Attention [WIP] General Guidelines for W3D Forum Game Moderators

[VERTi60]

Anyone interested for tomorrow's chat mafia at 10pm utc?

[ChopBam]

Can't make it; sorry.

[Nodlied]

1 hour ago, VERTi60 said:

Anyone interested for tomorrow's chat mafia at 10pm utc?

As you might have read elsewhere, I'm going to be very busy for the next 2.5 weeks.

[Killing_You]

So I just stumbled on the game Town of Salem, and apparently, while this game is similar to Mafia, it also has an extra phase where the person who was voted up must present a defense, and players can vote "guilty," "innocent," or "abstain." Might be a mechanic worth checking out at some point.

[VERTi60]

5 hours ago, Killing_You said:

So I just stumbled on the game Town of Salem, and apparently, while this game is similar to Mafia, it also has an extra phase where the person who was voted up must present a defense, and players can vote "guilty," "innocent," or "abstain." Might be a mechanic worth checking out at some point.

I have and played ToS, the problem with that mechanic is that it's mostly redundant since in forum mafia game the most voted have plenty of time to present a defense anyway, having an extra phase just for that would slow the pace down, imho. In a chat mafia/fast game though it might be more useful.

[Category 5 Hurricane]

I could see it being useful for Ace Attorney or Danganronpa-themed games.

[Retaliation]

If no one else has a game ready, I can get 40k mafia ready pretty quick.

[Category 5 Hurricane]

Warhammer Mafia, begin!

 

iLTS wins. Next game.

[Jeod]

9 hours ago, Retaliation said:

If no one else has a game ready, I can get 40k mafia ready pretty quick.

Make me Emperor of Man

7 hours ago, Category 5 Hurricane said:

Warhammer Mafia, begin!

 

iLTS wins. Next game.

Heads up for you, I think a Ghost Trick Mafia 2.0 would do very well here after your Steins;Gate game.

[OrangeP47]

Sunflower and I may have a game idea, but it will not be ready for some time, and I can't host or even play possibly for awhile due to the Championships coming up.

It would be a twelve player setup as it current stands though too, and it'd be difficult to scrape together that many players, especially if we co-GM it.

[Category 5 Hurricane]

1 hour ago, Jeod said:

Make me Emperor of Man

Heads up for you, I think a Ghost Trick Mafia 2.0 would do very well here after your Steins;Gate game.

I have been doing some thinking on running another Ghost Trick game, thanks to Let's Dub doing a fan voice over for the game and you using music from it. I've got a couple other ideas as well, but for the same reasons I've been severely limited in time to play mafia games, it probably wouldn't be a good idea for me to run one.

[Jeod]

I'm planning a PokeMafia game, using elements from Star Wars Mafia, to begin near the end of August or the start of September. Sign-up and start date range will be between August 20 - September 8.

[TheIrishman]

Oh, well I'm interested. Do we play as pokemon or trainers?

[Jeod]

3 minutes ago, TheIrishman said:

Oh, well I'm interested. Do we play as pokemon or trainers?

Trainers vs. Team Rocket. Pick a team of 6 from the first generation (no legendaries) and battle 1v1 at the end of each discussion phase.

[TheIrishman]

I'm planning to host a CYOR Mafia: Supernatural Edition sometime mid October in the spirit of Halloween. It'll run very similar to CYOR: Halloween Edition, except Horror isn't required, so a lot more options will be open. For example, Boo from Mario, Haunter from Pokemon, Crowley from Supernatural, or even Blair from Soul Eater. Whatever you can think of as long as it's either Supernatural or hunts the Supernatural. Hopefully you guys keeps it relatively Halloween themed though :b That said, if someone has a different game they'd prefer to run or even suggestions for my game, let me know.

[Jeod]

Question for you regulars. We have added some new familiar faces to our usual mafia games and all of our lives have changed a bit since 2016. With the current trends in mind, would it be beneficial to shift hammer times? 6:00PM EDT (or 11:00PM GMT/BST/IST) has been the norm because of work schedules--it was a decent time for those of us in the west as well as in the eastern continents. Would it be better to shift hammertime forward or backward by 1-2 hours, or to any other specific timeframe? What are your thoughts? Please also respond if it's something else besides work/life that's keeping you from being able to play/be interested in mafia.

[Nodlied]

I believe that it's fine at the moment. If we move the hammer to two hours later, it'll be 2 hours past midnight in most European countries while if we move it to two hours earlier, I'm pretty certain that most US players will still be at either work or have dinner. Then again, I'd like to hear what other people think.

[Jeod]

Perhaps. I did write that with @iLikeToSnipe, you, @Category 5 Hurricane, and @TheIrishman in mind, but @Voe, @Mojoman, and @Chaos_Knight could also be included. I made a table to help with research in finding out what makes people participate more in mafia games. This table doesn't include ongoing games, and it's sorted by replies.

Here it is again, but sorted by date:

So far the biggest indicator of participation is the type of game. I initially thought date would matter because we got more players around late 2016 and early 2017, but it's overwhelmingly clear that aside from the difficulty of the game, the game types that gain the most participation are CYOR, RPG, Battle, and Politics. I don't even know if Battle should count because many of the contributing posts are from battle phases and not dayphase discussion.

[OrangeP47]

Some insight on a few data points.  Warhammer mafia was done at a time when several of us were busy with other commitments (I'm generally top poster, but I was involved with Mafia Universe Championships at that time, and I know a few others had some other reasons).  I think battle games might have some bias because of how long they take and battle phases, but you've already noted that.

I know this might sound egotistical, but you might have to control for my high post count.  Post count goes up noticeably since I joined, and some of the dips in later games are where I was eliminated early or didn't otherwise participate.

[Jeod]

2 minutes ago, OrangeP47 said:

Some insight on a few data points.  Warhammer mafia was done at a time when several of us were busy with other commitments (I'm generally top poster, but I was involved with Mafia Universe Championships at that time, and I know a few others had some other reasons).  I think battle games might have some bias because of how long they take and battle phases, but you've already noted that.

I know this might sound egotistical, but you might have to control for my high post count.  Post count goes up noticeably since I joined, and some of the dips in later games are where I was eliminated early or didn't otherwise participate.

Here's the doc if you want to mould it for precision.

Research & Trends.xlsx

[iLikeToSnipe]

I think you ought to look at post to player ratio per game day/phase. Might give some more insight.

[Louis]

😋

Edited March 17, 2019 by Louis

[Jeod]

To be added to the OP. I may add more to this with specific mechanics like time travel/changes. @Category 5 Hurricane might be a good contributor to this guide due to his moderation of the complex Steins;Gate Mafia.

CYOR Order of Action Resolution

The Golden Rule

The golden rule of Choose Your Own Role games is to resolve actions that modify other actions first. An example is provided below:
 

Spoiler

 

ChopBam uses an action on Night 1 to charge a daykill, but must use it again on Night 2 to have the daykill ready on Day 3. FRAYDO uses a time machine action on Night 2 to undo ChopBam’s actions on Night 1. ChopBam’s Night 1 action was undone, meaning that while he did charge his daykill during Night 2, the daykill will now not be ready until Day 4.

 

Following the golden rule is not always easy. It’s important to neatly organize and record player actions and resolve them before writing the result PMs. This can be made a tad easier by sorting the players in a list based on who used a modifier action, so that those are resolved first. Below is an example of three players involved in a complex resolution:

Spoiler

 

OrangeP47 submits a nightkill on FRAYDO. Louis uses an action to force OrangeP47 to target TheIrishMan and passes an item to Shade939. ChopBam uses a lightning rod action on Louis, which forces her to target him. The nightkill is always resolved last (barring a few specific action types, see further below), so OrangeP47 is last on the list. Louis is using an action to modify OrangeP47’s action, so she gets resolved before OrangeP47. ChopBam used an action to modify Louis’ actions, so he gets resolved before Louis.

1. ChopBam

2. Louis

3. OrangeP47

ChopBam’s lightning rod action forces Louis to target him. Since Louis passed an item, we know we change that target to ChopBam. But her other action targets two players! Let’s take a closer look at that action. It’s a redirect action that has a placeholder of <player> and then <target>. This is resolved by replacing the <target> placeholder with ChopBam. However, the logical flow dictates that the <player> placeholder is what is replaced to fall in line with the item passing placeholder:

• Redirect <player> <target>

• Pass item <player>

Why is this? Well, at the “logical” resolution, Louis redirects ChopBam to target TheIrishMan. This creates a complicated loop since ChopBam has already redirected Louis to target him, but is now forcing TheIrishMan to also redirect actions to target him. We don’t really want players to get caught in a loop like this since it essentially makes them use their action twice in a night. So, we use the following resolution:

• ChopBam -> Lightning rod Louis

• Louis -> Redirect OrangeP47 to TheIrishMan -> [ChopBam interrupts] -> Redirect OrangeP47 to ChopBam

  • Also: Pass item to ChopBam

• OrangeP47 -> Nightkill ChopBam

With this resolution, ChopBam only ends up visiting his own initial target: Louis, and thus the complex action loop is eliminated.

 

Emergency Conflicts

Sometimes the golden rule is too complicated to interpret accurately, which happens when multiple player actions conflict with eachother. In such a case, a general order can be followed. The following is a list of what types of actions are resolved and when:

1. Copy (as in a player copies the action of another player)

2. Hide (when a player hides behind another player)

3. Bus Drive (a player swaps two players as targets)

4. Roleblock (a player prevents another player from performing an action)

5. Redirect (a player forces a player to target a different player)

6. Protect (a player keeps another player from being nightkilled)

7. Miscellaneous actions

8. Killing actions

9. Recruiting (changing another player’s alignment)

10. Inspect (cop, watcher, tracker etc)

[VERTi60]

 

Since there are games already going on I won't be hosting the next Star Wars Mafia RPG for a while but you can expect it from me later this year before the release of ep. IX (so probably November-December).

It won't be focused on dueling this time (although battles will happen occasionally to have some sort of game based elimination).  The character customization and RPG elements will be improved, while also adding more professions and skills.

[VERTi60]

If we won't have any planned games for now (May June), I could host a Conquest type Mafia game based on Game of Thrones. Probably with simpler mechanics so it's ready sooner. (SW Mafia Mafia RPG or even Dead Space Mafia RPG will be a lot more complicated).

[VERTi60]

Since there are no objections I'll start the sign up thread for Game of Thrones Conquest Mafia by the end of this week (most likely Friday).

@Voe not sure after the 8th season debacle but hope you're still are interested  We won't follow the story just the flavor.

[Voe]

7 hours ago, VERTi60 said:

Since there are no objections I'll start the sign up thread for Game of Thrones Conquest Mafia by the end of this week (most likely Friday).

@Voe not sure after the 8th season debacle but hope you're still are interested  We won't follow the story just the flavor.

Just for you, Vert.

Sign me up

[Jeod]

[TheIrishman]

On 5/20/2019 at 10:38 AM, VERTi60 said:

Since there are no objections I'll start the sign up thread for Game of Thrones Conquest Mafia by the end of this week (most likely Friday).

@Voe not sure after the 8th season debacle but hope you're still are interested  We won't follow the story just the flavor.

I know myself and Louis will end up joining as well.

[Retaliation]

If no one objects, I think I'll try my hand at a Halloween CYOR mafia to start sometime early-mid October.