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Mafio Party

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QTesseract said:
The neutrals don't have a choice. Once neutrals reveal themselves (or are revealed to exist in general), scum can force them to lynch whoever they want.

Well, that claim needs some explanation, and honestly saving this strategy for future usage on SV mafia isn't all that useful since it requires a game like this one to pull off anyway (and a lot of confidence, even if it isn't inherently all that risky).


Requirements: Survivors(s)+Scum(m)>Town(t)*, m>1, weak or no town vigilante, scum regular night kill (or the ability to credibly bluff such).
Optimal time to execute: When a Scum teammate is on the chopping block
How to pull off:
  1. Scum A, who's on the lynch block, publicly admits themselves as scum. They then announce that, unless the Survivors vote out a town, Scum will target one of them that night.
  2. If no doctor or protective claims, then all survivors are obliged to vote alongside mafia; they have a guaranteed win if they do, and a (s-1)/s chance to win if they don't. Unless they purposefully play sub-optimally, it's in their best interest to vote how scum wants.
  3. If a doctor or protective claims, they must be able to prove that they are, otherwise the same calculus above still applies, since a guaranteed win is still strictly optimal. If they can, 1 survivor can now afford to lynch scum, so unless s+m>t+1, a scum dies. This doesn't mean the plan fails, however.
  4. In order for the doctor to get someone to switch, they have to believably precommit to using their power on the survivor. This means that they're roleclaimed, and cannot defend themselves from a scum nightkill. Since s+m>t, s+m-1>t-1, and the above equation still allows the plan to come off. The remaining scum can then stay undercover and will always have this same plan as a backup any time one of them comes up for a lynch, and town can't afford to lynch survivors (survivor voting block + scum voting block stops it, it's in both of their interest to cooperate on this). This is effectively a win condition for scum since there isn't a doctor to stop the strategy anymore.
What Town can do or have:
  • Jailer + Doctor or Doctor + Doctor. A two part defend crew can allow the jailer (or one of the two doctors) to go out and let a survivor defect, and then the other doctor keeps them alive. The second doctor must be unrevealed, and both must be alive. This isn't a perfect defense, but if scum doesn't see it coming scum loses a player and a nightkill for nothing and town is in a better position.
  • Night immune doctor / Jailer: see above, but only one person must still be alive
  • Strong town Vigilante. A strong town vigi neuters this plan, as they can either provide a counter pressure (if you vote alongside maf, I'll kill you instead) to cancel out scum's abilities, or they can simply murder whichever scum makes the announcement (less effective, but still workable)
  • Multivoter. It doesn't technically let town win, but it causes Scum's calculations to be off, so they can end up triggering this too early and get lynched regardless for no benefit.
Complicating Factors:
  • Night immune (or single immune) survivors: they can afford to vote against scum if they want to, and don't have to reveal them self so scum may not know ahead of time.
  • Lyncher. They're easy for scum to get onside, and count as scum even more tightly for the purpose of doctors pulling away survivors.
  • Weak vigilante. These can perform a lesser amount of the counter-pressure provided by a strong vig; while they can't directly imitate the loss chance behind the mafia's attack (and thus have less influence on the actions of survivors), they can make it so that a single survivor defects should a town doctor exist. Without at least a week vigilante, survivors have no incentive to vote alongside town here even with a doctoral guarantee.

*where town is town votes, and thus includes multivoters.
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Okay, the problem with this is that it requires all roles out in the open and that scum believe all claims (and aren't wrong to do so).

It also requires the survivors believe all claims.

It also requires that the scum out themselves as a whole once they get survivors onside, which is gambly as hell. Once you openly admit that you are scum trying to kill a town player, any unknown vigilantes or other such powers can cause this to be turned on you. Moreover, people don't necessarily behave optimally. If one of the Survivors had decided to side with town, maf would lose in such a scenario.

In general, it's an all or nothing gambit that scum can't know is worth it except in fairly specific scenarios (eg seven players left, 2-3 scum, three town, rest are neutrals, scum on chopping block, where browbeating the survivor to get them onside may be safe and they can credibly threaten to kill, and requires all town are revealed as non-protectives. It also requires survivor claims to be honest, and not lies)
 
Terrabrand said:
Okay, the problem with this is that it requires all roles out in the open and that scum believe all claims (and aren't wrong to do so).

It also requires the survivors believe all claims.

It also requires that the scum out themselves as a whole once they get survivors onside, which is gambly as hell. Once you openly admit that you are scum trying to kill a town player, any unknown vigilantes or other such powers can cause this to be turned on you. Moreover, people don't necessarily behave optimally. If one of the Survivors had decided to side with town, maf would lose in such a scenario.

In general, it's an all or nothing gambit that scum can't know is worth it except in fairly specific scenarios (eg seven players left, 2-3 scum, three town, rest are neutrals, scum on chopping block, where browbeating the survivor to get them onside may be safe and they can credibly threaten to kill, and requires all town are revealed as non-protectives. It also requires survivor claims to be honest, and not lies)
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They don't actually need to know who the survivors are, just that they exist. Scum can credibly threaten to pick a player at random, and that gives a 1/(s+t) chance of them dying even if unrevealed. It's still strictly superior for them to obey.

Survivor doesn't have to bevel all claims. They only have to believe that scum has a nightkill and that their is >1 scum. Since this shouldn't happen until day 2 at a minimum, they almost certainly have confirmation of the first, and the second should be obvious if no scum are dead yet.

Scum also doesn't have to out as a whole. They can wait to vote (or at least, to switch over to the townie) until there is confirmed no doctor, or they can disguise themselves as survivors. They lose less than 1 bit of anonymity, as over half of the playerbase are still suspect. A weak vigi doesn't really work here, either, since the first scum can give a list of targets in order that Survivors have to work down. A strong Vigi by itself is still in Scum's favor as well, since vigi has to kill scum before scum kills them and scum has 2 kills (lynch + night) to vigi's one; they just prevent an auto town loss rather than supplying town a win.

Yes, admittedly it does require that people play to win, but honestly if a group isn't trying to fulfill their wincon, you have bigger issues. I know I personally wouldn't play with a group that self sabotages to screw me over.
 
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Night Action Breakdown
  • Threadmarks
    • Night 1:
    Rosalina - Bubbles Rikimaru=Archeo
    Donkey Kong - Barrels Archeo (Hits Rikimaru)
    Bowser Jr. - Codes Pawn Lelouch
    Waluigi - Sabotages Rikkimaru (Hits Archeo)
    Mario - Investigates Elf
    Yoshi - Protects Broken Base
    Peach - Informs Broken Base
    Daisy - Compare Derpmind=Terrabrand (Unaligned)
    Kamek - Gift Bone Dice Rikimaru (Gifted to Archeo)
    Toadsworth - Duel Event : Terrabrand=Broken Base (No Message)
    Wario/Toad/Toadette/Vanillas/Bowser/King Boo - None

    Night 2:
    Rosalina - Bubbles Terrabrand=Derpmind
    Donkey Kong - Barrels QTesseract
    Bowser Jr. - Codes Terrabrand (Hits Derpmind)
    Mario - Investigates JoeBobJoe (Is Jailed)
    Yoshi - Protects Nictis
    Peach - Informs Cyriccube
    Daisy - Compare Rikimaru=Ellf (Co-aligned)
    Kamek - Gift Pocket Watch Lizard Knight
    Toadsworth - Double Event (Message)
    Wario/Toad/Toadette/Vanillas/Bowser/King Boo - None

    Night 3:
    Donkey Kong - Barrels Pawn Lelouch
    Bowser Jr. - Trigger Code (Both Survive)
    Rosalina - Sabotage Cyriccubed
    Yoshi - Protect Cyriccubed (Is Jailed)
    Peach - Inform Rem
    Daisy - Compare Rem=Broken Base (Co-aligned)
    Kamek - Gift Terrabrand Giant Glasses
    Toadette - Smash JoeBobJoe
    Toadsworth - Abstains (No Message)
    Wario/Vanillas/Bowser/King Boo - None

    Night 4:
    Donkey Kong - Barrels Rikimaru
    Bowser - Abstains
    Rosalina - Sabotage Nanimani
    Yoshi - Protect Nictis
    Peach - Abstains
    Wario - View Cheese4Every1 (No visitors)
    Toadsworth - Activate Hammer (No Message)
    Vanillas/King Boo - None
     
  • Threadmarks
    • QTesseract said:
    They don't actually need to know who the survivors are, just that they exist. Scum can credibly threaten to pick a player at random, and that gives a 1/(s+t) chance of them dying even if unrevealed. It's still strictly superior for them to obey.

    Survivor doesn't have to bevel all claims. They only have to believe that scum has a nightkill and that their is >1 scum. Since this shouldn't happen until day 2 at a minimum, they almost certainly have confirmation of the first, and the second should be obvious if no scum are dead yet.

    Scum also doesn't have to out as a whole. They can wait to vote (or at least, to switch over to the townie) until there is confirmed no doctor, or they can disguise themselves as survivors. They lose less than 1 bit of anonymity, as over half of the playerbase are still suspect. A weak vigi doesn't really work here, either, since the first scum can give a list of targets in order that Survivors have to work down. A strong Vigi by itself is still in Scum's favor as well, since vigi has to kill scum before scum kills them and scum has 2 kills (lynch + night) to vigi's one; they just prevent an auto town loss rather than supplying town a win.

    Yes, admittedly it does require that people play to win, but honestly if a group isn't trying to fulfill their wincon, you have bigger issues. I know I personally wouldn't play with a group that self sabotages to screw me over.
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    The problem is that there are a lot of roles, just from standard, that can screw that over, and scum has to know for sure that they plus the Survivors outnumber town, which they won't unless all survivors claim and nobody lies about being a survivor.

    I mean, fuck. This is a gameplan that can be wrecked by a town player claiming survivor, causing scum to reveal and get lynched at no benefit.

    In this case half of the non-CPU, non-survivor roles would have run counter to that, because of their wincons.
     
    It might be worth it if you tell your team mates to vote you after you do it, since any survivors that switch off the lynch will be seen as scum ('If not by role, then by choice. All who decide the mafia should live must die' would be something like my response here) so I could see this as a good way to Bus. Any third parties that decide to avoid the risk of being NK'd are going to be taking Town attention, and your buddies can build cred in the meantime.
     
    Terrabrand said:
    The problem is that there are a lot of roles, just from standard, that can screw that over, and scum has to know for sure that they plus the Survivors outnumber town, which they won't unless all survivors claim and nobody lies about being a survivor.

    I mean, fuck. This is a gameplan that can be wrecked by a town player claiming survivor, causing scum to reveal and get lynched at no benefit.

    In this case half of the non-CPU, non-survivor roles would have run counter to that, because of their wincons.
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    There aren't that many that can do this. Having 2 doctor equivalents alive, one of which is unclaimed and Isn't the jailor is rare to have happen while the above is true, and it's even rarer to have the above paired with the big it needs to actually counter that strategy.

    Town players almost never claim survivor. The reverse happens all the time, but quite rare for the reverse to happen since vanillas want to be night kill targets (over prs), and avoiding a lynch for being a third party is usually more important for town players. It's not outright impossible for it to happen, it it's not a real counterargument.

    As far as the plan goes, if they do fall short, not only do they get to bus until last minute to scout the waters, they also have a nice juicy target of third parties to point town against (if scum is particularly bussy, they can have one or more of their own on the list of announced targets for scum + npc block.

    This game was ideal for it. Toadsworth and boo were survivors, bowser was an anti town lyncher (better, as long as you save their lynchee for midgame), and bowser jr, who has to be 2-2 with maf. If he doesn't reveal until bowser mason + scum is half, and he shouldn't, he can work with them to take out the remaining npcs. Both scum and CPU can win with an equal
    Number of players, so both could win here.
     
    Okay, see, part of the flaw I'm talking about is a town player could claim to be a survivor to get the scum to stick their necks out, which they have to do to make the plan work unless there are basically more survivors left than town.

    So like I could easily have said 'I'm totes an NPC bro' to try to bait out the remaining scum players in such a situation, and if they mis-assess the claims they'll stick their necks out only to lose them.
     
    Terrabrand said:
    Okay, see, part of the flaw I'm talking about is a town player could claim to be a survivor to get the scum to stick their necks out, which they have to do to make the plan work unless there are basically more survivors left than town.

    So like I could easily have said 'I'm totes an NPC bro' to try to bait out the remaining scum players in such a situation, and if they mis-assess the claims they'll stick their necks out only to lose them.
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    You seem to be misunderstanding how this strat works. This is only triggered if scum is on the chopping block, for those very same reasons. If a scum isn't going to be lynched, there's no need to try and control the lynch. That's why it has that "when to use" tag. The cost only comes if other scum get revealed by their votes, and they don't need to do that if they're outnumbered after all.
     
    -wakes up-
    We won? Great!
    Honestly, WingCat and ArcheoLumiere made mistakes that made Then killed.
    Cheese (Who is a first time player) played excellently. They were caught in the end but still impressive.
     
    @Cheese4Every1 I legit want you to reconsider not playing again. This was a super strong opening showing and with your performance you legit have a really solid shot at winning if not for terrible luck, and as I think I've shown over my 3 games, people tend to only get better. I know you feel that this isn't your scene, but you did great so I feel obligated to at least ask.
     
    You know what kinda amuses me?
    The whole BB reveals my letters was seen as a mistake at the time.
    But I was never targeted and was able to spread by letters in piece.
    And even when I revealed that I never had to reveal my secondary ability
    Which is nice.
    I was way to passive with the pocket watch.
    On the last night I 'abstained' because I forgot to...we...anything.
    Honest Hour with LK
    Also, I don't know about y'all but my PMs had great flavor
    @ComiTurtle once again thank you for this wonderful game
     
    @Broken Base thanks, I'm glad to hear it :) as I mentioned a little after the game ended I am definitely considering it! It got a lot more fun as I got more involved. Being a lone mafia member was an interesting experience
     
    I have been asked to make one more post, to share something that happened after my death post.

    https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/471125997232717835/473292302081720323/redacted_screenshot.png

    If I had any inklings about coming back, I certainly don't now. (And no, I will not share the identity of the person who told me. I know how important this matter is to you, which is why I agreed to make this post. But I gave my word.)

    If you want to talk further, ping me on Discord. Send a friend request if we don't share a server.
     
    To be clear: the above happened N1, after my death post. AL's mistake was making the rounds by then, but how did they know about Cheese?
     
    so um what

    Like honestly, Comi should know what was going on, or at least part of it, so if he wants to explain I leave it up to him I guess and not speculate... but so much of this seems to make no sense?
     
    Be aware I've been investigating since the claim was made to me. I've been trying to be quite subtle about it.
     
    Could anyone tell me if I did well or bad? And anything that I should probably improve on or avoid doing in the future?
     
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