Newbie Mafia

[-A-]

With the permission of Lord RW, I’m going to be running a game for people new to mafia, or those who want to brush up on the basics. A lot of the games we run tend to be large and extremely complicated, so they’re probably a little inaccessible if you haven’t played mafia before (or even just if you haven’t played on EWB.)

The game will include 7 players, with an ‘open set-up’ (that means that everyone knows what roles and alignments are in the game before it starts.) Here it is:

2 mafia

1 investigator/cop (50% chance)

1 protector/doc (50% chance)

3-5 vanilla townies

For a description of these roles, take a look at the Mafia Resource Thread. There’s a 50% chance for each of the power roles, but it’s not an either/or situation. You could have both in the game or you could have neither (there’s a 25% chance of each of those happening.) All roles are distributed totally randomly in this game.

Depending on how much interest there is, these games will probably be running every month, so keep an eye on the Mafia Cube if you miss out. I’ll give preference to the new players who miss out in the next game and watching the progress of the game will be a good way of getting into the swing of things.

For New Players:

Make sure you take a quick look at the Mafia Resource Thread. Don’t worry about the more complex roles at the moment, none of them will feature in this game. I also recommend checking out a couple Traditional Mafia games from the Mafia Cube. These are the kind of games that are most similar to this one – you rely on being able to read other players rather than having a lot of abilities. Examples include Traditional Mafia IV and Perfect Ten Mafia.

This game will include mostly new players with a couple of experienced hands to lend a helping hand. Remember that they’re not guaranteed to be Town, so you can’t necessarily trust everything they say. Even mafia players have to try and appear to be helpful, though, so their opinions won’t be useless. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes – this game is a learning experience and you’ll figure out more if you’re getting involved in discussion. You don’t need to be contrary just for the sake of it, though

Everyone’s instinct when they first start playing is to distrust everything and the more ‘cleared’ someone is the more you get a nagging feeling that they could be scum. Keep in mind that anyone could be scum and anything could be a lie, nobody is cleared. If you spot a complicated scenario that flies in the face of what’s accepted by everyone else, don’t necessarily assume it’s true. You’ll be able to find a way everyone is scum, just try and work out how likely your scenario is and file it away. A lot of the game is trying to work out the most likely suspect, not the only suspect.

For More Experienced Players:

If you’ve been around for a while and still want to play in a basic game, go ahead. I’m not going to stop anyone from playing the game, so if you’re very experienced and have won Traditional games before, please consider not applying. If there are people who have much less experience than you applying, they probably want to play even more. It’s impossible for me to set criteria for applying, so it’s up to you to decide if you should play. This is a learning experience above all. It's not going to count for the Survival Standings.

Particularly for the first one of these, expect there to be a lot of dodgy play. Don’t sign up if you’re going to get frustrated by this. Equally, please try not to totally dominate the game with your opinions. If the newer players aren’t speaking up, try and make it as easy as possible for them to get involved.

For Extremely Experienced Players:

One of the most important parts of this is going to be recapping afterwards. I’m going to be writing some kind of analysis as the game goes on with the benefit of knowing who everyone is. I reckon it’d be a good idea to have someone else doing the same thing, but without knowing which alignment everyone is. If you’re one of the most experienced players around (particularly in Traditional games like this) then it’d be great if you could let me know if you’re interested. We only need one other person per game (because getting two different opinions will likely be confusing enough) but there are going to be other games down the line and rotating those involved stops us pushing all the new players in our own specific direction.

SIGN-UPS:

1. nabeel

2. IJS

3. Split

4. Jam

5. SKA

6. Cloudy

7. Winter F'n Sun

8. deangelo

9. Slogger

10. Blaze

11. Meacon

12. ruderocket

13. TylerBlackMark

14. FD

15. -Matt-

16. badotori

Edited February 6, 2009 by -A-

[nabeel]

Please

Edited February 4, 2009 by nabeel

[IJS]

Having seem some games I would like to try my hand.

I'm in.

[Jimmy]

I'd be happy to help out, if you can call me experienced.

[Jam]

I've started to put effort into playing a bit more lately so would be interested to tweak how I play in a traditional game as analysis is where I struggle a bit. Of course I'd be willing to step aside for anyone though

[OGpistolpete]

I'm interested.

[Pizza]

I'm new, let me play.

[MalaCloudy Black]

I guess I'll go in as well.

[DFF]

I'm not new, but I'm not good either and I'd like to help improve myself. Thus, in please

[-A-]

People can still sign-up by the way.

[deangelo]

Yeah, I'd like to be in. I do want to learn the art of mafia. I thought I missed out on another one.

[Slogger]

I suck at mafia, Can I join?

[Blaze09]

I suck which means I should be allowed in the game

[Guest Mr. Potato Head]

I'd be willing to follow and analyze.

[-A-]

Perfect, MPH, much appreciated.

[Meacon Keaton]

Sure, I could use to some help in my mafia-gamage.

[ruderrocket]

I'd like to join, if you'll have me.

[Gongsun Zan]

A suggestion - make it a 12 player game instead. With 7 you're on lylo on day 2 assuming the town doesn't hit scum on day 1. You've got enough players anyway.

Edited February 5, 2009 by Gongsun Zan

[-A-]

Yeah, I was seriously considering that given the tendency to bandwagon on day 1. It's not really the most fun part of the game and things can be half over because people get bored. I'll amend the set-up, as long as it's OK with RW.

[Jedinak]

I'd like to get in if there's room.