# Harry Potter Mafia **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [June 25, 2010, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429 "2010-06-25T01:13:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 36
**Author:** ![One\_And\_Only\_Wanderers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/838e76/32.png) [@One\_And\_Only\_Wanderers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/One_And_Only_Wanderers)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/701 "2010-07-29T18:43:35Z")
THe edit thing never occurred to me. Booooo scum and good game all. Thanks for running it Mahaloth and co mods ---
**Author:** ![peekercpa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8baadc/32.png) [@peekercpa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peekercpa)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/702 "2010-07-29T18:49:31Z")
and i guess we have to wait for **pede** to chime in but … i’ve played many games with him and his play drives me nuts. and while i feel your pain, **story** , i find it hard to believe that he would do something that bastardly. 'course i never figured that the first **exmrspeek** would end up being a lesbian after two kids and 12 years, so what do i know? ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/703 "2010-07-29T18:51:32Z")
> [@Red\_Skeezix](#): > > Situation: > Tied Lynch, sudden death overtime. Peeker starts posting his role pm, but is town and is one of the lynch candidates. the other lynch candidate is the last scum player. I chose to ignore the rule violation, since the it would result in an overall reward for breaking the rules. Town ended up lynching scum anyways, but I didn’t think that I should award town the victory simply because a single player chooses to flout the rules. I must be missing something, because I don’t see how a player dying can help his own team. A loss of a townie means the scum are that much closer to winning. A loss of a scum means the town is that much closer to winning. Please go into more detail. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/704 "2010-07-29T18:58:11Z")
> [@storyteller0910](#): > > SON OF A BITCH. > > Our work network server went out at around 11:15 and just came back on. I entirely intended to vote for Guiri; I was entirely sure Guiri was Scum, and was mostly trying to tease out whether his partner was Wanderers or Chipa (turns out I’d have been wrong either way, so I guess it doesn’t matter _that_ much, but oh, how that makes me angry). I’m sorry to hear that, Storyteller. I was wondering. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/705 "2010-07-29T19:01:05Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > I must be missing something, because I don’t see how a player dying can help his own team. A loss of a townie means the scum are that much closer to winning. A loss of a scum means the town is that much closer to winning. Please go into more detail. A townie dying costs Town half of a mislynch. A townie being lynched costs the town a full mislynch. If the townie who was going to be lynched dying means that the next candidate, who is scum, gets lynched, that can be a win for the Town. For example, say that there are two confirmed Town, one unconfirmed Town and one Scum. If the Town mislynches the unconfirmed Town the scum wins. If the unconfirmed is killed and the last scum member is lynched(he being the only unconfirmed player remaining, this is guaranteed to happen), the Town is guaranteed to win. In general, if there are more confirmed Town than living scum, Town is guaranteed to win if all of the unconfirmed Town were to somehow drop dead. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/706 "2010-07-29T19:12:13Z")
For those who haven’t seen the spoilers yet, Hardly Sanguine had a whole basket of potential powers that he never used, until that one time he tracked Guiri. Nobody ask me about balance in general because I’m hopeless with it, but there is one significant town role you’re missing. And yes, I had a one-shot kill that could have been used at any time. I did fully intend to go scum at the time I joined the game (and immediately died), but would have had to survive to night four to make the choice, I think. The mechanism of choice was not disclosed to me up front, so even given my intentions the whole thing was a little shaky. I don’t get pedescribe, either, Storyteller. Reading about all that in the spoiled thread – I can’t even imagine how frustrated I’d have been in your shoes. ---
**Author:** ![sachertorte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sachertorte/32/3727_2.png) [@sachertorte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sachertorte)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/707 "2010-07-29T19:14:22Z")
> [@Normal\_Phase](#): > > For those who haven’t seen the spoilers yet, Hardly Sanguine had a whole basket of potential powers that he never used, until that one time he tracked Guiri. Nobody ask me about balance in general because I’m hopeless with it, but there is one significant town role you’re missing. I included him in my estimates. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/708 "2010-07-29T19:19:14Z")
Y’know, no offense, **Mahaloth** , but I really don’t feel too bad about this loss at all now that I look at the balance sheet. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/709 "2010-07-29T19:19:55Z")
I don’t know why I thought you hadn’t. Need more coffee. ---
**Author:** ![Chipacabra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@Chipacabra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chipacabra)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/710 "2010-07-29T19:22:29Z")
Arg. ARG! I suspected something was up once 3 votes were on Wanders, but it was too early to be sure, especially since Story hadn’t come back yet. In a LyLo situation, the scum are going to vote together by the end of the day if that’ll win a vote, because it doesn’t matter if it they reveal so long as they win. The way the votes were spread out, two singleton votes, 3 votes on Wanders, and a confirmed town undeclared, if that’s the way the votes were lined up near the end of the day, the other two votes on wanders had to be scum. I intended to wait until later in the day, to make sure scum weren’t waiting to pool their votes… and then I fell asleep. ARGH. In retrospect, I should have at least dropped my vote before I fell asleep. Sorry, guys. ☹ I liked this game, but it was so frustrating. Apathy was a far, far greater threat than the death eaters. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![special\_ed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@special\_ed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/special_ed)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/711 "2010-07-29T20:00:53Z")
I think Mahaloth had a game that on the surface was balanced way into Town’s favor. Lost, maybe? and Scum still won that. Balance is not an easy thing to do, but I do agree that a player who can choose to join either side makes a game very difficult to balance. I’d like to see someone re-run Pod People, which ran on domebo, but I’d be afraid apathy might kill that game again/ ---
**Author:** ![peekercpa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8baadc/32.png) [@peekercpa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peekercpa)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/712 "2010-07-29T20:11:23Z")
and i don’t get the whole balancing thing. but it sure seems like if **story** would have come back and voted **guiri** that the scum would have been down to one player. notwithstanding the fact that there was a town power role modkill. it sure seems like town would have cakewalked it even at that point. even with a nk town still had the tie break on a 2 - 2 split. and i didn’t get the whole snitch mechanic and how it got moved but as long as it ended in a townies hand at 1 - 1 town still wins, right? ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Skeezix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/aca169/32.png) [@Red\_Skeezix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Skeezix)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/713 "2010-07-29T20:12:05Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > > [@Red\_Skeezix](#): > > > > Situation: > > Tied Lynch, sudden death overtime. Peeker starts posting his role pm, but is town and is one of the lynch candidates. the other lynch candidate is the last scum player. I chose to ignore the rule violation, since the it would result in an overall reward for breaking the rules. Town ended up lynching scum anyways, but I didn’t think that I should award town the victory simply because a single player chooses to flout the rules. > > I must be missing something, because I don’t see how a player dying can help his own team. A loss of a townie means the scum are that much closer to winning. A loss of a scum means the town is that much closer to winning. Please go into more detail. This is all from memory so I might be mistaken in some places. So there was 6 players alive (5-1) And the votes are tied between MentalGuy and Peeker with 3 a piece. If I had modkilled Peeker, then MentalGuy would have had the vote majority and would be lynched, winning the game for town automatically. ---
**Author:** ![sachertorte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sachertorte/32/3727_2.png) [@sachertorte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sachertorte)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/714 "2010-07-29T20:18:59Z")
The town suicide thing is all about confirmed versus unconfirmed. At the beginning of the game it is a battle between Town and Scum, but if Town can generate a large set of Confirmed Town players, then the game becomes Confirmed Town versus the Unconfirmed Town. Scum needs the Unconfirmed in which to hide. Any Unconfirmed Town that can commit suicide increases the ability of Town lynching scum. Too few unconfirmed and too many confirmeds, and Town wins outright and there is nothing scum can do about it. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/715 "2010-07-29T20:25:30Z")
> [@](#): > > I think Mahaloth had a game that on the surface was balanced way into Town’s favor. Lost, maybe? > > and Scum still won that. Even more than that: Part of the reason Town lost was that it was biased in favor of Town. We were in an information hole due to the tie-break mechanic, but everyone assumed that the game started with at least four Scum. Given that assumption, the only consistent scenario had one particular player as Scum (I can’t remember who). So we lynched him, and were wrong. I’ll take my share of the blame, incidentally, since I was the one who came up with the argument that led to it. But everybody else in the game agreed with it, too. On the death benefiting one’s own team question, it can actually hurt Town to add a player to the Town side right from the start of the game. Whether there’s an even or odd number of players makes more of a difference than a single vanilla. If the Scum win condition is a strict majority and the vote tie-breaker can go either way, then Town benefits from an even number of players, and is hurt by an odd number; if the Scum win condition is equal numbers, then Town is hurt by an even number and benefits from an odd number. So **Hardly** ’s mod-kill was a double whammy: Not only was it a loss of a player, it brought the numbers from odd to even. ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/716 "2010-07-29T20:26:38Z")
Well, not everybody agreed. Damn it. Actually, I’m not sure if that’s true or not. I don’t really remember anything about that game except disagreeing with everybody about everything. ---
**Author:** ![peekercpa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8baadc/32.png) [@peekercpa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peekercpa)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/717 "2010-07-29T20:28:39Z")
what **sach** said. it’s the same stunt we pulled in simpletown (?). ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/718 "2010-07-29T20:29:26Z")
Ah, right, you were the poor schlub who got lynched for that, weren’t you? Well, a majority of the folks agreed with it, anyway, and we obviously weren’t going to listen to your objection, since of course you were Scum. ---
**Author:** ![sachertorte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sachertorte/32/3727_2.png) [@sachertorte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sachertorte)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/719 "2010-07-29T20:35:10Z")
Town hasn’t been doing very well lately. I wonder why. ---
**Author:** ![HardlySanguine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HardlySanguine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HardlySanguine)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2010, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429/720 "2010-07-29T20:51:43Z")
Hey, guys. I want to apologize to everyone – I was a big fucking idiot and I ruined the game. I still feel horrible, not that that’s any consolation. I think learned my lesson, and I hope you will let me play with you all in the future. * * * I didn’t say anything about **Guiri** because I wanted to see who he’d vote for/speak out against and who might protect him. I was going to try and build a case against him without revealing that I’d tracked him first, and if that didn’t work, reveal and protect myself that Night. @ **Normal** : Do you really think it would’ve been wise for me to use my powers any earlier? The message thing, maybe, but I couldn’t think of anything useful to do with it, given that I figured **story** was going to be NKed. **@Red** : **Maha** made you pick your cover roles? When did this happen? Did **Omi** not have a cover when she was killed? Side notes: I was thinking scum were **Guiri** (obviously), **OAOW** , **Inner** , **Jimmy** , **Chipa** , **Story** , in that order. What happens if the snitch wasn’t in the possession of a voter voting for a tied lynch candidate? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429.md?page=35) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/harry-potter-mafia/544429.md?page=37)