Basic Mafia Strategy (updated 1/3 4:21 PM EST)

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Basic Mafia Strategy (updated 1/3 4:21 PM EST)

Post by Advance Stratagist »

After that last game I felt I should make a topic here about some tips, and common strategies for mafia games, to help people do better in the future. Some of the things that happened was just crazy, and hopefully this helps out a bit.

This will be a basic list of some of my personal Do's and Don't when playing a mafia game. I'll break it into four parts. One for everyone in general, one for playing as the mafia, one for playing as the town, and one for being a wildcard.

UNIVERSAL TIPS

1. LEAVE YOUR RELATIONSHIPS AT THE DOOR - Unless the gm decides to handpick the roles, all roles are going to be randomized. The randomizer doesn't care if you're put up against your best friend, or teamed together with someone you hate. Anybody could be mafia, and anybody can get town. Voting/hitting someone just because you don't like them OR not voting/hitting someone because they're your friend is the worst line of thinking you can do in this game.

Going along the same thing here, it also is usually a good idea not to let a debate or argument you may have with someone as anything personal outside of the game (unless it's really something uncalled for which would probably be handled by the GM). I've seen people grate on each others nerves during mafia games that ended up like best buddies as soon as the game ended.

2. READ THE FREAKING RULES. ALL OF THEM. - Nothing is more embarassing then having something horrible happen, because you didn't properly understand something about the rules. Be it a question about a role, or investigations, or even as basic as how hit requests and lynches work. Knowing the rules of the game will save you from making a silly mistake later.

3. DON'T FREAKING ROLECLAIM IN THE THREAD - I don't care if you're about to die. If your mafian, you lose all chance to try to make the town second guess themselves about their decision. If your a town role, you paint a big ol' bullseye on your butt with a neon sign over it saying "SHOOT ME MAFIA". If there's a decent reason behind it, it may work out, but roleclaiming for the sake of roleclaiming is utterly pointless, and doesn't help you out at all.

4. A MAFIAN GOING AFTER A MAFIAN ISN'T AGAINST THE RULES - There's a difference between trying to make your faction lose, and creating a decent cover. Sometimes a couple mafians may accuse each other, or one will specifically accuse someone. No matter which one gets killed off, the other tends to look better after that. And if everyone is sure they are town after that, the mafia are in a good position with someone the town will never want to vote out.

5. TALK TO PEOPLE, YES EVEN THEM - Isolating yourself will tend to get you nowhere. Communicating with others gives you more information to work with then trying to do it all on your lonesome. The mafia especially need to communicate to each other and coordinate plans, so they don't screw each other up by accident. The town needs to contact people so they have something to work on and aren't shooting in the dark.

6. BE READY FOR A LONG GAME - It really depends on the size of the number of players, but it's not uncommon for games to run for a very long time. A week long game would be considered fast. 3 or 4 weeks is considered normal. 6 to 8 weeks is when it starts being thought of usually as a long game.

7. READ THE WHOLE THREAD - Sometimes, you'll be away for a few hours, and nothing's really happend when... BAM! Suddenly there's accusations flying around, fingers are being pointed, someone tries to keep things stress free with pictures, another person gets the gm mad, and before you know it you're 40 pages behind on everything and for some reason there's a monkey on a unicycle and pom poms in the corner with someone's investigations. As annoying as this will be, read over everything that happened when you get the time. A summary can tell you the general gist of what happened, but seeing everything for yourself can give you a better picture of what unfolded, and could give you ideas you otherwise would have missed.

8. DON'T UNDERESTIMATE NEW PEOPLE - It's generally a bad idea to underestimate anybody in general, but especially with new players. It's possible they'll be horrible at the game and just never figure out what to do. It's possible they'll have problems at first, but learn as they go along. It's also possible they may turn out to be so good, they could wipe out a mafia, make their own, beat the rest of the town, while proving the heterosexuality of Adrian Andrews and Miles Edgeworth.
Going along the same vein, don't overestimate someone either. Even the best players can have an off day, or just do something really friggin stupid.

*NEW* 9. A MAN IN THE SHADOWS? LYNCH HIM! (OR WHY MOUSE ALWAYS DIES DAY 1) - Acting like your enigmatic or mysterious does not make people think "wow he sure knows what he's doing, we should listen to him". More accurately it's gonna make people think "oh crap, he's hiding something, we better find out what he's up to or lynch him to be safe". Unless your plan is to die for some reason, don't do it.

TOWN TIPS

1. VOTE DANG IT - The single greatest way to kill the town is to keep them from being able to lynch anyone. The second being to keep them from lynching who they want to lynch. Willingly not voting does NOTHING to help the town. Nobody gets killed, meaning you have nothing more to go off of, and you give the mafia a free phase to kill someone. And guess what, they ain't gonna kill one of their own. (on purpose anyways) The only reasons to willingly not vote someone are few, and almost never come up anyways. This is especially true in day 1, when you usually have little to nothing to go on, and are probably going to hit a town. Not killing anyone at all just leaves you one player shorter the next time, and still without any information.

2. DON'T WAIT FOR DECISIVE EVIDENCE - This is not Phoenix Wright. You will almost NEVER have anything but circumstancial evidence, and vague suspicions, unless the detective manages to do something. And chances are you won't be in contact with them, unless you get lucky. If you got a decent suspicion on someone, act on it.

3. A DEAD ROLE'S GUESS =/= BETTER THAN A DEAD NILLA'S GUESS - I noticed people tended to trust the suspicions of a dead role moreso then one of a dead nilla. Which is great and all if they're a detective with investigations they can at least show. When it comes to guesses and suspicions however, a role doesn't make one person's educated guess better then someone else's just because they had a role.

4. MAKE SURE YOUR ARGUMENTS MAKE SENSE - It's great to be able to be the one to catch a mafian. But in your rush to seem like a hero of the world, you may find out that what seemed odd turned out to not really mean anything at all, and then you could have problems if you picked the wrong person. If you see something that seems odd, try to think of other reasons that they could have said or done something, and see if it makes sense at all. You may find it's just too weird to ignore, and press on. Sometimes you may find another reason that seems to explain it for the time being. Either way, it helps to think it through before accusing someone.

5. RANDOMIZERS HAVE SHORT TERM MEMORY - The greatest thing casinos have ever added to las vegas roulette tables is a sign that shows what numbers have come up in the last few plays. They're designed to trick your mind into thinking that a certain number or color has to come up sooner or later. But it doesn't mean anything in the least, that ball has the same chance of hitting a square every time. Same thing with roles in mafia. Just because someone gets townie a lot lately, or always seems to get mafia, doesn't mean they're somehow overdue to be given the other side. Nor does it mean they are always condemned to play the same faction. They get a new shot at the dice every game.

MAFIA TIPS

1. GET YOUR PLANS TOGETHER - It's going to be hard enough to avoid suspicion from the town as it is. Not letting each other know what is going on is going to make things even harder on you. Even if your teamed up with someone you aren't too fond of usually, suck it up and work with them on how you can best beat the town.

2. DON'T GET CAUGHT UP SAVING ONE PERSON - Yes it'd be nice for you if everyone lived, and losing the godfather or another role early in the game stinks. But having everyone in the mafia jump up and down to save them makes you into a huge target as well just for having defended a mafian.

3. THINK LIKE A TOWNIE - Try to figure out what you'd be doing currently if you were a plain old vanilla town. Then when you talk to people, you have a better idea of how to keep yourself sounding normal, and less of a chance of accidently saying something you shouldn't know.

4. VOTING BLOCS CAN BLOW YOUR COVER - If everyone in the mafia always vote together, or blatenly all switch to somebody for little reason, then you're just gonna make yourself an obvious target if the town is smart enough to realize it.

WILDCARD TIPS

1. WORK FOR THE FACTION YOU JOIN - People tend to have a preference for what side they wanna join if they get a wildcard role, but if you end up in a different faction, don't fret too much over it. Do the best you can to help the side you have joined, even if it's not the one you may have wanted to join originally.

2. AFFILIATE WITH SOMEONE AT LEAST - You don't have to affiliate right away if you don't want to, and in some cases it may work out better to wait a bit before trying to get on a side. But eventually, you'll want to team up with someone. To a small degree, it's because you can't really win if your unaffiliated. But more to the point, especially if someone knows you're a wildcard, and you don't want to affiliate, they may suspect you've already joined up with the other side.

3. DON'T REVEAL YOURSELF TO MORE THAN NECESSARY - Sure, it'll help with affiliating to tell someone you are a wildcard. But try to keep that as hidden as possible. The more people that know you are a wildcard, the more will want you affiliated. And that could easily cause problems if you get people from both sides wanting you to join them, which could cause you to get lynched or killed if one side suspects you've joined the other.

I have more, but I can't think of other ones off the top of my head. I will add them as I think of them, or if more suggestions come in I feel should be added.
Last edited by Advance Stratagist on Sat Jan 03, 2009 11:27 pm, edited 8 times in total.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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My name is Geno, and I approve this message.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Good job David.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Nicely done.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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If you think this will stop me from working as a loner, think again. That has always been my style.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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and that is why you end up having problems every single game.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Advance Stratagist wrote:and that is why you end up having problems every single game.
Except some people here actually approved of my 'being a loner' playing style. Their personally opinion, my personal opinion.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Super Judge Bro. wrote:
Advance Stratagist wrote:and that is why you end up having problems every single game.
Except some people here actually approved of my 'being a loner' playing style. Their personally opinion, my personal opinion.

And that's why I made a point of listing that in the first post as a bad idea.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Advance Stratagist wrote:
Super Judge Bro. wrote:
Advance Stratagist wrote:and that is why you end up having problems every single game.
Except some people here actually approved of my 'being a loner' playing style. Their personally opinion, my personal opinion.

And that's why I made a point of listing that in the first post as a bad idea.
Tough luck. I do try to attempt to communicate, but for the most part I do things my own way. If you don't like it, so what. These tips aren't a rule.

Continue to think that I fail. That's right, continue. The more you unexpect me of doing something, the higher the chance it might surprise you.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Insho, AAO Mafia V Dead Thread, Pg. 29 wrote:Faulty reasoning, inattentiveness, overcompensation and overthinking...

These are the [Cardinal Sins] of the [game], as the atrophy of the duration sets in. With less to lead, more fail...
I'd like to mention this. Note that there are some edited parts, but in almost every game, these are the same 3 problems.
AS? Would you deem this worthy enough to add up there?
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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SJB: Your right, it's not a rule. I'm pointing it out because it does make things much easier on yourself.

It's like eating soup with a fork. I'm sure you could if you really tried hard enough, but it really is easier to just use a spoon.


Insho: Doesn't quite fit the setup I have right now for the list, but I think I can reword it so it can fit it.
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Advance Stratagist wrote:Insho: Doesn't quite fit the setup I have right now for the list, but I think I can reword it so it can fit it.
As long as the point is up there, I am happy. Seriously is like a mental atrophy,though...
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Advance Stratagist wrote:SJB: Your right, it's not a rule. I'm pointing it out because it does make things much easier on yourself.

It's like eating soup with a fork. I'm sure you could if you really tried hard enough, but it really is easier to just use a spoon.
On, really?

I find PMing people and configuring a plan with others to be harder than what I currently do. Granted that would make me a pretty bad mafioso if I ever do become one. If that would happen, I would probably talk a little more and suggest things. But I could never carry out orders, I'd rather be bossed around.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Super Judge Bro. wrote:I findPMing people and configuring a plan with others to be harder than what I currently do. Granted that would make me a pretty bad mafioso if I ever do become one. If that would happen, I would probablytalk a little more and suggest things.But I could never carry out orders, I'd rather be bossed around.
I struck out everything other than what you need to do.
You already had the answer.
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Re: Basic Mafia Strategy

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Oh, well that's helpful if I have no idea what to talk about.
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