January Challenge

[popsofctown]

January challenge:

RCOWOTAIFD

!

This challenge is about striking a magic special balance between nightless and a setup with night. Wouldn't it be great if you could also treasure and cherish an obvtown player with good reads, even if the mafia were still permitted to remove some other players?
Setup requirements:

• There must be a factional nightkill or poisoning primarily controlled by the mafia
  
• It must be possible for town to ensure any arbitrarily selected town player survives (or at least brings voice, treestumping will be allowed as a solution) to the end of the game when town isn't mislynching.
  
  This warrants some explanation:
  A 9p with a doctor an endless backups for the doctor would not count, because if the arbitrary player is itself the doctor, the arbitrary player doesn't reach endgame.
  A 5:2 with a 1-shot BP doctor would qualify, if town lynches scum day one, the arbitrary town player can either be protected, or is the doctor himself.
  The fact that it's possible the arbitrary player is the doctor, and the doctor gets shot twice does not disqualify the setup, because if town does not mislynch day 2, the game ends before the arbitrary player is removed.
  Baton Pass could qualify because town could collectively pick any player to get the nightkill immunity.
  Two mafia and seven town bodyguards would qualify because it is always possible to keep a certain player alive.
  You should get the picture by now.
  
• It needs to be impossible to mechanically confirm the guaranteed-voice player, unless they are mechanically confirmed by being poisoned like in Marked For Death or tree stumped somehow.
  
• Speaking of tree stumped, it will be allowed for the arbitrary player to have their voice only in some type of beyond-the-grave neighborhood.
  
• Temporarily removing a player from the game but specifically bringing them back just in time for the end will also be allowed, if that's what you're into.
  
• You cannot use a Flag mechanic to help you reach the condition. Flag mechanics are actually pretty cool in general and I'd normally say yes but this challenge is already pretty broad so I have to narrow somehow.

[RadiantCowbells]

owo

[popsofctown]

Does that mean you figured out the acronym?

[RadiantCowbells]

Radiant Cowbells Only Wants One Time Alive In Final Day?

[popsofctown]

That's the new official meaning for the acronym now because it's more wholesome but it was the social media meme

Spoiler: language

RadiantCowbells Only Wants One Thing And It's Fucking Disgusting

I've wanted to do something like this as a challenge for like 3 months I think it's a fun challenge parameter. Pure nightless itself is very good/interesting/needs to be used more but shades of grey between removing players whenever you want and needing to deal with certain players in dayplay no matter what is really interesting to me and is part of what I find exciting about Undertale Semiopen.

[RadiantCowbells]

Oh I considered that immediately but I was like why would that be and I noticed Alive In Final Day so I tried to make that work

[chennisden]

Well, I'll actually put together a setup but I have an idea

Let's say town can, once in the game, vote for a guy to become bullet + lynchproof until day of lylo. This ends the day with no lynch but gives scum two NKs

And this power is completely optional

[popsofctown]

Oh I considered that immediately but I was like why would that be and I noticed Alive In Final Day so I tried to make that work

The "disgusting" thing you want is to be alive in the final day, I think you get sadface sometimes about being nightkilled so that you don't get to participate in endgame sometimes. You might not be the only one with those sadfaces but you're the only one I can think of advocating the design principle in open setup discussions.
Definitely don't interpret it as having anything to do with the original tweet

before

it was photoshopped that's bad :X. I imagined the the tweet with your avatar and 9 white flag setups under it

[popsofctown]

I'm guessing that's a 7:2 chennis?

[chennisden]

Idk the inherent mechanic seems a bit scumsided. 9:2?

[chennisden]

Also the mechanic could get toxic real fast because of egos but if I've learned one thing from debate

NON UNIQUE

[chennisden]

Actually I'm really tempted to mash together above mechanic with Hitlist

Who knows what kinds of insane things I could make

[chennisden]

Ok so yeah here's a mashup numbers come later

So D1 is just a vanilla day, cool beans, very nice. At the end of D1 mafia has to make an ordered list of N people (N is a number I will determine later). Every night they have to nightkill from that list, in that order.

If someone on their list dies they either 1) get removed from the list or 2) mafia loses a kill, too bad so sad. I don't know which one I want to go with yet. Probably 1) would be more predictable and less frustrating. When their list is over they have free reign over who to kill, yay.

Once in the game, mafia can remove someone from their list. Also once in the game, town can vote for someone to be made lynchproof and bulletproof until lylo, but this comes at the cost with ending day with no lynch AND giving mafia two nightkills.

[chennisden]

Idk if I want town's mechanic to confirm the target's alignment or whatnot. I'd want to make some incentive to actually USE the ability instead of town just ignoring it, grumble grumble.

This seems inherently scumsided?

[TemporalLich]

Here's a basic placeholder setup.

Wanted to do a basic Frostbreathing Mafia setup but that's against the challenge rules as players never

stay

dead from the factional kill in that setup (frostbreath only leaves you dead for a cycle and is flipless, basic Frostbreathing Mafia breaks the first rule by failing to give the Mafia a method to kill.).

Rise of the Treestump

11 players

2 Mafia Goons

9 Vanilla Townies

Normal rules for lynching and factional nightkills apply. Mafia may communicate in their PT at any time.

Once in the game during day, a dead player can be immediately revived as a treestump by the alive players voting with HEAL: tags and reaching majority with said HEAL: tags.

If a lynch is reached or deadline hits with HEAL: votes active but no majority, the treestump revive vote can be tried again the next day.

Yes, this almost breaks the "protected IC" rule, but it falls through the exception.

[Something_Smart]

The Other Side

2 Mafia Goons

(with factional roleblock)

7 Townies

Pregame, each townie chooses to be a

Miller 1-Shot Cop

or a

Macho Doctor

.

Balance is probably screwy. It's 1 am. I'll think about it more later.

This fits the letter of the challenge but maybe not the spirit, because the arbitrary townie to be protected must be known in pregame, before town has been allowed to communicate at all. Will rework if pops doesn't think this should count.

[popsofctown]

The challenge has the more generic spirit that maybe you figure out someone is obvtown in Day1's dayplay and build a winning strategy off of that

And also the "RC only wants one thing and it's fucking disgusting" spirit where RC wants to play his next game and have a way to always know he'll have an impact in LyLo

S_S your solution hits the second spirit enough that it's fine.

[yessiree]

Well, I'll actually put together a setup but I have an idea

Let's say town can, once in the game, vote for a guy to become bullet + lynchproof until day of lylo. This ends the day with no lynch but gives scum two NKs

And this power is completely optional

something similar

Impeachment Mafia

• 7 VT
  
  
• 2 Goons
  
  
• Each day, players may elect a president with plurality vote
  
• Elected president becomes bulletproof
  
• Each night, mafia must choose between their factional night kill, or
  Impeachment
  , effectively tree-stumping the president
  
• After a president has been impeached, a new one cannot be elected again
  
• Alignment is not revealed after being tree-stumped

[callforjudgement]

We See Everything

• 14 Townies; 3 Mafia; 3 Werewolves.
  
• 3 non-Mafia randomly become Masons, and 3 non-Werewolves randomly become Monks; no player can be both Mason and Monk (reroll both lists if this happens).
  
• Masons have private communication with each other, as do Monks. Masons are confirmed as non-Mafia to each other. Monks are confirmed as non-Werewolf to each other.
  
• Standard Day/Night cycle.
  
• Town wins by eliminating all scum. Scum wins by equalling the numbers of the other two teams put together.
  
• Both scumteams generally have a compulsive nightkill. However, if at the start of a Day a scumteam is at least as large as the number of remaining townies, the other scumteam loses its nightkill for the rest of the game (faction sizes are always public, so this event can be announced by the moderator).
  
• Each player has a "semiprotection" ability: they can PM the moderator during the Day to semiprotect a player for the following night (other than themself). They may change their choice as often as they like during the day, but only the last choice will be respected.
  
• At the start of each Night, both scumteams are sent a complete list of who each player semiprotected. If a player has been semiprotected at least twice, they are not a valid choice for that night's nightkill.
  
• Tiebreaks for screwy endgames:
  • In a 2:1:1 (town:scum:scum) ending, the thread is locked, and each player submits a guess as to who is scum to the moderator. If either townie guesses both scum correctly, or neither scum guesses scum correctly, town wins. Otherwise, any scum who guesses the other scum correctly wins (this may result in a scum/scum tie).
    
  • A 2:3:2 ending is an automatic win for the larger scumteam.
    
  • In a 1:1:1, 1:2:2, 2:2:2, 1:3:3 or 2:3:3 ending, the thread is locked, and each scum submits a guess as to who the other scum are to the moderator (scum may confer before guessing). If only one team has a member that guesses correctly, that team is the only one that wins. Otherwise, it's a scum/scum tie. Town cannot win in these scenarios.

I'm not that good at balancing Larges, so I'm not confident on the numbers with this (although as a multiball, it's likely to be fairly self-balancing). The semiprotection mechanic means that most of the strongest players (both town and scum) are likely to survive to later in the game; having a lot of private communication makes coordination easier. Scum seeing all night actions helps to produce the information imbalance that Mafia needs (and is often missing in multiball); it also encourages town to discuss actions more openly if they wish to do so, on the basis that scum will see their action anyway. Oddly, it may be a townsided mechanic (my experience in multiball is that giving scum more information often benefits town by making it easier for scum to find each other; it also makes scumhunting easier).

[popsofctown]

Semiprotect seems really cool

Have other games run masonries that are only guaranteed to not belong to a specific faction? I'm not sure that'd be fun.

[callforjudgement]

The mechanic comes from the Open setup Masons and Monks (which I think has been dropped due to being far too scumsided). It's a lot less broken than six confirmable townies would be, whilst presenting some amount of information.

[chennisden]

Al Capone's List

7 town

2 scum

During N1, mafia makes an ordered list of 4 players like following:
1. Player 1
2. Player 2
3. Player 3
4. Player 4

If someone dies, they are removed from mafia's list. If mafia's list is non-empty, they must kill from said list in said order.

Once, at any point in the game, the mafia may remove someone from their list.

Once, during the day, the town may vote to

Protect

a player. Their alignment is confirmed and they are made 1-shot bulletproof. They are removed off of Al Capone's list if they are on it. However, this ends the day in a no-lynch and gives the mafia two nightkills.

[popsofctown]

I think you should call it Psycho Pass cause it's like the town is predicting crimes

[chennisden]

Public Hitlist

7 town

2 scum

Pre-game, mafia submits an ordered list of 3 players as such:
1. P1
2. P2
3. P3

This list will be made public information.

(Mafia are allowed to put themselves on the list.)

If someone dies, they are removed from the list. If the list is non-empty, mafia

must

kill from this list, in the specified order. (For clarification, P1 is killed before P2, etc.)

Town may, at any point in the game, vote to remove someone from the list.

[chennisden]

What a wonderful idea