# Mafia: Baker Street \[Game in progress\] **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [February 7, 2014, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752 "2014-02-07T14:39:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Askthepizzaguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askthepizzaguy/32/9405_2.png) [@Askthepizzaguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askthepizzaguy)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/81 "2014-02-12T22:43:46Z")
**Big important reminder:** > [@](#): > > 1. Most importantly, **there is no Night phase**. The game will continue from Day One directly to Day Two. _All_ actions, including the Scum kill and any power role actions, must be submitted prior to Dusk and will resolve along with the lynch. In practice, this means that you might (for example) attempt to investigate a player that has been lynched. This is an intended effect of the setup. I’m going to post this reminder at the start of every phase. This is unusual and it’s going to help someone to have it in front of their faces when the round begins. ---
**Author:** ![Askthepizzaguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askthepizzaguy/32/9405_2.png) [@Askthepizzaguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askthepizzaguy)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/82 "2014-02-12T22:45:46Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > \*Revealing now would force scum to post what they know or make guesses about the setup before any information-gathering roles could have an action. It’s possible that holding people accountable immediately will give us something to test against with lynches and night kills. Possible, but the scum roles can rather simply edit their clue to make it false, and townies are given false clues. > [@](#): > > **5.** With one or two modest exceptions, every player - Town and Scum - has been given a single clue about the game setup, the roles, or the characters. More than half of these clues are 100% accurate; some proportion of them that is \>0% and \<50% are false. False clues have been given _only_ to Town-aligned players. I will state for the record that I have by various means attempted to ensure that public reveal of certain clues or other information may not always benefit the side of the player given the clue. Underlining mine. Unless I’m missing something I do not believe you can catch the scums this way. ---
**Author:** ![Askthepizzaguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askthepizzaguy/32/9405_2.png) [@Askthepizzaguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askthepizzaguy)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/83 "2014-02-12T22:49:24Z")
**Vote: Darth Sensitive** That’s not even a proper name for a Sith lord. Your disguise doesn’t fool me… _Moriarty!_ ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/84 "2014-02-12T22:52:02Z")
I think the more lies we force scum to tell the better off we are but I take your point. ---
**Author:** ![Askthepizzaguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askthepizzaguy/32/9405_2.png) [@Askthepizzaguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askthepizzaguy)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/85 "2014-02-12T22:59:38Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > I think the more lies we force scum to tell the better off we are but I take your point. I’d say it’s normally a flip-a-coin proposition whether to mass reveal or not, but it’s written right in the game mechanics that it could backfire. I’m a gambler type, playing it safe is less interesting to me, but going into the casino and betting it all on black on the opening play is probably unwise. I’d like to know more about what we’re dealing with before pulling out all the guns. > [@](#): > > I will state for the record that I have by various means attempted to ensure that public reveal of certain clues or other information may not always benefit the side of the player given the clue. Experienced game hosts tend to insert some backfiring mechanism into a game to prevent mass-reveals. Sometimes it’s cover roles, sometimes it’s info that’s more useful to scums than townies. ---
**Author:** ![wevets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9a140/32.png) [@wevets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wevets)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/86 "2014-02-12T23:13:00Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > I think the more lies we force scum to tell the better off we are but I take your point. I guess the trick with the clues is that some townies will wind up telling lies, since we know that some of the clues are false, while scum might choose to lie or tell the truth depending on what effect they think their clue would have on town. I kind of want to know that the clues are out there though. The lynchee will know they’re dying, and so they can reveal their clue. But people who are victims of other types of kills, scum kills, vigilante kills, whatever - they will not know they’re going to die and their clues could potentially be lost to us forever. ---
**Author:** ![Askthepizzaguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askthepizzaguy/32/9405_2.png) [@Askthepizzaguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askthepizzaguy)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/87 "2014-02-12T23:29:44Z")
> [@wevets](#): > > But people who are victims of other types of kills, scum kills, vigilante kills, whatever - they will not know they’re going to die and their clues could potentially be lost to us forever. Potentially false clues could be lost to us forever, yes. Remember that this game can be solved simply by lynching the correct persons and in many setups there are no clues and no detectives and town still wins basically half the time. Town over-reliance on gimmicks is one of the reasons why scumbags who are suspected of being guilty avoid being lynched- there’s usually some excuse. Oh, I can prove I wasn’t at X that night, I have a decent alibi, whatever. In a typical vanilla game they have no such bogus alibis and they die when the majority suspects them. There’s no defense to a group of people lynching you for the hell of it. But in many games town is destroyed because they place their faith in the power of their role abilities to save them or help them deduce things, and this causes town to be more predictable- the scum team can anticipate who is about to be lynched and therefore, their voting record becomes harder to analyze because they can smell the way the wind is blowing, and then their night actions also become more accurate because town’s movements are usually straightforward. If the scums don’t know who is about to be lynched and cannot talk their way out of it, there’s no defense, no alibi, and no bamboozle. ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/88 "2014-02-12T23:43:24Z")
I agree that a mass reveal of clues is likely to have unforeseen, possibly bad, consequences. But lynchees revealing their clues doesn’t seem to have a downside. I do think that we should not spend too much time and effort worrying about the clues, lest we distract ourselves from Ye Olde Scumhunt. I’m excited by the lack of a night phase, I think this should help keep everyone involved in the game. **Chronos** , are you going to resurrect your voting program? Or is it defeated by the availability of multivote? I’ve not played, as far as I can remember, in a multivote game before. What effects does mv tend to have in terms of the voting record, other than it being more complicated? **Inner Stickler** , I’m interested in your remark that revealing clues will force scum to lie. What leads you to that conclusion? ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/89 "2014-02-12T23:55:56Z")
Well they can either post their guaranteed true clues which would be helpful or they’ll have to make something up which is always risky and may be the beginnings of a noose around their neck. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/90 "2014-02-12T23:58:28Z")
Does anyone have a clue that would be bad to post? I’m favoring posting all of our clues based on mine. ---
**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:** [February 13, 2014, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/91 "2014-02-13T00:00:14Z")
OK, so we know that the information in the clues is unreliable, both because a few Townies have false ones and because the Scum might lie about them. But this isn’t anything new: Most of the information we have in a Mafia game is unreliable. I’m of the opinion, though, that the Town can use all the information we can get. This is especially true if there’s meta-information in some of the clues, like in the example, which might help us figure out which ones are false. To get the ball rolling, here’s what I have: > [@](#): > > CLUE: James Moriarty, the Scum leader, can lose his Godfather status under some conditions. Others can reveal their clues or not as they choose, but I recommend it. On another topic: We have multivoting here, and that’s a very powerful tool for Town, since using it puts more information into the voting record. People should generally be ending the day with multiple votes in place. I believe, though I have not yet proven, that the optimum would be for each of us to cast approximately as many votes each Day as there are live Scum. Based on the size of the game, we probably have four or five Scum, so that’s about how many votes I intend to have live at the end of the Day. On yet another topic: **pizza** , I really don’t think votes like that do any good. Yes, it’s impossible for a Scum to defend against it, but it’s also impossible for a Townie to defend against it, too. And I realize that early votes can stimulate discussion, but not random votes, because what is there to discuss in them? If that vote stays in place once the Day really starts rolling, I probably will vote you for it. Added on preview: > [@](#): > > Quoth **DaphneBlack** : > > Chronos, are you going to resurrect your voting program? Or is it defeated by the availability of multivote? It’s not defeated, and is in fact helped, by multivote, since (as mentioned above) that puts more information into the voting record. It is, however, defeated by sufficiently skilled Scum players, as illustrated in the LotR game. I therefore do not expect to deploy it in this game, since I don’t know how to compensate for that. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Bravo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_bravo/32/493_2.png) [@Johnny\_Bravo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Bravo)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/92 "2014-02-13T00:12:52Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > Does anyone have a clue that would be bad to post? I’m favoring posting all of our clues based on mine. I think each player should individually evaluate the _potential consequences_ of their clue being false information. If you think your clue (were it to be false) could conceivably lead to a mislyching, then keep it to yourself for the time being. If you think your clue is relatively ‘safe’ to post, then go for it, but I agree that a mass reveal is asking for trouble. So for example, I think **Chronos’s** clue was a good reveal because it makes sense and, even if it’s one of the false tip-offs, I can’t currently see it contributing to a townie getting lynched by mistake. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/93 "2014-02-13T00:15:15Z")
Okay. First of all, I’m vanilla. My name is **Estelle Anderson**. My alignment is “Yours” and my wincon is “You win when all of Mine (Scum) have been eliminated”. The last part of my letter makes fun of me being powerless by saying: “If wealth is power, you are among the most powerful of my expected guests. Unfortunately, wealth is not power. Killing indiscriminately is. This means that you are out of luck, power-wise. HAPPY TUESDAY!!!” Two things about my clue: 1. I have one that I think would BENEFIT scum to know more than Town…however… 2. Since some clues may not be true anyway, not sure if it matters. Still, if my clue IS one that is true, I’m pretty sure it would benefit scum extremely well. I predict scum (wanting to know what my clue is) might vote for me (using weak or stupid reasons) to try to get me to post it. But the joke is on them…because I’ll post it ANYWAY if enough players think I should. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Bravo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_bravo/32/493_2.png) [@Johnny\_Bravo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Bravo)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/94 "2014-02-13T00:17:26Z")
And, lest I be accused of being vague, my clue is a potentially dangerous one. If mine is false then I can imagine fairly simple series of events that could lead to a lynching. On the other hand, if it’s _true_ then it’s potentially a really useful clue! So I’m willing to be convinced that we’d be better off if I shared. ---
**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:** [February 13, 2014, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/95 "2014-02-13T01:13:42Z")
**Idle** , since you’re the only one who knows your clue, you know better than any of us whether it would be good to reveal it. I think that in general, it’s probably to our advantage if most people reveal, but there can certainly be exceptions (for instance, if your clue says who Holmes is, definitely don’t reveal that one!). On the other hand, **Johnny** , I wouldn’t be too worried about the possibility that a clue can be false, since we all know that that possibility exists. And we do know that most of them, at least, are true. Even if a clue does lead to a lynching, well, something that gives us a better than 50% chance of a correct lynch on Day 1 is pretty good. Plus, every clue that we learn is false allows us to be more confident in all the rest of the clues, since there are a limited number of false ones. ---
**Author:** ![Astral\_Rejection](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@Astral\_Rejection](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astral_Rejection)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/96 "2014-02-13T01:16:20Z")
I am opposed to a mass claim of clues, wholly and utterly. If you’re dying and you deem it wise, reveal. Otherwise, I say we play them close to our chest until we think they’re directly useful to the gamestate at hand. Here’s my reasoning: 1. My clue is potentially beneficial by sitting on it and waiting. I’d reckon others have similar clues. 2. The “clue” mechanic was added for a reason. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a power role or two that can make use of them. This might mean we should mass-claim them now, but this is a Storyteller-designed game, and he’s not an idiot. I would stake my pulitzer on the game being balanced around a stream of clues be revealed over the course of the Days. 3. Storyteller himself said this in the rules: > [@storyteller0910](#): > > I will state for the record that I have by various means attempted to ensure that public reveal of certain clues or other information may not always benefit the side of the player given the clue. Word of mod directly states that town & scum clues might not necessarily be beneficial for their respective teams, and this suggests that town has the most to lose by mass-claiming clues. Scum can guess what might hurt them, and lie. Town will find that a harder proposition. 1. I hate mass claims of any kind on Day 1. 😃 I’m going to ever-so-slightly lean town on those who have suggested and discussed a mass claim without referencing my point #3. I’d expect scum to notice that rule, weigh the dangers of fishing, and stay out of proposing a mass claim this early in the game. ---
**Author:** ![Astral\_Rejection](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@Astral\_Rejection](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astral_Rejection)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/97 "2014-02-13T01:19:46Z")
For the record, I do not have a pulitzer. My wager above is safe! I should add, editing your post does not seem to be against the rules in this particular game. That said, I will give you the evilest of eyes if you edit. Even if you make an innocent formatting error or a typo, or (like I do all the time) omit words or even whole sentences, I think you’re better off amending your post with a follow-up post. ---
**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:** [February 13, 2014, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/98 "2014-02-13T01:31:43Z")
Agreed on the editing. Most edits are innocent, but Scum could also edit to remove an accidental slip. Best to avoid the possibility entirely. And I suspect that the primary purpose of the clues is just to stimulate discussion, since it can be hard to start talking Day 1 when nobody else has said anything yet. They seem to be working. ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/99 "2014-02-13T01:52:46Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Agreed on the editing. Most edits are innocent, but Scum could also edit to remove an accidental slip. Best to avoid the possibility entirely. > > And I suspect that the primary purpose of the clues is just to stimulate discussion, since it can be hard to start talking Day 1 when nobody else has said anything yet. They seem to be working. I agree with both of the above points. And I understand why you would reveal your clue, given what it says. If the consequences of being false are low, then I can’t see the harm. Do you mind explaining why you think it would be optimal to vote for the probable number of people as there are scum? I can’t help but think that that will make it harder to spot scummy voting patterns… **Idle** ’s claim rings true to me. **Inner Stickler** , fair enough! ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Sensitive](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/58956e/32.png) [@Darth\_Sensitive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Sensitive)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2014, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752/100 "2014-02-13T02:58:36Z")
> [@Askthepizzaguy](#): > > **Vote: Darth Sensitive** > > That’s not even a proper name for a Sith lord. Your disguise doesn’t fool me… _Moriarty!_ I think the only appropriate response to this is the standard retailiatory vote. OMGUS **Vote Askthepizzaguy** And now that I have defended my honor and gotten used to voting after a long hiatus… **Unvote Askthepizzaguy** My clue is only going to relevant in the event that we make name claims. I think it’s useful, but my gut feeling is that making all of the clues useful to start the game would require a big big info dump that might give scum an early advantage per what storyteller said. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-baker-street-game-in-progress/680752.md?page=6)