Ilium said:
Is the Seer allowed to say "I'm the seer and I KNOW he's a werewolf"? Only works once (the remaining wolves are sure to kill you next night) but it seems that when you're down to 1 wolf it's all over if the seer is still around. I guess that's the real goal of the wolves?
Sounds like fun, but I have to agree with Teflon Billy. I don't see that logic comes into it much.
Not really.
For one, the Seer can only check one player per night cycle - and the wolves kill one player per night cycle. So in that sense, it's a race against time.
Moreover, the seer is in the position where it is extremely difficult to use the knowledge he or she has. How do you do it? Propose durng discussions that someone is a werewolf? As soon as you do point out that the werewolf is a werewolf - the other wolves will target you the next night cycle. It becomes very hard to act on the information without "showing your hand" as it were.
As for deduction - it's not that kind of game. It's about reading body language, confronting people because they are quiet - confronting them because they are loud - confronting them because is suits your fancy. How they react to being accused is the game; watching and analyzing how people vote is another. It's all information that flows into the hopper.
Billy - the logic is there but it takes time to get going and start to take on a life of its own in the circle of players. The first few rounds does tend to be random instinct based lynching before the circle tightens and the werewolves start to feel the heat.
It's not a game of deduction in that sense. It's far more like Poker meets Survivor than it is like Clue or a murder mystery game. But learing how to read when people are lying and when they aren't is a difficult skill to master. And as you are learning how to read a liar - you are also learning how to lie more convincingly. As you link the voting patterns and body language together, it all starts to fall into place - but the liars eventually start to get better at it too. It's a dance where the balance shifts over time as the players become better at detecting a liar, then later as the # of games pass, they start to become much better at lying and playing so as to stay beneath the radar in the circle.
In the end - it
is easier to detect a liar than be one - but that's what makes it a cool game!
As far as a game you have a chance to play at home? No. I agree totally. Does not happen. Getting that number of interested people together is extremely difficult.
But as I said, at something like Gencon, it was as easy as it could be. It's the perfect Gencon pickup game.
There were two or three pickup games conducted in the hall outside where boardgames were being held in the main convention hall. There were 40-50 willing players all involved into the wee hours of the morning most every night.
