Live Mafia

[Benmage]

Hello all. Looks like everything is bustling as usual.

I'm looking to do a live game of Mafia 10-15 people. It's been awhile, so if anyone has some ideas that make it a little simpler on the mod, feel free to post it here or PM me. (FYI Games this weekend)

-One of my biggest issues is night actions!
--If the setup is only semi-open (a list of potential normalish roles) whats a good way to recieve said actions without giving away said role or having massive night delays.

I've only done live a handful of times, as I'm most likely King of the Nerds of my friends... I mean the coolest dur .. So in the past I've had 10 or less people usually stand in a circle only ever with cop/doc/mafia and ask those roles to open eyes and point out who they want to use their actions on with everyone else obviously eyes closed.

ANYWHOSE... great for any feedback otherwise stay cool all

[FakeGod]

AITP

[BBmolla]

Like, over google plus or what

[Benmage]

Live as in, in person.. Everyone in the same room, like a mini mafia party... No technology, old school nerdom.

[Untrod Tripod]

ooh boy

this is awkward

[saulres]

I've never played F2F, but it seems to me that you'd get the group-actions (scumkill etc.) by doing the close eyes - open eyes - point - close eyes routine.

For the individual actions, give each player, including the VTs and Goons, a set of cards with the same number on them -- so Player 1 gets cards with "1", Player 2 gets cards with "2", etc. At night, have

everyone

write a name on their card secretly and then give the cards to you. You take a minute or two in private to cross-reference those who have actions with what the actions do and then tell everyone the results.

[Untrod Tripod]

in the commune, we've found that nightless setups are easier to run, although they're fairly constrictive in terms of setup wackiness.

you could use a whiteboard or "Guilty" and "Innocent" cards for investigative things. that definitely simplifies confusion over cop results.

[Majiffy]

Shea did something with a pad of paper that worked pretty well. You'd have to ask him the specifics, though.

[BBmolla]

Friends and Enemies is undoubtedly the best F2F setup imo.

Texting night action probably would speed things up for closed/semi open.

But most semi open we just have the role wake up even if it doesn't exist.

[Suzune]

I have played live mafia before over skype. We played without cameras because of the size restriction of Skype and because of general player shyness. We found that it worked out pretty well, games moved quickly and we could easily play one an hour. Skype gave us the change to use the discussion part for the mafia and for submitting night actions. This kept us from having to hang up and recall. The game ran day phases at about twenty minutes and night phases with anywhere from two to ten minutes. Once all actions were submitted then the day would begin. Mafia had day talk ability so they could be discussing separately during the main game. The biggest trick is bandwidth though, the larger the call the more weight.

In personal opinion, the game runs better with less power roles. In fact, playing all vanilla works just fine.

[xRECKONERx]

in the commune, we've found that nightless setups are easier to run, although they're fairly constrictive in terms of setup wackiness.

you could use a whiteboard or "Guilty" and "Innocent" cards for investigative things. that definitely simplifies confusion over cop results.

As someone who lives here, fuck nightless setups.

[Katsuki]

Friends and Enemies is undoubtedly the best F2F setup imo.

SO MUCH THIS

Though I've only ever played this with scummers before. With non-scummers, our roles tend to include witches, docs (angels), vengefuls, cupids, KING (vote for king each day, king has double vote for said day), and I can't remember what else. Obv play with werewolves so much more fun than boring mafia.

[Bicephalous Bob]

But most semi open we just have the role wake up even if it doesn't exist.

Do this the first night, after that you can just wake the PRs up by tapping on their head. Use a stick if the floor is squeaky.

[Soft-spoken]

most methods include unfair tells imo. the "open your eyes and point" thing can give non-visual location ques very easily. no matter how discrete the player is, someone with good hearing and spatial intelligence can pinpoint them.

i like to use small pieces of thick paper. pass them out to everyone during night phase. everyone writes their name on top, and their target below... in such a way where their hand covers what they are writing. VT's write "vanilla" instead of their target.

mafia faction kills are decided on who has the majority of votes, and you can randomize the member that makes the kill between someone that voted in the majority. if no majority is reached, pick a piece of paper at random to decide the mafia who is making the kill and the target.


if you do it this way, there is no unfair tells unless people are careless with their piece of paper.

[Benmage]

Appreciate it all, feel free to keep dropping ideas..

The texting one seems interesting.. technology

I've done the xyz powerroles even if not ingame.

I agree that I wasn't crazy about the pointing thing.

-The paper idea sounds decent. I'm going to think on this... thanks again all

[BBmolla]

most methods include unfair tells imo. the "open your eyes and point" thing can give non-visual location ques very easily. no matter how discrete the player is, someone with good hearing and spatial intelligence can pinpoint them.

This honestly isn't a problem if people aren't dumb as hell. But then again at mafia meets and my game nights the night is full of trolling which covers up a lot noises.

Blast music if needed. It stops sound tells. Not allowing mafia to discuss kills is super bleh.

[BBmolla]

Paper idea takes fucking forever. Just saying.

[Soft-spoken]

thats a good idea. why didnt i think of music lol

[callforjudgement]

You want to favour day actions over night actions in live Mafia games, they're much easier to mod. (Some amount of night actions will be necessary, though, especially the scum kill. You could play a Nightless, but that deprives the scum of any ability to communicate; frantic hand signals overNight are something of a hallmalk of in-person games.)