Mini Normal 1829 - Game Over

[chilledtea]

Is there a reason why mods announce the result of their games in the queue, generally with a spoiler?

[kraska77]

1) why would blitz use the doc claim to try to save herself later in the game, but if elyse was scum, she'd have had to be the doc yet she claimed VT D1 at L-1???
2) and if elyse went before shadow, shadow would have been autolynched after elyse had fake claimed VT as scum doc, and shadow confirmed that fake claim day 2.

I know I totally would have pulled a gambit like this as scum so i couldnt write her off as town for it...

[mhsmith0]

@chilled: yes but idk what it is lol

[kraska77]

But then again I probably should stop assuming all ppls are crazies like me =(

[Shadow_step]

Kraska you came through for me <3 xD

[callforjudgement]

Is there a reason why mods announce the result of their games in the queue, generally with a spoiler?

The announcement's just so the listmod's aware that the game is over.

I don't think there's any actual reason to announce the result, but it's common to do so. The result gets spoilered in case someone wants to read through the game unspoiled. (This is also the reason why the title just says "game over" rather than "scum win", and why the alive/dead lists are spoilered.)

[MichelSableheart]

mhsmith, while I agree with you that the mafia doctor was very powerful in this setup, I think you are severely underestimating the town power here.

If the tracker tracks the mafia doc to one of his partners, it's difficult for the doc to find a claim that can explain that action. Doctor doesn't work, as it's likely the most scummy member of the mafia team that was protected. I would probably have to claim either jailkeeper or roleblocker in that situation, but both of those are obvious scumclaims given the other powers the town has. Similarly, Vanilla Cop/Neapolitan is also too much investigative power, so the mafia vanilla cop also has trouble fakeclaiming. If the tracker targets any of the scumteam during the night and survives, there is a good chance that scummember will be lynched as a result.

Similarly, even though the gunsmith isn't as strong as a full cop (1 incorrect innocent, 1 incorrect guilty), he can also detect two of the mafia members.

Finally, the vig. If mafia doc prevents the vig shot, then that effectively functions as a guilty result on the player targeted (as could be seen during night 3). If he shoots 2 town players, town gains a mislynch. And if he shoots 1 townplayer, he becomes conftown himself, without actually costing town a lynch (as his target would likely have been lynched anyway).

Add the bodyguard, who should help keep conftownplayers (vig/investigative/investigative results) alive and confirm himself town in the process.

Basically, scum used it's nightabilities optimally this game, killing both investigative roles night 1 and night 2, preventing a vig kill, then killing confirmed innocents night 3 and 4. Yet we still lost 2 scummembers (at least partially) to night interactions. blitz' fakeclaim wasn't believable given town power, and the vig shot on shadow essentially functioned as a guilty investigation. If perfect nightactions leave you with 1 scummember who needs to dodge 4 kills (lynch, vig shot, lynch, lynch), I don't think you can call the mafia abilities overpowered.

[chilledtea]

I think saving a scum member from kill is less noteworthy than targeting a scum member for a kill.

I also feel that night actions were good on both the sides, night isn't the only that should matter.

[Titus]

I really enjoyed playing this game, and following it after I died.

Well played mich. As you'll see in the dead thread I was between u and kraska in MyLo. Surprised town didn't consider more:

1) why would blitz use the doc claim to try to save herself later in the game, but if elyse was scum, she'd have had to be the doc yet she claimed VT D1 at L-1???
2) and if elyse went before shadow, shadow would have been autolynched after elyse had fake claimed VT as scum doc, and shadow confirmed that fake claim day 2.

Overall I was okay with the balance. I thought both sides played fairly well (town reading other town correctly, scum with some good calls on NKs), and to have it come down to a MyLo scum win confirms it for me.

Thanks for modding CT!

I fake claimed doc because no buddies were on me. I physically felt like shit and wagon composition was bad so I needed to survive longer. I expected to die though.

[karnos]

I think I get lynched as town every time. People should start looking at my meta. I mean, maybe I should change my playstyle, but TBH then it'll look even faker because I'll try to look like I'm playing in a style I don't like to play in. Blah.

[Transcend]

Scum PT? Or did someone object..

[mhsmith0]

mhsmith, while I agree with you that the mafia doctor was very powerful in this setup, I think you are severely underestimating the town power here.

If the tracker tracks the mafia doc to one of his partners, it's difficult for the doc to find a claim that can explain that action. Doctor doesn't work, as it's likely the most scummy member of the mafia team that was protected. I would probably have to claim either jailkeeper or roleblocker in that situation, but both of those are obvious scumclaims given the other powers the town has. Similarly, Vanilla Cop/Neapolitan is also too much investigative power, so the mafia vanilla cop also has trouble fakeclaiming. If the tracker targets any of the scumteam during the night and survives, there is a good chance that scummember will be lynched as a result.

Similarly, even though the gunsmith isn't as strong as a full cop (1 incorrect innocent, 1 incorrect guilty), he can also detect two of the mafia members.

Finally, the vig. If mafia doc prevents the vig shot, then that effectively functions as a guilty result on the player targeted (as could be seen during night 3). If he shoots 2 town players, town gains a mislynch. And if he shoots 1 townplayer, he becomes conftown himself, without actually costing town a lynch (as his target would likely have been lynched anyway).

Add the bodyguard, who should help keep conftownplayers (vig/investigative/investigative results) alive and confirm himself town in the process.

Basically, scum used it's nightabilities optimally this game, killing both investigative roles night 1 and night 2, preventing a vig kill, then killing confirmed innocents night 3 and 4. Yet we still lost 2 scummembers (at least partially) to night interactions. blitz' fakeclaim wasn't believable given town power, and the vig shot on shadow essentially functioned as a guilty investigation. If perfect nightactions leave you with 1 scummember who needs to dodge 4 kills (lynch, vig shot, lynch, lynch), I don't think you can call the mafia abilities overpowered.

Wrt balance, consider the simple scum setup of goon-goon-roleblocker. That's generally considered to be a pretty solid amount of scum power, so the question becomes, is scum here more or less powerful than that. The answer is more... a lot more.

Start with the vig. A roleblocker can stop vig shots. But a block on vig still has good odds to save a townie. Meanwhile, a mafia doc keeps the feature of potentially stopping vig shots on scum without having any chance to accidentally save a townie.

Next, the gunsmith. This one is obvious: scum doctor gets a fake innocent (much like a godfather vs a cop), while roleblocker semi outs his existence by giving gunsmith no result.

Next, the tracker. Here, you have TWO non killing scum roles, neither of which result in obvious sketchy outcomes, such as a roleblocker migth cause someone to know they were roleblocked. When as a tracker you see someone visit someone else who doesn't die, you generally consider it an innocent result (all the more so if there are multiple night deaths), and don't much question why they visited (mafia doctor action, if sketchy as a doc protect, could easily instead be a pro town jailkeep, for instance, for all the tracker would know).

And bg/ascetic are both essentially useless. Bg can only "confirm" himself by dying, which is really only useful to protect a really strong town role, or a hard confirmed town, neither of which this game had. Ascetic is a named townie that could reasonably be a policy lynch for setup spec reasons.

Moreover, scum has an every night investigative role (especially if/when they realize the vig is out of shots, since then doc can kill if needed). This means that towns only real edge here, namely the existence of a bunch of named roles (even if they're almost all crappy), is undermined by scum teams ability to narrow down who is or isn't VT.

So basically every single ability of town is actively countered by scum power, AND town roles don't work well together (vig works badly with bg and gunsmith), AND three of the four active town roles are limited shot.

The only real thing town had going for it design wise was lack of day chat. But overall it was very scum sided by MS standards, with town powers badly coordinated and scum powers substantial. I think the reviewers over-valued the sheer number of town roles and under-valued how much power scum had and how badly the town powers worked together.

Ps here are the mini normal setups I've been involved in:

1823 mod
Goon encryptor 1-shot strongman
Vs vig, tracker, doctor, 1-shot bp

1782 player
Encryptor, odd night ninja, even night jk
Vs follower neighbor, voyeur neighbor, odd night jk, even night rb

1775 player
Encryptor goon goon
Vs jailkeeper, universal backup, JOAT (cop/watcher/commuter/bodyguard)

Each was way more town sided compared to this one.

[mhsmith0]

Also mini not normal, radjas GoT mafia

2-shot janitor, 1-shit bp, tracker
Vs IC, watcher, odd night vig, bodyguard, plus flavor that gave town info

[MichelSableheart]

I agree with you that scum has more power then goon/goon/roleblocker. Doc is comparable to roleblocker in the way it counters the town powers, so the vanilla cop is added bonus.

What I disagree with is your assessment that town is weak.

Start with the vig. If the vig gets off two shots, even on town, he has gained town a lynch. (suppose that nero shot karnos night 1, and all other nightkills and lynches remain the same. Then day 4 would see Nero, Giga, Kraska, Elyse and me alive, with Nero and giga confirmed and me needing 2 mislynches). The only way a vig kill will be stopped is if he targets a mafiamember, which in lategame spec is similar to a guilty result (see the day 3 discussion). The vig, even 2 shot, is a very strong role in this situation.

Next, the gunsmith. He gets a fake guilty on the vig, but the vig has provable actions, so that's unlikely to lead to a mislynch. Other then that, he gets a correct guilty on 2 out of 3 mafia members. That's not as strong as a full cop, but is still an extremely useful role.

Third, the tracker. This role gets a correct guilty on 1 out of 3 mafia members, and severely limits the ability of the other two mafia members to fakeclaim, as he may have contradictory results. If IAI had tracked me night 1 and survived, I would have to claim jailkeeper/roleblocker and coordinate that claim with shadow during night 1. Once shadow claimed vanilla cop during day 2, I didn't have a good claim that could explain my night 1 action anymore. Again, tracker is not as strong as a full cop, but it is a second strong investigative role.

The bodyguard is far from useless. It increases the chances that the strong roles in the setup (vig and 2x investigative) survive to use their abilities. If thor had protected IAI night 1, town would have had a guilty result on blitz. Even if it fails at protecting the powerroles early (as was the case here), it can still force the mafia to nightkill the bodyguard rather then the player they wanted to target. I had to keep Giga alive to Mylo because you protected Nero.

The weakest role of the 5(!) is the ascetic, but even that role functions as a named townie with a confirmable ability, so is not completely useless.

Sure, most of the townroles were limited to 2 or 3 shots, but that's all a town powerrole can hope for anyway. Surviving as a town powerrole to day 4 is rare, so the limited number of shots is not a huge downside.

My estimation is that scum was stronger then a usual scumteam, and town was stronger then a usual town (I would rate this town as stronger then any you listed). That's why I rate this game balanced, but swingy.

[MichelSableheart]

Let's compare the towns you listed to this one:

1823: 2 shot vig is marginally weaker then full vig, tracker is the same. bodyguard is somewhat weaker then doctor, ascetic is somewhat weaker then 1 shot bulletproof, but gunsmith adds a very strong investigative role.

1782: follower & voyeur is a slightly weaker investigative role combination than tracker & gunsmith, but it becomes similar when you add in their neighbour status. That leaves the JK/RB combination, who together have an action every night. Their actions are unlikely to have more impact than those of the vig, however, and this town has the bodyguard and ascetic on top of that.

1775: universal backup has a similar impact on the game as the bodyguard, in that it helps town powerroles survive, though it's somewhat stronger. The JOAT has far less investigative power then the tracker/gunsmith combination (gunsmith is close enough to cop that the added tracker makes the combination stronger then a single full cop), and the jailkeeper will have a weaker impact then the vig. Add the ascetic for added town power here.

the mini theme: odd night vig is weaker then 2 shot vig, bodyguard is the same, watcher is comparable to tracker, IC is weaker then gunsmith (who can also get guilty results). This comparison is therefore fully dependent on the strenght of the flavour info and comes closest, but if the flavour has impact comparable to the named townie status of the ascetic, then this town is stronger.

[mhsmith0]

1823:
2-shot vig is WAY weaker than vig, bodyguard is WAY weaker than full doc. Full doc can outright prevent multiple kills, and can travel every night (so tracker can see) with no risk of the action killing him. Full doc and bodyguard are not even slightly comparable. Hell, just look at this game. If Thor is a full doc he probably docs the gunsmith n2, and now we are back to odds with another investigative shot. Or barring that, my save on Nero would have also put us back on odds AND confirmed me town WITHOUT my dying.

Ascetic is not slightly weaker than 1-shot bp either. It is massively weaker. Bp is a pro town role that forces scum to waste an extra night kill to eliminate, which means that a strong town player can dominate a game with a bp.

Doc+vig or doc+tracker can lead to weaker versions of "follow the cop", which was the main reason I gave scum a 1-shot strongman (also had a chance to use it on the bp).

As far as gunsmith goes, it can get a false guilty on the vig (and out them both) or a false into on the mafia doctor. Moreover, the limited shots means that there's a strong incentive to out early since here aren't many shots left, which changes the game play of the role a lot.

1782:
Town essentially has three decent powers and one joke power (voyeur). The town powers are a bit nerfed by odd/even, but they have the potential to go late game and really hurt scum. As it was scum killed town PRs basically by accident, but we got an n2 block on scum that opened the floodgates to a relatively easy town win.

1775:
The main reason we lost was that maestro game threw. JOAT has two strong investigates in cop/watch, and the watch power was wasted when n2 it could have spotted the second scum.

Mini: odd night vig is basically the same as 2-shot. Small chance of dying n2 vs small chance of getting a third shot. Watcher is WAY stronger than tracker, basically comparable to alignment cop. But the big town edge was flavor; janitor potentially screws it up, but otherwise it's solvable by flavor. Without flavor it's comparable to this one, with scum power set up to counter town flavor (three scum PRs AND day talk was too much scum power).

[mhsmith0]

I man, you guys played well, and congrats, but this game probably shouldn't have passed normal review. At best it was BARELY within reasonable boundaries. I'm quite curious to see the review thread actually, tbh.

[mhsmith0]

Of course bitching about setup isn't super useful, so here's how I'd be more balanced while keeping the concept:

1) all scum become macho (or MAYBE all but doc). This means that doc is now ONLY useful against the gunsmith, and vig is no longer massively nerfed

2) vanilla cop becomes even night. Scum get a small bit of investigative power, but it's not game changing like an every night v cop is.

If that's too far to town, then I'd turn the goon into encryptor or pull the ascetic (who I'd presume was added just as a throwaway bit of power to town to make up for their overall lack of power)

[mhsmith0]

Another interesting idea would be to switch the doc/bg so town gets the full doctor, and scum gets the bodyguard. That way bg can be used as a false inno to tracker, or a cover on the v cop (though thats unwise IMO), but is essentially just a throwaway scum power instead of one that's super OP against the given town powers.

[MichelSableheart]

The problem is that you can not significantly nerf scum while keeping tracker+gunsmith+vig+bodyguard in the game. This is a mini. With the vig in the game, mafia only gets 4 nightkills to work with. Each of the four named roles is provable and therefore unlynchable. Mafia has to hit these four powerroles with their four nightkills, or is forced to take a confirmed innocent into Mylo/Lylo regardless of the actual nightactions of these four powerroles.

Yet the tracker and the gunsmith can create more confirmed innocents, and the vig can reduce the lynch pool as well. Even if they never target scum (which would mean the doctor has no effect whatsoever), scum risks losing simply due to process of elimination.

Your main complaint seems to be that scum doctor massively nerfs the vig. This is not the case. An important function of the vig, getting rid of scummy looking town, is completely unaltered by the scum doc. And even if the scum doc does stop a vig kill, that is essentially the same as a guilty investigation in this setup. As you can see from the discussion of day 3, once it's clear that there are a vig and a gunsmith in the game, scum doctor becomes a logical conclusion, which means that the failed vig kill must have been on scum.

You can alter something in the margins, like getting rid of the X-shot on the gunsmith (what is the chance he will live past night 4 to make use of that?) or the X-shot on the bodyguard, but you can't significantly nerf the doc without getting rid of town power.

[callforjudgement]

@mhsmith0: Note that in many setups, Bodyguard is stronger than Doctor. (In this setup, it's weaker in general because it's a kill/protect setup;

however

it turned out stronger in the actual events in the game, as the Bodyguard used the ability to die in the place of a confirmed townie, meaning the lynch pool was one player smaller than it would have been; a Doctor shot would have lead to no net benefit.)

[mhsmith0]

Actually it was massively weaker, as a doc shot would have put game back on odds and nearly confirmed the doc as town since what kind of dumb scum no shoots there.

[mhsmith0]

I think we disagree on a few basic things:

1) the vig itself and its functionality in this setup

you think vig/bg/gunsmith is a good set of town powers to have. It isn't. It's a terrible set, because they coordinate really really badly. Gunsmith can easily out the vig early, and bg can accidentally save a scum. Vig is by nature a swingy role; throwing in those two roles nerfs the vig pretty notably.

And then vig is even further nerfed by being two shot and by having a scum doctor (which in this context is WAY more powerful than a roleblocker against the vig, since rb can easily save a town, while doc is just going to save scum). Basically, a two-shot vig is negative EV against a scum doc UNLESS town has the ability to outright stop another night kill (jk or doc or rb or commuter/hider etc.). So mechanically speaking, a 2-shot vig is reasonably likely to only have one kill go through (double shooting or shooting a protected scum), which makes it merely a role that puts town on evens, which really isn't much use, ESPECIALLY given the reasonable likelihood that vig shoots a town PR.

So mechanically, a two-shot vig is a really bad fit in this setup. A full vig also I think doesn't work well given gunsmith and scum doc, I'd actually think a full jailkeeper instead, which adds some swing and can screw with either town (tracker/gunsmith) or scum (vanilla cop) investigatives, and is a role that's very powerful late game.

Alternatively, doc and 1-shot bp coordinate nicely with a vig, far better than bg and ascetic, so at least town gets meaningful kill prevention power as compensation for the scum power and the vig/gs poor fit.

2) gunsmith with a false guilty (vig) false inno (mafia doc) and fake claimable guilty (mafia vanilla cop) is super nerfed, even before the 3-shots. As much as I hate cops, it should have been a 3-shot cop with that much power set up to screw with it. Tracker is ALSO nerfed, since it has multiple scum roles that visit at night and can suggest false innocents.

3) town lacked a single super strong role to build the game around. No full vig, no masons, no alignment cop. If town isn't going to have a really big role to build around, it needs roles that work reasonably well together, and/or basically no scum power. Instead it got roles that worked badly together, and a lot of scum power opposing it. This is a setup that's going to be won by scum probably around 2/3 of the time as a closed setup IMO on MS. I'd say that's really pushing the boundaries of balance.

Ps take a look at this thread
http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=67307

Personally, I think power distribution shouldn't deviate too far from this:

3 Goons - 3 Strong Powers OR 4 Middling to Strong Powers
2 Goons, 1 Mafia PR - 4 Strong Powers OR 5 Middling to Strong Powers
1 Goon, 2 Mafia PR's - 5 Middling to Strong Powers

In terms of that philosophy, there were two mafia PRs here, and five town roles of middling ability that worked badly together.

t with that said, I do agree that mods/reviewers are often too quick to nerf things, and everyone forgets that towns are really really stupid. A tracker or rolecop isn't the kind of information role that can carry a town. (And the scum seriously do not need a roleblocker to counter a tracker/doctor combination,

or a mafia doctor against a two-shot vig.)

A bodyguard is just a buffer; stronger protective roles help not just an individual town, but actively make the meta a better place by discouraging scum from shooting the most obvious targets. I don't know why voyeurs are even a thing.

Cough, cough

For the most part, I think the simplest way to produce a balanced game is to include a Cop or Masons but they're a very blunt tool in terms of creating balance as you always have confirmed players in the game, and understandably some mods don't like using this role.

The challenge is to create a balanced game when these roles aren't present, and I think it's necessary that the town has multiple full-power roles, like Watcher, Tracker, Jailkeeper, Gunsmith etc, with scum getting no more than a 1-shot RB.

The dinky little weak PR's that can on either team like 1-shot Doc, Even-Night Role Cop etc, should be like garnish on the finished setup to make it a bit unpredictable, and not really counted when tallying up the power you've given to town. But I'll talk about that more when I do this:

[chilledtea]

Sorry I was away and very busy so I couldn't update the mafia thread.

Mafia Thread Link

[callforjudgement]

I think we disagree on a few basic things:

1) the vig itself and its functionality in this setup

you think vig/bg/gunsmith is a good set of town powers to have. It isn't. It's a terrible set, because they coordinate really really badly. Gunsmith can easily out the vig early, and bg can accidentally save a scum. Vig is by nature a swingy role; throwing in those two roles nerfs the vig pretty notably.

For what it's worth, I'm increasingly coming to believe that it makes sense for a vig to claim when they have one shot left, unless they suspect a roleblocker in the setup or have missed a kill. Scum can't kill them in time to blank their shot, and the vig can confirm themself by claiming their shot. That would also prevent accidentally blanking the gunsmith.

Additionally, a vigilante and bodyguard don't really interfere. I can believe a bodyguard accidentally protecting scum, but if the scum in question is playing townishly enough that a bodyguard might protect them, it's very unlikely that the vigilante will shoot them on the same night.

Finally, it's worth noting that the town roles have to be at cross-purposes for the setup to be remotely balanced. A 3-shot gunsmith who's immune to being accidentally killed or mislynched before they get full use of their power role balances an otherwise vanilla 10:3 by themself. (The 10:3-with-gunsmith setup is only scumsided because the gunsmith might end up dying early.) And town have so much power on top of that!

And then vig is even further nerfed by being two shot and by having a scum doctor (which in this context is WAY more powerful than a roleblocker against the vig, since rb can easily save a town, while doc is just going to save scum). Basically, a two-shot vig is negative EV against a scum doc UNLESS town has the ability to outright stop another night kill (jk or doc or rb or commuter/hider etc.). So mechanically speaking, a 2-shot vig is reasonably likely to only have one kill go through (double shooting or shooting a protected scum), which makes it merely a role that puts town on evens, which really isn't much use, ESPECIALLY given the reasonable likelihood that vig shoots a town PR.

A roleblocker would be much more useful for scum,

because

it can save a townie from being vigged. Blocking a vig shot on a townie is typically good for scum, as the townie in question is quite likely to end up mislynched (if they weren't, why would you vig them?) and thus giving scum an additional kill. (Especially because if a vig kill on a player is prevented, that strongly suggests that the player is not town-aligned.)

2) gunsmith with a false guilty (vig) false inno (mafia doc) and fake claimable guilty (mafia vanilla cop) is super nerfed, even before the 3-shots. As much as I hate cops, it should have been a 3-shot cop with that much power set up to screw with it. Tracker is ALSO nerfed, since it has multiple scum roles that visit at night and can suggest false innocents.

It has to be nerfed given how powerful the role is when it isn't. (It should be noted that we assumed the players would guess the presence of a mafia doctor. They did.)

3) town lacked a single super strong role to build the game around. No full vig, no masons, no alignment cop. If town isn't going to have a really big role to build around, it needs roles that work reasonably well together, and/or basically no scum power. Instead it got roles that worked badly together, and a lot of scum power opposing it. This is a setup that's going to be won by scum probably around 2/3 of the time as a closed setup IMO on MS. I'd say that's really pushing the boundaries of balance.

The game was swingy enough as it is (mostly due to the Mafia Doctor; if they died early, a town win would be almost inevitable). Concentrating town's power in a single strong role would make things even swingier. (As it is, town had several roles that gave a lot of information by themselves. If the bodyguard stops a kill, that leaves the lynch pool one player smaller than it would otherwise unless the bodyguard was already confirmed by other means. The vigilante is also unlikely to get lynched as they can claim to save themselves; that removed two players from the lynch pool in the actual game. Removing three players via night actions is close to balanced.)