Given the recent slow in game sign ups, I wanted to make a thread/poll to collect some feedback. Particularly if you're actively checking the site but not signing up for games because you haven't been interested in the last few games, we'd like to hear from you!
The poll is multiple choice so just select all the game types you'd like to play in.
More specific feedback (high complexity vs low complexity, more high flavor games, etc.) is always welcome, you can leave it in this thread or PM me (I don't bite!).
Also, just as a note, most of the queues are fairly short so if you've been kicking an idea around you should ask for help polishing it! I'm willing to review/cohost just about anything and you can always ask for help in #lonely-hearts on the discord server.
I tend to favor larger games because I like that they last longer, and it’s more interesting to me. Complexity can be whatever, as long as the roles/mechanics don’t completely take over the game.
I ~like minis enough to sign up for them, but I didn’t vote for them.
Micros are bleh. I like IRC style games but not on a forum.
Please note that I technically haven't played a game here in over a year, but:
I hate Micros because they don't feel like mafia to me.
Prefer Specialties/Normals/Minis, especially if they are elegantly designed. Not to toot my own horn here, but I'd snap join one of my own games without question.
Would have probably joined a game or two along the line this year if I wasn't so busy or if I didn't review the game in question.
Yeah, I tend to like larger more complex games. The mini/micro scene isn't for me. Other things come into it as well, such as real-life, deadlines at work, etc.
I wonder if it's just a symptom of something else. Like, the assumption here is that watchmen took so long to fill up because lots of people looked at it, and then didn't take action because they weren't interested (whether it was size, roster, flavor, etc). That might not be. It seems to me it just took a while for more-active people to die in Eurovision.
If we're seeing a lot of people follow a thread (view but not /in), then maybe that's a sign that there are lots of first-time lurkers that are just working up the courage to take the plunge. I know I lurked and lurked for months before attempting to play. Something along the lines of a mentor/mentee game could get people off the fence. I know those happen from time to time.
Currently operating under that assumption, yes, because the alternative is that the site is dead because of the Nexus split and closure scare from April.
It's not just Watchmen Wanted, of the four games we've fired since then three were in signups for unreasonably long times before filling. Modern Mafia, a specialty, is the only one that really attracted a lot of interest. Hence the poll.
If we just aren't seeing enough traffic / don't have enough active players to play a 7 player micro and a 12 player mini at the same time then not enough people are even viewing games to fill an 18-19 player normal or specialty. Which is a conversation we're going to maybe have to have depending on how future sign ups go. Don't think it's as bad as all of that yet so we're collecting data and seeing what we can do to keep interest up.
I'd be happy to host or mentor a basic for new players if there's interest, though I'm not really sure how to gauge that interest. In theory people are supposed to post to the player contact list that they're interested in a basic and once enough people sign up for one it just fires but I'm not sure that's effective.
Funnily enough, I tend to enjoy more micro and mini games than anything with more than 12 players. I usually get overwhelmed early game when there is more than 12 players posting rapidly and then I easily end up in the constant catch-up mode (and lurking) and then just losing all my motivation.
I prefer more complex (though not necessary high-power) games. For example, some of the set-ups I have fond memories are games like Bravely Default, Battle of the Amyrlin Seat & Vagrant Story.
I'm that guy that checked all the boxes (sorry, not sorry) because I like my Mafia like I like my coffee most my entertainment: varied, frequently crazy, and thought-provoking.
That said, I probably normally gravitate to minis most often, because:
• Micros tend to have shorter deadlines that sometimes mean I miss significant chunks of Days, especially on the weekends.
• Normals and Specialties start off with so many posts that initial Days are hard to keep up with (and woe betide my catchup chances if real life throws me a curveball during those early Days).
But I specifically like having a variation of games where sometimes it's more likely that I will have to rely on behavior and analysis (Low complexity Minis, Mini-Minis (Micros), and Micros-on-Steroids (Normals)) and other times having games with juicy unique mechanics and roles that I can explore, exploit, and sometimes be surprised by (High complexity Minis and Specialties).
Bottom line: Mafia is an entertainment opportunity that allows me to be social and creative, and I haven't really met a variety I didn't like other than the frenetic insanity of Turbos.
Micro’s are too fast for me when I’m on cruise, and I’ve seen deadlines in mini’s recently that also go too fast for me.
I like every game type as long as I get the time to catch up when my cruises get too busy.
I too like variety. But my main preference is for high concept games. Be it mini or specialty. Role madness isn't a game style I generally enjoy unless there is a larger mechanic involved (prisoners dilemma in Zero Escape or Factions in GoT).
My recent lack of signing up has little to do with game variety though, has been entirely driven by real life. So changing the queues massively wouldn't have changed my participation recently.
Yeah. Just to be clear, we're not really looking at a major restructuring right now, just wondering if we should be focusing on firing more specialties or normals or something.
I voted for Minis and Normals not because I specifically dislike the others but for specific reasons.
I like Minis because it's got a manageable number of players for me, else I lose track.
Normals are kind of a "training wheels off" gamemode where I test myself. Like big Minis,
Specialties are fun to read, but are usually too complex for me. I'm terrible at setups, and having nonstandard roles/mechanics screws me up real bad.
Micros don't feel like Mafia, like Proph said. They're also too short, like Cantrip said. I also feel like standard Mafia tells don't apply much either. It's fun to TRY and figure the game out. I like the open setups.
KoolKoal: Feel free to take this with a grain of salt since self meta isn't particularly helpful, but I think I get scumread mostly for style over substance, but also for a certain lack of substance over style. It's not so much what I AM posting most of the time (though sometimes that can seem bad) but what I'm NOT posting. I've been told I come to non-obvious conclusions a lot, so when I post, quite a bit of the time there's jumps in logic that people can't follow and they think that's scummy. I get that accusation about a lot of questions I ask specifically. People call them "busy work" when the questions are legit etc.
As far as things to ignore, I can't think of anything. I would suggest you focus less on what I'm doing and more on how I'm doing it. That's probably more likely to be accurate. Like I've just said, what I do tends to come off a little weird, but if you look for how I do it, mindset comes into play and maybe you figure out something useful.
Specialties and Micros tend to be too focused on mechanics and losing sight of behavioral analysis that makes mafia, well. Mafia, at its core. Normals are my preference as I like a larger, simpler game.
10/3 is a pretty unusual player size for us, there's a lot of 9/3 and 11-12/4 in the mini and normal queues. It's been ages since we had a neutral or multiball game, though since 99% of set ups are closed I can't guarantee any given game does or doesn't have them (other than my own, which I will state up front that any game I host will not be multiball unless explicitly stated in the sign up thread and neutrals need a very good reason to exist and have achievable wincons, so no vanilla survivors or serial killers).
Most hosts will tell you high, medium, or low complexity to give you some idea of what sorts of and number of roles the game has, too. Low complexity is pretty close to bog standard Mafia with few roles. Medium complexity might have a couple unusual roles but it shouldn't be rolemadness. High complexity is role madness or weird game mechanics like Arkham's Auction House and such.
Also multiball and stuff like cults are straight up banned from the Normal queue, other stuff like traitors are technically at the reviewer's discretion but I don't think we have any active reviewers that would allow alignment changing in a Normal at all.
Probably should have said "10/3-ish". Was thinking one town one scum faction, at least 3 scum, vanilla mafia game.
shadow's game currently in signups, for example, looks like a lot of fun, except that the previous prison block mafia he hosted had a neutral, so I wouldn't want to play in the current one on the chance that it did too.
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Given the recent slow in game sign ups, I wanted to make a thread/poll to collect some feedback. Particularly if you're actively checking the site but not signing up for games because you haven't been interested in the last few games, we'd like to hear from you!
The poll is multiple choice so just select all the game types you'd like to play in.
More specific feedback (high complexity vs low complexity, more high flavor games, etc.) is always welcome, you can leave it in this thread or PM me (I don't bite!).
Also, just as a note, most of the queues are fairly short so if you've been kicking an idea around you should ask for help polishing it! I'm willing to review/cohost just about anything and you can always ask for help in #lonely-hearts on the discord server.
https://discord.gg/HyKA6bH
I ~like minis enough to sign up for them, but I didn’t vote for them.
Micros are bleh. I like IRC style games but not on a forum.
I hate Micros because they don't feel like mafia to me.
Prefer Specialties/Normals/Minis, especially if they are elegantly designed. Not to toot my own horn here, but I'd snap join one of my own games without question.
Would have probably joined a game or two along the line this year if I wasn't so busy or if I didn't review the game in question.
I wonder if it's just a symptom of something else. Like, the assumption here is that watchmen took so long to fill up because lots of people looked at it, and then didn't take action because they weren't interested (whether it was size, roster, flavor, etc). That might not be. It seems to me it just took a while for more-active people to die in Eurovision.
If we're seeing a lot of people follow a thread (view but not /in), then maybe that's a sign that there are lots of first-time lurkers that are just working up the courage to take the plunge. I know I lurked and lurked for months before attempting to play. Something along the lines of a mentor/mentee game could get people off the fence. I know those happen from time to time.
It's not just Watchmen Wanted, of the four games we've fired since then three were in signups for unreasonably long times before filling. Modern Mafia, a specialty, is the only one that really attracted a lot of interest. Hence the poll.
If we just aren't seeing enough traffic / don't have enough active players to play a 7 player micro and a 12 player mini at the same time then not enough people are even viewing games to fill an 18-19 player normal or specialty. Which is a conversation we're going to maybe have to have depending on how future sign ups go. Don't think it's as bad as all of that yet so we're collecting data and seeing what we can do to keep interest up.
I'd be happy to host or mentor a basic for new players if there's interest, though I'm not really sure how to gauge that interest. In theory people are supposed to post to the player contact list that they're interested in a basic and once enough people sign up for one it just fires but I'm not sure that's effective.
I prefer more complex (though not necessary high-power) games. For example, some of the set-ups I have fond memories are games like Bravely Default, Battle of the Amyrlin Seat & Vagrant Story.
You should join one of the BurTogs games, since they are designed by your very own protégés!
my coffeemost my entertainment: varied, frequently crazy, and thought-provoking.That said, I probably normally gravitate to minis most often, because:
• Micros tend to have shorter deadlines that sometimes mean I miss significant chunks of Days, especially on the weekends.
• Normals and Specialties start off with so many posts that initial Days are hard to keep up with (and woe betide my catchup chances if real life throws me a curveball during those early Days).
But I specifically like having a variation of games where sometimes it's more likely that I will have to rely on behavior and analysis (Low complexity Minis, Mini-Minis (Micros), and Micros-on-Steroids (Normals)) and other times having games with juicy unique mechanics and roles that I can explore, exploit, and sometimes be surprised by (High complexity Minis and Specialties).
Bottom line: Mafia is an entertainment opportunity that allows me to be social and creative, and I haven't really met a variety I didn't like other than the frenetic insanity of Turbos.
I like every game type as long as I get the time to catch up when my cruises get too busy.
My recent lack of signing up has little to do with game variety though, has been entirely driven by real life. So changing the queues massively wouldn't have changed my participation recently.
I like Minis because it's got a manageable number of players for me, else I lose track.
Normals are kind of a "training wheels off" gamemode where I test myself. Like big Minis,
Specialties are fun to read, but are usually too complex for me. I'm terrible at setups, and having nonstandard roles/mechanics screws me up real bad.
Micros don't feel like Mafia, like Proph said. They're also too short, like Cantrip said. I also feel like standard Mafia tells don't apply much either. It's fun to TRY and figure the game out. I like the open setups.
Specialties and Micros tend to be too focused on mechanics and losing sight of behavioral analysis that makes mafia, well. Mafia, at its core. Normals are my preference as I like a larger, simpler game.
Most hosts will tell you high, medium, or low complexity to give you some idea of what sorts of and number of roles the game has, too. Low complexity is pretty close to bog standard Mafia with few roles. Medium complexity might have a couple unusual roles but it shouldn't be rolemadness. High complexity is role madness or weird game mechanics like Arkham's Auction House and such.
Also multiball and stuff like cults are straight up banned from the Normal queue, other stuff like traitors are technically at the reviewer's discretion but I don't think we have any active reviewers that would allow alignment changing in a Normal at all.
shadow's game currently in signups, for example, looks like a lot of fun, except that the previous prison block mafia he hosted had a neutral, so I wouldn't want to play in the current one on the chance that it did too.