Alright. Some thoughts on the game. So, to get the player count up, I included TheFleece. I had sent him an invite and on Oct. 1, Friday, he said that he might be able to play depending on what currently had on the go and when it would start. I messaged back that it was happening the following Monday on the 4th but didn't hear back. Then I was debating if I include him or not. He seemed open to the idea. Last time, he was a last minute addition as well and ended up as the Godfather. He commented after that he didn't expect a role of that much responsibility after the Metroid game ended. I decided to take the chance and just include him as a townie this game. That way, if he was busy then it wouldn't require too much work for him to play or just be a very casual player. However, he never did log back on since the 1st. He ends up joining a small group of players signed up for a game who then miss the whole thing. Stevey in the Animal Kingdom Mafia game, Garnee around Mafia 16 or 17. Most famously Kirby_Killer_Dedede in Mafia 2 who ended up being the only winner.
I included him on the optimistic side of hoping he'd be ok to play if he eventually logged on and saw he'd been included. And, if not, well we've had other games where some townie people bailed. My fault for jumping the gun and including him without an official answer. Turns out, he had an effect on the game. I really thought no one was going to go after him from the Mafia or Killer side because he wasn't around to vote but Crimm went for him on Day 3 and ended up finding that Thieving Slinker to lose the abilities he had acquired.
As for RABicle, I knew he had some other stuff in life going on. By the time the game finally started, it was much later than originally intended. As such, he was currently on a trip and then he had an exam coming up that he wanted to make sure he was prepared for. So, I asked if he just wanted to be a townie at the time I was doing the role assignments and he said yes. The time of the game limited his availability as well. Of course, in hindsight, it does seem like I'm putting the townie side at a disadvantage with two players who'd have questionable availability for the game. That said, there have been games with absentee players and the townies have still won so nothing is certain in these games. You never know how it will play out once in action.
That said, it did seem like a lot of people suffered in being able to participate much. Crimm seemed excited to join only to have a bunch of things which probably distracted him with credit card problem and live RFN show to handle. lolmonade also mentioned being away on the first weekend of the game. The weekend Dread released.
(I myself was also away for that weekend and back home late Monday. It made me just miss out the Tetris 99 Event. I suddenly remembered the Monster Hunter theme was happening and logged on. I had about 48 minutes to get it. Closest I came was 5th place in one match. The clock passed the deadline and I need 20 points to get it which would probably require another top ten finish or higher. I got eliminated around 42nd place just giving me 10 points and a total of 91/100 only for the theme to then disappear. First time I missed a theme in Tetris 99. Obviously this is the worst thing anyone suffered while this game was played.
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Ah, but back to the point. I'd check with lolmonade after the night phase began on Discord since I knew he'd like see those messages to find out if he wanted to protect anyone. He mentioned that he should have more time to play around when Day 3 was going to start but I'm not sure if he did have more time or not. Not sure what happened to Stratos. He was one of the people who was pushing for another game to happen and signed on early for this. He was there Day 1 and then disappeared. Hopefully it is nothing too serious but I recall this sort of happened in Mafia 75. He was the King of Red Lions and disappeared after the first or second day. When the game later ended, it turns out there had been some family emergency ending up having to go to the hospital as they waited there a few days on that situation. Again, I hope it was a similar circumstance with this game.
On the first day and night of the game, I didn't hear anything from the vigilante ShyGuy but that didn't surprise me. I knew he'd probably be a cautious player with that ability but I had asked if players could notify me whether they'd be using their power or not. I decided to check in with him on Night 2 to see if he was planning on using it or not and it seems he had not realized the game had begun. I thought I'd made it clear it was about to happen when I first invited him but this game made me question whether anyone reads anything I post at all.
Meanwhile, ThePerm seemed ready and eager to play only to go out Night 1. Likewise, Insanolord kept checking in all throughout the game after being knocked out Night 1 so he may have been more active in the threads and games then what others were. Nickmitch also was much more active and in the game. All of these active players were knocked out early which I can't fault the Mafia and Luigi on since taking out active players and keeping inactive is still one of the top recipes for winning these games. It ruins the power of the townie vote and makes their ability to sway it stronger. All the Mafia members were quite active in the early going which hurt and helped a bit. A lot of members did get some focus and accusations by other players in the game but they were able to ride those out. Luigi Dude was the one with the most suspicion from his participation after Day 1 and he managed to escape the vote over the next 4 days.
Would things have turned out differently if a couple of those active players were townie and a couple more inactive were Mafia? Most likely as any game replayed with players in different roles will be different than the one before it but it doesn't necessarily mean the townies would win it in that hypothetical scenario. Mafia could still have won then too. You just never know with these games.
Still, I understand the frustration pokepal148 had as the game went on and so many players were hardly around with low participation. I had hoped a higher player count would offset that as there always seems to be a couple players that are busy in life when the game happens and hardly active but with more players around then hopefully there'd still be more activity happening. Plus, with how long the days are with the 48-hour voting period or so, the hope is that players that do get busy in real life are able to whether those IRL concerns and still be able to jump back into the game after a few days without missing too much or being stuck in a bad position. It just didn't seem to happen this game. Is this a sign of future games to come or just bad timing with this game? I suppose we'll find out with the next one.
Topic: Mafia LXXXVI: Luigi's Mafia Mansion. Day 6 - The Panic Room and The End (Read 10459 times)
