Shorter deadlines question for the community

[MichelSableheart]

For me, I can reliably spend time on a mafia game about once a day. Posting more then once a day might be possible on some days, but can't happen reliably.

Given that, shortening deadlines will greatly reduce the number of posts I can make in a single day. Because of this, I'm unlikely to play in anything that has a deadline shorter then 10 days, and would prefer a 3 week over a 2 week deadline. I even would prefer games without a deadline at all (a lynch occurs when a decision has been reached) if they had mechanics that prevent stagnancy, though this has less to do with the fact that I can only post once a day, and more with the fact that deadline lynches have a tendency of creating a game pattern where things are stagnant for a large period of time, and only reach a flurry of activity when deadline approaches.

[MichelSableheart]

That's a different type of stagnancy then what I'm talking about, though. I'm not talking about pure activity, but about impetus towards a lynch.

In my experience, lynches well before deadline are extremely rare. In fact, bandwagons that could viably lead to a lynch seem to almost only happen when deadline is close by. Players are willing to compromise to prevent a no lynch at deadline, but they seem to be unwilling to compromise on a lynch when deadline isn't looming.

As a mechanic to prevent that kind of stagnancy, deadlines work, kind of, but they are an extremely crude tool for the job. Most of the game remains stagnant, with a flurry to reach a lynch in the last 24-48 hours. If a mechanic could be found to encourage players to compromise throughout the game, I would much prefer that.

I'm not entirely sure what such a mechanic would need to be. I'm thinking perhaps something like prods for players on vanity wagons? "You're the only one voting player X. Noone has joined you in the past 72 hours. You have 48 hours to convince someone to join you or to change your vote" (times dependent on desired game speed, obviously).