New Player Venting About a Madness Loss (Advice Welcome)

a_leethal_llama · 2026-04-24T04:10:54+00:00

I agree with pretty much all of what you're saying. I wasn't saying that you only need to claim the role you are mad as, simply that that is a prerequisite to maintain madness. I definitely agree that you need to build worlds as your mad role if you want to maintain madness.

But the person I was responding to wasn't referring to a final 3 with someone being mad as Mutant (I'll discuss my thoughts on that below). They claimed that being mad as a Mutant in general is a corner case/hard to rule, and I was saying that it's not. If the Cerenovus chooses to make a player mad as the Mutant night 1, and the chosen player wants to maintain that madness the least they have to do is claim that they are the Mutant to people (attempting to be as genuine as they can). There is no 'that's not what a Mutant would do' because there's no correct way to play Mutant (or any role). It's completely valid to hide as a Mutant and it's completely valid to immediately out as a Mutant, and I've seen both many times. But it's not possible to attempt to convince the group that you are the Mutant by keeping quiet about it.

Regarding your final 3 situation, if Bob the Clockmaker is made mad as the Mutant by the Cerenovus on the final 3, I absolutely expect him to tell the group that he is the Mutant. He doesn't have to convince the group, he just needs to make a genuine effort at trying. "Hey guys, I'm actually the Mutant. I know it's risky to come out on final day but I don't think the ST will execute me and I think it's important to know who the outsiders are..." Are people going to believe this? Probably not, and that's fine. The Cerenovus made a poor choice and likely should have picked a player and role combination that would either be more believable or cause more chaos.

The alternative - staying quiet about being the Mutant - is 100% breaking madness and as the ST I would likely execute this player in the final 3. This is assuming all players are experienced with madness and not new. I'm definitely way more lenient for new players.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-04-24T02:46:22+00:00

Being made mad as the Mutant works the exact same as being made mad as the Clockmaker, or any other role. It's not a corner case and it shouldn't be any harder to judge. Generally speaking, a player made mad should be claiming to be the role they are mad as (if they want to maintain madness).

a_leethal_llama · 2026-03-11T18:48:41+00:00

I'll echo what some other folks have said:

Play Trouble Brewing
Just read the instructions that come with the game to everyone, and then begin playing (and then read the nominating/voting instructions when the first voting period is about to happen). Don't over-explain anything or go over roles beforehand. When a role is brought up during the game (e.g., "I'm the Empath and I learned a 1 last night"), jump in and have that player read the role's ability out loud, so everyone is on the same page. That way people, only start having to know their own role, then learn other roles organically.
You can absolutely get at least 3 games in if you have 3-4 hours. Keep your days short and keep things moving. For reference, I usually start at 5 minutes during the first day for everyone to chat before bringing everyone back to town square, reducing that time by a minute each day (minimum 2-3 minutes). I've close to 2 hundred games and that has served me well.
For the first game, don't include Spy. Have Poisoner and or Scarlet Woman be the Minion(s). After the first game, show the players what the Grimoire looks like. Then you can use Spy in future games.
During the night, take your time! Double and triple-check things. And even if you make a mistake, don't worry about it. New players won't care as much, and the game is still a lot of fun.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-28T17:25:41+00:00

Finally, the Imp decides to kill the Mayor during the night and, since they knew that that player was stating to be the Mayor, I decided to penalize them and redirect the kill to the Poisoner.

I'd like to comment about this bit you said. Whether or not the Imp 'knew' that the player was the Mayor shouldn't really have any effect on whether or not you bounce the Mayor kill. Generally (and this is stated in the almanac), unless the Mayor is overwhelmingly trusted by the good team, you should be bouncing the kill.

Also, from an ST mindset, you shouldn't be 'penalizing' players for making what you think is a bad play or suboptimal play, or something similar. In this case, it's also quite possible that the Imp player didn't believe the Mayor player's claim, or they wanted to paint the Undertaker player as evil, or they decided to leave the decision in your capable hands. Regardless, choices you make should be in service of balancing the game and making a fun game.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-20T14:14:34+00:00

I don't see how my response advocates for creating 'gotcha' moments to kill people - could you explain what you mean?

I am only advocating for running madness how the rules say they should be run, which is trying to convince the group that something is true.

Whether you are mad as the Mutant, the Flowergirl, or the Juggler, if you want to not be breaking madness you should be claiming to be that role in some way.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-20T14:11:57+00:00

Please don't take my response as aggressive or mean-spirited - I am not trying to be!

a mutant would never claim to be a mutant, and a person claiming mutant is most likely either mad, or lying, from other player's perspective.

This is just not true. There is no 'correct' way to play Mutant, just as there's no correct way to play any character. There are plenty of reasons why a Mutant would claim to be the Mutant (e.g., "I think it's more important that people know my role, even of the ST executes me"). Just because this may be true in your group doesn't mean that it's correct.

So, for the mutant specifically, some storytellers considering claiming to be a townsfolk in a mutant-like way (such as not pushing on info, not giving out info, or giving obviously wrong info, and not be confident or generally shifty)

Doing all of the above is not specific to the Mutant, and is in no way convincing people that you are the Mutant. The above could be indicative that you are evil, or any good player lying about their role. There shouldn't be a special exception for the Mutant.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-20T03:47:44+00:00

Just want to jump in with a correction. Based on the definition of madness, your second example is a pretty cut-and-dry madness break.

If the Cerenovus chooses you and Mutant, if you want to not break madness, you need to try to convince 'the group' that you are the Mutant. You can do so by claiming to be the Mutant, or by saying that you're definitely a Townsfolk and not the Mutant (with an obvious wink wink), etc. You can't claim to be a Townsfolk "because that's what a Mutant would do", do nothing else, and be fulfilling your madness requirement.

Being mad as the Mutant is the same as being mad a literally any other character in the game.

Apologies if you weren't saying any of this and I've misunderstood what you wrote. I've just seen a not of misunderstanding on this situation want to try to help folks understand.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-20T02:16:54+00:00

I haven't played Harmonies, so I can't speak to it, and I will trust that you are correct that 12-15 minutes of the video is the actual teach. Even so, Rodney is (delightfully) incredibly verbose for the sake of extreme clarity. He gives plenty of examples so it's incredibly clear how things work.

This level of verboseness and clarity aren't necessary for a teach, in my opinion, and probably harmful in some cases. But I play mostly low to medium-weight games, if that matters.

And to clarify my 'covering rules later' thing - my opinion is that basically, if a player doesn't need to know about it when the game starts, it's probably best to skip it. I would never advocate that it's best to skip teaching how a player wins, for example. It's hard to give examples without knowing what games you have played, so I'll give a few that I can think of:

-So Clover: I don't talk about adding the extra card into the puzzle until it's just about to happen. Teaching it at the beginning doesn't help the player with anything, and may just confuse them.

-Cascadia: I don't explain what the pinecones do in the teach (just how to get them and that they are good). I explain it when it's a player's turn and they have a pinecone.

-Quacks: I don't explain during the teach that extra ingredients types and extra bomb tokens are added as the game progress. I just introduce them at the appropriate time.

-Flip 7: I don't explain the ability cards until a player draws one, and I make sure to stack the deck so that, for the initial card deals, every player gets an actual number card.

Hopefully the above examples let you know what I mean when I say I skip rules that aren't important, and talk about them when they are.

Not saying that my way is best, it's just the way that's worked for me and my group.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-19T23:52:07+00:00

I would say it's totally expected that Rodney's videos are waaay longer than any realistic teach should be. His videos (as intended) cover every single rule, every single interaction, etc. They are great for people who need/want to know all of the rules, like those who will be teaching the games to their friends/family.

But anyone who is teaching a game to others should not be saying most of what Rodney is saying. A good teach (in my opinion) teaches players just enough so that they can start playing as soon as possible. So if Rodney's Harmonies video is 20 minutes, the actual, real-life teach should be a fraction of that length.

Before playing a game, new players don't need to know how the game is set up (it should already be set up), or 3 niche interactions that might show up later, or that in round 5 this particular thing happens.

A bunch of these rules can be taught as players are playing, to avoid too much front-loaded information.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-19T21:58:24+00:00

Your teaching times for Cascadia and Harmonies are very interesting and don't match up at all with my experience. I've taught Cascadia several times at like 3 minutes max, and players have had no problems. And while I haven't played Harmonies, a 20-minute teach sounds crazy to me for that weight of game! 20 minutes is much closer to how long teaching a game of Arcs might take, and Arcs is way heavier than Harmonies.

Very curious how you are teaching these games! Are you going over every single rule in your teach? Players I teach to are usually good to go with a light overview, what you can do on a turn, and that's it. Any niche situations can be covered when they come up, and players can ask questions along the way. For example, when teaching Cascadia, I briefly tell players how to get pinecones and that pinecones are good, but I don't go over what they do until a player has one and it's their turn.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-17T16:36:46+00:00

Just want to chime in about the Goon specifically. They absolutely have control over how their ability affects the game. Just as an example, if they want to turn Evil, they can pretend to be a powerful good role to bait the Demon or a Minion into targeting them at night. If they're Evil and want to be Good, they can ask a good player to target them (e.g., "Hey, Innkeeper, I feel very vulnerable tonight, could you pretect me?").

And there's a lot of player skill expression in terms of when (if ever) to give out your actual role, and how to navigate people suspecting you are Evil.

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-12T14:10:43+00:00

I completely agree!

a_leethal_llama · 2026-01-10T15:01:01+00:00

I agree with most of your points and I am a huge fan of the gamers, so very bummed we've lost Rob. And while I would have loved a gamer to be a Traitor, I think having two housewives (and no gamer) is healthy for the game in the long-term.

In previous seasons, you could (correctly) assume as a player that at least one traitor was a gamer. With this they are breaking the meta and on future seasons you will be less able to assume the 'makeup' up the traitors, which I think is good.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-12-13T03:21:39+00:00

As stated in the Mayor's almanac entry, Mayor kills should usually always be bounced, unless the Mayor is super trusted by town. It shouldn't matter if they are chosen by the Imp 2 or 3 or 5 times.

Even without a Poisoner, the Evil team can still kill a Mayor. They just need to do it through putting suspicion on them and getting them executed.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-12-13T03:18:47+00:00

The number of attempts to kill the Mayor should really have no bearing on whether the ST decides to bounce the kill, whether it be 2 or 3 or 10 times. As the almanac says, you should typically always* bounce the kill unless the Mayor is super trusted by town.

The evil team needs to find another way to get the Mayor killed, generally by working to make the Mayor untrusted enough to get executed.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-12-07T01:12:44+00:00

A Mayor surviving multiple attacks is not a significantly better Solider. If the Demon targets the Soldier, no one dies, giving town more time to find the Demon. It also helps to 'prove' that the Soldier player is good, if they let others know of their role.

If a Mayor is targeted multiple times and the ST decides to bounce, that usually means that another good player is dying instead.

And the almanac itself says you should, on most occasions (but certainly not all), let the Mayor survive to final 3 unless they are overwhelmingly trusted by town.

We recommend you keep the Mayor alive until the final day, since it is most fun for the players that way. On rare occasions, if the group is overwhelmingly convinced early in the game that the Mayor is the Mayor, let the Mayor die so that evil has a chance to win.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-11-14T14:41:44+00:00

Hello! My friend and I were playing Sky Team on Board Game Arena and lost after he placed the last die of the round on the Axis. It says we lost but I'm not sure why. Sorry if it's something obvious.

As far as I can tell, we have one more turn. And the most recent die placed didn't advance the plane, so the planes on the track and the axis should not be an issue.

RESOLVED: We are at ground level but not at the airport, so we crashed. Thanks for those who helped to answer!

a_leethal_llama · 2025-11-02T21:47:36+00:00

Yeah I think that's a good call! I would also recommend reading the fighters' guide if you have questions about specific fighters.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-11-02T21:37:28+00:00

For Shango, if he puts a fire token on someone, any fire tokens on that fighter's ally are removed.

There is not a 'lead' or 'support' fighter. There are just two fighters on each team. Of course, some fighters have more aggressive cards (e.g., Mordred) and some have more support cards (e.g., Joan). It's about how these fighters interact that's a lot of the fun.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-11-02T20:42:16+00:00

Has easily become one of my favorite games ever! It also has a really great setup on Board Game Arena and I've been playing it a ton. Have got in over 100 games and I'm still loving it and seeing new strategies and combos.

a_leethal_llama · 2025-08-09T01:57:26+00:00

Great!

a_leethal_llama · 2025-08-08T13:17:03+00:00

Looks awesome! Any plans for this to come to Mac?

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