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Wisdom of the Crowds

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Wisdom of the Crowds is an optional signup method of excluding Village Idiots or disruptive players without resorting to a traditional moderator-written blacklist.

Here's one way it could work:

Every player who /ins for the game has the right to PM the mod with the name of someone else in the list they ABSOLUTELY don't want to play with. If X people do this about the same player, that individual is removed from the playerlist. Nobody should be posting about this in the signup thread except the mod, who shouldn't say WHO excluded the player. Mods can overrule if they suspect shenanigans, with the understanding that doing so may cause X people to /out from the game (tip: this already happens when you don't remove some players). Obviously this requires some sort of 'comment period' on the last few players, to avoid gaming the system. 24 hours ought to be plenty for that.

If your list is more than X players long, you probably won't be happy in that game regardless of whether several of them get banned. Think of that before trying to ban the entire playerlist out of spite.

Mr. Flay came up with this as a way to move the policy elimination into the pregame. This isn't entirely new. Objective criteria for excluding people from the game have been allowed for a long time (always?). Some mods have lately started refusing people from signups if they get private complaints. This just formalizes it, gives the power of who you play with back to the players, and hopefully will make games run smoother in the future.

WOTC

disambiguation entry.

  • Wisdom of the crowds is how we actually play mafia. "is the collective opinion of a diverse independent group of individuals rather than that of a single expert". We are in effect a Trial by Jury where everyone is a suspect of a future crime that is anticipated and expected with the added caveat that the Killers are also on the Jury. First thought of by Aristotle. Where people come together to be better, collectively. Decision Making is made by the collective group hoping to achieve a good outcome.
  • It can be put into effect in a mafia game like this: Players V, W, X, Y, and Z are in a game. Only one mafia is left. Players W, X, Y, and Z think Player V is town. Conclusion: Player V is likely town. This can be used to great effect early on in the game or even late in the game when rereading. Once a flip occurs always remember to re-evaluate your world view.

Variants

In Wisdom of the Mod (or WOTM), the moderator may elect to disallow a player to play in a game.

In Wisdom of the One (or WOTO or WOT1), players can appeal to the mod with complaints against a certain player, and the mod will attempt to rectify the problem as best as they can. Unlike WoTC, it is not guaranteed that a player will get outted due to another player's complaints. Unlike WoTM, the decision doesn't rely solely on the moderator. In a way, it serves as a middleground between the two.