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 Hey there goons! I'm here to tell you about a gem of an indie game that deserves your attention. It's called Throne of Lies. ToL is a hidden role game in the vein of Mafia or Werewolf, but styled after a medieval court. Games are made up of 16 players who are assigned secret roles. The majority of the players are Blue Dragon (the good guys). They have to find and kill all the evil players to win. Two of the players start evil, either as Unseen or Cult, which have different playstyles, and the goal of eliminating all BD (Blue Dragon) players. One player is the Neutral Killer, a solo class which wins by eliminating all other non-neutral players (BD and Unseen or Cult). The remaining players are Neutral, an assortment of different classes which have their own goals and uncertain loyalties -- they might win alone, or they might even be able to win while dead. If you're interested in the game, you can buy it here for Public Discord: https://discord.gg/tol Be warned: This game is very complex and will take you a while to learn. The title is an example of the kind of jargon that players use in the game and will expect you to understand, though if you state you're new you may get some leniency. I'll do my best to explain everything you need to know in this OP post if you choose to buy the game (which you should, it's very good and needs players!). I figure with the growing fervor over Among Us people might be interested in dipping their feet into some more complex hidden role games where you can fight back more as an innocent.  Part 1 - The Basics Each match is composed of Day and Night phases. Like in Mafia and Werewolf, you take your actions at night and then can choose a player to execute during the day by voting. All classes have Night Actions and some classes also have Day Actions they can perform. The game starts on Day 1, which is very short and usually consists of joke claims or hammering an early Day Action that has an effect on the following night. Usually, someone (or multiple people) will die on Night 1. Sometimes one of those people will be you! It's OK, you can still participate in the game by talking in deadchat and making bets on who will be executed/killed during the day and night phases. Or, you can leave without penalty and queue up for another game. If you did make it to Day 1, you will most likely be expected to claim a Blue Dragon (or Neutral) role and possibly give logs from your Logbook (where you can keep track of night actions and claims) stating what you did on night 1, especially if you are playing an investigative class or a class that can kill other players. If you are evil (Unseen/Cult/Neutral Killer) you will have to make a fake claim, and provide fake claims! If you're Neutral, but not necessarily evil, you might want to give a fake claim anyway just so you aren't killed for being neutral, and therefore possibly the NK (Neutral Killer). Writing things down is not only okay, it's expected, and everyone is given an in-game tool to do it. Your logs will be shown to all other players when you die (so if you're evil, don't out your teammates in them). The surviving court members will also choose someone to vote up for treason, usually to force them to give a claim or be executed. If you're BD, it's polite to give your logs ahead of time because they can only vote up 2 people per day. If you're evil, you might want to force a vote, or get some goodwill by claiming when your number is called. If it does come to a vote, they might just decide to execute you, so passing on suspicion might be the right play. It will usually take until Day 3 or 4 to get everyone's claims, especially if people are silent -- sometimes, being quiet can be good for you as an evil or neutral class. On Night 1/2 and onward, someone will be converted to the Cult/Unseen, usually every other night, so if BD isn't getting the right people, the evil team will grow in size as BD's numbers dwindle. This cycle continues until either the BD win by killing all the evil players, or the Unseen/Cult win by killing the NK and converting/killing all BD, or the Neutral Killer wins by killing everyone who isn't neutral. Sometimes neutral players will win along the way, or will win alongside one of those 3 factions. When players die or are executed their roles will be revealed, along with the contents of their Logbook (but not their private notes), allowing any information they've gathered to be accessible to living players from that point on. If you're executed as BD, don't take it too personally! It's a team game and you will still win if BD wins in the end. There is no point complaining about it. Always remember to reference Class Cards heavily, both to bolster your fake claims and to catch people out on their lies. You can access all the abilities of any class, as well as Tips for playing them (which also often include tips for fake claims to help them fake that role).  Part 2 - The Specifics OK, now let's get into the incredibly obtuse terms everyone will use and expect you to understand, starting with the thread title. "n1 - sc 6 / inv 4 ns | 9 visited" This is an example of a Logbook entry from the Sheriff role. "n1" means Night 1, meaning this entry corresponds to the first night of the game. "sc" means Scout, the Sheriff's day ability which allows them to tell if the Unseen visit a player. "inv" refers to the Expert Investigation ability that the Sheriff has, which tells them if someone is Unseen. "ns" means Not Suspicious, i.e. the player targeted (#4 out of 16) is not Unseen. "9 visited" means that the Scout ability alerted the player that #9 visited #6, so #6 was probably converted to the Unseen. The in-game Glossary contains many of these shorthands. Since the game piles a lot of information on you in a limited time, it's common to shorthand things so that you can keep up with the chat and not miss anything. No one will get mad at you if you don't do it, but they might get mad at you if you use it wrong and therefore look suspicious. Don't worry too much if people's logs look like gibberish to you. Usually they are just shorthand for the name of an ability, or the name of a class. There are a few guaranteed classes every game: There will always be a King, who will always be #1 on the player list. No one knows if they are a Good King, and therefore aligned with BD, or an Evil King (EK) and therefore aligned with the Cult/Unseen, except for the King themselves, until they die. There will always be a Prince, who will always be Blue Dragon-aligned. There will always be either a Sheriff (if an Unseen game) or a Paladin (if a Cult game). There will always be a Neutral Killer, who might be a Sorcerer, a Possessor, or a Reaper. There will additionally be 2 Unseen/Cult members, 2-3 Neutral players, and 7-8 random Blue Dragon classes. Some classes are unique, which means there can only be 1 of them. All classes also have a type, which can be investigated by other classes to determine if your claim is real or fake. The class groupings are Killer/Offensive, Support/Social, and Special/Investigative. So if you make a fake claim, you'd be well-advised to claim a class which is within your actual role's grouping lest you be outed for it. Though if you are, you can always claim you were framed by the Scorned! Special note: Some classes can do something called "trollboxing" (tb for short) which forces a player to say something in chat that they do not, themselves, see. This is either the Fool trying to get you to execute them, or the Scorned trying to get you to execute an innocent person. Either way, if someone says something and then doesn't press it, you can repeat it back to them to confirm that it's real. Next post: a full rundown on all the roles and how to play them, for you to consult if you get assigned to them. Cup Runneth Over fucked around with this message at 03:06 on Sep 16, 2020 |
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Sep 14, 2020 09:46
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Part 3 - Roles So you started a match and have no idea what you're doing. Oh God! Quick, consult your Class Card and read the Tips section. Now you know the basics, but how do you actually play them? Well, let me tell you. Good King  Royal Finger (Day): Count your vote twice once per day. Cannot use Decide Fate on the same day. Use this to tip the scales for your team or force people to claim if BD isn't organized enough to get the last vote in. Decide Fate (Day): Immediately execute or pardon a player. Use this very sparingly unless you are certain and BD is being idiotic. Guards! (Night): Makes yourself death immune so you can't be assassinated (you can still be Reaped). Don't overuse this, it's not that big a deal if you die. It's more powerful in lategame anyway, most people won't go for the King right away, especially if you're not aggressive. Stand Guard (Night): Makes another player death immune. Use this on confirmed BD (people who are exonerated by logs, or push for someone to be executed who turns out to be evil). Always safeguard the Prince if they out themselves, as much as possible. Oh boy, you're in the hot seat now. As one of the few guaranteed classes, and by far the most visible one, everyone will be looking to you for advice and guidance. If you have no idea what you're doing, then you're quickly going to piss people off and ruin the chances for your team. Remember, no one has any idea whether you are a good or evil king except yourself, and there is no way they can verify except to kill you. Fortunately, the King actually has a fairly low non-social impact on the game, so you're not necessarily going to make a huge difference. The most helpful thing you can do is get the "claim train" rolling and start demanding that people be accused to force them to claim a role. You don't need to put them on trial, that can actually be a waste of time. Just use your golden name in chat to organize BD around threatening people with a trial so they spit out a claim, and then write those claims down in your Journal. Make sure that you provide the claims people have given whenever possible, and feel free to post your list of claims in the chat to help BD. Being too aggressive with executing people can lead to you being seen as an Evil King, and waste BD's time, so don't press things too hard unless other players have put forth evidence that is being lost in the flood of chat. Your role is primarily an organizer, especially as a new player. Your voice will cut through the chatter, so you can use that to boost information and make sure everyone gives a claim. That's all you really need to do! Unseen/Cult King   Royal Finger (Day): Count your vote twice once per day. Cannot use Decide Fate on the same day. Use this to force claims you think are spurious under the guise of seeking information. Decide Fate (Day): Immediately execute or pardon a player. Use this only towards the end of the game, as if you force execute someone who was innocent, you will immediately draw suspicion. You can also use this to waste the day's execution, buying time for the Unseen/Cult, and probably sacrificing yourself in the process (you can win while dead if the Unseen/Cult win). Improved Safeguard (Night): Makes your target (or yourself) death immune so they can't be assassinated. Save this for protecting suspected Unseen/Cult members from Knights. Close Allies (Night): Tells you if another player is Unseen/Cult. Pretty simple. You can use this on people you suspect of being bad to verify that they are, so that you can safeguard them. Thought Good King was tough? Welcome to Evil King! Again, no one knows whose side you're really on until you die -- that includes the Unseen or Cult. Anything you do to hint to them that you're Evil might also cause BD to turn on you, so it's best to just let them work alone. Instead, you're going to be doing pretty much the opposite of the Good King and sow discord and chaos covertly. Don't ask for claims, or ask for them slowly and unorganized. Leap on opportunities to point the finger at people you suspect are innocent the moment someone starts to doubt them. The more time BD spends in trials, the better, and if they get mad at you, just say you're not good at the role. The bottom line is, seize any opportunity to make things more confusing and loud, and don't value your own life TOO highly -- the most important thing is to keep the Mastermind/Cult Leader alive so they can continue converting, and any time BD spends executing you is time they aren't pursuing evil players. HOWEVER, be very careful if there are any Butlers alive. If you make people suspect you, a Butler can simply poison you without wasting a trial, causing you to die the next night. That might be cause for you to investigate Butler claims particularly fiercely, since if you can get them all killed, BD has to waste the execution on you. Also, you don't really need to keep night logs; if you go up on trial, no amount of log-posting will save you. Also, don't forget there's a Neutral Killer out there! Pursue them aggressively, because if they kill off the other evil players you will lose, and it's one thing you can side with BD on. You might also want to encourage killing neutrals in general (except Sellsword) just in case they're the NK, because they usually side with BD. Prince  Imprison (Day): Locks a player in a cell for the night, allowing you to anonymously interrogate them and (starting on night 3) execute them if you so choose. Use this on whoever's the most talkative on day 1, because they will probably be targeted. If anyone says they're going to target a number, you can also jail that number. Execute (Night): Only available from night 3 onwards. You will want to be very careful with this, because if you use it on a BD, you can no longer execute anyone. But not TOO sparingly -- only being able to jail people is better than letting someone evil go. As the only guaranteed, unconvertable BD-aligned role that can kill people (and there is only one Prince per match), you can make or break games for the BD. It's up to you how covert you want to be as Prince. You will be the #1 target for evil players, since you are the most powerful role that BD has. But if you're open about it, you might be able to rely on people using their abilities to protect you. If the court doesn't get around to executing someone, or is too afraid to execute them, you can jail them to make sure they don't cause any harm. You can also execute roles that can't be executed by the court without penalties, like the Fool. Make sure you ask whoever you jail for a claim (on night 1) or their logs (night 1 and onwards!). You can also keep track of who you've jailed if it's not outed during the day, because people might unknowingly claim to have visited someone you imprisoned, which is an obvious lie, because imprisoned people cannot use their abilities and cannot have abilities used on them (if someone tries, they will be told the target was imprisoned). There is a lot of meta centered around outing yourself as Prince on the first day. However, doing so also puts you at risk of being encircled by the Reaper, killing everyone who tried to protect (or attack) you on night 1. Both are valid, and as Prince, you probably won't survive the game anyway. Pay very close attention to who you have imprisoned when nights pass without anyone dying, and feel free to imprison people multiple nights in a row if you suspect them of being bad. Even if you don't execute them, you can stop them from attacking anyone. You can also tell your jailed prisoner to use their ability on someone, and then jail that person two nights later to confirm that the ability was used as you requested. In short: take meticulous notes on who claims to be what, remember you can both protect people by jailing them and keep them from killing people, and use your jail to deal with people whom the court thinks are suspicious but haven't executed yet. Princess  Flirt (Night): Tells you a player's class category, Killer/Offensive, Social/Support, or Special/Investigative. Use this to find people who are K/O when they shouldn't be and out them as killers. Will of the Wisp (Night): Tells you if the targeted player attacks someone that night. Princess can be stressful, but really it's a rather laid-back role. Your primary job is to use Flirt to find people who aren't what they claim to be, and out them to the court so they can be executed. Flirt with people who claim neutral roles, or who seem suspicious, or who haven't claimed anything yet. Cross-reference the result with the class type in Class Cards to verify that it's one of the two returned to you. Bear in mind that your results are not infallible, especially if you are investigating someone suspicious and not at random. There are several abilities that can fool you into thinking someone is a killer when they aren't. Report your results, but you don't need to push them. Observer  Observe (Night): Find out who the target visits. Overlook (Night): Discover who visits the target. Overlook is a very powerful BD class, and therefore in grave danger after they claim. They are a high priority to be killed or converted, so you should probably avoid claiming until necessary, or until you can provide evidence that will influence a trial. Overlook is a great ability to use on night 1, especially on anyone who talks a lot or was mentioned on day 1, as they are almost guaranteed to be a night 1 target. You can also observe suspicious people, but it's honestly better to just overlook people who talk a lot or seem like likely targets, as you can gain a lot of information from noting down who visits them. Alchemist  Stoneskin Potion (Day): Makes yourself death immune the following night. Crimson Potion (Night): Heals the target, curing bleeding/poison and preventing them from dying. Emerald Potion (Night): Kills the target. Good claims: Physician, Alchemist Being neutral is tough. Alchemist especially so; your only objective is to survive. BD is hesitant to trust you; rightfully so, since you might be the Neutral Killer! Alchemist is a common claim, especially for Sorcerer, which can just claim that it's using emerald potions when it kills people and hope nobody asks it to heal anyone. You can claim Physician and try to fly under the radar, or be right up front with everyone that you're an Alchemist and you're just trying to stay alive. It's often best to use a Stoneskin Potion day 1 so you don't get randomly killed before anyone can even claim. You can also use Emerald Potions to kill people who are pushing for you to be executed, though bear in mind that throwing them around will get BD to hate you if you kill innocents. Ultimately, though, unless they believe you're the Killer, they have better things to do than pursue you. Exonerate yourself by healing people and try not to piss off anyone who has the time to kill you. And remember, you can win with the Neutral Killer or Unseen/Cult, so if BD becomes outnumbered, consider jumping ship! Fool  Troll Box (Day): Force a player to say something in day chat. They won't see what they said. Use this to sow chaos and discord -- make the King tell people to execute you. Force people to make bad claims. The sky is the limit! Hide (Night): Make yourself death immune. Good to do night 1 unless you claim something day 1. Deceive (Night): Make yourself suspicious when investigated. Do this when you Good claims: Alchemist, Princess, Observer, Scorned, anything complicated that an evil person might make a glaring error in the logs for Oh boy, it's the Fool! Perhaps the most fun class in the game, your goal is to be put on trial and executed, so you can be as sloppy and careless as you like, because looking suspicious will only help you. The more desperate BD is, the more likely they are to execute you. Just be careful not to be too obvious, since if they figure out you're the Fool then you're properly cooked. The best way to play Fool is to play a BD-aligned class badly, failing to do things that would prove your claim and providing logs that seem earnest but are impossible. While claiming Princess, wait until you're on trial and then claim you flirted with someone and got "s/o," or fill your logs with totally random flirts and hope someone calls you out for being wrong. Have fun with it! As Fool the only thing you can do wrong is tip your hand and seem like you're intentionally being suspicious. Inquisitor  Interrogate (Night): Determine if a player is a Heretic. Used pretty much at random. Ruthless Efficiency (Night): Kill a player. Use it to kill people you've interrogated and confirmed are Heretics. Good claims: Princess, Butler, Maid, Sheriff/Paladin, Inquisitor Inquisitor is not an easy neutral class. Your targets will always start as BD (though they can be converted later), so BD is initially inclined to want to get rid of you. Fortunately, the three Heretics don't need to die by your hands, so you have that going for you as long as you can maintain the facade. Being outed as Inquisitor isn't guaranteed death, though; you might even be able to get BD to tolerate you, especially if you out yourself later on in the game when your targets may have been converted. It's a good idea to put yourself up for King if the current King dies; you can out yourself and promise to work with BD, because your objective goes away if you're made Neutral King, and all you need to do is survive. There isn't a lot you can do other than look for heretics, and possibly use your fake claim to frame them for execution (though this is risky if you end up getting blamed for the death of an innocent). Your #1 priority should be staying alive, as you have no tools to protect yourself and no one is looking out for you. The best way to achieve that might be to largely stay quiet, and always vote to execute in case it turns out to be one of your Heretics. Mercenary  Don Armor (Day): Expend a brilder to be death immune that night. Not a good idea to use unless you suspect you're going to be targeted. Stand Guard (Night): Choose a target and occupy everyone else who targets them, gaining 1 brilder for each successful occupy. Shield (Night): Choose a target and gain 3 brilders if you prevent their death. Good claims: Knight, Mercenary, Physician Your goal as Mercenary is to earn "brilders" for successfully protecting people (good or evil) from attack, with a goal of reaching 7 (after which you've won, even if you die). You can do this by guarding/shielding proven BD that might be targets for evil players, or by playing mind games to try to get people to target someone so you can guard them. An easy way to earn brilders is to guard someone who talks on day 1, or is aggressive during the day, or even to just claim you're going to attack someone at the end of the day when putting you on trial is impossible, and then guard that person instead. When push comes to shove, it's best to just out yourself as Mercenary, since you're a pretty low priority for BD, especially if they've already found the NK. You can claim Knight, since Knight is able to defend people, but the Princess will see right through you. Physician is a Support class you can claim, but of course you won't be able to do any healing. Do your best to fly under the radar, and if you get really desperate, just beg for brilders and hope one faction will take pity on you and spare you for being an innocent neut. Also: keep a count of how many brilders you have in your journal. Providing it when asked for logs can help exonerate you. Sellsword  Stonewall (Night): Choose a target and occupy everyone else who targets them, except if they are attacking or converting them. Divert (Night): Choose a target and redirect them to another target. Good claims: Butler, Knight, Drunk Sellsword can be a pretty difficult class, but fortunately you can win while dead, and your only goal is to ensure BD loses. You are best served stonewalling BD like the Prince, Princess, Observer, Sheriff, Knight, etc. especially after they have been proven, so that the Unseen/Cult or NK can target them while you are keeping any BD protection away from them. Divert is pretty risky and rarely rewarding, but it can be clutch if you use it right; you can redirect the Physician, Alchemist, Chronomancer, or Court Wizard to prevent them from saving someone. Or, if you redirect someone and the target you chose dies that night, chances are good you just indirectly found an evil player that you can then form an alliance with. Butler is by far the best claim for Sellsword IMO. They are also an Offensive class, and they are also based around occupying people. If you successfully use Stonewall, keep an eye out for anyone saying they were occupied the next day so you can write down that you occupied them in your fake logs, since Butler's occupy works differently. If you aren't able to find someone who was confirmed to have been occupied, then claim you occupied someone dead (make sure their class is not occupy immune!), or that you simply partied (the Butler skill which protects them from being attacked). Bear in mind you can only party twice per game, so it's better to claim to have occupied someone if you are sure they were occupied that night. And don't forget you can win with the Neutral Killer, not just Unseen/Cult! Sorceror  Walking Bomb (Day): Plant an undetectable bomb on a target. All bombs can be detonated in one night, allowing you to get multiple kills. Try not to plant them on suspicious people or they might get executed, which is a waste. The King is a great target for this as you will want them to be dead before the endgame (or else they can execute you), but you can't bomb the starting King, so if the starting King dies, advocate for one of your bomb targets to be the new King. Escape Fate (Day): Buy yourself some time by forcing a pardon. It will usually be fairly obvious you're the Sorceror afterwards, but then you can detonate all those bombs that night! Magic Missile (Night): Kill a player. Will be canceled if you target someone death immune or guarded by the Knight (who would kill you). Detonate (Night): Kill all players with a bomb planted on them. You can kill the Mastermind this way! Good claims: Butler, Drunk, Knight Less good, non-K/O but still workable claims: Maid, Alchemist, Hunter if no one else claims it As a Neutral Killer you have a hard game ahead of you. Your foes outnumber you twelve or thirteen to one. Your best bet is to pick off quiet people who aren't likely to be protected or watched, or people like the Princess who can out you, or anyone who seems to be aggressive during the day and might get you put on trial. Sorcerer is probably the easiest NK because you're unlikely to die unexpectedly, and your kills don't stick out from regular assassinations. If you keep a close eye on the chat, you can manufacture Butler or Drunk claims with ease, and Knight is workable too though it's frequently a suspicious claim that will draw attention to you. If you find someone who's death immune, you can use a Maid or Princess claim and get BD to execute them, as that's probably the Unseen Mastermind. However, it could also be the Scorned or Inquisitor, two Neutral classes who can win with you and who you might be better served befriending. In general, avoid targeting neutrals; you gain nothing from it. You can also claim Alchemist, and even though Princess will see right through it, you can claim that you were framed by the Scorned (a very common tactic for Scorned on open alchemist claims). You can inure yourself to the King and offer in whispers to use Emerald Potion on people he suspects; this is a good way to avoid getting asked to heal people, since you can't. If no one else steps up as Hunter, you can also claim that; people will be more afraid to try and execute you, and the logs are easy to fake. It's worth keeping track of, if nothing else, who the other neutrals are, since if you end up outnumbering the BD and Cult/Unseen, you can just out yourself as Sorc and ask them to side with you. Chances are, they will win with you, so they have no reason not to! (WIP) Cup Runneth Over fucked around with this message at 12:12 on Sep 14, 2020 |
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Sep 14, 2020 09:46
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Reserved jic
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Sep 14, 2020 09:46
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Good game, haven't played in ages mind you
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Sep 14, 2020 10:22
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tithin posted:Good game, haven't played in ages mind you Play some more. It's in a good place but needs players.
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Sep 14, 2020 10:51
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Gonna try and work my way through the rest of the neutral & starting evil roles today.
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Sep 14, 2020 20:32
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This thread had some real good timing on being put up it seems, since you can now grab this for like $1/£1 in the latest Humble Bundle: https://www.humblebundle.com/games/better-futures I'll probably give it a shot here personally thanks to that, and I'd bet some other folks will probably do the same considering the price if they grab any level of that bundle as well.
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Sep 15, 2020 19:43
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Arc Impulse posted:This thread had some real good timing on being put up it seems, since you can now grab this for like $1/£1 in the latest Humble Bundle: https://www.humblebundle.com/games/better-futures Thanks for the heads up! I edited the OP.
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Sep 16, 2020 03:01
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