It seems we need to establish some solid rules for Mafia. Let's use this thread to set up some standards.

1. Your objective is to win the game by fulfilling your win condition by any means possible except for the ways declared invalid by the rules. Because of the necessity of having everyone’s role message look slightly different, and generate them quickly, your role message might accidentally leave something out or be vague, or you might simply think it is, just ask me via NB or email. However, in general, the Mafia wish to kill the townies, and townies wish to eliminate the Mafia.

2. You may talk however you like in the Game Thread. During the Night, game-related information may not be discussed, but other talking is alright, though this varies from mod to mod.

3. The Moderator will not interfere with lying or anything of the sort. You can have nonsense coming out of your mouths for all I care. Seriously, you are encouraged to lie through your teeth, so long as you do not directly quote me or say you are, the latter will also result in a modkill. DO NOT DIRECTLY QUOTE THE MODERATOR. Everything you receive from me needs to be thoroughly paraphrased, assume I will view any paraphrase in the least favorable light.

4. You may NOT use the NB system to communicate game related information during the DAY OR NIGHT, unless your role permits it. Inform the Moderator if a player is trying to talk to you because they are not supposed to. You may only use the NB system to communicate with the Moderator, who will answer questions and activate power roles, or your special faction, which is an exception.

5. When a player has been eliminated from the game, they are not allowed to receive any information that any player has or has received, nor are they allowed to give information to any other player. They will have to wait out the game like a good dead person. No exceptions. The penalty if anyone does not comply to this rule is possible punishment from the next Mafia Game.

6. Day will last until a LYNCH occurs, or when a deadline has been reached. A deadline may be set by a Moderator at any time they deem necessary. A deadline is a granted/limitation of amount of time for the Town to decide upon a lynch. If no consensus is reached by the deadline, meaning no player reaches the majority of votes, a NO LYNCH will occur. Day will turn into Night.

7. Modkills - Basically there are two types. The first, for rules violations, will end the day in the place of a lynch. Where post editing is concerned “three strike you’re out” will be the rule of thumb, unless the mod rules otherwise. Other rules violation, such as direct quotation, is an auto-modkill and ends the day. Message editting for the purpose of tables, hyopcopping, etc is allowed within reason, but please put "Table" in the header of the message, and do not overuse this.

8. Inactivity - Rules for inactivity vary from mod to mod, but in general, not posting for 3-4 days will get you warned, then modkilled, and the Day will end after two modkills.

9. You must unvote to vote on another person if you are already voting for someone.

You MUST vote and unvote in the following format:


Vote: TheDragonReborn<
Unvote: (name optional, but it would help me if you gave it)


Votes and unvotes in any other form WILL NOT BE COUNTED, except in the header of your post. To bold your vote, use this format (but eliminate the spaces:

< b > Vote: TheDragonReborn < / b >

Single exceptions will be made if someone is clearly trying to unvote, if some sort of last minute rush is involved, but only for unvotes, never votes.


10. Once a player reaches the amount of votes required for a MAJORITY the player will be lynched. Unvotes will NOT BE COUNTED as soon as/after a player has reached majority. To No Lynch, a supermajority must be reached - that is, a 2/3 vote.

11. Dead players may not post. You are dead, stay dead. If a dead player tries to get information out of you by any means (including by NB) report them to the Moderator. Any player doing this may NOT be allowed to participate in the next Darkfriend Game. “Bah!” comments, which are posts by dead players containing no pertinent commentary, are allowed, within reason, for examples see other games, there are usually a wad of them at the beginning and end of each day. I’ve never seen any that were out of line or endangered the game.

13. Once a role activation has been sent in, you may not change it. Asking the moderator to do so will not make you special. If you make a change real quick, with something in the header like ‘Oops, wrong name’ and the timestamps are real close together, an exception may be made, but assume this will not be the case.

14. If you have a Night Action and do not use it BEFORE the Deadline is over, too bad! The Moderator will give enough time for the players with Night Actions to send them in, and enough time for the players without Night Actions to get enough sleep. All Nights will last 48 hours with limited exceptions but the Moderator shall not inform the Town of the exceptions, which would give away too much information.

15. The Moderator will only answer questions as deemed necessary. Do not ask about anything Role-Specific in the Game Thread. Any question like this, or that the Moderator thinks will ruin the game WILL NOT BE ANSWERED. New players are advised to use the NB to ask any sensitive questions, as “How does investigation work?” asked on the game thread, amounts to suicide by DF knife.

16. If you are going to be away for a lengthy amount of time, please be courteous to inform us. It is not the responsibility of the Moderator. The preferred method is to post a thread with RBIRL (Real busy in real life) in the header, reasons aren’t necessary, but a rough timeline would be appreciated, i.e. “Busy this weekend, can’t post much”

17. All of the rules are subject to change as the Moderator see fit. The Moderator will try report any changes to the Rules as fast as they can.

18. This is a game! The accusations may get intense - they usually do - but HAVE FUN!

Here, for convenience, are the basics of Mafia in flash form - http://cataldo.freeshell.org/mafia/mafiascum04.swf
And the MafiaScum wiki, with plenty of information on roles - http://mafiascum.net/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

Issues with these or any other rules may be brought up in sub-threads. To keep it neat, please try to put one rule per sub-thread.