Role Claims: there's a lot

[Mr_Gnome_It_All]

Well Zone my current personal stand on it is: "It depends on the situation!"

I think there is a right time and a wrong time for an 'everyone roleclaim'!

The right time being a point in a game where not many are left so might be needed to get everyone in the same spotlight and start some analitical discussions (wow, that's a fancy term)

The wrong time, being any time else!

[ZONEACE]

well that makes sense. Sorry i asked so many questions

[Gaspode]

Mass claims on day one or two take most, if not all, of the fun out of the game of mafia. I never have and most likely never will advocate early mass claims for that reason. It may be the best way to win once in awhile, but I play mafia for the fun of it, not for the sake of reminding everyone how many games I've won.

The situation where it is the best play is definitely possible, but it

should

never arise. All mods should compose their games in a manner that strongly discourages this type of play. Scalebane's Justice League example is the perfect example of what not to do. No offense to whoever ran it (JereIC maybe?), but mafia games should NEVER be designed with a setup where everyone in the game can figure out what roles are in the game and either their powers or alignment. That makes it impossible for the mafia to win. That's the beauty of games like Intrigue, Mixed Theme, and all DP games--no one can figure the whole thing out from role claims alone. In these games, a mass claim would leave the town just as clueless as they were in the beginning. Games like that are the mark of a very good mod.

[Norinel]

Scalebane's Justice League example is the perfect example of what not to do.

The full schematic of Fairytale was a more subtle one- the three little pigs (Docs), Hansel and Gretel (masons), a prince and princess, a vigilante, and four evil. Seven of the eight pro-town roles have some way of sort of proving their identity, and the eighth got killed Night 1. In addition, the pro-town roles were all basically standard roles, and the scum claims were weirder.

No offense to whoever ran it (JereIC maybe?), but mafia games should NEVER be designed with a setup where everyone in the game can figure out what roles are in the game and either their powers or alignment.

There are three easy ways of dealing with that that I don't think I've seen yet. One is to use a theme that has many more possible rolenames than you do players, like Famous Women or Mixed Theme. Within a theme, you can put in a role or two that's an absolutely ridiculous claim (Like DP's last few games having powerless roles). The last doesn't work with theme games, but mathcam's role/motive split idea all but destroys claiming as a useful tactic, since everyone has a role. I think I might try it out in my next game.

[mathcam]

The last doesn't work with theme games, but mathcam's role/motive split idea all but destroys claiming as a useful tactic, since everyone has a role. I think I might try it out in my next game.

Thanks for the homage, Norinel. I really do think it's a good way to run a game...obviously not the only way, but one that does limit the ability and even the motivation for a mass role-claim. As long as roles and motives are assigned independently, then when someone comes out after being bandwagoned and says "I'm a doc", the next guy just says "So what? Maybe you're an evil doc." Giving out your role only weakens your ability to perform it well.

In split motive/role games, way to get additional information (as opposed to role claims) is deciding whether or not the person used their role in a way that meshes with them having a pro-town motive or not. This, of course, is a much trickier decision than whether or not someone's role claim sounds plausible, which as so many have pointed out already in this thread, is often just a test of the mod.

I would like to mention on a side note that mass role-claiming isn't really a "new" strategy in that it was just conceived recently. It's that the newer more non-standard games are the first games where this has been a viable strategy. It wasn't that mass role-claiming back when, say, Werebear's 10/2 Townie/Mafia game was the norm was unheard of, just that it was quickly dismissed as a waste of time.

Cam

[Dragon Slayer]

A bad case of easy win for the town because (well because of the roles in the game, but this has something to do with it) was Someone's Harry Potter mafia. It was alright, it's just that the roles in it were just... well go take a look at it and tell me how I could have one. Legally.

[Thoth]

In the defense of someone's game is that it turned out rather unlucky for the Mafia. During day 2 we had already 5 nightkills and a Scum lynched day 1to get to 6 dead. Harry Potter, Hermione, Ron Weasley and Prof Dumbledore were still in the game at that moment though. If some of those would have been among the 6 dead it would have been a lot more dificult for the town to win.
The unbalance was more in the amount of luck with strong town roles and 5 night killers in 3 parties.

[Norinel]

Well, having 3 kills per night in a mini makes the game far too chaotic, and the fact that every single one of the most mainstream roles was in the game made them basically confirmable innocents.

[JereIC]

Like Norinel just pointed out, having a game full of main characters is one of the big vices with theme games. It's a lot of fun to have Neo, Trinity and Morpheus running around a Matrix-theme game, but it doesn't give much wiggle room for the mafia. It also sucks to watch Neo and Trinity get killed night one, and Morpheus lynched that day, but that's a different matter. I think PolarBoy's Toybox game is a good model of a theme game; there are so many toys in the universe that you can make up a claim from scratch, but none of them are really stars, and in my case I was able to take my role name and come up with a credible, pro-town role.

And Gaspode, if you're talking about Mini 38, mass-claimability was one of a number of awful design flaws in that game. Uhm, I apologize.

[Yoko Kurama]

I feel early role claims are fine. It is a different strategy for the game. You have mafia lying to you throughout the game anyway why wouldn't they role claim to show their "innocence"? You simply have to weed out all of there BS a go by simple fact (sometimes luck) to win. Now it is there own fault if some basic townie roles role claim and die, just part of the game and if they do they may not early role claim in later games.

[PolarBoy]

We're not talking about individual claims to protect onesself from a lynch. We're talking about the dreaded mass-claim. A trategy in which everybody reveals their role on the basis that the mafia could not hide themselves once all of the townie roles are revealed. Like what if you did a game based on "The Lion King" and the townie roles were Simba, Nala, Timon, Pumbaa, Zazu, Sarabi, Mufasa, and Rafiki. Even if we had a four-member mafia(Scar, Banzai, Shenzi, and Ed, obviously) the town could easily win day one by a massive claim as all of the townie roles have to be in the game and none of them could plausibly be anti-town. Basically it would make a really cruddy game.

Actually, it just occurred to me that in such a setup the mafia could still conceivably win by realizing in advance that this would be true and intentionally cross-claiming with the townies in hopes of being more plausible and getting them lynched. That is, assuming roles with no abilities.

[Dragon Slayer]

But then they would get the real innocent lynched and the mafia player would be left to die the next day.

Like what if you did a game based on "The Lion King" and the townie roles were Simba, Nala, Timon, Pumbaa, Zazu, Sarabi, Mufasa, and Rafiki. Even if we had a four-member mafia(Scar, Banzai, Shenzi, and Ed, obviously)

A little scared now.

Scar, Banzai, Shenzi, and Ed, obviously

Well, of course! Obviously!

-DS

[PolarBoy]

Yeah but it wouldn't matter if enough of the gambits succeeded. Watch this little diagram using asterisks to represent townies and plusses to represent mafia.

********++++
Here we are pre-night 1. The town seems to have a huge advantage until...

*******++++
...the mafia make their first kill. Day one we have a mass role-claim and all of the mafia members cross-claim townies. We'll assume that day one a townie gets lynched for being less plausible than his mafia counterpart. That gives us...

******++++
...after day one and...

*****++++
...after night 2. Obviously at this point the lying mafia member gets lynched, that gives us...

*****+++
...after day two and...

****+++
...after night 3. The town is now in check, and as far as roles are concerned, has no edge. There is one townie who is confirmed innocent as his role has to be in the game and no mafia has cross-claimed. If the town misses this lynch, they lose. So the mafia do have a theoretical chance, though a smaller one than in a black and white game. Bear in mind though that this is with a 4 member mafia. Quite large for a no roles game.

Anyway it might be interesting.

* Considers running "The Lion King Mafia" *

[Gammie]

I completely agree, Dragon Pheonix. I recently played in Justice League mafia, and I didn't like it very much, due to the fact that the townies were the 7 league members and the 8th townie was aquaman. The mafia (or SK in my case) didn't have a chance when forced to roleclaim, due to the fact that there wern't any more roles left to claim.

Check out that link BlackHawk gave, there were PLENTY of claims for that game. The fact he threw in Aquaman would have made anything non-imediate JL would have throw the town off.

I don't like early on claims, other than the first bandwagon maybe.

But nonetheless, it is incredibly hard to claim in set games like that.

[Fletcher]

I couldn't care less.

[Medicated Lain]

I agree with DP, and Gnome. Whether mass role claiming is good in a game, depends on the game, however, when it is good for it, it really isn't like mafia at all.

In my opinion, mafia is a game based on the characterics, not on the characters. In a standard mafia game, mass-roleclaiming is a horrible thing, and in honesty, role-claiming in general.... but that's *if* it's a standard game, I don't think any of those are played here, atleast not now, talking about games like mathcam was mentioning, 10/2.. maybe a cop in there somewhere. But it seems like none of the games here are truely *classic* mafia, which isn't necisarely a bad thing, alot of the games being played are really alot of fun... the standard games, you can definately tell are a direct evolution from the older version, but when you get into the more complex games, like in the themed area, it's like a whole new branch. In themed games, it seems benificial to know the mind of the mod, I wonder what the differences would be between a game full of players who know the mod, and a game full of player's who don't... but that's getting way off topic.

[Dasquian]

I think in future games, I'm definitely going to kit my mafia out with full role descs that they would've received if they were innocent, so that they can role-claim and know that it'll fit straight in with whatever else is out there, even if they don't know what that is. Maybe even trivial night abilities - that way they can "prove" they are who they say they are and if the town trusts them on the basis that they "have a role", or learns it through a mass role-claim, they're no better off.

I've seen a lot of games recently where it ends up with the mafia forced to make up a weird-ass minor role that clearly isn't true, or claiming townie and getting tripped up because they didn't know what the other townie role descs looked like. I think that's weird because the entire point of the game is that the mafia

have

blended in with the town already and aren't obvious enough to pick out in a line-up - hence the whole daily lynch rigmarole

[Antrax]

A "new" strategy? Okay...
Antrax