Final Mafia 2019 (Cold War Mafia)

[Csargo]

I hope Csargo wasn't overly disturbed in responding to my request.

Happy to help.

 

[Manasi]

i tried posting more and see if the issue would fix itself and it didn't so don't know. Don't want to play a game with a posting time limit. And the more i thought about it the more i remember how much 48/24 sucks so not interested.
enjoy

highlight of the game iyam

 

[Manasi]

@Csargo respond to me on discord soab

 

[Zack]

I followed this a bit, but missed a lot of pages. Seemed like a fun game.

missed subbing in and padding my $tat$ with a free win by about 15 minutes or so

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Now that it is over I have a rules question.

I eliminated Tak because cfc tracks the last time he logged in so I knew that he couldn't have issued the kill order on USA#1 Manasi. I felt like I might have broken the rules even looking at that, but in my defense I was looking for a different reason...but I refrained from outright saying "Tak is cleared because..."

So, how would that normally fit in the rules?

 

[Montmorency]

I accidentally left the QT links in the Mafia role PMs when I posted them, and I see a couple of you have looked before I could edit.

I apologize to Mary, Seon, and Zelda for my carelessness.

 

[Montmorency]

Now that it is over I have a rules question.

I eliminated Tak because cfc tracks the last time he logged in so I knew that he couldn't have issued the kill order on USA#1 Manasi. I felt like I might have broken the rules even looking at that, but in my defense I was looking for a different reason...but I refrained from outright saying "Tak is cleared because..."

So, how would that normally fit in the rules?

This could be considered angleshooting, but I don't think it breaks any explicit rules that I set out. It was a popular tactic on the Org many years ago. I wouldn't punish it, but it's not difficult to understand why leaning on activity records has come to be seen as unsportsmanlike.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

This could be considered angleshooting, but I don't think it breaks any explicit rules that I set out. It was a popular tactic on the Org many years ago. I wouldn't punish it, but it's not difficult to understand why leaning on activity records has come to be seen as unsportsmanlike.

Fair enough. I kinda thought the game was effectively over by then either way, and like I said I was actually looking for a different reason, but I will be more careful in future.

 

[Montmorency]

Game Notes​

My notes taken throughout the gamecourse, mostly contemporaneous with some later edits. Refer to this for any balance discussion. I mention a number of possible tweaks in the abstract, but I don't intend to ever run this setup again because it's just not very interesting IMO. I chose it because I wanted a relatively simple cops-and-doctors setup without being the bog-standard OG Mafia "one full cop one full doctor", so I pulled the first suitable one I saw from the MU archives.

My overall impression is that the game has a handful of general balance problems (as opposed to deliberate weights), the biggest being my addition of a USA alert for successful enemy scans, the second-biggest being the sum of actions between Town scan + protect and Mafia scan + kill. In this iteration IMO the imbalance only hastened Mafia defeat, which was in the final sense a product of Town outplaying Mafia. More detailed notes and suggestions in the spoiler. Also some comments for Visor and other players in the spoiler.

There were 280 posts on D1, 75 posts on N1, 280 posts on D2, 95 posts on N2, and ~470 posts on D3. I don't believe I'ver ever seen an activity trend like that in a game before.

Visor Town MVP for leadership
Tim Town MVP for overall wim and analysis
Rask Town MVP for analysis and being AFAIK the only person to correctly guess the entire scum team while all were still alive
Manasi Town MVP for being USA #1 and the other stuff

Well-played Seon for guessing all the town PRs (though you didn't have time to take advantage of it).
Well-played Pzelda for briefly (during and after D3) convincing every other player you were town. He didn't intend to bus Seon btw.

GG to the town cops, Red Mary, and all the rest as well. Keep playing @MaryKB , you'll do fine.

Spoiler :

When doing some light mathematical simulation of the first round of the design, I found that Mafia would have about 50% probability of scanning at least one PR on N1, with over 15% probability of scanning at least one as well as killing one. Seeing that, my pro-town bias engaged and I nerfed the N4 double scan. Post-game edit: I always wanted a design that was slightly town-sided, and ultimately good towning won this iteration, but the design as I implemented it probably does lean too far in one direction.

I did a bad job in managing recruits. There was a lot of confusion and angst over signups. Should I have firmly set the game target as 15 rather than immediately accommodating to a reduced 13-player design? A number of outside entrants were needed to fill the slots, but on the other hand maybe the perception of a lower ceiling dissuaded someone from entering?

I bungled the rollout of the game.

I wanted during D1 to change the tie-resolution mechanics as follows:
Previously it was to be decided by the first post-deadline tie-breaking vote. Now instead, the first such tie-breaking vote will initiate a 1-hour period (lightning round) in which players may freely vote between tied players. If at the end of this period there is still a tie it will be decided randomly (by RNG). The criterion that during a tie period only votes for tied players are valid remains in effect.
I decided against it because it seemed pointless to burden players with more complex rules once the game was already underway.

At midday D1 the only nonvoters were the USA and USSR characters (Manasi and Mary).

Going into EOD1 the scum had some sketchy-ass votes placed. Mary and Seon hard wagoning Omega for no reason, with Zelda support-voting Barto even though HE ALREADY HAD NO VOTES (other than Omega's own support vote). They stuck to their votes and in the end Logic's was a totally pure wagon, while Omega had two scum on her.

I can no longer remember: Did Manasi have that avatar before I assigned the USA role to her?

I wanted to try out support votes this game, and to that end banned Abstain and No Lynch to create a dichotomy between normal and support votes. In the end, probably predictably, normal votes dominate gameplay unless the mechanics specially reward alternatives. Still worth a shot.

As soon as D1 ended Barto investigated Mary. Had he been a full cop the game could have been decided right there. But even without that result, Manasi choosing to protect Visorslash was a strong pro-Town move. Somehow the Mafia, despite two of them being active and one responding to PMs about it, despite submitting scan orders, declined to assign any kill. At first I was going to randomize, but decided I should reward Town's initiative (all town roles submitted actions soon after EOD) and punish Mafia's disorganization instead of allowing the possibility of an arbitrarily-lucky devastating GM-guided strike against Town. This was bolstered by the only content suggestive of a target being Seon's desire to get rid of Visor mid-D1. Hey, if Manasi protected Visor, and the only intimation from Mafia was suggestive of a future attack on Visor, and they didn't bother to submit an order, I'm awarding the round to the more deserving (IMO) side.
Edit: Losing the N1 kill, whether to inactivity or protection, was already a serious handicap for the Mafia that had nothing to do with balance.

Suprised at how much night chat there was. I figured it would amount to 5 posts, 10 max, largely soon after or soon before day. But I think it worked out well overall (Tim appreciated it), it's just that the game proper had more activity than anticipated and this carried over to night I suppose. Though frankly, as I'll reference below, this might well be the game with the highest (absolute and proportional) night activity I've ever seen. A quarter of all game posts at night?! Edit: Not counting D4.

N1, both sides scanned Synsensa, who was probably the top or second-consensus scum among townies.

I had taken away the Mafia double-scan on N4 to nerf them a little, but after a day of gameplay I decided I should compromise for the contingency of serious setbacks: a special double-scan once Soviet Union is solo, or reinstating the N4 double scan. In retrospect another good balancing mechanism would have been to remove the USA player's doctor ability if the USSR was lynched, or if two of three mafia died. And in keeping with my intent for one side to have a compounding advantage if it gained one over the other, a N2 mafia double scan (instead of N4) to make pinning one town PR almost certain in the early game. Edit: In the first place, any staggered double scan should have been set for N2 or N3 because most games are probably basically decided by N4, meaning an emergency tide-turning ability should come sooner.

Given the way the game went in practice, the night chat probably also helped Town inordinately (and more than it usually would!).

During D1 and N1 a number of people had explicitly scum-leaned two of three scum (in a single post). If there were some who guessed the whole team, but spread across posts, sorry for being unable to identify you. However, counting an EBWOP, Rask actually did scumread the whole team in a post. He correctly surmised that Logic's wagon was pure. Congrats!

Visor said:

i think this is the most active ive seen takhisis.... well ever in a game

Well, what about that small one you hosted?

mafia obviously killed, any group of 3 people in this game are active enough to submit a nightkill

alotofappropriategifs.gifs

Answering some of Tim's questions about game PRs, I realized that if USSR + 1 are dead then the PR eligible to search for the last scum will by definition clear anyone they scan who isn't a positive result. A minor balance issue I didn't consider previously. Edit: Maybe more significant for balance than I first surmised.

Mary's D2 entry spewed Rask clear.

At certain points, D1 vote spread in Visor's game mirroring D1 vote spread in my game was remarkable, I struggled not to comment on it. Edit: I guess both games were very similar in the sense of power-town and PR action dominating passive scums.

As soon as Seon returned he got back to business and guessed that Tak and Manasi were PRs. So that's pretty good. In that moment I could envision Mafia turning it around, as long as they could mislynch D2. Even better, later in day he recommended a scan of Johanna.

Syn called out Visor for his Town leadership status/behavior, in what I would have considered an independently classically-scummy post.

I supported PZelda's lynch in the parallel Visor game on the Org because his presentation carried a similar - I don't know how to describe it, superficiality? - between the two (though of course I couldn't say anything). I began wondering if Tak, playing in the Org game alongside me, and Visor the host, would transfer anything of the experience from Zelda's flip. Edit: He never had the chance sadly.

Tim has the makings of a very good analytical player. Towards EOD he was sharp in promoting the Seon wagon.

CFDs on Manasi and Johanna, two townie PRs, could have amounted to a proper loltown moment.

Visor #686: Goddamnit you're spiking my host anxiety you bastard.

Barto #695: You already have my promissory doubloons

Omega in #782 said while speculating about bussing scenarios: "if he's the USSR, get closer to his own kills." I believe she may have misunderstood the setup to grant USSR a second kill once their partners are dead rather than removing their scan. However, this is another interesting balancing idea - maybe create some perverse incentives by exchanging the USSR scan for an extra kill when the partners are lost. I wouldn't have deployed this idea in my game in its existing configuration, as it seems to me more suitable in a bigger game with more complex roles. Also astounding that Omega had the reason for the lack of a night kill pegged, though Seon wasn't solely responsible and there was no roleblocker. Bad communication indeed. Also, Tim was later correct to suggest that Zelda could have made a mistake and inadvertently bussed Seon, which was in fact the case.

Commenting on Tim commenting on Spartacus (public mass fake claim) scanner strategy: Yes, the problem is that a mafia reading someone scan them innocent outs the latter as a fake-claimer, while a single player posting a positive result on true mafia is almost certainly identifying of a real investigative role. The workaround is for some townies to choose to sprinkle in fake positive results, but of course to the extent this doesn't affect their posting and voting behavior - if you have a legit red scan on someone you should want them dead right? - it too can be sussed out as a bluff. This kind of strategy only ever makes sense within the context of anti-claim games, which is a mechanic I won't go into here unless solicited.

Overnight, it's been amazing watching from a PIS perspective how lynching a scum can quickly unravel townies' theories of the game for the worse. Where Zelda and Mary had been consensus scum leans before Seon flipped, suddenly they averaged out to light-town consensus. In part this was surely due to their posting themselves higher, but this shift seemed to be path-dependent from the moment of the flip to some extent. I wonder if there's something generalizable here, in town success affecting POE quality. But then, just as the next flip (Rask N2) came, the worm turned again and Mary became a suspect for Visor again. How does this stuff work? What is "information" as a philosophical concept anyway?

Tim #969: "If our SK cop chimed in right now and said "I scanned Mary and she is NOT North Korea what good would that actually do? Mary still might be USSR."

^^kappa

It came to my attention that a dead player made an allusion to the game in an OT thread accusing Tak [of being scum]. I'm not too strict about mentioning the game outside the thread, but public speculation about alignment is discouraged because it can prejudice readers who aren't certain of what knowledge may lie behind such claims (No one was privately spoiled during gameplay).
https://forums.civfanatics.com/thre...ram-is-overrated.644161/page-35#post-15613536

Lol @ Tim D3 tinfoiling Visor and Mary immediately taking that pretext to suss Visor (with a case that at least wasn't entirely preposterous at face value, well done). I could imagine how he would react once he returned to the thread. At that point it was looking like a mislynch for D3 though; would Visor be spurred enough by Mary's suss to rally the Town and CFD her?

Tim privately pointed out that the USA notification about town PRs being scanned seems useless. That's why I added it in as a fun bonus; it doesn't mechanically affect balance in any way, but it's something extra for the role to play with, keep them engaged. And hey, it's possible to read Town PRs just like it's possible to catch a scum in the thread, so knowing a PR is targeted could potentially allow a skillful and lucky doctor to protect just the right person. The US player is also alerted if they themselves are scanned, so with the implication that they are going to die the next night they can be unburdened to approach the thread in a different way, perhaps even claim in order to push through a preferred lynch on cachet. Lots of possible twists, depending on how the US player behaves.

^^^Post-Manasi thoughts: lol. I truly did not anticipate the possibility of the doctor claiming when one of the other Town PRs is compromised, in order to trigger a mass claim right before a PR would be NKed. I was thinking in a self-centered way when I formulated this ability, as only supplementing the USA role's individual play UTR. So my signature unique addition to the design ended up being the biggest imbalancing feature. I mean, sure, in many other game states a mass claim would be less useful than it was on our D3, but I have to admit that there isn't actually zero impact on balance from USA player getting a heads up on a good time for mass claim.

Manasi #1040: "If we lose this I'd be SHOCKED."
Famous metaphorical last words, is a tempting framing. Edit: But she had it.

Visor: "Bussing usually ends up backfiring"
Hmmm...

Poor Visor correctly tunneling Mary (though he kept getting diverted to other speculation), working hard to get satisfaction. Noting (did he see my post?) that Mary hardly mentioned or interacted with her partners in her first game was high-level play and had the chance to blow the game wide open either on the spot or seeding for the future. Manasi sacrificing herself to claim immediately afterwards was, like, the figurative one-two punch. Or at least it is for any observer, like damn. If Pzelda could go deep he has exactly one path now and would have to avoid being lynched for the Mary non-interaction tell, and avoid scanning by Johanna while killing Manasi N3. Mislynch three times within Snerk, Omega, Syn, and no one else. Almost impossible. Actually, scratch that, with Johanna's claim and Mary's flip Syn could be retroactively cleared. Otherwise his support vote for Mary would make him prime ML material. Manasi, Joan, and Visor would all have to be NKed, Tak would claim, Syn would be cleared, and Tim would be unlynchable. For the coup de grace, Johanna's last action before being NKed would be to clear Snerk, one of the last indispensable mislynches. Starting D4 there would be only one mislynch remaining - Omega/TS - against three mislynches needed for victory. By definition an unbeatable towncore and POE. GG Zelda. I did not foresee the doctor being audacious enough to solicit multi-claim with their activity result.

There were 280 posts on D1, 75 posts on N1, 280 posts on D2, 95 posts on N2, and ~470 posts on D3. I don't believe I'ver ever seen an activity trend like that in a game before.

So, simultaneously in my game and Visor's game, Mafia is getting demolished. Textbook power towning vs. passive mafia. Wowee.

Interesting balance thought: Allow night chat in-thread, but not if mafia was lynched. Or the inverse, but either way is a restriction I'd want to see tested.

Barto will have to be replaced sadly, and won't enjoy the Town victory. Or should I wog him? Either way is lame, but with a substitution at least someone else gets to parachute in at the kill. Also, averts a tarnishing mislynch of an inactive player. Doing nothing, as Visor points out, unnecessarily prolongs the game by allowing a needless mislynch. If Tak were active he would certainly claim.

The Johanna rulebreak was just bizarre. Like, why? Given the Barto situation I didn't want to fish for subs any more and burden them with a late-stage game. Modkill was appropriate in the situation, sadly.

Apparently multiple players felt the game's pace was too high for them to keep up with.

Re. Pzelda's inevitable defeat after Csargo's claim: Zelda actually succeeded in going deep as of EOD3, fooling pretty much everyone, and for that he should be congratulated. Mary's death made it almost impossible for him to solo given the narrow POE. That's certainly disappointing for him, but even had Manasi not claimed and Snerk or Tak or Syn been lynched in place of Mary, the game would most likely have ended the same way. Tak/Csargo and Johanna and Manasi would eventually claim, and Tim and Visor were unlynchable. Moreover, the first instinct of scum after D3 was to kill Visorslash before switching to Manasi. Had Manasi not claimed, it is probable that Manasi would have protected Visor a third time and Mafia would have attacked him to no effect, earning town another round. Meanwhile, Johanna would continue scanning unchecked and there weren't many targets left. I don't see how a Mary-Zelda team could have survived 4 mislynches, or three in a row for parity win, from D4 on. In the end, PRs and power-towning from Visor, Tim, and Rask in the thread closed too many options for the mafia from the beginning, who never quite found a steady stance.

Regardless, for Zelda and his team to be brutalized in two simultaneous games must feel bad.

Had we got a 14th player on board, I would have introduced a 3P (third party) Survivor role (Yugoslavia). This role would be able to choose a faction to tie itself to on N2 (in terms of victory conditions), but would not contribute toward parity either way nor be able to communicate with Mafia or learn their identities if aligning that way. I would have kept this extension to the design secret as it was an individualistic role designed not to affect balance and I didn't want to scare anyone.

Obviously we could not get that extra player, but during gameplay I thought of an interesting balancing tweak to the concept. Now the role would contribute to parity if aligning with scum, thus permitting scum the hidden potential to enjoy easier victory calculations. A scum-aligning Yugo could claim publicly and eat a lynch, sacrificing full victory to deflect attention from mafia killing roles. Alternatively, having made the choice it could try softing its status to deter crossfire within the faction. Opposing townies would also have a choice between lynching a claimed threat to its VCs, or continuing to hunt for the more dangerous killing roles. Or if the Yugo player chose to side with town, it would have to balance hunting scum in-thread and not drawing the night kill. Or it could just remain a pure neutral and YOLO the game. An entertaining complication to the design IMO.

I even had music prepared for a Yugoslavian full victory (personal survival + any factional victory).

Tim #1473: "Raw fact, if Tak/Csargo were NK Manasi wouldn't have been scumkilled in the night.
" Wait, why? Manasi had to die because she was the doctor.
[/QUOTE]

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Tim #1473: "Raw fact, if Tak/Csargo were NK Manasi wouldn't have been scumkilled in the night.
" Wait, why? Manasi had to die because she was the doctor.

Because at that point even without angling the cfc status bar Tak was obviously inactive through the night since Csargo had taken his place. The only way to cover that was if Csargo had taken over going into the night rather than after coming out of it. I had been considering the possibility that Tak-as-scum could disappear publicly but somehow slip in a kill order and whether that might somehow cross his mind, but the sub call confirmed him as not-scum.

 

[Montmorency]

Tim #1473: "Raw fact, if Tak/Csargo were NK Manasi wouldn't have been scumkilled in the night.
" Wait, why? Manasi had to die because she was the doctor.

Because at that point even without angling the cfc status bar Tak was obviously inactive through the night since Csargo had taken his place. The only way to cover that was if Csargo had taken over going into the night rather than after coming out of it. I had been considering the possibility that Tak-as-scum could disappear publicly but somehow slip in a kill order and whether that might somehow cross his mind, but the sub call confirmed him as not-scum.

Right, of course, I was forgetting the connection and only thinking in pure mechanical terms.

 

[pzelda]

GG town,
I hated ending up on Seon, but he was unable to respond to my questions and failed to give me another good reason to put my vote elsewhere. I could only wait for eod and hope for a right wagon to jump on. It was Manasi, but when I was around the wagon was quite firmly ahead and I decided to skip on it. It was a mistake.
Other than that we probably would kill Tak or Visor n1. I think killing Tim or Rask could actually give us a chance to win the game as they were strong and firm voices d2. Killing Tak could make this game less of an auto.

I think Mary was doing alright d3, but every mislynch bait either managed to step up their game or get cleared.
I guess I could push Snerk harder, but I'm a bad power player.

I made several other mistakes, especially d1. I was wolfing in two games and I was rather busy irl too. I was really anxious about Visor spotting similarities between my play here and at the org.

Visor and Manasi were the two most inspiring towns this game for me. Visor was super successful at pushing most lazy villagers towards being more active and Manasi's epic defense d2 and an almost ideal claim d3 were great moments too.

Mechanically, It could be little townsided, but we also failed to send in one NK or focus on killing PRs.

It was fun. I'd prefer us to cause at least one more mislynch, but losing against this village is no shame.

 

[Snerk]

Good stuff! I haven't seen a CFC game with this level of activity in a long long time. It takes me back and I'm moved by it.

Thanks for hosting, Monty, really cool set up and you moderated it superbly!

Visor: print the entire game, frame it, mount it, and read it to the children every year.

Tim: do the same only edit out all your tunneling on me. If the children question your narrative, beat them.

And a bunch of other players who played REALLY well too. Gratz to entire town faction for a well executed game. Solid! And the scum faction put up a good fight too but town needed a victory after last game's complete rout by the wolves.

I'll not be available for a new game immediately but I'm sure I'll be around soon for more shenanigans if people are still hosting.

 

[RRRaskolnikov]

Re-reading the thread, I got mafia reads on pzelda, Seon, Synsensa, and Omega...

I forgot Mary!

I guess this caused my early death...

I want to say I had a blast during this game, even reading through it after I was killed. Not being able to do anything was really frustrating (I couldn't even liked the "I won't be available for this game" CrimsonFox posts around page 50 )... and I am glad Montmo correctly guessed that my post in the photo thread was more of a joke than anything else.

I want to thank Montmo for hosting this game, which was surprinsingly active and tense. Thank you all for participating, it's so much better this way.

As for players, well the town was exceptionnal imo, with additionnal praises for Tim and Visor. I think Tim (just 2 games iirc ) will be a big threat for any opponent in the future (I would love to team with you as wolf )...
Like Snerk, at one point I was thinking "OMG, if he his a wolf, that's pretty much the ultimate play".
The mafia were unlucky imo since we correctly guessed Seon early, then Mary step up his game but it felt too late (never play the same cards the same way twice in a row VP!)... Still I was way more sure about Seon/Zelda than about her. Then Manasi/Visor pretty much settled the game fast. Still well done guys!

Also very good fluff during this game... I think part of me is still laughing at the "It's happening" gif Visor posted in D2 EOD

Oh, and I hope Takhisis will be back soon and healthy...

Cheers,
Ras

 

[JohannaK]

Well, GG Visor and Tim, go town! I dont know what else to say, the led us to victory pretty flawlessly. Raskol was like my favourite until he got off'd.

I'm sorry about the curious incident of the scum in the nighttime. It'd never happened to me, but it certainly was my fault. Then I was paranoid the town could still mislynch its way into a Mafia victory and got belligerent with Montmo over the modkill, which I want to publically apologize for because it really was uncalled for. Subbing me was still the right thing to do though.

The Mafia were all surprisingly scummy, but they managed to make the bus work for a short while. I dont mean that they were exceptionally scummy, but they just didnt hide it so well. Mary made a good effort to do so and I bought it. Even on her wagon I wasnt really sure we were gonna hit scum. Zelda was textbook lowlaying scum but the bus made me think he could well be lowlaying town. Seon was unfortunate and got caught out in the open not knowing what the hell was happening to him. RIP.

 

[MaryKB]

I don't know how I should feel that Mary scanned Snerkiepoo and I N1 just to see if we should die first.

Is this how you treat the people you love, @MaryKB?

I wanted to confirm neither of you were power roles so I could order my satellites not to kill you.

Monty can verify this from our East Bloc chat lol.

 

[Yakostovian]

Glad to see I had next to nothing to do with another town win!

@Manasi

here u go

Pretty level 0 but I feel better about the people voting on Logic than Omega.

Strangely enough, this aged REALLY well. (0 wolves on town-me EOD, 2 wolves on Town-Omega, 1 wolf off-wagon)

 

[Yakostovian]

@Visorslash on mobile now, so I won't quote your post exactly, but I am more used to MU nowadays, so my suspects aren't immediate nor certain anymore. I could continue to defend myself, but that would be a waste of a dying townie's time. Instead I'm going to hunt.

@Snerk quotes 5 different people and calls them scummy. That's 5 suspects.
Notice he also fails to answer my question.

@RRRaskolnikov seems to have missed snerks post of 5 suspects as well, and her vote for me is flimsy.

@Manasi has forgotten the game entirely?

@pzelda is doing more coasting than I would like from him.

I will only be voting Omega in self preservation.

This aged okay. I at least had 1 of my three suspects right, and correctly called Omega town

Standard US Military date conventions put the most significant factors first.
YYYY/MM/DD HH:MM:SS

Which, by all rights, makes the most absolute sense.

I stand by this post and will until the end of time.

 

[RRRaskolnikov]

Tak's august game had 154 posts, last game 448, this one 1517 and counting... I expect the next one to beat the 4500 mark

 

[Snerk]

Tak's august game had 154 posts, last game 448, this one 1517 and counting... I expect the next one to beat the 4500 mark

I believe >4000 would be an all time high for these waters! Despite the relatively high post/day in this game there weren't much of any walls of text so it was pretty manageable. But if the overall output is significantly higher I start having real trouble with digesting the thread. I know some people don't have much of an upper limit on this, and I'm in awe, but I very much do.

And like already said, Xenforo is hardly ideal for mafia games.