Changes to Normal Games (update September 2022)

[Skygazer]

Hmmm.

With the Day specific modifier and the informed modifier, would revealing information to a player on a specific day be considered normal?

[Skygazer]

thats easy, just have backup one-shot loyal friendly-neighbor neighborizer

...

[Skygazer]

Apologies if this was brought up already, but a counterpart to the "Lazy" modifier such as "Procrastinating" could be cool. A modifier that only allows the role to function if there's only one scum left. Could be used to reduce swing (in a game with lots of protectives there could be a procrastinating strongman), or even potentially swap the setup around a bit when there's only one scum left ("lazy tracker" gets replaced with a "procrastinating motion detector").

It also has the potential to throw a major wrench into setup spec so I think it would have to be used with care.

[Skygazer]

Ya I feel like there are many scenarios in which it could be used very poorly by a game designer! I feel like I can think of a lot more "bad" uses than "good," which probably wouldn't be ideal for Normalcy?

Those two examples (used as a scum modifier or tied to another role with a town lazy modifier) are the only two examples I could think of that were negative feedback. Other than "procrastinating compulsive loyal vigilante" which should never see the light of day

[Skygazer]

Has there ever been any thought or discussion on making the Publishing modifier normal? I think it's a fairly cool mechanic that doesn't seem terribly abnormal to me... Granted it can be fairly overpowered depending on the context! It kind of eliminates the need for PRs to out after getting guilties which is kind of a big balance concern. And it would be one of the few sources of known-to-be-true info that town has. It probably would have to be paired with a 1-shot on stronger investigative roles or some other limiting modifier.

[Skygazer]

Not in the NRG but disabler would probably be a little too iffy for normal games considering someone who lands the disabled role will have no idea what's going on, I'd imagine.

If you want to emulate that mechanic in a normal game you could probably do a role with a useless modifier and make a backup of that role without the modifier. Like having a combined doctor-vig with a backup vig or something like that maybe?

[Skygazer]

It would be interesting to run a game where the deadlines are (# of living players + 1) days. Day one in a 13p mini would be 14 days, 3p elo would be 4 days...

Would a lack of deadlines be considered normal?

[Skygazer]

rename it to the paranormal queue and only allow spooky roles

Impersonal and Procrastinating are also ideas worth considering, being the inverted version of Personal and Lazy respectively.

Nthing

[Skygazer]

snip

This all seems really reasonable as well. I kind of wish Traitor wasn't Normal just because it's such a weird mechanic

[Skygazer]

I'm tempted to agree with Ali for kind of the same reason I think traitors shouldn't be normal; it can drastically alter the scumhunting dynamic in a way that just doesn't mesh with normalcy in my mind. They also feel much harder to balance around in my mind.

There is an upside in multiball in that it can help with game pacing which is good for larges

[Skygazer]

I think you could make cases that multiball is a reasonable expectation. You could also probably argue that it deviates from what you might see in a "standard" game of mafia these days. Ultimately I don't think removing multiball would really have *too much* of an impact on the normal queue since it's usually announced in advance anyways (so no one would really be caught off guard by it). I'd imagine more options for game design is better than less options.

I realized that it's not actually required to divulge multiball in normals apparently. I kind of wish that was a requirement. I also kind of wish mods had to divulge faction ratios in normals (ie: hey everyone, this game is 13:4).

[Skygazer]

I guess listing faction numbers would spoil any hail mary vig claims coming from a serial killer. Maybe it could be something like "there are three members of the mafia in this game." I don't know, maybe others won't agree, but I feel like having to guess at that on rare occasions (say, in an 11p game or 15p game) is kind of at odds with normalcy.

[Skygazer]

Informed Bulletproof Goon would be technically legal (although there would be a lot to consider there...). Post restrictions aren't normal, though. That sounds like a theme mechanic tbh

edit:

Post Restrictions (other than those included in the ruleset, such as "No quoting your Role PM").

That might actually be allowed, but it could probably be argued that such a mechanic goes beyond what one might expect in a typical game of mafia.

[Skygazer]

One of the problems I can think of is that it might be advantageous to out the info, which the restriction is put in to prevent... but there are also probably situations (especially towards endgame) where it makes sense for scum to out it anyways and have their bp informed goon eat a modkill intentionally.

[Skygazer]

I was thinking more along the lines of "either side can out a member of the other side to do a 1 for 1 trade" which could be useful if one scum team hasn't lost anyone and the other is down to just the informed BP.

[Skygazer]

honestly i think that might be a good point from random nurse... we have novice, even night, odd night already, so it might be cleaner wrt role names to have another modifier?

although tbh any phase-based modifier is considered normal (i've seen prime-night used in a normal game a while back), so in my personal opinion i would have nothing against something like "less than night x" modifiers or something like that if it makes the role name look more aesthetically pleasing

[Skygazer]

actually night 1-3 might be the cleanest way tbh

[Skygazer]

What exactly makes it non-Normal?

I feel like most of my suggestions get shot down with little rationale behind it. What kind of bounds should I work within when trying to think up new Normal roles/modifiers?

I just want to add to this: I believe most of the normal roles are considered normal because they were used a lot in themes to the point where they became commonplace (and don't have anything too funky going on). The normal queue is supposed to be representative of typical games where a player can kind of have set expectations that nothing too wild will happen. I think this idea that normals should be "typical" is becoming even more important now that the Newbie Queue has closed and Newbies are being directed to play normals and approved opens.