2020 Match 1 of The Resistance: Avalon

Welcome to 2020 Match 1 of The Resistance: Avalon on qt3! Borrowing rowe’s adaptation of fire’s excellent write-up from our past games:

Three Evil-doers have infiltrated the ranks of the loyal Good folk of King Arthur. And now, they must survive five harrowing quests to prove their loyalty to the Round Table. Will Arthur’s servants succeed in at least three of the five quests? Or will Evil thwart any attempts at success?

In this game, there will be 6 Loyal Servants of King Arthur and 4 Minions of Mordred. The number of players per quest is as follows. An asterisk (*) indicates that two Failure votes are required to fail the quest, when normally only one is required.

Quest 1: 3 players
Quest 2: 4 players
Quest 3: 4 players
Quest 4: 5 players ( 2 failure votes needed)
Quest 5: 5 players

========== The rules ==========

There are five turns, or quests. The game winner is determined by the majority: the winning faction succeeds in their goals in three or more quests. That is, Good wins if three or more quests succeed and Merlin survives; Evil wins if three or more quests fail.

There is a strict no PMs policy (except to the moderator for voting). Feel free to send your paranoid thoughts to me though so you can safely vent or get things off your chest.

Setup: Player order is randomized and players are randomly assigned roles (see below for more info on each role.) Players receive their role assignments. Each role will receive a PM with the following information:

Good characters (6 total):
Merlin - Knows Evil (except for Mordred), must remain hidden
Percival - Knows Merlin (also Morgana, and can’t tell which is which)
Loyal Servant of Arthur (quantity: 4) - you get squat, just the knowledge that you’re a Good person (which is enough reward)

Evil characters (4 total):
Morgana - Appears as Merlin to Percival; knows Assassin and Mordred
Assassin - Minion of Mordred; knows Morgana and Mordred
Mordred - Unknown to Merlin; knows Morgana and Assassin
Oberon - Appears to Merlin; unseen to other evil, has no knowledge

========== Round order ==========

Leader Selection: The first Party Leader (for Quest 1) is selected at random. In normal play, subsequent Party Leaders proceed down the list, and the list wraps around. Plot cards: A player can assume team leadership at this time using the Strong Leader plot card. Strong Leader cards can be played immediately after No Confidence.

Quest Start: Plot Cards: At the beginning of each quest (i.e., the first Party Leader for each quest), the party leader is dealt three Plot Cards in-thread. The number of plot cards depends on the number of players, as follows:
5-6 players: 1 plot card
7-8 players: 2 plot cards
9-10 players: 3 plot cards
Thus, for 10 players, there will be 3 plot cards per round. The party leader distributes the Plot Cards to any of the other players (not him/herself).

Quest Start, Party Selection: At the start of the Quest, the party leader chooses a number of players to accompany him or her on a quest. This is done publicly in-thread. The party size for each quest is determined by the number of players, according to the rules.

Party Vote: Players vote (open ballot) on whether the quest should be allowed to proceed. Voting will be called at 24 hours past the quest announcement and absent votes, abstentions, and passes will be counted as yes-votes. Votes may be PMed to me so that voting order does not influence anybody; alternately, you may vote publicly in-thread. I will post the results of the votes including the names of all voters. Majority wins; ties favor failure. Please bold your vote if you vote in-thread. Players that miss two votes in a row will be disqualified from the game.

Party Vote Results: The results of the party selection and each player’s vote will be displayed publicly in-thread.
If the majority of the votes are negative: proceed to Quest Start, Party Selection again. This counts as a party leadership change. Five party leadership changes in one quest results in an Evil victory for the game. Plot cards: No Confidence Plot Cards happen after the vote in-thread. These count as a party leadership change.

Call to Arms: The moderator will announce that the quest is a go, and that quest’s party members must PM their votes (see below). Plot cards: In The Spotlight happens now: play the card in-thread. Your answer will also be delivered in-thread.

Quest Vote: Players selected for the quest vote on whether the quest succeeds or fails (closed ballot). Quest party members must PM me their votes once called. In the first three turns and the final turn, one failure-vote fails the quest for the Good faction (and wins it for Evil.) In the fourth turn, two failure-votes are required for Evil to fail the quest.

Good players must vote SUCCESS. Evil players may choose to vote SUCCESS or FAILURE. This vote is a closed ballot. Vote order will be randomized and revealed without player names. Any missing votes will be treated as SUCCESS votes. Players that miss two votes in a row will be disqualified from the game.

Quest Results: The result of the quest is revealed, including each randomized and anonymized vote and whether the quest succeeded or failed. Plot cards: Keeping a Close Eye on You cards can be played at this time: play the card in-thread and your answer will come from me by PM.

========== Plot cards ==========
Plot cards (quantity in parentheses)

(2) Keeping a close eye on you: You may look at one played Mission card
One-time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card may use this card to examine a played Quest card. Using this card does not require a player to announce its use before the Quest cards are played, nor does it affect the Quest card played. Multiple Quest cards may be checked in a single round, but no more than one player may check a single player’s Quest card on a round

(1) Establish Confidence: The Leader must show their Affiliation (Good/Evil) card to a player of their choice
Use immediately – The Leader must pass their Affiliation (Good/Evil) card to any other player for examination

(2) Strong Leader: You can become the Leader. Play before Plot or Team Cards have been distributed
One time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card may use this card to become the Leader. Use of this card must be declared before the Leader takes any actions (draw Plot Cards or distributing Team cards). When a “Strong Leader” is played, another “Strong Leader” may not be played until a Vote has been taken

(2) Overheard Conversation: You must look at the Affiliation (Good/Evil) card of a player on your immediate right or left
Extended description: Use immediately – The player to whom the Leader passes this card must look at the Affiliation (Good/Evil) card of one adjacent player. MB: The “adjacent” player is up or down the list; select the adjacent player publicly and the moderator will PM the result

(3) No Confidence: You may null an approved Vote and force leadership change
One time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card may use this card to reject an approved Mission team (successful Vote). Using this card counts as a failed Vote

(1) In the Spotlight: You can choose another player to submit their Quest card face up
One-time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card may use this card to force a player to play their Quest card face up. The player playing this card must declare its use and the target player prior to any player on the Quest team selecting their Quest card

(1) Open Up: You must reveal your Affiliation (Good/Evil) card to one player of your choice
Use immediately – The player to whom the Leader passes this card must pass their Affiliation (Good/Evil) card to any other player (including the Leader) for examination. NB: The result (Good or Evil) will come from the moderator by PM

(1) Take Responsibility: You must take a Plot card from another player
One-time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card must take one Plot card from any other player.

(2) Chicago Proxy: You may cast another player’s team vote
One-time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card may chose another player and take their team vote giving the card player two team votes.

========= TL;DR Notes: ===========

  • This is a 10 player game, 6 Good, 4 Evil Including Oberon
  • The 2 Opinion Maker cards have been replaced with 2 Chicago Proxy cards which allow a player to steal a team vote (not a mission vote!)

Player Order:
@caseyrobinson
@rho21
@rowe33
@knightsaber
@cuthbert
@soondifferent
@scottagibson
@craigm
@jorn_weines
@snebmi

@caseyrobinson is the first leader and has been dealt the following cards:
Overheard Conversation: You must look at the Affiliation (Good/Evil) card of a player on your immediate right or left / Extended description: Use immediately – The player to whom the Leader passes this card must look at the Affiliation (Good/Evil) card of one adjacent player. MB: The “adjacent” player is up or down the list; select the adjacent player publicly and the moderator will PM the result
Establish Confidence: The Leader must show their Affiliation (Good/Evil) card to a player of their choice / Use immediately – The Leader must pass their Affiliation (Good/Evil) card to any other player for examination
Strong Leader: You can become the Leader. Play before Plot or Team Cards have been distributed / One time use – The player to whom the Leader passes this card may use this card to become the Leader. Use of this card must be declared before the Leader takes any actions (draw Plot Cards or distributing Team cards). When a “Strong Leader” is played, another “Strong Leader” may not be played until a Vote has been taken

I want to just add an extra note here to remind people that the Opinion Maker cards have been replaced. This is because they are kind of dumb but also because they really slow down the game in forum format.

Also, the time frame to vote will be loosely enforced, particularly considering the timezones in play, but I would appreciate if people can try and check in daily. This game is best if everyone spends at least 3 hours a day arguing in this thread. I have seen a bunch of you over in P&R so I know that should be any easy thing :)

Some great cards right off the bat…IF Casey uses them for Good!

I’m free a lot of the day, but I have a couple hour-long meetings per day and I can’t really check in during those. I shouldn’t be really busy for more than an hour or so though.

Would be better if the Strong Leader came out later, when we had some established goods. But these are decent cards. Let’s see what shenanigans Casey gets up to with them.

He can still wait to give Strong Leader until we get some info from the cards. In fact, these cards will probably give more info than most missions would, if he uses them right. They could also really hurt us if he uses them wrong. So, we’ll see, but the game’s barely started and this is already exciting.

Signing in. Good luck all.

Good luck to good!

I’d like to get a chain of trust going so let’s start with the OC to @Jorn_Weines .

Is the plan then for Jorn to overhear me and for you to EC to me?

@Jorn_Weines choose to look at the loyalty of either:
@craigm
@snebmi

Turn one and we get to have fun and interesting times already!

Ok so who gets the first accusation of cylon Mordredfulness?

My accusations quiver is full, but now I bide my time and see what people decide to do.

I will look at @Snebmi @Lantz

@CaseyRobinson Jorn has been updated with Snebmi’s loyalty

I’ve forgotten everything from ye grande codex of inquisitorial best practices, is it suspicious that he’s going backwards instead of gathering information on the up and coming leaders?

Quick, someone teach me the meta.

Generally, the reason behind going backwards or forwards is because we’ve decided that’s random. If he ECed to someone in the middle, that would be suspicious, because why EC to someone in the middle? Is it really random? As far as I know, this group usually goes backwards (not 100% sure) so I would say that as of yet, he hasn’t done anything out of the ordinary. He wouldn’t necessarily want to give his Overheard to someone next to him if he wants to build a chain, since that person could just as easily look at him. Giving it to someone two steps away (Jorn, for instance, because I’m next to Casey) is probably the most random thing he could do in this situation. That way, Jorn can check on me and (assuming he says I’m Good) Casey can EC to me and we’ll have a chain.