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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 14:40:11 GMT -5
Post by Mahaloth on Nov 30, 2010 14:40:11 GMT -5
I'll say what I think I always say:
1. In every game I design, the scum are provided with fake claims to ensure that the game would not be broken.
2. It's very hard to get our act together quickly enough for the scum to have limited time to prepare their fake claim.
3. It will reveal town power roles to the scum.
We're better not doing it right now.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 14:41:14 GMT -5
Post by Mahaloth on Nov 30, 2010 14:41:14 GMT -5
Personally my attitude as a moderator is that a mass claim should never break the game in favour of the Town. However I won't put much effort into ensuring that the Town cannot shoot themselves in the foot. Right. I allowed Town to claim in Lord of the Rings. It nearly cost them the game, if a few other happenings hadn't occurred. If they wanted to shoot themselves in the foot, they were able to.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 14:42:19 GMT -5
Post by Mahaloth on Nov 30, 2010 14:42:19 GMT -5
There are two types of mass claims to consider. Name claim: we each reveal which card we are. Power claim: we each reveal what powers (or none) we have. Players should be explicit which type of mass claim they're referring to. Ed covered the pros and cons well. My opinion is that it's a little early for mass claims, but I'm not against it. The earlier we do the mass claim, the less flexibility scum will get with their false claims. Did you already claim vanilla? If so, why did you if we hadn't agreed to claim?
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 15:01:06 GMT -5
Post by Pleonast on Nov 30, 2010 15:01:06 GMT -5
Personally my attitude as a moderator is that a mass claim should never break the game in favour of the Town. However I won't put much effort into ensuring that the Town cannot shoot themselves in the foot. That's a rather unbalanced setup, in my opinion. Players (collectively if not publicly) should have the information needed to avoid screwing their own side in a catastrophic way. Or the game have built-in mechanisms to limit the damage. Otherwise, you'll occasionally have a game where one side does something, through no fault of their own, to make winning impossible. In other words, ideally the end result should be based on which team played the best, not which team avoided the moderator's land mines. Did you already claim vanilla? If so, why did you if we hadn't agreed to claim? A mass claim has a different calculus than an individual claim.
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Total Ullz
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 15:06:25 GMT -5
Post by Total Ullz on Nov 30, 2010 15:06:25 GMT -5
That's a rather unbalanced setup, in my opinion. Players (collectively if not publicly) should have the information needed to avoid screwing their own side in a catastrophic way. Or the game have built-in mechanisms to limit the damage. Otherwise, you'll occasionally have a game where one side does something, through no fault of their own, to make winning impossible. We really view thing very differently. But I'm having a hard time commenting in general because of on-going games. However I'd love to have a mass claim/break game/shoot in foot-conversation on this site at one point. If there is one thing I've learned in mafia is it: I can always learn more But this is not the time and place to fill up the game with general mafia-talk IMO.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 15:17:09 GMT -5
Post by Pleonast on Nov 30, 2010 15:17:09 GMT -5
But this is not the time and place to fill up the game with general mafia-talk IMO. It's always time for mafia talk. ;D But really. While it may not seem immediately relevant, general talk reveals how players think. Which is immensely useful in the long run for distinguishing scum from town. I do understand if you're constrained by other games, though. Just try to keep the talk truly general. Or specific to this game.
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Merestil Haye
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 15:42:37 GMT -5
Post by Merestil Haye on Nov 30, 2010 15:42:37 GMT -5
Early mass claims work in two cases. 1. Where the Mod hasn't properly designed the roles. 2. When a bizarre set of circumstances removes a safeguard and the mass claim becomes viable. I assume, given the level of expertise we've developed, that Bufftabby has avoided the first trap; also, recalling Ragnarok, there were all sorts of possibilities for the then Get of Loki to fake claim. I don't see how the death of a Town Watcher can make it safe for the Mafia in this game to fake claim. I'd also like to point out that the Mafia can talk together in the Day (see Rule 2). I frankly doubt that a mass claim will work now. Later, maybe. Let's take it under advisement and come back to it later.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 16:17:29 GMT -5
Post by ComeToTheDarkSideWeHaveCookies on Nov 30, 2010 16:17:29 GMT -5
I'm willing to keep a mass claim on the table of conversation as much as everyone wants to talk about it, but I don't think we should do one just yet.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 16:35:18 GMT -5
Post by Rysto on Nov 30, 2010 16:35:18 GMT -5
Early mass claims work in two cases. There is a case three: a game like You Solve It, where players have specific information that the mod intends them to claim. However that's a very special case: in YSI we knew exactly how the information worked and how it would be useful to town.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 17:34:45 GMT -5
Post by guiri on Nov 30, 2010 17:34:45 GMT -5
I'm leaning against a mass claim at this early stage in the game. I see the benefits however all the pros mentioned in special ed's post are dependent on a number of other factors and events while most of the cons are guaranteed outcomes of the mass claim itself. Moving on to my semi traditional opening salvo: so, how about that mass claim idea that we talked about on Night 0? Who's for it, who's against it and why? In both your posts so far you've stated that you like talking about a mass claim but you haven't actually discussed it yet. Are you for or against it in this game? Why? And yet, town slaughtered scum in that game, and I think the mass claim discussion had something to do with that. Are you referring to the issue with the personalized vanilla PMs which exposed some non-vanilla players?
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 18:56:51 GMT -5
Post by harmless little bunny on Nov 30, 2010 18:56:51 GMT -5
I would be ok with a name claim, but I feel like anything more would benefit scum. If the town power roles were truthful it would make scum's job easier by painting a target, and if they lied I think they would be as likely to slip up as the scum are. Maybe even more likely because the scum would possibly have a fake PM, but the town power roles would probably have to make one up if they wanted to lie.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 18:57:20 GMT -5
Post by Mahaloth on Nov 30, 2010 18:57:20 GMT -5
A mass claim has a different calculus than an individual claim. Why did you claim?
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 19:13:41 GMT -5
Post by NAF1138 on Nov 30, 2010 19:13:41 GMT -5
I don't know how I feel about a mass claim yet, but I am always pro information. My stance is that a mass claim is generally a net neutral in terms of immediate harm/benefit to town, but forcing claims early can usually help us in the long run. Are you referring to the issue with the personalized vanilla PMs which exposed some non-vanilla players? It seems like that discussion (among other things) led directly to the lynching of Peeker, and got things shaking early in the game which helped town even more. I know people are saying that town lucked into the win in EDII but I disagree. The steps that town took in the early game led directly to town getting good breaks later in the game. I firmly believe that you make your own luck, and that getting as much solid information out in the open as early as is reasonable (reason-ability is left to the judgment of those holding the information) is the best possible play for town in every game. Mafia is a game of numbers vs information. Town has numbers, scum has information. The best chance town has to fight scum early on is to leverage their numbers in the pursuit of closing the information gap before scum can gain the advantage in terms of numbers.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 19:20:47 GMT -5
Post by special on Nov 30, 2010 19:20:47 GMT -5
Mafia is a game of numbers vs information. Town has numbers, scum has information. The best chance town has to fight scum early on is to leverage their numbers in the pursuit of closing the information gap before scum can gain the advantage in terms of numbers. I know this is stated often enough to make it appear to have some validity. But I think it's not that simple. Town has more numbers than Scum, and Scum has more information that Town, but neither have a monopoly on information or numbers.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 19:23:43 GMT -5
Post by metallicsquink on Nov 30, 2010 19:23:43 GMT -5
As much as more information for town would be helpful, we have no way to verify any of the claims if we were to make them this early in the game. Plus, as others have mentioned, we would just be setting up our town power roles for quick deaths. I think it's better for town to not claim at this point. When we have more information and maybe can confirm each other wherever possible, I think a claim would be more beneficial to town. Obviously, it's hard to know when that time would be but I don't think it's this early in the game.
As for a name claim, I cannot really comment since I don't have a clue about Tarot or what it means.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 20:03:58 GMT -5
Post by Sister Coyote on Nov 30, 2010 20:03:58 GMT -5
My stance is that a mass claim is generally a net neutral in terms of immediate harm/benefit to town, but forcing claims early can usually help us in the long run. I disagree strongly that anything that makes it easier for Scum to know who they should be targeting is a net neutral, and I certainly hope you're talking about claims early in an individual Day (so that people have a chance to reconsider/change their vote) and not forcing as many early claims as possible. Town has more numbers than Scum, and Scum has more information that Town, but neither have a monopoly on information or numbers. This. So much this. And I'm agreeing with Ed, and that scares the hell out of me.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 20:12:49 GMT -5
Post by Inner Stickler on Nov 30, 2010 20:12:49 GMT -5
I don't feel comfortable claiming powers yet; I agree with the others who feel it is not in town's best interest at this point. I do wonder however about the utility of a name claim, which by necessity would also be a major/minor arcana claim, something I know sach mentioned in Night 0. I would be open to a mass name claim at this juncture. I've just read the wikipage on the hierophant and nothing jumped out at me as screaming this is a tracker role, so I am relatively confident that the remaining power roles will not be exposed through just a name claim. Obviously, the possibility of a major/minor arcana discrepancy is a danger here, but I am not sure for which side. This also has the benefit of, if there is a role name investigator out there, they have something to check against.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 20:52:58 GMT -5
Post by ComeToTheDarkSideWeHaveCookies on Nov 30, 2010 20:52:58 GMT -5
I know people are saying that town lucked into the win in EDII but I disagree. The steps that town took in the early game led directly to town getting good breaks later in the game. I firmly believe that you make your own luck, and that getting as much solid information out in the open as early as is reasonable (reason-ability is left to the judgment of those holding the information) is the best possible play for town in every game. The Town won, but you just can't hand-wave the luck of the draw out of the outcome of that game. Town play had nothing to do with a significant amount of things that happened to advance the Town win condition.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 20:57:41 GMT -5
Post by harmless little bunny on Nov 30, 2010 20:57:41 GMT -5
I don't feel comfortable claiming powers yet; I agree with the others who feel it is not in town's best interest at this point. I do wonder however about the utility of a name claim, which by necessity would also be a major/minor arcana claim, something I know sach mentioned in Night 0. I would be open to a mass name claim at this juncture. I've just read the wikipage on the hierophant and nothing jumped out at me as screaming this is a tracker role, so I am relatively confident that the remaining power roles will not be exposed through just a name claim. Obviously, the possibility of a major/minor arcana discrepancy is a danger here, but I am not sure for which side. This also has the benefit of, if there is a role name investigator out there, they have something to check against. I agree with you. The name claim has a couple of ways to help town: * the scum could slip up and claim a name that already belongs to a townie * town could have an investigator that can confirm claims or call out the scum if they are lying The danger would be if this game has all of the power roles with major names and vanilla with minor ones in which case it would effectively be the same as role claims in that the scum would still get their targets. Actually, it would be much worse than role claims because the scum would have targets, but we wouldn't know that they had the targets from the names.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 21:00:06 GMT -5
Post by Inner Stickler on Nov 30, 2010 21:00:06 GMT -5
I have faith that Bufftabby wouldn't be that simple.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 21:02:50 GMT -5
Post by Hockey Monkey! on Nov 30, 2010 21:02:50 GMT -5
I'm not against a mass claim at some point in the game, but I'm not sure it would serve the best interest of the town to make one this early. I have to agree that the maker of the game is no newb and has likely accounted for a mass claim when balancing the game. I don't see a benefit to town right now, but I do see the benefit for scum - namely the roadmap to kills. I'll be up for discussing a mass claim later if events transpire that would warrant one.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 21:04:05 GMT -5
Post by harmless little bunny on Nov 30, 2010 21:04:05 GMT -5
Yeah, I didn't say I thought it was likely. I just figured I should mention the possibility.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 21:06:02 GMT -5
Post by harmless little bunny on Nov 30, 2010 21:06:02 GMT -5
Yeah, I didn't say I thought it was likely. I just figured I should mention the possibility. I just want to point out that this is in reference to Inner Stickler's last post just to eliminate confusion before it starts.
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 22:09:18 GMT -5
Post by charr on Nov 30, 2010 22:09:18 GMT -5
Oh, huh? My name is not one of the major arcana cards. :/
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Day One
Nov 30, 2010 22:10:15 GMT -5
Post by charr on Nov 30, 2010 22:10:15 GMT -5
^ Completely irrelevant.
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Post by Inner Stickler on Dec 1, 2010 1:02:29 GMT -5
Perhaps, perhaps not. If you're town, it reveals to everyone with a major arcana role that the minor are indeed in play. It will reveal even more as we lynch more people and see more deaths and get a look at the breakdown of town vs scum, major vs minor arcana, and power role vs vanilla. I'm a little surprised you were so cavalier with it.
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Total Ullz
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Post by Total Ullz on Dec 1, 2010 2:57:51 GMT -5
I don't feel comfortable claiming powers yet; I agree with the others who feel it is not in town's best interest at this point. I do wonder however about the utility of a name claim, which by necessity would also be a major/minor arcana claim, something I know sach mentioned in Night 0. I would be open to a mass name claim at this juncture. I've just read the wikipage on the hierophant and nothing jumped out at me as screaming this is a tracker role, so I am relatively confident that the remaining power roles will not be exposed through just a name claim. Obviously, the possibility of a major/minor arcana discrepancy is a danger here, but I am not sure for which side. This also has the benefit of, if there is a role name investigator out there, they have something to check against. I agree with you. The name claim has a couple of ways to help town: * the scum could slip up and claim a name that already belongs to a townie * town could have an investigator that can confirm claims or call out the scum if they are lying The danger would be if this game has all of the power roles with major names and vanilla with minor ones in which case it would effectively be the same as role claims in that the scum would still get their targets. Actually, it would be much worse than role claims because the scum would have targets, but we wouldn't know that they had the targets from the names. I don't think a name claim is as simple as that. We have to consider that there might be roles "linked" to each other. For instance a SK that has to kill certain "cards"/roles. Also scum could have an investigator as well. On the plus side we lock everyone into oneclaim and this will force them to stick with that one claim no matter what happens in the game. That could work as a real big bonus for Town. No knowing much about Tarot I'm not sure if we might risk giving up information with the names alone. But I'd be willing to discuss it some more.
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Total Ullz
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Post by Total Ullz on Dec 1, 2010 3:02:09 GMT -5
Then why did you say it in the first place?
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Post by brewha on Dec 1, 2010 9:27:33 GMT -5
Oh, huh? My name is not one of the major arcana cards. :/ My first thought was that this was just a silly thing that an inexperienced player would say - as town. But, perhaps it's a skillful scum ploy to throw us off in the event of a claim.
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Post by NAF1138 on Dec 1, 2010 9:55:25 GMT -5
I know this is stated often enough to make it appear to have some validity. But I think it's not that simple. Town has more numbers than Scum, and Scum has more information that Town, but neither have a monopoly on information or numbers. Of course it's not that simple. If it were just that simple the game wouldn't really be all that interesting. But if you are going to boil something down to its essence in order to examine strategy values you are going to lose some nuance. And frankly, that nuance is a distraction when it comes to determining general guidelines for good play. Those guidelines aren't once size fits all either, they require some thinking in how the get implemented, but the basic premise that if town gains information rapidly early in the game that information will snowball and town will win is sound. But follow me here. The basics of the game. A.Town (needs to kill an unknown number of scum in their midst in order to win) vs B.Scum (needs to kill a majority of known non scum in their midst in order to win). How is it best for town to determine the kill, find scum. How do you find scum? Gather information about other players. All types of information, but the only way to find scum is to find out about the players. So to achieve its goal town must gather information and then use it to kill players. What are towns assets? 1) Power roles who either gather information, hold information or protect town's numbers. 2) the ability to kill other players based on gathered information (either with lynch or vig). 3) Town's numbers which allow them to make mistakes and hold off the scum. Crap...I got to go to work, I'll be back to finish this later. Let me know if this is making sense so far.
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