Chicken Scratch [Game 2: Endgame]

[Cheetory6]

Premise:

Chicken Scratch is a game of drawing, deciphering and betrayal. Players will be bird employees working at a small business trying to take care of their daily workload. The catch is that one player is a disgruntled worker known as the Botcher, who wants to see the company fail.

Game flow:

Work Stage

- At the start of the day, each player will be given a case file with a name, say, "the Timmins Case", which will contain a prompt made up of a prefix descriptor and a noun that it applies to. They'll have to draw the prompt within a time limit. Once the time limit has been reached or all players have submitted their drawings, a botching interlude will take place in which the Botcher will have the opportunity to sabotage one of the cases.

Next the cases will be passed on to another set of players. Those players will have to describe what they think the original prompt was based on the drawing they received (the prefix and the noun).
Once all prompts have been submitted, the cases will be passed along to be drawn by another set of players, and so on until all but one player has contributed to the case. The case will then be passed along to the final worker in each chain, who will have to pick out what they think the original descriptor words were from a list of randomly generated possibilities.

The structure of a case will look like this:
Original Prompt -> Player drawing -> Player prompt -> Player drawing -> Player prompt -> Player drawing -> Player guess

The results of the work stage will be presented in the game thread to all of the workers, revealing how successful they were in getting to the original prompt.
If any four case files had their original prompts guessed correctly, then the game immediately ends in a worker win.

Accusation Stage

- Players will then be able to vote for who they think has been intentionally trying to lead to derail the cases. Voting will have typical majority hammer rules. There is no night phase in this game, but rather instead a limited number of voting opportunities.
Players will start with a single vote round, but will get an extra voting round if at least half of the words were guessed correctly.

The botcher wins if players fail to vote them out before they've run out of votes.

Deadlines:

Drawing phases

- 72 hours

Botcher interludes

- 24 hours

Prompting phases

- 24 hours

Guessing phases

- 24 hours

Vote phase

- 72 hours

Status

:

Interlude

Spoiler: Game Two

Players

:

-BipolarChemist
-GeorgeBailey
-Datisi
-hellbooks
-RH9
-Not_Mafia
-Cheery Dog

Case Status

:

AHRIMAN FILE:

Complete!

ANURADHA FILE:

Complete!

DAVONTE FILE:

Complete!

HERSHEL FILE:

Complete!

KARSTEN FILE:

Complete!

METODIJ FILE:

Complete!

PALLABI FILE:

Complete!

Spoiler: Game One

Players

:

-Cheery Dog
-GeorgeBailey
-BipolarChemist
-hellbooks

Case Status

:

CHIFUNIRU FILE:

Complete!

DIARMAID FILE:

Complete!

OUSMANE FILE:

Complete!

VILHELM FILE:

Complete!

JUMMAI FILE:

Complete!

NINOCHKA FILE:

Complete!

THORBORG FILE:

Complete!

ZVIADI FILE:

Complete!

[Cheetory6]

• Picture/sentence standards:
  
  
• Any drawing program--Photoshop, Flash, MS Paint--will do. Drawing pictures by hand and scanning them will also do. Making a diorama with paper cutouts and silly putty and sending a photograph of that will do. The sky is pretty much the limit here. In fact, if you can get your hands on one of those airplanes that draws pictures out of fake clouds, then the sky is literally the limit here.
  
• Having said that, please draw everything from scratch. You can use Google Images as a reference, but don't paste other people's pictures into your own.
  
• Words are completely banned. English letters used to denote words, and codes (camel octopus dinosaur eagle snake), will also be sent back with a stern warning, although if it's relevant you can use them to portray the alphabet. Numbers and symbols and math are all fine.
  
• Pictures should be 800 pixels wide by 600 pixels tall. Please don't go too far over that; some of us have tiny laptop screens. Photographs are best saved as JPGs; otherwise, if in doubt, you should probably save as a PNG. Do not save as a BMP under any circumstances or I'll have to ask you to reformat it before sending it onward, and nobody wants that.
  
• Please be mindful of where you upload your pictures to. Tinypic deletes its pictures without warning, and anything uploaded to the wiki is accessible by other players. Most people use Imgur or Discord uploads these days.
  
• When you upload, don't save it under a name that will hint at its origins. This is something else that you'll need to reformat over.
  
• Prompts must be limited to a descriptor word and a noun. I'll generally be kind of lenient with this.
  
• Keep in mind that regardless of how you format your prompt submissions, I will be uppercasing them for standardizing purposes.
  
• Please don't break the site rules. Keep it reasonably safe for work, and preferably not too gross. Please don't make chains about poop, okay?
  
• I am one of those spirit-of-the-game type hippies. If I'm forgetting a rule, I'll let you know. You might be asked to resubmit in light of this.

• Miscellaneous:
  
  
• Please don't talk to other players about the sentences/pictures you got. If somebody tells you anything about a chain you haven't seen yet, please let me know.
  
• I will note in-thread if somebody is behind.
  
• If you haven't sent a link in within the deadline for a picture, I'll send you a prod. Other actions may be taken if you receive multiple prods.
  
• Have fun! If you aren't having fun, you should talk to me about it, and I'll do my best to find you a replacement. You can also talk to me when you are having fun, of course.

Credit to Ether/the Telephone Cat for the ruleset and for generally being the wizard who made Telephone Pictionary a thing in the first place which a lot of this ruleset is based on.

[Cheetory6]

If you have any questions about how the game works feel free to post them here, full disclaimer that I have no idea how well this will work!

[Cheetory6]

I'm simplifying the setup and reducing playercount to four, will see if anyone else is interested!

[Cheetory6]

Sending out PMs shortly!

[Cheetory6]

First round is starting! Going to lock the thread for now. If you have any questions about anything feel free to send them to me via PM.

Also, added some updated drawing/prompting rules to the second post. Let me know if anything is unclear.

[Cheetory6]

Update: Hand drawn drawings are okay, for anyone who had been considering that option before my updated ruleset got posted.

[Cheetory6]

I have all of the drawings but going to resolve deadline in the morning because work is all consuming tonight! Sorry all!

[Cheetory6]

BOTCHER PHASE: A BIG COVERUP PART I

It's time for botching! During the first round's botcher phases, the botcher will be given the option to cover up part of one of the drawings to try to obscure part of the original meaning of the case.
They now have

(expired on 2022-03-30 09:00:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Captioning Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-03-31 09:30:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

Still missing some drawings for this phase, extending deadline to tomorrow:

(expired on 2022-04-04 13:30:00)

[Cheetory6]

BOTCHER PHASE: A BIG COVERUP PART II

It's time for botching! Same as before, during the first round's botcher phases, the botcher will be given the option to cover up part of one of the drawings to try to obscure part of the original meaning of the case.
They now have

(expired on 2022-04-05 14:00:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Guess round is out, players have (expired on 2022-04-06 15:00:00) to make their guesses as to the original meaning of the case.

[Cheetory6]

RESULTS:

Spoiler: CHIFUNIRU CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Captioning[hellbooks]:

Second Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Guess[GeorgeBailey]:

Spoiler: DIARMAID CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Captioning[Cheery Dog]:

Second Drawing[hellbooks]:

Guess[BipolarChemist]:

Spoiler: OUSMANE CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Captioning[GeorgeBailey]:

Second Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Guess[hellbooks]:

Spoiler: VILHELM CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[hellbooks]:

Captioning[BipolarChemist]:

Second Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Guess[Cheery Dog]:

[Cheetory6]

Spoiler: Results Round Summary

CHIFUNIRU FILE:

FRIGHTENED LIBRARY vs

DIVINE DIAMOND

DIARMAID FILE:

SARCASTIC BEER vs

ROMANTIC ACTOR

OUSMANE FILE:

LUCKY OPERATION vs

QUESTIONABLE

OPERATION

VILHELM FILE:

QUIRKY FRIENDSHIP vs

SPARKLING FUTURE

Because of the results of the first round, it may or may not make sense to continue playing or move directly to the accusation phase. Players now have 48 hours to discuss the results of the first round and vote for whether they want to continue with the second round or not by posting VOTE: CONTINUE ROUND 2 or VOTE: SKIP TO ACCUSE.

You have (expired on 2022-04-08 18:00:00) to reach a decision, a lack of majority vote by deadline will result in continuing to round 2.

[Cheetory6]

With a majority vote we're moving on to the second round!

New Drawing Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-04-10 01:00:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

Still missing some drawings for this phase, extending deadline to day after tomorrow:

(expired on 2022-04-11 10:00:00)

[Cheetory6]

BOTCHER PHASE: ADDING TO THE PROBLEM

It's time for botching! During the second round's botcher phases, the botcher will be able to add prefixes/nouns to the pool of options for the final guess.
They now have

(expired on 2022-04-12 08:00:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Captioning Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-04-13 10:00:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

New Drawing Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-04-16 10:30:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

Flip is going to be delayed until tomorrow, still missing some drawings anyways!

[Cheetory6]

Sorry for the delay! Too much easter chocolate, not enough chicken scratch. Next phase is kicking in now.

BOTCHER PHASE: ADDING TO THE PROBLEM

It's time for botching! During the second round's botcher phases, the botcher will be able to add prefixes/nouns to the pool of options for the final guess.
They now have

(expired on 2022-04-19 13:30:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Guess round is finally out, players have (expired on 2022-04-20 22:30:00) to make their guesses as to the original meaning of their case.

[Cheetory6]

RESULTS:

Spoiler: JUMMAI CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[hellbooks]:

Captioning[Cheery Dog]:

Second Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Guess[BipolarChemist]:

Spoiler: NINOCHKA CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Captioning[hellbooks]:

Second Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Guess[GeorgeBailey]:

Spoiler: THORBORG CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Captioning[BipolarChemist]:

Second Drawing[hellbooks]:

Guess[Cheery Dog]:

Spoiler: ZVIADI CASE

Original Prompt:

First Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Captioning[GeorgeBailey]:

Second Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Guess[hellbooks]:

[Cheetory6]

Spoiler: Results Round Summary

JUMMAI FILE:

FAKE CHICKEN vs

FAKE

MACHINE

NINOCHKA FILE:

NEEDY POTATO vs

NEEDY

POTATO

THORBORG FILE:

BRAINY WEDDING vs

BRAINY

GIFT

ZVIADI FILE:

NEW FOOD vs

NEW

FOOD

Based on the ruleset this is a worker win! (In hindsight the immediate worker wincon needs to be harder or botcher needs more tools but can't really balance things in the middle of the game q_q woops)
Will reveal who the botcher is in 24 hours if they don't want to reveal themselves and people want to try to guess for fun.

Thanks for playing everyone! Sorry if the setup was a little undercooked lol. It's based on a video game I've been working on, but the translation to forum feels a little imperfect/clunky. If anyone has any feedback in general on potential improvements would love to hear it.

[Cheetory6]

Yeah I think my concern is just that so much of the time in the game is spent with the thread locked. If there's two rounds it feels like there should be more opportunity for discussion. Would it maybe make sense for the thread to just stay open so people can talk about stuff for 48 hours? Or is it functionally fine with discussion only when it gets to the end with voting?

[Cheetory6]

Yeah I do think you're right, when I run another I'll only let it fire if it gets to at least six.

[Cheetory6]

Re-using the thread for next game, signups are opening now, will only fire if we hit at least six players!

Notable updates:

Botcher will be able to affect multiple cases during each botcher phase.
There will be only one round, rather than two.
The single round will have three drawing phases and two prompting phases.
Increasing the threshold of correct guesses required for a win to four out of six.

[Cheetory6]

I have no site access from the 12th-16th May, will this affect the game too mich

I think if we're good on deadlines then should be done before then and worst case I can just extend a drawing deadline to cover that time period.

[Cheetory6]

I'm gonna leave signups open until later tomorrow to a cap of 8.

[Cheetory6]

First Drawing Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-04-27 09:00:00)

. Good luck everyone!

[Cheetory6]

BOTCHER PHASE: ADDING TO THE PROBLEM

It's time for botching! During this botcher phase, the botcher will be able to add prefixes/nouns to the pool of options for the final guess.
They now have

(expired on 2022-04-28 21:30:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Captioning Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-04-29 23:00:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

New Drawing Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-05-03 10:00:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

Pushing deadline to tomorrow morning because I'm missing four drawings: (expired on 2022-05-04 10:00:00)

[Cheetory6]

BOTCHER PHASE: A BIG COVERUP

It's time for botching! During this botcher phase, the botcher will be given the option to cover up part of some of the drawings to try to obscure part of the original meaning of the case.
They now have

(expired on 2022-05-05 18:00:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Captioning Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-05-06 21:00:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

New Drawing Phase has begun and will end in

(expired on 2022-05-09 14:00:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

BOTCHER PHASE: MINIMIZING PROBLEMS

It's time for botching! During this botcher phase, the botcher will be given the option to shrink one of the drawings.
They now have

(expired on 2022-05-12 01:00:00)

to do so.

[Cheetory6]

Guess round is finally out after some sad pathetic bad mod error stuff that probably hopefully didn't affect the endgame.
Players have (expired on 2022-05-16 17:00:00) to make their guesses as to the original meaning of their case.

Deadline is longer to accommodate Not_Mafia's potential absence during that timeframe.

[Cheetory6]

RESULTS:

Spoiler: AHRIMAN CASE

Original Prompt: UNPLEASANT BIRD

First Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Captioning[hellbooks]:

Second Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Captioning II[Datisi]:

Third Drawing[Not_Mafia]:

Guess[RH9]:

Spoiler: ANURADHA CASE

Original Prompt: GIANT HOSPITAL

First Drawing[hellbooks]:

Captioning[Cheery Dog]:

Second Drawing[Datisi]:

Captioning II[Not_Mafia]:

Third Drawing[RH9]:

Guess[BipolarChemist]:

Spoiler: DAVONTE CASE

Original Prompt: REPULSIVE SHIRT

First Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Captioning[GeorgeBailey]:

Second Drawing[hellbooks]:

Captioning II[Cheery Dog]:

Third Drawing[Datisi]:

Guess[Not_Mafia]:

Spoiler: HERSHEL CASE

Original Prompt: ROBOTIC SALT

First Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Captioning[Datisi]:

Second Drawing[Not_Mafia]:

Captioning II[RH9]:

Third Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Guess[GeorgeBailey]:

Spoiler: KARSTEN CASE

Original Prompt: ODOROUS FIRE

First Drawing[Datisi]:

Captioning[Not_Mafia]:

Second Drawing[RH9]:

Captioning II[BipolarChemist]:

Third Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Guess[hellbooks]:

Spoiler: METODIJ CASE

Original Prompt: ORIGINAL JET

First Drawing[Not_Mafia]:

Captioning[RH9]:

Second Drawing[BipolarChemist]:

Captioning II[GeorgeBailey]:

Third Drawing[hellbooks]:

Guess[Cheery Dog]:

Spoiler: PALLABI CASE

Original Prompt: FLAWLESS ELBOW

First Drawing[RH9]:

Captioning[BipolarChemist]:

Second Drawing[GeorgeBailey]:

Captioning II[hellbooks]:

Third Drawing[Cheery Dog]:

Guess[Datisi]:

[Cheetory6]

Spoiler: Results Round Summary

AHRIMAN FILE:

UNPLEASANT BIRD vs

RABID

BIRD

ANURADHA FILE:

GIANT HOSPITAL vs

GIANT

HOSPITAL

DAVONTE FILE:

REPULSIVE SHIRT vs

REPULSIVE

SHIRT

HERSHEL FILE:

ROBOTIC SALT vs

FRIGHTENED

FAMILY

KARSTEN FILE:

FLAWLESS ELBOW vs

FLAWLESS

ELBOW

METODIJ FILE:

ORIGINAL JET vs

JUMPY

DRIVER

PALLABI FILE:

ODOROUS FIRE vs

ODOROUS

SIGN

With only three correct guesses we go into the Accusations Phase!

Everyone has

(expired on 2022-05-21 22:30:00)

to come to a decision on who will be fired from the company.

[Cheetory6]

votecount

RH9 [1] - GeorgeBailey

Not Voting - BipolarChemist, Cheery Dog, Datisi, hellbooks, Not_Mafia, RH9

It takes four votes to give someone the pink slip.

Deadline:

(expired on 2022-05-21 22:30:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

votecount

RH9 [3] - Cheery Dog, Datisi, Not_Mafia

Not Voting - BipolarChemist, GeorgeBailey, hellbooks, RH9

It takes four votes to give someone the pink slip.

Deadline:

(expired on 2022-05-21 22:30:00)

.

[Cheetory6]

RH9 has been fired, he was

Spoiler: RESULTS

the Botcher

!

The game has ended in a

Worker Win

!

[Cheetory6]

Overall the game was slightly closer this time, but still getting the overall feeling that it's too hard for the Botcher atm.

I might try running a non-botcher version where it's more like you're playing against the house rather than each other if there's interest for that.

Would love feedback for any aspect of the game if people have it. Otherwise, just wanted to say thanks for playing!

[Cheetory6]

i would enjoy a game where we all compete against each other somehow. or co-operate. though i'm not sure how would a game be designed around that.

The variant I was thinking would be players vs mod where I would get access to some of the botcher mechanics and I'd be trying to sabotage the effort to get a certain number of chains correct. Not sure if it'd have similar clunkiness issues to the current version though.

Is this an existing game or one of your own division?

It's based on a video game I've been working on the last little while. I'd plug it for playtesting but I'm not sure if that's against site rules lol.

[Cheetory6]

Yeah, you're definitely right. I think I'll have to start getting more creative with botching mechanics no matter what if I want to run this again. Drawing to combat against a specific botcher mechanic was something that occurred to me as a possibility, but I hadn't come up with a good solution against that besides just coming up with new botcher mechanics every game, which seems kind of hard with the player as botcher variant.