The Syndicate

Russtifinko wrote:

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

Russtifinko wrote:I'm told I have a pretty hardline stance against info dumps, but this is my philosophy: if it's information you did not get in the thread, it should never show up in the thread, period. So I'm with DH there. Some of the best times I've had in mafia have come from not revealing info, like my showdown with DH in Grimm. I also tried damned hard not to drop info in Zelda. I'm not sure I succeeded entirely, but I definitely enjoyed the game more because I had to put in the extra effort to build cases to convince civs to see it my way.

Actually, the mechanics of the Zelda game surely let you learn some things about other players, and especially that I was civ. And the same mechanics also helped me learn that you were Ganon. No info-dropping required.

They did, actually. In fact I was able to figure out the entire baddie team, but just a hair too late. Which I think was a sign that the balance of the info in the game was handled extremely well.

Thanks for the reminder, I thought I had tried very hard to reveal myself but wasn't sure if I had let something slip.

Russtifinko wrote:I'm told I have a pretty hardline stance against info dumps, but this is my philosophy: if it's information you did not get in the thread, it should never show up in the thread, period. So I'm with DH there. Some of the best times I've had in mafia have come from not revealing info, like my showdown with DH in Grimm. I also tried damned hard not to drop info in Zelda. I'm not sure I succeeded entirely, but I definitely enjoyed the game more because I had to put in the extra effort to build cases to convince civs to see it my way.

juliets wrote:I also agree that tweaked randomization can work for the best. Not giving new people info roles and not giving non-players important roles are two examples of this. The new participation rules after a time will likely take care of the worry that a non-player will get one of the important roles but I agree that not giving new people info roles is also something we could do.

Epignosis wrote:

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

Epignosis wrote:For my part, I am largely done with "valuable" info roles. Gone is the regular civilian role check. I used to like the idea, but now I don't. I have come up with several mechanics you'll see in future games of mine, and these will make dropping info even more ill-advised and in some cases impossible.

Easy fix. Include a group of 4 civvies that have the four roles listed in this mafia game, but don't tell any of them which type they are.

Not my thing because http://wiki.mafiascum.net/index.php?tit ... y/Analysis

Epignosis wrote:For my part, I am largely done with "valuable" info roles. Gone is the regular civilian role check. I used to like the idea, but now I don't. I have come up with several mechanics you'll see in future games of mine, and these will make dropping info even more ill-advised and in some cases impossible.

DharmaHelper wrote:I think an important thing to take into account is the concept of prevention vs. punishment. Its all fine and good to have punitive measures in place, but I think a more successful approach would be if hosts developed their games to make it as difficult as possible for infodumping to happen, and as difficult as possible for role outing to occur.

Whether that means writing more secrets into the game to create paranoia and doubt regarding claims, or in-game mechanics that spread misinformation, or whatever the case. I don't think it needs to be a question of "What bad things can we do to infodumpers", but rather find ways to encourage actual effort, and make infodumping and role outing useless or too difficult to warrant.

timmer wrote:A good example of how to use role info without revealing said info; I knew that whoever had the ring was a civ, and that if they voted for the Necromancer they would die instantly. I knew this because of my role as Col. Mustard. So when I saw Roxy die after voting Snowy I knew exactly what had happened. And though my initial "Snowy, you're dead meat!" or whatever it was lacked subtlety and wasn't quite in tune with my point here, the case I then built around Snowy was based primarily on his voting records. His voting pointed to him being a Suit, not a Sorcerer, but instead of worrying about that, I tried to build a solid case around him being a Suit, because I legally could, knowing he would flip Sorcerer and I'd have to be "wuh wuh?" I was arguably a little too insistent on Snowy, which may have suggested that I had other info, but I built a legal case around in-thread events.

A good example of how NOT to use role info: I knew Zeek's role had changed, resulting in him becoming Marla Singer, me discovering I was the Narrator, and we now had permanent BTSC. I knew SVS was Snape, and I could see in the thread that she had somehow caused our changes, but she was frustrated because she wasn't getting the feedback she felt she would have if Zeek was a civ. At first I did the right thing and stated that i trusted Zeek was civ due to his gameplay and voting records and case building up to that point. but after SVS kept questioning things, I completely abandoned the rules and essentially blurted out that zeek and I were tied together thanks to her. It didn't out my ROLE, I never did that in the game, but it outed BTSC which was just as bad. I should have stuck to my point about Zeek and just let SVS stew about it, and if people started voting Zeek, I should have just fought hard to show how he was a civ. Instead I let frustration get the better of me and blurted out our link.

Example A = pretty good
Example B = atrocious