Mafia: general discussions.

So, I'm writing about the differences between the forum-based Mafia game and the Mafia game played in person with friends and acquaintances, as well as their common features. The first common feature is the standardization of rules. The rules for the forum-based Mafia and the in-real-life (IRL) Mafia differ, but from game to game, they usually don't change. In the forum-based game, nights and days last much longer, with each game phase taking up to a day. This is done so that everyone has time to participate, as we have people with different schedules and time zones. During the day, as in IRL Mafia, there are discussions about who to eliminate. At night, there are discussions about who to target with actions. The Mafia usually sits in a Skype group and discusses how to harm the town through killings and other nefarious deeds. The townspeople usually sit alone and think about who to heal, investigate, etc. (the roles of investigator and doctor are standard here). Once they've decided, they immediately send their actions to the game master, either through Skype or private messages. They need to do this within 24 hours (or even less). These are relatively small changes. A bigger change is that you can't reveal your role, shout "I'm the detective, I investigated him, he's Mafia!" It's not just not advisable, it's forbidden, and it can lead to being removed from the game. You can hint subtly... but it's usually not a good idea. You can pretend to be another role, but only subtly, so that you can't be accused. The main source of information in the forum-based Mafia is the newspaper. It displays a lot of information. You can find out not only who died, but also who killed them, and get a clue about the killer (a hint that, through Wikipedia, should lead to the player's profile). It also often displays the healing actions and many other actions. Now, let's talk about roles... The roles in the forum-based Mafia are formed anew each time, and they are not standard. Only the night actions (NA) are standard, and even that's not always the case. Here are the most basic ones: - Killing. This is straightforward; I explained the clue mechanic earlier. - Healing. It simply saves from being killed. - Protection. It also saves from being killed, but there's a difference. Protection usually goes early in the order (yes, due to the large number of actions, the order can affect the outcome of the night), while healing goes late, and by the time healing happens, some additional nasty thing might have already occurred. However, we often have roles that ignore protection, and in such cases, healing works. - Blocking. The selected target will not be able to perform their night action. Although in some cases, they still might be able to, but this doesn't happen very often. - Isolation. It either acts as a block + protection, or as complete isolation in the literal sense. That is, neither the target can perform an action, nor can anything be applied to them. - Investigation. It's not quite the same as the investigation in IRL Mafia (i.e., the detective). After investigating, the detective would definitively know whether the player is Mafia or a townsperson. Here, you get a status, such as "looks like a townsperson" or "looks like Mafia." But you know that there are townspeople with the status "looks like Mafia," and vice versa. So, you still have to think. The role's status is always written in its description. - Redirection. This is when the target's night action occurs, but not as they intended. That's all for now. I recommend studying the other subtleties during practice. I'll just say that roles can also have special features (they are always written), such as the ability to survive being killed or to ignore the fact that you've been blocked at night. How to start playing? Get a number, wait for the others, and see your role in your private messages. Immediately send your night action, because the game starts at night, and then wait for the newspaper. Once the newspaper is released, you can write something intelligent in the thread, but remain silent at night. That's the gist of it