HomeTips for hosting your round
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Tips for hosting your round
by Leo E. Sat Jul 07, 2012 5:20 pm
As we now have a number of people signing up for rounds, I've decided to post some simple tips that will help your round be as fun and balanced as possible. I'll try to make things simple and concise, but you can always check the wiki for better tips. So without further ado, here's some basic things that you probably already know, but bear repeating. Check the spoiler tag for the list.
I may add more later if I need to, but that's all for now. Hope this helped.
EDIT: Here's a small list of things you should NEVER do while hosting. While there are many discouraged things that fall under the category of "bastard mod" games, these are things that you shouldn't do even then.
- Spoiler:
- 1: Maintain a good ratio of townies and mafia.
This is more difficult than it sounds. In a basic game with little or no power roles, one mafia for every four or five townies is a decent place to start. But when you start to add in power roles, things get wonky. While initially adding power roles to the town reduces the mafia's chances of winning, when you add a LOT to the town they usually end up doing more harm than good; and if you added mafia to compensate for the high number of pro-town power roles, now the town has almost no chance of victory.
If one side seems too powerful, rather than changing the town/mafia ratio or adding power roles to the other side, try things such as making the more useful town power roles dependent on an enabler (to reduce the town's power) or skipping the night phase after a Godfather is killed (to reduce the mafia's power).
2: Plan roles ahead of time, and prepare contingencies.
The first part goes without saying. You don't want to wait until the short signup phase to start writing out your roles. Start writing them as soon as you get an idea.
Now what happens if you get a much higher or lower number of participants than you expected? Obviously you'll have to remove or add some roles and likely change the town/mafia ratio, but HOW you do this is more important.
If you must remove roles due to low turnout, a good place to start would be with less-basic roles and roles that require a large number of people, such as trackers and actors. Compulsive killing roles such as serial killers greatly increase the speed of the game by adding an extra death each night, so in smaller-than-expected games, they should be the first roles removed.
In the event that you garner more participants than you planned for, a simple way to keep things relatively the same would be to add vanilla roles with no abilities. However, make sure other roles aren't greatly affected by a change in the number of players.
3: Anticipate anything that could go wrong.
A broken setup can ruin the most interesting games. For those who don't know, a broken setup is when things (generally small things, such as the loss of one specific role) end up rendering the game potentially unwinnable for a faction.
Here's an example of a common and not particularly damaging situation.
Imagine a cop investigates a doctor. The two now know each other to be innocent, and the cop can publicly announce his investigation results without having to worry about being killed by the mafia, due to the doctor knowing who the cop is. Depending on how your roles are set up, this could render the game unwinnable for the mafia depending on how long it takes them to get the doctor lynched or killed.
If you anticipated this, you could give the mafia a solution to deal with it. For example, by giving them a kill that can bypass protections (such as a poisoner), or making the doctor unable to protect the same person two nights in a row, or even changing the doctor to a jailkeeper to prevent the cop from investigating while being protected.
If absolutely necessary, you can simulate the first couple nights (either by yourself with random ability targets or by asking a few people to help) to ensure that things don't go haywire early in the game.
4: Double-check everything, then check it again.
A mistake by a player can mean an innocent's death or a mafia's cover being blown. However, a mistake by a mod can ruin a game.
Make sure everything is correct. Talk to power roles before the day ends to confirm their target. Constantly double-check with the mafia so you're sure who their night target is (and, if necessary, which of them will be performing the kill). And most importantly, review every post to check for uncounted or mistaken votes. This also goes hand-in-hand with making sure players aren't breaking any rules.
5: Avoid hidden role abilities unless called for.
If you're not specifically going for a bastard mod game, or using roles that require hidden abilities (such as a paranoid cop), try to leave all the information in the open.
6: Be clear and impartial.
Two things that should be second nature to anyone wishing to moderate a game. First, ensure that your players will experience as little confusion as possible with their roles and abilities. Wordy role PMs that describe abilities in great detail are better than short ones that don't.
Also important, try to avoid ability conflicts. For example, if a roleblocker targets a paranoid gun owner, does the roleblocker die before their block takes effect? A good way to avoid this would be specifying to the roleblocker that their ability takes priority over all others, or by saying that their ability only blocks abilities that their target chooses to activate, not passive abilities like the paranoid gun owner's.
Second, make sure not to give unfair hints to either side. While it's generally acceptable to correct a player when they make a mistake about open information (for example, if someone attempts to use an ability in a way that their role description says they cannot, or if someone openly suspects another player that has already been publicly confirmed as innocent), you should never hint at any information that your players shouldn't know yet. For example, if a vigilante or mafia targets a bulletproof role, you shouldn't say things like "Do you want to reconsider that target?".
Also, don't railroad your players. For those unfamiliar with the term, railroading is when you goad your players into making certain choices because you want the game to play out a certain way. This is bound to make everyone hate your game and never join your games again.
7: Be quick.
Both in updates and checking for role abilities. Some abilities activated during the daytime can influence what happens during the rest of the day, and if you miss the timing, the game can be thrown off-balance.
As for updating, this can be difficult if you're trying to write a story along with it, but it's just something you need to be able to manage. A good idea would be to start writing the story when it becomes clear who will get lynched and how the nighttime abilities will play out. Even if some things change, you should still be able to use most of the story you wrote.
8: Have fun.
This sounds like one of those bullshit tips that have no purpose, but it's true. If you enjoy making the roles, writing the story, and moderating the game, odds are your players will enjoy it as well. On the other hand, if you constantly think "Wow, this role is really stupid" while making your roles, well, what makes you think your players won't think the same thing?
I may add more later if I need to, but that's all for now. Hope this helped.
EDIT: Here's a small list of things you should NEVER do while hosting. While there are many discouraged things that fall under the category of "bastard mod" games, these are things that you shouldn't do even then.
- Spoiler:
- 1: Hiding win conditions
Hiding aspects of a role can be justified based on the situation, but you should NEVER hide or lie about what each role must do in order to win the game.
2: Unaligned masons
Masons are two players that know each other to be innocent and can converse privately during the night even when PMs aren't allowed. You should never, in ANY way, allow two masons to end up on different teams. There IS a term for players allowed to PM each other at night who do not know each other's team, and when using this, you should make sure both players are fully aware that their neighbor could be part of any team.
3: Using a Jester
The Jester is a role that wins the game if it is lynched. Due to how absurdly easy it is to get lynched, games with Jesters typically end in one or two days with the Jester coming out on top.
If you truly want to incorporate a similar role into your round, you should take steps to ensure that it isn't game-breaking. For starters, the game should continue even when the Jester is lynched, allowing another faction to claim victory along with the Jester. Another good idea is to set a range of days (such as between the second and fourth days) where the Jester must be lynched in order for him to win, or even stating that the Jester must be lynched on an odd-numbered day or to win. In addition, Jesters must never be able to vote for themselves.
My personal favorite limitation is making it so the Jester must be lynched on a specific day in order to win. A good target day would be somewhere between mid-game and late-game (for example, if you expect the round to last eight days, the target date should be around the fifth or sixth day). This way, the Jester must survive a decent portion of the round while simultaneously not presenting a threat to the mafia (so that he does not get night-killed), and garnering enough suspicion to easily get lynched on the target day, but not so much that he gets lynched prematurely or attracts the attention of a vigilante.
Last edited by Leo E. on Mon Jul 09, 2012 12:46 pm; edited 3 times in total
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by spplmj Sat Jul 07, 2012 10:08 pm
>Changing the poll choice after its been made
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Leo E. Sat Jul 07, 2012 10:11 pm
spplmj wrote:>Changing the poll choice after its been made
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by spplmj Sat Jul 07, 2012 10:14 pm
I seriously hope you mods don't do this
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by spplmj Sat Jul 07, 2012 11:39 pm
>Sticking a thread on a board with only 6 threads
(USER WAS PADDLED FOR THIS POST)
spplmj wrote:
I seriously hope you mods don't do this
(USER WAS PADDLED FOR THIS POST)
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Leo E. Sat Jul 07, 2012 11:58 pm
Greentexting twice in three posts and quoting your own reaction images?spplmj wrote:>Sticking a thread on a board with only 6 threadsspplmj wrote:
I seriously hope you mods don't do this
That's a paddlin'.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Leo E. Mon Jul 09, 2012 12:47 pm
List updated, now includes stuff you SHOULDN'T do.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Not_anon Mon Jul 09, 2012 3:14 pm
Leo E. wrote:List updated, now includes stuff you SHOULDN'T do.
Well since my game is a bastard mod game, this will come in quite handy.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Leo E. Mon Jul 09, 2012 3:53 pm
Not_anon wrote:Leo E. wrote:List updated, now includes stuff you SHOULDN'T do.
Well since my game is a bastard mod game, this will come in quite handy.
Read again. This stuff is generally considered inexcusable, even for bastard mod games.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Mentle Tue Jul 10, 2012 12:34 am
I think we should bring back the limitations of our earlier games (well, Stalin already did it) like making the doctor unable to protect the same person twice in a row (using the Jailkeeper instead like the guide says might work even better depending of the game balance), and expand that limitations to any combination that can be game breaking, like bulletproof and hider.
Although they have no means to investigate, if the players communicate and decide to trust each other, it's just like the hider was converted to another bulletproof. We had this combination in one game, and with few voters left we survived until the end.
Although they have no means to investigate, if the players communicate and decide to trust each other, it's just like the hider was converted to another bulletproof. We had this combination in one game, and with few voters left we survived until the end.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by StalinCommander Tue Jul 10, 2012 6:20 am
Oh I remember that
And since I was a doublevoter, We would have won if Orion hadn't derped.
And since I was a doublevoter, We would have won if Orion hadn't derped.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Mentle Tue Jul 10, 2012 12:35 pm
StalinCommander wrote:Oh I remember that
And since I was a doublevoter, We would have won if Orion hadn't derped.
In all fairness, it was the first time a tie between townies and mafiosos happened in our games.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by DA Mon Nov 26, 2012 1:09 pm
Here's a tip for round hosting!
Don't force the amount of players based on the roles.
It might deter the experience + would force the admin to do oddball stuff when the requirements are not met.
Don't force the amount of players based on the roles.
It might deter the experience + would force the admin to do oddball stuff when the requirements are not met.
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Re: Tips for hosting your round
by Leo E. Mon Nov 26, 2012 10:29 pm
DA wrote:Here's a tip for round hosting!
Don't force the amount of players based on the roles.
It might deter the experience + would force the admin to do oddball stuff when the requirements are not met.
What kind of asshole would do this?
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