The Assassins Guild

[Tables]

Quicklink:

Day 1

Evening 1

Night 1

Morning 1

Day 2

Evening 2

Night 2

Morning 2

Day 3

Evening 3

Night 3

Morning 3

Day 4

Evening 4

Night 4

Morning 4

Day 5

Evening 5

Night 5

Morning 5

Day 6

Evening 6

Night 6

Day 7

Night 7

Day 8

Night 8

Day 9

Night 9

Day 10

My name is Nicolas Le Povidevin. One month ago I attempted to hire assassins to kill 15 people who were going to destroy my life. Now, I have been caught and am facing the death penalty, but before I am given the lethal injection, I want to explain why I did. You may label me selfish, and a monster, but in my mind... my only regret is that I was unable to escape the law. These people got what was coming for them, but... perhaps I should allow you to make your own mind up after seeing all the evidence?

One month before

“...Those are the terms of the contract, Mr. Le Povidevin. We will choose who to kill each night, and it is too dangerous to try and kill multiple times per night. But don’t worry, we will note your requests to kill certain targets first, especially as you consider them more dangerous.” The master of the assassins guild, known to all as simply ‘The Master’, spoke smoothly and calmly. While 15 targets was far above her normal work, she was confident that this would go smoothly. After all, her guild were well organised, so even if there was a spy, he would only know one other member. “Is this acceptable for you?”

“It will have to be, I suppose. Now as I said to you... you’ll get a deposit now and the rest of the pay in instalments for each kill. Are you in agreement over this?”

“We are familiar with this system. Do not fear, we will ensure your contract is fulfilled.”

As I said, there were 15 people who caused me this... this pain. Really, there are two groups of them. One group consisted of the police, some businessmen and shopkeepers and even my own family , who either together, or in successive coincidences, managed to take over or destroy my company... once I saw they would succeed, I withdrew as much money as possible and fought back my initial desire to end it all – rather than that, I decided on revenge. The other group... I’m sure you know about the injust war on Kanari by your country, The Unified Territories. As a native of Kanari, this war tears at my heart. the politicians involved in spearheading this war, and in fabricating the evidence against us, must be killed as an example to this country. And on top of that, there are the millitary – the assaults and breaches of human rights on the natives of Kanari conducted by them. Yes, I’m aware they’re accusations and aren’t backed up by enough evidence. But... the accusation alone makes my blood boil. If they are innocent, then peace on their souls, but if they aren’t, then death is too good for them. Oh, and there’s a few others, who have committed various other unpunished crimes.

-----

I am Abel Elzroth, the chief detective here in New Novo. Right now, we are investigating a shady ‘Assassins Guild’ in the city. Rumour has it they currently have 6 members in the guild, plus ‘The Master’ who leads them. We believe they have links to a person we’re tracking down...

We’ve just finished closing down the business of Povidevin Incorporated, who have been involved in a number of illicit and illegal trades, although their owner, Nicolas Le Povidevin, escaped both with his life and much of the company funds in his Swiss Bank Account. We have reason to believe Nicolas is intending to hire the assassins from this guild to perform a number of murders. It is up to me and my assistants to stop them. Fortunately, we have a mole inside the Assassins Guild. He’s one of our best agents, but we’re going to pull him out after about one week, at which point we’ll transport him to safety and he can tell us what he knows.

-----

Colton stood with a group of other men and women, all fearing for their lives. He knew he had to speak. This was his dad causing their grief and panic, even though he had nothing to do with it. He hid his tears and began to speak to the small crowd.

“Today, my father, Nicolas, is hiring assassins. I know I’m one of his targets. He believes I was involved in a conspiracy to take over his business, along with other members of our family. The plan he explained to me was... it would have worked, but I have no interest in that business of his. I just want to live a happy life with my wife and children... please, everyone, we need to stop him and the assassins! If we don’t then... then... I don’t want to think of my children growing up knowing their Dad was killed by their Granddad.” Colton turned away to shed a tear. His thoughts about his family were his greatest fear – they were probably safe, but he knew how much they valued him as a dad, and a husband. Slowly, Colton turned back to the crowd to continue his speech. “Many of you may be guilty of the crimes my dad has accused you. Many may be innocent. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter... only you know yourself, and regardless, we’ll have to work together to save our own lives.”

“I did some research on these assassins he’s hiring. There are seven of them plus my dad, and they’re going to strike tonight. We can take the initiative though. Among this crowd, the assassins are hiding, in plain sight of us. That’s how they learn our strengths... our weaknesses... and where to strike. We have to talk, work out who they are... and kill them first. So, my friends... I don’t recognise most of you, and most of you don’t recognise me, but now, we much work together, to solve this puzzle and save as many innocent lives as possible.”

----

Even if you read these before, please reread them: It would be a shame to have the game marred by people unintentionally breaking rules:

[spoiler=Rules]1. Make no further assumptions about the rules than what is stated in here. Don’t assume everything will be like a normal mafia game, as there will be a number of differences from what you might expect.

2. For all intents and purposes, the mafia will be referred to as the assassins during this game.

3. Normal mafia rules apply: Vote on someone to kill at day, send in actions at night, win by eliminating all opponents even if you die first.

4. No editing your posts except within 1 minute of posting (formatting etc.). Don’t take and paste screenshots or do other similar things. Don’t post when you are dead except one informationless post. If you try and bend the rules, I will punish you as though you broke them.

5. Vote in the format: ##Vote: {user}. You may vote nobody. Votes not in this format may or may not be counted – I will be counting votes by searching for ##, so at the very least, if you miss that out it’s unlikely your vote will get counted.

6. You must not quote your role PM or anything that looks like a role PM, even if fake. Role PMs in this game are pretty epic and contain a lot of story inside them. You may, however, paraphrase what your role does and your role name. In addition, DO NOT QUOTE OR PARAPHRASE FLAVOUR. You may try to act in character if you want but that's entirely optional.

7. Punishment for breaking minor rules seemingly accidentally (e.g. editing) will be a public warning. Any other rulebreaking will be punished by a modkill, possibly multiple modkills on your team if the rulebreaking is severe enough. TL;DR: READ THE RULES BEFORE PLAYING

8. This game will be plot heavy. Many hints may be found within the flavour including a lot of what is unique about the game: Hints will be highlighted in red so you can find them easily, but I won’t be telling you exactly what they mean in the case of ambiguity!

9. This game needs 23 signups MINIMUM. More would be preferred as replacements. If signing up, I recommend that you need to be able to access the internet most days during November.

10. This is a NO PM game. Exceptions being the Assassins (mafia) and potentially any other roles whose role PM states they may communicate with a certain player(s).

11. The game will take place over four phases: day, evening, night and morning. Evening and morning are not ‘real’ phases, but not a whole lot will occur during them to give me time to write flavour and process events (check rule 8 for a reason this is needed)

12. Day phase will last exactly 72 hours unless a majority is reached before that. I will attempt to give warning about time left each time I post but make no guarantee. As soon as 72 hours have passed since I announce it is day phase, the game enters evening, even if I do not announce that myself. As soon as I notice 72 hours have passed however, I will announce it is evening and if needed, note the last post/vote made during the day.

13. In the evening, everyone may talk except the player(s) who was lynched if any. For the purpose of flavour, the player has effectively been killed and you are waiting for the coroner to report back with information. Evening will last an unspecified amount of time. If you do not need to know the deceased’s role, feel free to send night orders.

14. After evening the game goes into night phase. This will last 48 hours or until all night orders are in and the assassins are happy for the night to end. During the night players may talk in the thread as normal. As soon as 48 hours are up, night ends and it goes to morning, regardless of if all orders are in.

15. Morning is to night what evening is to day. In other words, you may now discuss and vote as though it were day. I will make a post with the death scene(s), THEN send out night action results and finally announce it is day phase.

16. This game consists of only two factions: The town and the assassins. There are NO third parties.

17. There are a few surprises in this game. You will have to wait until the game starts to find out what they are, though. Yes, this is just rule 1 again under a different guise.

18. Some players may have additional information asides from their role PM: When you die your entire role PM will be revealed, but never any additional information. For clarity, your role PM is the bit inside the quotes and additional information is outside it.

19. There are some generics in this game. Just because you are a generic, it does not make you less important to the game than anybody else. You still have access to the most important elements of the game: Talking, scumhunting and voting.

20. Role PMs are different from what you will normally expect. Some are written from first person, some third person, and none explicitly state what your role is. However, the hints provided should make it fairly clear what you can do but you may have to find out one or two details for yourself (e.g. Your role might say you can investigate someone each night – so you know you’re a cop, but you don’t know if you’re going to get an assassin/town result or a role PM or even something else back from it). No role does anything unexpected from the flavour, this is not a mind screw style game.

21. Following on from the above, ALL actions can be used on anyone. Even me or people not in the game. This may (actually, it’s very likely to but not certain to) have no effect.

22. Certain events in the game will cause special events. These are predetermined and will have small effects on the game. Mostly, they’re for plot reasons. The triggers for these are things such as specific nightkills (target and killer) or lynches (voter/lynched etc.)

23. If there are any rules I have missed but should be obvious anyway then I reserve the right to punish you for breaking them and adding them into the rules to retroactively justify it.

24. If you have any questions about the rules that aren’t answered in the rules list then feel free to ask.

Amendment 1: Day phase majority for an instant lynch must be 4 votes above 50%, minus a vote for every multi or secret voting role that dies.

Amendment 2: You may vote for yourself

[spoiler=Credits]Life, for assisting in creating and balancing the game, which was a huge help in getting the game released (and obviously, balanced)

Levity, for the Choral Mafia games which inspired me to make a heavily story based game

General Spoon, for the idea of a segmented mafia (even though mine is implemented completely differently) and also, erm, attempting to check the game for balance (he gave up after seeing how stupidly disorganised my notes were, I don’t blame him). Also for many other ideas.

Silent Mercenary, for the idea of having a spy in the mafia. While he didn’t invent the idea by a long shot, he was the one who pitched it to me and I eventually decided to use it.

Everyone else who has run mafia games that I’ve drawn from in some small way.

Everyone who played the game, especially those of you who were active and complimented me in some way during the game (flattery will get you far)

Wikipedia, for telling me how ridiculously inaccurate my idea of assassins in this game are. I call it artistic license.

Many games, TV programs and perhaps books and films, which inspired ideas in the plot for the game. Most of it was subconscious stuff, so I really can’t name specifics.

Everyone else who did things to help organise the game or make it in some special way.

[spoiler=A disclaimer]:

I know next to nothing about real life assassins or politics or stuff. What I do know doesn't fit in with this games flavour very well. As such don't complain about the story being ridiculous. As the names of countries and cities suggest it's set in a fantasy world anyway.

Also, while I've made every effort to make the game as enjoyable as possible, including making rules clear, there MAY be problems I've overlooked or things. In which case, don't hesitate to contact me and tell me, and I'll try and fix them as soon as possible.

Thank you and please enjoy the game.

Player List:

1: JB25 - Craig Cork, Corporal (Townie) - Day 9 (Hung)

2: Raymond - Reena Momaya, Sheriff (Townie) - Day 2 (Mob lynching)

3: Balcerzak - Camilia Perish, The Master - Night 4 (Grenade)

4: Spykor - Martin Dobrzykowski, The Shadow (faux delayed roleblocker) - Day 6 (Stabbed by a vengeful woman)

5: Luka Megurine - Max Gillie, Paranoid Politician (BP) - Night 3 (Broken Neck)

6: Snike - Robin Turbyfill, Spy - Day 7 (Evacuated)

7: Radiant Dragon - Abel Eltzroth, Cop - Night 5 (Literal Backstab)

8: Dickpickle - Nicolas Le Povidevin, Revenge Seeker - Night 2 (Shot)

9: BK-201 - Rolland Flakne, Drugger - Night 7 (Sniped)

10: Hemlock - Suzie Stamas, Nightmare - Day 7 (???)

11: Ether - Darryl Felt, ??? - Night 9 (???)

12: Strawman the SawmanShaman - Lance Capron, ??? - Night 2 (Disappeared)

13: WeaponsOfMassConstruction - Joshua Homan, Private (Vigilante) - Night 8 (Tortured)

14: Dracohon - Cedric Swager, ??? - Night 1 (Neck broken)

15: Furetchen - Aaron Mandel, Senator/Tracker - Day 5 (Stoned)

16: Levity

17: Groner - Jerald Dungee, Crooked Cop (Faux Bodyguard) - Night 4 (Beheaded)

18: Mr. Know-it-all Anouleth - Jonah Canestraro, Thief - Day 4 (Suicide > Lynch)

19: Psych - Tim Duhon, ??? - Night 7 (Easy kill)

20: MLS - Rolf Estela, Hider - Day 8 (Killed)

21: Mikethfc

22: Silent Shaman - Linda Butterfield, Shopkeeper (townie) - Night 8 (Killed)

23: Jean-Marc - Colton Le Povidevin, The Son - Day 3 (Almost escaped)

24: Proto

Replacements Queue:

1: SlayerX

This night phase will end at 6pm GMT on Thursday 11th

Edited January 4, 2011 by I Eat Tables

[Tables]

Also once again, you need to play smart. It's a no PM game, but a lot of players will need to think carefully about their powers. In particular, the town might benefit from assuming there's a vigilante (okay, I'll even GIVE you that there's some form of vigilante) and thinking of that as a second lynch decision during the day - at least occasionally.

[Scarlet]

OH MY GOD, I'M FINALLY NOT MAFIA

YEEESSSSSSSS

...*cough* ahem.

What better way to start this off than by putting a finger of suspicion on Tables?

...what do you mean he's not even playing?

Now, seriously. I guess there's no point in voting for people before they even posted, so take this post merely as a sign that I'm ready to do stuff.

[Life]

Oh and I'm writing up a full post game report afterwards. If you do something even remotely stupid, you can bet that I will crucify you for it since both Tables and I have said to play smart. On the flip side, if you do something ingenious even as a regular townie, I will praise that.

[GR8MasterGab96]

I'm ready! I guess...

[Mikethfc]

6. You must not quote your role PM

I'll just stick this here for a certain somebody who shall remain anonymous :P

[Jaybee]

I'm mafia again?

Beautiful.

[Darros]

I'll just stick this here for a certain somebody who shall remain anonymous :P

inb4saidsomebodyspazzesout

[Life]

I'll just stick this here for a certain somebody who shall remain anonymous :P

I'd worry about your own shoddy play if I were you.

[Deliriyum]

Does anyone else hate Day 1?

[Zanarkin]

Does anyone else hate Day 1?

yep, its always too llong and clueless.

[Scarlet]

Then let's do something about that!

Slayer, can you give me any kind of reason as to why we shouldn't lynch you?

[Zanarkin]

While i'm not the best, i'm not the worst player either, and if i'm mafia, you'll see me trip and die.

[riariadne]

... Well, I can't say my role isn't interesting. Well, maybe I can. I dunno. It sort of is, it sort of isn't. But what if that's bad? What if it's bad to be interesting? What if someone's out to get me because I'm interesting? What if someone wants to get me because I may not be interesting to them? Is there anything I can do to divert attention? Maybe I'm just completely screwed in the first place! That's terrible!

tl;dr will be roleplaying this game

[AstraLunaSol]

Fun. c:

[Psych]

So, if I'm reading correctly, we have until Day 7 to do....something.

That doesn't give a whole lot of extra time.

[Zanarkin]

What? Is that some sort of mafia whine? If i read correctly, it says that the spy will be taken out within one week, and will only know 1 member.

[Anouleth]

What? Is that some sort of mafia whine? If i read correctly, it says that the spy will be taken out within one week, and will only know 1 member.

It doesn't specify how much he will know or will be allowed to reveal... so we can't really jump to any conclusions.

[BK-201]

What? Is that some sort of mafia whine? If i read correctly, it says that the spy will be taken out within one week, and will only know 1 member.

Well all it says is this: He’s one of our best agents, but we’re going to pull him out after about one week, at which point we’ll transport him to safety and he can tell us what he knows.

[Snike]

*checks notes*

After a week, if we don't kill an assassin or stop a kill, they have majority, I think.

[WeaponsofMassConstruction]

I claim: 4th party serial killer. Loopholes, hah.

[Anouleth]

*checks notes*

After a week, if we don't kill an assassin or stop a kill, they have majority, I think.

After three days, if every lynch and vigilante-kill misfires, they have majority.

[Snike]

Well, Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we have "Lunch".

Alright, so, I'm pretty sure we should NL today. An ML is risky, IMO.

[Anouleth]

Well, Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we have "Lunch".

Alright, so, I'm pretty sure we should NL today. An ML is risky, IMO.

I'm inclined to agree with you. We don't really have any information to move on. Tomorrow, the cops/stalkers/watchers/etc. can point us at least away from townies, even if not necessarily towards any mafia.

[Zanarkin]

Well all it says is this: He’s one of our best agents, but we’re going to pull him out after about one week, at which point we’ll transport him to safety and he can tell us what he knows.

You forgot a part.

so even if there was a spy, he would only know one other member