mafia as an educational tool?

[stark]

well folks, i am in need of your help and expertice. after failing my american history project misserably, ive been granted another chance at some points. i showed our professor the mafia game, and was interrested. she says that if i can pull of a successful game of mafia in class, no harm done to my grade. currently, we are covering the salem witch trials, which i thought was a great opporotunity for a mafia game. our class consists of 26 people excluding my self. any ideas for roles, game dynamics etc?

[halo freak]

First a few questions,
do you think your classmates will be able to understand a play well complex roles or will you have to stick to basic roles? (not that they are stupid or anything it is just their first time) No matter how capable your classmates are i think you should stick to something that would fall into the normal bracket and keep the surprising twists down unless you think they could handle it
Do you have any large game setups lying about?
Are you supposed to be doing this on your own or can you get help? and How long do you have to play the game? (i won't mind co-modding, or at least helping with the setup as my abilty to mod is somewhat limited by not being there in person) But you might also want to consult someone who has played alot of face to face games and can judge how long they will take

Do we have a guide for newbies written out yet? That could proven usefull.

[Thok]

To do this properly, I'd suggest having a scum group that can't nightkill, but is trying to get various people lynched. That is, make the town think that they are trying to hunt witches, but there are no real witches in the game. Your scum group could be the people who lead the Salem Witch Trials in real life.

Of course, you'd have roles like paranoid cops and you'd give the mafia oppurtunities to blackmail others at night. Remember, you're trying for historical accuracy, and not necessarily game balance here.

[stark]

ok. we have three days to play this, so perhaps 2 games of thirteen running at the same time would work better. basic roles would probably be better, considering that probably none of them have played mafia before. i did make a setup for a large game, though i doubt the roles would apply without serious editing. i was thinking that the leaders of the witch trial would be the scum. night killing might be a problem considering we would want to get this done within the time limit. i can receive help, she said to use what ever you could to make the project work. if i can, ill see if i can get the game filmed. i was also going to throw in a real witch as an sk, just for fun 8)

[RangeroftheNorth]

Important question: Will this game be online or FTF?
If you are playing a RL game, it severely limits the options for roles unless you have people writing things down or going to separate rooms. Doing anything very complicated with the roles in RL is very difficult.

[halo freak]

2 games might be good but then you have the problem of if you use the same setups then people might be able to over hear some of the roles and make assumptions about the game. On the other hand you could do two different setups but that could be too much hassle. (i assume you will all be in the same room)

[stark]

right. this is going to be ftf, in class. the roles should be fairly simple, with all the roles pre-listed. bad idea?

[halo freak]

Good idea. Are you going hand out cards with roles written on them?

[stark]

that would be best. during night, how do you recomend going about night actions?

[halo freak]

The standard proceedure seems to be everyone puts their heads down and closes their eyes, then you say things like "mafia wake up" and the mafia lift their heads and gesture towards their target but i don't like it because even if you are not intentionally cheating you can't help but hear the person beside you moving about. I can't really think of a way of getting around this though

[RangeroftheNorth]

25 players makes for a really big FTF game, especially if most/all of them haven't played before. I would reccomend doing two or three games. You pretty much have to reveal the roles at the beginning, unless you want to do a great deal of writing out roles on cards, which is difficult since a lot of players won't understand their roles unless they are able to ask questions. Asking questions is difficult without revealing your role, so be sure

everyone

understands

all

of the roles before hand.

Simple roles that work well:
Mafia(of course)
Cop
Doc
Role Blocker

You can incorporate other roles too, but those are the only ones I would advise for an unexperienced group. If you have both a role blocker and a cop, remember to get the role blocker's choice before you get the cop's.

These are just my ideas. I have played a lot of ftf mafia. It is considerably different than the online variety.

[PolarBoy]

The idea of making the witch-hunters themselves the scum has certain difficulties. If you do what Thok said, you have a situation of a closed set-up that is ostensibly open. You would have to explain to all of the players that it is a witch trial and that everyone is trying to eliminate the witches, and then privately explain to the mafia what is really happening. This creates some logistical difficulties.

Just saying "the witch hunters are mafia" lacks the impact that discovering that discovering that would have. The game would be more true to history if you just made the witches mafia and ignored the facts in favor of the emotional realities (This is commonly done in games based on history, they have much more signifigance to the player when it is done right).

One way to do it might be to play two games. First play a game of mafia with a standard town vs. mafia scenario, but balance it hugely in favor of the town. So you'd have a mafia of 3 against 23 townies. No cops or doctors; this is, after all, the first time they're playing.

For the second game you say that it's the salem witch trial, and that the mafia have been replaced by witches. Introduce some new roles, like a cop-type role who can find witches.

What you don't tell the players is that there are no witches, and the investigations are all paranoid.

That'll give them something to chew on. Admittedly it's impossible for the town to win based on the supposed rules presented by the mod, but it'll give them a much better idea of what a witch hunt really is.

[stark]

right, as i said, i thought that two 13 person games would be best, almost 2 minies. looked around a bit on the internet and came up with some town roles
Martha Corey is accused of witchcraft.
Rebecca Nurse(doctor role?) was denounced as a witch.
Elizabeth Proctor was denounced as a witch.
Sarah Cloyce, Rebecca Nurse's sister, was accused of witchcraft. (backup doc?)
Elizabeth Proctor and Sarah Cloyce were examined before Hathorne, Corwin, Deputy Governor Thomas Danforth, and Captain Samuel Sewall. During this examination, John Proctor was also accused and imprisoned.
April 19
Abigail Hobbs, Bridget Bishop, Giles Corey, and Mary Warren were examined. Only Abigail Hobbs confessed. any ideas ?

[halo freak]

23 vs 3 ?!? Don't you think that i just a bit biased?

[RangeroftheNorth]

It all depends. Do you want the witches to be the town, and the witchhunters to be the mafia? Do you want the witchhunters to be the town, and the witches to be the mafia? I like the idea of having the town all be witchunters and having no witches, but I've always liked decieving people.

Also, having a backup do is limiting. If you have a backup doc, you have to anounce when the doc has died. In ftf games, I don't like revealing roles (other than mafia) upon death. Since the setups are open, this gives the mafia a better chance of making a succesful role claim. Again, it's up to you.

[stark]

lol. we dont have to use all of the names, just ideas. ive found nothing regarding who actually orchestrated the trials, but, if we throw in in sk, it has to be the man from satan, who was claimed to come from boston with a sheet of paper asking people to do his bidding, atleast according to one of the testifiying witches. cult perhaps?

[halo freak]

A cult could be difficult to do ftf.

[stark]

probably right. how about some sort of double voter or lynch manipulator?

[RangeroftheNorth]

I agree with halo.

What about a game with two mafias of two people each? One is the witches and one is the witchhunters. That would provide better balance, and still be do-able. I would reccomend a medic, and a cop. It should be fairly easy to run and fairly well balanced.

[Thok]

23 vs 3 ?!? Don't you think that i just a bit biased?

In this sort of scenario, historical accuracy/learning experience is more important then game balance. Remember, not everybody in Salem got lynched.

[Yaw]

I agree with PB. For their first game, if you tell them they're hunting witches, the mafia had better be witches. When they get some experience it's fair to switch up and have an unexpected scum group, but definitely not off the bat.

Also, vanilla is probably better. Less they have to keep track of, so they can concentrate on gameplay.

Very important that nobody else has mentioned -- if you're running this for a class, this must keep the

entire

class interested for the amount of time you have. If it's one period only, you're probably fine -- the dead will still be somewhat invested in the game. If you're running this over two periods, and the game's only halfway finished at the end of the first, you're going to have a problem. Half the class will be dead, and will have been dead since the day before. They aren't going to be interested in watching other people play, and you can't seriously expect them to sit there and do nothing for the entire class. So you'll have created a big distraction for the players (because the dead are going to try to do something to occupy their time), while leaving half the class bored. Don't fall into this. PB's idea of two games would work, if you had one per day (and could reasonably expect to finish a game per day). Smaller games might have potential, but parts of your class are going to get different experiences. If you do this, you'll want to have a discussion at the end to debrief the entire class on the different games, so all students get the same things out of the lesson.

At any rate, fiddle around with ideas for this. Just remember, you want the entire class involved in something productive at all times.

[stark]

you are right about keeping the class interested, obviously its not going to be fun getting killed day one and having ot sit through 2 more classes. however, this is ment to be historicaly acccurate, and considering that there really werent any witches......?

[TBuG]

There weren't witches, but there were Wiccans, who weren't actual witches but did practice something considered as witchcraft.

[Yaw]

I don't think you can claim that. Gerald Gardner was the first person to publish anything about Wicca, and in 1954. The Salem Witch Trials occurred in 1692 -- about two and a half centuries

before

Wicca arguably existed in any codified form.

Now, in 1692 there would have been underground mystical sects, and a tradition of herbalism. Whether either of these existed in Salem at the time is open to debate (though I'd consider the former unlikely, especially in a village in the Colonies). The trials were most likely mob hysteria combined with remnants of misogynist propaganda from the Malleus Maleficarum. (In other words -- Wicca had nothing to do with it. Ignorant myths from the church did.)

[stark]

considering that we are learning about the trials, wouldnt it make more sense to give the role descriptions, but not the role names. that way, historical accuracy is maintained. we then make the persecutors the scum.