What does a Watcher see?

[Seol]

I voted 2, but I meant 1. I'm surprised that article has been incorrect for so long.

What the wiki said was what watcher had been considered to be, as far as i can make out, since the founding of the site (i actually read old games to confirm this). That a bunch of people came along and tried to redefine the role does not render the wiki 'wrong.'

And yes, I know i'm in a minority of one here.

It renders the wiki 'wrong' if they were successful. I'm not saying that's the way it

should

be, but in this respect the Wiki is analagous to a dictionary. Dictionaries don't define language, they document it - similarly, the Wiki should use the definitions for roles as they are commonly understood.

That's why this thread was necessary - to ensure that the Wiki represented the Watcher as understood by the community, not just by Stoof. If you're in a minority of one, that doesn't make you wrong about what a Watcher should be - as long as you accept that you're 'wrong' about what a Watcher

currently

is (wrong in inverted commas because a) you are under no illusions that your opinion and that of others differs and b) what is 'wrong' and 'right' here is not a matter of merit but consensus).

edit: My point here, clumsily made, is that 'wrong' isn't really the appropriate word here. More accurate to say that because a number of people redefined the Watcher to a role that makes more intuitive sense - one who watches their target, with the previous role already accounted for under the umbrella of Tracker - the Wiki was rendered not wrong, but out of date.

[The Fonz]

Well, flavourwise, certainly in the sense it was created, the idea was that the watcher stakes out (watches) the target's house at night, and sees whether the target goes out or not.

The newer variant is more like a nightwatchman at a plant, or a security guard at the gates of someone's home, who checks the cctv to see if anyone enters. Hence 'nightwatchman' being a fitting role name in my eyes. Security guard or concierge also being more fitting names.

[Mr. Flay]

I think what Seol's searching for is that, in most cases, the wiki should be descriptive, not prescriptive. Official, scratchpad, and 'personal' pages aside (like Stoofer's Rules pages), the wiki's strength is that it collects and presents information from the forums in a more accessible format.

Or at least, I'd like to think so. And yes, I'm pretty sure that definition of 'Watcher' predates the "new" wiki, so it's probably worth looking at again.

[Guardian]

I edited it slightly, to include the alternate (where Watcher is really just a weak tracker):
http://www.mafiascum.net/wiki/index.php ... #Variation

Do you guys think that that's an accurate description?

I put a good bit of effort into this, and I'm really hurt that none of you have even bothered to see if my edit is accurate.

[undo]

According to mikeburnfire's list of roles, Watcher = 1 and Tracker = 2

So, 1.

[Yosarian2]

Fonz: My impression is that back in the early days of mafiascum, some roles were not very clearly defined, and watcher was one of them. Right from the start, there were several different watcher/nightwatchmen varients who all saw different things. The role has become more standardised now, and pretty much always means #1.