Random Nurse's Mini Normal Review, August 2023 (Released)

[implosion]

Hello implosion. I was informed by Datisi that I needed to PM you with my setup and about finding reviewers for my closed Normal game.

I'm also the alt of wake1, and have been a member since 2013. Could you share with me the form I need to fill out too, please?

I have the role PMs here:

Normal Vanilla Townie

Welcome! You are a

Normal Vanilla Townie

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Normal Vanilla Townie

Welcome! You are a

Normal Vanilla Townie

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Normal Vanilla Townie

Welcome! You are a

Normal Vanilla Townie

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Normal Vanilla Townie

Welcome! You are a

Normal Vanilla Townie

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Normal Vanilla Townie

Welcome! You are a

Normal Vanilla Townie

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Town Neighborizer

Welcome! You are a

Town Neighborizer

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- During the Night you may target one player and add them into your private communication thread here: __________
- This Neighborhood has Daytalk activated.

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Town Miller

Welcome! You are a

Town Miller

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- If investigated by a Cop, the result that Cop will get is "Guilty."

You win when all members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Loud Town Tracker

Welcome! You are a

Loud Town Tracker

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- During the Night you may target a player and learn who, if anybody, that player targeted the same night (but not the action the player performed).
- The

Loud

modifier makes it so if Player A targets Player B at night, Player B will be informed that they were targeted by Player A with a Loud role but not what action was taken. For example, if Player A was a Loud Tracker and used it on Player B, Player B would be notified that they were targeted by Player A with a Loud role, but not that they used tracker.

You win when all members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Town Doctor

Welcome! You are a

Town Doctor

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- During the Night you may target one player and prevent them from dying that Night.

You win when all members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Town Cop

Welcome! You are a

Town Cop

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- During the Night, you may target a player to learn their alignment. Your results will be "Town," "Mafia," or "No Result."

You win when all three members of the

Mafia

are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Informed Mafia Goon

Welcome! You are a

Informed Mafia Goon

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- You are informed that a Town Cop exists in this game.
- Every Night, your team will be able to kill one of the members in the town.
- Your team members include __________ and __________.
-

DAYTALK:

At all times you have access to a Private Topic where you can talk with your partners, provided here: ______________

You win when the

Mafia

obtain a majority or nothing can prevent this from occurring.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Multitasking Mafia Roleblocker

Welcome! You are a

Multitasking Mafia Roleblocker

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- During the Night phase you may target a player and roleblock them. Your target will not be able to use their Night ability, if they had one.
- A

Multitasking

role is a role that allows its owner to perform more than one active night action in the same night; in other words, if the player has multiple night choices that refer to different actions, they are not mutually exclusive and can be performed at the same time.
- Every Night, your team will be able to kill one of the members in the town in addition to your Power Role.
- Your team members include __________ and __________.
-

DAYTALK:

At all times you have access to a Private Topic where you can talk with your partners, provided here: ______________

You win when the

Mafia

obtain a majority or nothing can prevent this from occurring.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

Multitasking Mafia Role Cop

Welcome! You are a

Multitasking Mafia Role Cop

.

Abilities/Info

- During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
- During the Night phase you may investigate a player to learn what their role is. A target without a Power Role will give a result of "Vanilla."
- A

Multitasking

role is a role that allows its owner to perform more than one active night action in the same night; in other words, if the player has multiple night choices that refer to different actions, they are not mutually exclusive and can be performed at the same time.
- Every Night, your team will be able to kill one of the members in the town in addition to your Power Role.
- Your team members include __________ and __________.
-

DAYTALK:

At all times you have access to a Private Topic where you can talk with your partners, provided here: ______________

You win when the

Mafia

obtain a majority or nothing can prevent this from occurring.

Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

___

- Mafia would have Daytalk

- Mafia have Multitasking

Setup here:

Rules

General:

• Please adhere to the site rules.
  
• Do not discuss this game of mafia outside of this game thread or the private threads of this game. However, anyone who wishes to spectate may PM me to join the Dead PT.
  
• Anyone in the game may request a personal confessional thread to use however they see fit. This thread counts as private communication, and therefore cannot be directly quoted from.
  
• Days will be 14 days long.
  
• Night phases will last 48 hours maximum. On any given night, if all players PM me that they are okay to speed up the night, it will end sooner.
  
• During the Night phase, no talking may be done in the thread.
  
• Do not quote PM's from the mod at all (real or fabricated). This includes specific timestamps and that sort of meta-data. Please ask me if you're uncertain whether something breaks this rule. Paraphrasing is acceptable.
  
• If you have any questions about your role, or the game, feel free to PM the mod.
  
• Dead players may not post. This includes "bah" posts and the twilight phase before each Night phase.

Voting / Player Actions:

• Vote with vote tags (VOTE: Random Nurse). Note that nicknames, abbreviations, and acronyms are acceptable, as long as the intended vote is obvious. I will state if a vote isn't obvious.
  
• Osuka's auto vote-counter will be used for this game.
  
• Don't try to confuse me with your votes.
  
• An execution will occur once a majority decision is reached. If no majority is reached, the day will end peacefully. A majority decision is decided by half of the playerbase +1 vote.
  
• Following an execution, it is twilight. Living players may continue to post until I lock the thread and declare it Night.
  
• If you have a night Action, you may submit it from Night 1 and each subsequent Night (or whichever nights are specified by the role). If you don't submit an action I will count it as taking no action, but I prefer if you tell me that you're taking no action.

Activity:

• You are expected to post at least once every 48 hours. If you haven't posted for 48 hours, I will prod you. If you do not respond to the prod within 24 hours (either in thread if it's the Day phase, or via PM during the Night) then I will replace you.
  
• As well, if you accrue more than three prods, I will force-replace you.
  
• If you decide to replace out, PLEASE PM me and don't post in thread after doing so. If you want to rescind the replacement please PM me again and don't post in thread until you hear back.

Misc:

• No impossible/hard to read text, or cryptography. For example, I would prefer that no font size smaller than the one you're reading now be used.
  
• The mod may make mistakes - please point out any mistakes gently. Mistakes will be corrected where possible, but sometimes mistakes are made that cannot be reversed. These will stand as final to be commiserated over after the game.
  
• If you need to get the mod's attention, either PM me, or bold the text you wish to draw to my attention. PM'ing me works best.
  
• I reserve the right to alter/remove/add any rules as I see fit. You will, of course, be notified if that happens, however.

Setup Information:

• This setup is closed and Normal.
  
• Mafia
  have Daytalk.
  
• Mafia
  also have Multitasking enabled
  
  
  Spoiler: Sample Role PMs

  
  
  

  Vanilla Townie

  Welcome! You are a

  Vanilla Townie

  .
  
  

  Abilities/Info

  
  - During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
  
  You win when all members of the

  Mafia

  are eliminated and at least one town-aligned player is alive.
  
  Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

  
  
  

  Mafia Goon

  Welcome! You are a

  Mafia Goon

  .
  
  

  Abilities/Info

  
  - During the day, you may vote for whoever you want to eliminate.
  - Every Night, your team will be able to kill one of the members in the town.
  - Your team members include __________ and __________.
  -

  DAYTALK:

  At all times you have access to a Private Topic where you can talk with your partners, provided here: ______________
  
  You win when the

  Mafia

  obtain a majority or nothing can prevent this from occurring.
  
  Confirm by replying with your role name and alignment.

  
  
  

[implosion]

Primary: mastina
Secondary: implosion

[implosion]

My basic first impression is that it's maybe balanced? If not I'd err toward it's a bit scumsided. It's definitely pretty swingy.

Cop is obviously very strong, loud tracker is also a good role vs multiple multitasking scum roles where it might be able to guilty them + clear their targets, and doc to be able to follow-the-investigative is also a good role. But multitasking roleblocker

and

rolecop is a lot of counterplay. The fact that there's a miller is probably good just so that there's some doubt cast on the safety of info from 2 investigatives.

[implosion]

It might increase swing in that it'd be super painful for scum to lose members because they'd be double-whammied by not being able to use their powers + the tracker becoming stronger.

[implosion]

Sorry I've been a bit slow to see this, was on vacation.

I think 1-shot universal backup is technically an invalid role. The problem is that universal backup inherits the first allied non-VT to die, so if there were e.g. a town neighbor, the UB would become a 1-shot neighbor, which is a nonsensical role. It's sort of awkward but UB plays by special rules when it comes to modifiers.

While putting the UB on the miller avoids this for this setup, it's still a problem because a savvy 1-shot UB will notice it, and see that it essentially implies that there are no passive roles in the town, which means they could get a free counterclaim against a mafia member who unwittingly fakeclaims miller or mason or vengeful, etc. I view normal roles as essentially a language, and "1-shot universal backup" as a syntactically invalid sentence in that language.

I think there are some other ways to reduce swing that could work. One idea is to make the cop novice, and make the roleblocker even-night and the rolecop odd-night. But I do agree with mastina that the setup doesn't *need* a change to reduce swing to be passable.

[implosion]

I don't think 2 millers is the way to fix balance, there's always a risk with 2 millers that you get into a painful counterclaim situation that just ruins the game. I don't think the scum really need more either, they've got 2 full ungated strong roles plus knowledge that there's a cop.

[implosion]

You could inform them in theory, so they know not to claim it unless they want to be in a counterclaim, since there's a chance they see "there's a cop" and think "oh i'll fakeclaim miller then". Other than that miller is likely to claim d1 so it won't affect much.

Like mastina said (and I agree with), balance is probably fine since scum have a lot, it's just somewhat swingy (which is not perfect, but is also okay, and I don't see a great solution to reduce it since I think 1-shot UB isn't a real role).

[implosion]

I've put it in signups. Some notes on role PMs (all minor/nitpicky):

-Using "Normal Vanilla Townie" is fine, but just be wary that there's a chance some player will try to call someone else town for knowing the proper name or that someone will claim just VT and get called scum for it; I personally prefer standardized naming for that reason.

-I think "Bulletproof vanilla townie" should technically be "town bulletproof", as a vanilla townie is a townie without any role. This could be confusing e.g. in a setup with a vanilla cop (which this doesn't have but it's best to be safe, scum could always fakeclaim it etc)

-Town win condition shouldn't explicitly say how many mafia are in the game unless it's publicly 3:10 in which case that should be listed in the setup information area.

-The "Mafia have multitasking enabled" setup info is probably redundant with mafia actually having the multitasking modifier; I'd just remove the modifier from them if they're multitasking by default, especially since there's no rolecop or town role that interacts with the modifier specifically.

-Lazy doctor should say the ability will fail, not that they "can't use it" anymore (because the lazy modifier can exist in games where it's not public how many scum there are, for instance - they're still allowed to try)

-The miller role PM says the cop's result would be "guilty", but the cop says "town", "mafia", or "no result" - these should be made consistent probably (and also, it's good to pre-write all possible result PMs from power roles and show them here as well, if you haven't yet)

-Another small consistency thing: if the cop's role PM says that they can receive "town", "mafia", or "no result", then it's good if the tracker's role PM also explicitly mentions that they may receive no result (and that this is different from "your target visited nobody").

[implosion]

Although actually I just noticed the changes (I thought it was just role PMs for the previous setup)

I think the bulletproof townie with information here is a bad idea. It just makes this game potentially incredibly frustrating for scum if that player is really townie and they know they can never kill them, without actually helping with balance or improving how much enjoyment players are likely to get out of playing the game. The town also just does not need that big of a boost of a potential confirmed town (via the cop) unkillable innocent. I don't think they needed any boost, I think it was balanced before these changes. The doctor nerfing is probably fine either way.

[implosion]

I have put it in signups (and I'm not going to undo that) but I might avoid actually launching it until we get clarity on the setup being run; the setup in post 7 was approved by mastina and I as balanced (if swingy), and I think large changes like adding a bulletproof are likely to sway that.

[implosion]

(My recommendation would be to just go with the setup in post 7 so that we can avoid more rounds of back-and-forth - it seems like you have other ideas you want to explore, and that's fine, but I suspect they likely belong in a different setup.)

[implosion]

Looks generally good. I should be launching it shortly. Thanks!