Good Roles & Bad Roles [for hosts]

[~ Gheb ~]

Virtually always good:

Vanilla Townie
Jailer & Friendly Neighbor [as used in Macman's Simpsons Mafia]
Voteblocker
Goon
Roleblocker


Good in most setups:

Friendly Neighbor [as used in Rockin's Sleepover Finale]
Vengeful Townie [underrated; a more balanced Vig]
Comparison Cop [good with multiple scum factions & traitors]
Town Traitor [can balance setups with janky numbers]
Doc / Combat Medic / Hot Nurse [good when you have 1 or more roleblockers]
Census Taker [underrated; similar to Comparison Cop]
Firefighter / Shrink [Can be used without Arsonist / Cult for Paranoia]
Tree Stump
Gravedigger [Balances tracker, watcher and Forensic Investigator]
Ninja
Busdriver [when you have lots or PRs]
Tracker [Can also be used as a mafia role!]
Vanilla Cop [good in simple setups]
Neighbors [Boosts communication]
Marker
Warlock


Good only in specific setups:

Closed Mason [extremely powrful with no real counter]
Vigilante
Innocent Child [only in simple setups; never use it with Comparison Cop!!!]
Cream Puff / Town Cop [need a lot of roles to counter-balance]
Forensic Investigator [difficult to balance]
Mason Recruiter / Cult [very advanced roles to use]
Witch / Interceptor [difficult to balance]
JoaT variations [mediocre filler options]
Watcher [only when there are very few or weak PRs]
Arsonist [difficult to balance and make interesting to play]
Serial Killer [extremely difficult to balance]
Siblings [difficult to balance]


Blue = Town aligned
Red = Mafia aligned
White = either
Yellow = 3rd Party

 

[Radical Fiction]

When you say bad roles are too hard to balance well, do you think they ever have been balanced well?

>mfw Warlock easier to balance than Cop

 

[#HBC | marshy]

man

i was hoping this thread would be dedicated for everyone to unleash their hatred and **** on all the roles they believe to be awful

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Marshy, feel free to do so!

When you say bad roles are too hard to balance well, do you think they ever have been balanced well?

I don't think they've ever been balanced well in the history of dGames. I'm pretty sure it's impossible for Closed Masons and Bombs to be perfectly balanced at all and I think the amount of requirements needed to make Cop / Watcher balanced are too much to actually make the role suited for a good game of mafia.

>mfw Warlock easier to balance than Cop

Cop is terrible and one of the roles that's been never balanced correctly. Without Roleblocker / Busdriver, Godfather / Traitor and Miller + unreliable Cop variation the Cop is broken.

Warlock is like the easiest indies to balance and the best indy for small games. It's only broken in EM because NL is such a popular choice D1.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

Hentai II masons were perfectly well balanced.
Cop vs. Roleblocker and Godfather is fine.

 

[Rajam]

Good Role: Limited Shots (whatever)

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Cop centralizes but it's not a bad role.

 

[Ramen King]

Good Role: Limited Shots (whatever)

This .

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Cop vs. Roleblocker and Godfather is fine.

Nope.

Cop centralizes but it's not a bad role.

It overcentralizes and is a very bad role.

 

[Raziek]

Hey, look at this enlightened rebuttal.

Really, what's the point of saying "Discuss", if all you're going to say is "Nope."? You know, maybe actually explain why?

smfh. You suck Gheb. You made a discussion topic then verbally dismissed discussion.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Yeah because saying "Cop centralizes but it's not a bad role" is a post that allows for major discussion, right?

Moron.

 

[#HBC | J]

Well to throw another conversation out there instead of having the one above me continue *ahem*....

I like having unconfirmed sanities in my games because I find it makes them easier to balance, especially for like cops/docs and the like. What are other people's opinions on unconfirmed sanity roles? A little *******ish but at the same time, I just like them more.

 

[Radical Fiction]

Cut the attitude, Gheb.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Well to throw another conversation out there instead of having the one above me continue *ahem*....

I like having unconfirmed sanities in my games because I find it makes them easier to balance, especially for like cops/docs and the like. What are other people's opinions on unconfirmed sanity roles? A little *******ish but at the same time, I just like them more.

Like I said, I feel they're among the things that can be used to balance out the cop. And yeah, it's an assholish role to give people but I feel like a cop is a lot more assholish to ... everybody else in the game. Nothing's more stupid than playing a great game as scum and then get exposed to a cop because the role removes any need for skill in the game. The very least you can do is to make it a 50/50 chance that the cop doesn't give you a reliable result and a possible counter-claim scenario between two town cops. A paranoid or naive cop is a decent addition to a sane cop to make him ... acceptable.

 

[#HBC | J]

I don't get the hate on cops in a closed set-up/online game.

I get the hate on cops in open set-ups/IRL games.

 

[BarDulL]

I don't really think Cop overcentralizes game play in Dgames too much. On EM it really does; everyone plays follow the cop there. Over here people take the time to read others and there's usually set up balance to counteract the Cop anyway.

I guess Cop does kind of counteract standard game play in that building trust and reading others can become inconsequential, but most PRs can accomplish the same thing (roleblocker blocks scum, no NK occurs, yada yada) and there are usually millers/GFs running about (or if not, scum can easily claim miller as a defense.)

 

[~ Gheb ~]

How many of you guys, who think that Cop isn't broken have been caught by a cop while playing a seriously good, if not flawless scum game yet? I don't think you can understand the extent of its power unless you feel it from its worst side.

 

[#HBC | J]

Well if you count Tracker/Watcher that's the way I am usually caught to be honest and it does suck but its mot like game-breaking. Not by cop though.

 

[Nicholas1024]

I don't see cop being excessively overpowered. Sure, with no balancing factors he can be broken, but when you account for miller, godfather, role blocker, bus driver, lawyer, framer, yakuza, indie roles, limited investigations, and of course different sanity cops, it's definitely possible to include one in a good setup.


Also, a role being easy to balance and actually good are two different things. A jester that doesn't end the day upon being lynched would be pretty easy to just toss into a game. Doesn't stop the role from being completely and utterly horrible. Similarly, although VT's are a building block in most games, it's one of the less interesting roles to actually play, it's generally preferable to at least have something you can do during the night phase, even if it's just a one shot roleblock.

 

[BarDulL]

I got ***** via PoE in GS3 because of the Cop/claims, but that had more to do with me opting not to kill the Cop right away when he had already claimed (aka being a newb.)

In Paper Mario mafia, Jscum got largely screwed over by Pierce tracking him (Pierce was suspicious of J because of Sephiroth's Masamune, but J had played a really good scum game on D1 which was before Seph's suspicions of J). After that, I got J jailed and there wasn't a kill, so we were pretty close to Jscum confirmation via ability use. However, J did utilize wifom (claimed he was using a cop-like ability on the person he actually killed, also claimed that scum no-killed the night J was jailed), so it's not as though there aren't options to counteract those roles. If you play it really well, people will believe you. If you haven't been playing an amazing scum game, then you're probably screwed.

 

[#HBC | J]

I actually will disagree with you on the VT thing, Nichy. VT is one of my favorite roles to draw in set-ups. Sure it's "Uninteresting" in PR wise but I feel VT is more of a thing that is a preference type thing.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

How many of you guys, who think that Cop isn't broken have been caught by a cop while playing a seriously good, if not flawless scum game yet? I don't think you can understand the extent of its power unless you feel it from its worst side.

Sucks. Find him faster or reach a point where the anonymous cop thinks you're town. I play to the cop in every game I can be boned by one.

 

[#HBC | Laundry]

>quality of role is based on balancing difficulty
>doesn't base it on the ability of the role itself
>doesn't account for usefulness of role
>doesn't account for anything at all except balancing

you're ****ing kidding me, right?

Jailer+Cop is already mostly balanced in a basic game. Throw in a godfather on a scum team. I just balanced a cop.

 

[adumbrodeus]

Cop is a terrible role because of what it is, but should be pretty easy to balance inherently (just give scum a significant, but weaker shot of power).

The real problem is that it has really strong synergy with a lot of other town roles, which makes it difficult to predict exactly how much power the cop adds. Oh, and never have the cop as the only town pr in an open setup. Just don't do it.


So, stupid role, but ok to balance in smaller games. Really difficult to balance in larger/pr heavy games.

 

[#HBC | Laundry]

How many of you guys, who think that Cop isn't broken have been caught by a cop while playing a seriously good, if not flawless scum game yet? I don't think you can understand the extent of its power unless you feel it from its worst side.

I got ****ed over by the mass claim at the end of Ryker maf thanks to Jerkus' claim. I'm not bitter about that, despite losing an otherwise brilliantly-played game.

That's the point of the cop's existence in the first place. It's to give town a ****ing chance at hitting those players that you can't get something in-thread on lynching otherwise. Any decent scum that doesn't mess up will be hard to catch in-thread. Cop provides a means for catching those players good enough to do that. That's the entire point of investigatives. You may not like how clear-cut it is but them's the breaks, kid.

Besides, the second cop claims, he essentially opens himself up to whatever scum have to throw at him. Usually there isn't a second investigative to take advantage of this either.

 

[#HBC | Nabe]

I think it's perfectly justified for a mod to include roles and to expect the players to play the game to account for them. But as scum, you shouldn't have to be on your toes accounting for a cop in every game.

Including a godfather is a strong hint, and I would obviously expect any scumteam with a godfather to play as if there's a cop. By the same token though, I might just give my scumteam mod knowledge that there's a cop, and maybe role resources to cover that eventuality if those resources would also help with other town roles and maybe hurt them in conjunction with other town roles as well.

I can't think of any instance when I've been copped and haven't felt that the inclusion of a cop in the setup was justified.


On another note, I do think roles that should be included in a game depend on the current climate in the community. I wouldn't run Pizza Mafia in the current climate for example.

 

[adumbrodeus]

>quality of role is based on balancing difficulty
>doesn't base it on the ability of the role itself
>doesn't account for usefulness of role
>doesn't account for anything at all except balancing

you're ****ing kidding me, right?

Jailer+Cop is already mostly balanced in a basic game. Throw in a godfather on a scum team. I just balanced a cop.

Yeesh, that a 10-3?

Godfather barely counterbalances cop, toss in a town jailer and scum is sort of screwed in spite of the fact that the roles aren't synergistic.

 

[#HBC | Laundry]

I tend to use roles based on how I feel the set-up would work. If I make a scumteam with no reliable means of beating a cop but plenty of ways to throw off a tracker, I'm obviously throwing in a tracker instead of a cop.

I get the feeling of it. There's very little wiggle room once a cop claims and unless you seriously have a good reason for it, you're not getting out of it. Half the tired excuses in the game have been tried and don't work and the other half are just ridiculous. You're basically getting beaten without getting outplayed and it sucks. But it, along with other investigatives, exist for the sole reason of catching mafia that don't screw up. They're easily the most necessary PR in existence. :r

 

[#HBC | Laundry]

Yeesh, that a 10-3?

Godfather barely counterbalances cop, toss in a town jailer and scum is sort of screwed in spite of the fact that the roles aren't synergistic.

Very, very basic game. I'd run it for newbies with maybe a roleblocker on top of the cop but not outside of that scenario.

 

[adumbrodeus]

I don't really think "good vs bad" is a good way to frame this thread honestly. At least not with what it's trying to get at.

Very, very basic game. I'd run it for newbies with maybe a roleblocker on top of the cop but not outside of that scenario.

It's basic, but definitely favors town a lot. Cop is just, so powerful, even with the expectation of possible counters.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

I will respond to this when Im more sober than right now but eh, you all are kinda wrong [either on the thread's purpose or on the roles].

Also like to apologize to Raz but you shouldn't always pick on me without knowing the circumstances or paying mind to it. You'd be a cool guy if you wouldn't alyways **** on me without any reason or look at other stuff first =/

 

[Ramen King]

You weren't in the wrong.

 

[Ramen King]

I think I agree with the cop bit. I hate trackers even more balancing wise. Especially for the type of game's I like to make. I mean a tracker could be alright in like an OS game where everyone has PRs, but otherwise they're pretty wak to try and balance to me.

 

[Swiss]

Every game I play, I play to direct the cop. I dont think ive ever been lynch off a guilty (someone verify?) and I KNOW ive had guilties on me. I dont see the cop as an issue. In terms of balancing it, what WL said.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Please take note, that the topic title says "for hosts". With that in mind ease of balance *is* the same as a 'good' role. Why do you think hosts use VTs more than anything else? Because it's the best role aka the easiest one to balance a game with!

Well if you count Tracker/Watcher that's the way I am usually caught to be honest and it does suck but its mot like game-breaking. Not by cop though.

I don't see cop being excessively overpowered. Sure, with no balancing factors he can be broken, but when you account for miller, godfather, role blocker, bus driver, lawyer, framer, yakuza, indie roles, limited investigations, and of course different sanity cops, it's definitely possible to include one in a good setup.

I got ***** via PoE in GS3 because of the Cop/claims, but that had more to do with me opting not to kill the Cop right away when he had already claimed (aka being a newb.)

In Paper Mario mafia, Jscum got largely screwed over by Pierce tracking him (Pierce was suspicious of J because of Sephiroth's Masamune, but J had played a really good scum game on D1 which was before Seph's suspicions of J). After that, I got J jailed and there wasn't a kill, so we were pretty close to Jscum confirmation via ability use. However, J did utilize wifom (claimed he was using a cop-like ability on the person he actually killed, also claimed that scum no-killed the night J was jailed), so it's not as though there aren't options to counteract those roles. If you play it really well, people will believe you. If you haven't been playing an amazing scum game, then you're probably screwed.

You all observe the issue from the same angle - you all think "as long as X is the case then the cop isn't a problem". However, it takes only one instance where X is *not* the case for everything to fall apart. The cop just doesn't allow for it.

I got ****ed over by the mass claim at the end of Ryker maf thanks to Jerkus' claim. I'm not bitter about that, despite losing an otherwise brilliantly-played game.

Just because you're not bitter doesn't mean the mod shouldn't have done better though. If you play a brilliant game and get ****ed over solely because of a mass claim then the mod didn't do his job adequately imo.

That's the point of the cop's existence in the first place. It's to give town a ****ing chance at hitting those players that you can't get something in-thread on lynching otherwise. Any decent scum that doesn't mess up will be hard to catch in-thread. Cop provides a means for catching those players good enough to do that. That's the entire point of investigatives. You may not like how clear-cut it is but them's the breaks, kid.

That's just a whitewashed way to say the truth: Cop evens out a skill difference, that is the town's job to overcome. If a scumbag can't be caught otherwise then the town needs to step it up. Punishing the mafia for it is extremely unfair.

I think it's perfectly justified for a mod to include roles and to expect the players to play the game to account for them. But as scum, you shouldn't have to be on your toes accounting for a cop in every game.

Including a godfather is a strong hint, and I would obviously expect any scumteam with a godfather to play as if there's a cop. By the same token though, I might just give my scumteam mod knowledge that there's a cop, and maybe role resources to cover that eventuality if those resources would also help with other town roles and maybe hurt them in conjunction with other town roles as well.

Those are some good ideas. However, think about how many counter-measures are necessary to make a cop balanced. If you have a 13 man game with a cop and you need a GF, RB, Miller and a second cop variation to make it fair ... you've based more than 1 / 3 of the set-up around the cop just to make him not too powerful.

I think I agree with the cop bit. I hate trackers even more balancing wise. Especially for the type of game's I like to make. I mean a tracker could be alright in like an OS game where everyone has PRs, but otherwise they're pretty wak to try and balance to me.

The reason I can accept trackers [and thus put them into the 'meh' category] is that they don't give information that doesn't require interpretation - a tracker by itself still isn't worth that much compared to the cop result: the tracker is thrown off by *every* visiting PR and it does not always give information that can be immediately useful. If a track result tells you "he went nowhere", you learn a lot less than when a cop result tells you "he's innocent".

 

[Make it Rain!]

That's just a whitewashed way to say the truth: Cop evens out a skill difference, that is the town's job to overcome. If a scumbag can't be caught otherwise then the town needs to step it up. Punishing the mafia for it is extremely unfair.

It's not extremely unfair for one side to have an inherent advantage just by not screwing up? Okay.

Let's say I'm playing a great town game and manage to bag one of the scum while saving a townie from a mislynch at the end of D2. I get killed the next night. Is that fair to me?

It's basic, but definitely favors town a lot. Cop is just, so powerful, even with the expectation of possible counters.

8 VTs, 1 Cop, 1 Jailer against a roleblocker, godfather, and goon is thoroughly town-sided? Mafia has two answers to the one role capable of finding them and the protective can't just keep protecting the cop. The second the ******* claims, he's getting roleblocked every time if he didn't bingo the blocker too.

Just because you're not bitter doesn't mean the mod shouldn't have done better though. If you play a brilliant game and get ****ed over solely because of a mass claim then the mod didn't do his job adequately imo.

Coulda claimed VT and had been fine. I shot myself in the foot, it had nothing to do with Ryker's set-up at all.

 

[#HBC | FrozeηFlame]

Normal cop just straight up isn't a good role. Here's why.

It requires little to no skill on the cop's end while granting MASSIVELY USEFUL returns.

It can be immensely overcentralizing if placed in a setup without proper counters or with too powerful town PR allies. Namely, Cop should NEVER be put in any game with any protective role other than Jailer, should never be put in a game with a watcher, and should never be put in a game without the scum having a Rber, Framer, Lawyer, or Tailor.

The best way to implement the cop role is to put restrictions on it. Make the cop WORK for the hugely beneficial information he's getting, or otherwise introduce greater room for error and make the process of making reliable deductions a bit more complex.

Examples:

Death cop: Cop does not see investigation results until he dies. Results are then either published in public by the mod upon his flip, OR sent privately to a player previously chosen by the cop. The former is obviously more powerful and you can pick the way it works according to the relative balance of the game.

Indirect/Reporting Cop: Cop doesn't receive his result directly but instead must choose another player to receive his results. For more dynamism, don't let him ever repeat a target.

Comparison Cop: Great role esp. for games with multiple indies, or two anti-town factions that are decently large. Never let him compare anyone against himself. For added dynamism and to reward good planning and foresight, require that he pick his first target on the first night, second target the next night, and deliver the result the night they pick their 2nd target. Rinse repeat for each night phase afterward. This punishes the cop if he picks someone who dies between the 1st and 2nd night and also slows down the rate at which he can amass info, since Comparison Cop in smaller games and investigate almost in the entire game very quickly if played well.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

Comp cop is infinitely more powerful than normal cop. You're insane if you're suggesting that over cop because cop is too easy to get rewarded for.

The propsed restriction you suggest is also relegating the role to uselesness in a small game unless every card in the deck falls right.

 

[#HBC | FrozeηFlame]

I disagree with you but I'm not getting into it with you because I know you get off to the thought of taking up my time and trolling me.

1.) Comp cop is absolutely not more powerful that a normal cop in a large game with my proposed restriction, especially if you have a role in the game that can mess with cop results, or have multiple scum factions that come up the same alignment. That's the whole point of the restriction, after all.

2.) Use a different cop than comp cop in a small game if you actually believe that comp cop with that restriction is useless in a small. I have a hard time believing that you actually, legitimately think that everything has to go perfect in a small game for a comp cop with that restriction to do anything but if ACTUALLY believe that then just use a different style of cop. Simple.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

1.) Compared to a single cop with no restriction as opposed to a conparison cop with a restriction, sure. An even night cop (the variant that best compares to your restriction) in a large is less powerful unless you include absolutely no roles that can deal with it and he knows that he can identify potential independents.