[Mafia game] The Realm of Phere

[Astral Rejection]

More on my issue with WISH:

Choie was untrackable, so we couldn't see her "cast" the wish. It could be anything, like PetW's no-reveal, Weedy's false reveal, an extra death one night, and Mosier's zombie resurrection. I'm sure there were others I didn't see. Town had no mechanic to solve what happened with any of that. And that's very, very frustrating. This game, on paper, was town vs. Choie. But town never had a way to discern that. Town never had a way to realize that none of the "evil" people were part of a team. And the various wishes, since they were unsolvable, hinted at a bigger array of enemies, with town completely unable to figure out their source.

[Gadarene]

Astral's concerns are spot on.

That is absolutely absurd and game-breaking.

[Scathach]

Eh, I'm ok with a lot of the weird stuff. I signed up for the game expecting it to be crazy and I wasn't disappointed.

I would consider it analogous to the recent Arkham game on Idlemafia where the 3rd Party could leave random "bombs" on people with triggers/colour effects chosen by the bomber. The bomber could also do things like have people get a PM during the night that their pee had turned blue Completely unpredictable but just a sort of fun red herring.

[Astral Rejection]

Fair enough, Scathach. It's not quite the same as our situation here, but either way that sounds like something that would frustrate me. Just not my cup of tea, I suppose.

[Visorslash]

The dropouts sucked, and the double nightkills suck, I will admit. Maybe you could've dumbed the writeups/role PM's down to bare basics, or lessened the extra text to keep you sane?

[Gadarene]

Originally Posted by Scathach

Eh, I'm ok with a lot of the weird stuff. I signed up for the game expecting it to be crazy and I wasn't disappointed.

I would consider it analogous to the recent Arkham game on Idlemafia where the 3rd Party could leave random "bombs" on people with triggers/colour effects chosen by the bomber. The bomber could also do things like have people get a PM during the night that their pee had turned blue Completely unpredictable but just a sort of fun red herring.

There's a difference between "fun red herrings" and things that have actual, substantive effects on the game, like changing people's reveals, resurrecting extra people, and causing extra deaths that couldn't be solved at all.

[Askthepizzaguy]

Kinda figured Gadarene would be whiny at the end. As for lack of respect for players, I have to hand it to you Gad, you're never shy about disrespecting the moderator or your fellow players, or taking offense to the same sort of disrespect you dish out at people. The feeling is more than mutual there, buddy.

[Visorslash]

Originally Posted by Gadarene

There's a difference between "fun red herrings" and things that have actual, substantive effects on the game, like changing people's reveals, resurrecting extra people, and causing extra deaths that couldn't be solved at all.

At the end of the day, would you rather a fun game or a balanced game?

I understand you didn't find this all that fun, but I assume a fair few of us did. I enjoyed this, it was a nice change. Balance issues obviously, but in the end I had fun, would play again.

[Scathach]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

Fair enough, Scathach. It's not quite the same as our situation here, but either way that sounds like something that would frustrate me. Just not my cup of tea, I suppose.

Yep, the obvious difference is that in Arkham they really were red herrings, they didn't have any effect. I do think as a mechanic it was slightly broken here, but I was expecting a lot of weird stuff to be happening anyway.

[Suburban Plankton]

Well, I was correct about one thing: I suspected there was no "Scum Team". Unfortunately, I think that was my greatest contribution to the game...

The only problem I had personally with this game was the pacing, which I think all will agree was a bit slow. But that wasn't such a big problem for me; it was just an adjustment that I needed to make.

As I pointed out during the game, we did overwhelmingly request a "Mad Scientist" game, and that's what we got. Maybe the statement of "it's just a Mafia game" was misleading, maybe Pizza was a bit over-ambitious, maybe the game turned out to be too complicated to effectively moderate; these are all risks that I think we (as a group, but not necessarily individually) accepted when we asked for a "wild and crazy" game.

It wasn't the most successful Mafia game I've played in, but it certainly wasn't the least successful either. I quite enjoyed it. I'm a big fan of 'unusual' setups and mechanics in Mafia. I get as big a kick out of 'figuring out the game' as I do 'finding the bad guys'...and this game was definitely a success to that end.

I'd play in a sequel to this game, as long as there were a few (and just a few) tweaks. Mainly, I think there was a need for a co-moderator to help keep the game moving. secondly, it's clear in hindsight that there needed to be better disclosure about the 'non-standard' nature of the game. Note I say "in hindsight" because I personally have no issue with the way the game was promoted; I got pretty much exactly what I was expecting, but it's clear that not everyone feels the same way I do.

Thanks for an entertaining game, Pizza!

[Gadarene]

The game wasn't too complicated to effectively moderate. I know many people who could have moderated it effectively.

[Astral Rejection]

Quick question for Choie or Pizza:

If Choie had been lynched Day 1, would the game have ended in town victory?

[Normal Phase]

The biggest single thing that pointed to choie was Weedy's death, IMO. I think maybe if a few more people had been willing to believe that the reveal (even accepted as written) was not necessarily of a scum player but rather a PFK, then maybe some momentum may have gotten started on exactly why she died. With Weedy-as-scum there wasn't really any incentive to ask the question. And choie was right that she didn't have fully acceptable answers to my questions, but I'll give the lack of follow-through on that to myself -- I was just too fully blindspotted by her and too confused by what the setup might be to go anywhere with it. When I died my big idea was still choie plus the people she'd resurrected, not choie alone, and so the more I trusted Astral the less inclined I was to look more closely at choie.

I do with the third parties and such had been more forthcoming, earlier. I think it would have helped with a couple of the mislynches if they had.

But choie's good, no question. I'd still like to see her on a scum team sometime -- it really is a whole different kettle of fish than PFK I think.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

Quick question for Choie or Pizza:

If Choie had been lynched Day 1, would the game have ended in town victory?

No

Originally Posted by askthepizzaguy

The Evil being with command of the demon at the end of the game will be the winner. Unless, of course, all the Evil aligned players are wiped out. In which case town wins.

If the SK is lynched while in possession of the shard, the town will vote on the shard and the game will continue, as long as an evil person exists.

I believe storyteller was "born" evil.

[MHaye]

ATPG, I think your biggest mistake was to go it alone.

Next time you get the urge to do something like this, get someone to co-mod. I'd have volunteered if I'd known just how complex it was; I have (I like to think) a couple of complicated games under my belt where I provided a bit of systemisation to help the mod and players keep track of what was happening.

Also, I play D&D. A lot.

I do feel that the game was not quite as advertised - the issue about having to change classes in order to get Mafia powers should have been out in the open. That being said, I liked the incentive to vote the leveling mechanism gave.

Overall I enjoyed it, but could have enjoyed it more.

[choie]

Thanks for the compliments guys. I wish the game had seemed more fair to you so I could feel I'd earned them.

I've had my clashes with Gadarene, but I do have to back him up on some of his complaints, pizza -- I wouldn't want you to dismiss them just because they came from a guy who was very vocal about disliking your mod style in the Little Mermaid game over at Giraffeboards.

The length of time between the EOD / EON was crippling to game momentum. I know you've apologized for that and explained how difficult the score-toting was, but you acknowledge that a bit too briefly IMHO. There was really no need for you to go solo; there were others willing to help you out (perhaps MHaye, perhaps Hoopy Frood, or Normal once she was obliterated with no chance of return). And beforehand... well, you've known all along what your work schedule is, so why plan the EOD/EONs for daytime when you're not around? This is even more true for the very last EOD. I know you were on a trip, I know you wanted the 6/6/6 symmetry, but if you were able to tell anyone about this trip in advance (Visor says you told "a bunch of people") why on earth couldn't you include us?

To touch on the unfairness of this game not being random, I'd say there were likely two players not chosen at random. I understand why the Big Bad had to be "vetted" to make sure s/he wasn't going to flake out, which I don't have a habit of doing in the games we've played, and to be someone who was enthusiastic and a likely active participant, which -- well, you can see by the number of posts here, I was sure as hell active.

The second role that I'm assuming wasn't random was Normal's. She and pizza are obviously comrades and the fact that he gave her massive power and one of the longest and badassed death scenes isn't likely to be coincidence.

But okay, so there were two of us who were not random. The rest probably were, I'd imagine. So is it very bad not to be randomly chosen, at least important roles?

To answer the question about what would've happened if I'd been lynched on Day 1, I can't imagine pizza wouldn't have arranged for the Shard to magically be transported to another player in such a game-breaking incident. I asked him something similar at one point -- what happens when I'm lynched? I was actually trying to hint at this in-game when I tried to steer people away from attacking the Demon, because I was aware that he was the mechanism for performing the lynches, not the actual baddie. So I was actually being pro-town there; if you'd broken the demon (and with 6666 hp that would've taken a lot of doing -- septimus and his 600hp would've still taken five Days/Nights to kill him, and only if he'd done so every single round).

Anyway Guiri, now you know why I went ballistic when you posted that "Well, good game, choie, you fooled almost all of us." I was certain you'd been spoiled and was miserable that you'd be so mean as to ruin the game for the rest of us. I did object, also to pizza, about his having spoiled Visor and Weedy. I would have loved to bring back Visor, much for the same reason I brought back Gadarene: resurrecting known "enemies" would've thrown everyone off, both the resurectees and the unknowing Townees who didn't yet know I was a reviver. And Weedy's return, after bieng revealed as good, would've further cemented my role as an agent of Virtue.

But for all the disagreements we may have with pizza's mod style, I think he's right that Town lost the game due to an unfortunate number of dropouts and unusually inattentive players. The idea that there was no scum team was posited more than once but was ignored. Heck I even postulated it myself, but no one took up my theory (though it was leading you in the wrong direction). And people not submitting actions is baffling. There was one Night where there were, like, four attacks at all, and one of them was mine.

It may have been due to player ennui, which will be blamed on the inactive moderator. But I think both our sides failed on that score. So we do have to take ownership of our own (well, your own, mwah-ha-ha) bad decisions in the final result. LightFoot was the only one who really came close to asking me for a public claim, but I was able to deflect that -- and I totally shouldn't have been. That was Town's fault, not pizza's. I am good with words but I'm not that good; y'all should've never let me get away with the amount of deflection I did whenever asked about my healing/powers.

And just in case I haven't made it clear enough: I fucking hated the PM idea, as well as the realization that there was another secret board somewhere. Scum is supposed to have more knowledge than Town, but I was in the dark about a lot of stuff that was going on. Heck, I was certain there was another PM group consisting of Normal and a bunch of others and that Silver and Astral were just playing me. I assumed even the Scums were working together -- I suspect they could've figured out who they were and formed a real cabal.

Anyway I would've liked to play this role in a game where people felt it was fair, and without PMs.

And yes, septimus, we're even now. I only wish Stanislaus were here so I could exact my revenge on him too. At least I got you and Weedy!

[storyteller0910]

So...

I just want to apologize for vanishing from the game. This was not fun for me. I think the design was really cool and really fun, actually - but it wasn't Mafia, really, and I was terrible at it. Never once did it occur to me that my "evil" alignment was relevant. I had no idea who to vote for and no idea what was happening at any point, ever.

And, honestly, I feel like this was one of the nastiest games, on a person-to-person level, that I've ever played or witnessed. I've been in games where there have been dust-ups between players - even been part of dust-ups - but I've never played one where it seemed, as it did here, like most of the players just disliked one another in general.

So I wound up having a series of real-life circumstances that pulled me away from the game for a few days, again, and by the time I got back it was hopeless trying to catch up and I knew that if I were modkilled it wouldn't affect anyone's side, so... I just let it go.

So I'm sorry for that, to the other players and to the moderator. I am going to avoid playing in games for a while, until I am more able to commit time to it. It seems to cost much more time to play in a game than to moderate one.

[Astral Rejection]

Apology accepted, storyteller.

I understand where you're coming from. And I agree with many of your points. I think my biggest issue with this game, at the deepest level, is that it didn't feel like mafia. Throw in the personal attacks, the long delays, and I can totally understand losing your drive to play.

I tried responding to personal attacks with jokes, but it's incredibly disheartening to be subjected to them over and over. I don't begrudge people deciding they don't need to be attacked during their leisure games.

[gnarlycharlie]

good game, choie.

thanks for the game, Pizza. it was a hell of a concept. very experimental so i can understand the difficulty.

initially i was going to tell town how silly they played but i got the result i wanted. if Scathach and i couldn't win, i hoped scum would.

so i'll just comment on how inflexible a number of players were. just because you guys aren't used to PMs or neutrals doesn't mean they are anti-town. a lot players couldn't get past their concept of what mafia should be. i admit that town versus PFK might not be mafia. in retrospect i should have taken Normal's invitation to dialogue for neutrals.

dropouts hurt the game as well. but to be fair, the game did say that it was okay to be too busy to play. of course i didn't expect non-participation.

in the end, i'm glad i was right there was only one bad guy. i guess i'm not too lousy a player. i also think that i might have some insight into Pizza's twisted mind.

[storyteller0910]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

I tried responding to personal attacks with jokes, but it's incredibly disheartening to be subjected to them over and over. I don't begrudge people deciding they don't need to be attacked during their leisure games.

Oddly, it wasn't so much the attacks at me that were bothering me. I only really got one of them - from choie, actually - and it made me angry but I'm not made of porcelain so it was fine. It was more that the generalized sniping made the thread: (1) unpleasant to read; (2) difficult to parse, because there were so many posts worth of angry noise; and worst of all (3) even harder to analyze, because it was hard to tell if so-and-so voted for such-and-such for potentially nefarious reasons (in game) or because so-and-so just plain disliked such-and-such.

Anyhow, I'm thinking a kindler, gentler game might be in order sometime soon. Anyone up for an open game?

[Gadarene]

Originally Posted by storyteller0910

Oddly, it wasn't so much the attacks at me that were bothering me. I only really got one of them - from choie, actually - and it made me angry but I'm not made of porcelain so it was fine. It was more that the generalized sniping made the thread: (1) unpleasant to read; (2) difficult to parse, because there were so many posts worth of angry noise; and worst of all (3) even harder to analyze, because it was hard to tell if so-and-so voted for such-and-such for potentially nefarious reasons (in game) or because so-and-so just plain disliked such-and-such.

Turns out, it didn't matter why anyone voted for anyone at all! Woo!

[Normal Phase]

That really was one of the funniest things, choie -- I didn't actually HAVE a ton of power. I had the double vote, true, and started kind of "ahead of" most players by a level or so, but that's it. What happened was I was I had a shield that protected against 50 hp physical damage, and I got hit by exactly that much, twice. I was voted the blue pendant, which protected against all damage by water, on the same day that I got hit by THAT, then it happened again the next day. I also possessed the diamond pendant (protection against light, I think) from the beginning; and traded for the red pendant (protection against fire) from Astral; but IIRC neither of those were ever tested.

So I was never damaged, despite really being nothing out of the ordinary as a role. It was freaky and rather cool and I'm happy it spooked you a bit. I don't know why I warranted such a good death write-up either -- I was rather demoralized and floating along on the current by then and had been for a while.

I'm fine with the setup, but the sniping was very hard to take. Very hard. I'm not even sure I'm not to blame at all, as I seemed to piss people off at every turn and only one of those people was acting. Pretty much the only time I was actually trying to be nasty (in a way) was in calling Astral a bastard, and ultimately I think he's the only one who didn't hold it against me.

Pizza's a good guy and a clever and usually-prompt (even if not this time) game creator. Some of the things said about him also were hard for me to take this game.

[Astral Rejection]

Normal, I said it in-game, and I'll say it again: you're a strong, smart player and I respect you immensely. We're cool in my book. Just take some of what I said in the thread to heart.

[Silver Jan]

Originally Posted by Normal Phase

That really was one of the funniest things, choie -- I didn't actually HAVE a ton of power. I had the double vote, true, and started kind of "ahead of" most players by a level or so, but that's it. What happened was I was I had a shield that protected against 50 hp physical damage, and I got hit by exactly that much, twice. I was voted the blue pendant, which protected against all damage by water, on the same day that I got hit by THAT, then it happened again the next day. I also possessed the diamond pendant (protection against light, I think) from the beginning; and traded for the red pendant (protection against fire) from Astral; but IIRC neither of those were ever tested.

So I was never damaged, despite really being nothing out of the ordinary as a role. It was freaky and rather cool and I'm happy it spooked you a bit. I don't know why I warranted such a good death write-up either -- I was rather demoralized and floating along on the current by then and had been for a while.

I'm fine with the setup, but the sniping was very hard to take. Very hard. I'm not even sure I'm not to blame at all, as I seemed to piss people off at every turn and only one of those people was acting. Pretty much the only time I was actually trying to be nasty (in a way) was in calling Astral a bastard, and ultimately I think he's the only one who didn't hold it against me.

Pizza's a good guy and a clever and usually-prompt (even if not this time) game creator. Some of the things said about him also were hard for me to take this game.

Normal, one of my mistakes is that you contacted me really early on, I gave you my info and I trusted you. Then choie said" I think you are Town" and I did the same thing to her. Good grief, I knew how weak she was, I knew she was the Resurrectionist. She even asked me me who she should revive and I said Gadarene. And Gad was resurrected, I would like to say that I wouldn't fall for that kind of play again but I would be lying. I have found out that I am kind and gullible and maybe not suited to Mafia.

[Silver Jan]

I didn't ever doubt LightFoot as I said in the game, she did doubt me and she was right to do that, I was in the vipers nest.

[Scathach]

Originally Posted by Silver Jan

Normal, one of my mistakes is that you contacted me really early on, I gave you my info and I trusted you. Then choie said" I think you are Town" and I did the same thing to her. Good grief, I knew how weak she was, I knew she was the Resurrectionist. She even asked me me who she should revive and I said Gadarene. And Gad was resurrected, I would like to say that I wouldn't fall for that kind of play again but I would be lying. I have found out that I am kind and gullible and maybe not suited to Mafia.

Jan, don't beat yourself up - practically no one suspected choie. That's why she survived til end game under basically no lynch pressure. There's no question of gullibility here, unless everyone in the game was gullible.

[choie]

Originally Posted by Silver Jan

Normal, one of my mistakes is that you contacted me really early on, I gave you my info and I trusted you. Then choie said" I think you are Town" and I did the same thing to her. Good grief, I knew how weak she was, I knew she was the Resurrectionist. She even asked me me who she should revive and I said Gadarene. And Gad was resurrected, I would like to say that I wouldn't fall for that kind of play again but I would be lying. I have found out that I am kind and gullible and maybe not suited to Mafia.

Hey I was the unwittingly direct and indirect cause of Town losses in both my previous games, and both times it was because I was trusting the wrong person*. In Thrill it was Stanislaus who led me down a primrose path to my own (and Town's) death, and I followed blindly, like a lamb follows a shepherd just before it turns into a dish covered with mint jelly. But despite those games, this time was able to (ahem) pull the wool many folks' eyes, if you'll pardon the extended sheep metaphor. So you never know.

* I don't think kindness enters into it. I certainly consider myself kind IRL, and I'm sure many other Mafia players are too.

Originally Posted by Scathach

Jan, don't beat yourself up - practically no one suspected choie. That's why she survived til end game under basically no lynch pressure.

Correction: not "basically" no lynch pressure, but absolutely no lynch pressure, thankyouverymuch. God knows I made many mistakes in the game and often didn't know what the hell I was doing, improvising most of the time (though there were reasons for the killing order and why I chose whom I chose). But, while many consider me a beneficiary of pizza's overgenerous empowerment, I will accept nothing less but full marks for never once being in danger of a lynch. Never got within twenty feet of the gallows, except as an onlooker.

If I ever get past my mental exhaustion to play another Mafia game, I fully expect to swing!

[Scathach]

Originally Posted by choie

Correction: not "basically" no lynch pressure, but absolutely no lynch pressure, thankyouverymuch.

Correction acknowledged

[Visorslash]

I said it before in the QT, and I'll say it again here. You guys seemed to be very "Choie is town, end of story". I think in the future, unless the player is mod confirmed as being townie, always be willing to entertain the fact that they might be scum. A lot of you blindly trusted choie, which in turn led to your defeat. Just something to consider for next time.

[Visorslash]

Originally Posted by Visorslash

I said it before in the QT, and I'll say it again here. You guys seemed to be very "Choie is town, end of story". I think in the future, unless the player is mod confirmed as being townie, always be willing to entertain the fact that they might be scum. A lot of you blindly trusted choie, which in turn led to your defeat. Just something to consider for next time.

Since my post doesn't seem to be showing up.

[BigT]

Originally Posted by Askthepizzaguy

Kinda figured Gadarene would be whiny at the end. As for lack of respect for players, I have to hand it to you Gad, you're never shy about disrespecting the moderator or your fellow players, or taking offense to the same sort of disrespect you dish out at people. The feeling is more than mutual there, buddy.

He just pointed out flaws in your game. You are the one who decided to make it personal. If you can't take someone pointing out the flaws in your game, then stop making them and go away.

This post was extremely out of line.

[BigT]

Okay, and here's the actual thing I came back to say before seeing that post above:

Why in the world didn't anyone call out choie's "Are we sure we're at LyLo"? The MOD had just said that toDay was the final day. You were mod-confirmed to be at LyLo. There's no other way the mod could have been sure the game was going to end, unless Town had already lost and two other teams were duking it out.

I'm not saying you'd know she was scum, but at least she was making a mistake in assuming it wasn't certain.

And, yes, I'm sorry, but an unwatchable single Scum is never a good mechanic. You need either the ability to see who the Scum is or to be able to figure it out from posts. The entire point of mafia is that it is possible for Town to figure out the game, and the mod did say this was still Mafia.

And I'm still not convinced that PMs didn't horribly hurt the game. As an outsider, there was no way for me to figure out that Scum was choie, since I had no way of evaluating everyone else's evidence that she was Town. And that for me made me think this game wasn't very good.

I apparently wasn't alone, as I didn't see a forbidden thread at all this time. I had no one to talk to about the game at all. And I even wound up avoiding the game until the end.

And, just to be clear, this is all a criticism of the game, and not of the mod. The only criticism I have for the mod was in my previous post.

[BigT]

Originally Posted by Visorslash

I said it before in the QT, and I'll say it again here. You guys seemed to be very "Choie is town, end of story". I think in the future, unless the player is mod confirmed as being townie, always be willing to entertain the fact that they might be scum. A lot of you blindly trusted choie, which in turn led to your defeat. Just something to consider for next time.

In fact, what I want to know is what everyone had on choie that they thought they could be sure she wasn't scum. Some people were all about how they wanted to show their posts that proved that choie wasn't Scum, if only she'd claim--hence the reason she probably didn't want to claim her cover role. Let's see it, please.

BTW, I think your characterizations of her were offbase. You really did say some thing that were rather upsetting early on in the game, and her response, while wrong, really did seem like actual frustration with you. I think your depression was making you assume bad intent when none was there.

[Astral Rejection]

I thought she was town because she resurrected town players, seemed genuinely involved in "solving" the game, reacted in a townie way, hadn't made any posts that truly pinged my scumometer, hadn't seemed to be in collusion with anyone else (as shown by my vote chart), and was utterly protected by Silver Jan, whose powers I didn't know for sure.

I was concerned about her still being alive, but I thought that pointed to an inexperienced scum team. Because, ultimately, I was still looking for a team. I've never played a game of mafia that didn't have a scum team in it, which made me blind to this particular twist.

[Silver Jan]

Originally Posted by Astral Rejection

I thought she was town because she resurrected town players, seemed genuinely involved in "solving" the game, reacted in a townie way, hadn't made any posts that truly pinged my scumometer, hadn't seemed to be in collusion with anyone else (as shown by my vote chart), and was utterly protected by Silver Jan, whose powers I didn't know for sure.

I was concerned about her still being alive, but I thought that pointed to an inexperienced scum team. Because, ultimately, I was still looking for a team. I've never played a game of mafia that didn't have a scum team in it, which made me blind to this particular twist.

I was looking for a Team and in a way, so was choie, she didn't want the evils to find her out. I think she played really well and we just didn't want to believe that she could be scum. I want to be scum with her sometime. I think the game would have been better if we knew what we were playing, this wasn't a game of normal mafia, it was more of a D&D game. Pizza put a lot of effort into the game and I could have picked up more clues if I had thought them necessary. Yep RL gets in the way too and I was a bit lazy, next game I will take copious notes