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[mastina]

Hi I reviewed this game.

[mastina]

hi mastina, i do not think this game was well-balanced

Hi Menalque, I disagree with that--you have a roleblocker who cannot get guilties when there's only one scum alive (the traditional time where roleblocker is at its strongest), meaning that a roleblocker is incredibly unlikely to block the scum kill, but can block the town investigatives, making it incredibly hard to use well and balance of probability, more likely to hurt the town than help them.

You have a Loud Neapolitan, which the scumteam have full knowledge about--this allows the scum to know exactly when someone has been inno'd or guiltied'd by the role, allowing the scum a great deal of counterplay, especially since the role cannot get hard-guilties since the scum can claim anything not-VT in response. Easy to do thanks to their full setup knowledge and the role being Loud.

You have a Loud Follower, which the scumteam have full knowledge about--a follower is akin to a tracker in power in being an incredibly situational power role. It gets stronger with less scum in the game, and is at its strongest when there's only one scum left alive, but it still, just like the roleblocker, requires targeting the scum making the nightkill, and is completely worthless otherwise. If the follower doesn't target the scum making the nightkill, the follower is worthless. And even if the follower DOES get a guilty, the scum can easily, if they are fast about it, initiate a 1v1 by knowing about the role before it has claimed and potentially pull a stunt such as stealing the claim from them, for instance. (Say the follower claims a guilty but does not explain what type. That would give scum a window to fullclaim and reverse it around by claiming a guilty of their own.)

And you have a Motion Detector, which is a role that gets bundleloads of worthless results. No Motion is not an inno result until there's only one scum alive, and Motion Detected is only a guilty when there is no possible explanation for the motion. No visit, no power role visit, no power role actioning, etc. Most results do nothing to help the town scumhunt.

The town roles have some decent synergy in being able to somewhat confirm the presence of other roles--but nothing to confirm those roles come from town inherently. All of the town's roles fit as potential scum roles.

Now admittedly, 3/4 of the town roles become much stronger with only one scum left alive and all of the town roles are stronger with two scum left alive. So if scum die early, the game becomes much much harder for the scum. But,
1: the lack of protective roles which the scum have full knowledge of means the scum have free reign to nightkill power roles the

moment

they identify who the PRs are, and,
2: If the town yeets scum out early and the game becomes much harder for the scum...job well done? Towns shouldn't be punished for yeeting scum early, towns should be rewarded for yeeting scum early, scum shouldn't be rewarded for letting scum die early, scum should be punished for letting scum die early, so if the town yeets scum early and the game becomes harder for the scum as a consequence...I don't see the issue with that? That's how the game should work. Good play rewarded with good results, ,bad play punished with bad results.

So if scum die early, yes, the town gains a huge edge, but like...that's
A: a statistical abnormality, and,
B: in my opinion, just good design?

If this game were played out 100 times I think the town stomping the way they did in this game happens 10 or less times out of that. This was one of the best possible outcomes for the town. When you have an outcome that is a statistically speaking abnormal outcome that's unlikely to happen, the game's obviously going to appear less balanced due to the game having already swung to one extreme.

But if you look at the roles and the outcomes based off of theory rather than off of the outcome of the game in question, the balance becomes much much more clear. After all, reviewers cannot know the playerlist of a game in advance. So we can't balance off of the outcome of the game; we can only balance off of the theory behind the game and by the theory of the game, I stand by this setup being balanced or damn near close to it; I'd put it at within the 55-45 margin. (And for reference, we allow things to go as far as 60-40 in either direction. So a game that's at less than 60-40, in this case 55-45 or closer, like could be 52.5-47.5, or even 50-50, is damn near close to balanced.)

[mastina]

Assume that scum magically know which player is which role. They have to predict which guilty to lose a scum to. The odds of three townies never checking a scum in 3 nights is astronomically low.

Oh? Are they?

Let's do the math then.

For the follower to get a guilty:
They need to follow the scum making the nightkill.
On N1, there is a 1/11 chance of that occurring. (9.090909090909091%)
On N2, there is a 1/9 chance of that occurring. (11.11111111111111%)
On N3, there is a 1/7 chance of that occurring. (14.28571428571429%)

For the roleblocker to get a guilty:
They need to roleblock the scum making the nightkill.
And keep in mind that if they block scum that didn't make the nightkill--they can't block that scum again even if the scum DOES make the nightkill later. (Say they target the scum not nightkilling N1 but said scum nightkills N2--the roleblocker will fail for the entire rest of the game.)
This one is thus something I don't know how to calculate for sure, but let's use the formula above for simplicity's sake;
On N1, there is a 1/11 chance of that occurring. (9.090909090909091%)
On N2, there is a 1/9 chance of that occurring. (11.11111111111111%)
On N3, there is a 1/7 chance of that occurring. (14.28571428571429%)

For a motion detector to get a guilty:
They need to detect the scum making the nightkill, AND have no town PR target the player who makes the nightkill (not to mention, the scum have an easier time talking their way out of an MD guilty than any other type of guilty).
On N1, the odds of that happening are (10/11) * (10/11) * (10/11) * 1/11: 1000/14641, a 6.830134553650707% chance.
On N2, the odds of that happening are (8/9) * (8/9) * (8/9) * 1/9: 512/6561, a 7.803688462124676% chance.
On N3, the odds of that happening are (6/7) * (6/7) * (6/7) * 1/7: 216/2401, a 8.996251561849229% chance.

What do you get when you add all three percentages up?
34.48773448773449% for the follower, assumed 34.48773448773449% for the roleblocker, and 23.63007457762461% for the motion detector.

Keeping in mind also: the town does not know that a roleblocker guilty is a hard guilty until no killstop roles are claimed (because a doctor, jailkeeper, babysitter, rolestopper, bulletproof, commuter, and hider all give possible explanations for no kill).
The town does not know that a motion detect guilty is a guilty.

So between the three, if all three were left alive you might get a 92.60554355309359% chance of getting

one

guilty between them, but that's if all three were left alive for three nights straight and with the lens of the above that not all guilties are hard guilties. Only the follower is a guilty that cannot be argued against. (Counterbalanced by being Loud and thus letting the scum know precisely when they have been guiltied.)

The Neapolitan has different math, admittedly:
3/11 N1 (27.27272727272727%)
3/9 N2 (33.33333333333333%)
3/7 N3 (42.85714285714286%)

But again, the Neapolitan while guiltying scum is Loud and thus means the scum targeted by it know they have been guiltied and know they need to claim a power role. Any power role. Literally any power role--they can claim an unprovable role and the Neapolitan has no way of telling otherwise. And if the claim is appropriately low in power, it can fit into the setup fairly easily. And to reiterate, this is only IF the Neapolitan guilties scum.

And all of this math? Is in the worst case scenario where scum do not identify any of the threatening power roles to them.

The scum have a 4/9 shot N1 at hitting a power role (assuming a VT dead D1).
If they miss and a VT dies D2, then on N2 it's 4/7.
If they miss and a VT dies D3, then on N3 it's 4/5. (Granted, if there's literally only one VT left in the game, the scum have done something very, very, VERY wrong.)

This means that bussing is 100% off the table.

Is that a bad thing? Scum should not be rewarded by the setup for killing scum, they should be fully aware they should be punished for killing scum. Town should not be punished by the setup for killing scum; they should be justly rewarded for killing scum.

2) Loud follower does not have a counter.

The loud follower does not have a good counter if they get a guilty, that is true enough--however, as shown above, the statistical odds of the follower getting a guilty are quite low.

The counterplay to the loud follower is also plenty apparent BEFORE a nightkill--select someone to perform the nightkill you don't think the loud follower will target. You've got little in the way of counterplay after a guilty, but you've got plenty of counterplay before a guilty exists by guaranteeing that no guilty is generated.

Once down to the last goon follow the cop takes place. Roleblocker and follower work in tandem and scum can’t do shit.

Bluntly if the game gets down to one scum alive with both the roleblocker and follower alive, they deserve to lose and the town deserves to win.

The mafia are the informed minority--both of those are key. They are the minority, so statistically speaking it is hard for the town to get guilties on them especially given the scum are informed. By knowing what roles are in the setup and by knowing who the scum are, the scum have the best idea of who among them are least likely to be caught by 3/4 of the town power roles. Because as it turns out, follower/roleblocker/motion detector all have the same type of preferred target.

And as the informed minority they have the advantage of communicating with each other, collaborating, and coordinating. This can allow them to hone in on the power roles (with full knowledge of what they are, it is easier to pick up on identifying behaviors) and to coordinate who does the nightkill as to dodge the town PRs and to, in their dayplay, play in a way to help maximize their night action gameplay.

After all--you don't need to bus in order to look town as scum. Bussing is one way to look town as scum; it is not the

only

way to look town as scum. Plus you don't necessarily need to bus; distancing without bussing is still viable in this setup. If scum, with full knowledge of the setup, do nothing to capitalize on this knowledge and strategize, then they are neglecting their advantages as the informed minority by not taking advantage of the information given to them.