How or when have you felt you got better at playing mafia?

[mastin2]

To give an

actually

serious response:
The first time I really got better as scum was Good vs Evil, Chaos vs Law. Before (and during the beginning of) that game, I was not a scum leader; I was following the directions of MoS, who I trusted to guide us to victory.
But then, MoS got nightkilled, so I was left to fend for myself. That game was the first game where I profiled players: I did threat assessment, using what I knew off of them in general AND off of what they had given thusfar, to paint out a picture, a prediction, for what they

would

be doing when given new info. This was the first time I was actually planning out my kills and putting real thought into setting up an endgame, thinking, "Who will I be up against, and what is my best chance at surviving? Who do I need to convince?"

The odds were stacked against me, so I got lynched in mylo, but it was still the game-changing moment which sparked the series of scumgames I'm known for: Anything Goes, Left 4 Dead, Attack on Titan (okay, so we lost that one, but it was a close game and give credit where it's due: prior to me coming in, all three scum were the leading wagons; after I did, the town mislynched D1), Paranoia Mafia, Inorganic Chemistry, and maybe some others. All of them took from that one moment, using what I would later dub Situational Awareness: knowing what position you're in, and manipulating it such that your team is in position to win.


There were two moments that triggered me getting better as town.
One, the moment where the type of analysis I did changed. When I stopped focusing on the surface level stuff (what a person was saying, and arbitrarily from some mathematical standpoint assigning it a value of "hey, that comment is town/scum") and instead focused on the psychology behind the player, my accuracy improved. I went from "that action is scummy/townie" to, "Hey, player X is doing that action, but I can't understand why. It makes sense for Y to do it, and if Z was doing it I'd think Z town, but X doing it makes no sense at all", more or less.

Two, the moment where I stopped lying to others about the above change and was just upfront about it, if necessary admitting gut rather than trying to lie my ass off to come up with some logical reason why this person who is obviously scum would be scum. That was the moment I became more charismatic.


But the thing is, true to both town and scum games is...after a certain point, things become cyclical: what you need to do in each game is different from the last, so there's no true "point of improvement". The game's so ever-changing that something which improved your game last time will significantly hinder you next time, and on rare occasions you can get vice-versa.

[Postie]

I think the first major breakthrough I had in terms of improving my game was to focus on townhunting rather than scumhunting. I find that it's incredibly easy for town to do scummy things, but a lot less easy for scum to do convincingly towny things. I wasn't very good at this at first and gave townreads

way

too generously, but from then on I started actually learning what worked and what didn't; when I tunneled people because I thought they were being scummy I got nowhere and was almost always wrong. I do feel comfortable scumreading people other than by PoE sometimes now, but I think I only started noticing what worked in terms of scumtells once I'd first gotten a better grasp of how to townread people.

[Accountant]

Doublethink is the most important tool in a mafia member's arsenal. You're far less likely to drop scumtells if you're town.

[callforjudgement]

I have won more games as scum using that technique than any other. (At at least one point in the fairly distant path, I was confident that I'd solved a game I was in, only to realise a few minutes later that I was scum who'd completely forgotten the fact.)

Sometimes, though, it doesn't work. If your buddies are acting scummy and you try that, there's a good chance you'll be caught by PoE (especially if town has night actions). And in a role-heavy game, sometimes it's more important to keep a good handle on the nightplay as scum. (Most scum games I play, I hardly ever lie. In Worst Roles Mafia, I was lying pretty much continuously and constantly. The game mechanics (and my rather terrible role) meant that there was no way I could avoid falling under heavy suspicion, and thus I had to burn towncred to take out threats to the scum as quickly as possible.)

[Postie]

At at least one point in the fairly distant path, I was confident that I'd solved a game I was in, only to realise a few minutes later that I was scum who'd completely forgotten the fact.

#scumgoals

[Killthestory]

I got better by playing the game.

[Accountant]

I was confident that I'd solved a game I was in, only to realise a few minutes later that I was scum who'd completely forgotten the fact

Did you solve it correctly?

[Accountant]

Guys teach me how to catch PRs as scum, I literally have no idea and every unclaimed PR flip in all my games have taken me by surprise

[mastin2]

The key to catching PRs is to not try to catch PRs.

[Accountant]

The key to catching PRs is to not try to catch PRs.

That makes no sense.

[mastin2]

And yet, you'll find it works quite well.

[McMenno]

play role madness games

[Accountant]

And yet, you'll find it works quite well.

you have to actually explain the process

it may be that trying too hard to catch PRs is detrimental to catching PRs, but it's clear that you can't just wait around all game for a PR tell to fall into your lap. I know, because I've done that and it doesn't work

[Davsto]

I mean there are some telltale signs but generally they're only obvious when less experienced players have PRs. A good player with a PR is generally pretty hard to detect.

[Firebringer]

And yet, you'll find it works quite well.

Basically you don't need to fish for prs because they make themselves fucking obvious.

[Postie]

I mean there are some telltale signs but generally they're only obvious when less experienced players have PRs. A good player with a PR is generally pretty hard to detect.

I disagree, although I think it often depends on how well you know the player. If you know they don't have a history of being fence-sitty or subdued/safe, and suddenly here they are being slightly quieter and/or noncommittal than usual, there's a good chance they're a power role.
Another thing to look for is how they respond to pressure. Do they seem more uncomfortable under pressure than usual? When there's pressure on them, do they act like they've been cornered and give out vibes that say "back the fuck off"? If you're town, you can often tell this apart from scum-uncomfortableness by whether you think the player would lose their cool as easily/quickly if they were scum; lots of scum players, if not most, like to try and act like they're not phased by anything you throw at them, so if they're coming across like they're very obviously feeling unnaturally stressed it's likely a power role thing.

[Davsto]

postie remember when i was a cop and you ruled me as the only player that couldn't possibly be the cop?

It's honestly not that difficult to throw scum off the scent when it comes to finding PRs - I mean, in the sequel, I convinced scum that I

was

the cop, even though I wasn't. Even only mildly experienced players tend to quickly learn how to hide being a PR (and decent players can also trick scum into thinking they have a PR when they don't). I'm not saying you should leave it down to pure luck, but you can't expect to consistently guess PRs, much like you can't expect to consistently guess scum players.

[Postie]

postie remember when i was a cop and you ruled me as the only player that couldn't possibly be the cop?

That was my first time PR-hunting shhhh.
And I did have you as the player most likely to be the cop right until you pulled that funny bullshit at the end of the day, which in hindsight I should have scrutinized way more.

It's honestly not that difficult to throw scum off the scent when it comes to finding PRs - I mean, in the sequel, I convinced scum that I

was

the cop, even though I wasn't. Even only mildly experienced players tend to quickly learn how to hide being a PR (and decent players can also trick scum into thinking they have a PR when they don't). I'm not saying you should leave it down to pure luck, but you can't expect to consistently guess PRs, much like you can't expect to consistently guess scum players.

Sure, I just disagree that it's as difficult as you're making it out to be.

[mastin2]

Hint:
If you kill a VT off of PR-hunting:

I wish you good luck in winning against those strong players you left alive, and/or the ACTUAL PR.
'Cause you're gonna need it.
Since you left alive those strong players, and/or the ACTUAL PR.
And probably killed someone that said strong players and/or actual PR had suspicion of.

Which narrows their POE pool down and makes them question assumptions such as why they've written you off as town for so long.

[kuribo]

always kill your greatest threats. if no player is a threat to you, congratulations you can actually afford to try PR hunting.


but 99% of the time, someone will be a threat to you.

[callforjudgement]

PR-hunting is a good way to tiebreak between two players who are equally large threats (whether because you have no large threats or because you have too many). It's also decent if you have a choice of an obvious kill and a WIFOM kill and are having problems deciding whether to WIFOM or not (hint: mathematically you should do it occasionally but not most of the time). And of course, if you're in an Open setup and know that you may

have

to kill the PR to have a chance of winning, you try to kill the PR. (An example I'm thinking of is if you're in 5:1 at the start of N2 of a Micro, know that there's a Cop out there, and the Cop hasn't claimed yet. If you fail to kill them, then you can't counterclaim them tomorrow as town will lynch both you and them for the win, and if you don't, they'll confirm two innocents + themself, thus bringing you down to a 1v1 with the unconfirmed player.)

[Accountant]

Usually I take the obvious kill and bullshit my way out of it

[callforjudgement]

Usually I take the obvious kill and bullshit my way out of it

Most of the time, that's indeed the correct action.

[Kmd4390]

I peaked in my first year or two and got worse from there.

But I started playing in 2008, started working full time in 2009, and became a phone poster in 2011. So the amount of free time and internet access you have has a lot to do with "skill" in mafia. I'd even go as far as to say I had another steep decline in early 2014 when I started working 16 hour days with no internet access during that time. After 2 years of that, it's probably time to stop playing.

Edit: Confidence and mental health make a big difference too. The stronger you are in those categories, the better you'll find you play.

[Ranmaru]

I am not sure. I don't have an achievement tracker or anything. I don't have a sense of time. It seems I have gotten better at scum though, because my town play got better, but there are still areas I can improve. I find similar to martial arts, I practice it, but always have something I need to fix and re-learn. I'm always afraid I'll fall back to my previous self though, and am therefore afraid of reading my newbies.

In response to what KMD said, generally I always invested plenty of time into the game. Now I play mafia off and on because I realize that I let the other parts of my life sink while I play Mafia.

---

I realized talking Mafia theory with an experienced member (or much more experienced than you member) actually helped me to improve in my newbie days. Imagine my reaction when I was told "Buddying is not scummy" and I was like WHAT really. Yet, I haven't talked mafia theory with anyone really, in a long while. I've just been going on experience and critique and self-reflection.