Yeah, pretty much the same comments about this game as last game.
Very fun, but with quite a few frustrating mechanics.
1) Vote immunity should be used sparingly, if at all. There is nothing more frustrating for a village than knowing whose mafia but being able to do shit all about it.
2)RNG (rolling) based mechanics. I'm not really a fan of using RNG to determine large parts of the game as it takes the control away from the players a bit. Personally, i would of preferred if each player had a set strength and each ship had X points to allocate between all players (without knowing the DCs) such that they had to strategize where is most important to allocate. This would also involve the mafia infiltrators more.
3)It looks like there were too many mafia or the game was balanced for too many of them. They didn't seem to be at all concerned about revealing themselves after about day 2 and this game sort of deteriorated away from a game a 'mafia' to ship-battling.
All that said, this was still very fun and your games so far have had a flavor that make them a joy to play in.
As for 3:
There were 10 mafia: 2 on the Piett, 1 each on the Chief and Cain, and 6 on the Williams, which is a ton.
We were pretty much racing the clock as far as we knew, though. With only the vote to kill people, without actively revealing we never would've been able to kill off enough of you before the 3 NPCs died. Like Rawkking said, we had to forgo our "villager" action in order to do anything mafia-ish, and there's only so many times you can get away with "Oops I was inactive sorry".
Megatin on
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KayWhat we need...Is a little bit of PANIC.Registered Userregular
Well, the easy way to prevent cheating is to use a site like orokos that enforces logins, of course then anyone can look up everybody's rolls, or force everybody to use a known campaign name
I think that's how they caught 3clipse's cheating, though he was using both sites and picking the best roll each day.
I rolled fairly, you can go back and check! I even described the rolls as to what they were for, which would have been a huge mafia tell if it had mattered at all.
Well, the easy way to prevent cheating is to use a site like orokos that enforces logins, of course then anyone can look up everybody's rolls, or force everybody to use a known campaign name
Yeah, the rolls are public, so everyone would have to put a generic description in.
That leads to the problem of "Roll first then decide what to do with it once I see the result", though.
@Megatin: I think it would of been more fun if the Venusian ships were stronger, but the mafia were more about sabotage than destroying the village directly.
Well, the easy way to prevent cheating is to use a site like orokos that enforces logins, of course then anyone can look up everybody's rolls, or force everybody to use a known campaign name
Yeah, the rolls are public, so everyone would have to put a generic description in.
That leads to the problem of "Roll first then decide what to do with it once I see the result", though.
You could have the order sent in with a number (eg 11221) timestamped BEFORE the roll with the same number, but that means two PMs for the host to sift through.
Well, the easy way to prevent cheating is to use a site like orokos that enforces logins, of course then anyone can look up everybody's rolls, or force everybody to use a known campaign name
Yeah, the rolls are public, so everyone would have to put a generic description in.
That leads to the problem of "Roll first then decide what to do with it once I see the result", though.
You could have the order sent in with a number (eg 11221) timestamped BEFORE the roll with the same number, but that means two PMs for the host to sift through.
Hmm that's not a bad way to do it, although it's nearing the threshold of when it would be easier for the host to just do it all themselves
Of course, the host doing it all makes rerolls, etc, pretty much impossible.
So long as you're the last man standing, you acquire all of your other ship officer's abilities, may act six times per day and have an AC of 23 when shot at by enemy boarders."
@Megatin: I think it would of been more fun if the Venusian ships were stronger, but the mafia were more about sabotage than destroying the village directly.
Considering the whole "inactive to use powers thing" and us having to beat the rolls of the things we were trying to sabotage, even if it was designed that way we were horribly ineffective at sabotage.
Kay's fire on my coordinates power was a well designed power, of course for some reason he still showed up doing nothing in the narration =/
2)RNG (rolling) based mechanics. I'm not really a fan of using RNG to determine large parts of the game as it takes the control away from the players a bit. Personally, i would of preferred if each player had a set strength and each ship had X points to allocate between all players (without knowing the DCs) such that they had to strategize where is most important to allocate. This would also involve the mafia infiltrators more.
Yeah; I think next time I'll try either some kind of action point system or maybe some straight-up Paper-Rock-Scissors type mechanics (like what you see in, say, Fury of Dracula).
@Megatin: I think it would of been more fun if the Venusian ships were stronger, but the mafia were more about sabotage than destroying the village directly.
Considering the whole "inactive to use powers thing" and us having to beat the rolls of the things we were trying to sabotage, even if it was designed that way we were horribly ineffective at sabotage.
Kay's fire on my coordinates power was a well designed power, of course for some reason he still showed up doing nothing in the narration =/
Well half the sabotage would be in just not doing your job, however i think rather than appearing inactive in the narration, you should of appeared as if you failed the roll.
@Megatin: I think it would of been more fun if the Venusian ships were stronger, but the mafia were more about sabotage than destroying the village directly.
Considering the whole "inactive to use powers thing" and us having to beat the rolls of the things we were trying to sabotage, even if it was designed that way we were horribly ineffective at sabotage.
Kay's fire on my coordinates power was a well designed power, of course for some reason he still showed up doing nothing in the narration =/
Well half the sabotage would be in just not doing your job, however i think rather than appearing inactive in the narration, you should of appeared as if you failed the roll.
That is pretty much how most of us expected it to be day 1. Our powers even say that "we should try to think of a bluff to explain why your power failed". But then inactivity olololol.
My other complaint (which I think Ender realizes given his comments) was that it was impossible for the mafia to form any kind of coherent strategy aside from trying to finish off ships that the venutian battleships happen to rng enough. From what the mechanics have told us destroying the Williams first, then the Cain (or perhaps the battleship to eliminate the admiral) would have been the ideal strategy. However, we didn't know anything about the Sarlaac until the day before we formed it (and that was also based on RNG), we didn't know its powers until it was formed, and we didn't know about it's hidden weakness until the Williams came barreling into us.
Cain proboards, though Jdarksun had the good sense to not approve my access after I was inactive on my first day in, so I'm waiting for the unlock to see what's inside too :P
Rawkking Goodguy on
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FaranguI am a beardy manWith a beardy planRegistered Userregular
edited July 2010
For those interested I am in the process of starting a mini where there is minimal usage of RNG.
You should look at it when I post it sometime in the next day or so.
Oh, and for the Viper Captain Farangu, since he seems to have successfully made his helmsman rolls, unlike a certain cheater and thus should be considered the real hero in this mini:
Wait, you formed a death star and you didn't think that the Falcon would be its weakness?
We were told it was a "gestalt attack mode" that would combine the two ships. No mention of what it would actually do.
Rawkking Goodguy on
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RingoHe/Hima distinct lack of substanceRegistered Userregular
edited July 2010
I never rolled once, because I am lazy.
I think I learned something about myself in this game: I really play Phalla just to kill people. To be the Tactical Officer and not get any killing done by powers or the vote was quite frustrating. I really feel I should have enjoyed this insanity but apparently my bloodlust is much too important.
So, sorry for being kinda bitchy, Ender! And thanks for running the game!
The RNG did seem to have too much control though, how lucky were we on those last rolls?
Void Slayer on
He's a shy overambitious dog-catcher on the wrong side of the law. She's an orphaned psychic mercenary with the power to bend men's minds. They fight crime!
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FaranguI am a beardy manWith a beardy planRegistered Userregular
edited July 2010
I had three Vipers which did 1d8 damage each, and my target had 10 HP.
First Viper hits for 7,
Second misses,
Third hits for 4.
. They didn't seem to be at all concerned about revealing themselves
Well, no shit after narration basically revealed every single mafia member. Take or feign an action? Narration or even worse - before narration it was sure to pop up in a clarification post. Public seering of entire ship? Sure why not. Or the thing with Teucrian slipping in fake messages. Sounds gre- hey wait!
though after day 2 that meant I simply forgot the game was a phalla which helped. It's got a great space adventure vibe to it.
That was actually due to my ability more that 3clipse. One of my powers was to make the helmsman's roll an automatic success, and it was used in that instance.
Shushnik on
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The AnonymousUh, uh, uhhhhhh...Uh, uh.Registered Userregular
edited July 2010
I had that power too, actually. Heck, if I'd known other people on my ship had my "improve shield/weapon capacity", I'd have used that instead. >_>
. They didn't seem to be at all concerned about revealing themselves
Well, no shit after narration basically revealed every single mafia member. Take or feign an action? Narration or even worse - before narration it was sure to pop up in a clarification post. Public seering of entire ship? Sure why not. Or the thing with Teucrian slipping in fake messages. Sounds gre- hey wait!
though after day 2 that meant I simply forgot the game was a phalla which helped. It's got a great space adventure vibe to it.
Man I'm still upset about the fake message. That was some seriously bad luck/miscommunication that got me caught and I'd love to know how people would have interpreted the message if things had gone differently. Now I'll probably never get narration powers again.
Also, someone who is an expert on the rules, could you explain if my initial cryptogram about Wildcat would have been in violation and precisely why the rule exists? I'm curious about that.
My opinion is that I didn't care for the rampant vote immunity. I'm usually against rolling in phallas, but this one worked and it fit rather well, I liked it. It could have been more puzzling/intellectual and less random, but I didn't expect it to be anything but random so I was ok with that.
3clipse, cheating is lame. You've now broken the no dead talking rule in my phalla and cheated in this one. I was considering banning you from my next game for the first issue, since I asked you to discontinue the after-death communication and you ignored me. Now I'm certain, don't bother signing up for my games.
Also, I only fudged 3 rolls total. I was perfectly honest for most of them. The last attack roll on the fusion core, for example.
So nyeh :P I regret nothing!
Oh, only 3 out of the 7 days? Oh my. Are you counting the times you would have fudged the roll but decided not to because your roll was already good? I don't think you are.
I was gonna minigrudge ender for making our mafia powers drawback be different from what it actually was, but now Ender and I get to grudge someone together.
Edit: And you broke the no dead talking rule in another game? Ugh, I like to occasionally give people chances to redeem themselves, but I'm gonna have to think long and hard about it when I host another game.
. They didn't seem to be at all concerned about revealing themselves
Well, no shit after narration basically revealed every single mafia member. Take or feign an action? Narration or even worse - before narration it was sure to pop up in a clarification post. Public seering of entire ship? Sure why not. Or the thing with Teucrian slipping in fake messages. Sounds gre- hey wait!
though after day 2 that meant I simply forgot the game was a phalla which helped. It's got a great space adventure vibe to it.
Man I'm still upset about the fake message. That was some seriously bad luck/miscommunication that got me caught and I'd love to know how people would have interpreted the message if things had gone differently. Now I'll probably never get narration powers again.
Also, someone who is an expert on the rules, could you explain if my initial cryptogram about Wildcat would have been in violation and precisely why the rule exists? I'm curious about that.
I am still actually confused as to exactly how Kay managed to accidentally reveal your encyclopedia entry as fake.
. They didn't seem to be at all concerned about revealing themselves
Well, no shit after narration basically revealed every single mafia member. Take or feign an action? Narration or even worse - before narration it was sure to pop up in a clarification post. Public seering of entire ship? Sure why not. Or the thing with Teucrian slipping in fake messages. Sounds gre- hey wait!
though after day 2 that meant I simply forgot the game was a phalla which helped. It's got a great space adventure vibe to it.
Man I'm still upset about the fake message. That was some seriously bad luck/miscommunication that got me caught and I'd love to know how people would have interpreted the message if things had gone differently. Now I'll probably never get narration powers again.
Also, someone who is an expert on the rules, could you explain if my initial cryptogram about Wildcat would have been in violation and precisely why the rule exists? I'm curious about that.
I am still actually confused as to exactly how Kay managed to accidentally reveal your encyclopedia entry as fake.
Late on day one, Kay and me corresponded via PM and i suggested the question "have any strange access attempts been made or has anyone accessed a station they shouldn't have?".
Kay sent it off and i don't think he realized it would expose anyone.
Posts
As for 3:
There were 10 mafia: 2 on the Piett, 1 each on the Chief and Cain, and 6 on the Williams, which is a ton.
We were pretty much racing the clock as far as we knew, though. With only the vote to kill people, without actively revealing we never would've been able to kill off enough of you before the 3 NPCs died. Like Rawkking said, we had to forgo our "villager" action in order to do anything mafia-ish, and there's only so many times you can get away with "Oops I was inactive sorry".
I think that's how they caught 3clipse's cheating, though he was using both sites and picking the best roll each day.
I rolled fairly, you can go back and check! I even described the rolls as to what they were for, which would have been a huge mafia tell if it had mattered at all.
3DS FCode: 1993-7512-8991
That leads to the problem of "Roll first then decide what to do with it once I see the result", though.
@Megatin: I think it would of been more fun if the Venusian ships were stronger, but the mafia were more about sabotage than destroying the village directly.
You could have the order sent in with a number (eg 11221) timestamped BEFORE the roll with the same number, but that means two PMs for the host to sift through.
Hmm that's not a bad way to do it, although it's nearing the threshold of when it would be easier for the host to just do it all themselves
Of course, the host doing it all makes rerolls, etc, pretty much impossible.
"YOU ARE THE LAST MAN STANDING ON YOUR SHIP!
So long as you're the last man standing, you acquire all of your other ship officer's abilities, may act six times per day and have an AC of 23 when shot at by enemy boarders."
So we actually hurt ourselves by incapping them?
Considering the whole "inactive to use powers thing" and us having to beat the rolls of the things we were trying to sabotage, even if it was designed that way we were horribly ineffective at sabotage.
Kay's fire on my coordinates power was a well designed power, of course for some reason he still showed up doing nothing in the narration =/
Williams proboard.
Yeah; I think next time I'll try either some kind of action point system or maybe some straight-up Paper-Rock-Scissors type mechanics (like what you see in, say, Fury of Dracula).
Well half the sabotage would be in just not doing your job, however i think rather than appearing inactive in the narration, you should of appeared as if you failed the roll.
That is pretty much how most of us expected it to be day 1. Our powers even say that "we should try to think of a bluff to explain why your power failed". But then inactivity olololol.
My other complaint (which I think Ender realizes given his comments) was that it was impossible for the mafia to form any kind of coherent strategy aside from trying to finish off ships that the venutian battleships happen to rng enough. From what the mechanics have told us destroying the Williams first, then the Cain (or perhaps the battleship to eliminate the admiral) would have been the ideal strategy. However, we didn't know anything about the Sarlaac until the day before we formed it (and that was also based on RNG), we didn't know its powers until it was formed, and we didn't know about it's hidden weakness until the Williams came barreling into us.
Cain proboards, though Jdarksun had the good sense to not approve my access after I was inactive on my first day in, so I'm waiting for the unlock to see what's inside too :P
You should look at it when I post it sometime in the next day or so.
Chicago Megagame group
Watch me struggle to learn streaming! Point and laugh!
Congratulation!!!
For shame.
Twitch Stream
We were told it was a "gestalt attack mode" that would combine the two ships. No mention of what it would actually do.
I think I learned something about myself in this game: I really play Phalla just to kill people. To be the Tactical Officer and not get any killing done by powers or the vote was quite frustrating. I really feel I should have enjoyed this insanity but apparently my bloodlust is much too important.
So, sorry for being kinda bitchy, Ender! And thanks for running the game!
Chicago Megagame group
Watch me struggle to learn streaming! Point and laugh!
3DS: 0963-0539-4405
Here is the chief's command and control proboard.
The RNG did seem to have too much control though, how lucky were we on those last rolls?
First Viper hits for 7,
Second misses,
Third hits for 4.
I shit you not.
Chicago Megagame group
Watch me struggle to learn streaming! Point and laugh!
So nyeh :P I regret nothing!
Well, no shit after narration basically revealed every single mafia member. Take or feign an action? Narration or even worse - before narration it was sure to pop up in a clarification post. Public seering of entire ship? Sure why not. Or the thing with Teucrian slipping in fake messages. Sounds gre- hey wait!
though after day 2 that meant I simply forgot the game was a phalla which helped. It's got a great space adventure vibe to it.
Sure like the roll to stay alive after we ate you.
Pretty hard for us to win when you made it impossible for us to kill the ship inside of us.
Alas
Man I'm still upset about the fake message. That was some seriously bad luck/miscommunication that got me caught and I'd love to know how people would have interpreted the message if things had gone differently. Now I'll probably never get narration powers again.
Also, someone who is an expert on the rules, could you explain if my initial cryptogram about Wildcat would have been in violation and precisely why the rule exists? I'm curious about that.
Though I don't really see the problem in a code breaker puzzle being inserted into narration. But you'd have to ask the mods.
My opinion is that I didn't care for the rampant vote immunity. I'm usually against rolling in phallas, but this one worked and it fit rather well, I liked it. It could have been more puzzling/intellectual and less random, but I didn't expect it to be anything but random so I was ok with that.
3clipse, cheating is lame. You've now broken the no dead talking rule in my phalla and cheated in this one. I was considering banning you from my next game for the first issue, since I asked you to discontinue the after-death communication and you ignored me. Now I'm certain, don't bother signing up for my games.
Oh, only 3 out of the 7 days? Oh my. Are you counting the times you would have fudged the roll but decided not to because your roll was already good? I don't think you are.
I was gonna minigrudge ender for making our mafia powers drawback be different from what it actually was, but now Ender and I get to grudge someone together.
Edit: And you broke the no dead talking rule in another game? Ugh, I like to occasionally give people chances to redeem themselves, but I'm gonna have to think long and hard about it when I host another game.
I am still actually confused as to exactly how Kay managed to accidentally reveal your encyclopedia entry as fake.
Twitch Stream
Late on day one, Kay and me corresponded via PM and i suggested the question "have any strange access attempts been made or has anyone accessed a station they shouldn't have?".
Kay sent it off and i don't think he realized it would expose anyone.