Policy Discussion: Invitationals

[Fiasco]

1) yes
2) maybe 1 big game and 2-3 minis a year
3) if themed, it should be a theme with very broad appeal
4) voting sounds like a bad idea; I'd use a small panel of people who 1) are generally respected (maybe listmoddish types), 2) have been on the site long enough and played enough games, and 3) don't want to participate in the invitational themselves

[Fiasco]

Maybe the inviter(s) should be anonymous people who are trusted by the mod.

[Fiasco]

People might try to drum up support. (edit: this was in response to TSQ)

I don't see how letting everyone vote would make for a fairer or more interesting selection of invitees. It's more work, too. Anonymous unaccountable elites for the win.

[Fiasco]

Doesn't take away my objections:

* People will pester their friends into voting for them
* The game will be filled with the most active friend-pesterers and with players who are highly visible for the wrong reasons
* More potential for "ill will on the part of those who don't get in"; votes won't stay completely secret (personally I don't really care if I get to participate; I just would like to see games with exceptional-quality play)
* No potential to match a set of players to each other for playing style or whatever
* Voting and counting votes means unnecessary effort
* The average voter isn't as good at picking an interesting set of players as the average Anonymous Trusted Veteran

[Fiasco]

If our population was more invested in each of their games, I'd support the idea of an open-sized game. Problem is, I fear that it would do one of two things:
a) the game would be so large and unwieldy that it would suck the life out of many other games on the site;
b) no one would want to get in a game so large and unwieldy, and it would lose the specialness you're looking for because only 12-15 people would sign up.

As I suggested earlier, if you define twelve "players" based on join month or first letter of username, then let everyone participate on behalf of their respective "player", everyone can play without the game getting too big. Call it "Hydra Mafia"; people grow new heads all the time.

Err, yeah, I've been wondering about this, but we could attempt to set up a cross-site Invitational. Not just GL and this site, but also from other sites with good Mafia players.

QFT

[Fiasco]

Not really; you'd only send someone a role PM as soon as they first posted in the thread. If that's still too much work for the mod, ask active players to pass along their team's PM to any newcomers.

I guess assigning team membership completely at random would work just as well as basing it on month/letter, BTW.

[Fiasco]

That's not an invitational, though, and it has broken scoring rules.

[Fiasco]

Just because there are players in it from different sites?

[Fiasco]

He is totally talking about me.

You might very well think that. I couldn't possibly comment.