Long term health of mafiascum

[xRECKONERx]

Signups should be automated, too.

Once signups are automated, it'd be as simple as a moderator just choosing a role from a drop-down menu.

[xRECKONERx]

Then we don't need listmods to do a bunch of work!

Then we can just have people signup and give the moderator of each game approval/rejection powers!

[xRECKONERx]

Private Topics should be subthreads of the game, by the way, instead of their own forum.

[Psyche]

I did advertising through google adwords a while ago with my own money as a test case, spending about 20 bucks. I think unless and until the site gets somewhat monetized (even lightly) that it's difficult to maintain an advertising presence though.

fwiw I'm all for statistics being automated, even if it was a simple "enter who is mafia, town, and third party and who won" for each game, then having a player's profile show win, loss records for each type. The issue is I'm not sure who's going to code that, and getting universal adoption would require some concerted effort beyond just the coding.

If we just standardized - even really loosely! - certain posts that the moderator makes, it would be so easy to scrape this stuff on a semi-regular basis.

[Majiffy]

A lot of the suggestions have been technical in nature. The problem there is the amount of man power we have. I can take 1 thing and run with it, I don't have the time or drive to do 10 things. This effort is going to take the whole community to be successful. If there is something you can think of that you can do, share it.

If you ever need sound design or anything else relating to audio, I'm your man.

Everything else I'm pretty useless about. You kids and your techno-gizmo-doodaddies and your inter tubes.

[reinoe]

I did advertising through google adwords a while ago with my own money as a test case, spending about 20 bucks. I think unless and until the site gets somewhat monetized (even lightly) that it's difficult to maintain an advertising presence though

I was mocked for suggesting that a donations bar be moved to the top of the forum for everyone to see.

[xRECKONERx]

I can do marketing, advertising, social media, etc but that's pretty useless to a site that isn't being monetized.

Plus, it's highly unlikely things like that get entrusted to non-staff.

[Zachrulez]

Based on what I see in those numbers, our user retention rate looks like it's gone up not down. The primary problem in need of fixing is that new users has MASSIVELY dropped off.

That's different then. That's not us doing anything wrong, that's people not finding us.

I just opened a private browser and Googled "Mafia Game". We don't show up on the first three pages at all. "Mafia Roles" we're the first listing. "Mafia Online" we're number seven, with epicmafia as number one.

Bing: "Mafia Game", not in the first three pages. "Mafia Roles", third on the list. "Mafia Online", towards the bottom of page 3.

Google again: "Werewolf Game", not in first three pages. "Werewolf Roles", not until page 3.

Search engines aren't finding us well enough I think.

Getting at least to the first page on common mafia searches would definitely help. If you're on page 3 on common mafia searches, you aren't being seen.

[Psyche]

But we are always on the first page, right?

[Casanova]

Based on what I see in those numbers, our user retention rate looks like it's gone up not down. The primary problem in need of fixing is that new users has MASSIVELY dropped off.

That's different then. That's not us doing anything wrong, that's people not finding us.

Or they're finding us but not signing up.

I definitely agree SEO is a major factor, but I think people are underestimating the impact of aesthetics. We may be losing visitors in the first ten seconds.

[Psyche]

no i didn't mean to post that at all

[xRECKONERx]

But we are always on the first page, right?

no

[Psyche]

damn it

[fferyllt]

I did advertising through google adwords a while ago with my own money as a test case, spending about 20 bucks. I think unless and until the site gets somewhat monetized (even lightly) that it's difficult to maintain an advertising presence though.

fwiw I'm all for statistics being automated, even if it was a simple "enter who is mafia, town, and third party and who won" for each game, then having a player's profile show win, loss records for each type. The issue is I'm not sure who's going to code that, and getting universal adoption would require some concerted effort beyond just the coding.

This is the sort of thing that as a game mod I'd want to adopt because I think players would want to play in games they know would be reflected in their stats, which would make my games more attractive

If it could be bundled with something that makes part of the gruntwork of modding easier, I'd adopt it wholeheartedly. A game table with players/replacements, maybe, if the tables were accessible to a votecounter like Thesp coded.

[Kagami]

Imo, keeping stats is dangerous due to the vagaries of game balance.

Players already feel cheated if they lost because they believe other team is too strong, it will be worse if losing becomes a mark on their permanent record.

I would also anticipate far more strategic replacing out, and replacing out is already something that happens too often.

[Phoenicks]

Do we enable a private message or whisper system? Do we ban private messages in play and trust users not to cheat? Do we change the chat so that users can't privately message each other? If someone threatens me via PM on site, I can report the PM; how do we enforce our site rules on chat?

There is no automated process for this atm. Adding one is a reasonable suggestion. With that said all messages are logged so if someone ever says anything inappropriate to you, report it manually via PM to a discussion mod or admin.

Are private messages logged so admins can view them? (I don't think this has ever come up.) If not, I could report fakes manually.

Most of these seem like secondary concerns. If using IRC, anyone could run a game any way they wanted. All you need is channel operator status.

This means you now need a system for deciding who gets channel op. (Say, anyone can open a room and get op status, and players join, like epicmafia.) This still leaves undecided what's considered 'normal'. If you leave night action resolution up to each channel op, then they're hosting instead of a bot. PMs, whispers, and ranks are secondary -- but if we only impose forum mafia onto chat mafia, it will not appeal to players who don't like forum mafia.

I would love a mafiascum chat game. I think it's a lot more involved than we're presuming. (And if I could code something up, I would.)

I don't think we agree at all actually. You say logic, lying and listening, I say apathy and a playerbase that votes and ends games because fuckit we've been playing forever let's just get it over with. Games do not last weeks. They last Months. What I should have said was if I look into joining a Large right now, it would cut into my plans for

Febuary

. In my personal and doubtlessly unpopular opinion I don't think a game day should be longer then 1 week, maximum. There is such a thing as just too damn long.

How often / Where do you play offsite? Everywhere else I've ever tried uses Power Roles way more than we do. That's what I mean by logic, lying, and listening. Games here do last inordinately long; I like it that way but agree with your point that 'normal' here is abnormal everywhere else.

I agree with what I quoted: the Micro Queue, an innovation here, is normal everywhere else.

It would be highly undesirable for mods to just start running 48h deadline games without making it VERY clear that it was a function of their game. As I said before, the queue structure forces an amount of homogeneity and deadline times fit into that.

What about a new queue?

Most would-be-hosts don't slink off because they can't host C9++ or Fire and Ice; they want to host large games with new roles and flavor.

Could we try something like our Large Game queue that has much relaxed modding requirements, in exchange for requiring much shorter deadlines? Could we have a queue that works like players are used to from other sites?

Players who want the style we're used to with week-long phases would still, of course, create demand and supply for the kinds of games we're used to. And if deadlines are much shorter (say, 48 hours), would we need such heavy requirements on modding?

People are conflating "fad" with "trend" -- we're not saying we should all go out and buy Furbys.

Great post.

[Phoenicks]

Also, on newbie games:

I liked 2of4 much more than Matrix6, and stopped joining as an SE entirely because I didn't like the new setup. Am I the only one? Newbie games would fill faster if we had more SE's playing.

And, do we even care about SE's in newbie games? Right now we're trying to spread our values and teach newbies how fun mafia is in the same game. This means we need a setup that attracts the interest of SE's who have seen it all... while also accommodating newbies who haven't.

Would newbies be more coherent if we vastly shortened deadlines there to retain interest? (Would it be a problem if newbies who enjoyed short games didn't graduate onto longer games?)

[GuyInFreezer]

Imo, keeping stats is dangerous due to the vagaries of game balance.

Players already feel cheated if they lost because they believe other team is too strong, it will be worse if losing becomes a mark on their permanent record.

I would also anticipate far more strategic replacing out, and replacing out is already something that happens too often.

Aka epicmafia suicide rate

[Master Mew]

I would also anticipate far more strategic replacing out, and replacing out is already something that happens too often.

This is something we can handle.

1.) Who says replacing out has to void the game from your record? If it's going to create problems, then maybe it shouldn't.

2.) Alternatively, track players' replace-out rates as well. If you start to abuse it, good luck getting into games.

[Master Mew]

Also, on newbie games:

I liked 2of4 much more than Matrix6, and stopped joining as an SE entirely because I didn't like the new setup. Am I the only one?.

I agree, Matrix6 is too complicated for Newbies.

[chamber]

Are private messages logged so admins can view them? (I don't think this has ever come up.) If not, I could report fakes manually.

Everything that goes through the chat is saved.

[GuyInFreezer]

I would also anticipate far more strategic replacing out, and replacing out is already something that happens too often.

This is something we can handle.

1.) Who says replacing out has to void the game from your record? If it's going to create problems, then maybe it shouldn't.

2.) Alternatively, track players' replace-out rates as well. If you start to abuse it, good luck getting into games.

That's what epicmafia did.
I remember it not helping.

[zoraster]

epicmafia tracks leaves but (1) doesn't prevent you from playing just embarrassing and (2) leaving a 30 minute game is probably about entirely different things than leaving a 2 month game.

Signups should be automated, too.

Once signups are automated, it'd be as simple as a moderator just choosing a role from a drop-down menu.

I'm obviously fine with this too, except that we'd still want to figure out a way to handle non-standard roles. But it actually might help if statistics were limited to normal games (or standardized roles, whatever form that takes) games. Might take away from creativity though as people focus more and more on stats, which may be a short term gain long term loss.

[GuyInFreezer]

As tedious as it is, I actually enjoy doing votecounts and moderating manually though.

P-Edit: keeping stats for normal games only is a great idea actually. It also helps with normal games filling more.

[chamber]

If you ever need sound design or anything else relating to audio, I'm your man.

Lots of things can use sound design. Of the many things actively being discussed, at the very least the new multimedia object/introduction tool would likely greatly benefit from good sound design.