Post by Mettaton on Aug 20, 2017 11:52:05 GMT -4
Note: These are taken from other sites, which will be credited at the bottom part of this post. Please use CTRL+F to find the specific terminology you are looking for.
ATE (Appeal to Emotion): This is typically used to undermine a player's argument by suggesting that it is not logically based but instead designed to get reader(s) to agree with the player for emotion-based reasons.
For example, Player 1 encouraging everyone to lynch Player 2 because Player 2 has played like crap, doesn't deserve the win, and his type of play shouldn't be encouraged would be an ATE / Appeal to Emotion designed to convince players to vote for Player 2 because of their anger at his playstyle versus anything about his alignment.
This term is almost always used in a pejorative way given ATE is typically not beneficial to the Town and can be used manipulatively to secure mislynches.
AMA (Ask Me Anything): Refers to when a player is openly asking others to ask him any questions that they have. This is often seen as a bit open-ended and perhaps passive -- i.e. the player in question is asking others to prompt him as opposed to moving the game forward on his own with his thoughts.
Buddy(ing): Refers to an accusation that two players are closely coordinating with each other (including, but not limited to coordinating their votes) for a nefarious reason that is not beneficial to the Town -- the most common implication being that the two players are members of the Mafia and are implementing a plan that they discussed in Mafia night chat. They could also be Neutral Evils / Neutral Killing roles who have discovered each other's identities and who share a win condition of the Town losing the game.
Because Town members do not know each other's identities at the beginning of the game, there is some risk in over-coordinating actions among scum members. For example, if a player randomly votes another without any compelling evidence, and another two players suddenly vote for the accused as well, this could be a potential indication that all three are Mafia members and they are attempting to force a mislynch.
Accusations of buddying also arise when a player seems repeatedly votes along with another player without expressing any opinion of his own or any doubt about the first player's accusations. Essentially, this is to say that sheeping another player blindly can lead to accusations of both sheeping and buddying.
Breadcrumb(ing): A breadcrumb refers to a (usually, Town-aligned) player's subtle reference to his role, night action, or night feedback. Breadcrumbing refers to a player leaving breadcrumbs (as described above).
The purpose of breadcrumbing is to allow a player to leave clues without overtly revealing his role or results, which might result in him becoming the target of the Mafia or Neutral Killer.
In addition, a record of having left breadcrumbs can help a player establish his credibility later in the game if he needs to make a role claim or make an allegation against another player.
Bussing:
A strategy whereby one member of a scum team (Mafia, Triad, or Cult) accuses or votes up another member of his team, not in an serious attempt to get that player lynched, but in order to deceive the Town into believing you are not aligned with that player (even though you actually are). This can be helpful if either of you are lynched or killed at night because then the Town will remember / you can point to the fact that you were previously suspicious of that player.
CC (Counter-claim/Counter-claiming): Refers to a person claiming a role, then another person claiming that they are that role and not the first person. (If it is known there is only 1 type of that role in the game.)
CFD (Chinese Fire Drill): Refers to when players suddenly change their votes from one likely lynch candidate to another toward the end of a game day. The term is usually used pejoratively as a warning against such practice as this practice anecdotally speaking rarely results in scum being lynched.
On the one hand, the end of the day is usually a good opportunity for action because many / most of the players in a game tend to be online and participation (given the need to decide on a lynch).
However, it is typically not advantageous to the Town for a lynch to be decided at the very last second without sufficient back and forth discussion (or hearing from the accused player). This is the reason the term CFD is a pejorative one -- since the unpredictability of a last minute lynch is often not successful for the Town, especially as the Mafia is informed and may use their group voting power to push a lynch against a Town player.
Chainsaw (Chainsaw Defense): Refers to a player (X) defending another player (Y) by attacking the player or players (Z) who had been accusing X. Chainsawing is typically used pejoratively to describe questionable play and often considered to be a potential scum tell, especially to the extent that the chainsawing player had not previous suspected the accusers of being scum and the chainsawing player seems more intent on defending the accused player than than on actually scumhunting.
Specifically, it is somewhat odd to see a player overzealously defend another player by attempting to discredit that player's accuser, rather than focusing on the truth of whether the accusations are in fact correct. The Town's job is to identify and lynch the scum and outside of Masons or custom setups, Town ordinarily do not know who other members of the Town are (unlike scum). Therefore, becoming overly critical of someone merely because they are accusing another player might suggest that you have a relationship / inside information about the accused player (i.e. in the worst case, that the two of you are groupscum together).
Chainsawing may be unilateral (X defends Y by attacking Y's accuser Z) or mutual (X defends Y by attacking Y's accuser Z AND Y defends X by attacking X's accuser A). Mutual chainsawing is especially questionable as Town players should not strongly buddy up with others unless they have absolutely or near-absolute confirmation that each other are in fact Town aligned.
You should also consider the role of personal (i.e. real life) biases in terms of chainsawing. I.e. if players are friends, family members, or partners outside of the game, they may be more likely to defend each other out of some sense of real-life obligation or loyalty. Obviously, this is not a wise tactic for a Town player given anyone could be scum and it is not helpful for yourself or for the Town to have a blind spot for another player merely because you know them more closely.
Check: Refers to the act of investigating another player at night in order to determine that player's alignment.
To the same end, a Red Check refers to checking someone and receiving feedback that the person is a member of the Mafia and a Green Check is refers to checking someone and receiving feedback that the person is a member of the Town. The colors typically correspond to the color coding used by the host in his setup (where Red is typically Mafia and Green is typically Town).
Cit: A shortened version of Citizen.
Claim (Roleclaim): Claiming is the act of publicly claiming to be a certain role, whether true or not.
Clear(ed): Refers to when a player appears to have their allegiance with the Town guaranteed. Most commonly by having lead a lynch on the Mafia, been checked by the Sheriff or Investigator, or by being a confirmed Town role.
D(x): Refers to Day with the proceeding number indicating which Day. For example, D1 would mean Day 1, D2 would mean Day 2, etc.
Daykill: Refers to a host-designed role's ability to kill another play during the day. Usually, this ability would be activated by sending a private message to the game's host, who would then post an update indicating that the role's target had been killed. Alternatively, the player could publicly reveal their action. This ability is often found on Town roles -- for example, a Day Vigilante, but can also appear on scum roles as well.
Doc: A shortened version of Doctor.
Evil Roles: Refers to any role that is evil by definition. Evil roles are either Mafia roles in general or Neutral roles that wish to see one or all factions die.
Feedback (Night Result): Refers to any information that you receive either based on your night action (for example, investigating another player) or based on something that happened to you at night (for example, being roleblocked or transported).
Flip: Refers to when a player's role is revealed by the game host after that player has been lynched or night killed. The term's origin is from the Mafia in-person party game where people received their roles on cards and cards would be flipped over to reveal roles. Notably, there are a number of roles in Forum Mafia which may prevent a player's role from being flipped (such as a Janitor) or which may falsify how a player's role flip looks. In addition, while most setups reveal players' roles upon lynching or death at night, not all do so, which can add to a game's challenge.
FoS (Finger of Suspicion): It is a reference or suggestion that someone may be scum without actually voting on them, perhaps in order to see everyone's reaction.
This can be an important strategy element in terms of reaction testing because members of the Mafia / Triad are likely to defend each other in chat. Also, to the extent that another Town member has cleared the target of the FoS, that can be helpful information for the Town as well.
FPS (Fancy Play Syndrome): Refers to a player who uses overly elaborate strategies or arguments to play toward his win condition, when a far simpler approach could have sufficed and which would have usually been far less risky. This term is derogatory in nature and is typically used to criticize players who overcomplicate the game or use excessively unconventional or novel strategies in the place of more conventional ones that are more likely to be received positively by their allies / faction.
Framed: Refers to a player that has been investigated and found to be Mafia due to having been targeted by a Framer.
Gambit: Refers to a risky maneuver by a player such as a potentially false role claim or unsubstantiated allegation against another player that might turn the tide of the game if successful.
Gambits are controversial because of their high-risk, high-reward nature. A well-executed gambit could turn the tide for the Town and result in an unlikely victory even when Town is not doing well. However, a failed gambit might doom the Town to a loss even when they might have otherwise had a chance.
In terms of meta, certain players are more well known for executing gambits than others (see, Fancy Play Syndrome). Generally speaking, gambits are somewhat discouraged unless executed by a very skilled player and / or the Town is in a desperate situation where it needs a major break or set of circumstances to go right to win the game.
Game Cards (Rolecards/RCs): Refers to the posts that the host makes to start the game, each day, each night, and the end the game. These posts are one of the primary responsibilities of a host given the information they provided to the players. At minimum, they should indicate the Day / Night number, whether any players were killed / lynched, and if applicable, revealing the roles of the killed player(s).
Hosts vary in the complexity and detail that they add to their game cards, with some also providing the player names (with crossed out names for dead players), role list (with crossed out names for eliminated roles), and flavor text which may or may not correspond to the game theme for the host's setup (if applicable).
GF: An acronym for Godfather.
Groupscum: Refers to the Mafia faction of players in a particular game, who typically have more than one member (usually two or three in most FMs). This term is in contrast to the Neutral Killing role in some FMs, who does not have any factional allies and is usually on his own.
Hammer (Vote): Refers to the final vote required to lynch a player -- in most setups, this means the majority vote on the player being lynched.
There are some custom Forum Mafia roles which specifically impact the voter who hammered a certain player. Please note that some games do not have a hammer vote concept and the day will continue on despite a majority of votes being on one player.
The Town should be careful not to rush a hammer because in most games, its success will be driven by the quality of daytime discussion. Accordingly, rushing a hammer deprives the Town of the opportunity for further discussion even if its lynch target is correct.
Hard Claim(ing): Refers to a player directly claiming that he is a specific role. Hard Claims are in direct contrast to Soft Claims, which are more subtle and leave the player room for ambiguity.
Hidden Setup (Closed Setup): Refers to a variant of Forum Mafia games where the host does not disclose the game setup, potential roles, or in some cases, even the rules to the participating players, all of which would typically be disclosed.
Hydra: Refers to a special type of account which is expressly set up for the purpose of allowing two or more different people to play / post as the same player slot in a Forum Mafia game. Typically, games allowing hydras usually restrict them to two or three players per hydra. Also, some games only allow for "training hydras", which consist of at least one lesser experienced player in order to facilitate better balance among the different players.
IIoA (Information Instead of Analysis): Refers to a player's tendency to speculate more about the way in which the host has configured the game setup (to the extent it is not hidden) as opposed to providing reads of other players / pushing other players for their thoughts / reads.
Some players view IIoA as a potential indication that a player is scum, because such players may be more risk averse in letting on too much of their reads / sharing too much information that might later need to be contradicted in the event they are pressured.
In contrast, other players find it helpful to discuss how to approach a host's game setup, especially to the extent that the game setup is particularly novel, unique, or complicated.
Inno(cent): Can refer to voting to spare a players life in a trial or proclaiming a player to be Town.
ISO (Isolation): It is where a player gives a read on another player by reading / reviewing just player's posts in isolation (i.e. without reading other players' posts). This is often a very good strategy to use when putting together a read on another player because it allows you to evaluate the quality of their posts and determine whether they collectively suggest whether a player is more likely to be Town-aligned or scum-aligned.
Killing Roles: Killing roles are all the roles that have an ability to kill other players at night. each 'faction' have their own killing roles that are listed in the 'Killing' category of the random system. Town Killing, and Neutral Killing.
KPN (Kills per Night): It is an assessment of how many kills per night are likely given the presence / absence of Mafia / Triad and a Neutral Killing role. Most commonly used as a reason to keep other neutral killers alive because they keep the town deaths high per night.
Lawless: Refers to a type of Forum Mafia setup where there either is not a Town whatsoever (instead, dueling scum factions) or there is a Town full of offensive TPRs (Vigilantes, Veterans, Bodyguards, etc.) against a number of scum factions. Lawless games are typically not driven by investigatory leads as much as night killing and potentially, alliances between different factions.
L-(x): Refers to the number of additional votes required to lynch a player -- for example, L-1 means that one more vote is required, L-2 means that two more votes are required, etc.
ATE (Appeal to Emotion): This is typically used to undermine a player's argument by suggesting that it is not logically based but instead designed to get reader(s) to agree with the player for emotion-based reasons.
For example, Player 1 encouraging everyone to lynch Player 2 because Player 2 has played like crap, doesn't deserve the win, and his type of play shouldn't be encouraged would be an ATE / Appeal to Emotion designed to convince players to vote for Player 2 because of their anger at his playstyle versus anything about his alignment.
This term is almost always used in a pejorative way given ATE is typically not beneficial to the Town and can be used manipulatively to secure mislynches.
AMA (Ask Me Anything): Refers to when a player is openly asking others to ask him any questions that they have. This is often seen as a bit open-ended and perhaps passive -- i.e. the player in question is asking others to prompt him as opposed to moving the game forward on his own with his thoughts.
Buddy(ing): Refers to an accusation that two players are closely coordinating with each other (including, but not limited to coordinating their votes) for a nefarious reason that is not beneficial to the Town -- the most common implication being that the two players are members of the Mafia and are implementing a plan that they discussed in Mafia night chat. They could also be Neutral Evils / Neutral Killing roles who have discovered each other's identities and who share a win condition of the Town losing the game.
Because Town members do not know each other's identities at the beginning of the game, there is some risk in over-coordinating actions among scum members. For example, if a player randomly votes another without any compelling evidence, and another two players suddenly vote for the accused as well, this could be a potential indication that all three are Mafia members and they are attempting to force a mislynch.
Accusations of buddying also arise when a player seems repeatedly votes along with another player without expressing any opinion of his own or any doubt about the first player's accusations. Essentially, this is to say that sheeping another player blindly can lead to accusations of both sheeping and buddying.
Breadcrumb(ing): A breadcrumb refers to a (usually, Town-aligned) player's subtle reference to his role, night action, or night feedback. Breadcrumbing refers to a player leaving breadcrumbs (as described above).
The purpose of breadcrumbing is to allow a player to leave clues without overtly revealing his role or results, which might result in him becoming the target of the Mafia or Neutral Killer.
In addition, a record of having left breadcrumbs can help a player establish his credibility later in the game if he needs to make a role claim or make an allegation against another player.
Bussing:
A strategy whereby one member of a scum team (Mafia, Triad, or Cult) accuses or votes up another member of his team, not in an serious attempt to get that player lynched, but in order to deceive the Town into believing you are not aligned with that player (even though you actually are). This can be helpful if either of you are lynched or killed at night because then the Town will remember / you can point to the fact that you were previously suspicious of that player.
CC (Counter-claim/Counter-claiming): Refers to a person claiming a role, then another person claiming that they are that role and not the first person. (If it is known there is only 1 type of that role in the game.)
CFD (Chinese Fire Drill): Refers to when players suddenly change their votes from one likely lynch candidate to another toward the end of a game day. The term is usually used pejoratively as a warning against such practice as this practice anecdotally speaking rarely results in scum being lynched.
On the one hand, the end of the day is usually a good opportunity for action because many / most of the players in a game tend to be online and participation (given the need to decide on a lynch).
However, it is typically not advantageous to the Town for a lynch to be decided at the very last second without sufficient back and forth discussion (or hearing from the accused player). This is the reason the term CFD is a pejorative one -- since the unpredictability of a last minute lynch is often not successful for the Town, especially as the Mafia is informed and may use their group voting power to push a lynch against a Town player.
Chainsaw (Chainsaw Defense): Refers to a player (X) defending another player (Y) by attacking the player or players (Z) who had been accusing X. Chainsawing is typically used pejoratively to describe questionable play and often considered to be a potential scum tell, especially to the extent that the chainsawing player had not previous suspected the accusers of being scum and the chainsawing player seems more intent on defending the accused player than than on actually scumhunting.
Specifically, it is somewhat odd to see a player overzealously defend another player by attempting to discredit that player's accuser, rather than focusing on the truth of whether the accusations are in fact correct. The Town's job is to identify and lynch the scum and outside of Masons or custom setups, Town ordinarily do not know who other members of the Town are (unlike scum). Therefore, becoming overly critical of someone merely because they are accusing another player might suggest that you have a relationship / inside information about the accused player (i.e. in the worst case, that the two of you are groupscum together).
Chainsawing may be unilateral (X defends Y by attacking Y's accuser Z) or mutual (X defends Y by attacking Y's accuser Z AND Y defends X by attacking X's accuser A). Mutual chainsawing is especially questionable as Town players should not strongly buddy up with others unless they have absolutely or near-absolute confirmation that each other are in fact Town aligned.
You should also consider the role of personal (i.e. real life) biases in terms of chainsawing. I.e. if players are friends, family members, or partners outside of the game, they may be more likely to defend each other out of some sense of real-life obligation or loyalty. Obviously, this is not a wise tactic for a Town player given anyone could be scum and it is not helpful for yourself or for the Town to have a blind spot for another player merely because you know them more closely.
Check: Refers to the act of investigating another player at night in order to determine that player's alignment.
To the same end, a Red Check refers to checking someone and receiving feedback that the person is a member of the Mafia and a Green Check is refers to checking someone and receiving feedback that the person is a member of the Town. The colors typically correspond to the color coding used by the host in his setup (where Red is typically Mafia and Green is typically Town).
Cit: A shortened version of Citizen.
Claim (Roleclaim): Claiming is the act of publicly claiming to be a certain role, whether true or not.
Clear(ed): Refers to when a player appears to have their allegiance with the Town guaranteed. Most commonly by having lead a lynch on the Mafia, been checked by the Sheriff or Investigator, or by being a confirmed Town role.
D(x): Refers to Day with the proceeding number indicating which Day. For example, D1 would mean Day 1, D2 would mean Day 2, etc.
Daykill: Refers to a host-designed role's ability to kill another play during the day. Usually, this ability would be activated by sending a private message to the game's host, who would then post an update indicating that the role's target had been killed. Alternatively, the player could publicly reveal their action. This ability is often found on Town roles -- for example, a Day Vigilante, but can also appear on scum roles as well.
Doc: A shortened version of Doctor.
Evil Roles: Refers to any role that is evil by definition. Evil roles are either Mafia roles in general or Neutral roles that wish to see one or all factions die.
Feedback (Night Result): Refers to any information that you receive either based on your night action (for example, investigating another player) or based on something that happened to you at night (for example, being roleblocked or transported).
Flip: Refers to when a player's role is revealed by the game host after that player has been lynched or night killed. The term's origin is from the Mafia in-person party game where people received their roles on cards and cards would be flipped over to reveal roles. Notably, there are a number of roles in Forum Mafia which may prevent a player's role from being flipped (such as a Janitor) or which may falsify how a player's role flip looks. In addition, while most setups reveal players' roles upon lynching or death at night, not all do so, which can add to a game's challenge.
FoS (Finger of Suspicion): It is a reference or suggestion that someone may be scum without actually voting on them, perhaps in order to see everyone's reaction.
This can be an important strategy element in terms of reaction testing because members of the Mafia / Triad are likely to defend each other in chat. Also, to the extent that another Town member has cleared the target of the FoS, that can be helpful information for the Town as well.
FPS (Fancy Play Syndrome): Refers to a player who uses overly elaborate strategies or arguments to play toward his win condition, when a far simpler approach could have sufficed and which would have usually been far less risky. This term is derogatory in nature and is typically used to criticize players who overcomplicate the game or use excessively unconventional or novel strategies in the place of more conventional ones that are more likely to be received positively by their allies / faction.
Framed: Refers to a player that has been investigated and found to be Mafia due to having been targeted by a Framer.
Gambit: Refers to a risky maneuver by a player such as a potentially false role claim or unsubstantiated allegation against another player that might turn the tide of the game if successful.
Gambits are controversial because of their high-risk, high-reward nature. A well-executed gambit could turn the tide for the Town and result in an unlikely victory even when Town is not doing well. However, a failed gambit might doom the Town to a loss even when they might have otherwise had a chance.
In terms of meta, certain players are more well known for executing gambits than others (see, Fancy Play Syndrome). Generally speaking, gambits are somewhat discouraged unless executed by a very skilled player and / or the Town is in a desperate situation where it needs a major break or set of circumstances to go right to win the game.
Game Cards (Rolecards/RCs): Refers to the posts that the host makes to start the game, each day, each night, and the end the game. These posts are one of the primary responsibilities of a host given the information they provided to the players. At minimum, they should indicate the Day / Night number, whether any players were killed / lynched, and if applicable, revealing the roles of the killed player(s).
Hosts vary in the complexity and detail that they add to their game cards, with some also providing the player names (with crossed out names for dead players), role list (with crossed out names for eliminated roles), and flavor text which may or may not correspond to the game theme for the host's setup (if applicable).
GF: An acronym for Godfather.
Groupscum: Refers to the Mafia faction of players in a particular game, who typically have more than one member (usually two or three in most FMs). This term is in contrast to the Neutral Killing role in some FMs, who does not have any factional allies and is usually on his own.
Hammer (Vote): Refers to the final vote required to lynch a player -- in most setups, this means the majority vote on the player being lynched.
There are some custom Forum Mafia roles which specifically impact the voter who hammered a certain player. Please note that some games do not have a hammer vote concept and the day will continue on despite a majority of votes being on one player.
The Town should be careful not to rush a hammer because in most games, its success will be driven by the quality of daytime discussion. Accordingly, rushing a hammer deprives the Town of the opportunity for further discussion even if its lynch target is correct.
Hard Claim(ing): Refers to a player directly claiming that he is a specific role. Hard Claims are in direct contrast to Soft Claims, which are more subtle and leave the player room for ambiguity.
Hidden Setup (Closed Setup): Refers to a variant of Forum Mafia games where the host does not disclose the game setup, potential roles, or in some cases, even the rules to the participating players, all of which would typically be disclosed.
Hydra: Refers to a special type of account which is expressly set up for the purpose of allowing two or more different people to play / post as the same player slot in a Forum Mafia game. Typically, games allowing hydras usually restrict them to two or three players per hydra. Also, some games only allow for "training hydras", which consist of at least one lesser experienced player in order to facilitate better balance among the different players.
IIoA (Information Instead of Analysis): Refers to a player's tendency to speculate more about the way in which the host has configured the game setup (to the extent it is not hidden) as opposed to providing reads of other players / pushing other players for their thoughts / reads.
Some players view IIoA as a potential indication that a player is scum, because such players may be more risk averse in letting on too much of their reads / sharing too much information that might later need to be contradicted in the event they are pressured.
In contrast, other players find it helpful to discuss how to approach a host's game setup, especially to the extent that the game setup is particularly novel, unique, or complicated.
Inno(cent): Can refer to voting to spare a players life in a trial or proclaiming a player to be Town.
ISO (Isolation): It is where a player gives a read on another player by reading / reviewing just player's posts in isolation (i.e. without reading other players' posts). This is often a very good strategy to use when putting together a read on another player because it allows you to evaluate the quality of their posts and determine whether they collectively suggest whether a player is more likely to be Town-aligned or scum-aligned.
Killing Roles: Killing roles are all the roles that have an ability to kill other players at night. each 'faction' have their own killing roles that are listed in the 'Killing' category of the random system. Town Killing, and Neutral Killing.
KPN (Kills per Night): It is an assessment of how many kills per night are likely given the presence / absence of Mafia / Triad and a Neutral Killing role. Most commonly used as a reason to keep other neutral killers alive because they keep the town deaths high per night.
Lawless: Refers to a type of Forum Mafia setup where there either is not a Town whatsoever (instead, dueling scum factions) or there is a Town full of offensive TPRs (Vigilantes, Veterans, Bodyguards, etc.) against a number of scum factions. Lawless games are typically not driven by investigatory leads as much as night killing and potentially, alliances between different factions.
L-(x): Refers to the number of additional votes required to lynch a player -- for example, L-1 means that one more vote is required, L-2 means that two more votes are required, etc.