# MAFIA: The Game - Ideal for Beginners \[Game in Progress\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Thread Games\ **Created:** [July 14, 2015, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099 "2015-07-14T00:45:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 42
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/821 "2015-07-31T14:31:05Z")
> [@Precambrianmollusc](#): > > Well I was just responding to a few questions, what am I supposed to do , if I don’t I am ignoring the responses , if I do I have a weird fixation. > > Now that is a weird thing to say. You haven’t actually responded in any meaningful way, you’ve just kept repeating that I’ve been “retroactively revising” my explanation for my vote and haven’t directly addressed my defense against that charge at all. And of course I’m NOW certain that septimus was town! My use of that particular phrase in the post you’re quoting is what is known as a “joke”. Let me ask you this: look again at the post in which I voted. If you were writing an analysis of the day’s vote and wanted to summarize my stated reasoning in the vote in a few words, what would YOU say? ---
**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 31, 2015, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/822 "2015-07-31T14:47:55Z")
> [@Biotop](#): > > I was wondering if making a wild ass guess at who _all_ the wolves are would be a helpful tactic. This is something that I at least try to do, yeah. It doesn’t necessarily need to be all of them, but trying to chain the reasoning together as a bunch of if-thens can be super helpful. For instance, trying to do that today has led me to believe that if the last lynch was in fact town vs. town, there’s really good chance it wasn’t primarily scum-driven, i.e. that it was a town-led town vs. town fiasco. I think it’s pretty hard to put together a cohesive theory about what everyone was doing that led to that sequence of events if 1. **TexCat** is town and 2. key players in the vote switch were scum. Part of this is that sufficiently unadvanced town play (mine included, to be sure) can be indistinguishable from unadvanced scum play. > [@](#): > > (Example: My example here is **Bayard** , who probably would not have gone to all the trouble to write that long post with spoiler if he was wolf, IMHO). This I really don’t like. Why wouldn’t he? I think we can conjecture a fantastic wolfy reason to write that post. If **Plum** is Town, he’s an ideal lynch target at this point, and it’s (clearly) worth Town credit to make the case, because there’s plausible Town reasons to be wary of his play up to this point. You’re relatively bulletproof for having made the case if he’s lynched and flips Town, and in the meantime, another wasted lynch. **Bayard** , incidentally: 11 minutes before end of Day, you said you didn’t have anything useful to do with your vote. **septimus** responded immediately that you could force a three way tie by voting **Dante**. You’ve since said you have no lean on **Dante** , and you’re on record as thinking both **TexCat** and **septimus** were Town. Why didn’t you switch? ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/823 "2015-07-31T15:14:13Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](#): > > **Bayard** , incidentally: 11 minutes before end of Day, you said you didn’t have anything useful to do with your vote. **septimus** responded immediately that you could force a three way tie by voting **Dante**. You’ve since said you have no lean on **Dante** , and you’re on record as thinking both **TexCat** and **septimus** were Town. Why didn’t you switch? I probably hesitated to use a vote purely to engineer a tie. And, in any case, a minute after he made his post about the three-way tie, **septimus** changed his vote from **Dante** to **TexCat** , so the possibility of a tie was gone. Then I think a couple other votes came in for the two front runners, and voting for **Dante** was moot. Why would you think I should have tried to get a tie by voting for someone I didn’t have strong wolf leanings on? ---
**Author:** ![Plumpudding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Plumpudding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plumpudding)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/824 "2015-07-31T15:30:53Z")
> [@Precambrianmollusc](#): > > You are massively over estimating the verisimilitude of your posts . At the very least I give people some inkling of where I stand and what my opinions are. ---
**Author:** ![Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/prof.pepperwinkle/32/13627_2.png) [@Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Prof.Pepperwinkle)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/825 "2015-07-31T15:45:38Z")
> [@Biotop](#): > > If you are wolf and **TexCat** is innocent, why the vote switch that gets you on everone’s radar? > > Conversely, if **TexCat** is wolf, your switch seems designed to help save her. Yes it makes others who voted for **septimus** seem guilty, but your vote switch came at a time that was very helpful to her and you were on **septimus** ’ list as likely to be scum. We do not know if **Chronos** and **septimus** were right in their thoughts, but we do know that their posts were not lies. That does make sense. I realize I shot myself in the foot. Any idea why septimus wanted a three way tie? ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/826 "2015-07-31T17:01:09Z")
Wow, a reasonable and coherent post that even displays some ability to take a joke! More like this, please,\*\* Plumpudding!\*\* > [@Plumpudding](#): > > Good post. It was a very strange end-of-day. I still feel Cygnus42 is more probably town rather than scum. I can see scummy reasons for him to unvote within two minutes after the claim, but that is quite risky. Also remember it was a highly confusing end. I had only a vague idea of the vote-count, and I’m quite sure I was not the only one. I think it would be a safer play to just lay low and claim he he’d stepped out for a bit to discover the bad news. Could you explain “\*\* TexCat\*\* and **Cygnus 42** seem extremely likely to be on the same team, for instance.” a bit further? Yeah, on further review that’s not quite as logical as it seemed last night when I was busy protecting **septimus’** remaining stash of\* Indica.\*😛 Obviously, if we assume either of them is scum, that provides a strong scum motivation for **Cygnus’** last minute vote switch, and it seems logical to assume the other is also scum. If we assume **TexCat** is town, then there is no scum motivation for the vote switch (except to earn “scum wouldn’t possibly do that!” points), so **Cygnus** is probably also Town. But what I missed is that if we start by assuming **Cygnus** is town, that doesn’t really lead us to any conclusions either way about **TexCat**. So while I’m quite suspicious of **Cygnus** , there doesn’t seem to be any reason to vote for him as long as there is a good chance that we might vote to flip **TexCat’s** card toDay, which would give us valuable information about **Cygnus** (not that I am saying that that by itself constitutes a valid reason for voting **TexCat** ). I certainly can’t dismiss **Cygnus’** claim to have been confused and unsure about the vote count at the end of Day, since I was in exactly that position myself. On the other hand, I wasn’t thinking that I might have to switch my vote at the last minute based on motivations that I couldn’t be honest about. If **TexCat** is scum, scum would have had a very strong motivation to carefully count up the votes as Day’s end approached, and **TexCat** would have had plenty of time to plan a claim. So **Cygnus’** last minute vote change, which made him look more townie but didn’t change the outcome, also doesn’t strike me as strong evidence that he is Town. ---
**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 31, 2015, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/827 "2015-07-31T17:30:19Z")
> [@Bayard](#): > > I probably hesitated to use a vote purely to engineer a tie. And, in any case, a minute after he made his post about the three-way tie, **septimus** changed his vote from **Dante** to **TexCat** , so the possibility of a tie was gone. Then I think a couple other votes came in for the two front runners, and voting for **Dante** was moot. > > Why would you think I should have tried to get a tie by voting for someone I didn’t have strong wolf leanings on? I don’t mean to coach you about what you should have done; I’m trying to flesh out why. What you said was > [@](#): > > Since I think the top vote-getters are both town, I don’t currently have a very good way to use my vote. and there was a proposed solution advanced. I mean, “didn’t have strong wolf leanings” vs. “think… are town;” there’s some qualitative difference there. You seemed to be looking for a way to use your vote productively with respect to the specific problem of the top vote-getters, in your mind, being Town. It isn’t clear to me, from your perspective, why **septimus** ’ proposal wasn’t better. ---
**Author:** ![JSexton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@JSexton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JSexton)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/828 "2015-07-31T17:39:30Z")
Mod: vote count? ---
**Author:** ![Plumpudding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Plumpudding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plumpudding)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/829 "2015-07-31T17:52:20Z")
> [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > Wow, a reasonable and coherent post that even displays some ability to take a joke! More like this, please,\*\* Plumpudding!\*\* Believe me, I’ve been in this exact situation before! Not knowing anything about any of you, I tried and failed. It’s never too late to change tactic! > [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > Yeah, on further review that’s not quite as logical as it seemed last night when I was busy protecting **septimus’** remaining stash of\* Indica.\*😛 So you’re where that went?! Should we be suspicious? > [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > Obviously, if we assume either of them is scum, that provides a strong scum motivation for **Cygnus’** last minute vote switch, and it seems logical to assume the other is also scum. I agree, but right now we can’t be sure, or sure enough, of either of them. We can’t afford to loose our number-advantage at this point. He did not vote again, that could be explained by him being rushed to get his change on record. But it could also mean he was hesitant to vote **TexCat** , for scummy reasons, assuming there was a tie on the horizon. > [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > If we assume **TexCat** is town, then there is no scum motivation for the vote switch (except to earn “scum wouldn’t possibly do that!” points), so **Cygnus** is probably also Town. > > But what I missed is that if we start by assuming **Cygnus** is town, that doesn’t really lead us to any conclusions either way about **TexCat**. So while I’m quite suspicious of **Cygnus** , there doesn’t seem to be any reason to vote for him as long as there is a good chance that we might vote to flip **TexCat’s** card toDay, which would give us valuable information about **Cygnus** (not that I am saying that that by itself constitutes a valid reason for voting **TexCat** ). This I agree with. I’m still suspicious of **TexCat** , and even though I for the most part lean town on **Cygnus42** , an unvote without a followed vote seems a bit weird. > [@Thing\_Fish](#): > > I certainly can’t dismiss **Cygnus’** claim to have been confused and unsure about the vote count at the end of Day, since I was in exactly that position myself. On the other hand, I wasn’t thinking that I might have to switch my vote at the last minute based on motivations that I couldn’t be honest about. If **TexCat** is scum, scum would have had a very strong motivation to carefully count up the votes as Day’s end approached, and **TexCat** would have had plenty of time to plan a claim. So **Cygnus’** last minute vote change, which made him look more townie but didn’t change the outcome, also doesn’t strike me as strong evidence that he is Town. Yeah, but a two minute window is pretty small. It could go either way, but I can see a confused townie trying to avoid what actually did happen, lynching a potential Guardian. There was no reason to believe \*\*Septimus \*\*actually had a power, so a pre-fabricated Guardian counter-claim during a two minute window seems like a bit of a stretch, especially on Day One. Right now, I should observe more than chime in, and it seems most of you agree with that! We had a strategical advantage in our numbers that we don’t have anymore. We need to be careful about who we lynch. Other than that, the more theories, the better. ---
**Author:** ![DiggitCamara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@DiggitCamara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiggitCamara)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/830 "2015-07-31T18:37:45Z")
> [@Biotop](#): > > Okay… Point taken. I don’t think I am a particularly good player. I just want town to win. > > But I do see advantages if several people were to post their lists if only to see what common names were showing up. I don’t think anyone would seriously consider my whole list or anyone else’s list as something other than a wild guess, but if a wolf had to post his/her list it might be revealing. > > But I will let it go for now unless others see a benefit… This is, of course, a wholly different beast. Indeed, I would see quite a benefit in this because it would be much more benficial than the usual “hunting for clues” which ensues when/if the Seer is Nightkilled (assuming, of course, that the Seer is one of the players who publishes his/her findings along with others). Downside (especially if we consider the Seer participating in this effort): the Wolves could see who is “eerily correct” and target him/her because of that knowledge. The longer I think about it, the more I believe that this is a pretty good idea, but that it shouldn’t be executed toDay or even toMorrow but just after that. That way, the Seer’s knowledge wouldn’t die with him/her; (s)he would have accumulated enough knowledge to make it worthwhile to risk exposure; the Wolves would be easier to spot by their “suspicions”. ---
**Author:** ![Dante\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@Dante\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante_G)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/831 "2015-07-31T18:57:50Z")
OOG Who among us has moderated a mafia on The Dope before, besides Storyteller? I have a couple questions about running my game when and if I get the chance. I can PM you. Thanks ---
**Author:** ![JSexton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@JSexton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JSexton)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/832 "2015-07-31T19:04:56Z")
> [@Plumpudding](#): > > Right now, I should observe more than chime in, and it seems most of you agree with that! No. You don’t get to switch to lurker mode when the pressure is on. > [@](#): > > We had a strategical advantage in our numbers that we don’t have anymore. We need to be careful about who we lynch. Other than that, the more theories, the better. The game started 14-5, and is now 12-5. We’re fine. There’s absolutely no need to panic about numbers. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/833 "2015-07-31T19:50:16Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](#): > > I don’t mean to coach you about what you should have done; I’m trying to flesh out why. What you said was > > and there was a proposed solution advanced. > > I mean, “didn’t have strong wolf leanings” vs. “think… are town;” there’s some qualitative difference there. You seemed to be looking for a way to use your vote productively with respect to the specific problem of the top vote-getters, in your mind, being Town. It isn’t clear to me, from your perspective, why **septimus** ’ proposal wasn’t better. Fair point. Unfortunately I probably don’t have a very satisfactory answer for why I didn’t move my vote. I don’t recall exactly what my thinking was at the time. I said in my first reply to you that I “probably” hesitated; I equivocated with the “probably” because things were happening fast and I don’t remember everything that was going through my mind when **septimus** proposed the three-way. But within a minute he’d moved his vote, and two minutes later there was another vote for him, so it was moot. If I’d voted **Dante** , it would have ended, what, 7-6-4 instead of 7-6-3 ( **septimus, TexCat, Dante** )? If I had acted in that one minute after **septimus** made his proposal, perhaps things could have been different, I guess. But, hell, I don’t know, maybe I was refilling my coffee right then? Maybe I was scratching my chin and thinking about it? I don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/834 "2015-07-31T19:52:28Z")
> [@DiggitCamara](#): > > This is, of course, a wholly different beast. Indeed, I would see quite a benefit in this because it would be much more benficial than the usual “hunting for clues” which ensues when/if the Seer is Nightkilled (assuming, of course, that the Seer is one of the players who publishes his/her findings along with others). > > Downside (especially if we consider the Seer participating in this effort): the Wolves could see who is “eerily correct” and target him/her because of that knowledge. > > The longer I think about it, the more I believe that this is a pretty good idea, but that it shouldn’t be executed toDay or even toMorrow but just after that. That way, the Seer’s knowledge wouldn’t die with him/her; (s)he would have accumulated enough knowledge to make it worthwhile to risk exposure; the Wolves would be easier to spot by their “suspicions”. I don’t think that idea has much to do with the Seer at all. The Seer will be very lucky to be able to identify even two scum. If we all make a list of five or even three players we are suspicious of, most if not all of the Seer’s list would be based on his/her own judgment. It wouldn’t be a useful guide to Town in finding scum, and it wouldn’t stand out enough to scum to put the Seer at risk. As I said, my fear is that it will allow the Wolves to sense when they are drawing attention before they otherwise might; if they see that they are on a lot of lists, even if they aren’t currently drawing votes, they will know to change tactics. On the other hand, it is also possible that Town players might take a closer look at people who make a lot of lists. Also, active players tend to express suspicions on multiple people anyway; I have already identified four players I am highly suspicious of (including you!). So one advantage to this plan is that it would get the opinions of Town players who don’t post much into the mix. We would also get scum opinions, of course, but we will get those anyway if the scum decide we need them. Another potential advantage is that, if everyone is on record with their top five suspects, you would expect that a Townie who decides to switch votes would almost always move from one person on his list to another. It would look very suspicious if a wolf found it necessary to suddenly jump on a wagon for someone who hadn’t been on his list. Well, it won’t affect me toDay anyway, but I am leaning toward the idea looking pro-Town. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/835 "2015-07-31T19:54:56Z")
> [@JSexton](#): > > Mod: vote count? I’m starting to lose my faith that there is a Mod.☹ ---
**Author:** ![JSexton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@JSexton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JSexton)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/836 "2015-07-31T20:08:01Z")
Are you there, Mod? It’s me, JSexton. ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/837 "2015-07-31T20:10:58Z")
Maybe the Rockers caught him. ---
**Author:** ![Dante\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@Dante\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante_G)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/838 "2015-07-31T20:11:36Z")
Not trying to step on Story’s toes here, but… Dante G - 3 (Prof P, Diggit, me) TexCat - 3 (Biotop, Nonsuch, Plumpudding) Plumpudding - 2 (Dante G, Bayard) JSexton - 1 (Mahaloth) Thingfish - 1 (precambrian) ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/839 "2015-07-31T20:22:02Z")
> [@Dante\_G](#): > > Not trying to step on Story’s toes here, but… > > Dante G - 3 (Prof P, Diggit, **me** ) > TexCat - 3 (Biotop, Nonsuch, Plumpudding) > Plumpudding - 2 (Dante G, Bayard) > JSexton - 1 (Mahaloth) > Thingfish - 1 (precambrian) (my bold). Did you mean that you had voted yourself? I’m guessing that was a copy-paste error? ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2015, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099/840 "2015-07-31T20:22:06Z")
> [@Dante\_G](#): > > Not trying to step on Story’s toes here, but… > > Dante G - 3 (Prof P, Diggit, me) > TexCat - 3 (Biotop, Nonsuch, Plumpudding) > Plumpudding - 2 (Dante G, Bayard) > JSexton - 1 (Mahaloth) > Thingfish - 1 (precambrian) That agrees with my count. I’m sure it’s due to poor [COLOR=“Black”] **storyteller’s** [/COLOR] RL issues, but it’s sort of an interesting twist to play a game without official vote counts. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099.md?page=41) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-the-game-ideal-for-beginners-game-in-progress/725099.md?page=43)