The two factions are internally GOOD / BAD (the engine never renames them). Their display names
default to The Order (good) and The Syndicate (bad), but the game owner can override both to
anything they like at create time — so a group can theme the sides however they want (serious or silly).
The Goal of the Syndicate is to get all of the Order into prison or kill them to win the game. The Syndicate know who their fellow members are, to give them an advantage. There should always be fewer Syndicate than Order players in the game.
The Goal of the Order is to get all of the Syndicate into prison or kill them to win the game.
Has the ability to get a bad guys identity revealed once per game (good guys only) Priority:8
Has the ability to supress another players ability for this round Priority: 10
Has the ability to force another player to vote for a specific player (once?) Priority: 9
Can kill 2 players by sacrificing himself, all parties involved die after the round. Priority: 1
Has the ability to let another player out of prison (once a game) Priority: 2
Has the ability to Veto the outcome of a Vote (once a game) Priority: 8
Swap two players' votes for the current round in the public log. The per-player totals are preserved (it is a straight swap), so the prison outcome is unchanged — only who-voted-whom is falsified. Only living voters who actually voted this round can be swapped, and a swap where both already voted for the same player is rejected (no-op). Priority: 8
Protect one player from death this round — negates a Suicide Bomber on that target (the bomber's own self-sacrifice still dies). Settles before the Suicide Bomber so the protection is in place before the kill resolves. Priority: 3
Your own vote counts twice this round. The doubled vote counts in the tally and is reflected in the public totals. Priority: 8
Scrub who-voted-whom from this round's public record — the per-target totals still show, but the attribution (which voter chose which target) is hidden from everyone. Priority: 7
Secretly add phantom votes (+1/+2) onto another player's actual tally, so a player nobody really voted for can be imprisoned. The phantom votes count toward the result and show in the public totals, but have no visible voter — the tell is a tally that exceeds the count of visible voters ("something's rigged"), deniable because roles are hidden. Priority: 9
Arm a trap on a chosen player. If the holder is ever imprisoned or killed, they drag the pre-chosen player to prison with them. A reactive trap — it cannot be used proactively, only sprung when the holder falls (once per game). Priority: 5
Reveal one player's ability (not their faction — that is the Informant's job). Knowing who holds the Suicide Bomber / Bodyguard / Frame is orthogonal to faction intel, and usable by either side. Priority: 8
Each turn every player that is not in prison or dead votes for 1 other player. At the end of the round the player with the most votes goes to prison at the end of the round after all abilities are considered. If two or more players tie for the most votes the round ends in a draw — no one goes to prison, but a draw feeds the Deadlock (see below).
Each player can view the whole history of the game including votes, this should lead to a more informed decision making
Players that have been voted into prison can no longer partake in the voting or use their abilities (except if their ability says otherwise)
Once per game (global) any prisoner can start a riot. Any prisoner has a 50% chance to get out of prison during the riot and will join the game again in the beginning of the next round. Any player that gets out of prison can choose if he joins the good guys (rehabilitated) or the bad guys (corrupted). Other player won't know as what the player chooses to come back into the game.
The game is named for what happens when the table can't decide. Every draw raises the pressure; when it has built up enough, the system forces the board open.
- The counter. A single global deadlock counter starts at 0. Every round that ends in a draw increments it by 1. It is cumulative — a clean elimination (someone actually goes to prison) does not reset it. Only a Deadlock break resets it (see below).
- What counts as a draw. A genuine tie for the most votes counts. A Chancellor veto does not — the veto cancels the vote outcome entirely, so no winner is ever determined and the counter is untouched. A draw that a Mind Bender engineered (by forcing votes into a tie) does count — the counter only cares about the outcome, not the cause.
- The break. On every 3rd draw the Deadlock breaks: all players currently tied for the most votes go to prison together, and the counter resets to 0 (so it builds toward the next break from scratch).
- The auto-riot. Immediately after a break, a riot erupts in the prison: every prisoner (not just the freshly-tied ones) has a 50% chance to escape and rejoins next round, secretly choosing GOOD/BAD on the way out (rehabilitated/corrupted), exactly like a normal Riot. The chaos resets the board rather than favouring a side — escapees can flip either way.
- Not a "real" riot. The auto-riot is a system event; it does not consume the once-per-game player-initiated Riot. Prisoners can still call their own riot afterwards.
The point of the mechanic is that stalling is not a safe strategy: a faction that tries to win by muddying every vote will trigger breaks that throw bodies into prison and churn the board through riots.
Players who died can no longer interact with the game but can continue to spectate
- the communication between the player and the game will happen via websockets.
- Communication includes voting and ability usage from the player side and updates about the gamestate from the server side
- Abilities get assigned when the game is started
- Owner of the game can choose which abilities are allowed in the game
- Owner of the game can choose how often an ability is represented
- A players should only be able to see his ability (unless his ability states otherwise)
- Abilities have a priority from 1 to 10, in which order they play out. The higher the priority the earlier it is considered in the settling
- Consequential abilities like Suicide Bomber that can exclude other players from the game have a low priority
- A player can vote for another player in the voting phase
- Settling means determining the outcome of a round
- has to include votes and abilities
- voting should be settled with concern to abilities that influence the voting (like the mind bender)
- ability settling should happen in order of ability priority
- result of the settling will be: which player got voted into prison (if any), which player died and other sideeffects to history and other assets
- history will be sent with the gamestate in the beginning of each round
- can be viewed be any player (no matter if alive, in prison or dead)
- history changes with abilites like the hacker