Quote Originally Posted by vornksr View Post
I've thought about how one might resurrect the spy in FM before, and this seems like it might be the best way you could implement it. It's got some potentially fatal drawbacks, though:

1) It makes the spy an almost 100% guaranteed way to detect mafia (except for the immune gf), stronger even than sheriff (since sheriff at least can be duped by framer).

2) It encourages the mafia to encrypt their night chats, which is hella annoying but a perfect workaround. (Each night, player A tells B how to encrypt his posts, B tells C, and C tells A. Since the spy can only hear one mafia player, he'll never be able to learn the encryption that his target is using... he'll have to break the code himself.)

3) It eats away at the mafia's greatest strength, which is the ability to work together and pool knowledge. Given that the mafia is the only faction never to have won a game, it seem undesirable to be implementing roles that work against them.


But I like the idea nonetheless, and I think it might be workable in the mechanic I'm planning for the FM I host. My game's going to be set on the islands of Venice, and where players live/where events occur matters. The spy could target an island, rather than a player, and "overhear" a set number of posts that took place on that island during the night. This would be less useful at first, but as the endgame approaches and the town figures out who lives where, it might become very useful.

This sounds like a really interesting workaround to the issues of making the Spy totally overpowered. Definitely looking forward to seeing what you do with it!