#Implementing Wraith

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rustic ore
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There's a new cool character called the Wraith!

"You may choose to open your eyes at night. You wake when other evil players do."

The Wraith knows and shares what happens at night.
But how to implement it into pickup games here to try and capture all of it's elements but make it as easy to do so is a difficult task. This forum could be used to suggest and develop a way of implementing a version of Wraith so that it can be used in games to some level of success.

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A suggestion I wrote up (apart from the last bit cause idk):

| General ST Approach

  • Storytellers should aim to avoid messaging multiple players at the same point in the night phase if Wraith is on-script/in-play and look to keep messages sequentially. This includes waking other players up due to another player's ability.
  • When communicating with the Wraith, the ST should structure their wording around the actions a player does and not give extra details depending on their character. ie. "Paradox points at catto and bhamber" or "I show Paradox a 0".

| "You wake when other evil players do"

  • Whenever the ST goes to wake an Evil Player, also DM the Wraith that they wake with another player. Communicate this with the Evil Player as well.
  • The Wraith and Evil Player may request the ST to send a short message to the other. Any limitations on message length/amount can be ST decided.
  • When the Evil Player is put to sleep, inform the Wraith they are put to sleep too.

| "You may choose to open your eyes at night"

  • At any point in the night, the Wraith may DM the ST that they are doing 1 of 3 things: Opening Eyes, Peeking, Closing Eyes.
  • When "Closing Eyes", the Wraith is not informed of anything in the night phase and cannot interact with any players.
  • When "Peeking", the Wraith learns some information of the Night Phase. This could be up to ST discretion how much info to give but at the minimum should be informing the Wraith who wakes and who doesn't.
  • When "Eyes Open", the Wraith learns more information of the Night Phase and can interact with some players. This could be up to ST discretion, but the Wraith should learn more detail of what players do such as if they choose any players, if the ST showed them a card/token/pointed at a player etc.
  • When "Eyes Open", the Wraith may request the ST to send a DM to another player (evil or good / awake or not). The receiver may only request a DM be sent back if they are currently awake.
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not sure how to implement getting caught though which is a substantial part of the Wraith

fathom radish
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the nights… oh the long long nights 😧

deep hearth
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I would also add when "Eyes Open" the current awake player learns that the Wraith has their eyes open.

And the last part I would do only when the other player is awake. A Wraith with their eyes open can only communicate with someone who's awake.

sand dock
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I think the Wraith encompasses a lot and simplifying it for unofficial would be good. Something like at the start of the night Choose whether you are Peeking, Eyes Open or Eyes Closed. If Peeking a random good player receives a ping (same as widow) that a wraith is in play. The wraith would then learn essentially the night order, who you visited in order. Eyes open would mean you see everyone's info as well but instead of a widow ping its a fearmonger announcement. Eyes closed Nothing happens. You may choose to send a (insert word count) message to each evil player and they may send one back. Learn a player when they turn evil and they learn you. IDK fully but i do think it should be simplified

sand dock
rustic ore
deep hearth
rustic ore
rustic ore
sand dock
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I dont think that there is a good way to catch the wraith - I also think getting an onslaught of messages from the wraith as an ST would suck

sacred mountain
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If I ever had to run it, I'd make it a 1/3 chance a good player sees the wraith each night they peek

rustic ore
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For reference, online Wraith has a 7% (I believe) chance of getting caught

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so 1/3 in much higher 😂

deep hearth
sand dock
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thats gonna have special coding and functionlity for it

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that we can't get

rustic ore
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Sorry yes Official App has built in Wraith functionality

deep hearth
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They're going to have a built in "chance of seeing wraith" thing?

rustic ore
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Clear solution is Wraith scritpts gotta be played on the App 😎

rustic ore
deep hearth
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How about this then:

The Wraith chooses at the start of the night if they want to do "Eyes Closed", "Peek" or "Eyes Open".

  • If the Wraith keeps their eyes closed, nothing happens apart from them waking up with evil.
  • If the Wraith decides to peek, they have a 1/20 chance of getting caught that night. ST randoms a player who catches them if they do get caught.
  • If the Wraith opens their eyes, they have a 1/4 chance of getting caught.

At any point in the night when peeking or eyes open, the Wraith can choose to communicate with the current awake player, revealing themselves to them.

This tries to balance the risk-reward situation that doesn't feel completely unfair to the wraith. Especially since to gain the complete night order, they only have to peek twice and to gain the complete actions, they only have to open their eyes twice.

sand dock
# rustic ore And similarly, I dont think a Fearmonger styled announcement embodies Wraith's d...

i think changing wraith to be played on the unofficial is fine ngl. It was made intentionally or unintentionally to move more people to the Official app. I think rewriting the character for essentially Discord based games is fine (also id kind of just wait and see what CBOTC do as they play through Discord and I trust the people running that stream to come up with something sensible)

rustic ore
rustic ore
sand dock
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I will say that this character does attack some of the core things about playing through Discord. The wonky night orders, the fact its all though dms, some random chance thrown in there

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The heart of my suggestion was swapping the random chance aspect with giving the Wraith some anonymity within the confines of people knowing its a wraith game. The style also makes it bluffable by evil that they "got the wraith ping". Wanted to fully air out my idea

sacred mountain
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Skill diff character

deep hearth
# rustic ore again, a 25% chance is much much higher than what playtesting has proven

It's only 25% chance if they choose to full open their eyes. It's when they get the most information, and they can choose to not fully open their eyes for a lesser chance of getting caught.

This isn't in person and I think it should be considered that getting information through messages from the ST on what other players do is a lot more powerful than vaguely seeing things in person when you're not even sure what you've seen. You can't always make out the empath number shown, or the players the FT picked etc. As such, to balance the fact that you have precise information, you should probably make the chance of getting caught higher.

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It's the reason Spy and Widow are stronger in discord than in person, but you can't really balance those to be the same. With Wraith, you can if you change the risk-reward formula

sacred mountain
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If I'm bluffing as the Wraith can I also keep my eyes open during the night?

deep hearth
sacred shadow
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if you pick bhamber and catto there’s no way you get a 0

covert bluff
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While not exactly a solution, I think it's important to constantly remind STs that they can veto any custom for any reason. This includes "I don't want to run x character" While this won't tell STs how to run Wraith, it could help in reducing the number of bad Wraith games due to it being vetoed more often

calm tundra
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Should the wraith learning which tokens are in night info be up to ST discretion or is there a preference to standardize that? Inperson when I give demon bluffs out, my players have a hard time telling what tokens they see from a distance so I just give them the tokens so they can tell the icon, name, and read it themselves. A Wraith would not be able to tell what they are unless they're neighboring the Demon.

calm raven
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Each night learn a player and the info they learnt, there’s a 1/4 chance they learn a wraith is in play

grim prism
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Just gonna put it out there... maybe wraith just isn't for BOTCU...

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It is a character based around a play pattern that does not work in the more structured environment of online play

rustic ore
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Plus it’s cool, don’t see why we can’t try implementing it

grim prism
rustic ore
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Veto

grim prism
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I think you have to just ignore the "peeking" aspect of the character

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I would not run this character on the unofficial app, but if I did I would offer the wraith the choice of seeing and not seeing. If they choose not seeing I would give them a night order of evils waking (except maybe ET) and any picks they make. If they chose waking I would give them the order people woke and any choices they make. If they chose waking then at the beginning of the night I would role N dice where N is the number of times they have chosen to wake and if for every roll that gets say a 5 or 6 then I'd message one good player and say "You say <player_name> with their eyes open"

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I would message the good player when they woke up and before they made any decisions

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Not saying this is the best solution but it's the least disruptive solution I can think of that fits the spirit of the character.

sand dock
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They finally hit IRL gold, we can't play this

normal sorrel
# grim prism I would not run this character on the unofficial app, but if I did I would offer...

It’s a good step, but I think one of Wraith’s core mechanics is that waking with evils means being able to communicate with them. Not being able to do that worsens the Wraith. Maybe a groupchat DM could help in which you give them limited time to talk with one another.

Also, forgive me if I misread, but this doesn’t allow the Wraith to control when to open or close their eyes, no? It’s either fully open, or only open for evils.

grim prism
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Correct, otherwise the ST has to DM the wraith 10 times a night

normal sorrel
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Understandable, it would get tiring. But maybe we could do something here.

The Wraith first messages ST to start the night awake or asleep. If the Wraith is awake, the ST warns them the next person is about to wake, and can choose to stay awake or asleep (maybe the Wraith can even learn who is about to wake)

Then the Wraith should be the one to prompt ST that they want to sleep or wake.

grim prism
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I completely agree that is in the spirit of the character, but we already have a problem with night length

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ST’s are already running >5 min nights, this more than doubles the number of messages each night

sand dock
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Yeah in an unofficial setting the power should be on/off or on/off/peeking

normal sorrel
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Another idea could be using the website’s Organ Grinder Hidden Vote system, and keep an eye out for the Wraith if they have their hands up (awake) or down (asleep)

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Though I guess it changes little about night length

sand dock
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Imma be so real no ST is monitoring the whims of the wraith in discord games

dark marlin
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Sometimes, IRL characters should just be IRL characters

pearl notch
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The way I would personally want to run it is with no random chance. If you are "peeking" you only get caught if pointed at by a player. If you have your eyes open, you get caught it you are pointed at, shown by the ST as part of info, or if the person woken is directly across the grim from you (the two people directly across on odd player counts). This may need to be adjusted depending on how strong it is, but I would prefer the consistently

pearl notch
dark marlin
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I have no objection to that, and if something good is found I may run that variation

teal ore
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Perhaps this is a scheduled only game. ST's are their own worst enemies half the time around here

deep hearth
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How about completely changing wraith into "Evil wakes up together"? Make a group chat with all evils in, give them a max per person word count and ignore the part of waking with good players.

grim prism
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That ignores all of the abilities of wraith to see other people waking

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Could you also so something like

  • Eyes Open: You learn everything and everyone learns you
  • Peeking: You learn the waking of everyone on the opposite side of the grim and something that they might learn you (I like Greedy's suggestion of they learn you if they pick you)
  • Closed: You only learn evil things
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Because if you're peeking you can't see your neighbours without being obvious

fathom radish
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ngl I feel like most of the suggestions in this thread will make fast STs slow and slow STs even slower to the point that Wraith’s almost not worth it

neat cove
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it also feels very much like Not The Wraith based on what we've actually seen of it

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the Wraith is not loud the way a Fearmonger is

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and bra1n said the chances of an eyes open wraith getting caught is 7%

normal sorrel
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Is that foran entire night or for every instance a good player would wake?

fathom radish
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every time the ST sends a night signal to a player, it’s a 7% chance

grim prism
deep hearth
deep hearth
grim prism
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25.2%

deep hearth
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25.195% xD

grim prism
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Hahaha

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Yeah I mean it's not 7*4

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But I think that it's a fact that Wraith can't be run online

deep hearth
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I used an online calculator 🙂

grim prism
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The question is whether we use a homebrew character that has that same feel or not

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And I say not

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I may be wrong or in the minorityUnless we are open to

deep hearth
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I say ST decision on how they implement it, and should be clarified BEFORE voting on scripts

grim prism
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So are you suggesting let evewry ST run it how they want to ? or a standardised runining decided by the community?

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Because ST's can't run wraith as a character on the unofficial app

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If it's going to be run it has to be a homebrew character (with the same feel)

deep hearth
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Is it not on the app? I thought it was?

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Oh like that

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I got ya

grim prism
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The official app automates the system, we would need ST's to run it themselves, which is the big difference (as I understand)

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Also unofficial app nights are generally longer in my experience so it's more of an issue

deep hearth
# grim prism So are you suggesting let evewry ST run it how they want to ? or a standardised ...

I think for now we should probably experiment. If there's a clear way that's better, we should standardize that way. If there's maybe 2 or even 3 good ways of running, we could still give ST choice on standard between those.

From what I've seen, compared to other new character releases nobody's jumping on trying this, which I think shows players being hesitant to play it. I'd like to see what people come up with in the coming week 🙂

grim prism
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I agree with experimentation, but should that be happening in pickup or scheduled? I think that there is a danger with wraith of making very unfun games and also discouraging a lot of players from joining pickup games

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Every person I have talked to (as well as me) has said they would drop from a game if Wraith was on script specifically in a pick up game. Is that a reason in and of itself not to allow it? Absolutely not. Is it something to consider carefully? Imo yes

rustic ore
grim prism
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*double

deep hearth
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I personally haven't heard much of that thought yesterday having talked to about 15-20 players casually about it, but also nobody's enthusiastic to try it

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For now it's more like "Huh? What WOULD we do?"

fathom radish
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I’d only be willing to play a discord wraith game with an ST that I trust, and I feel like that’d be easiest to find in scheduled games

deep hearth
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I think you can run it quite fast if you're an experienced ST as in +1-2 minutes per night. I would personally like to try to run a TB+wraith (or spy out wraith in) just to see how feasable it is without losing too much time

grim prism
grim prism
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Also, a lot of the times the long nights are nothing to do with the ST

deep hearth
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In the end, a lot of the extra time is narration to the Wraith. So I think it should be fine as long as you have prepared what you need to narrate

grim prism
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You can't prepare it all though, the ST needs to narrate night actions to the wraith

fathom radish
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I think a big source of lengthening could be having to wake players 1 by 1, if the solution we go with requires that

deep hearth
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You know what characters are in play. You can definitely prepare it. Just not the exact choices but for instance FT you know it's going to be "Points towards x and y. I give no/yes"

deep hearth
grim prism
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I think that logically you are right that you can run it quickly... But the evidence of the server is that a lot of ST's take way too much time over things that can be done quickly

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TB nights really should not be taking more than 2 mins and they can be done in 30 seconds b ut people regularly go over 5 mins

deep hearth
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But I think we shouldn't limit the use of Wraith in pickup. Seems like it's not going to be a problem cause players don't even post scripts with it

fathom radish
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well it’s not on the script tool

grim prism
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I agree that the problem is sort of moot as people don't want to play it much, but whatever we do we are limiting the use of wraith in pickup because wraith can't be run online, the question is whether we introduce some wraith-like character

fathom radish
deep hearth
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Though maybe it does. We'll see!

grim prism
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And if we are going to be introducing a wraith-like homebrew character, does that open the door for other well tested homebrew characters to be allowed in pickup? That's a question for a different thread but something I am very for

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But the point stands that "allowing wraith" on the server is actually "introducing a new homebrew character that captures the feeling of wraith"

calm raven
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@rustic ore will we get in trouble if we just ping TPI and ask if they have any experiences from their playtests?

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Like they must have done testing before ending with their current version

rustic ore
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@lone palm Do you have any insight on how we could implement Wraith onto the Unofficial? I don't know if you've used playtest methods similar to how games are ran here or are just in person etc

rustic ore
deep hearth
normal sorrel
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The difference though is that all you need to say for Alejo - SC is, “I will run that SC wakes before evil info.” Wraith requires a deeper explanation.

sacred mountain
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If I had all the power in the universe, that's how I'd have the wraith run on this server

deep hearth
grim prism
grim prism
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And the main power of wraith (in my eyes) is that you get to see what good players are picking

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It's stronger than spy specifically in the case of you know who the FT has picked or who the VI's have picked

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That version of the character can be added, but it isn't a good substitue for wraith

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An aside with respect to the 7% chance of being seen on each interaction, it's a good number

image.png
grim prism
deep hearth
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I do wonder where they got the 7%?

rustic ore
deep hearth
grim prism
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Well it’s also positional

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Seeing the player opposite you wake up and learn info is easier than seeing the player on your left waking up and picking the player on their left

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That (imo) is where the richness of the character comes from

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You can see some people wake but not their info

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You can see some people’s info but not exactly who

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And at any time you can raise the stakes to try and find out more

rustic ore
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@haughty beacon

haughty beacon
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Would it not just be

  • the wraith can message every player privately during the night
  • The wraith can tell Story teller what level of info they want
    Wake order only - no chance of being caught
    Info also - percentage chance of being caught, per piece of info
  • the wraith is told who the evil players wake decisions
  • The wraith tells the Story teller at the start of each night, the mode they want.

I think it is best to try to keep things as simple as possible for the ST as it could be quite intensive

fallow breach
rustic ore
grim prism
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I was about to say… data is only useful from competent ST’s…

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(Ones that know how minstrel works 😉 )

fallow breach
rustic ore
haughty beacon
grim prism
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Shadow messed it up 2 games in a row! First they were the ST then the next game they were the minstrel and forgot to proc again 😭

haughty beacon
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Also - just a thought I had regarding good players finding the Wraith - there are no false positives built in - realise that wasn't really recorded, and might be super rare, but it did kind of happen in the release stream.

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not saying that we should build that into what is already quite a complex character to run, but just worth mentionig

icy crag
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Like, the wraith can only make gestures IRL, how are they writing dm's to people.

haughty beacon
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Sign language exists

icy crag
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Just because it exists, doesn't mean everyone can speak it. I dont think the wraith in any form should be able to send complex dm's. e.g. pointing at someone or smth

normal sorrel
# icy crag Just because it exists, doesn't mean everyone can speak it. I dont think the wra...

I think this is a good baseline (or whatever the term is). It’s inevitable that a character built for in-person will not translate 100% online, so we have to discount some things. And as Huff mentioned on STs already taking longer for the nights, there are things that we don’t need to add here.

Like in the live stream game, the Wraith at one point took another player’s script from their hands and gave it back after a while, adding a hprror aspect of the game. I don’t think we need to translate that online, especially if we want to integrate Wraith in unscheduled games.

bronze cedar
cloud tusk
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My biggest issue with this minion, is that it will make nights take an insanely long time, therefore I won’t try it online unless im playing the app in a scheduled game.

teal ore
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I don't think there is a way to make it work.
Wraith: On your first night, you learn which order players were woken up

rustic ore
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@jolly sluice you ran Wraith last night correct? How did it go

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Idk if it was in the bag etc

jolly sluice
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died d2

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they peeked and rolled a 5, which was low enough to reveal them. I also didn't use the optional rule, but if i had, the game would have gone differently.

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im changing my numbers

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also it takes an abusrd amount of time to run

rustic ore
rustic ore
jolly sluice
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too high and i had open to guaranteed seen which im changing too

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new numbers:
OPEN: 31%
PEEK: 3%
i will be experimenting for a while

haughty beacon
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Confirmed

gritty ledge
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@upper cave we have to be first chat

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or im tunneling on you

rustic ore
gritty ledge
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my b

fallow breach
grim prism
random sun
royal delta
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I'll go on the record to say this definitely won't be coded into the unofficial app. It's just too complex.

I can't play enough anymore to really discuss how to run this.

But I'll point out that I don't think any of you have mentioned the option for the Wraith to stare down every single waking player at night.

grim prism
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I was speaking with Fake Harry last night and he made a good point. Asking the question "Why is Wraith better than spy?" we decided that (1) it isn't but (2) was that it was the ability to communicate with evils at night. So I think there is some legs to an idea of a grim seeing role that can send 5 word messages to evils through the ST. It isn't Wraith, but I think something like "You see the grim just before each evil wakes, you may send the ST a 3 word DM to send to each evil as they wake"

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This allows the wraith to communicate who is monk/IK protected or maybe guide N1 pukka etc

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Maybe also incorporate something like a widow ping

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It's not the Wraith, but I think it does capture some of what makes it powerful

bronze cedar
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I still think emotes + player names would be fun 😆

sharp nova
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crazy idea: have a Co-ST for wraith, both will be in the ST channel talking, main ST handles the night as usual but the the Co-ST is specifically handling the wraith and their interactions. The ST's shoudl be able to coordinate since they are both on the same call and can just pass info back and forth easily

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that should help mitigate the "make nights longer" issue.

calm raven
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But a co-st in itself tends to make nights longer, although I do like the idea

icy crag
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But then youd need a cost for running a Wraith script

grim prism
empty venture
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TRUE

opaque gale
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Fused Paradox and Blitz Rulings together for Quick Reference, and i will be using this for my own private games, seems legit enough for me - also, how are five minute nights too long? it's just five minutes lol, days are MUCH longer and the best stuff happens in the night anyway XD (atleast from my pov as a ST lol)

Wraith_Ability_for_Online_Games.png
random sun
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😭

gloomy pewter
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This thread is covert advertising for the Official App

opaque gale
gloomy pewter
opaque gale
rustic ore
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But we're onto you Savan