WW Strategy Part II- Being The Wolf

[MDoranD]

***DISCLAIMER***This is not an all-inclusive strategy guide. Some of the finer points of playing the wolf come from practice. Certain situations arise that call for breaking most if not all of these points herein.


Being the Werewolf

I. Planning an opening strategy

A. 1st things first-PM your fellow wolves and give them your AIM handle. Communication between wolves is of utmost importance. PM'ing each other throughout the game will not suffice. When a game starts, most all players are online, so take advantage of this opportunity to open a chat room with your fellow wolves and outline a basic opening strategy. This should include:

1. Picking the 1st, possibly the 2nd nights werewolf kill. Choose wisely. In the 1st round, you should generally eliminate the strongest non-wolf player immediately. In subsequent rounds, this strategy will need to be modified. I will address this later.

2. Decide how active each wolf will be. It is common for at least 1 wolf to attempt to stay under the radar for as long as possible. This includes posting at a minimum, making non-aggressive votes, and generally going along with the masses. Active wolves will want to remain active posters throughout the game.

3. Goto "My Home". Turn off the option where you can be seen if you are online by other players.

B. Agree on who will PM the mod each night with that nights kill. You dont need 4 different votes going in each night.


II. Playing the game

A. (this refers to all wolves not playing "under the radar") Be consistent. Attempt to find villagers who make posts that seem suspicious, and call them out on it. This is easier than it sounds, as most new players will make posts that are not well thought out, or non-comittal. Prey on these posts. Be semi-aggressive with them. Examples-

-""quote the villagers suspicious post""-"A, you said this last round, however, you said this in a previous round...

-"Guys, reread all of X's posts, then look at last round, are you seeing what im seeing?"

B. OTOH, DO NOT MAKE POSTS that are not well thought out, or non-comittal. Examples-

-"Im leaning towards A, although i could be convinced to vote for B"

-"I guess Ill go along with the bandwagon, I vote for A"

-also, multiple joke or kidding around posts that infer your presence in the game, without you adding any strategy, are see-through to quality villagers. No REAL villager will only add non-strategic posts.

C. Jumping on the bandwagon

1. Often, you'll delight in seeing the village is heading in the wrong direction. You must take advantage. Some of your fellow wolves should not jump on. I reccomend somewhere around 50% should jump on board. The key to jumping on a bandwagon without appearing to be a wolf doing just that, is to find a unique reason to jump onboard. For example, if everyone is jumping on A because of his voting pattern, make a post explaining how you just noticed this post from A, and how it disagrees with another post. i.e., find a different reason to vote for the same person.

2. Smart villagers realize that most wolves jump on a bandwagon somewhere in the "sweet spot" of votes 3 thru 5. It is hard to avoid this, but you can usually still get away with it when you bring in a fresh reason for voting that way.


D. Voting for other wolves

1. A key mistake made by inexperienced wolves is not voting for your fellow wolves. Do not make this mistake. You win by staying alive, if they take it personal, screw 'em. If one of your fellow wolves is being bandwagoned, you may want to jump onboard. If one of your fellow wolves makes a HIGHLY suspicious post, call him out in the thread, and put him on the top of your list. Being the 1st to call out a wolf who is eventually lynched, is very helpful to your personal cause of winning the trust of the village.

2. Dont get me wrong, you want your other wolves to stay alive. To avert a bandwagon on a fellow wolf, the best time to try is before that suspicious wolf has more than 2 votes on him. Bring into play another possiblity to vote for at this point. Once your fellow wolf has 1/2 of what it takes to lynch him, its EITHER time to jump on that bandwagon, OR exempt yourself from voting, by just not posting, as if you were AFK for the moment.


E. Claiming another role

1. This is a high % play for a ww about to be lynched. When you are just a few votes shy of being lynched, sometimes you should claim another role, like seer. The key to this is to make a smart post about why youre the seer, explain you had no choice to come out now so you could avoid being lynched, and then explain who you have looked up this far, and who they SHOULD vote for.

Often, this play will get the village to unvote you, vote for who you claim to be a wolf, and makes the village lynch one of their own. Of course, you will be killed the next night, but you took down one more tasty villager for your wolf friends first. This really is a cant lose strategy, because if it doesnt work, you ended up lynched just like you would have been anyway.

Claiming the angel is a more expert play, but with much higher rewards. I dont want to give everything away in this thread. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

F. Picking off villagers

After the 1st round or two, you cant just go eating the best players night after night. You must lay a track of death that LEADS the village away from you. Dont automatically kill off the guy who wanted to lynch you last round either, sometimes that can lead the trail right to your front door!

Look for opportunites within posts between villagers. If two villagers went at each others throats last round, contemplate killing off one of the two.

Look for posts that give info that only a seer should know. This is of utmost importance in selecting victims. Look for someone who implies they KNOW someone is clean, or they are 100% sure A is a wolf. Obviously, noone could be 100% without being the seer.

If the seer comes forward, you have an obvious kill, unless theres an angel. With an angel, your only hope is to go back to killing villagers that will lead the village astray.


III. The endgame

Congrats, you made it this far, theres only you and two villagers left, and only one final vote.

A. Dont be afraid to post your vote FIRST. This is arguable, but I like voting first here. Any villagers who have doubt who to vote for may be on the fence. Your post may be what pushes them over onto your side. Id rather have that villager who has no clue reading my post first, before he gets a chance to read the other villagers post, and chooses to vote for you.

B. Make a strong case! Dont just vote. At the same time, keep it concise. Do not be overly lengthy. A 2 paragraph statement explaining how the last wolf could only be A may be the deciding factor.

It'll take some luck, but with sound strategy and smart posts, you just decimated a helpless village!


Feel free to add anything youd like. I didnt cover EVERY little detail, but this is a lot that I believe can help. Also, feel free to disagree, as im sure there could be better strategies out there!

MDoranD

[MDoranD]

im waiting for the tl;dr

[Zurvan]

Good job. Thanks for doing this.

But don't hold anything back - good strategy being spread makes all the games better. Just like the Poker strategy forums, except none of us stand to lose money from WW.

[wdcbooks]

If you are a wolf in the end I find the post asking each remaining person why you shouldn't vote for them to be surprisingly effective. I haven't once seen this strategy turned on the questioner.

Of course, the next time someone does that to me I am voting for them, but it still seems to work.

[-zero-]

[ QUOTE ]
If you are a wolf in the end I find the post asking each remaining person why you shouldn't vote for them to be surprisingly effective. I haven't once seen this strategy turned on the questioner.

Of course, the next time someone does that to me I am voting for them, but it still seems to work.

[/ QUOTE ]

Xorbie tried this last night and I called him on it.

[pudley4]

Another good strategy (which seemed to take place in the All-Star game) is to divide the wolves up into 2 groups, and have these two groups be as removed from each other as possible.

Also, ENDGAME:

Plan ahead (especially if you're the last werewolf) and keep another villager alive who you can accuse as the remaining wolf. Look and see who has voted for/accused your target, and then kill that villager off.

Also, wolves need to pay attention when the number of villagers and wolves are close to even. Many times it only takes one wrong villager vote to allow the wolves to pile on and win. Example:

Villager A
Villager B
Villager C

Wolf 1
Wolf 2

3 votes are needed to lynch. If any villager votes for another one, the two wolves should immediately pile on and win. This means you must be actively reading and refreshing the thread. I've been in at least 2 endgames where I was a wolf and my teammates did not pile on when we had a winning chance.

[metsandfinsfan]

[ QUOTE ]

3 votes are needed to lynch. If any villager votes for another one, the two wolves should immediately pile on and win. This means you must be actively reading and refreshing the thread. I've been in at least 2 endgames where I was a wolf and my teammates did not pile on when we had a winning chance.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is why I am always afraid to make the first vote when we are in this situation whether i am a villager or a wolf. If I am a villager, I am aware that if i am wrong the wolves can do this. If I am a wolf, I am paranoid that the villagers will know that i wouldnt vote first unless I am a wolf

[.Alex.]

Very nice.

[xorbie]

[ QUOTE ]
I haven't once seen this strategy turned on the questioner.

[/ QUOTE ]

Exhibit A: me.

[ScottHoward]

[ QUOTE ]
A. 1st things first-PM your fellow wolves and give them your AIM handle. Communication between wolves is of utmost importance. PM'ing each other throughout the game will not suffice

[/ QUOTE ]
ive been under the impression that wolves contacting each other during a game was not allowed? (other than at night, or is that what youre saying?)