The Royal Crown Coalition v. Gobwin Knob

[Foolamancer]

I've created an Erfworld-themed setup for the party game called Mafia, which is also known as Werewolf. Those of you who have played this game before, feel free to skip the next three paragraphs.

For those of you who have not, Mafia is a game which was created as part of a college course on psychology (or psychiatry, or communication, or something similar). It took off, and has become an extremely popular party game, and spawned several commercial versions (though you can play entirely for free). It is an exercise in trust and lies. Trust can kill you, but trust is ultimately what decides the fate of the players. You can't win on your own.

For an overview of the rules, you can see this Flash program. It's a very simple game, really; the Flash program shouldn't take more than five minutes to read and understand.

For a more comprehensive list of possible roles, you can check out this Flash program.

So here's how this Erfworld-specific setup is going to work.

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Jack Snipe and Wanda Firebaugh will act as the Mafia. Jack and Wanda, through judicious application of Jack's Foolamancy, have managed to replace two of the Courtiers of the Royal Crown Coalition! Each Night, Jack and Wanda kill a member of the Coalition and Decrypt him or her using the Arkenpliers. The Decrypted Coalition member then returns to his position of trust, acting as though nothing has happened. Thus the Gobwin Knob forces grow nightly, placing the very future of the Royal Crown Coalition at stake!

The Town will be represented by the Royal Crown Coalition. Prince Trammenis, several Casters from various Sides, and the loyal Courtiers of the Coalition must work together to bring down not only Jack and Wanda but the Decrypted remnants of their former comrades! The powers of the Casters offer some chance of victory, but even their spells may not be enough before the might of the Arkenpliers. No one can be trusted, and no one is safe.

The game will contain the following power roles:

Gobwin Knob:
- Wanda Firebaugh. As long as Wanda is alive, Gobwin Knob's Nightkill target will not be removed from play. Rather, they will have their alignment switched from the Coalition to Gobwin Knob, on account of being Decrypted.
- Jack Snipe. Once per Night, Jack can select a member of Gobwin Knob's forces to place a Foolamancy baffle over. That player will appear as though they are an ordinary member of the Coalition, thus foiling any investigation attempts against them.

The Royal Crown Coalition:
- Prince Trammenis. Trammenis, as the greatest diplomat in the land, has an unparalleled ability to forge alliances between people who would otherwise never trust each other. Once per Night, Trammenis can select a player to bring into his inner circle. The members of Trammenis' inner circle can communicate privately at any time. However, if Trammenis attempts to recruit a member of Gobwin Knob, Trammenis and all members of his inner circle die.
- The Dittomancer. The Dittomancer's ability to copy things extends to his own voting power. His votes count double.
- The Healomancer. Once per Night, the Healomancer can place protective wards on a player. That player cannot be killed or Decrypted by any means that Night.
- The Thinkamancer. The Thinkamancer's mastery of thought magic allows them to peer into a Coalition member's innermost thoughts. Once per Night, the Thinkamancer can investigate a player. They will be told whether or not that player is a member of the Coalition or Gobwin Knob.
- The Courtiers. The Courtiers are representatives of the different member nations of the Royal Crown Coalition. They have no special powers, but may vote as normal, and the fate of the Coalition rests heavily on their shoulders.

Other:
- If enough players sign up, there may be other characters making an appearance on either side - or maybe on a side all their own...

This game will require at least nine players, but can go as high as twenty - and the more people who want to play, the more characters will make an appearance! Maybe Charlie will try to manipulate events to his benefit, or maybe Parson decided that Gobwin Knob needed him on-scene.

[Shusagi]

I'm in!

[Nihila]

I'm in as well.

[thetobias]

count me in

[BLANDCorporatio]

I like this idea, and I'd like in, just to see how it goes.

However, I'm not very optimistic about the decryption mechanism. I know that in regular Mafia games, there's the occasional player (on the citizen side) that boops things up just for the luls, as in, they knowingly and deceitfully behave against the interests of the citizen group.

That happens usually in the citizen group, because it's more numerous, so by sheer chance that's where the occasional crazies end up; plus there's a certain kind of camaraderie created by being one or two (or three; didn't play too big games) mafiosos against a whole township.

But lets assume everyone will stick to their loyalty as the rules dictate- switching when decrypted.

The other problem is that, at 9 players, out of which 2 are mafiosos, the mafiosos need to survive 3 rounds (where a round is defined as knocking someone out then voting someone out) and they win. Aka, unless the townsfolk get at least one mafioso out within 3 rounds, they lose.

This is before we take decryption into account. Decryption will make things worse, to the point that I'm seriously doubting the chance of the townspeople to win. This will require some probabilistic modeling (yay!) but my take on it is that the townsfolk need to somehow eliminate the Wanda as fast as possible (and the more players, the less likely to pick the Wanda out, especially since we do not see or hear each other). OTOH, the less players there are, the easier it is for the zombie swarm to win.

Imagine 3 mafiosos out of 9 players (in regular Mafia rules). If all survive 2 rounds, they win, aka unless the townspeople eliminate at least one within 2 rounds, they lose.


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EDIT, PS:

- Prince Trammenis. Trammenis, as the greatest diplomat in the land, has an unparalleled ability to forge alliances between people who would otherwise never trust each other. Once per Night, Trammenis can select a player to bring into his inner circle. The members of Trammenis' inner circle can communicate privately at any time. However, if Trammenis attempts to recruit a member of Gobwin Knob, Trammenis and all members of his inner circle die.

Congratulations. This role has just been rendered useless.

[Sihoiba]

In, but a recruiter is going to cause some headaches depending on how many sign up (see Bland's comment)

[Foolamancer]

However, I'm not very optimistic about the decryption mechanism. I know that in regular Mafia games, there's the occasional player (on the citizen side) that boops things up just for the luls, as in, they knowingly and deceitfully behave against the interests of the citizen group.

That happens usually in the citizen group, because it's more numerous, so by sheer chance that's where the occasional crazies end up; plus there's a certain kind of camaraderie created by being one or two (or three; didn't play too big games) mafiosos against a whole township.

True, but there's nothing that the rules can do about that, short of me Modkilling someone.

The other problem is that, at 9 players, out of which 2 are mafiosos, the mafiosos need to survive 3 rounds (where a round is defined as knocking someone out then voting someone out) and they win. Aka, unless the townsfolk get at least one mafioso out within 3 rounds, they lose.

This is before we take decryption into account. Decryption will make things worse, to the point that I'm seriously doubting the chance of the townspeople to win. This will require some probabilistic modeling (yay!) but my take on it is that the townsfolk need to somehow eliminate the Wanda as fast as possible (and the more players, the less likely to pick the Wanda out, especially since we do not see or hear each other). OTOH, the less players there are, the easier it is for the zombie swarm to win.

Yes. Wanda is the Cult Leader role.

But I want to thank you for pointing out the problem with my OP:

EDIT, PS:

- Prince Trammenis. Trammenis, as the greatest diplomat in the land, has an unparalleled ability to forge alliances between people who would otherwise never trust each other. Once per Night, Trammenis can select a player to bring into his inner circle. The members of Trammenis' inner circle can communicate privately at any time. However, if Trammenis attempts to recruit a member of Gobwin Knob, Trammenis and all members of his inner circle die.

Congratulations. This role has just been rendered useless.

I typed out the wrong role information for Trammenis. He is supposed to be a Recruiting Mason. I'll see if I can edit the post to change it.

[BLANDCorporatio]

Yes. Wanda is the Cult Leader role.

There are at least 3 significant differences between that role and what Wanda is in this version.

1) The Cultist is 3rd party (as in, "opposed" to mafiosos and citizens alike); Wanda is mafioso-aligned.
2) Cultists can die by Mason visitation; Decrypted can kill Tram under the first version of the proposed rules.
3) Under the first version of your rules, there's no explicit provision that Decrypted die once Wanda dies, so the natural assumption is, they survive, unlike the Cultists.

Even if only point number 1) remains after rules-tweak, it's still significantly imba. It will be nigh-impossible to find the Wanda (if Jack plays right) for enough turns and that will tip the balance too strongly in favour of the decrypted.

[Foolamancer]

1) The Cultist is 3rd party (as in, "opposed" to mafiosos and citizens alike); Wanda is mafioso-aligned.

Which is just a naming convention, really. There is no traditional Mafia in this game. There's the Cult instead. I just called it the Mafia because that's the way that other people know the game.

2) Cultists can die by Mason visitation; Decrypted can kill Tram under the first version of the proposed rules.

Yep. I wrote down the wrong version of the Mason rules. I thought I had edited my first post, but it appears that my crappy connection kicked out on me again. Tram can kill the Decrypted. I'll try editing the original post again and see if it sticks.

3) Under the first version of your rules, there's no explicit provision that Decrypted die once Wanda dies, so the natural assumption is, they survive, unlike the Cultists.

Ah, left that out. My bad.

Even if only point number 1) remains after rules-tweak, it's still significantly imba. It will be nigh-impossible to find the Wanda (if Jack plays right) for enough turns and that will tip the balance too strongly in favour of the decrypted.

Since you seem to know what you're talking about, I'd be happy to hear your ideas on what your ideal Erfworld-themed setup would be.

[BLANDCorporatio]

Which is just a naming convention, really. There is no traditional Mafia in this game. There's the Cult instead. I just called it the Mafia because that's the way that other people know the game.

Alas, it isn't. In the original Mafia, as long as there are non-cultist Mafiosos, these may also help keep the cult population down. The idea being, a Mafioso may kill cultists or townsfolk, so s/he might just pick a cultist (or even the cult leader).

In our case, the Mafia is the Cult, so none keeps an extra tab on the other.

Since you seem to know what you're talking about, I'd be happy to hear your ideas on what your ideal Erfworld-themed setup would be.

My sensors indicate sarcasm is present. However I assure you of two things a) I know what I'm talking about and b) I don't yet have an idea to tame decryption.

But I'm not the only one here who knows what they are talking about. This is a forum, and we don't even have 9 players yet. Someone might come up with an idea in the next couple of days.

[Foolamancer]

My sensors indicate sarcasm is present.

Your sensors are faulty. I wasn't being sarcastic. So far, what you've said has been one hundred percent accurate; I've played enough Mafia to realize when someone knows more about the theory than I do. How would you build this scenario? I'm honestly interested in your thoughts.

[BLANDCorporatio]

If anyone has the time and inclination, here's a challenge for a programmer:

-suppose there exists a game. Coincidentally, it's the one we discuss now. (With rules slightly adjusted, as will be clear below).

- it starts with 9 players. One of these players is the Wanda, one is the Jack, one is the Healer and one is the Trem. I'll ignore the Thinka, because even if someone is spotted doesn't mean they get eliminated on the next vote; it might tilt the odds, but that's not exactly what I'm interested in. Also, I'm ignoring the Ditto, because boop Dittos.

- Definition: a dominant faction is one of the {Jack, Wanda, Decrypted} or {Trem's Circle} groups, provided that the group holds a majority of votes (I mean, contains a majority of players).
- Definition: a "round" contains two phases: "pick off" and "vote out". During "pick off":

-----if alive and not Decrytpted, Healomancer selects a player at random (which never happens IRL; Healomancer selects her/himself )
-----as long as one of Jack, Wanda, or Decrypted is present, select one of the other players at random; if Wanda is also present, this selected player becomes Decrypted unless previously selected by the Healomancer (in which case, nothing happens); if Wanda is not present, this selected player gets removed unless previously selected by the Healomancer.
-----if alive and not Decrypted, Trem selects a player at random. If that player is Decrypted, they get removed. If player is not Decrypted, they become part of Trem's Circle.

<Ambiguity in the rules- what happens if someone in Trem's circle, including Trem, gets Decrypted? Do they die, or do they stay in the Circle?>

- if after pick-off, {Jack, Wanda, Decrypted} becomes the dominant faction, they win.

During "vote":

-----randomly pick a player. If that player is not part of a dominant faction, they get removed. If the picked player is part of a dominant faction, pick again, a non-dominant faction player is picked.

- if after vote, Wanda is removed, all Decrypted are also removed.
- if after vote, {Jack, Wanda, Decrypted} contains no remaining players, the RCC wins.
- if after vote, {Jack, Wanda, Decrypted} becomes the dominant faction, they win.



OK. After that longish setup, what's all this for: The Problem Task:

generate the tree of all possible game paths and count how many end with RCC, vs. how many end with GK, victory.

[MarbitChow]

I think you need a Stanley "rule" in place - something that forces the decrypted to do something stupid each turn, like sacrifice a decrypted in an assassination attempt each night, or prevents Jack from using his power (he burned his juice on something pointless).

Perhaps a "Jillian" role - acts as a normal courtier, but cannot be killed by GK.

I think the Dittomancer should also be given a single self-ward (he ditto'd himself), so the first time he is killed doesn't count; it just reduces his vote count from 2 to 1.

[Daemonwelsh]

tickle me interested.

[thetobias]

This might be a crazy suggestion... but we do not need the game to be themed. I'd even suggest that for a first game we should play an unthemed game without any fringes.

So: 30% of the players are maffia. 70% of the players are civilians. None of the players are special roles. Every night the maffia kill someone, every day the civilians vote to kill someone, if the maffia kills all the civilians the maffia wins, et vice versa.

This way, no one will get confused, it will be easy to quickly play and for a next game we could create a theme or new roles.

Just my 2 schmuckers though, it'll all be up to Foolamancer, but I think a barebone game will be easier to play and manage. (I hosted the first Werewolf game on another forum, which quickly dissolved into chaos because I chose too many too fancy roles. I have experience with running a game and can warn you about the chaos (and hilarity) that WILL ensue.

EDIT: If youre dead set on having it themed give all players a nice fluff name and description, but no game mechanics.

[WaterMonkey314]

I'M in too, but Im very concerned about the decryption thing. In a group of experienced players with set and known play styles, that'd be a brilliant idea - but with inexperienced players, the character shift may not be noticeable.

Also, unless we get a large number of players, town will lose within 2-3 days assuming no no lynches.

[Foolamancer]

Sorry for the long time of no-posting. I've had a busy couple days. I'll respond to this thread in-depth later, once I've had time to look over the replies.

[turbler]

I would like to play as well, if there's still room.