CHOOSE-YOUR-OWN-MATERIA - CYOM5This is a mafia game in the CYOM series. In this game, powers are held in "materia": tradeable spheres that can be equipped to different slots to have different effects.
These games always have had these two features:
- Semi-open setup: all possible mechanics are known to the players at game start, though the exact arrangement is unknown
- Power-Creep: Players gain XP at the end of each day they survive, and may improve their powerset with XP.
CYOM is also inspired by the Choose-Your-Own-Spheres (CYOS) games, with their sphere web. Where CYOS had a Final Fantasy 10-style sphere grid, this game has Materia: power spheres that can be put into slots for different effects. This game follows a similar pattern to earlier CYOMs, though it is slightly different:
- Delayed-open setup: all mechanics are contained in materia, but players only know what possible materia there is, and what the materia they own does.
- Materia-As-XP: The materia itself is the form of XP. At the start of the game each player will gain five random materia, and another random materia at the end of each night. Materia can either be equipped, traded in the day, or spent for extra actions and respeccing.
Each player has the following slots with which to place their materia:
Weapon: [Gives them an action that can be used on other players]
Armour: [Gives them an immunity]
Accessory: [Changes their role]
During character creation, each player suggests 1-3 materia for inclusion in the game. Materia inspired by the players suggestions will form the pool for the game. I may reword or amend names for brevity, or combine similiar suggestions.
When you join the game, you must
privately PM the mod 1-3 materia ideas. Materia should be 1-2 word
elemental types (like
FF7 materia,
Pokemon types,
D&D damage types,
CYOM powers or even
mafia roles). Don't submit 'Evil', or words like it, as it's already taken. Keep in mind the more materia you suggest, the more mechanically complex the game will be.
By default, you start with five random materia and one slot in each equipment type.
You may optionally decide to replace any number of those five with your own suggestions (e.g. if you suggest Pig and Lust, you could choose to x2 Pig, x2 Lust and one random, or 5 Pig, or 4 random and a Lust etc.). In which case, PM the mod the desired ratio before the game begins.
Equipment slots:
Weapon: []
Armour: []
Accessory: []
At the start of each night, you may spend materia to gain additional slots.
Basic rules:
- Mafia is a game of informed minority vs uninformed majority. It alternates between day and night phases. During a day, players vote to eliminate a player. During a night, players submit an action to the mod. Players have different winconditions, and the game ends when there is no more uncertainty over who will win.
- No PMing to anyone but me, the mod.
- No Quoting of the Mod in relation to PMs. You are free to quote anything in the thread. You may also paraphrase. You may directly share the text of sphere abilities if you wish.
- Semi-hammers in effect. Days last on a soft 48 hours, unless majority is voting for any player or No Lynch. If a player is hammered, there is to be no more talking. If you accidentally post something after the hammer, you can and should edit out the post.
- Nights last 24 hours or until all players have submitted an action.
- Weekends count for 0 hours.
- There are no extensions.
- Vote by putting player names in bold and red: Bold and Red.
- Use powers by sending a PM to the mod; scum can do this using their Discord channel.
- You can always vote for "no elimination"
- Ordinarily, players are limited to one action per phase.
- Probably some other stuff that I've forgotten right now, but you know the drill.
At the start of the game, the name of all Materia in play will be listed, though not what each one does. Assuming 12 players and no materia combining, there would be 12-36 non-Evil materia in play.
Each Materia typically give an effect on attack, give immunity to themselves if put in defence, or give a new role element. Some materia have additional effects such as granting additional slots or unique role mechanics. Abilities do not typically interfere with equipped materia. No ability other than the mafia's unique Evil Materia can kill directly, though poison, conditional kills etc., are all possible. The purpose of most abilities is to either harm players you think are opposed to you, or increase your knowledge about the game and the movements of others. Use these tools appropriately to further your win condition.
When players are given random materia, duplicates are possible: each draw is an even chance from all possible non-Evil materia. It's possible for a materia not to be present anywhere at the start of the game (e.g. no one happens to pick or randomly draws Thunder).
Examples
Here are some example materia that probably won't appear in the game, but demonstrate the sort of mechanics:
Weapon | Armour | Accessory
Fire: Burn (inflicts burn at the end of the night; if the player was already burnt, kill the player) | Fire Immunity | Burn anyone targeting you
Slow: Delay | Delay Immunity | Act last
Nurture: Guard (grant your immunities to target) | Guard Immunity, +2 Bonus Armour slots | Guard a random player each night
Theft: Steal (one random loose materia) | Steal Immunity | Your attacks also steal one random loose materia
Evil Materia
The mafia have one copy of the Evil materia. During the first night, they should probably decide who among their number is holding it.
Evil: Kill | Kill Immunity | Kill the first person targeting you each night
The Kill Immunity works for all forms of ability-based kills (example: being frozen then shattered, being burnt twice, death by poison) but not the day elimination.
If the holder of the Evil materia is ever killed or eliminated, the Evil materia reverts to the mafia team at the start of the next phase. If the Evil materia is ever destroyed, it enters the pool of possible random materia that can be gained (through xp etc) but only for mafia members.
Evil cannot be duplicated, cloned or otherwise be used multiple times in the same phase.
Keywords
Some mechanics are explained in a glossary of keywords. There is a public glossary which is updated every time someone dies with the keywords associated with the dead player's materia. Each materia has at most one keyword that is revealed to the owner.
At the start of each day from D2 onwards, players will gain a new random materia.
At the start of each night, before any actions are sent or processed, players may place any loose materia in any empty slots they have. They may also optionally spend loose materia that they have to do the following Meta actions. Players can do any number of Meta actions that they can afford and may do the same Meta action multiple times if they have the materia to do so. Players may additionally equip any loose materia after using any Meta action (so you can buy a New Slot and fill it immediately after if you have the materia to do so).
Meta Actions
Respec: Spend one materia and remove all materia from all slots, so they may be re-assigned.
New slot: Gain a new slot. Spend materia equal to the new slot's number. (e.g. two materia for the second slot in a weapon). Bonus slots don't count towards the cost. (e.g. if a player had one slot in Armour, with the Nurture sphere giving them two bonus slots, it would still only cost two materia to gain another Armour slot, giving them four in total). Additional slots in weapons give combined slots ([]-[]), in which an attack triggers all combined materia's effects.
Refine: Spend one materia and gain one materia of your choice at the end of the night. Evil cannot be gained this way.
Duplicate: Spend two materia and choose another materia you currently have assigned or loose: instantly gain another copy of the chosen materia. Evil may not be Duplicated.
In the thread during the day, players can opt to Trade [number] materia with {Player} in exchange for [number] materia. Trades are processed at the end of the day, if pairs match. Players may specify to one another what they're trading, wheedle and bargain as much as they like, but all trade contents are blind: players must PM the mod the materia they actually intend to trade. If they fail to PM the mod, the materia will be chosen randomly from the loose materia held by the player, if possible. When trades are received, the materia received are listed alphabetically with no source given. Only loose materia may be traded.
Trades cannot be unmade and are processed from the first (valid) trade each player makes to the last.
E.g. Bloggs says "Trade 2 materia to Jane Doe for 1 materia - I've got some trash I'll give for anything". Jane Doe replies, "trade 1 materia to Bloggs for 2 materia". The pairs match and the trade goes through at the end of the day.
The mafia may privately and instantly trade whatever materia they have in their collection at the start of each night, and may do so before or after respeccing.
In CYOM5, there are only two alignments: Town and Mafia. Players will know how many of each mafia there are to find (the number will depend on the player count and possibly the materia).
Town Wincondition: You win when all mafia are dead, and at least one town player still lives.
Mafia Wincondition: You win when all town are dead, and at least one mafia player still lives.
A draw is possible if somehow no one survives.
There are no alignment inspections (and as such, no millers, godfathers etc.). There are no equipped-materia inspections or thefts, so the Evil materia can never be directly discovered on a player (except if scum decide for some reason to keep it loose, give or trade it away).
- TricMagic
- Imp
- Vermillion Skies
- Elephant Parade
- FallacyofUrist
- Crystalizedmire
- Gail 42
- Magma Mater
- zemaj
- Salvatore Monday
- ToonyMan
Chats will occur on the Ludorium server, which all players should join.
Author
Topic: CYOM 5: Choose-Your-Own-Materia - Day One - Equivalent Exchange (Read 1725 times)