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[Kuildeous]

I played Mafia de Cuba with some Facebook friends (well one friend and his friends) yesterday.
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/176558/mafia-de-cuba

I found it much more enjoyable than the one game of regular Mafia I played. It didn't feel like the first accusation is baseless. The godfather asks questions and sorts things out trying to figure out who's lying.

I chose a getaway driver. I could tell the three people in front of me each took a token. The four missing tokens were one getaway driver, one loyal henchman, and both agents. So I knew no one stole the diamonds before me.

I won without saying a single word. This was really because the godfather was inexperienced and eager. He questioned the person in front of me who reported that she passed on 10 diamonds to me. Then he questioned the person after me who reported that she received 12 diamonds from me. Naturally, he was perplexed and knew one of those two was lying. He asked me for my opinion, and I was crafting a careful lie to support the person in front of me. I figured that if she's lying about the diamonds, she must be an agent, and I want her to get accused so we both win. Before I could answer, the godfather accused the person after me.

So the person after me turned out to be loyal. The godfather had two mulligans, and one was spent in that false accusation. I was still trying to figure out how to answer him. While the people who went after me suspected diamonds were taken early on, I knew better. I deduced that the godfather removed three diamonds since the three people in front of me each took a role. So how could I lie? He would know that nobody prior to the loyal henchman took diamonds since she reported 12. There was some table talk, and everyone knew the person before me was a liar.

Here's where the godfather's inexperience got him in trouble. He accused her. Sure enough, she was a federal agent, and I got to ride her coattails. Success! I guess. That was kind of weird. It goes to show that not everyone follows your logic. I thought for sure he would see past the lie, but he apparently forgot he removed three diamonds. Or maybe he got excited at uncovering a lie and went for the kill.  Oops.

But yeah, I liked it. We couldn't say anything until the Godfather asked his first question. Then the lies and accusations would fly. This game was far shorter than it really should have been. By unveiling the loyal henchman, he should have ignored the first five players. I expected him too, and he didn't wait for my answer. I'm sure I was obligated to answer, but I was wracking my brain trying to figure out how to cast doubt on the person before me. I could only hope she was loyal and win that way, but why would she lie?

The funny part we learned afterward is that she didn't mean to lie. She had fat fingers and typed 10 instead of 12. She did lie about the roles being passed, and I would have gladly supported her in that lie. That would have changed things greatly, and he wouldn't have jumped the gun in accusations.

We're starting a new one this weekend. The new godfather is less likely to be so impulsive, especially since there seems to be no rule on the number of questions asked. It would be interesting if the Godfather were allowed to ask n/2 questions before the first accusation. Then n/4 before the second. And then maybe make an accusation after every question. It seems to me that the Godfather can ask each person a question and then deduce the progression.

[eHalcyon]

Watched the SUSD review.  I'm intrigued.

[Teproc]

It's pretty fun. Helps that it's super short, so if it doesn't work it doesn't work, otherwise you just do another one with a different Godfather.

[Kuildeous]

Yeah, it is a short game. I can see this being kind of popular, and I do like that there are reasons to lie right away.

So I played another game with some of the same group. New godfather. I was the first player, which was neat. I had the option to remove a role in screw with people. I had two loyal henchmen, a driver, and an agent. I decided to be a loyal henchman and ditch the agent in order to make things less confusing for the godfather. Afterwards, the moderator asked me why I didn't take the driver instead. First-player driver is loyal to the godfather by default. Probably would have helped.

Because it was a smaller group, there were no mulligans. A wrongful accusation costs the godfather the game. And that happened. Oops.

I did have a little fun with the guy after me. He confirmed that the henchman and agent tokens were gone. But then as the person after him reported missing diamonds, he decided to cast doubt on me and imply that I took some diamonds. That contradicted his claim that I took and burned a role, so he was rooted out easily. Gotta pay attention to your lies, man.

[Accatitippi]

It definitely sounds intriguing, but the fact that there might be a guaranteed winning strategy in games with more than 8 players makes me a bit skeptical to buy it before trying it. (this requires at least 4 of the 5 starting players to cooperate, but why wouldn't they? Everybody likes free candies!)
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1437762/nash-equilibrium-89-player-game
(of course there's house rules, but.)

[Kuildeous]

Yeah, I suspected something like this may be possible. This may be one of those cases where you'll have more fun without having a bunch of logicians around. Ignorance is bliss in this case because the players may choose suboptimal strategies, and the godfather cannot rely on them making the best choice. Likewise, the godfather may try to mix things up by removing fewer than five diamonds. I guess in this case, you have to bite the bullet and do something goofy just to throw a little uncertainty into the game.

I like the variant of rolling a die so the godfather has no choice in how many diamonds are removed. Just roll d6-1 and remove that many diamonds.