US Presidential Elections Mafia Endgame

Author: Casey_Risk

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That's the game! With all mafia players eliminated...

IT'S A TOWN VICTORY!

Mafia:

  • JoeBob - You are the Election of 1788-89! You were the first ever US presidential election, as well as the only one to span two years without a contingent election in the house. The enormously popular George Washington won all 69 electoral votes that were cast. This election, as well as Washington himself, would set important precedents for how elections and the nation in general would function moving forward. You are the Godfather! You appear to be Innocent to investigative roles, but you win with the Mafia.
  • Barney - You are the Election of 1824! The Federalist party had fallen out of favor with the American people, leaving the Democratic-Republican party as the only major political party in America. However, there were divisions and factions within, and four different candidates from the party ran for president. None received a majority of the electoral vote, causing the election to be decided by the House of Representatives. You are the Mafia JOAT and have the powers of the three men who advanced to the contingent election in the House.
    • John Quincy Adams - 1x Night Vote Thief - Andrew Jackson won the popular vote and had the most electoral votes, leading many to believe he would win the presidency, but Adams surprised the nation by winning the most state delegations, effectively stealing the election from Jackson (at least in his eyes). One night per game, you may target any player to steal their vote. You will have two votes at your disposal the following day, and your target will be unable to vote.
    • Andrew Jackson - 1x Framer - Andrew Jackson accused John Quincy Adams of striking a 'corrupt bargain' with Henry Clay to win the election. In reality, there isn't much evidence of this and Adams probably won through sincere voting, but regardless, Jackson was able to rally people in his favor, and Adams would lose his reelection bid to Jackson in 1828. One night per game, you may target any player to make them appear Guilty to investigative roles.
    • William H. Crawford - 1x Strongman - William Harris Crawford was the minister to France during the war of 1812 and afterwards was appointed Secretary of War by James Madison. One night per game, you may target any player to perform a Strongman kill -- a kill which cannot be prevented by any protective role.
Town:

  • Earth - You are the Election of 1920! The major candidates were Republican Warren G. Harding and Democrat James M. Cox, but the Socialist party candidate Eugene Debs also decided to make a run for president, despite being in prison at the time. Although incarcerated, Debs won close to a million votes, over 3% of the popular vote. It would be his last run for president. You are the Jailkeeper. Once per night, you may choose to jail any other player, protecting them from harm but also preventing them from using any active abilities. You win with the Town.
  • AustinL0926 - You are the Election of 1876! Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and his incredible facial hair ran against Democrat Samuel J. Tilden. The results were extremely contentious. Tilden won against Hayes in the popular vote, but there were widespread allegations of voter fraud, voter intimidation, and disenfranchisement of black Republicans. To solve the issue of who the winner ought to be, Congress created the Electoral Commission, a body of fifteen people tasked with investigating the election and settling the 20 disputed electoral votes. You have the investigative authority of the Electoral Commission. You are the 2x Cop. Two nights per game, you may target any other player to learn whether they are Innocent (win with the Town) or Guilty. You win with the Town.
  • WyIted - You are the Election of 1928! Republican Herbert Hoover defeated Democrat Al Smith. Smith was Catholic, and at a time of high anti-Catholic prejudice in the US, his faith hurt his campaign greatly, more so than any of his policy positions. However, Hoover himself would come to be hated after the Great Depression started during his term, and while he didn't respond to it very well, the Depression itself wasn't really Hoover's fault. Because both major candidates were judged somewhat unfairly, you are the Miller. You appear to be Guilty to investigative roles, but you win with the Town.
  • ILikePie5 - You are the Election of 2020! 2020 was a very dramatic and tense year for a national political battle, but former vice president Joe Biden managed to defeat the incumbent president Donald Trump, making him the first incumbent president to lose a reelection bid since George H. W. Bush in the election of 1992. You are the Town JOAT and have the following abilities:
    • Quarantine (1x Magistrate) - 2020 was the year the Covid-19 disease became an international pandemic, leading to wide-scale lockdowns. The response of the US to the pandemic was a major point of contention in the election. One night per game, you may target any other player to quarantine them, making them unable to receive or cast any votes the following day.
    • Steal the Election (1x Double Vote) - Joe Biden was accused by Donald Trump of using massive amounts of voter fraud. Eventually, widespread belief among Republicans that the election was stolen from Trump lead to an insurrection attempt at the Capitol with the aim of preventing Biden from being certified as the winner. One day per game, you may cast two votes at once on any player.
    • Blue Lives Matter (Deputy/Judge) - During 2020, the Black Lives Matter movement led widescale protests in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. Most BLM protesters were peaceful, but some were not and sparked violent riots, leading to backlash against the movement. These protests and riots, and the responses to them, were a huge issue throughout the campaign season. If the Cop dies in the night, you will gain a 1x Cop ability. If the Cop is lynched, then the following night, you will have the ability to target and kill any one player who voted for them.
  • Moozer325 - You are the Election of 1972! Incumbent president Richard Nixon soundly defeated Democratic challenger George McGovern. One of the issues Nixon ran on, among others, was desegregation busing, the policy of using the school bus system to achieve racial desegregation in schools by sending student to schools in districts other than their own. Nixon was opposed to the policy, labeling it 'forced busing.' It was a part of the Southern Strategy, an attempt by Republicans to appeal to white southern voters who were opposed to civil rights legislation and desegregation. You are the 1x Self-Bus Driver. One night per game, you may 'swap' yourself with any other player, causing all night actions targeted at you to be redirected to your target and vice-versa. Use this ability wisely! You win with the Town.
  • CatholicApologetics - You are the Election of 2000! Incumbent Democratic vice president Al Gore ran against Republican George W. Bush, son of former president George H. W. Bush. Gore won the popular vote, but the electoral vote would all come down to Florida, where Bush led by an insanely slim margin, only a few hundred votes. Controversy over the recount led to the Supreme Court Decision Bush v. Gore, which left Bush the winner of both Florida and the election as a whole. Because it all came down to the very last vote, at least in Florida, you are the Hammerer! You may only cast a vote if it is the deciding (hammering) vote. If you try to cast a vote which does not immediately end the day, the day will automatically end with your lynch instead. You win with the Town.
  • whiteflame - You are the Election of 1992! Democratic challenger Bill Clinton won against the incumbent Republican president George H.W. Bush. Independent Ross Perot also made a strong showing, gaining a lot of support and even getting to participate in all three presidential debates alongside Bush and Clinton. However, he severely damaged his campaign and his reputation when he dropped out of the race in July before resuming it several weeks later. Because of Perot's dropped, then resumed campaign, you are the Odd-Night Commuter. On odd-numbered nights, you may choose to commute away from town, making you unable to be targeted by any night actions. You win with the Town.

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Night actions:

NP1:

  • Pie, Moozer waive
  • Whiteflame commutes
  • Earth jails Wylted
  • Barney Strongman-kills Austin
  • Austin did not respond in time. (I informed him that all other actions had been submitted and he would die, and asked him if he would take Barney's place. He politely declined.)

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Commentary:

Well, that was a bit disappointing, honestly. I like to see games that are really interesting with lots of intrigue, where everyone has fun regardless of who wins. This one, unfortunately, was over too quickly. I considered letting the scum team ask if two elections are in the game as well, but figured it wouldn't be necessary, as there have been a lot of presidential elections in the US, so the mafia would have a lot to choose from, and given how the theme is not based in fiction, there would be no obvious elections that would be very likely to be in the game. JoeBob just got really unlucky, I guess.

Barney and JoeBob asked about Doctor and Watcher. I guess I can understand Doctor, but I don't think Watcher was necessarily a good choice. I wouldn't include a role like that without giving the scum team some way to counteract it such as a Ninja, Roleblocker, or Redirector. They didn't have any of those, so I wouldn't have included a Watcher or a Tracker. I also don't think claiming Doctor when Earth had already claimed Jailkeeper was a good idea, but Barney probably wasn't going to win anyway. However, I did think that if he was going to have any shot of winning, he'd have to kill Austin first and Pie second, and he managed to do half of that, plus it seemed to me like he was likely going to kill Pie next if he survived DP2.

I liked this setup. I like the idea of having the town's only protective role be a Jailkeeper. It's an interesting role, as it allows you to protect important power roles like Cop, but at the cost of preventing them from using their powers. I also included the Godfather, Miller, and Framer as a way of preventing the town from simply playing Follow the Cop, but since it could only be protected by a Jailkeeper and was thus weak, I added the Deputy to the 2020 election. I also added several voting roles as I felt it was thematically appropriate, and I was interested to see how they'd interact, but I didn't really get to see.

The Self-Bus Driver was a way of including a role that is typically scummy in the Town roles. I think doing that is a way to make games more interesting. Originally, it was just going to be a simple Bus Driver, but then I thought that the Bus Driver might just waive every night, so I considered making it compulsive, but I thought that would be too bad for the town (the Miller and Hammerer were already negative utility). I went with Self-Bus Driver, as it was one of my JOAT abilities in Villainous Villains. I understand why Whiteflame felt it was a pseudo-CC to his role, but I didn't think of it that way. I thought of it being a self-sacrificing role -- if you think you know who the NK will be, you can swap yourself in so the Town loses a less valuable role instead of a more valuable one. But, if you choose wrong, you run the risk of causing more chaos and hurting the town.

There were also a couple pseudo-theme splits involving the Cop (that's part of why the semi-Judge was included). Both 1876 and 2000 were elections decided by an (ostensibly) independent third party where the winner lost the popular vote. There's also 1876 and 2020 both being elections with widespread claims of voter fraud.

All in all, this had the potential to be a really interesting game, but fell short of that. Oh well, it happens sometimes.
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ggs
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@Casey_Risk
What was the theme split?
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@ILikePie5
What was the theme split?

It was elections won by a Democrat or a Republican versus elections won by neither a Democrat nor a Republican
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@Lunatic
It was elections won by a Democrat or a Republican versus elections won by neither a Democrat nor a Republican
Yup
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@Earth
@Barney
@AustinL0926
@WyIted
@JoeBob
Endgame thread up
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@whiteflame
@Moozer325
@CatholicApologetics
We're in the endgame now
AustinL0926
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Neat setup, thanks for hosting! A bit scumsided, considering there were 4 ways to get a false cop result (2 of them passive), and only 1 way to get a correct guilty lol.

Also, poor Joebob. Guy can't catch a break.
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@AustinL0926
A bit scumsided, considering there were 4 ways to get a false cop result (2 of them passive), and only 1 way to get a correct guilty lol.
Wouldn't there only be three ways though? One is investigating the Godfather, one is investigating the Miller, and one is investigating a Framed player.

I see what you are saying about it being a bit scumsided, though. Role madness games are just hard to balance properly. The other two roles I considered putting in the game were:

  • 1912/1x Bulletproof - Theodore Roosevelt was shot while out campaigning, but miraculously survived. Excluded due to being too similar to Commuter, but I would have included it as a BP Survivor role if we had gotten to 10 players.
  • 1948/Bookie - Due to Truman winning in a huge upset.

Earth
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Anyway, I'm working on my next game so if anyone wants to review what I have so far, I'll appreciate it.
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This was a pretty fun game and mafia got pretty unlucky.
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gg 
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@Casey_Risk
Neat setup, thanks for hosting! A bit scumsided, considering there were 4 ways to get a false cop result (2 of them passive), and only 1 way to get a correct guilty lol.

I disagree. A cop is the single most powerful role a town can have. You are literally being told the affiliation of another player, and on np1 when the player pool is so large and mafia don't know who to roleblock, etc, imagine losing a whole ass mafia player because a player made a correct guess. I think cops should have many counters if they are included in a game. Usually if I put a cop in I either make them extremely counterable like casey did, or more likely just don't include them at all. I've seen cop results break games so quickly before. 
WyIted
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Thanks for hosting this

Also George Floyd overdosed. Chauvin wasn't as obviously innocent as some of the use of force incidents the media normally focuses on and ultimately is probably a piece of shit who is not racist but a dick because he is a cop. 

I feel like this is a situation where immediately the right came out and called it a murder thinking if they finally sacrificed an innocent cop to the mob, than maybe it would appease them. It didn't.
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Also based on how the end plahed out, and Barney would have been lynched anyway, it might be time to prevent chat agapT paraphrasing
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@JoeBob
Terrible luck two games in a row as scum. I was frustrated for you on this one, since you probably would've ended up picking a clear election if Austin hadn't been experiencing his power outage and claimed earlier.
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@Moozer325
I understand why Whiteflame felt it was a pseudo-CC to his role, but I didn't think of it that way. I thought of it being a self-sacrificing role -- if you think you know who the NK will be, you can swap yourself in so the Town loses a less valuable role instead of a more valuable one. But, if you choose wrong, you run the risk of causing more chaos and hurting the town.
Yeah, maybe it had more to do with just the terms "Bus Driver" and "Commuter" for me. After giving it an overnight to think about it, I wasn't so sure anymore. I think the Bus Driver was bound to just be a headache if used, so props to Moozer for avoiding that pitfall.
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@WyIted
Also based on how the end plahed out, and Barney would have been lynched anyway, it might be time to prevent chat agapT paraphrasing
Yeah, I was thinking about that. I think it runs into the same problems as just posting the text of your PM.

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@Casey_Risk
Wow, that was over fast. Anyways, fun theme and fun game, thanks for hosting!