Mafia (also known as Werewolf or Assassin) is a party game modeling a battle between an informed minority and an uninformed majority. Players are secretly assigned roles: either "mafia", who know each other; or "townspeople", who know only the number of mafia amongst them. During the night phase of the game, the Mafia choose an innocent to kill. During the day phase, all players debate the identities of the Mafia and vote to kill someone whom the majority suspect. Players are eliminated until only innocents or mafia remain; the surviving side wins. Mafia is rarely played in groups of fewer than five, and must always start with more innocents than mafia.
Players make themselves comfortable in a space such that every player can see every other player.
[edit] Roles
Roles are assigned by a method which is both confidential and verifiable, often by dealing cards; a red or black card signifies the role as either:
* Mafia (alternatively, Scum, Werewolves, Worshippers, or Thieves)
* Innocents (alternatively, Citizens, Villagers, Townspeople, Townsfolk or Civilians)
Other roles are possible (see Variants).
Generally, game play also requires a Narrator (alternatively, God, Dealer, Don, Host, Moderator, Proctor, or Storyteller), a person not playing, but moderating the game. The Narrator knows the roles of each player and effectively narrates game play.
[edit] Night
The Narrator tells everyone to close their eyes and lower their heads ("It is now nighttime and all the villagers are asleep...") This can optionally be accompanied by all players tapping gently to mask any giveaway sounds of player movement. On the first night, the Narrator tells the Mafia to open their eyes and acknowledge their fellow Mafia members. Variations at this point:
* The Mafia may have a chance to kill off one of the Innocents by show of hands. (On the first night, the Mafia may "kill" the Narrator so that every Innocent gets a chance to participate in at least one execution decision. The Narrator then says in the Morning that he was killed and game play continues as usual.)
* Optionally, Mafia members must secretly communicate during the daytime and then unanimously agree to kill someone during the nighttime without opening their eyes to communicate (such as by having the narrator call out the names of each player, with Mafia players raising a hand to signify a kill).
* In large groups, each Mafia member can kill one person per night.
* In large groups, a Master Mafia member (Master Werewolf) has the ability to induct innocents into the Mafia (or infect villagers into werewolves).
Other variant characters may have turns to open their eyes to do "business" during the night (before or after the Mafia).
[edit] Day
The Narrator tells everyone to wake up and announces the Mafia's victim. Usually this involves the Narrator telling a story about the murder scene that the remaining players wake up to, and/or a story of how the victim was killed. For example, "The police chief said, 'Bob was shot seven times, stabbed three times, and drowned in the river. This is the worst case of suicide I've ever seen.'" This player is "dead" and may no longer participate in the game in any way, and is thus permitted to keep their eyes open at night.
Depending on the variant, The Narrator may reveal the identity of dead players, dead players may reveal themselves by flipping their cards face up (most common version), or the alignment of the dead may remain hidden. Typically, prematurely revealing one's identity by flipping one's card face up while still alive is considered suicide; in single-execution-per-day variants, this may count as the execution for that day.
During the daytime phase, the players deliberate over which suspected Mafia member they wish to nominate for execution. The Innocents want to execute a Mafia member but all players are allowed to vote. Generally, The Narrator will administer the election, the nominee may be given a chance to defend themselves and a majority is required for the execution to be carried out, although voting variants abound. The same rules apply to players who are executed by the Innocents as to players killed by the Mafia. In some variants, multiple players may be killed during the same day. Usually, each player must vote, can only vote once and cannot vote for themselves.
[edit] Phase duration
Daytime and nighttime can move quickly in live play, as daily executions and nightly decisions are communicated in real time. Daytime phases usually require a majority to be reached in order for a lynch (execution) to occur and effectively end the round. A set time limit may also be applied to this condition. At night, the evil factions have more information, and less to deliberate. Because of that, night is considerably shorter than day.
When playing online, more time is needed to reach decisions. Players aren't usually available in unison, so forum-based phases tend to last longer than live phases. Online "turbos" replicate live games in requiring all players' continuous participation; the day phase is typically 20 or 25 minutes long and the night phase is usually 5 minutes long. In long online games, days usually run from 9am to 9pm and nights from 9pm to 9am.[11]
[edit] Win condition
The game ends either when the last Mafia member is killed (Innocent victory) or the Mafia members outnumber or equal the Innocents during the day (Mafia victory). The innocents have no way of voting off mafia members at this point, but the mafia can still kill each night. Other variants have different victory conditions.
[edit] Number of Mafia
A game with just one more innocent player than Mafia players during the day phase will be won by the innocents if they always kill mafiosi (otherwise, they lose). A game starting with a night kill must begin with at least two more innocents than mafiosi to permit an innocent victory.
The optimal number of each type of character depends on players' preferences for game length and Mafia win percentage. A good rule of thumb is about one mafia for every two non-mafia members. So one mafia member for under five players, two mafia for five to seven players, three mafia for eight to ten players, and so on. For greater than sixteen players, games usually last too long and the dead become restless. It can add excitement to conceal how many mafia are playing (narration: "either two or three mafiosi are amongst you").
Generally, fewer players result in fewer turns and thus less time to determine the identity of the mafia. The inclusion of "variant" characters typically decreases the Mafia's chance of victory. For example, the addition of a Sheriff or Doctor will decrease the expected Mafia win percentage.
Allowing the Townspeople to abstain from killing on certain turns can decrease or increase the Mafia win percentage as can variants which make it more difficult for the Mafia to achieve a kill (e.g., requiring them to agree on a victim independently). The "no kill" variant compensates to some extent for the disadvantage given to odd numbers of Townspeople. Otherwise, 2n+1 Innocents are less likely to win than 2n Innocents (for n>2) because they have decreased their odds of voting for a Mafia each turn without increasing their number of turns (resulting in ties rather than Mafia majorities).
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Subject: Mafia Game Play 
Mon Jul 07, 2008 5:39 am
