information.
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Fifth of all, my thought on this game. 1) Look at the comments the game has garnered since it ended: no one seems at all interested in the flavor, or the game balance, or anything; they're all just talking about how ballsy the mason claim was.
Lighten up. If you'll note during the scumtalk, loran and I were comparing our flavor PMs and commenting about how brilliant they were. I don't really see how running a successful masons scum gambit detract from the enjoyment of the flavors overall.
In fact, I still am interested in seeing the flavor PM in which Voldemort NKed Harry Potter. DYH?
I liked the mafia being given the three unforgivable curses in addition to their individual abilities but I think being given an extra kill (and if Voldemort had gotten hold of the Elder Wand this would have been sheer hell on the town) was too much. Especially when the town had no true doc and the main doctor item was given the mafia to start. I'd like to know what sense that made when the town had no vig.
Because of all that I feel this setup actually punished the town for lynching the SK on day 2, which is a big problem.
That's rather subjective. What if Draco had control of the Elder Wand or the Sorting Hat and the series of Polyjuice Potions were successfully being utilized? Or if the Loran and AI were outed somehow in a 2 for 1 scenario? For a 24 players game, there were only 5 mafioso, which is rather few. Fiasco had 6 mafioso for less players than this, and the mechanics there were even more complicated for the town to fathom.
And the SK was essentially just a wildcard. Both sides gained both disadvantages and drawbacks from the SK dying so early in the game, as I mentioned earlier.
Rita Skeeter did nothing for the game but give Dagger a place to hide
On the other hand, Rita Skeeter was the reason for the whole suspicion on me in the first place. Claim-wise I was solid with McGonagall with the rate the town were clearing people based on name claims, and I could always play on the fact that there were two pairs of "masons", two JoaTs, and two Animagus for some bluffing. I was scrutinized because people didn't want to acknowledge the existence of both Spot and I at the same time.
One thing I'm curious about is how people feel about how I played my role. My choices were to either investigate a rolename every other night, or give the town collective a role investigation every night but have no control over it. I chose the latter, but it didn't work out very well (given that the first investigation ended up in the mafia's hands, and the others were never aimed at mafia when at least one of mine would have been). So in a situation like this is it better to keep control over an ability if it means overall less power for the town?
I would have done the same as you. I would have chosen a person I trusted or a group of them and pass the potions to said person or group every night. Mafia is a team game and I don't necessarily trust my judgment over those of others. With increased Polyjuice Potions in circulation, there is an increased chance of a successful hit.
I guessed Loran, because I deemed Kraj would most likely pass to you rather than Chimp. Failing that, I would suspect the real confirmed town pair, but when no one really said anything about during the day, I just assumed the potion was used and the result came up negative.
On the other hand, Rita Skeeter was the reason for the whole suspicion on me in the first place. Claim-wise I was solid with McGonagall with the rate the town were clearing people based on name claims, and I could always play on the fact that there were two pairs of "masons", two JoaTs, and two Animagus for some bluffing. I was scrutinized because people didn't want to acknowledge the existence of both Spot and I at the same time.
You definitely have a point there, but I think the parity argument would have been seen as mostly WIFOM, since it is.
I guessed Loran, because I deemed Kraj would most likely pass to you rather than Chimp. Failing that, I would suspect the real confirmed town pair, but when no one really said anything about during the day, I just assumed the potion was used and the result came up negative.
I was actually very close to passing to Loran. I didn't because he had claimed to receive multiple other items. I knew that passing him a potion would have meant him choosing between it and who knows how many other abilities, so I passed it to Chimp whom I trusted and who had not claimed any specific ability. I passed the next one to Some One even though I was nervous about him making a good choice with it because I trusted him to be town and knew he had nothing else to do at night. I assume SB did the same the next night as simply following my lead, but I think at that point I would have kept the potion considering time was running out and I knew how important it was to test the masons. But since someone (Loran?) said the mafia would have shot me instead of vanillafying me if SB hadn't replaced, it wouldn't have made a difference.
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CC's comment brings up a point that I think is something to learn from this game design-wise: Crappy roles might be good balancing factors, but they aren't fun and they invite bad play and/or low participation from a player base that is already strained. Rita Skeeter did nothing for the game but give Dagger a place to hide; the lousy role encouraged Cubus to try and be clever.
Rita was definitely underpowered. Her role really didn't "do" anything. It just sort of sounded like it did something. I don't think that, in and of itself, makes it "crappy" though. Is a vanilla townie "crappy?" In a game like this, with lots of abilities and item flying around, I think it's probably important to have some minor roles/abilities that don't do much.
The "Animagi" were a little tricky. I wanted them all to have some kind of similar ability for being Animagi, but could never come up with something that seemed flavorful that wasn't already being used. CP ultimately came up with the "item" based abilities that they all had variations on, and I thought it was fine.
CPEs role was just 100% annoying for everyone. Looking at his PM, it appears there was absolutely no redeeming quality about his role to make it the slightest bit fun. No wonder he spent the whole game posting just barely enough to avoid getting replaced. And so on.
I get to blame CP for that role too
More seriously, I'm not a fan of roles that have posting restrictions in general, but some people like them. There was also (in CP's defense) the possibility for a "slight" bit of fun, if CPE ever got his hands on some Babbling Beverage and got to give the entire town a posting restriction.
Now, from a logical standpoint, it doesn't ever make sense to make a Babbling Beverage, so I think CP knew it wasn't likely to happen, but he threw it in for a lark.
One thing I'm curious about is how people feel about how I played my role. My choices were to either investigate a rolename every other night, or give the town collective a role investigation every night but have no control over it. I chose the latter, but it didn't work out very well (given that the first investigation ended up in the mafia's hands, and the others were never aimed at mafia when at least one of mine would have been). So in a situation like this is it better to keep control over an ability if it means overall less power for the town?
I honestly didn't spend a lot of time thinking about the various strategies that players were using in this game. Every once in a while, I guess I might had gone, "man, that was unfortunate" or "oops, why is he doing that" or "nice call", but most of the time I was just trying to keep it running.
I think you did entirely right focusing on the Polujuice, and I think making it and handing it around every Night to your best guess for town is definitely better than keeping it, using it, and only getting 1/2 the potions.
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Quote from Bateleur »
Ambush Krotiq makes me laugh so much. I keep rereading the card and it keeps not having Flash. In what sense is this an ambush again? I just have visions of this huge Krotiq poorly concealed in some bushes, feeling slightly sad that his carefully planned ambushes never seem to work.
I'd like to apologize for my incredibly poor play in this game; I basically have no excuse, and I will say that a lot of the reasons for my lynch and misuse of the Elder Wand were entirely my fault.
Rita was definitely underpowered. Her role really didn't "do" anything. It just sort of sounded like it did something. I don't think that, in and of itself, makes it "crappy" though. Is a vanilla townie "crappy?" In a game like this, with lots of abilities and item flying around, I think it's probably important to have some minor roles/abilities that don't do much.
I don't really disagree, I'm just saying from the perspective of the person playing the role it's a bit of a disincentive to put a lot of effort into the game. Maybe that shouldn't be the case, but I think it's an accurate assessment of how people actually play. Townies just don't feel as invested in a game when they have nothing to work with other than a vote. (At least not in a game like this where it seems like everyone else does. In setups where vanillas are expected, like Newbies, it's a different story.)
Generally I think having players who were basically vanilla but started with an item, and who might be more powerful if they got ahold of a different item, mixed with players who have innate abilities, was an excellent combination. I just think some roles could have had better access to this mix.
I also think there's a big difference between giving someone an ability that doesn't do much, and giving them an ability that does nothing. It's rather disheartening for a townie to know if they claim their role 100% truthfully it's just going to look like they are making it up (which is totally did). It would have been much better, in my opinion, to give her an ability that didn't do much but at least did something. Say, she could choose an item by name and learn if that had changed hands during the night (not who ahd it but just that it changed hands). That would at least have potentially been useful and would have been somewhat confirmable.
And while vanillas and PRs both can have their place in the game, an annoying PR plus being vanilla and itemless is just a seriously sucky combination.
The "Animagi" were a little tricky. I wanted them all to have some kind of similar ability for being Animagi, but could never come up with something that seemed flavorful that wasn't already being used. CP ultimately came up with the "item" based abilities that they all had variations on, and I thought it was fine.
It was a weird twist, to be sure, but I think the design choice was generally a good one. It's just that Rita kinda got hosed.
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For the record, it says it differently in 2 different places - what did the polyjuice potion actually do?
It says you can learn a player's role, but it also says, in a different location, that you can maybe be targeted with something the person you targeted was targeted with.
For the record, it says it differently in 2 different places - what did the polyjuice potion actually do?
It says you can learn a player's role, but it also says, in a different location, that you can maybe be targeted with something the person you targeted was targeted with.
Basically the Polyjuice would turn you into a copy of the player you were targeting. You therefore learn their role name (because you look in a mirror and see who you are). The downside was that there was a chance this would draw the attention of someone who was actively looking for your target (i.e. they would get mis-directed and end up targeting you instead). This wasn't going to be for beneficial things (you wouldn't get passed items that were intended for your target), but it could draw kills - creating a dynamic where you might want to investigate someone scummy, but if you fear a vig. hit on that person you might end up getting shot yourself. This never happened during the course of the game.
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Quote from Bateleur »
Ambush Krotiq makes me laugh so much. I keep rereading the card and it keeps not having Flash. In what sense is this an ambush again? I just have visions of this huge Krotiq poorly concealed in some bushes, feeling slightly sad that his carefully planned ambushes never seem to work.
On the other hand, Rita Skeeter was the reason for the whole suspicion on me in the first place. Claim-wise I was solid with McGonagall with the rate the town were clearing people based on name claims, and I could always play on the fact that there were two pairs of "masons", two JoaTs, and two Animagus for some bluffing. I was scrutinized because people didn't want to acknowledge the existence of both Spot and I at the same time.
I thought I had a valid argument with the town usefulness of my role vs. yours.
Rita was definitely underpowered. Her role really didn't "do" anything. It just sort of sounded like it did something. I don't think that, in and of itself, makes it "crappy" though. Is a vanilla townie "crappy?" In a game like this, with lots of abilities and item flying around, I think it's probably important to have some minor roles/abilities that don't do much.
I was fine with it - it had some potential if the town put effort into trying to use the information (probably only extremely late game, though).
I don't really disagree, I'm just saying from the perspective of the person playing the role it's a bit of a disincentive to put a lot of effort into the game. Maybe that shouldn't be the case, but I think it's an accurate assessment of how people actually play. Townies just don't feel as invested in a game when they have nothing to work with other than a vote. (At least not in a game like this where it seems like everyone else does. In setups where vanillas are expected, like Newbies, it's a different story.)
Generally I think having players who were basically vanilla but started with an item, and who might be more powerful if they got ahold of a different item, mixed with players who have innate abilities, was an excellent combination. I just think some roles could have had better access to this mix.
I also think there's a big difference between giving someone an ability that doesn't do much, and giving them an ability that does nothing. It's rather disheartening for a townie to know if they claim their role 100% truthfully it's just going to look like they are making it up (which is totally did). It would have been much better, in my opinion, to give her an ability that didn't do much but at least did something. Say, she could choose an item by name and learn if that had changed hands during the night (not who ahd it but just that it changed hands). That would at least have potentially been useful and would have been somewhat confirmable.
I just wanted to contribute. My role couldn't really contribute anything. I couldn't contribute much with behavioral analysis because I replaced in at about 150 pages. And I definitely agree with the inability to truthfully claim in a game that has so many powerful roles floating around.
If you are going to make a quasi-vanilla role for a big game like this, don't use a name of questionable alignment like Rita Skeeter. Maybe Ron Weasley, who is pretty much useless in the books anyway. Give the player something
I'm not pointing at you at all, spot. I think you made the best effort you could. It was Cubus' play that put you behind the 8-ball. (The same could be said about Raf, who would have been much less likely to lynch in the endgame if Grimclaw hadn't been so scummy and YuanTi hadn't been middle-of-the-road at best.)
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The Golden Rule of forums: If you're going to be rude, be right. If you might be wrong, be polite.
- Thanks to CP and Axelrod for making this game, and thanks to Axelrod and all the replacements for sticking with it till the end. I was glad to see it end, even if the result wasn't the one I expected.
- Congrats to the winners, and good job on the mason gambit, guys.
- I can at least console myself by going two-out-of-three on day 1. And the new custom tag.
I'm not pointing at you at all, spot. I think you made the best effort you could. It was Cubus' play that put you behind the 8-ball. (The same could be said about Raf, who would have been much less likely to lynch in the endgame if Grimclaw hadn't been so scummy and YuanTi hadn't been middle-of-the-road at best.)
For the record, replacements suck. Not the people volunteering to, but those who replace out. It's an inherently screwy situation.
It screws up those who have plans based on the play of other players and it puts players like spot in impossible situations.
The moral, try not to replace out. If you get past day 2 without asking for a replacement, please try and stick through it, it just screws things over. (imagine if the mod had had to modkill kraj instead!)
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Mafia MVP Harry Potter Mafia!
Logical Reasoning is dead; Long Live Stupidity
Quote from Seppel »
I love Joboman, Poggy, Niv, and Vezok, because, while they may not be the best players, they still try to win. Having fun is the most important thing to a game, but I've learned that if you don't try to win, then you're ruining everyone else's fun.
I'm not pointing at you at all, spot. I think you made the best effort you could. It was Cubus' play that put you behind the 8-ball. (The same could be said about Raf, who would have been much less likely to lynch in the endgame if Grimclaw hadn't been so scummy and YuanTi hadn't been middle-of-the-road at best.)
I know you aren't, just explaining how I felt about the situation. I'd still like to see what Cubus' crypto was (IAHP).
When I first got my role, I wasn't discouraged at all. I only felt screwed when I realized my role couldn't really tell me anything, and that my claim was dubious at best.
The replacements were particularly bad in a game with cryptoclaims, it was particularly bad in my case since I couldn't break Grimclaw's crypto of my role which made me just about the only role without a crypto available. Not great for my trustworthiness.
Honestly, i don't have aLL that much to say about the game as i replaced in pretty late, and the last 2 days essentially felt scripted. I was still suspicious of Loran, but there was precious little i could do about it since, if he WAS scum (i was thinking they were some other variation along the lines of the polyjuice effect, they count as the same person, same name, if one's nk'd the other dies as well. Ect) then again, if Rafk voted me, i'd die, if goat voted me, i'd die. Regardless what happened, i would quite likely die if i tried to focus in on loran / AI. So.. i voted for Rafk and hoped he was scum. Basically the only option i saw.
@Kraj: Yes, i basically gave Somone the Polyjuice because, i still wasnt THAT certain of my reads on people as reading nearly 2700 posts was kind of brain melting, and i figured i would stick with your choice.
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[19:59] greymon90210: Hey StormBlind how tall are you? "I'm six money *****, don't forget it"
"The Critics always said that we'd only have a black president when pigs flu"...
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CP: I think you are attempting to put too much emphasis on gameplay mechanics, flavor, game design, etc, over how the game actually played out. The reason I play mafia is for the challenge of winning the game. If I'm scum, I want to fool the town. If I'm town I want to catch scum. If I'm a neutral survivor, I'm going to do what I can to survive to the end of the game. The aspect of mafia that appeals to me (and likely most players) is the actual gameplay--what actually occurs during the game. So for you to quit mafia because the players are actually discussing the gameplay after the game is ridiculous, as that's the reason people play mafia. The flavor/mechanics/game design is an aspect that enriches the game, and provides a framework of how the game is going to play out, but it's not the game itself. The game is an informed minority against an uninformed majority, and that's ultimately what people play for and what people are interested most in discussing.
Having a pair of scum claim masons day 1, and last all the way to day 9 where they end up winning the game for scum is unprecedented. It's going to dominate the post-game discussion, regardless of game design. I think you should take it as a complement that nobody is criticizing the game design. The complete lack of criticism is basically an implied statement that the game was balanced/well designed. Usually you will see a bunch of people in the post game discussing how they got screwed based on some aspect of game design. The fact that nobody is complaining about that, and that everyone seems to agree they had an equal chance to win is a positive statement itself.
I will say I enjoyed the flavor of the game, despite having limited knowledge of Harry Potter. I thought I had a neat role, though the crypto claim and my lack of a false claim made it impossible for me to ever use my XXX post ability, despite that being the one I most wanted to use. One aspect of my role I would have changed (although maybe this was intentional design) was to take away the part where it is publicly declared to the town that there has been an "educational decree". Having claimed the unlynchable aspect of my role, and having used it with a public declaration made it impossible for me to use the XXX post ability because it would have been immediately traced back to me.
Personally, I liked the item mechanic, and I like the direction that games of this nature (HP, Points, Hats) are going. I want mafia to be a game where you have to determine people's intentions based on their posts, their behavior, the choices they make, and not based on a cop's roleclaim, or how well they can fake a town-sounding role. I don't want games where a day 1 massclaim happens, and then you simply lynch the people with the fishiest sounding roles (or games where this could happen). Those games are insanely stacked in the town's favor, unless there is a mafioso with a very townie role, in which case the game is entirely a dice roll on whether or not some game factor outs him or he goes all the way.
I thought the item mechanic was done well in this game, I actually liked it more that hats. The issue I had with hats is that everyone having a "true hat" made the game too much based on people's true hats (roleclaims) rather than how they played or how they used the hats they had. Maybe I'm just bitter I got lynched solely because my true hat was scummy, and that I had to claim my hat without knowing what it did or without any real chance of making up a fake hat claim. Here, there was ambiguity, and having an item was unrelated to your alignment.
I think the purest item-based game I want to see is a game where everyone is vanilla. There is no evaluation of roleclaims. The game is entirely based on behavioral tells and how people utilize the items they come in contact with.
----
One thing I was surprised about was that nobody even thought to question my alignment based on my claim of Dolores Umbridge. The scum were clearly all part of Voldemort's team. The town were pretty much all "good" people (with a few ambiguities) in the HP universe. I fully expected someone to bring up some questions in that regard. I also thought the scum may have figured out that I was neutral (was actually hoping this was the case to take NK's out of the equation entirely).
I considered claiming Neutral Survivor instead of town. I knew my claim was going to get people off my back, as it wasn't something you see on scum, but it made me worry that I might end up eating a NK at some point. Thoughts on whether this would have been a good idea or not? I also had a survivor claim built into my crypto if I needed to use it, but decided against it.
Also, Kraj, I'm curious what you thought when you basically got the full run down on my role? What did you think I was in terms of alignment/win condition?
Finally, I hold that the JodoYodo lynch was a good one. I don't think that was a mistake at all. The real mistake the town made was to not continue down that path and lynch the masons after JodoYodo and his group of 3 confirmeds were not the scum. 7 Confirmed townies is truly absurd. We tested the group of 3, but did not test the masons? That was the town's mistake. After armlx turned up town, the masons should have been tested directly afterward.
I didn't really put much thought into it. There was no way your abilities would be fair on a mafia, so I knew there was no way I could fairly continue playing the game since I had been attacking you at the time. I left it at that, I didn't really put any more effort into figuring you out. But it felt good to learn you were neutral and I wasn't completely wrong in going after you. I must say kudos to you, though, for managing to avoid claiming for far longer than anyone else.
It's very kind of Axelrod to complement me about how well I took having to replace out, but truth be told I was getting rather burned out on the game. I did want to see it through to the end, but in a way it was kind of a relief. The funny thing was I had also replaced into Final Fantasy as the lone mafia member (that I knew of), which made that game a ton of more work than I anticipated, and I was modding a newbie game and Alx2's Prehistoric. Leaving Harry Potter was a bit of a relief, and then I was NKd completely unexpectedly in FF, so then I was like
If we're going to talk about game design and balance I'd say overall things were fairly balanced. The town had a fair number of investigative roles and items, which I think worked out better than having a true cop role. The town lost this game because so many players played just terribly, either making themselves into perfectly reasonable lynch targets or completely failing to use their abilities in any useful way.
The lack of any vig ability at all was very rough on the town, though. I assumed andelijah's role was an infectous vig that would fire randomly without wolfsbane.
I liked the mafia being given the three unforgivable curses in addition to their individual abilities but I think being given an extra kill (and if Voldemort had gotten hold of the Elder Wand this would have been sheer hell on the town) was too much. Especially when the town had no true doc and the main doctor item was given the mafia to start. I'd like to know what sense that made when the town had no vig.
Because of all that I feel this setup actually punished the town for lynching the SK on day 2, which is a big problem.
Current New Favorite Person™: Mallory Archer
She knows why.
In the book (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), Umbridge's decrees become a bit of a problem the characters have to get around (and a bit of a joke really) and they are announced publically like Axelrod did. This was a point where not reading the book might've hurt you, because if you did you would've guessed the results would've been publically published to the town.
No we did not guess you were neutral till I found out on the last day. The mafia's roles were so obviously scummy that we assumed the town had more than draco among them to allow the mafia to have a chance.
Ironically, you turning up survivor scared the **** out of me....We were essentially in a 2 town, 2 scum, survivor game, and in that case usually the survivor (if he knows about it) votes the town player so that the scum can immediately hammer. Well we were worried you'd try exactly that and lynch...the claimed masons. Phew.
I'd disagree with this. The scum had some major disabilities which cannot be underestimated, mainly that our rolenames were obviously scum. Unlike games like say Douglas Adams, where who knows who the hell is scum, there was no question.
We had 2 false claims, but only one was good, and any early subclaim routine (or worse a cryptoclaim) had a really good chance at outing us.
When the SK died, there was even greater chance for the town to find our rolenames (due to the longer game) and thus screw us. And the main cop item was a constant supply of polyjuice potions, anyone of which a hit on the scum would instantly result in a scumlynch.
And then there were a bunch of almost certainly town names (Harry Potter, Hermione, the Weasleys, Neville too really, as was Dumbledore, Sirius Black) that the scum had to get rid of in addition to the source of the investigations (Kraj/SB).
The town should've investigated the "masons." They had a bajillion opportunities too thanks to the SK dying. Had he been alive, sure the SK might've exposed the masons. But if he hadn't for some reason (he might've gone after all the bigname/power roles we did instead) the town wouldn't have had any time (figure the game wouldn't last past day 6) to check the masons with potions anyhow. Plus even if he shot the mason(s) i think that DYH and Dagger pull through in this scenario. I think the SK dying helped the town.
Logical Reasoning is dead; Long Live Stupidity
I didn't really, but if loran and AI were mafia, I was already dead, there was no point in trying to organize a lynch of loran and AI on this day. It didn't exactly affect the result, as soon as loran identified goat as neutral it was over. You can probably tell from my post that my attack on SB was not the world's most convincing, but the only way we could win at that point was for SB to somehow be mafia.
The critical errors were made well before. The town had already lost by the previous day (I actually wonder why the scum bothered backstabbing Dagger... they didn't know about goat yet, but they only needed one more mislynch at that point and claiming an investigation on someone like me would have been game over).
Well we did know that a mislynch equaled a win, but at the same time, we knew we could always speedlynch the next day if need be and still have the win.
I think that with the town's expectations of the number of mafia, getting rid of Dagger both emboldened the town somewhat and also made it seem very unlikely that there was more than one scum left, thus making the masons basically definite town.
In short, the odds favored us stabbing Dagger (haha..punny) once others pounced as well. Almost guaranteed us the 1 vote that we needed against someone else the following day to speedlynch.
-Alpha
But at least I didn't fall off the face of the planet after posting once.
Um, grow up?
[The Family]
I do have to say I find it amusing that CPE's one and only action, which was horribly scummy based on the assumption that you and AI were town (which, as far as I know, he believed), turned out to actually be the best play he could have made.
Your attack on SB was god-awful. If I were still in the game I would have to have voted you as the last scum over it. But your reasoning makes sense; if it wasn't SB then the game was over anyway because in no way should GR ever be voting to go to night when the game could end with the lynch.
CC's comment brings up a point that I think is something to learn from this game design-wise: Crappy roles might be good balancing factors, but they aren't fun and they invite bad play and/or low participation from a player base that is already strained. Rita Skeeter did nothing for the game but give Dagger a place to hide; the lousy role encouraged Cubus to try and be clever. CPEs role was just 100% annoying for everyone. Looking at his PM, it appears there was absolutely no redeeming quality about his role to make it the slightest bit fun. No wonder he spent the whole game posting just barely enough to avoid getting replaced. And so on.
One thing I'm curious about is how people feel about how I played my role. My choices were to either investigate a rolename every other night, or give the town collective a role investigation every night but have no control over it. I chose the latter, but it didn't work out very well (given that the first investigation ended up in the mafia's hands, and the others were never aimed at mafia when at least one of mine would have been). So in a situation like this is it better to keep control over an ability if it means overall less power for the town?
Current New Favorite Person™: Mallory Archer
She knows why.
I happen to like how you played it. I wouldn't have ever targetted the same player twice, and once revealed, I might suggest that all players with potions hold onto theirs until the last possible night, but I liked your move.
It spawned more possible investigations, made it harder for the scum to stop these investigations (for example we killed some one since as a newb he was more likely to target a mason and he had given away having a potion. But we knew there was one other potion out there but we didn't know who (i guessed chimp, iirc)).
And if a player didn't use his investigation right away he could be basically ignored by the scum until he decided to use the potion.
All-in-All, role wise, I liked how you played it. I actually probably would never have used the Felix Felicis, but you managed to lucksack into saving armlx from being Imperio'ed. Jerk. So I guess it's all good.
:-P
(Incidentally, Had Lupin Survived say 4 days, that wolfsbane potion mightve been required. which, you know would've hugely hurt the town and helped us. )
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I half agree with this. I put one really crappy (two in reality, but one by design) role in SoIaF, and i assigned it to DYH telling him it was a challenge. And i think those with crappy roles should take it as a challenge rather than a handicap, and embrace it. So I'm not against putting those roles into a game. But putting more than 1 or 2 of those roles in a game is probably likely to backfire.
Logical Reasoning is dead; Long Live Stupidity
I didn't have much of a choice. With an unknown number of Sacks of Galleons floating around, if Felix Felicis had ended up in the hands of the scum it would have been horrible. (Unlike your fearmongering about the Time Turner ) I suppose you might mean I never should have made it in the first place, and you have a point. But the ability to pardon can act as a pseudo cop if the scum don't see it coming and the ability to protect a player from all harmful night actions is potent. It was too good of a weapon to waste.
And I take umbrage (*snicker*) with the suggestion I "lucksacked" saving armlx; it was a deliberate and calculated decision based on the available information.
Current New Favorite Person™: Mallory Archer
She knows why.
Lighten up. If you'll note during the scumtalk, loran and I were comparing our flavor PMs and commenting about how brilliant they were. I don't really see how running a successful masons scum gambit detract from the enjoyment of the flavors overall.
In fact, I still am interested in seeing the flavor PM in which Voldemort NKed Harry Potter. DYH?
That's rather subjective. What if Draco had control of the Elder Wand or the Sorting Hat and the series of Polyjuice Potions were successfully being utilized? Or if the Loran and AI were outed somehow in a 2 for 1 scenario? For a 24 players game, there were only 5 mafioso, which is rather few. Fiasco had 6 mafioso for less players than this, and the mechanics there were even more complicated for the town to fathom.
And the SK was essentially just a wildcard. Both sides gained both disadvantages and drawbacks from the SK dying so early in the game, as I mentioned earlier.
On the other hand, Rita Skeeter was the reason for the whole suspicion on me in the first place. Claim-wise I was solid with McGonagall with the rate the town were clearing people based on name claims, and I could always play on the fact that there were two pairs of "masons", two JoaTs, and two Animagus for some bluffing. I was scrutinized because people didn't want to acknowledge the existence of both Spot and I at the same time.
I would have done the same as you. I would have chosen a person I trusted or a group of them and pass the potions to said person or group every night. Mafia is a team game and I don't necessarily trust my judgment over those of others. With increased Polyjuice Potions in circulation, there is an increased chance of a successful hit.
I guessed Loran, because I deemed Kraj would most likely pass to you rather than Chimp. Failing that, I would suspect the real confirmed town pair, but when no one really said anything about during the day, I just assumed the potion was used and the result came up negative.
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You definitely have a point there, but I think the parity argument would have been seen as mostly WIFOM, since it is.
I was actually very close to passing to Loran. I didn't because he had claimed to receive multiple other items. I knew that passing him a potion would have meant him choosing between it and who knows how many other abilities, so I passed it to Chimp whom I trusted and who had not claimed any specific ability. I passed the next one to Some One even though I was nervous about him making a good choice with it because I trusted him to be town and knew he had nothing else to do at night. I assume SB did the same the next night as simply following my lead, but I think at that point I would have kept the potion considering time was running out and I knew how important it was to test the masons. But since someone (Loran?) said the mafia would have shot me instead of vanillafying me if SB hadn't replaced, it wouldn't have made a difference.
Current New Favorite Person™: Mallory Archer
She knows why.
Rita was definitely underpowered. Her role really didn't "do" anything. It just sort of sounded like it did something. I don't think that, in and of itself, makes it "crappy" though. Is a vanilla townie "crappy?" In a game like this, with lots of abilities and item flying around, I think it's probably important to have some minor roles/abilities that don't do much.
The "Animagi" were a little tricky. I wanted them all to have some kind of similar ability for being Animagi, but could never come up with something that seemed flavorful that wasn't already being used. CP ultimately came up with the "item" based abilities that they all had variations on, and I thought it was fine.
I get to blame CP for that role too
More seriously, I'm not a fan of roles that have posting restrictions in general, but some people like them. There was also (in CP's defense) the possibility for a "slight" bit of fun, if CPE ever got his hands on some Babbling Beverage and got to give the entire town a posting restriction.
Now, from a logical standpoint, it doesn't ever make sense to make a Babbling Beverage, so I think CP knew it wasn't likely to happen, but he threw it in for a lark.
I honestly didn't spend a lot of time thinking about the various strategies that players were using in this game. Every once in a while, I guess I might had gone, "man, that was unfortunate" or "oops, why is he doing that" or "nice call", but most of the time I was just trying to keep it running.
I think you did entirely right focusing on the Polujuice, and I think making it and handing it around every Night to your best guess for town is definitely better than keeping it, using it, and only getting 1/2 the potions.
I WANT YOUR DEATH BARONS! Message me if you want to get rid of them!
I don't really disagree, I'm just saying from the perspective of the person playing the role it's a bit of a disincentive to put a lot of effort into the game. Maybe that shouldn't be the case, but I think it's an accurate assessment of how people actually play. Townies just don't feel as invested in a game when they have nothing to work with other than a vote. (At least not in a game like this where it seems like everyone else does. In setups where vanillas are expected, like Newbies, it's a different story.)
Generally I think having players who were basically vanilla but started with an item, and who might be more powerful if they got ahold of a different item, mixed with players who have innate abilities, was an excellent combination. I just think some roles could have had better access to this mix.
I also think there's a big difference between giving someone an ability that doesn't do much, and giving them an ability that does nothing. It's rather disheartening for a townie to know if they claim their role 100% truthfully it's just going to look like they are making it up (which is totally did). It would have been much better, in my opinion, to give her an ability that didn't do much but at least did something. Say, she could choose an item by name and learn if that had changed hands during the night (not who ahd it but just that it changed hands). That would at least have potentially been useful and would have been somewhat confirmable.
And while vanillas and PRs both can have their place in the game, an annoying PR plus being vanilla and itemless is just a seriously sucky combination.
It was a weird twist, to be sure, but I think the design choice was generally a good one. It's just that Rita kinda got hosed.
Current New Favorite Person™: Mallory Archer
She knows why.
It says you can learn a player's role, but it also says, in a different location, that you can maybe be targeted with something the person you targeted was targeted with.
Basically the Polyjuice would turn you into a copy of the player you were targeting. You therefore learn their role name (because you look in a mirror and see who you are). The downside was that there was a chance this would draw the attention of someone who was actively looking for your target (i.e. they would get mis-directed and end up targeting you instead). This wasn't going to be for beneficial things (you wouldn't get passed items that were intended for your target), but it could draw kills - creating a dynamic where you might want to investigate someone scummy, but if you fear a vig. hit on that person you might end up getting shot yourself. This never happened during the course of the game.
I thought I had a valid argument with the town usefulness of my role vs. yours.
I was fine with it - it had some potential if the town put effort into trying to use the information (probably only extremely late game, though).
I just wanted to contribute. My role couldn't really contribute anything. I couldn't contribute much with behavioral analysis because I replaced in at about 150 pages. And I definitely agree with the inability to truthfully claim in a game that has so many powerful roles floating around.
If you are going to make a quasi-vanilla role for a big game like this, don't use a name of questionable alignment like Rita Skeeter. Maybe Ron Weasley, who is pretty much useless in the books anyway. Give the player something
Current New Favorite Person™: Mallory Archer
She knows why.
But seriously:
- Thanks to CP and Axelrod for making this game, and thanks to Axelrod and all the replacements for sticking with it till the end. I was glad to see it end, even if the result wasn't the one I expected.
- Congrats to the winners, and good job on the mason gambit, guys.
- I can at least console myself by going two-out-of-three on day 1. And the new custom tag.
For the record, replacements suck. Not the people volunteering to, but those who replace out. It's an inherently screwy situation.
It screws up those who have plans based on the play of other players and it puts players like spot in impossible situations.
The moral, try not to replace out. If you get past day 2 without asking for a replacement, please try and stick through it, it just screws things over. (imagine if the mod had had to modkill kraj instead!)
Logical Reasoning is dead; Long Live Stupidity
I know you aren't, just explaining how I felt about the situation. I'd still like to see what Cubus' crypto was (IAHP).
When I first got my role, I wasn't discouraged at all. I only felt screwed when I realized my role couldn't really tell me anything, and that my claim was dubious at best.
@Kraj: Yes, i basically gave Somone the Polyjuice because, i still wasnt THAT certain of my reads on people as reading nearly 2700 posts was kind of brain melting, and i figured i would stick with your choice.