Hitchhiker's Guide to Mafia - Town wins!

[Snark]

Welcome to The Hitchhiker's Guide to Mafia! Please read this post carefully, as it contains important information about the game. If you are new to playing Mafia, please also read the pinned Newbie Guide topic in the Mafia forum.


Players:

Spoiler:

Mod: Snark
Co-mod: Adam H

1. ahammel
2. eculc
3. matt96
4. careyhammer DaBigCheez
5. KrO2
6. t1mm01994
7. JesseScottOwen
8. Vieto
9. webby
10. cjquines
11. wam
42. mpolo

Replacements:
1. roband
2. New User

Many, many rules:

Spoiler:

Voting rules:

1. Votes and questions must be posted in bold and on a new line, like this:
   
   Vote: Snark
   
   You must unvote to change votes, in bold and on a new line, like this:
   
   Unvote
   Vote: Adam H
   
2. When someone gains a majority of the votes, they are automatically lynched, and daytime automatically ends. No more day = No more positing, even if the hammer-vote was accidental.
3. If deadline is reached and no player has a majority of the votes, then the person with the most votes is lynched. If the votals are tied, then random.org will randomly select one of the tied players to be lynched UNLESS exactly half of the players vote for one player and the other half vote for another player. In that special case, there will be no lynch. If you don't understand this, please ask for clarification.
4. You can vote to "NL" (no lynch). If "NL" gets the majority of the votes, no one will be lynched.

Posting rules:

1. No posting in this thread unless you are playing in it. Co-mods may also post as long as they don't incite rebellion.
2. No talking about this game except in this thread or in an appropriately titled spoiler in the discussion thread.
3. No editing your posts. For any reason. At any time.
4. Do not lurk! One post per real-life day is the minimum before the mods get angry. This is a turbo, after all. (If you're going to be unable to post for any period of time, please let the mods know ahead of time)
5. You may post in thread during the day phase but not the night phase. If the deadline for a day passes, then it is automatically night, whether or not one of the mods has had time to make a day-end post.
6. You may not quote directly from your role PM. Paraphrasing is fine.

Death rules:

1. You’re alive until a mod tells you that you're dead, by PM or in thread.
2. Once you die, you may no longer post in this thread, but you may go to town reading spoilers. That is your consolation prize.

Random extra rules:

1. You can ask mods questions by PM if you'd rather not ask in thread.
2. NO PMing other players concerning this game unless your role specifically allows it and you CC both mods in every communication.
3. All PMs should be CC'd to both me and the co-mod: Adam H.
4. Any night abilities must be sent by PM at night and before the deadline. If everyone with a night action is ready to start the next day before the deadline for night is reached, the next day will begin early.

Once more, with feeling:
NO talking about the game except in this thread or in an appropriately titled spoiler in the discussion thread.
NO reading those spoilers unless you are declared dead, in thread or by PM, by one of the mods.
NO editing your posts.
NO PMing other players concerning this game unless your role specifically allows it and you CC both mods in every communication.
NO quoting directly from your role PM. Paraphrasing is fine.

A special note: There are mechanisms in place to discourage mass-claiming. It is allowed however, if you so desire. You've been warned.

Role PMs will be sent out shortly.
Please confirm in thread once you've received your role PM.
Please don't post real content until everyone has confirmed.
Day 1 will begin and a deadline will be set once everyone has confirmed.

[ahammel]

Confirminate! CONFIRMINATE!

[t1mm01994]

I'm with him ^

[Vieto]

Hang on, I need 15 more minutes before my supercomputer solves the question for this game.

[wam]

Confirm

[Snark]

All role PM's have been sent out! If you haven't received yours, please send me and Adam H a PM immediately.

4/12 confirmed.

[eculc]

Confirming.

[KrO2]

Confirming.

[JesseScottOwen]

You got a nice white dress and a party on your confirmation.

I just got a role PM.

[mpolo]

My message has been read
The info's in my head
Soon I'll go to bed

[Snark]

If you haven't yet received your role PM, please send me and Adam H a PM immediately.

8/12 confirmed.

[careyhammer]

Confirm

[matt96]

confirming, no time to post something creative or with any flavor at all, I'll be less busy tomorrow

[webby]

Confirming

[cjquines]

Confirmed.
Please be nice, I AM a newbie...

[Snark]

Attention! Attention, everyone! Greetings and welcome aboard the Heart of Gold Mark II. I'm Eddie, your onboard computer helper, here to assist you with all your in-flight needs. If you need someone to supply you with rope or keep track of incredibly simple calculations like votals, I'm your guy!

I'm just thrilled to be here you know, with all you wonderful people all in the same place! Isn't it just so nice? Now I have a little unpleasant news, but please don't get upset. It seems that a few of your fellow passengers are...hmmm how to put this delicately: they might be trying to kill the other passengers.

But you know what? Let's just forget about that ugly detail and enjoy ourselves, shall we?

Have fun, everyone!

Day 1
12 alive, 7 to lynch
Deadline in 5 days: April 30, 8:00am EST

Hey y'all, I forgot to mention that my personality circuits sometimes short out from time to time. If you see someone named Adam H posting here and he seems a bit mean, please forgive me for my attitude, but rest assured that everything that either of us says is correct.

[t1mm01994]

So, I'm diving into this completely flavourblind, and as such I'm only able to say that roband is scum. He's not replaced in yet? Well, this is awkward...

[wam]

Well unlike tim I am not flavour blind so here a a brief summary of main characters who I reckon we will have, includes spoilers!

Arthur Dent (main character, "quintesential english man", spends most of the time confused and searching for tea)

Ford Prefect (arthurs friend, alien, a reasearcher for the HHGTG)

Trillian (girl arthur met at a party, went off exploring space with ZB)

Zaphod Beeblebrox (alien, ex president of the galaxy, wierd wacky and on some strange mission)

Marvin the android (a depressed andriod, with a supercomputer brain)

As far as I am aware, they are the only characters in all the radio shows, books, tv series move etc.

More speculative roles

Vogons (galatic civil service and the only real contenders I can think of for mafia)

Slartibartfast (Alien, guy who works for a planet where they build other planets, including earth)

Trillians mice (two hyperdimensional super intelligent beings)

There is also some weird guy to do with Zaphods mission whos name I cant remeber.

Wikipedia summary
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitch_hike ... the_galaxy

A lot also depends on which version and format Snark has based all of this on, although my guess would be that it is the first book or the movie.

[cjquines]

Yo! I have no idea how to play mafia... so please go easy on me...

Also, mods, my schedule is a bit pack, so I can only post about 1-3 times per day.

[JesseScottOwen]

Wam, there are plenty of other characters. And what about characters from the other four (five if you include And Another Thing) books?

Ameglian Major cows WANT to be eaten. So that seems like a jester role.

Wowbagger, the infinitely prolonged.

Thor. (He's a Norse God. Check out the Avengers thread )

Hotblack Desiato.

Fenchurch.

God.

A Babel Fish power might be some sort of listener?

[Vieto]

Some possible scum roles:

The Vogons: the classic villains who end up destroying the earth.
Krikkit: They actually want to end the universe (outside of their bubble), so also a viable mafia
The Mice: Although I doubt they are mafia, as they never actually have an evil intention.

Yeah, there aren't many choices. If Snark is more flavour-savvy, he might go with Krikkit, otherwise he probably went with the Vogons.

I hope Agrajag is in this game.

[ahammel]

The Guide Mark II would be a possible mafia redirect. I see no reason why Frankie and Benjy (the mice) wouldn't be mafia. Perhaps they aren't malicious, but they wanted to remove Arthur's brain from his head, so I think that counts as bad for town. Krikkitmen and Vogons would probably not have any special powers aside form the kill. The mice might be Godfathers or something (since they were Trillian's pets). The two sensitive cops from the first book would also make good scum roles.

Since there are only 12 of us, there probably aren't more than 3 or 4 mafiosi, My official prediction is one Vogon, one Krikkitman and the Guide Mark II, Frankie and Benjy, or possibly the sensitive cops. Mafia powers will depend on how powerful town is and the number of independents, so it's probably no good speculating on it until day 2 or so.

I thought Thor only had a role as an extra in the HG2G books?

If Arthur does not turn out to be vanilla town, I will be very disappointed.

If Agrajag is here, he's probably an independent Arthur-lyncher. Come to think of it, it would be pretty funny if Agrajag, Frankie, and Benjy were all independent Arthur-lynchers. It would certainly fit the "universe vs. Arthur" theme in a few of the books.

[KrO2]

A lot of the characters show up once and then drop out, which means we most likely will have at least some minor character roles, but hopefully not many? I say hopefully because there's a wide enough range of minor characters that it could be anything the mods want to put in and we'd rather be dealing with known or knownish quantities.

The cows are a one-shot joke. Which I suppose means their presence depends entirely on the whim of the mods.

There could be some Frogstar Fighters in here. I think they come up more than once, or at least have a (relatively) significant part. If they exist they are probably some form of unpleasantness.

Or even the Krikkit people (Krikkitians? Krikkites?) who spend the third book being omnicidal maniacs. I would think they're a better fit for mafia than Vogons, but maybe the mods want to stick with earlier books where possible.

It's not impossible for the Guide to be a character, maybe something along the lines of giving other players random information.

I want to say the philosopher-king Ruler of the Universe might be here, but I don't know what kind of powers they might give him. Ditto for Deep Thought. Possibly something information-related for both.

If Wowbagger is in the game the same way he's in the books, he'd be really overpowered. "Cannot be killed (except possibly under specific narrowly defined circumstances involving rubber bands)" would hand him the victory outright, so it would probably be downgraded to x-shot. He'd likely have an interesting win condition, though; something not directly opposed to anyone else's but generally weakly negative from their point of view, so I kind of hope he's in here.

Ooh, maybe we have an Agrajag, a lyncher for Arthur Dent.

When Hotblack Desiato shows up, he does incredibly destructive things with extremely positive effects. So...a good guy?

Wonko the Sane could be a town-friendly independent of some kind.

I feel like these are getting tenuous, so I'll stop here.
I think I got significantly ninja'd, but I'll post it anyway.

[JesseScottOwen]

The Ameglian cows return in And Another Thing. Although sadly, I doubt references from that book will end up in this game.

I would assume that the Vogons are mafia. Not that it really makes a difference.

Agrajag seems like a cool character to be included. I hadn't thought of him.

Maybe Wowbagger's power (if he is present) has something to do with alphabetical order?

[eculc]

I'd guess that wowbagger is an independent, maybe SK. an X-shot power makes sense. I'd guess one or two.

Agrajag: joker maybe. as far as flavor goes, I suppose he doesn't *want* to be killed, he just ends up getting killed over and over anyways.

Vogons: afia. I couldn't see them being anything else.

Marvin: also joker.

granted, that's just my take on it.

[matt96]

Am I the only one who isn't ignoring the possibility of Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings being a serial killer (or vig, but I think the worst poetry in the universe would be more suited to a serial killer role)
Also, if the Vogons are in this game and have a poetry based NK, then Arthur Dent is probably immune to it,
Anyone think that the Mafia might be the marketing division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation, as they are "a bunch of mindless jerks who'll be the first against the wall when the revolution comes,"?

[KrO2]

I would be shocked if Marvin is a jester. He's not exactly trying to get killed; he lives to be thirteen times as old as the freaking universe. (I hope we don't have a spoiler policy.) If he's in the game, he's probably town; despite his attitude he does...tolerate the main characters.

Why would you think Wowbagger has a kill? Insults are rarely fatal*. Maybe he's just a survivor or nonexistent. Is x-shot deathproof survivor too powerful?
*(Except in the case of the cyborgs of Sontar III, who are incredible in every possible area except self-esteem. They consider shame to be a noncontagious terminal disease and may have strong negative effects from being insulted. They would consider Wowbagger the equivalent of the Grim Reaper if it weren't for the fact that their language has no vowels meaning that he never got far enough to reach them. That's neither here nor there.)

I can't see Agrajag as anything other than trying to get Arthur killed. That's even his win condition in the book; Snark would basically be forced to use that.
On which note, ahammel's idea of multiple Arthur-lynchers is really, really funny. It also seems unlikely, but if it's true then they probably don't know who here is Arthur, since otherwise it's like three free votes the first time he comes under suspicion.

ahammel, that looks like a lot of scum factions in your prediction. Wouldn't we just be doomed if there are that many kills aiming for the towniest players? I guess we'll find out about that after night 1.

[mpolo]

I've only read four volumes, and that's been a while back. I don't have any real objections to the speculation that has gone on up to now, though I kind of assumed that Vogons would be the scum. I don't remember the Krikkitmen, and don't really think of the mice as belligerent, despite their actions toward Arthur.

[KrO2]

The Krikkiters are from the third book; they're like the Daleks of the HHGG universe. I doubt it matters who the scum faction is, unless they might have different powers? Vogons control the bureaucratic backbone of the Galactic Civil Service, so I could see them having something like a secret extra vote, while Krikketers...I don't know. Something more offensive. Nobody suggested the mice as mafia, but they are definitely hostile to specifically you if you're from Earth.

[ahammel]

ahammel, that looks like a lot of scum factions in your prediction. Wouldn't we just be doomed if there are that many kills aiming for the towniest players? I guess we'll find out about that after night 1.

You misunderstand me. My prediction is one scum faction consisting of:

a) one vogon
b) one krikkitman
c) one of the Guide Mk. II (with a redirect), Benjy Mouse and Frankie Mouse (who can perhaps daychat with one another), or the sensitive cops.

[matt96]

I would be shocked if Marvin is a jester. He's not exactly trying to get killed; he lives to be 37 times older than the freaking universe. (I hope we don't have a spoiler policy.) If he's in the game, he's probably town; despite his attitude he does...tolerate the main characters.

FTFY

but more on topic, Marvin might be NK immune, he can survive being in a stunt ship for disaster area that crashes into a sun, I don't think anyone in this game could possibly have a NK that out does that in terms of destructive power.

[webby]

The speculation above mostly seems reasonable and shows that there's an extremely broad range of characters available to the mods.

With 12 players, I would make a guess at one scum faction containing 3 scum, with 7-8 town and 1-2 independents. If the independents are anti-town and/or scum are strong, there could be 2 scum, while if town is particularly strong there's an outside chance of 4, but I reckon 3 is the most likely number. Basically that means we probably need to get one of the first two lynches right and definitely need to get one of the first three right.

I would guess based on the flavour that the Krikkets are the scum faction, but I'm not sure on what that implies about their potential powers.

[KrO2]

I would be shocked if Marvin is a jester. He's not exactly trying to get killed; he lives to be 37 times older than the freaking universe. (I hope we don't have a spoiler policy.) If he's in the game, he's probably town; despite his attitude he does...tolerate the main characters.

FTFY

but more on topic, Marvin might be NK immune, he can survive being in a stunt ship for disaster area that crashes into a sun, I don't think anyone in this game could possibly have a NK that out does that in terms of destructive power.

Well, there's the Ultimate Bomb that the Krikkiters try to use that could kill everything. I don't think that would translate well into mafia terms, though. Also, good catch on the 37.

I haven't played many (any) closed games before, so I'm not going to try to guess at the distribution of scum, but it seems strange that there would be Krikkiters working with, well, anyone. They killed two grillion people for not being Krikkit in a them-vs-everyone war; they don't strike me as the type to form alliances. The Guide II and the Vogons would make sense, though. I suppose the mice could be with a scum faction, with the justification that they've been manipulating them all along, but I'd think they're more likely to be independent.

[matt96]

Also, good catch on the 37.

It isn't nearly as impressive when I have this next to me

does anyone know if any books in the series came out after 1989, because if so, then I have no idea about possible guesses based on flavor for those books.

expect lots of obscure references from me throughout the game.

[eculc]

well, all of my reference for flavor comes from the movie. I've never read the books, so I wouldn't know. what I *do* know is that marvin was eternally depressed, and that seemed to fit a joker to me. NK immune might be true too, I suppose.

[Vieto]

Personally, I don't think Marvin is a jester. Instead, I think his power is related to making anything he plugs himself into commit suicide. This means he probably has some sort of kill or roleblock (aka, killing the krikkit robots or the police vehicle).

[matt96]

This thread is currently role spec (most of which appears to be either guessing who the bad guys are, and spec on Marvin's powers, other possibilities include he is so depressed because he is the only vanilla town, or something related to having a brain the size of a planet, or a lightning rod as all the bad things are consistently happening to him) let's talk about relatively minor characters or groups that aren't guaranteed to be in this game, anyone want to say what they believe the following groups and characters chances of being in this game are?
Golgafinchians
Beletugese trading scouts
That group of people who go and visit the man who rules the galaxy
The man who rules the galaxy
The man who rules the galaxy's cat
The dolphins
People from that flying party that never ends

Sorry if they have names or I spelled something wrong, it's late where I am and I am tired, and I am too tired/lazy to look it up in the book.

[cjquines]

Huh? Vogons.

[wam]

So we can all agree that the five I posted are definatly here

Spoiler:

Arthur Dent
Ford Prefect
Trillian
Zaphod Beeblebrox
Marvin

The rest seems up for speculation and I think we just need to wait for the end of day 1 flavour for a better idea.

Snark also said that there are mechanisms to stop mass claiming, that suggests to me that everyone (or a large majority) are named characters.

[careyhammer]

I have no idea how to play this game, so please be patient with me.