Post by ForgotToFlush on Oct 4, 2023 3:46:10 GMT
Tropicana 17: A new attempt at a Standard OC Setup
By ForgotToFlush
Introduction
Outside Contact games are a classic staple of the PS! Mafia Forums. The implementation of side conversations and secret groupchats adds a new dimension to Mafia games, and OC games have traditionally been used as testing grounds for many different hosts, myself included. Previously utilized mechanics include blind setups, no reveals, and most recently, private voting. However, this variance in setup design means a lack of standardization for OC games. For the sake of increasing interest in OC games, I hope to provide a setup that can be repeatedly played, with wildly different experiences each time. To do this I've had some help from some key long-time collaborators, Fenrir, Schia and Snaq. Below I've outlined the creative process, and how everything came together to create Tropicana 17.
If you're interested in skipping straight to the setup and what it looks like, then click here (X). Otherwise, let's get into it!
Fruit Festival
The first seeds were planted thanks to an innocuous message in staffchat:
Here's an explanation of the role, retrieved from MafiaScum (X):
My mind immediately started racing with ideas; this role was unique, but also reminded me of the Cult-Rod from the Countdown setup. This afforded me an opportunity to use a role that was game-defining, but not game-ending. The level of whimsy combined with its powerful nature appealed to me, so I got to thinking about what type of setup would suit it. Eventually I remembered a setup that I thought would be perfect, if not for some complications:
Mad17er
Mad17er (X) was designed by soah for use in the Mafia Championships. Coincidentally, it was also the setup used during my first go-around in the Championships. It was critically panned for a number of reasons, but I believed it had potential as a testing grounds for the Fruit Festival role.
To summarize the setup: Everyone receives a limited use power role, each unique in terms of abilities and when it can act. This includes the Mafia, so there's strategic benefit in either randing a strong role like Vigilante, or in taking a role like Cop away from the Town. The rest of role list is populated by roles of varying utility, ranging from Doctors and Roleblockers to Voyeurs. As such, the high level of variation from one rand to another lead to a lot of complaints. Games where the Mafia received the Cops and Vigs were called scumsided by the players, and games where they went to the Town instead were called townsided.
There are other gripes related to the nature of the setup and its suitability for a competitive context, but I consider those contextual, and not important to my intended usage. The biggest concern is the level of variance, and reducing that in order to produce something less dependent on the initial rand.
Putting it all together
Initially, I attempted to restructure the setup around 15 players with 3 active nights, while lowering the level of deviance in terms of role power. However, this created a situation where the average role power was too low. With advice from my collaborators, we settled on a 17p list, featuring a multiball spread of 13v2v2. This allowed the role list to be expanded to 19, so that there are always 2 roles not in use. Additionally, the number of active nights was expanded from 3 to 5, hopefully leading to more emphasis on night play as well as day.
In terms of roles, from the original Mad17er, the number of Vigilantes was reduced from 2 to 1. While I initially wanted to cut them completely, we agreed on 1 being beneficial in a multiball context. It shouldn't be too centralizing for Town, and Mafia receiving it introduces a strategic decision in aiming for a crosskill or going after Town. Reducing the number also eliminates highroll situations where a single faction can control both Vigs.
As for other major changes, Alignment Cops were scrapped completely, as we all agreed on them being too centralizing. JOATS were removed, but only because of my personal view that they're unnecessarily complicated for the setup. Otherwise, the other roles were tweaked in terms of their active nights and numbers. That does it for subtractions, but in terms of additions, I introduced the Motion Detector (X), Follower(X), Reporter(X) and Inspector (X). Hopefully these create interesting gameplay scenarios as players attempt to maximize their PR usage.
Implementing the Fruit Festival proved to be the easiest part. Both Mafia teams have a 1x Factional Fruit Festival to be used at their discretion, which will affect all actions, excluding their own. This notably includes the actions of the other Mafia faction, creating interesting choices as to how it is used. If both Fruit Festivals are used on the same night, it essentially prevents either Mafia kill from resolving, potentially to the benefit of the Town. Additionally, Mafia have a strategic choice in terms of what night to use it, as each given night has its own associated challenge in terms of night actions.
To elucidate that point, check out the finished role list:
Hopefully this shows what I mean a bit more. For example, using the Fruit Festival on N3 blanks the Vigilante, as well as blanking the night with the most active roles. However, using it on a Night like 1 or 5 hits less roles, but stops stronger ones like the Watcher or Tracker.
I think the nature of the setup creates interesting OC gameplay for Town as well. OC allows Town members to be more discreet with how they disseminate information such as their role and when it can be used, allowing for things like claims and targets to potentially escape the eyes and ears of the Mafia.
Additionally, the nature of the setup and the discards means that each game is hopefully unique relative to previous ones, creating a bigger replayability aspect.
Takeaways
I'll be doing a test host of this in the near future. I think that this setup lends itself to the type of OC gameplay we'd like to promote, so hopefully the setup piques people's interest. If you happen to have feedback or ideas for improvements, I'm all ears. This setup is largely untested and mostly theoretical, so I'm happy to hear out any criticisms. Until then, I look forward to running some playtests.
By ForgotToFlush
Introduction
Outside Contact games are a classic staple of the PS! Mafia Forums. The implementation of side conversations and secret groupchats adds a new dimension to Mafia games, and OC games have traditionally been used as testing grounds for many different hosts, myself included. Previously utilized mechanics include blind setups, no reveals, and most recently, private voting. However, this variance in setup design means a lack of standardization for OC games. For the sake of increasing interest in OC games, I hope to provide a setup that can be repeatedly played, with wildly different experiences each time. To do this I've had some help from some key long-time collaborators, Fenrir, Schia and Snaq. Below I've outlined the creative process, and how everything came together to create Tropicana 17.
If you're interested in skipping straight to the setup and what it looks like, then click here (X). Otherwise, let's get into it!
Fruit Festival
The first seeds were planted thanks to an innocuous message in staffchat:
Here's an explanation of the role, retrieved from MafiaScum (X):
The standardized Role PM for "Fruit Festival" describes the action as follows:
As an active action: you may replace all night actions with a Fruit Vendor action, causing anyone who acted that night to send fruit to their targets. A player who received fruit will be told they received fruit (but not who sent it).My mind immediately started racing with ideas; this role was unique, but also reminded me of the Cult-Rod from the Countdown setup. This afforded me an opportunity to use a role that was game-defining, but not game-ending. The level of whimsy combined with its powerful nature appealed to me, so I got to thinking about what type of setup would suit it. Eventually I remembered a setup that I thought would be perfect, if not for some complications:
Mad17er
Mad17er (X) was designed by soah for use in the Mafia Championships. Coincidentally, it was also the setup used during my first go-around in the Championships. It was critically panned for a number of reasons, but I believed it had potential as a testing grounds for the Fruit Festival role.
To summarize the setup: Everyone receives a limited use power role, each unique in terms of abilities and when it can act. This includes the Mafia, so there's strategic benefit in either randing a strong role like Vigilante, or in taking a role like Cop away from the Town. The rest of role list is populated by roles of varying utility, ranging from Doctors and Roleblockers to Voyeurs. As such, the high level of variation from one rand to another lead to a lot of complaints. Games where the Mafia received the Cops and Vigs were called scumsided by the players, and games where they went to the Town instead were called townsided.
There are other gripes related to the nature of the setup and its suitability for a competitive context, but I consider those contextual, and not important to my intended usage. The biggest concern is the level of variance, and reducing that in order to produce something less dependent on the initial rand.
Putting it all together
Initially, I attempted to restructure the setup around 15 players with 3 active nights, while lowering the level of deviance in terms of role power. However, this created a situation where the average role power was too low. With advice from my collaborators, we settled on a 17p list, featuring a multiball spread of 13v2v2. This allowed the role list to be expanded to 19, so that there are always 2 roles not in use. Additionally, the number of active nights was expanded from 3 to 5, hopefully leading to more emphasis on night play as well as day.
In terms of roles, from the original Mad17er, the number of Vigilantes was reduced from 2 to 1. While I initially wanted to cut them completely, we agreed on 1 being beneficial in a multiball context. It shouldn't be too centralizing for Town, and Mafia receiving it introduces a strategic decision in aiming for a crosskill or going after Town. Reducing the number also eliminates highroll situations where a single faction can control both Vigs.
As for other major changes, Alignment Cops were scrapped completely, as we all agreed on them being too centralizing. JOATS were removed, but only because of my personal view that they're unnecessarily complicated for the setup. Otherwise, the other roles were tweaked in terms of their active nights and numbers. That does it for subtractions, but in terms of additions, I introduced the Motion Detector (X), Follower(X), Reporter(X) and Inspector (X). Hopefully these create interesting gameplay scenarios as players attempt to maximize their PR usage.
Implementing the Fruit Festival proved to be the easiest part. Both Mafia teams have a 1x Factional Fruit Festival to be used at their discretion, which will affect all actions, excluding their own. This notably includes the actions of the other Mafia faction, creating interesting choices as to how it is used. If both Fruit Festivals are used on the same night, it essentially prevents either Mafia kill from resolving, potentially to the benefit of the Town. Additionally, Mafia have a strategic choice in terms of what night to use it, as each given night has its own associated challenge in terms of night actions.
To elucidate that point, check out the finished role list:
Hopefully this shows what I mean a bit more. For example, using the Fruit Festival on N3 blanks the Vigilante, as well as blanking the night with the most active roles. However, using it on a Night like 1 or 5 hits less roles, but stops stronger ones like the Watcher or Tracker.
I think the nature of the setup creates interesting OC gameplay for Town as well. OC allows Town members to be more discreet with how they disseminate information such as their role and when it can be used, allowing for things like claims and targets to potentially escape the eyes and ears of the Mafia.
Additionally, the nature of the setup and the discards means that each game is hopefully unique relative to previous ones, creating a bigger replayability aspect.
Takeaways
I'll be doing a test host of this in the near future. I think that this setup lends itself to the type of OC gameplay we'd like to promote, so hopefully the setup piques people's interest. If you happen to have feedback or ideas for improvements, I'm all ears. This setup is largely untested and mostly theoretical, so I'm happy to hear out any criticisms. Until then, I look forward to running some playtests.