Mafia Championship Season 6 Setup - Suggestion/Discussion Thread

[Lissa]

Hi all.

Season 6 of the Mafia Championship is coming up and we need to get a setup figured out before invitations are sent out.

We're looking for a 13-17 player setup.

The setup for this game is something that has been brought up as a suggestion: https://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums...endly-72-24%29

Doing Mountainous again is also potentially on the table? Thingy would like to consider 14/3 if we go that route. Winrate for 12/3 is 4:9 t:w in S4 and 5:16 t:w on the site as a whole unless I missed any games. A new setup would be preferable, though.

We're open to all/any suggestions.

[Ampharos]

Addendum: Lissa is strongly against any 2-person mafia teams, which means 11/2 mountainous is off the table.

[LanMisa]

What's the problem with Matrix 12?

[Thingyman]

What's the problem with Matrix 12?

We'd prefer a new setup. So far we've had a new setup each year, and if possible I'd like to continue that streak. But if we can't think of something good, I'm inclined to go with the revised mountainous format (revised as in 14:3 instead of 12:3).

[GeneralHankerchief]

What's the problem with Matrix 12?

Some of the setups can be good, but they're outnumbered by the ones that are boring/unbalanced/just not that fun to play. You don't want to highlight a setup where there's only a 33% chance of it being good or playable.

Anyway @ Thingy + other Champs organizers, are there going to be any parameters that could potentially influence the setup chosen (such as total number of contestants, a desire to avoid N1 deaths, more power roles assigned than in the past, etc) or is just picking a workable setup paramount and then we go from there?

[LanMisa]

What's the problem with Matrix 12?

We'd prefer a new setup. So far we've had a new setup each year, and if possible I'd like to continue that streak. But if we can't think of something good, I'm inclined to go with the revised mountainous format (revised as in 14:3 instead of 12:3).

Maybe it's just me, but I find the idea of a Mountainous setup a bit boring... and as far as I am aware, many communities are more leaning towards role madness than plain setups, but that might be confirmation bias.

Alternatively, what about a Poisoner setup and/or a Neapolitan setup with the JOAT being modified to not have a vig shot (since no N1 vig shots were something a lot of people seemed to ask for)?

[GeneralHankerchief]

How married are you to the idea of having all possible setups easily displayed in a single table like they were for Matrix12 or 2x5?

[Thingyman]

What's the problem with Matrix 12?

Some of the setups can be good, but they're outnumbered by the ones that are boring/unbalanced/just not that fun to play. You don't want to highlight a setup where there's only a 33% chance of it being good or playable.

Anyway @ Thingy + other Champs organizers, are there going to be any parameters that could potentially influence the setup chosen (such as total number of contestants, a desire to avoid N1 deaths, more power roles assigned than in the past, etc) or is just picking a workable setup paramount and then we go from there?

We pick a workable/good setup and go from there. I.e. the setup will pretty much determine the exact number of participating communities.

Our wishes for the setup are the same as always:
- We prefer it to be a new setup
- We prefer it to not be too centered around one power role aka we'd like to minimize the variance involved with the setup
- We prefer it to not be too exotic, i.e. most of the communities/players should preferably already be familiar with the roles that are used OR at least any new roles should be easy enough to understand

What's the problem with Matrix 12?

We'd prefer a new setup. So far we've had a new setup each year, and if possible I'd like to continue that streak. But if we can't think of something good, I'm inclined to go with the revised mountainous format (revised as in 14:3 instead of 12:3).

Maybe it's just me, but I find the idea of a Mountainous setup a bit boring... and as far as I am aware, many communities are more leaning towards role madness than plain setups, but that might be confirmation bias.

Alternatively, what about a Poisoner setup and/or a Neapolitan setup with the JOAT being modified to not have a vig shot (since no N1 vig shots were something a lot of people seemed to ask for)?

No confirmation bias here, you're absolutely right that a vast majority of communities lean more towards role heavy setups than plain/vanilla setups. So that is for sure a big concern of mine. I'd PREFER to not have to go the Mountainous route again. But if we don't have a good, workable setup, then we might need to. The benefit to the Mountainous setup is that it is definitely the superior setup in terms of evaluating raw skill - mafia is about reading and manipulating, and a Mountainous game is about only that and nothing else.

BUT the Championship is mainly for the sake of fun and bringing communities close together, so if a majority of the participating communities hate the setup, then that's not a success.

How married are you to the idea of having all possible setups easily displayed in a single table like they were for Matrix12 or 2x5?

I'm not married to anything. Well, except my wife :P

[Thingyman]

I'd like to aim for us to have decided on a setup within one week, so I can get started on the invites. I think it's important that the communities know which setup they're nominating players for.

The setup doesn't necessarily need to have all of its details finalized - it's okay to adjust the balance of it after it's been picked. But I do want us to have a general idea for a setup decided within one week.

Which isn't a lot of time, so I'm hoping a lot of you will chime in and help us decide on something good

[Disquieted]

Our wishes for the setup are the same as always:
- We prefer it to be a new setup
- We prefer it to not be too centered around one power role aka we'd like to minimize the variance involved with the setup
- We prefer it to not be too exotic, i.e. most of the communities/players should preferably already be familiar with the roles that are used OR at least any new roles should be easy enough to understand

season

6

championship

Witchhunt

(i don't have any particular feelings on the setup except that I would strongly disagree with making it 14/3 mountainous. 12/3 mountainous is already bad enough in terms of time, though definitely usable and a good indicator of skill level and from a person with a role-madness preferred perspective, 14/3 mountainous would probably drive some community representatives insane. something something retention rates)

[LanMisa]

How about.... Mountainous Arson?

[Disquieted]

kinda of thinking about something fancy pants-esque actually, with two or three town PR "slots" with certain PRs rotating through them. but I guess that's just 2x5 under another name. don't mind me

uh. marson sounds like a FUN TIME pls do this unironically

[LanMisa]

Something I came up with on the fly: How about a 13-er setup with an odd-night Jailkeeper, an even-night Vigilante and a Mafia Rolecop?

[soah]

Maybe it's just me, but I find the idea of a Mountainous setup a bit boring... and as far as I am aware, many communities are more leaning towards role madness than plain setups

The setup linked above was something I designed specifically with the Champs series in mind since there's never been a setup that's really heavy on power roles. The benefits of the setup:

• It keeps all the good characteristics of closed setup role madness (role claims never confirm alignment, wolves have plenty of options for creative fake claims) while eliminating the bad characteristics (players can use their knowledge of the host to gain an advantage at guessing the details of the setup).
• No role is strong enough to win or lose the game for their team all by themselves.
• The protective roles discourage wolves from just killing off the best players on the first two nights.
• Villagers never have an incentive to alter their play in order to stay alive longer -- instead they would want to be villagery to get targeted by protective roles rather than the other roles. This makes it easier to evaluate who is really the best player.
• The setup rewards skillful play -- if the villagers collectively have bad reads then they will use their actions inefficiently and gain little benefit from them. If the villagers collectively have good reads then their actions can give them a lot of solid information.
• None of the most important roles act on n1, so those players have to play decently for the first two days in order to use their action.
• None of the roles are so weak that a villager would have an incentive to try to draw an early nightkill.

[Ampharos]

kinda of thinking about something fancy pants-esque actually, with two or three town PR "slots" with certain PRs rotating through them. but I guess that's just 2x5 under another name. don't mind me

uh. marson sounds like a FUN TIME pls do this unironically

something something retention rates otherwise you know I'd be down

wait why don't we call mountainous arson VOLCANIC it's a much better name than marson

[LanMisa]

Maybe it's just me, but I find the idea of a Mountainous setup a bit boring... and as far as I am aware, many communities are more leaning towards role madness than plain setups

The setup linked above was something I designed specifically with the Champs series in mind since there's never been a setup that's really heavy on power roles. The benefits of the setup:

• It keeps all the good characteristics of closed setup role madness (role claims never confirm alignment, wolves have plenty of options for creative fake claims) while eliminating the bad characteristics (players can use their knowledge of the host to gain an advantage at guessing the details of the setup).
• No role is strong enough to win or lose the game for their team all by themselves.
• The protective roles discourage wolves from just killing off the best players on the first two nights.
• Villagers never have an incentive to alter their play in order to stay alive longer -- instead they would want to be villagery to get targeted by protective roles rather than the other roles. This makes it easier to evaluate who is really the best player.
• The setup rewards skillful play -- if the villagers collectively have bad reads then they will use their actions inefficiently and gain little benefit from them. If the villagers collectively have good reads then their actions can give them a lot of solid information.
• None of the most important roles act on n1, so those players have to play decently for the first two days in order to use their action.
• None of the roles are so weak that a villager would have an incentive to try to draw an early nightkill.

I'm just not sure about the variance that might happen depending on which power roles scum roll. I also think that the setup is more townsided, but looking at all those mafia stomps during the last two years I wouldn't mind seeing a change in numbers.

[soah]

I can't edit my post, so pretend this is in there as well:

• The wolves generally are not forced to kill players just because of their roles.

[soah]

I'm just not sure about the variance that might happen depending on which power roles scum roll. I also think that the setup is more townsided, but looking at all those mafia stomps during the last two years I wouldn't mind seeing a change in numbers.

I spent a long time looking at randomly generated setups, and they all looked pretty similar to me in terms of balance.

[LanMisa]

I'm just not sure about the variance that might happen depending on which power roles scum roll. I also think that the setup is more townsided, but looking at all those mafia stomps during the last two years I wouldn't mind seeing a change in numbers.

I spent a long time looking at randomly generated setups, and they all looked pretty similar to me in terms of balance.

Ah, okay, I trust you on that.

[LanMisa]

Talking about that setup though, how many saves do you expect per game on average? This can strongly alter the length of a game, after all.

[Disquieted]

kinda of thinking about something fancy pants-esque actually, with two or three town PR "slots" with certain PRs rotating through them. but I guess that's just 2x5 under another name. don't mind me

uh. marson sounds like a FUN TIME pls do this unironically

something something retention rates otherwise you know I'd be down

wait why don't we call mountainous arson VOLCANIC it's a much better name than marson

the retention rates are probably the same as 12/3 mountainous unless something's slipping my mind wrt marson getting 2 extra villas or something.

[Thingyman]

Our wishes for the setup are the same as always:
- We prefer it to be a new setup
- We prefer it to not be too centered around one power role aka we'd like to minimize the variance involved with the setup
- We prefer it to not be too exotic, i.e. most of the communities/players should preferably already be familiar with the roles that are used OR at least any new roles should be easy enough to understand

season

6

championship

Witchhunt

(i don't have any particular feelings on the setup except that I would strongly disagree with making it 14/3 mountainous. 12/3 mountainous is already bad enough in terms of time, though definitely usable and a good indicator of skill level and from a person with a role-madness preferred perspective, 14/3 mountainous would probably drive some community representatives insane. something something retention rates)

Ah, yes. I forgot about this. Alright, 14:3 mountainous probably out then.

[soah]

Talking about that setup though, how many saves do you expect per game on average? This can strongly alter the length of a game, after all.

The wolves should be able to dodge the protection pretty well. I wouldn't expect many missing kills on average. And since there are two vig shots, you'd need a lot of missing kills just to make the game last longer than a regular 17er that has no vigs.

[El-ahrairah]

Is it possible to run two types of setup alongside each other? A role madness setup for those who want to play with PRs, and a Mountainous setup for those who prefer no PRs? Keep in mind I've never seen a champs game and have no idea how the series works. I'm not Champs material but I know I would prefer to play Mountainous if given the choice, so there's gotta be (maybe... possibly... hopefully...) others out there who feel the same. Right?

[Soneji]

Mountainous arson would be my preference.

As for the suggested set-up in the OP, I think it's the second best option but needs some tweaks/I have some questions.

1) if mafia rand both of the vig roles, this makes the set-up a bit lopsided. While there are doctor protects/roleblocks, the chances of them stopping a kill aren't high enough to make up for the raw power two extra kills gives.

2) alignment cop is worthless to the mafia, does this role become a role cop if mafia rand it?

I'd say that my suggestions to improve the set-up is to make it so mafia can't ever have both vigs but to balance things out the alignment cop if they rand it becomes a role cop with more/unlimited uses(the mafia learning a players role is nowhere near as important as a townie learning someone's alignment).

[GeneralHankerchief]

Is it possible to run two types of setup alongside each other? A role madness setup for those who want to play with PRs, and a Mountainous setup for those who prefer no PRs? Keep in mind I've never seen a champs game and have no idea how the series works. I'm not Champs material but I know I would prefer to play Mountainous if given the choice, so there's gotta be (maybe... possibly... hopefully...) others out there who feel the same. Right?

Along with this, what about the possibility of running one setup for the qualifiers and then a different setup (potentially mountainous or a variant thereof) for the wildcards/finale? Justification being that the community-pleasing, role madness aspect is used for the more social, "get to know you" type rounds that encourage community building, and then for the business end of champs later on we go with a more tournament-friendly setup.

[Soneji]

Is it possible to run two types of setup alongside each other? A role madness setup for those who want to play with PRs, and a Mountainous setup for those who prefer no PRs? Keep in mind I've never seen a champs game and have no idea how the series works. I'm not Champs material but I know I would prefer to play Mountainous if given the choice, so there's gotta be (maybe... possibly... hopefully...) others out there who feel the same. Right?

Along with this, what about the possibility of running one setup for the qualifiers and then a different setup (potentially mountainous or a variant thereof) for the wildcards/finale? Justification being that the community-pleasing, role madness aspect is used for the more social, "get to know you" type rounds that encourage community building, and then for the business end of champs later on we go with a more tournament-friendly setup.

This seems ideal, I have a strong love for role madness which is NF's bread and butter even though I'd want mountainous to be the main decider of the event due to it taking the most raw skill.

[Mistyx]

I actually disagree about mountainous being more skill-based. You could easily argue mechanical play is just as much of a skill as reads.

[soah]

1) if mafia rand both of the vig roles, this makes the set-up a bit lopsided. While there are doctor protects/roleblocks, the chances of them stopping a kill aren't high enough to make up for the raw power two extra kills gives.

If they don't make a pro-town shot then they will need to claim a different role (which is risky) to avoid getting lynched for it.

2) alignment cop is worthless to the mafia, does this role become a role cop if mafia rand it?

Merely taking the role away from the town is already a big benefit, and being able to claim a peek with no risk of getting counterclaimed is also beneficial in many circumstances.

[Soneji]

I actually disagree about mountainous being more skill-based. You could easily argue mechanical play is just as much of a skill as reads.

You really couldn't, mechanical play is majority of the time either just having basic skills to recognize optimal play or getting lucky playing WIFOM.

[Soneji]

1) if mafia rand both of the vig roles, this makes the set-up a bit lopsided. While there are doctor protects/roleblocks, the chances of them stopping a kill aren't high enough to make up for the raw power two extra kills gives.

If they don't make a pro-town shot then they will need to claim a different role (which is risky) to avoid getting lynched for it.

2) alignment cop is worthless to the mafia, does this role become a role cop if mafia rand it?

Merely taking the role away from the town is already a big benefit, and being able to claim a peek with no risk of getting counterclaimed is also beneficial in many circumstances.

You can make a pro-town shot and still shoot town, so I don't see how this is enough of a downside to counter my argument.

A role being useless in it's actual use to mafia isn't made up for by the very fact that town is denied it, as that also applies to every single role the mafia rands that the town doesn't. My suggested change to it is also part of the balance change that denies mafia being able to rand both vigs, it's a fair compromise.

[Thingyman]

Is it possible to run two types of setup alongside each other? A role madness setup for those who want to play with PRs, and a Mountainous setup for those who prefer no PRs? Keep in mind I've never seen a champs game and have no idea how the series works. I'm not Champs material but I know I would prefer to play Mountainous if given the choice, so there's gotta be (maybe... possibly... hopefully...) others out there who feel the same. Right?

Along with this, what about the possibility of running one setup for the qualifiers and then a different setup (potentially mountainous or a variant thereof) for the wildcards/finale? Justification being that the community-pleasing, role madness aspect is used for the more social, "get to know you" type rounds that encourage community building, and then for the business end of champs later on we go with a more tournament-friendly setup.

While I see the logic behind this, I think it'd be problematic in the sense that ... Some of these communities are not at all used to mountainous games, and they would feel handicapped - rightfully so - in a wildcard/finale game if they are going into that never having tried it before. So it doesn't feel right to have a format that would probably never allow someone new to mountainous to win, whereas if we have mountainous during the qualifiers where more players advance from each game and the average player quality should be lower, you still have a chance to adapt and learn the setup without being overwhelmed by other top tier players with plenty of mountainous experience.

[GeneralHankerchief]

Is it possible to run two types of setup alongside each other? A role madness setup for those who want to play with PRs, and a Mountainous setup for those who prefer no PRs? Keep in mind I've never seen a champs game and have no idea how the series works. I'm not Champs material but I know I would prefer to play Mountainous if given the choice, so there's gotta be (maybe... possibly... hopefully...) others out there who feel the same. Right?

Along with this, what about the possibility of running one setup for the qualifiers and then a different setup (potentially mountainous or a variant thereof) for the wildcards/finale? Justification being that the community-pleasing, role madness aspect is used for the more social, "get to know you" type rounds that encourage community building, and then for the business end of champs later on we go with a more tournament-friendly setup.

While I see the logic behind this, I think it'd be problematic in the sense that ... Some of these communities are not at all used to mountainous games, and they would feel handicapped - rightfully so - in a wildcard/finale game if they are going into that never having tried it before. So it doesn't feel right to have a format that would probably never allow someone new to mountainous to win, whereas if we have mountainous during the qualifiers where more players advance from each game and the average player quality should be lower, you still have a chance to adapt and learn the setup without being overwhelmed by other top tier players with plenty of mountainous experience.

This is fair.

[soah]

You can make a pro-town shot and still shoot town, so I don't see how this is enough of a downside to counter my argument.

Well yeah. The wolves are intended to benefit from their roles, so the vig in their own hands is intended to be better for them than the vig being in the village's hands. But the utility they get from the role is limited by the fact that they have to be responsible for the shot they take. So it's not overpowered.

A role being useless in it's actual use to mafia isn't made up for by the very fact that town is denied it, as that also applies to every single role the mafia rands that the town doesn't. My suggested change to it is also part of the balance change that denies mafia being able to rand both vigs, it's a fair compromise.

Again, they also benefit from the fact that the alignment cop is a confirmed role on the game, so they can use it to claim whatever nefarious peek they want and hold the town hostage with it. The alignment cops are the best source of information for the town, so taking those roles away from town is more beneficial than taking away most of the other roles from them.

And the wolves wouldn't want roles to change when they receive them because that would turn the town role cop into a partial full cop.

[Mantichora]

Hi all.

Season 6 of the Mafia Championship is coming up and we need to get a setup figured out before invitations are sent out.

We're looking for a 13-17 player setup.

The setup for this game is something that has been brought up as a suggestion: https://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums...endly-72-24%29

Doing Mountainous again is also potentially on the table? Thingy would like to consider 14/3 if we go that route. Winrate for 12/3 is 4:9 t:w in S4 and 5:16 t:w on the site as a whole unless I missed any games. A new setup would be preferable, though.

We're open to all/any suggestions.

That setup looks too mechanically complex. Lots of moving parts.

I think there shouldn't be any town alignment cops in the setup at all. Its an oppressive role that makes the entire game about itself.

[Mantichora]

Hi all.

Season 6 of the Mafia Championship is coming up and we need to get a setup figured out before invitations are sent out.

We're looking for a 13-17 player setup.

The setup for this game is something that has been brought up as a suggestion: https://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums...endly-72-24%29

Doing Mountainous again is also potentially on the table? Thingy would like to consider 14/3 if we go that route. Winrate for 12/3 is 4:9 t:w in S4 and 5:16 t:w on the site as a whole unless I missed any games. A new setup would be preferable, though.

We're open to all/any suggestions.

That setup looks too mechanically complex. Lots of moving parts.

I think there shouldn't be any town alignment cops in the setup at all. Its an oppressive role that makes the entire game about itself.

These two thoughts are disconnected. That being said, the inclusion of 2 peeks in the above setup would be another reason I don't think it would be a good fit for champs.

[LanMisa]

How about Tracker, even night vigilante and roleblocker vs. Role cop and roleblocker or jailkeeper?

[LanMisa]

In general I believe that the roles should be kept simple and easy to understand to whomever is going to come play here. Most likely 60% and higher of the players will be MU (semi-)regulars and most of them will have loads of games under their belt, but it should be friendly for beginners as well. At the same time no role should be so strong in its own right that the person randing it should be a massive EV increase or decrease for either side. It should also be a role that potentially allows for stronger players to shine and show off their skills in getting maximum utility out of it. Question is, what kind of roles does this leave us with?

What kind of role pool does this leave us with? I think that roles like Tracker, Roleblocker, Innocent Child, Poisoner and Healer, Mason (possibly as lovers, possibly as 1-shot BP lovers), Bodyguard come to mind. Doc and Jailkeeper could be too strong and swingy. For scum specifically a rolecop comes to mind. Question is, are there other roles and is it possible to create a balanced setup around them?

[Mistyx]

What I’m getting is that most people want to maximize variance while minimizing swing. Is that correct?

[LanMisa]

What I’m getting is that most people want to maximize variance while minimizing swing. Is that correct?

That's kind of contradicting.

[Jackofhearts2005]

I have a pokémon themed bastard setup ya’ll can use as long as you credit me in the title of all game threads.

[Jackofhearts2005]

Hi all.

Season 6 of the Mafia Championship is coming up and we need to get a setup figured out before invitations are sent out.

We're looking for a 13-17 player setup.

The setup for this game is something that has been brought up as a suggestion: https://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums...endly-72-24%29

Doing Mountainous again is also potentially on the table? Thingy would like to consider 14/3 if we go that route. Winrate for 12/3 is 4:9 t:w in S4 and 5:16 t:w on the site as a whole unless I missed any games. A new setup would be preferable, though.

We're open to all/any suggestions.

That setup looks too mechanically complex. Lots of moving parts.

I think there shouldn't be any town alignment cops in the setup at all. Its an oppressive role that makes the entire game about itself.

I agree.

[Thingyman]

What is this Mountainous Arson setup that people are referring to? Can you paste the setup details to this thread?

[Mantichora]

What is this Mountainous Arson setup that people are referring to? Can you paste the setup details to this thread?

It's a mountainous setup but instead of mafia killing each night, they have a factional arsonist action.

[GeneralHankerchief]

What is this Mountainous Arson setup that people are referring to? Can you paste the setup details to this thread?

Oh god.

Here you go.

tl;dr was that it's designed to improve on the main drawback of mountainous, which is that there's no way to stop the super obvious towns from being killed ASAP and to introduce a little bit more overall strategy into the setup. No N1 kill, mafia have to tiptoe around the lynch a bit more because they don't want to hit somebody they've doused, and town gets the added element of paranoia from "why are you still alive?" type of thoughts.

The factional arson is different from the common modbot-implemented one because the setup design allows you to both douse *and* ignite during the same night. So it would need some work on the coding side before it became usable for champs assuming we still want everything to be automated.

[Jaleb]

Setup I talked about last April: https://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums...s/16444-Colors

Maybe making the cops into memory oracles instead of cops (they reveal all targets instead of the previous night's). Their actions will not flip alignments which is something you try to avoid in championships, but skilled players can still use them to find mafia (poe).

Only issue is the needed for manual mods instead of automatic.

[mhsmith0]

Clearly season 6 needs to be a cult setup

[Apoc]

Some of the setups can be good, but they're outnumbered by the ones that are boring/unbalanced/just not that fun to play. You don't want to highlight a setup where there's only a 33% chance of it being good or playable.

did you not see the setup Lissa linked in her OP?

[Apoc]

Mountainous Arson is an abomination


Play Mountainous Poison instead

[GeneralHankerchief]

Some of the setups can be good, but they're outnumbered by the ones that are boring/unbalanced/just not that fun to play. You don't want to highlight a setup where there's only a 33% chance of it being good or playable.

did you not see the setup Lissa linked in her OP?

I've ascended to full MU status by not reading the OPs unless I absolutely have to