Must say, between a few of the recent games here, and watching yogs' 3 games off-site, I've come around to the beauty of the "open" or at least "mostly open" game setup.

It does take away the beauty of bodacious fake claims (much to adalia and Hijack's chagrin), but particularly for vanilla town, it seems to make the experience much less of a "****-if-I-know" lumbering in the dark where people just vote on meta and whatever crazy imagined theory they're running on.

I agree that can be agreeable to play. Not knowing what is involved in the game is kind of like not knowing all of the rules. I think the thing is that, when setups are open and are repeatedly played, then certain players (those who host, or those who have played more of them, or any of them, as opposed to a player who has not yet played it) have a possible advantage, and while, yes, the fact that it is open allows for everyone to know the same things, it comes to a point of the more experienced being able to have an easier time at winning, which becomes less fun for them (or some of them, anyway, I know it would for me, some people just like to win to win without the challenge mattering) and for the lesser experienced playing with them.

A championship makes sense to be open, otherwise I think mafia is advantaged.

So, overall, I think it just depends on the setup and balancing, and should be taken case by case by the moderator.

I'm totally up for / interesting in an open-setup / previously played setup like krypsyn was talking about hosting as the next game...if he is still hosting and that is what he still intends to do.

I've been saying this for some time. Every game I'm used to playing elsewhere, you always know at least most of the roles. Otherwise, it's a big guessing game because anybody can say they're anything and there's nothing you can do to dispute their claim.

I disagree. Part of the thrill of playing for me is using different methods to figure out what roles and mechanics are in play. I have mostly been vanilla, and yet I find things to be decipherable most of the time to one degree or another, and that is a HUGE part of the interest / intrigue for me. Sure, never with certainty until flips are made (and even then, not always!) or you yourself are able to get information (because you are scum or PR of somesort.) Not knowing everything allows the game to unfold interestingly potentially (as long as it is handled well, I think the key to the games is moderating, not the setups necessarily [a good mod won't use a bad setup, is also the idea]), and allow for richer flavor, among other benefits to it (games becoming stale, predicable, or generally just having less interest because everything is known.) But then it becomes a game of logic and likelihoods and what makes sense on multiple levels that I find to be a blast, and a lot of that is removed by knowing the entire setup and roles. Also, everyone knowing everyone's business is not logical, how do I know if the people I'm stuck in a train with, or in a bar with, are doctors, cops, serial killers, or what. It is an interesting and valid element for so many reasons.

I also know, from my hosting perspective, unless the setup specifically warrants / is suited for / works with an open setup, it is more interesting for me as a host to not have everything known. (which reminds me, if I've not said before, or even if I have, that I will not be wanting to share the PMs from my game, so that when if ever I host again and people choose different roles, or not, the PMs I send out will be of greater interest and add a more replay-value shelf-life to the setup that could be / I hope to be quite long.)

I think the open setups we've had here have simply been well-crafted and handled by the mods, and that the fact that they have been open isn't what has been inherently "better" about them. Here and in the championships, which have shown to have some very good moderators from what I have been able to tell.

Personally, I think this only works when you know the other players inside and out. You know how they act in certain roles, so you can get a decent read on them. Which, to be fair, is just fine for you guys, since all of you play with one another frequently, and this is basically the exact scenario. However, when you get a new player who isn't familiar with the others, it's kind of slow and grasping at thin air.

Believe it or not I like open games as well. I get a bit overwhelmed by an insane number of ridiculous false claims and role permutations. Though it IS sometimes fun in a role madness game (I still remember one game - wait robbeasy REALLY WAS THE TOWN PARANOID GUN OWNER and Warehall the serial killer??? Hold on, or was he a strongman... ;) ).

There was a brief moment in this game when I was super excited thinking I had stumbled on the "hidden mechanism" after drealmer's failed lynch. Of course, Occam's razor ended up winning the day ;)

I can see open being a preference, it's just not mine obviously, and I do like open games, just not exclusively, and just because a game is open doesn't mean it will be a good game, and just because a game is hidden, doesn't mean it is less likely to be good, there are too many factors to really say any given game, and again, I think balance of mechanics and how the mod handles it all is really the crucial thing.

Yup this is me, but reversed (prefer open, but like that we get crazy games here as well). When I first started playing here I sort of *HATED* the "unknown" and especially role madness games.

I forgot drealmer, did you play in the Tres Leches one? I think that was the game that turned me on to the occasional role madness. It was crazy and very fun. A lot more chaotic and less mafia than usual but fun in a different sort of way.

Serial killers, a few scum factions and townies with outrageous powers / roles. Hectic but good.

Nope, my first game was #31 and so the only flub game I've had the option to play was the male strip-club that I got mod-killed in. I think I like the idea of role-madness games too, and it is unfortunate I missed the Tres Leches game, and that I couldn't thrive with my posting restriction in the strip-club game because of the wild elements involved / many roles (which I hear is similar and why I mention, even though there was a vanilla element in the strip club game, not sure if other madness games have been hosted here, though I suppose it's likely.)

Want to know an experience even crazier?

I've started playing "turbos", where the cycles are typically 18/6.

That's not hours. That's minutes.

A couple of examples, cherry-picked to make me look good () ([url=http://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums/threads/3038-A-Turbo-With-a-Proper-Setup-and-Peek-Mechanics]two). I didn't link to the games where I had no clue what I was doing and sucked horribly.

So, who's next? Krypsyn, you're on top of the list. Are you ready to rumble? Or if not, drealmer, are you ready to take over?

I talked to Krypsyn last week and he doesn't want to currently host a game.

He is also co-mod for drealmer's game so if he wants to give his game a go we need ot find a nother one for him.

I am ready!

Except I've had 0 feedback from an assistant and I've never hosted before, but, I'm still confident and comfortable, it'd just be nice to have a little bit of a safety net in case there are things I haven't accounted for that I don't know what to do about (but, I've seriously been working on this setup for almost exactly 8 months, so I've quite the grasp on it, but still...)

I had been wishing yogsloth would be done with his tournament in case he wanted to play my setup, but I'm not going to ask someone to go before me (unless there is someone who sees the schedule and thinks the timing for them would be better if they went now?), PLUS I am kind of raring to go already!!! It's like a beast within bursting to be released from its cage of flesh.

It makes me a bit sad krypsyn won't be assisting me, I was really looking forward to his feedback and input. I hope he is okay and returns to us before too long.

GOGfather, shall I solicit for a new assistant?

---edit---

I'm leaving that initial post ^ up, but, here are my full and honest thoughts.

As excited as I am to start my game, there are a few factors that affect each other to consider

I think krypsyn will make a great assistant for my game, so if he is be back in another month, then I'd say it'd be good if we played a couple mini-games in the interim OR, get someone from the list who is ready to host and move them to #1. Of course, then he'd be up to host if he were ready, or I could go at that point.

If I am to go next, it is going to take time for the assistant to read through all of my files+information. I'm not sure how long, it depends on the person and on how much free time they have and how much time it takes to process it all (all of the flavor adds up to something like a novella at this point, I must say. There are probably 20k+ words of flavor to read, and then another 10k+ of other stuff.) Plus, I figure they'll have some what-if questions for me, and other feedback maybe? And so have to allow time for that. At that point, I think everyone will be itching to get started already, and perhaps we should run 1 mini-game at least first because of the time requirement?

With that, yogsloth I do believe is interested in playing my setup, and so I'm inclined to want to wait for him pretty strongly too, and if it ends up just being a matter of a week or two until his championship is over at the point mine is ready to start, might we as well run 1 or 2 mini games until then to allow for him to play if he wants?

Drealmer: "So, Krypsyn, what do you think of the mechanic where dedo turns into a unicorn on N3, except he's not really a unicorn but everyone else is totally tripping on LSD and thinks he is?"

Krypsyn: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17o1OlroNSE

Drealmer: "Great, so uh, I think the balance is pretty much perfect. Wouldn't you say?"

Krypsyn: "Heh."

omg you hacked our mod-chat!