Disappointing, to say the least. To get screwed with one poorly-timed move is not awesome after a) a relatively flawless performance by us to date and b) the townies playing like total crap (you did, I'm not beating around the bush here. Awful play outside of choxorn pointing and clicking me at exactly the right time. You want to find scum, you show up and vote more than once in a blue moon. The day phases were a joke). I have mixed feelings about the game as a whole, specifically about the endgame and in particular, the inclusion of the Serial Killer.
The setup as a whole intrigued me. Mafia vs a whole bunch of masons with no abilities at the start plus maybe a third party is something new and different. I have to admit, once I saw my mafia partners I felt really confident we could pull this off. Though once I started thinking about the game's design, and especially once a Serial Killer showed up, I started having some doubts.
Due to the setup, the mafia had a very difficult time coming up with alibis, partners, and abilities for the endgame. This game is a rare example of how with more kills, the *more* powerful the townies can get due to the way abilities are handed out. At the start, we had it very easy, but as players died we started getting very lost as to who has what abilities, who has/had a partner, and what abilities are currently in the game. If it wasn't for Blackadder revealing to ATPG, we would have known absolutely nothing as to who was who and what abilities were out there. Truth is, we only contacted Blackadder due to a host error where we initially thought he was the double-voter due to a voting tally screw-up. No error = very little chance we reach out like that and in turn, means no way we have anything tangible to work with. It's why we (I) scanned instead of killing choxorn, we knew nothing, and this was the only way we were ever going to learn anything.
I wasn't surprised to see no townie network form outside of chox and Gamez. The setup again leads to isolation between the pairs, as 1) no one can reveal alive partners and 2) No one will admit to dead partners as doing so reveals *you* have an ability. Tangentially, I will say I was happy to see a rule stating the dead can't participate. It would have been absolutely game-breaking if they could, and it almost happened with landlubber showing up, though not in the way I would have imagined. I supposed Gamez's role was a way to develop one, but I'd argue there's balance between the mafia's not ever knowing anything and the townies not having a scan-based network form. Ideally, the townies should be using the lynch vote to network, but you guys did none of that, so this lack of communication, both in-game (the lynch vote) and out of game (getting people on board for a particular lynch vote) really should have penalized you more. As an aside, I'd like to see Gamez's and Verarde's role PM's.
I never, ever expected there to be a S/K in the game. As ATPG outlined, he had zero chance of winning. None whatsoever. His inclusion made the mafia winning that much harder due to 1) him possibly killing one of us (he did), and 2) killing townies and opening up more abilities into the game. While he never did kill any townies due to dumb luck, the possibility was there for him and the mafia to kill a ton of people and open up a lot of powerful abilities into the game by the midgame. Whereas if there's only one team killing (us) the midgame gets stalled until later, which means there's more lynches to look for information in - where the voting blocks are, who's accusing who, etc etc. As far as the possible abilities go, I wasn't a fan of there being two ways to stop night killing, specifically an injury one which (I assume) would be made public. I'm hoping this wouldn't be the case, but if so had we attacked the wounded dude, for a day phase there'd be an instant townie network forming around the only guy who was now proven innocent through his ability, and due to pure dumb luck the mafia or S/K would have created this network pretty much by themselves. That possibility didn't sit well and also pointed me toward scanning that fateful night - I really didn't want to hit him instead. Alas, we already lynched him, but had no way of knowing (and ever knowing).
All in all, I loved the premise, hated the outcome not because we lost but how we lost. I'm a firm believer that if 1) mafia play close to perfect and 2) the townies play dumb, the mafia should win. You got really lucky, and we got really unlucky, and that leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. This post isn't meant to be a shot at anyone in particular, so please don't read into it. I'm just really disappointed with how it all played out.
