Masons: Two of the villagers are Masons (members of the secret society). Since they are together at night, they know each other are not werewolves. This adds to the game in several ways. It increases the number of people who have information, and thus makes the initial lynchings less random. It also makes two groups of people who will 'defend' each other: the werewolves and the masons.
Using these roles is a strong advantage for the village. I believe that with VERY experienced players (in which case, the game tends to strongly favor the villagers), that the masons could be too strong.
Cobbler: His job sucks so bad, he wants to die. The cobbler is on the werewolves team, but is not a werewolf! He doesnt know who the werewolves are, they dont know who he is. The game does not end in a situation where #(werewolves+ cobbler) >= #villagers. The cobbler looks like a villager to the seer. The cobbler is very interesting in that he actually doesnt mind being lynched in many cases, to protect a werewolf from dying. He can also create situations late in the game where he can form a voting block with the remaining werewolf and then block any lunchings from occurring. You can even have cases where the werewolf is trying to convince the cobbler that he is in fact a wolf, or that someone might fake being a cobbler to rat out who the wolf is, so they can then say they arent really a cobbler and lynch them!
Obviously, the cobbler is a strong addition to the werewolf team. I think its a great role for situations where having one more werewolf would be too strong, but without it the werewolves are screwed. For example: 5 player, as 1 werewolf, 1 cobbler, 9 player as 2 werewolves, 1 cobbler.
Angel: Each night, the angel chooses someone to protect. That player cannot be killed by werewolves. Possible rules to make the angel less strong are that they cant protect themself, and/or that they cant protect the same person two days in a row. The angel is especially good for situations where there an even number of non-moderator players (Odd numbers of non-moderator players are preferable, as there cant be a tie in voting if everyone votes, and if it goes all the way to the end, it will come down to 3 people of which 1 is a werewolf, which is the preferable endgame).
The angel can fix these endgames by causing it to end with an odd number of players.
The angel is obviously a strong boost to the villager team.
The werewolf hunter: The werewolf hunter is a villager, but if the game comes down to 2 people left, one werewolf and the werewolf hunter, then the werewolf hunter kills the werewolf! This role is particularly good to use in games with an even number of non-moderator players. Then, if the game comes down to a 3 villager (1 is the hunter), 1 werewolf endgame, and the villagers dont lynch the werewolf, then the werewolf must correctly pick which of the two remaining players to kill, because if they leave the werewolf hunter alive, they lose! This can create very interesting endgame situations, where the werewolf hunter is strongly faking being something else, to fool the werewolf, but in doing so runs the risk of being very suspicious to the villagers!
The werewolf hunter is a moderate boost to the villager team.
The Hunter. Sadly, the werewolf hunter and the hunter have names that are too similar. (We tend to not use both at once). Anyone think of better names??
When the hunter dies, they take a parting shot, killing one other player of their choice. If the game ends with one werewolf, and the hunter, and thus the werewolf kills the hunter, then the hunter retailiatres to kill the werewolf and everyone is dead, so its a draw...
The hunter is also a good addition to a game with an even number of players, as having an extra person die at some point will fix the situation back to an odd number. Obviously, you only need one of these solutions, two will fix and then break it again.
The hunter is a moderate boost to the villager team.
The priest: The priest can, during the night, look at the role of one player who is DEAD, one time per game. Obviously, you use this when playing that dead players roles are not revealed. I believe that playing this way (not revealing the roles of dead players) is a VASTLY superior way to play. (After all, the moderator knows when the game has reached an end condition). Not revealing dead players roles adds a lot of twists, and can give the werewolves ways to throw doubt on things that have happened. "No, he isnt really the seer, he is a werewolf getting us to lynch innocents".
The priest can do interesting things like confirm a werewolf death (and thus implicate those defending that person), or confirm that a dead person was a seer and was telling the truth in who he implicated (and was killed in retaliation by the other werewolf).
The priest is a small boost to the village team.
The Tinker: The tinker is avillager who looks like a werewolf to the seer! I find this a necessary wrinkle, to combat the power of many of the other special roles that help the village. Now, if the seer finds a werewolf, they might not really have the werewolf! It also gives the werewolves a possible alibi if the seer fingers them. "No, I swear I am the tinker".
An important note is that this role works MUCH MUCH better if the tinker doesnt even know they are the tinker! One of the villager cards at random is selected by the moderator to be the tinker, without the knowledge of the tinker player themself. For example, if the 2,3,4,5 of clubs were the villager cards, the moderator randomly picks one of these before handing them out, to be the tinker.
Without this twist, we have found that the Tinker merely states at the beginning "I am the Tinker", followed by: "Does any one else want to claim to be the tinker? If so, one of the two of us is a werewolf, and we lynch both of us". It works very well, a werewolf cant claim it or they and the real tinker just get immediately lynched. And now the seer never checks that person, and everyone knows they are a villager. When played that the tinker doesnt know they are the tinker, when the seer calls them out as a werewolf, it causes them to then supect the SEER as a werewolf, and leads to very interesting possibilites.
Note that the tinker doesnt have to be a basic villager, any villager role other than the seer could be made to be possibly the tinker. For example, with 3 villagers and 2 masons, you could make it that any of the 5 could be tinkers, or you could make it that just the three basic villagers could be the tinker.
The tinker is a moderate boost to the werewolf team, with the variant that the tinker doesnt know they are the tinker.
The Medium: The medium can hold a seance ("say-onse"), to speak with the dead. One time per game, players can agree to hold a seance on a certain dead player. Players then vote to have the seance. If the medium is alive and votes for the seance, it occurs. The dead player is allowed to speak with the group for a few minutes. It can be very beneficial if, say, the seer was raised, of for a variety of other reasons. If playing with the medium, dead players may NOT open their eyes during the night (at least until after the sceonce has occurred). Players who did look in the night, or were making too many comments as a dead person (possibly hinting they should be raised, or are the seer for instance) may not be raised from the dead.
Note that it works best if the medium does not know they are the medium! This is accomplished in the same way as the tinker. Again, you could possibly have a mason-medium, or a priest-medium, or whatever. Just state the rules you are using before play.
The seance should not be used as a way to 'prove' that a player is the medium. i.e, you shouldnt go: "Ok, we're going to have a seance, we'll vote for it one person at a time, and if it fails try again, until the one person who is the medium votes for it. Then we have proven that player is a villager." This breaks the role and makes it too powerful a benefit to the villagers. Rather, only one seance vote should be allowed. It should be called when there is a general majority agreement to use it, on a certain player. The medium not knowing who they are (and thus, no one really knowing if its even possible to hold the seance in the first place), should keep this possibility from happening.
Another good variant: Unknown roles. In this variant, players do not know the exact composition of roles in the game. You set the number of werewolves and the seer. Then you mix a number of special roles with some basic villagers, and draw SOME of them to be used, not showing which are discarded. You then mix them all and hand them out.
For example, in a 9 player (plus a moderator) game, you have 2 werewolves and a seer. Then there are 6 other roles. You put the following roles into a pile: Cobbler, Angel, 2 Masons, Priest, Werewolf Hunter, and 3 Basic villager cards. One of the cards is chosen randomly by the moderator to be a Tinker, and one a Medium. Of those 9 cards, 6 are chosen randomly and mixed with 2 werewolves and the Seer into a new pile and dealt out.
Thus, you could potentially have any of a variety of roles, cobbler, angel, masons (even a mason without a partner mason, so he doesnt know anything, except that there ARENT a pair of masons), priest, werewolf hunter, tinker, medium, or whatever else, in the game, but there are only SOME of those. A werewolf could come out and claim to be the priest, and maybe there is no priest to refute his claim! This leads to an enormous amount of cool possibilities, and I recommend it for advanced groups.
There is another role which can be combined with this variant: the Thief. The thief is one of the cards dealt into the pile to be chosen from randomly. If the thief is in the game, then during the first night, the thief gets to trade his thief card for one fo the cards that was discarded from the pile! Thus, IF there is a thief, then that player knows what all roles are in the game, and what are not. (Except they still dont know about the tinker or medium).
A few comments on a couple other roles, which I think DONT work:
The little girl: The little girl can peek during the time when the werewolves are killing someone, and thus if she is not caught (and then killed), knows who they are.
I think this breaks the game, it adds aspects to the game which are not psychology and deduction, and is far too strong when it works. It also forces rules like "no player can cover their face with their hands in the night" and things like that. We've tried it and almost everyone agrees its broken.
Cupid: Cupid picks two lovers. The lovers know who each other is, but not what their roles are. If one lover dies, the other immediately dies. In the rare case that the two are the only ones left at the end, and one is werewolf and the other villager, then the lovers win and no one else.
I tend to think it works ok in large games, where you really want more people to die fast cause the game drags so long, but it isnt good for most cases. It can also lead to some broken endgame situations.
Anyway, there are countless other role possibilities, but these are ones I have found to work very well. Some strengthen the villagers, and some the werewolves, so you can make the game more balanced for your group's skill level. (As players get better and better, the villagers tend to win more and more, particularly becasue random lynchings cease, and everyone is participating strongly in rooting out the werewolves, and people spend a long time before deciding on a lynching, so their results are more accurate).
Have fun with your next werewolf game!
Posted Fri Aug 27, 2004 11:49 pm