The Tribunal

[AHarlequin]

A generic game of mafia, with a small "twist."

There are two factions - the Town and the Mafia. The ratio will be 10 Town to 3 Mafia; there will no third-party players.

The game will begin with a short, 48-hour "Day Zero." This day will have no lynch; rather, there will be an election.

Night Zero will follow - with no night actions. The winner of the election will be tasked with choosing three other players - secretly and over Night Zero - who will, together, form the Tribunal. (That makes a four player Tribunal: the winner of the election, and their three choices.)

At the start of Day One, all members of the Tribunal will be informed of each others' identities - and of how many Mafia members are on the Tribunal. Their names and composition, however, will not be made public.

From Day One on, the game proceeds "as normal" - but with three notable exceptions.

First, the Tribunal will receive a night kill; they must vote overnight on a player to kill. They are free to discuss their desired target amongst themselves - but, their ballots will be secret. (In other words - a Mafia member on the Tribunal is free to lie or change their vote secretly.) In the event that there is a tie, the Mafia will be informed of their dilemma and will be able to choose whichever target they prefer.

Second, all members of the Tribunal will be granted the ability to freely communicate with each other as a group. However, they will also lose all communication abilities. This means that Mafia members on the Tribunal will not be able to communicate with their compatriots.

Third, all members of the Tribunal will have their alignments (and roles, should they exist) permanently hidden. At-death, Tribunal members will flip only as "Tribunal;" investigative roles (should they exist) will fail if they target a Tribunal member.

The game ends when either the Town or the Mafia has been eliminated - or, when nothing can prevent a faction's elimination.

With 2 kills per night, plus a daily lynch, it'll likely end quickly - one way or another.

All references to roles should be treated as "should such a role exist" - e.g. the fact that the rules reference blocking, protecting, tracking, &c does not mean that such powers will be in the game.



Rules: (Pretty standard; the only really notable change from "stock" rules is rule 10.5, regarding what happens if - somehow - everyone dies.)
-2. Be civil, or at least not too rude, to everyone! This oughta be a given; as such, it's rule -2. Following this rule is very important!
-1. Play to win. This rule is very important as well! If you're about to be lynched, don't reveal who your scum-friends are; don't give up and surrender to lynches if you can avoid it, either. Sometimes, giving up can be strategic--but if it's just surrendering to avoid defending yourself...
0. This is a game--the whole point is to have fun. If you're not having fun, it means something's wrong; feel free to message me if this occurs.
1. Vote for the lynch like this--large, red (#FF0000) font. I'm fine with nicknames and abbreviations, but if I can't tell who it's for I won't count it.
1.5 I will be using Connect4's vote-counter. If your vote doesn't register on the vote counter--due to having the wrong size or color, for example--it will not be counted. I will post votals occasionally for you all to check against, but I recommend keeping track of votals yourself.
2. No PMing unless a role or ability allows you to. The Mafia and Tribunal, of course, are exceptions--provided they keep me CC'd they can communicate freely with one another.
2.5 Mafia members on the Tribunal may not communicate with fellow Mafia members - unless, of course, they're on the Tribunal as well.
2.7 All of these are by necessity "honor system," but please respect the rules.
3. The day ends at the deadline, not when I post the end of the day. I'll provide a time, and link to a countdown; each day will last roughly 72 hours, and each night will last up to 48 hours with speed deadlines in effect. I won't be too strict on this, but please--when it's night, it's night.
3.1 You may keep talking 'til I end the day, but I'll stop counting votes once the deadline hits.
3.5. Rule 3 also applies to situations when a player's actions end a day.
4. When you're dead, you're dead--please, don't post investigates, suspicions, or, really, anything post-mortem and in-thread--unless your role allows it.
5. No Lynch and Abstain are valid options. End day is not, for reasons which will likely become clear.
5.5 In the event of a tie between players, I will determine who is lynched based on who reached the higher total first, or came from the higher total. No Lynch will take priority unless a role gets in the way.
6. Do not use orange text, or variants on the color orange, unless your role allows it.
6.5. If a player writes something in large and orange, treat it as though I myself said it, and as though it is guaranteed true, unless I say otherwise. If you have the ability to post or activate abilities like this, your role will confirm that you can post his way.
7. In the same vein as rule 5, don't fake-activate abilities during the day. Activating an ability which you do not have is grounds for a modkill or replacement.
8. Please kindly refrain from editing or deleting posts.
9. In the unlikely event that a player is modkilled, their role will be changed to that of a third-party survivor, which is (of course) an auto-loss.
10. The Town wins if there is a loyal member of the Town alive and all members of the Mafia have been eliminated. The Mafia wins when all Town players have died and there is at least one Mafia member left alive, or when nothing can prevent the same. It is conceivable, albeit unlikely, that the number of Mafia could equal the number of Town members without the Mafia winning.
10.5 In the unlikely, but possible event that every single player in the game is dead, the Mafia wins if the Tribunal had no mafia members on it, and the Town wins otherwise.
11. Don't copy-paste your role PM or other private messages with the GM.
11.5. In the same vein as this--feel free to make cases based on numbers, actions, or even the plausibility of claims and roles - but, don't ask questions like, "What is the fifth word in your alignment PM?" when trying to deduce alignments. That ain't mafia, that's Extreme Hangman.
12. All roles are "barring shenanigans."
13. Night order resolution will go:
Triggered actions from the end of the previous day.
Blocking of blockers.
Other blocking.
Protection.
Kill.
Investigation.
13.1 Differently-"timed" roles, such as kills which occur "before any other action," may exist.
14. Lastly, a guarantee. There will be no alignment-switching shenanigans, game-ending Fool/Lyncher-y roles, &c.
14.1 Death information will be accurate.
14.2 However, it might not be as informative as you'd like.

[sinnybee]

Cool idea.

[Niakan]

This game strongly favors the town if vanilla -- mafia should have strong night abilities that aren't cancelled out by being in the tribunal. Also a chance that the elected townie randomly selects all three mafia members causing autowin is undesirable

[Niakan]

Town should largely be vanilla -- I can see a doc being thrown in there. Mechanically they have too much of an advantage.

[AHarlequin]

This game strongly favors the town if vanilla -- mafia should have strong night abilities that aren't cancelled out by being in the tribunal. Also a chance that the elected townie randomly selects all three mafia members causing autowin is undesirable

Then again, what's to prevent 1 mafia on the Tribunal from "outing" the three townies as mafia?

Without disclosing roles (should they exist), I've done my best to balance the game reasonably, given that town starts out with both a bit of extra information and a possible kill.

[Niakan]

This game strongly favors the town if vanilla -- mafia should have strong night abilities that aren't cancelled out by being in the tribunal. Also a chance that the elected townie randomly selects all three mafia members causing autowin is undesirable

Then again, what's to prevent 1 mafia on the Tribunal from "outing" the three townies as mafia?

Without disclosing roles (should they exist), I've done my best to balance the game reasonably, given that town starts out with both a bit of extra information and a possible kill.

Their names and composition, however, will not be made public.

Wow you know what, I missed this part above ^. This is pretty much autowin. 2/3 chance that all townies make up the tribunal, and the mafia doesn't know who they are? Holy crap. It's like an informed town team that's allied with an uninformed town team.


The mafia need a mafia to be on the tribunal or they're screwed.

Here's a worst-case scenario for the town:

4TT:6T:3M

D1 -- odds are townie lynch
4TT:5T:3M
N1 -- odds are townie kill x2
4TT:3T:3M
D2 -- assume townie lynch even though numbers are even now to the tribunal. Hell the tribunal can even out themselves D2.
4TT:2T:3M
N2 -- assume townie kill from TT, TT kill from Mafia
3TT:1T:3M
D3 -- it's lylo, there are 3 clear townies, and the town has a 3/4 chance mechanically of lynching mafia.

The town is more likely to win than the mafia if you have zero communication this game. Game broken, sorry. Unless you give the mafia multiple kills overnight or make it so that there are 5 mafia. In a worst case scenario with no communication the town tends to win. Imagine if the town lynches a mafia on D1 or D2. Complete disaster for the mafia team:

D1- Town lynch
4TT:5T:3M
N1- Town kills
4TT:3T:3M
D2 Mafia Lynch
4TT:3T:2M
N2 If two townies are killed, it's autowin for town. If a TT is killed by mafia it's almost autowin
4TT:1T:2M
D3 -- here's autowin. Lynch a townie, kill another one. And all of a sudden you have a town team that overpowers the mafia team during the night.
4TT:2M
N3 -- TownTribunal and Mafia trade kills and town will win the war of attrition.
3TT:1M
D4 -- one mafia left, lynch him.


Going back to N2 with a TT killed instead of second townie:
3TT:2T:2M
D3 -- Actually nevermind. This is autowin for town too if the tribunal hasn't outted themselves. Town forces NL, takes it to the night game to overpower mafia.
3TT:2T:2M
N3 -- Assume townies killed:
3TT:2M -- GG.
N3 -- Taking it back to if a TT is killed:
2TT:1T:2M -- 2/3 chance of autowin. mechanically. with no scumhunting involved.

I dunno this is all pretty crazy. Gonna stop here... if you think you have it covered you have it covered, but...

[lecrae]

I kinda understand what Niakan is saying, but if it is an all town tribunal, then the mafia are screwed with four clear townies.

[sinnybee]

2/3 chance that all townies make up the tribunal

Actually, 10/13 * 9/12 * 8/11 * 7/10 = 29%
There will probably be at least one mafia on the tribunal.

However, I'm not saying Niakan is wrong--there could well be a balance issue here.

[Niakan]

2/3 chance that all townies make up the tribunal

Actually, 10/13 * 9/12 * 8/11 * 7/10 = 29%
There will probably be at least one mafia on the tribunal.

However, I'm not saying Niakan is wrong--there could well be a balance issue here.

Whoops, reversed my numbers.. meant 1/3