Commonly Asked Questions on Mafia Theory

[mastina]

One of the main reasons they were made not-explicitly-Normal is that there was no sort of consensus on what the role actually did.

Not for lack of trying, mind you. I could probably dig up three or four topics at minimum between MD and the NRG private forum where we did what we could to try.

(Still bitter my idea wasn't accepted, though. It was rational, it made sense, and it was what most moderators who want the role to be pragmatic use. Treating the role like a commuter, with the modification that if the person they're hiding behind is shot at the hider also dies was perfectly sensible, since all it'd take to include the bit we've tended to associate with hiders of them dieing behind scum is to add an accepted modifier of 'weak' and bingo! Weak hider = a pragmatic, sensible role which could see good use in a game.)

[mastina]

If you're using a role that's capable of detecting more information, such as a Tracker, the exact resolution isn't standardised as far as I know; some mods allow blocked actions to nonetheless be tracked, some mods don't. This doesn't seem to be standardised even in Normals (where it should be standardised). I'm going to ask the NRG for a ruling, because this is a clear omission in the current rules.

My standardization is dependent on the wording of the roleblock action.

If a roleblocker's role PM specifies "causes the action to fail", the player actioning will be seen visiting, because their action

happens

, it just has its effect fail.

If a roleblocker's role PM specifies "prevents the action", the player actioning will not be seen visiting, because their action is prevented from having happened in the first place.

This is why I am so adamant of moderators checking the exact wording of their role PMs. This is not semantics; there are actual distinct differences in effects from word choice.

[mastina]

I cannot believe that town would do worse than random lynching.
When all nightkills are equal (PR-wise)

You need look no further than this to see where your premise goes wrong.

Just because a game's mountainous does not mean all nightkills are equal.

There's a huge difference between selecting Ellibereth as an N1 nightkill and, saaaaay, oh, I dunno, Not_Mafia as an N1 nightkill.

Which do you suppose would more heavily negatively impact the town?

It is precisely for that reason that towns do worse than random lynching: their most competent players, one after another, are killed off, leaving only the most incompetent town players alive. These players are the ones that are scummier, these players are the ones that are less logical, these players are the ones more prone to being manipulated, these players are the ones more prone to being in the extremes of self-doubt or confirmation bias rather than in the ideal happy medium of the two. These players are mislynch bait who frequently don't take the game too seriously--and the scum leave them around, making it easier to blend in with them, or alternatively, to become a "town" leader and take control of them.

If every flock needs a shepherd yet you kill off literally every single town player capable of leading the flock, it isn't too hard for scum to take that role of shepherd and suddenly, they sweep.

[mastina]

Eventually though wouldn't this become less of an issue? To use your example, how would Ellibereth win as scum? If such BoP exists, it makes sense that you'll end up having these same players lose as scum simply for not being killed.

Ellibereth may be the most extreme example of paragon-level town players, but even he is not infallible as town; he can as town delay his gamebreaking, he can as town end up only naming one scum, he can as town fail to name every scum as being scum, so those traits can be played up if he himself is scum--people still trust him enough to give him this leeway and only turn against him when given strong overwhelming evidence of him getting wrong what he

should

get right.

Getting a read on, say, DeasVail wrong is something people wouldn't condemn him for, whereas getting a read wrong on chesskid would be a nail in his coffin. He's perfectly capable of, as scum, manipulating circumstances where he gets reads "wrong" on players he can get wrong reads on, and gets reads right on players he can afford to be right on that he knows he would get right.

And even then

, as I alluded to--not every player is Ellibereth. He is, as said, the most extreme. If HE, the most extreme, is capable of this...then someone who is a less-stellar town player than Ellibereth but still much better as town than scum would be able to pull it off even more flawlessly.