StarCraft II Mafia
is, as the name suggests, a Game Mod for the highly popular RTS StarCraft II. Based on the party game Mafia (AKA Werewolf), players on the Town's side must attempt to determine and kill off the members of the Mafia (or Triad), while the Mafia must kill off all the townsfolk while avoiding discovery; neutral roles add further confusion by attempting to fulfil their own objectives.
Although it has amusing graphical representations and a graphic user interface, the majority of the game is text-based; during the day phase, players attempt to verbally ascertain each others' roles and discuss the state of the game and each others' actions, in order to determine the identity of the Mafiosos, Triad Enforcers, and other threats to the town. The town may then vote to trial and then lynch one of their members each day. At night, the Mafia and Triad Killing Role (usually their Godfather/Dragon Head) selects a target to kill and may communicate without the town's knowledge, while other roles (which will be detailed below) use their night abilities to covertly aid or hinder the Town's cause, or advance their own. Typical setups also include a Neutral Killer whose goal is to wipe (nearly) everybody out.
SC2 Mafia provides examples of the following tropes:
- Ten Little Murder Victims: Part of the premise of the game.
- Accuse the Witness: A usual tactic of (poor) Mafia/Triad/Evil roles, and will thus usually get one lynched, but it can sometimes cause sufficient confusion and get the town to distrust their own Investigative roles.
- Apathetic Citizens: Survivors, who can win with anyone as long as they survive until the end of the game. Also a possible cause of losses for the Town, if there are a lot of AFK or just plain indecisive players.
- Attack Reflector: The Veteran, who kills everyone who tries to kill them while on alert... as well as everyone who merely visits them.
- Beneath Suspicion: A good strategy for Mafia/Triad/Evil roles, and certain Town roles.
- Boom, Headshot!: One of the lynching animations.
- Boring, but Practical: Various players consider various roles this, especially the universally-reviled "Shitizen", whose only ability is to become invulnerable for one night.
- Some players will Rage Quit in response to receiving these roles, although this is actually a punishable offence.
- Burn the Witch!: A couple of the lynching animations feature this.
- Chewbacca Defense: A usual symptom of being a Jester... or attempting to appear as one. However, this is the only way it will get you off in normal gameplay.
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Complacent Gaming Syndrome: Most standard game setups follow the "9/3/3" rule: 9 town members, 3 Mafiosos or Triad, and 3 Neutral roles including a Neutral Killing role. Attempting to play a save which does not follow this, such as a save featuring Mafia vs. Triad vs. Town or a guaranteed Cult spawn will get you branded a Troll by someone, even if the save is perfectly valid and playable. - Cosmetically Different Sides: The Triad roles are basically the Mafia roles with a different name.
- Crosses the Line Twice: A lot of what is said on the first day.
- Death Seeker: The Jester, whose goal is to get lynched. Hilarity Ensues.
- Dirty Cop: The Vigilante role.
- Divided We Fall: The aversion or playing straight of this can be the difference between victory or defeat for the town.
- Driven to Suicide: A game mechanic if you vote to lynch the Jester or leave the game. Rare in-game situations can also make this one's best option, and it can also be used to surrender, such as if you are the last surviving Neutral Evil role with little chance to win, but no reason for the town to suspect you.
- Feed the Mole: Often done by Mafias and Triads to the Spy, who can listen in on their night chat.
- The Gadfly: Frequent, and can even have a tactical purpose as the Jester... or to pretend to be one.
- Godwin's Law: Players will frequently name themselves some variant of "Adolf Hitler" or after other infamous historical figures, and/or spout blatantly racist or otherwise inflammatory remarks on the first day. Sometimes the latter even has a tactical purpose to lure others to attack you; other times it's simple trolling.
- Good Counterpart: The Masons to the Cult. Like the Cult, they may communicate anonymously at night, and know each others' identities. Unlike the Cult, their goal is to see the Town win, and they may only recruit otherwise roleless Citizens (which can be invaluable if an Auditor is in play). They also discover Cultists who attempt to convert them, and their Mason Leader will kill Cultists (and only Cultists) he visits at night, allowing him to check alleged Citizens for Cultists.
- Hanging Judge: The Judge, who is a Neutral Evil role who wishes to see the town lose, and thus uses his enhanced voting powers and anonymous Court to help the Mafia/Triad and other Evil roles .
- Heroic Sacrifice: The job description of the Bodyguard, who defends one target each night. If their target is attacked, they die... but so does the attacker, and the target does not.
- High-Voltage Death: One of the lynching animations.
- Hollywood Voodoo: Implicitly used by the Cult and Witch Doctor roles.
- I Know You Know I Know: Most often happens with (suspected) Jesters, but can happen in other contexts, too.
- The Jester's goal is to get lynched during the day. However, the Town will not vote to lynch a known Jester, as one of the guilty voters on a Jester will commit suicide the next day. So the Jester must act suspiciously... while not making it obvious he is a Jester.
- Similarly, Mafia/Triad or other Evil roles may act like a Jester in order to avoid suspicion and being lynched... but if they act too obviously like a Jester, this may also draw suspicion, as a real Jester would not make their identity obvious..
- Internet Jerk: Usually rampant on the first day of each game, where in most cases nobody can be trialled, and in all cases everyone lacks hard evidence. Most players settle down after that.
- Irrational Hatred: Possibly the motive for the Executioner role.
- Joker Jury: Can happen when Mafia or other Evil roles gain majority, but have not won yet.
- Jump Scare: Some people like to do this by "confessing" to being a Jester in their last words, whether true or not.
- Kangaroo Court: Downplayed. Trials are usually conducted on the basis of "Guilty unless proven innocent", but a good defence has a decent chance to see you let loose unless there is other evidence against you, and towns are usually reluctant to lynch completely without evidence.
- Kill and Replace: The Disguiser's and Informant's modus operandi. They kill a player and steal that player's identity.
- Kill It with Fire: The modus operandi of the Arsonist. Also featured in a couple of lynch animations.
- The Medic: Doctors, who can protect one player from death per night.
- The Mole: Everyone who isn't Town.
- Also specifically the Mafia Disguiser role, and its Triad counterpart the Informant, who can kill and replace a player, leaving their old identity seemingly killed by the Mafia/Triad.
- Molotov Cocktail: Used in one of the lynch animations.
- No-Sell: Roles which are "night immune" are immune to being killed at night (except by certain roles which explicitly ignore night immunity).
- Omnicidal Maniac: Neutral Killing roles.
- Power Nullifier: The Auditor, who can remove one player's role and unique abilities each night, rendering them a Citizen (if formerly Town), Mafioso/Enforcer (if formerly Mafia/Triad), or Scumbag (if formerly neutral).
- Rage Quit: If you do so, your character commits suicide.
- Refuge in Audacity: One possible defence, which can get you off the hook if you make the town think you're a Jester.
- Religion of Evil: The Cult, whose goals are to convert or lynch everyone who opposes them, including the Town. Each night, the Cultists have the ability to recruit one non-Mafioso, non-Night Immune player to their cause, as well as speak anonymously. Cultists also know each others' identities.
- Running Gag: "Red is always evil", one of the most common and accepted excuses for starting a random lynch.
- Sensory Abuse: The night sequence.
- Serial Killer: The role of the same name.
- Serial-Killer Killer: A properly-played Vigilante, or a misplayed Serial Killer.
- Shell-Shocked Veteran: The Veteran role.
- Shot at Dawn: One of the lynch animations.
- Shout-Out: Not infrequent, especially with the use of custom names.
- Space Marine: One of the player models available. Also used for a couple of the lynch animations.
- Squick: The night sequence. Also, Some people should not be given the role of Town Crier.
- Taking You with Me: The other part of the Bodyguard's job description, as seen in their entry under "Heroic Sacrifice".
- Troll: Griefers are notorious for ruining games in various ways, including:
- Gamethrowing: Revealing your teammates as the Mafia, or otherwise acting contrary to your team's best interest.
- Skyping: Using outside-of-game information to cheat, such as by cooperating as roles which should not (be able to) cooperate, or pass information which should not be able to be given anonymously.
- Vigilante Man: The Vigilante, a Town role who may kill one player a night, a limited number of times...
- Vulgar Humour: Happens quite a lot.
- We ARE Struggling Together: The Evils love to see (and Invoke) this.
- Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing:
- A role who is deemed to be somewhat useless (due to Crippling Overspecialization or easily countered) may sometimes not perform their function(s) and thus be carried by their team.
- The Survivor's main goal is to get to the end of the game. If they are able to be confirmed, it's possible for Survivor to win by doing absolutely nothing.
- The Amnesiac role can, if pressured by a faction that will get majority, pick a role of that faction and then win after not performing their chosen role's functions.
- The Jester and Executioner's win condition is to be lynched and have another player lynched, respectively. Sometimes, a lynch-happy town might actually put the Jester or the Executioner's target up and lynch them - without the Jester/executioner having to do anything.
- Witch Doctor: The role of the same name, who protects players like the Doctor... but also makes anyone he saves into a Cultist, if they are not already.
- Witch Hunt: Basically the premise of the game.
