Mafia Cards: Help finalize card list and sample setups

[mith]

Split from the sticky.

1. We have some extra space in the deck, and I'd like to use some of that space to add a few cards with modifiers built in, since it looks like removable stickers won't be an option. Please suggest commonly used modified roles. The current list (determined by which ones we're using in sample setups):

1-shot Vigilante (Kids with Guns)
1-shot Bulletproof (Matrix 6)
Innocent Child Town Lover (Lovers' Gambit)
Recruitable Mafia Traitor (Thrill on a No Kill)

All of these except for IC Town Lover are pretty common anyway. We can avoid having the extra card for the IC Town Lover if necessary, because the Town Lover cards have different art (we can just specify in the rulebook for that setup that the female Town Lover should be flipped or something).

Common ones I can think of right now:

Macho Cop
Weak Doctor
Day Vigilante
(1-shot) Bulletproof Serial Killer - not sure how easy this would be to do clearly on a card with our current resources; would want to make it clear the 1-shot applied to the bulletproof part, not the kill.

2. We may also use some of the cards for sample setups in some way, but regardless of whether they are on cards or in the rulebook, I wanted to revisit our list and see if there are any new open/semi-open setups which we might include. The current rulebook is here: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B15tX ... jFRQ2VHNTQ

I know there was a second Open Setup design contest; some of those setups probably aren't suitable (they don't use generic roles or they use particularly non-standard rules), but some might be. We've also had a lot of time pass since that list of setups was finalized, so I'm sure there have been other solid setups proposed and run which might be worth including.

In particular, we only have one 10 player setup on the list (other than the variable count ones), and if there's another solid option out there I would love to include it.

[Gamma Emerald]

Use smaller things for modifiers, like tokens or w/e.

[mith]

Tokens are fine if the modified role is publicly known to exist. The intent here is to provide a way to include the modified role without additional explanation - the player would get their random card and see on the card that it is 1-shot or whatever. Such a modifier either has to be built into the card, or "attachable" in some manner (the removable stickers would have done this, if they had worked; the other option is to sleeve all the cards and have modifiers which can be inserted into the appropriate sleeve during setup).

[Gamma Emerald]

Maybe a smaller card?

[mith]

Regardless of the format the modifiers take, the point of this thread is that we have extra space in the deck and we don't have the option of adding entirely new roles at this stage, so using some of the slots for modified versions of existing roles is going to happen. We just need to decide which ones to include.

[callforjudgement]

The most obvious missing setup to me is White Flag. 10:3 should be fairly balanced face-to-face (which is more townsided than forum Mafia), and it might be worth making it a variable setup.

With respect to the second design contest, my setup Grey Flag Nightless (6:3 vanilla, Vengescum, White Flag) was a finalist and has had a couple of successful tests. Unfortunately, it's fairly sensitive to changes in player numbers, unlike simpler vanilla formats. An older version of the same setup, Black Flag Nightless (7:3 vanilla, White Flag, Nightless, 3:2 is an immediate scum win) is 10 players and also works fairly well (it has some known problems related to replacements, but that shouldn't be a problem in face-to-face games). The only other setup of mine I'd suggest as potentially useful is Vote For Town, which is basically mountainous vanilla with the win conditions swapped (town win via lynching enough townies that the scum have half the votes, scum win via having the whole faction lynched, self-voting is only allowed if it's the hammer); note that it needs more townies relative to scum to be balanced than a typical Nightless does (we've been running 6:2 on the forums but something around 7:2 or 9:3 is probably correct for face to face).

It might be worth mentioning in the rulebook that Bulletproof only works once. Unlimited Bulletproof is fairly rare, and making Bulletproof single use would solve your Serial Killer problem.

In terms of cards to print, I'd suggest printing a 1-shot Town Cop card. That's very valuable in Closed setups, and it might even be worth printing a 2-shot version. (Other powerful town investigatives – Neopolitan (not in the deck IIRC), Watcher, Gunsmith – are also frequently seen 1-shot in Closed setups.) Strongman (which is in the deck IIRC) is nearly always 1-shot, and I'm not sure there's even much value in printing an unlimited version. Odd/even night modifiers are most useful on roles that block other roles, notably Town Doctor and Mafia Roleblocker. I mostly see Bulletproof on otherwise vanilla townies nowadays (often just 1-shot, although it doesn't matter much in this situation). Weak is best on Town Doctors and to a lesser extent Town Cops (although Weak Doctor can safely substitute for Weak Cops in most setups). Approximately how many slots are you looking to fill with modified roles?

[mith]

White Flag should be in over The Bus Stop; it's easily the most run of the Vanilla Variants (other than Nightless, perhaps). No idea why I left it out last year.
Grey Flag Nightless is fine, but if Vengescum and White Flag are both already there, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to take up space as a variable count setup (I'll make a note to put this in the Vanilla Variant spreadsheet), and we already have more than enough 9 player setups, so would probably only be included if we just have leftover space and no better ideas.
Black Flag Nightless as a 10 player is a reasonable one to include.
(I am partial to all of these, of course.)

Vote For Town sounds neat, but isn't really appropriate for this project - it definitely doesn't qualify as a "normal" game.

The thing with Bulletproof is that we already have a Bulletproof Town card, which is unlimited, and it's not currently feasible to edit card text. We could just drop the unlimited slot and include the 1-shot modified card, of course, but specifying that it is 1-shot in the rulebook would be strange given the card text, and the goal is to make everything as clear as possible on the card without having to consult the rules or ask the moderator questions. (Making the Bulletproof modifier explicitly 1-shot is reasonable though. For that matter, we could just use the Vanilla Town card, overlay the 1-shot Bulletproof modifier, and replace the art with the existing Bulletproof art, and then there's no card text issue.)

1-shot Cop is reasonable. I don't know about printing a 2-shot version; it's less useful in small setups (where you are usually better off just having a full Cop or a 1-shot), and anyway they can use the not-printed-on-the-card modifiers if they really want to do that.
The issue with Odd/Even in a fixed configuration is that you kinda want the other version available too, and that's too much real estate. And in general I'm hesitant to include too many Doctor variants because Doctor is pretty weak to begin with; I think Weak Doctor is probably common enough to include (and does something interesting with the Doctor); I'm less enthused about Odd/Even Doctor.

My thinking right now is that we have space for about 12 new cards - we're going from 72 to 90, but some of that space will be taken up by a rulebook (if I can figure out how to get it printed) or sample setup cards (if I can't get the rulebook done). 1 of those slots will be an extra Mafia Lover (we only have one on the list for some reason - I guess the thinking was it would be used for setups with cross-alignment Lovers - for example, Every Step You Take, where there's a 50-50 of 2 Town Lovers or 1 of each - and setups with two Mafia Lovers could just use Goons, but we are printing so many setup-specific things anyway, and Mafia Lovers in a large closed setup is reasonable). As mentioned above, we could drop the full Bulletproof Town card and just have a 1-shot version.

[callforjudgement]

I meant, specify in the rulebook that the Bulletproof modifier is 1-shot.
I was trying to list the most common uses for each modifier, in part to see if we wanted them at all. If the best use for a modifier isn't very good, we may as well just skip it.

I guess here would be a short list I'd suggest of role+modifier combinations, most important at the top:
1-shot Town Cop
Bulletproof (or 1-shot Bulletproof) Townie [the difference between these is small enough that they can normally be swapped out within a setup without unbalancing it]
1-shot Mafia Strongman (most likely replacing the unlimited version; an unlimited Strongman is hard to use in a setup)
Macho Town Cop
Weak Town Doctor
1-shot Town Vigilante
(1-shot Bulletproof) Serial Killer

That's only 6 extra cards if you replace the Strongman, so it's possible that there's space for some less important role+modifier combinations. Some suggestions:
1-shot Town Day Vigilante [often very fun in more casual games]
Even Night Mafia Roleblocker [most frequently used odd/even role in my experience]
1-shot Town Watcher / 1-shot Town Gunsmith (not sure which of these would work better, probably not worth adding them both)
Bulletproof (or 1-shot bulletproof) Vigilante [admittedly, this is mostly a joke suggestion, but it's a surprisingly commonly used joke role; pity it can't be a Miller too]

(Also, you might want to consider putting the Day icon on the Treestump, given that it can be activated during the day.)

[mith]

I got that, what I'm saying is that if we have an existing Bulletproof Town card which is unlimited, it's confusing to then say in the rulebook that Bulletproof is 1-shot. The solution is to get rid of the unlimited one and just have a 1xBP modifier.

Strongman only exists as a modifier. Bulletproof does exist as a card, though. So still 6, if we replace the unlimited Bulletproof.
Gunsmith is not in the deck. 1-shot Watcher is reasonable.

This is the current card list (69 role cards, 2 blanks, 2 other). I'm not opposed to getting rid of the blurb card if there's good reason to.

Blurb 1
NAR 1
Mafia Doctor 1
Mafia Fallen Angel 1
Mafia Godfather 1
Mafia Goon 5
Mafia Lover 2
Mafia Ninja 1
Mafia Role Cop 1
Mafia Roleblocker 1
Mafia Suicide Bomber 1
Mafia Tracker 1
Mafia Traitor 1
Mafia Vanillizer 1
Town Beloved Princess 1
Town Bodyguard 1
Town Bulletproof 1
Town Cop 1
Town Doctor 1
Town Innocent Child 1
Town Jailkeeper 1
Town Juvenile Delinquent 1
Town Lover 2
Town Mason 3
Town Monk 3
Town Paranoid Gun Owner 1
Town Role Cop 1
Town Roleblocker 1
Town Seer 1
Town Supersaint 1
Town Tracker 1
Town Tree Stump 1
Town Vanilla 15
Town Vengeful Townie 4
Town Vigilante 1
Town Watcher 1
Werewolf 5
Werewolf Alpha 1
Serial Killer 1
Lyncher 1
Blank 2

[mith]

(Oh, and the "Fallen Angel" is the lose-if-lynched Godfather for Vengeful Mafia. We were going to change this to Politician, and it is listed this way in the rulebook, but it's still Fallen Angel in the files I got from diginova and it's going to be difficult/impossible to change at this point. I am leaning toward removing it and just making a lose-if-lynched modified Godfather card instead, or not having a slot for it at all and just having a rule addition in the setup. So there may or may not be an extra free slot there.)

[mith]

Does anyone have a good name for a modifier which means "if this role is lynched, your alignment loses"? Best I have come up with so far is "lynchpin", though "Lynchpin Godfather" sounds pretty strange.

[KuroiXHF]

Does anyone have a good name for a modifier which means "if this role is lynched, your alignment loses"? Best I have come up with so far is "lynchpin", though "Lynchpin Godfather" sounds pretty strange.

Neo? (Inspired by The Matrix)

[mith]

We also don't currently have an icon for Strongman (or this new one), and I'm not sure how easy it would be for Adam to make new ones which match. Anyway, here's our current list:

1-shot
2-shot
Macho
Weak
1-shot Bulletproof
Innocent Child
Even-Night
Odd-Night
Lover
Compulsive
Non-Consecutive
Recruitable

[callforjudgement]

Does anyone have a good name for a modifier which means "if this role is lynched, your alignment loses"? Best I have come up with so far is "lynchpin", though "Lynchpin Godfather" sounds pretty strange.

I use "secretary" for this, and make it act like a role name from a grammatical point of view (i.e. "Mafia Secretary" or "Godfather Secretary"). The idea is that once you lynch them, you get to see the list of members and track down all the rest.

If you want something that's more like a modifier grammatically, "Critical" might work.

[PeregrineV]

Does anyone have a good name for a modifier which means "if this role is lynched, your alignment loses"? Best I have come up with so far is "lynchpin", though "Lynchpin Godfather" sounds pretty strange.

Ultimate

[mith]

Another possibility is to make it modify the Goon instead - "Dependent" or something like that, meaning "If the Godfather is lynched, you die immediately." I think this would be a bit more useful in larger setups (not that UltimateCriticalNeoLynchpin Godfather couldn't be used, but obviously it is far more harsh).

Anyway, this is the list as it stands at the moment, from most important to least:

Town

1-shot Bulletproof

Vanilla - replaces unlimited Bulletproof card
Town

1-shot

Vigilante
Mafia

Recruitable

Traitor
Town

Confirmed Innocent

Lover - changed modifier name to avoid the ickyness of "Innocent Child Lover"
Mafia

Lynchpin

Godfather or Mafia

Dependent

Goon - replaces Fallen Angel card

Town

Macho

Cop
Mafia

1-shot Strongman

Goon
Town

1-shot

Cop
Town

Weak

Doctor
Town

(1-shot?) Day

Vigilante
Mafia

Even-Night

Roleblocker

1-shot Bulletproof

Serial Killer

Along with the additional Mafia Lover, that leaves 1 slot in an 84 card deck, if nothing else changes (leaving us with 6 cards for sample setups, rule reminders, etc.).

[callforjudgement]

Dayvig should be 1-shot. Otherwise it basically just becomes a must-kill role for the scum. (Especially in face-to-face games, it's really obvious who the dayvig is and that they're town, so you don't want to give them additional power to shoot people on later days on top of that.)

With that clarification, I like this list. (I agree that a Dependent Goon is easier to work into a custom setup than a Vengeful-style Godfather.)

[Gamma Emerald]

Can Dayvig also qualify as Desperado?

[callforjudgement]

You could use it as one in a custom setup easily enough.

(Admittedly, I don't really understand the fascination with the Desperado role.)

[Gamma Emerald]

I've seen Desperado, in fact in my first ever forum game a Desperado took me out. I have a fearful fascination for this role.

[mith]

Yeah, ultimately the players and moderator can agree to modify the roles in whatever way they like, just by announcing something like "Hey, in this game if you get the Day Vig, you are actually a Desperado, and here's what that does". We're just trying to cover some commonly used roles so that they can be used as-is for closed setups, without announcing them beforehand. (There will also be at least 2 blank cards. And a "blurb" card which just has some flavor text and "Are you /in?", which also has a matching back, you could use it as a third blank if you wanted.)

[Creature]

What about erasable markers?

[mith]

I'm going to test them out on the sample deck and see; it would certainly be useful for the blanks at least. I suspect they won't erase well, though.

[DrippingGoofball]

Just let me know if you need anything drawn.

[chamber]

I can maybe put an hour towards things sometime this week if its needed. What's the deadline for getting stuff finalized? What needs the most work? The rules?