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Mafia

ℹ️
A small town is struck by a Mafia team! Catch all of the Mafia and save the townspeople (with the help of a doctor and detective) before it’s too late!
Grouping
Whole group
Duration
20-30 minutes
# of Moderators
1 (IA or Instructor); Optionally have both IAs alternate narrating, or have a scholar try narrating!
🛝 Find Mafia Brain Break Slide Here

Instructions:

Preparation
Before starting the game, assign roles. Have all scholars put their head down or close their eyes. As you call out roles, go around the room and tap on their shoulder to assign the role to that scholar. Scholars who are not assigned a role become a general townsperson.
  • While there’s a wide variety of roles to choose from, here are the common ones to start:
    • 📖 Narrator: Not a townsperson. Tells the story of each round and keeps track of the townspeople’s actions.
    • 👀 Mafia: Chooses a townsperson to kill each round.
    • 🩺 Doctor/Angel: Chooses a townsperson to save from being killed each round.
    • 🔍 Detective: Chooses a townsperson to investigate. The narrator will confirm or deny if that person is one of the Mafia; it is up to the detective to share their findings during voting.
  • Feel free to adjust the ratio of Mafia to Townspeople to change the game speed, and add in new roles as you’d like. For a group of 30 scholars, start with 2 Mafia, 2 Doctors, and 1 Detective as a guide.
 
Game Play
  1. 🌙 The Narrator begins the game by saying, “Night has fallen. Townspeople, go to sleep.” At this point, all players have their eyes closed.
  1. 🌙 Each night, players with roles are “awoken” to do their task.
    1. For example, the Narrator might say, “Mafia, wake up.” All Mafia players then can open their eyes and choose who to kill by pointing at a player. The Narrator notes this player down, then says, “Mafia, go to sleep.” All players then have their eyes closed once again.
    2. This is repeated until all roles have woken and gone back to sleep.
    3. Tip: It can be helpful to have a Google Doc or notes sheet open to keep track of these choices throughout the game!
  1. ☀️ The Narrator announces the night is over by saying, “Townspeople, wake up.”
  1. ☀️ Each Morning, the Narrator tells a story of the night before.
    1. You can get very creative here! A Narrator might say, “(Player1) was walking through the park one day. Unfortunately, they didn’t notice all of the construction going around, and accidentally fell into a giant hole, never to be seen again.”
    2. If that player was killed by the Mafia and saved by a Doctor in the same round, the Narrator might say, “Luckily, (Player2) was walking by and stopped (Player1) just in time!”
    3. This updates the whole town on who was killed and saved. All players who were killed (and not saved by a doctor) are now Ghosts. Ghosts do not speak for the remainder of the game, but they can observe the game during the day and night.
  1. Now all of the townspeople (no matter their role) vote on who they think the Mafia is.
    1. The player they vote out becomes a Ghost.
    2. At the end of voting, the Narrator will share the number of Mafia, Doctors, and Detectives remaining in the game.
  1. The game continues in rounds of Night, Morning, and Voting, until there are only Mafia left (Mafia win), or all the Mafia have been discovered (town wins).
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