User:Ircher/Standard Ruleset

General Rules

This ruleset is meant to be comprehensive and cover almost all situations. Hence, they are very long. If you are short on time, please go to the recap section for a TL;DR version.

Respect

1. Follow the golden rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
   1. Personal attacks and derogatory language directed towards others or oneself will not be tolerated.
   2. Other forms of toxic behavior that promotes an unpleasant environment will also be dealt with as needed.
   3. Please assume good faith of all players that request replacements. Discussing the reasons behind replacements brings an outside influence into the game, and it is the moderator's job to determine whether a replacement request is tactical in nature. It is also rude and disrespectful to the player who requested replacement.
   4. Avoid bringing up real life events in the game thread. If a player brings up a real-life event in the game thread, do not attempt to guess the player's motives for doing so. It is best to let real life stay out of this thread, but when it affects your ability to play, others should not resort to the unethical practice of assigning ulterior motives to it.
   5. Do not suggest other players be banned or force-replaced in-thread. If you think a player has broken the rules, you have two options. Your first option is to report the post if it breaks the site's rules. Your other option is to privately pm me the post alongside a description of why the post breaks my rules or the site's rules.
   6. You are expected to respect pronouns to the best of your ability. While mistakes do occur, any refusal to respect pronouns is grounds for immediate force-replacement. Think of it this way: how would you feel if someone purposely misgendered you?
2. The use of the "L"-word is strongly discouraged. Please adopt alternatives such as "eliminate", "fade", "launch", etc.
3. Avoid using the plain spoiler (blackout) tag. Use spoiler= instead. This rule exists because the content hidden within a blackout tag is not easily accessed on mobile devices and many players (including the moderator) access and play mafia on mobile devices.
   • [spoiler]This is wrong and will be edited by the moderator.[/spoiler]
   • [spoiler][color=red]You can use the spoiler tag if you use a different color alongside it.[/color][/spoiler]
   • [spoiler=]This is the preferred way to do it.[/spoiler]
4. Please spoiler animated GIFs, videos, and multiple large images. This rule exists for those with slower Internet connections. It also reduces the vertical length of pages and is more pleasing to the eye, especially on mobile devices.
5. Do not spam the thread with constant and persistent off-topic posts. Mafia is a social game, so it is okay to occassionally talk about things that are not directly relevent to the game at hand. That said, excessive off-topic posting results in increased filler and makes it hard for other players to find game-relevant content.
6. Play the game and play to win. By not playing the game, you ruin the experience of other players.
   1. Do not use the dice tag or other forms of provable randomness.
   2. You must read your role pm. Do not claim otherwise. If the moderator failed to send you a role pm, please notify the moderator privately. I will force-replace any players that violate this rule, no warnings. People have been banned for this in the past because it breaks the entire premise of mafia.
   3. Claiming scum by yourself or with other players is fine provided that it is clear to the moderator you are not attempting to throw the game.
   4. Scum may attempt to kill their teammates at night provided that 1) all living team members agree and 2) there is clear evidence to the moderator that such a move is not heavily detrimental to the team's win condition. In all cases, the moderator must explicitly approve of the move for it to be counted.
   5. Players may self-vote at any time and for any reason unless it is a hammer.
   6. Town-aligned players should only self-hammer in exceptional circumstances. A similar ruling applies for scum-aligned players.
7. Please request replacement if you do not have enough time to play the game. Nothing is inherently wrong with replacing out of a game, and you are doing more harm to the game by staying in than you would if you replaced out.
   1. For games with very long threads (more than fifty pages), please think twice before replacing out as it is hard to find replacements for those games. An alternative to replacing out in many circumstances is to declare V/LA instead.

Honour

1. Discussion of ongoing games at any time, through any means, and regardless of content, is prohibited as per site rules. See below for more information on this very important rule. I am somewhat stricter about this rule than most moderators. You are forewarned.
   1. You are free to communicate with the moderator, backup moderators, and/or co-moderators about this game at any time for any reason. You may also contact list moderators and admins who are not players of this game if an issue arises. Note: It is preferable for you to contact the game moderator first about an issue before escalating to site staff.
   2. You may discuss players' activities in other games in a general sense provided that you do not mention anything of substance. It is up to moderator discretion as to what constitutes a statement of substance. Please see this post by Untrod Tripod for more details.
   3. Do not use {redacted} and similar phrasing to bypass the rule against ongoing games. Micc does a really good job explaining what is and is not acceptable here. The key takeaway is it is better to say you cannot discuss something because of ongoing games instead of substituting {redacted} for what you cannot say.
   4. Alt-slips and hydra slips must be quoted by your main account as soon as possible. Failure to do so in a reasonable time frame will result in the moderator believing the slip to be a discussion of ongoing games and taking the appropriate action.
   5. Do not quote or reference any post or statement made in this game in your signature and/or your wiki page while the game is ongoing. Signatures are shown on every post and wiki pages are publicly accessible and sometimes referenced in other games.
   6. You are allowed a single contentless "Bah!" post after you die. Further posts and/or posts with content are breaches of the discussion of ongoing games rule.
   7. Once the moderator formally states in the game thread that a player is being replaced, that player should cease any and all posting in the game thread.
   8. If your role specifically allows you to communicate about this game outside the game-thread, then you may do so in the way dictated by your role.
   9. In general, you are allowed to discuss this game in private topics related to the game.
   10. If you have questions about this rule, please contact the game moderator (preferable) or a list moderator not in this game.
2. Trust tells and other forms of outside influences are prohibited.
   1. Do not replace out in such a manner as to confirm your alignment.
   2. Do not threaten to replace out. Do not demand others to replace out. If you believe a player should be force-replaced, please contact the moderator. In addition, all replacement-related communication should be conducted privately with the game moderator.
   3. Bets of any kind relating to this game (including avatar bets) should be avoided.
   4. The moderator will only respond to the following requests in-thread: 1) votecount-related questions and corrections 2) V/LAs 3) formatting fixing requests 4) questions about public mechanics and 5) the roles or abilities of flipped players. All other questions including speculative questions should be asked by pm.
   5. Do not discuss actions taken by the moderator while the game is still ongoing. Please save that discussion for post-game. You may privately contact the moderator if you have questions about such actions.
3. Cryptography and other forms of codes are generally not allowed. Breadcrumbs are generally okay.
   1. Do not attempt to use BBCode to hide messages.
   2. All text should be at least size 75. Exception: Text in ooc tags does not have to be resized from the default.
4. The direct quoting and/or copy-pasting of private communication is prohibited except as noted below. Violations of this rule can lead to modkills.
   1. The following may be copied (but not quoted) verbatim from role pms: 1) alignment 2) flip role/flavor name (generally second line of the role pm) and 3) effective role. Again, do not quote any of the preceding.
   2. Investigatives and other power roles may directly copy (not quote) unflavored results they receive. These are generally bolded.
   3. Mafia, masons, and other players with private topics known to consist solely of a single alignment may freely copy and/or quote role pms and result pms into the private topic. They may also submit night actions as a collective there as well by bolding. (Please be aware that in games like Grand Idea Mafia, masonries are not guaranteed to consist of solely one alignment, so this rule does not apply to those groups in those kinds of games.)
   4. Other forms of moderator communication should neither be directly copied nor quoted in the game-thread or anywhere else in this game.
   5. Do not reference timestamps, read statuses, private topic access numbers, and similar forms of metadata in the game thread. If you have a question about whether something is allowed, please ask.
   6. Do not link to private topics for any ongoing game into the main game thread. Do not quote posts from private topics from any ongoing game into the main thread.
   That includes this game.
   7. You may paraphrase anything not otherwise covered by these rules (unless otherwise specified); however, please be careful. Also, regardless of whether something is a direct quote or not, surrounding it in quotation marks (") is not acceptable. The moderator will automatically assume that anything that came from another thread that is surrounded in quotation marks is in fact a direct copy-paste and will take action as necessary.
5. Do not attempt to impersonate the game moderator, backup moderators, co-moderators, or site staff in any fashion.
   1. Purple is the moderator's color in the main thread, and #33AA99 is the moderator's color in private topics. You may use either color as you please provided that it is clear you are not trying to impersonate me by doing so.
   2. Player-provided votecounts should be explicitly marked as "Unofficial" and should not use the same format as official ones.
6. Do not edit or delete your posts.
   1. The moderator will not delete any posts for any reason including in private topics.
   2. For private topics, you are allowed up to 24 hours after the game concludes to request redactions of your posts. This does not apply in the dead/spectator PT.
   3. Posts edited by the moderator will be signed by the moderator and include the reason for the edit. Edit: Here is an example. ~Ircher
7. Do not cheat and attempt to play the game under multiple accounts.

Miscellaneous

1. Follow the spirit of the rules.
   1. Do not attempt to find loopholes in the ruleset.
   2. While the moderator generally assumes good faith, inadvertent rule breaks may also be punished if deemed necessary.
2. Do not pretend to break the rules. Please do not make my job harder than it needs to be.
3. A player is allowed to replace back into their slot if the slot has to be replaced multiple times provided that 1) the player was not force-replaced due to inactivity or a rule violation and 2) the player did not join the dead/spectator thread or otherwise receive information that would compromise the game.
4. Players may rescind their replacement requests privately as long as they have not received any information that compromises their slot and replacements have not already been found.
5. Penalties for breaking these rules include moderator notices, moderator warnings, force-replacement, referral to list moderators, and modkilling. (These are listed in increasing order of severity.)
6. The moderator reserves the right to update this ruleset as necessary. New items will be underlined, and deleted items will be striked through. (Note: The markup on this line is an example.)

Recap of Primary Rules

• Follow the golden rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
• Follow all site rules especially the ones against discussing ongoing games and threatening/demanding to replace out.
• Do not discuss replacements, both in terms of the incoming and outgoing players.
• Do not use the plain spoiler (blackout tag) by itself; use the spoiler= tag instead or combine it with colored text.
• Be mindful of other users. In particular, try to spoiler animated GIFs, videos, and posts with multiple images.
• Play to win the game and do not use provable randomness.
• Be sure to read your role pm. Do not claim to have done otherwise; if you did not receive a role pm, please PM the moderator. This also includes reading who your teammates (as mafia or other groupscum) are if that was sent in a separate pm.
• Please respect pronouns and avoid using the L-word.
• Follow the spirit of the rules, not the letter.
• The moderator reserves the right to update this ruleset as necessary.
• This summary is not (and cannot) be all-inclusive. Please take the time to familiarize yourself with the entire ruleset when you get the chance; things that are in bold are particularly important.

Activity and Deadline Rules

Standard Activity and Deadline Rules

1. Day 1 lasts 14 days. Day 2 lasts 10 days. All other days last 7 days. Nights last 48 hours.
   1. Night actions must be submitted at least fifteen (15) minutes before the deadline. This gives the moderator time to resolve actions and promptly start the next phase on time.
2. Day extensions are rare and are evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
   1. A minimum of 24 hours will be alloted to any player who replaces in. (More time may be granted if the thread is long.)
   2. Extensions for holidays (especially American holidays) will generally be accepted or announced in advance.
   3. Extensions for site down-time will be made as appropriate.
   4. Other extension requests are likely to be rejected.
3. Nights may be extended if a replacement is needed. A minimum of 24 hours will be granted for night actions after a replacement is found.
4. You must post at least once every 32 hours. The moderator will prod you if you do not. Note: Traditionally, I have relaxed activity requirements on weekends; however, in practice, this leads to the game stalling and causes more harm than it helps (as I learned in a survey response). Declaring V/LA on weekends is still acceptable if you have limited availability during the weekends.
   1. Unless the thread is locked, all prods must be responded to in-thread. All prods must be responded to within 32 hours of when the prod was issued.
5. You can prod dodge, but two (2) prod dodges are equivalent to a single prod. If you are prodded again from prod-dodging, you may not prod dodge. While a subjective rule, prod dodges are objectively defined as posts that contain little or no content related to the game. Minimum content is not defined here as to mitigate abuse but do realize that this rule is applied as objectively as possible.
6. V/LAs should be announced in-thread, not by pm. The moderator will not decline a request sent by pm, but your fellow players would like to know that you are gone as well. You should set V/LA tags in the User CP to ensure I do not forget. Setting them in the User CP makes it very easy for the moderator to see who is V/LA and not.
7. If you have regular weekend V/LA, it is your responsibility to inform me at the end of each week or to set V/LA status.
8. V/LA players must post at least once every 96 hours (4 days). Excessively long V/LAs (14 days or longer) may have stricter requirements imposed on them.
9. Your activity will be closely monitored. I reserve the right to warn and replace players whom I believe are exploiting loopholes in the activity rules.
10. To be clear, you are expected to post more than the bare minimum dictated by the prodding rules.

Experimental Activity and Deadline Rules

These experimental rules are intended to encourage more balanced activity. In today's meta, posting too little is less of a concern as compared to posting too much. A large portion of this is devoted to explaining my viewpoint on the issue; if you are skimming, focus on the first sentence and the stuff in bold.

1. Unless one of the following rules conflict with a previous rule, all of the rules under the standard activity and deadline rules section apply.
2. Day 1 has a minimum deadline of three (3) days. Day 2 has a minimum deadline of two (2) days. Days 3+ have a minimum deadline of one (1) day. Votes will still count during this time period. This minimum deadline is waived if there are five (5) or fewer living players. If a hammer occurs before the time limit expires, the game will enter a twilight phase where all players may continue to talk. The moderator will keep a countdown to indicate the earliest time the day may end. The intention behind this rule is to give everyone a chance to speak. It also encourages players not to spam everything at once but to take their time to formulate their thoughts.
3. You may double-post, but further posting in a row is heavily discouraged. More specifically, this rule is intended to cut down on things that needlessly clutter the thread such as spamming one liner quotes when catching up. This needlessly clutters the thread and takes up vertical space. It also makes it harder to refer back to older posts due to paging. With the advent of phones, this is a popular and "easy" method to catch up, but there are ways, even on phones, to combine smaller posts into larger ones. Try using the draft feature in gmail (or another email client of yours) or the notes app (on iPhones) to compose your thoughts in one post rather than as a burst of several posts.
4. Players that have a disproportionate number of posts at the end of a day phase will lose their vote in the following day. This is determined by computing the mean and standard deviation of number of posts (across the entire game) amongst all currently living players at the end of the day (including the recently hammered player, if applicable). The minimum and maximum post count will not be considered in this calculation. Any player whose total number of posts is greater than or equal to two standard deviations above the mean are considered to have a disproportionate number of posts. This rule is waived when there are five (5) or fewer living players. This rule only applies in non-normal games. Remember, not everyone can be online all the time. Be sure to give your fellow players a chance to speak rather than drowning out the thread with posts. Furthermore, spamming the thread is inconsiderate to players who are behind. They will become further behind even though they may in reality be posting at a reasonable rate. Please remember to be considerate of your fellow players at all times. If you are worried about your post count, you can use an online standard deviation calculator to check whether your post count falls astray of this guideline.
5. Penalties for violating the rules against posting too much include notices, warnings, loss of vote (in non-normal games), penalty votes (in non-normal games), and force-replacement (in escalating order of severity).

Setup-Specific Rules

These rules may be overridden by the particular setup's rules, but they should give a good baseline of what to expect.

Voting, Execution, and Twilight Rules

1. To vote, use bold (Vote: Player) or the vote tags. The latter is highly recommended to ensure your vote is not missed. The usage of bold is an antiquated way of doing it back before vote tags existed.
2. To unvote, use bold (Unvote: Player) or the unvote tags. The latter is again preferred and highly recommended.
3. You do not have to unvote to change votes. Furthermore, I will only track the last *valid* vote in your post.
4. Player abbreviations are allowed provided the moderator can reasonably determine whom the player is referring to.
5. Invalid or ambiguous votes will not be counted. The moderator will note such instances. Exceptions to this rule (for invalid votes) may be made in LimLo situations to prevent voting shenanigans.
6. Hammer occurs when half of all living players (rounded down) plus one cast a vote against the same player (or No Execution). All votes after a hammer will not be counted, and the hammered player is the one who will flip. The time following a hammer is Twilight, and all players may continue talking. This rule may be superseded by setup-specific rules or by the experimental activity and deadline rules. Please check the particular ruleset of the game you are in.
7. Simple majority rules apply unless otherwise specified: no execution will occur if deadline is reached without a hammer.
8. Players should cease talking as soon as twilight ends (i.e.: when the moderator posts). Twilight exists mainly for the moderator, not the players. Do not rely too heavily upon it.

Typical Setup Rules for Normal Games

These rules to most explicitly normal games I run. Please remember that a specific game may override these rules as appropriate.

1. All private topics possess daytalk.
2. Unless otherwise specified, mafia may not perform a kill and use an active ability at the same time.
3. If this is a micro, the game begins with 7 town and 2 scum. If this is a mini, the game begins with 10 town and 3 scum. Player ratios in large normals vary; please check the specific game's ruleset.
4. This setup was approved for normalcy and balance as governed by the Normal Guidelines.
5. Here is a sample role PM (it's very possible the moderator is lazy and does not edit the number or title): Welcome to {Size} Normal {#}: {Title}.
You are a Vanilla Townie.

You possess no special abilities other than your vote and your voice.

You win when all threats to the town are eliminated, and at least one townie is still alive.
Confirm by pm'ing me your alignment and role name.