The Syndicate

We will be running the Full Game Queue in a short time. We will be announcing when submission are open, and when the poll will run a few weeks before it actually does so. In the interim, however, we had a question we thought we would put to the members.

The voting system we use now gives you a certain number or votes, all equal to each other. Lets say four votes, all worth the same. You choose 4 games, and all your votes are worth *1* This is easy to keep track of, and is simple and transparent. But it does mean that your vote for your favorite game will be worth the same as your vote for that fourth game you had to struggle to come up with.

We have been discussing possibly weighting your votes. So your first vote would be worth 4, your second, 3 and so on (assuming 4 votes). This would be harder to keep track of and to watch, so we would be making periodic updates. But this would allow for your favorite game to be treated that way. This would really work best, though, if we had a large turnout.
So we are opening this discussion up to you. We are going to keep this poll up until when the Full Game Queue Poll starts, and we will do it however the members vote.

If you could say why you like the option you support, that would be good, and votes are changeable if someones argument sways your opinion

But do we have equal or weighted votes for this poll?

I person, 1 vote smartass

Epignosis wrote:But do we have equal or weighted votes for this poll?

Since your wife has lost weight, her vote is now worth less than it was 3 months ago.

I voted go the simple way. Usually there is not much difference in my 4 votes in terms of how much I want to play the games. The difficulty is in narrowing it down to 4. Thank you for the option to vote.

I voted for weighted, because it more accurately reflects the preferences of the electorate, and prevents the third party spoiler effect.

I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

You're the reason Woodrow Wilson was president.

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Is it possible to hide votes and responses? Or is it more enjoyable to discuss as you go along?

Also, will we have a submission deadline?

I say yes if it's doable. I use this method of voting with my friends whenever we need to decided something, and people are almost always satisfied with what is decided on. My biggest concern is how we are going to accomplish using this alternative voting system. Are there plugins or something we'd add to the poll or would it be stating votes in thread/PMs?

And Re: SVS, how large do you expect the vote pool to be? i could see above 40 votes, especially if it's up for a few weeks.

Made wrote:I say yes if it's doable. I use this method of voting with my friends whenever we need to decided something, and people are almost always satisfied with what is decided on. My biggest concern is how we are going to accomplish using this alternative voting system. Are there plugins or something we'd add to the poll or would it be stating votes in thread/PMs?

And Re: SVS, how large do you expect the vote pool to be? i could see above 40 votes, especially if it's up for a few weeks.

20+ mafia games with votes coming from 50 or so people. (These are very rough guesses since I don't know the actual answer).

That's ~200 votes spread across ~20 games, so ties will definitely happen in an unweighted system.

thellama73 wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

You're the reason Woodrow Wilson was president.

No, I wasn't alive yet. I had nothing to do with the Russian Revolution, either. Or that nasty crucifixion business

And we will discuss how the poll will run as we get closer, MM. There is a submission deadline, yes.

Linki, if you have a way to tabulate it in thread, Made, that does not requirte modifications to the board, let us know.

Linki @ MM, no we will have less than 20 games. And I don't recall ties being an issue in the past.

And by "the past" I mean this has been the system used at every Mafia site I have played at, and I never recall ties being an issue

I like the idea of weighted votes. There will often be one game I really want to play more than others.

I do wonder about it even though I voted for it though. I'm not sure about SVS' clique effect, has that been something of a problem in the past? Do cliques all vote for the same game or is it that they vote for each other? My problem is this - what if I want to vote for fewer than 4 games. What are my votes worth if I only cast 3? What if I only cast two? What if I only cast one?

So, even though I voted weighted votes, I can understand that multivotes would be very complicated for everyone to sort out and I'm not at all bothered if it doesn't go that way. I like the innovative spirit though.

We never did it before, so, no, it has not been a problem in the past.

S~V~S wrote:

thellama73 wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

You're the reason Woodrow Wilson was president.

No, I wasn't alive yet. I had nothing to do with the Russian Revolution, either. Or that nasty crucifixion business

And we will discuss how the poll will run as we get closer, MM. There is a submission deadline, yes.

Linki, if you have a way to tabulate it in thread, Made, that does not requirte modifications to the board, let us know.

Linki @ MM, no we will have less than 20 games. And I don't recall ties being an issue in the past.

I was definitely highballing the number of players offering feedback, but I'm sure there will be more games and more players voting than the last one I took part in.

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

Black Rock wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

Let's form the anti-clique clique coalition!

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

Black Rock wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

Let's form the anti-clique clique coalition!

Sorry, I am a proud member of VAL, an Animal Sanctuary Squad affiliation.

A Person wrote:

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

Black Rock wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

Let's form the anti-clique clique coalition!

Sorry, I am a proud member of VAL, an Animal Sanctuary Squad affiliation.

Are marmots invited?

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

A Person wrote:

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

Black Rock wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

Let's form the anti-clique clique coalition!

Sorry, I am a proud member of VAL, an Animal Sanctuary Squad affiliation.

Are marmots invited?

Noooo, they're converting you.

I like weighted idea but it's too impractical and prone to mistakes, voted vote=1

I like the idea of weighting your votes. It could be accomplished with a little extra legwork. Here is how I see it being accomplished:

First, Member X decides which games to vote for. They cast their votes using the poll system, which will register each vote as counting as 1:1. Then Member X lists their preferences in order in the thread like this:

Here are my votes in ranked order!

1. Braggadocios Bison Mafia
2. Eclectic Earthworm Mafia
3. Stinky Squid Mafia
4. Awesome Aardvark Mafia

The mods/poll runners would then have to do the work of assigning the correct number of votes to the correct game behind the scenes. It can be easily done with a spreadsheet: games in the poll across the top, players who voted down the side, with the bottom row summing the vote quantities for each game.

Black Rock wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

I'll be in the BR and MM anti-clique.

Golden wrote:

Black Rock wrote:

S~V~S wrote:I voted for 1=1, since that prevents the Clique effect. especially in a small voting pool. It just seems more fair to me.

Me too. Plus I ain't a part of any Clique so that would not work for me at all.

I'll be in the BR and MM anti-clique.

Wow this anti-clique is really taking off.

I don't think I've ever been in a clique but it sounds awesome. I will join your anti-clique clique group bandwagon. Are there going to be refreshments after the meetings?

Punch & Pie

S~V~S wrote:Punch & Pie

But my side has a free hat.

Voted 1=1 bc why fix what ain't broke?

Too many people in the anti-clique for me I do send my best wishes though.
I'll be the person with no label

Roxy!!!!

Made wrote:I say yes if it's doable. I use this method of voting with my friends whenever we need to decided something, and people are almost always satisfied with what is decided on. My biggest concern is how we are going to accomplish using this alternative voting system. Are there plugins or something we'd add to the poll or would it be stating votes in thread/PMs?

And Re: SVS, how large do you expect the vote pool to be? i could see above 40 votes, especially if it's up for a few weeks.

The mods have discussed a few ways to implement this. So, it's entirely doable-- we just wanted you all to be able to decide how we'll queue up the games.

Roxy wrote:Voted 1=1 bc why fix what ain't broke?

I would argue that it is broke because more preferred games are getting played after less preferred games under the current voting system.

I've done this elsewhere, but it bears repeating.

Suppose there are three games in the poll: Republican Mafia, Bull Moose Mafia, and Democratic Mafia.

Suppose there are three voters: Teddy, Willly, and Woody.

Teddy's preferences look like this: Republican>Bull Moose>Democratic.
Willy's look just the same.

Woody's preferences are: Democratic>Bull Moose>Republican.

Under the 1=1 system, Republican gets 2 votes, Democratic gets 1 vote, and Bull Moose gets no votes, so the order of the games is as follows:
1. Republican Mafia
2. Democratic Mafia
3. Bull Moose Mafia

Even though two out of three people preferred Bull Moose to Democratic, it gets played last. If we used the weighted voting, however, the scores would look like this.

Republican - 7 points
Bull Moose - 6 points
Democratic - 5 points

And the game list would more accurately reflect the preferences of the group. This is why I favor the weighted vote approach.

Llama clearly votes for the Bull Moose party on that analysis.

Golden wrote:Llama clearly votes for the Bull Moose party on that analysis.

I just think the 1912 presidential election is a potent example.

thellama73 wrote:

Golden wrote:Llama clearly votes for the Bull Moose party on that analysis.

I just think the 1912 presidential election is a potent example.

Look, I'm just saying, it's pretty clear you are still upset about the Democratic party being ranked higher than the Bull Moose party. That's all I'm saying.

Also, I'm pretty sure Teddy would have voted for the Bull Moose party. If he was still voting Republican, he deserved not to be elected.

I vote Democratic Mafia.

I am not a fan of clique mafia, it's why I stopped playing before. So if game order is decided by votes I fall on the side of weighted . Just curious though, why can't games be played in the order of submission or by whose game is ready first?

LizKeen wrote:I vote Democratic Mafia.

I am not a fan of clique mafia, it's why I stopped playing before. So if game order is decided by votes I fall on the side of weighted . Just curious though, why can't games be played in the order of submission or by whose game is ready first?

Weighted votes are more likely to reward cliques unless there is a large voter group, imo. For instance let's say you have a group of five that can be expected to give preference to each other. One of them, and only one, has submitted a game. If all five of them vote for it with their first preference vote, that gives it 20 votes. With a minimum of 10 games, you would need alot of voters to eqalize that advantage in a weighted system. Not saying we have that situation, but if we did, its impact would be minimized by not weighting votes. Plus its more transparent which I like.

And we do do first come first played in the speed queue. Running that queue as supply side and this one as consumer demand driven balances out nicely. Also deadline pressure can be the incentive some people need to finish a game. Plus it is fun We have a lot of exciting games coming up, it will be a good year!

S~V~S wrote:

LizKeen wrote:I vote Democratic Mafia.

I am not a fan of clique mafia, it's why I stopped playing before. So if game order is decided by votes I fall on the side of weighted . Just curious though, why can't games be played in the order of submission or by whose game is ready first?

Weighted votes are more likely to reward cliques unless there is a large voter group, imo. For instance let's say you have a group of five that can be expected to give preference to each other. One of them, and only one, has submitted a game. If all five of them vote for it with their first preference vote, that gives it 20 votes. With a minimum of 10 games, you would need alot of voters to eqalize that advantage in a weighted system. Not saying we have that situation, but if we did, its impact would be minimized by not weighting votes. Plus its more transparent which I like.

And we do do first come first played in the speed queue. Running that queue as supply side and this one as consumer demand driven balances out nicely. Also deadline pressure can be the incentive some people need to finish a game. Plus it is fun We have a lot of exciting games coming up, it will be a good year!

TBH, that's not an accurate representation of how weighted votes work, SVS.

Ideally, everyone would create their own queue. Submit it. Then, the aggregate would be calculated. SO, let's say there's 5 games to be ranked. Let's say a group of 5 people rank the same game as number 1. That gives it 25 points. Now, if any five people rank another game #1, or if some rank it #1 and some #2... a balance can be met quite easily. 4 #2s plus 2 #1s but this new game in the lead now. This, of course, is only considering selected votes.
This is absolutely no different to when you have, let's say 4 votes, and they're all worth 1. So four people vote for a game they want to play. That STILL requires 4 other people to vote for another game to even tie it.

The weighted system basically allows us to run run off elections in a world where certain games did not get submitted. Users can vote for their favorites without fearing: 1) how other people are voting and how that might affect the order and 2) that some games will receive NO votes because ideally, every game submitted by every person would receive 1.


In addition, your complaint about cliques seems very... wrong to me? If 5 people want to play a game first-- how is this unfair? How would it be unfair that their first choice gains a lot of support/points just from them? If there's more demand for the representation of the game, then it should be represented as such. Right? More votes=higher preference.

I don't think weighted votes will make anything any less cliquey to be honest. if a "clique" wants to vote a crap game because their friend is hosting adding weighted votes won't change that.
I feel like weighted votes just overcomplicates the process, but that's just me. I also like to vote for low vote getting options to make people feel good, so maybe I am not the best one to give advice.

also, we have had ties I remember, but usually the hosts in the tie work it out themselves. There has never been a problem that I remember

I have elected to vote for weighted votes, largely from remembering the experience that two of the games I voted for I wanted to play sooner than the other two.

I would also suggest that *two* mods (rather than one) keep independent spreadsheets of the votes. That way, they can make sure their numbers match before the order of the games is established.

Epignosis wrote:I have elected to vote for weighted votes, largely from remembering the experience that two of the games I voted for I wanted to play sooner than the other two.

I would also suggest that *two* mods (rather than one) keep independent spreadsheets of the votes. That way, they can make sure their numbers match before the order of the games is established.

I volunteer to be one of the two.

thellama73 wrote:

Epignosis wrote:I have elected to vote for weighted votes, largely from remembering the experience that two of the games I voted for I wanted to play sooner than the other two.

I would also suggest that *two* mods (rather than one) keep independent spreadsheets of the votes. That way, they can make sure their numbers match before the order of the games is established.

I volunteer to be one of the two.

I don't mind being the other. It's simple Excel data entry.

I like the weighted system, especially if the vote results (including the weighting) are made public (it could be anonymous, if people were worried about feelings being hurt). I think it might be useful/interesting/edifying for hosts and players to get a really clear idea of what themes, mechanics, hosts, etc have the most drawing power, and I think a weighted system provides more nuance in analyzing those results. I like the idea of being able to reward a host that comes up with a good pitch with more votes than a host who maybe has a theme that I'd like to play, but whose proposal was less polished/interesting/whatever. I also like the idea of making that reasoning clear in the thread (feedback is good! critique is good!). The chances are that as a player I'll sign up for any game that fits in my schedule, but when it comes to voting for which games I'm most excited about, I want to be able to nuance my response.
It's not like I think the current system is terrible (it's not. It works OK), but I really like the idea of trying something new, and I especially like the idea of trying something that might give incentive to hosts to create games that are EVEN MORE awesome than the games here already are.

Also, this is the most pro-market thing I've ever written. I'm scared.

Canucklehead wrote:Also, this is the most pro-market thing I've ever written. I'm scared.

What's to be scared about? Pro-market is the way to go!

I voted for the weighted option because I like trying new things I'm also a fan of the normal system because I think it works, but it's worth a shot to see if this system works even better.

I don't think cliques are a problem but I'm not in any cliques so what do I know :P I feel like people will vote mainly based on the theme of the game while also considering who the host is. Some hosts have proven track records. Newbie hosts may have an uphill battle to climb for their games to become as popular, but that's just more incentive for everyone to create really great and fun games

Canucklehead wrote:Also, this is the most pro-market thing I've ever written. I'm scared.

I think it's also pretty pro-consumer tbh.
It gives a more accurate representation of what PEOPLE want.

Epignosis wrote:

thellama73 wrote:

Epignosis wrote:I have elected to vote for weighted votes, largely from remembering the experience that two of the games I voted for I wanted to play sooner than the other two.

I would also suggest that *two* mods (rather than one) keep independent spreadsheets of the votes. That way, they can make sure their numbers match before the order of the games is established.

I volunteer to be one of the two.

I don't mind being the other. It's simple Excel data entry.

fingersplints wrote:also, we have had ties I remember, but usually the hosts in the tie work it out themselves. There has never been a problem that I remember

If it were me running the poll, I would not find it difficult or too much work at all.

The concept makes sense to me, and seems ideal.

Also, another way to prevent cliquiness is to take votes via PM or host it on a third party site where votes wpuld be hidden.