It's even longer now ;)

Thanks David, that's one of the other main reasons we wanted to get some games on film in Vancouver - so we could have some games out there with different Storyteller styles. Whilst the April 2019 play-throughs were great, we didn't want to give people the impression that they all have to storytell exactly like me (this is Evin here) to run a great game. Everyone's going to have their own style and go at their own pace. :)

Jon had a really hard job to do, because explaining all of Fake Fortune Teller stuff is bloody hard. To me, it looked like a minion trying to jump on a sword. Instead, a stupidly close game just because Zach wanted to use his vote.

@@pwndnoob4937 while you're right, I kind of feel Zach at that point couldn't follow all the might-have-beens and just decided to go with the info he had at the start, that Evin or Reggie was the scarlet woman, which if true, could have been been an imp via her own ability or a star pass by then

That's actually pretty good.

Heyoooo!

It's also interesting how many of these videos are evil wins, considering how even the win rates are in the data.

Heyo! Evin here on the BOTC account. I still love this exchange: - Jon fails to remember that Fortune Teller acts on the first night. - Evin fails to notice that Jon failed to remember this. - Jon quickly recovers. 😅 (In both our defense, it was three o'clock in the morning after a long day.)

Other than that i thought he did a great job bluffing though. The one other thing I think he could have done better, though it ended up not mattering, would have been if at the end he accused Brittany of being the Demon instead of Evin, just because I think that would have led to quicker buy-in from the group for voting to kill Brittany, which still would have led to a victory for evil. It would have been an easier sell to Evin (obv), but also to the rest of the group, who had generally built up a lot of trust in Evin by that point. Additionally, Reggie, who as far as I could tell came off as pretty trustworthy, had a pretty good reason to be suspicious of Brittany, although nobody seemed to listen for some reason -- she claimed to be the Empath and got 0s on her neighbors until Zach died, and then got a 1, meaning that Brittany was evil unless Reggie had been poisoned or was lying. Shame nobody listened to her. Now that I think about it though, the demon bluffing as fortune teller bluffing as washerwoman is a risky gambit, because aside from having to keep track of all the lies of bluffing as fortune teller, they are now presenting as a fairly safe-to-execute character. If there was about to be a vote to execute him, I assume he would have had to come out as fortune teller, which may have led to him having to kill himself on a subsequent night.

I’ve been enjoying the No Rolls Barred playthroughs with Ben storytelling. I really like the way he walks through the game step by step after it’s over.

@@kev_whatev I watch those too. They have such a great setup and the cast are really funny. Adam and Sully in particular

@@NewDrovack Carley is one of my new favorites. She’s a stone-cold killer.

fwiw the argument of "The Empath was a Minion so the Undertaker was killed to avoid confirming them as a Minion" is also a valid worldview. Killing the Undertaker claim doesn't confirm the Empath

Hey Crystal, this is Evin here! There certainly are a tonne of Storytellers in this video. Steven, Ben, Brittany, Eden, Jon, and myself have all done a *tonne* of conventions and events; Meg and Reggie have done storytelling at a few conventions with us in the past, and Reggie is traveling with a Grimoire at the moment and continues to run games; and whilst Zach doesn't typically play as Storyteller he's still a big part of BOTC in Seattle and helps out at various conventions too.

Hello Banana God, this is Evin here. I recently answered a similar question on the BoardGameGeek forums, so I'll reply with the same answer here: The current version for pre-order on CrowdOx is the standard version of BOTC without the Kickstarter stretch goals. I’m afraid that the late-pledge period for the Kickstarter version of the game closed on the 25th of June 2019, which was two months after the Kickstarter campaign ended. For the Kickstarter stretch goals, there were a few cosmetic enhancements but the stretch goals predominantly revolved around, as you've mentioned, early access to about 30 roles that we're planning to release later on across a series of expansions. (There are no extra whole expansions included in the stretch goals, but a few roles from each planned expansion together make up the bundle of stretch goal roles. Players will have to make custom scripts to play games with these roles, but we plan to make a few of our own favourite custom scripts available online as suggestions.) There's nothing exclusive to the Kickstarter versions involving gameplay - we believe that if a feature is good enough to play with then it should be shared with everyone - it's just that the Kickstarter versions will have access to a few roles that will be available to everyone eventually.

@@BloodontheClocktower hey i just checked my emails regarding the pre-order and it said i ordered the "kickstarter version". whats the difference between the 2

Hey Banana God, this is Evin here. There was a late-pledge period after the Kickstarter campaign lasting two months, so anyone who pledged in that time will still be due for a Kickstarter copy. Pre-orders for the standard copy of the game began on the 26th of June, 2019. There was an issue with the pledge manager for a brief time where the Kickstarter version of the game was still 'mapped', which meant it was appearing in pre-order invitation emails alongside the standard version, but at checkout and in confirmation it was still the standard version. If you contact us at storyteller@bloodontheclocktower.com with your order information I can give you specific details about your order.

Hey Nikhil, this is Evin here. I'd say that this is a great example of why the Poisoner is such a great role. The pieces were here for the Good Team to figure it all out, and I myself have done enough dissection and post-mortems of this game to determine what I (as the Ravenkeeper on the final day ) *should* have said to convince the Good Team that I was not the demon. (Which was basically this: "If you think that I'm Evil, then that means Reggie is Good because the Storyteller wouldn't point out both Evil players to the Investigator. But Reggie believes that *I* am Good, so if you think that I'm Evil, then it means you trust Reggie, which means you must trust me. If you think that Reggie is Evil, then you know that at most one of us is Evil, which means you must trust me." In this game, we could have figured out that someone somewhere along the line had very likely received misinformation and that it was probably the Investigator. Keep in mind that a player claiming Saint died in the night, so we knew it was highly unlikely that we had a Drunk as there were no other Outsider claims. This means that even though there is a possibility for misinformation, it's only going to be up to one player receiving misinformation on each night. From here: - Reggie knew it was highly unlikely that she'd been poisoned the first night, because she received the same info (zero) on the second night too. If she'd been poisoned on both nights, then that means that at least one of her neighbours on the first two days would have been Evil. - Zach was later confirmed as the Investigator by the more-or-less confirmed Undertaker (who'd been mostly confirmed when they knew who the Mayor was without anyone telling them), and Reggie's information of 'one' after Zach died tracked with her suspicions of Brittany. - If Zach was giving correct information then Reggie would have to believe there was a Scarlet Woman in the game, which means it's not possible for *her* to have been poisoned, as there was no Poisoner. However, Reggie was receiving info that the other player pointed out as the Scarlet Woman (me, the Ravenkeeper) was Good. This means that after Zach died, she knew her information was in direct conflict with Zach's. - But who's information was wrong - Reggie's or Zach's? For Zach to *not* be poisoned, she would have to have been poisoned on both nights, but for her to be poisoned means that Zach's info is wrong because a present Poisoner would mean there's no Scarlet Woman. Therefore, she knew that Zach had received incorrect info and that there was a Poisoner in the game. - Reggie knew the Undertaker couldn't have been poisoned, as without a Drunk in play it meant that Zach was either the Investigator or Evil. If Zach was the demon then the game would have ended, and if they were the Poisoner then the Undertaker couldn't have been poisoned. - This means that Reggie basically had it figured out that Zach was on the Good Team and was the Investigator, but that his information was wrong and that her's was right, which was why she trusted me (Evin, the Ravenkeeper). - From that point on, where she trusts me completely, we should have been able to lay all of this out and convince the other players on the Good Team that there's no way I was Evil, because the Storyteller would basically never point out both Evil roles to the Investigator. From there, here's how the trust could have extended: - The group knows that, at most, only one of me or Reggie are Evil. - However, Reggie has a strong reason to trust me. Whether or not you believe Reggie is Evil or whether you believe she's Good and you trust her info, this means that I am Good and should not be executed. - Zach, the Investigator, is trusted because of Reggie's Empath information and the Undertaker's information. - The Undertaker is trusted because they knew who the Mayor was without being told, and they died at night when they were about to learn some crucial information. - The Mayor is trusted because the Undertaker knew who they were and they were more or less willing to be executed day one. - The Saint is trusted because they died at night and no one else is claiming to be an Outsider. You hopefully see what I'm getting at here. Although most of these connections are not ironclad, there is a possible and likely path for the Good Team to navigate to mostly be able to trust each other. And in many games where it's not 3am and where everyone isn't exhausted, players have the brain power available to be able to do this :P - not all the time, but a lot of the time. It's rarely possible to prove anything 100% in Clocktower (which is a feature, not a bug), but it's hardly an impossible and random mess. It's a genuine puzzle of probability and conditional logic, centered around reading behaviour and figuring out who to trust. If we had done the above and established that I, (Evin, the Ravenkeeper) was not on the Evil Team, then we're still down to deducing whether it's Jon G or Brittany so a win still isn't guaranteed at that point. It remains unclear whether we still would have won, but there were enough behavioural and circumstansial reasons for Jon to have been suspected over Brittany (and indeed, in the video, I ended up trusting Ben's read and nominating Jon for the execution). And remember, this game was hardly a stomp for the Evil Team. They had the wool pulled over my eyes for most of the game but as soon as the final day began I knew with near-certainty that I was the last living Good player and I had two other Good players on board with me. If we had been able to convince just one of Zach or Meg to vote on Jon with us then the Evil Team would have had real trouble rallying enough votes to execute a different player as the remaining Good Team would have been fearful of tying the vote. Eden probably would have voted with them, but by the time it got to Zach it would only have been three votes and so he avoids tying it at this point. This is all to say that even with the chaos caused by the Poisoner at the start, this was still an extremely close game and is a perfect example of why the Poisoner is such a great role. If you've somehow read this far, I recommend reading BOTC Designer Steven Medway's first 'Behind the Curtain' blog post about the design of Clocktower. It goes into far greater detail on the role of information and misinformation in how Clocktower plays out, explaining it in far better and far greater detail than I could in just this comment. You can find it here: bloodontheclocktower.tumblr.com/post/184151143385/behind-the-curtain-1-total-chaos-sort-of

@@BloodontheClocktower Hi Evin, in your analysis as to what you could have said to convince the good team relies a lot on Reggie's info but that can be relied on only in retrospect. Once the Investigator said that either of you is a Scarlett Woman, it could very much be true if Reggie was a Scarlett Woman and she is acting as an Empath being showed 0 to gain the trust of the good team as she knows for sure then you and Zach are good. Also the Undertaker getting confirmation later about Investigator would incline them to trust Zach more than Reggie. In fact you yourself couldn't be sure that Reggie is not acting. Of course you could know Reggie personally and her vibes tell your intuition that she is not lying but not for the outside observer. Also such in-depth analysis needs time not available practically while playing as story teller needs to call nominations soon. Acc to me, the good team had only 3 pieces of key info: 1. Reggie's Empath knowledge. 2. Undertaker's confirmations of Mayor and Investigator 3. Relative trust on Meg's Saint Because the poisoner poisoned the Investigator, Points 1 and 2 became more of a burden than help for the good team. That makes it so much more difficult for the good team as anyways they are the ones on clock and need reliable info to execute the demon. Maybe instead of saying poisoner is OP, i should say the poisoner can completely ruin it for the good team by chance (since poisoner doesn't know the roles of the good team). Maybe there should be an additional condition to their power that it will fail if targeted at a 1st night ability person or that they cannot poison the 1st night. At least then the first nighters can be sure that their ability will not malfunction unless they are drunk. I am not sure if that will make Poisoner a bit more "variance-less" as currently it seems it creates high variance in certain circumstances.Even here if the poisoner had poisoned the Undertaker the 2nd night instead of you (Ravenkeeper) by chance, further misinformation would have been created for the good team making it nigh impossible for the good team to have any reasonable deduction as to whom to trust..very close to the impossible random mess that you mentioned as the good team also needs to deal with the bluffs of the evil players along with this uphill double whammy misinformation. One point i feel is if you and other good players were convinced that you are the only good player alive and Reggie is not evil, then it was highly likely the Imp was Jon as then it fits Brittany's bluff that she was the Monk and saving Jon. If at all anybody is suspicious as to why Jon isn't dying, they are being made to feel falsely by Brittany that "Hey I have been saving Jon , hence he is not dying" which implies Jon is more likely to be the Imp than Brittany. Thanks for the link, I'll check it out. Great game design though..and please post more videos! I love watching your BOTC playthroughs :D

​@@nikhiljohn1841, That's totally fair to point out about Reggie's information not being the group's information - I'm giving the *whole* post-game analysis here, which is a whole lot more than players can sometimes manage in-game. I gave the main argument from Reggie's perspective because she was in the best position to analyse her own information versus Zach's information and determine that something was definitely wrong with Zach's info. But as it relates to the final day, my point remains the same: Whether or not you believe Reggie is Evil, if you're trusting that Zach is telling the truth when he says that he was shown that either me or Reggie are the Scarlet Woman, and you're listening to what Reggie is saying, then you should *know* that either: - Reggie is the Scarlet Woman and I am Good.* - Reggie and myself are both Good. (*It's possible that the Storyteller has pointed both Evil players out to the Invetigator, but it's extremely unlikely. I've run ~500 games of BOTC as Storyteller and I've only ever done this once, and only because the nature of that particular setup meant that doing this gave the Evil Team the best possible shot.) From here, the group can accept that executing me is the wrong move and we can turn to figuring out the rest, regardless of whether or not we trust Reggie. (Although, working to point out that a player everyone was keen on executing on the final day is not the demon is not exactly an Evil thing to do, so trusting me at that point basically would have meant trusting Reggie too.) You're absolutely right about the Poisoner in this game - Brittany could have chosen different players and caused a whole lot more havoc. Or she could have had no impact on the game with her ability. In either case she's not picking randomly, she's making the best choices she can with her ability and trying to have fun in the meantime. For picking Zach first, Brittany and Zach are close friends so when she sees that he's on the opposite team she probably wants to destabilise him as much as possible, regardless of what his role is. There's also a tendency amongst regular players that people will poison the people next to them on the first night in case one of them was the Empath. For Brittany, Zach met the double criteria of 'close friend' and 'is sitting next to me' - she didn't know he was the Investigator but it was hardly a random pick. For each night after that, she was picking me because she had received credible-ish info from Jon that I was the Ravenkeeper. (And thanks for pointing that out - I felt like I hadn't played so great in this game, but I guess that by letting my role slip to Brittany via Jon that I spared the Good Team from more of the Poisoner's havoc.) Poisoners will almost never make games totally unsolvable in the way that you're describing, and on the occasions that they do it's through proper sleuthing, deception, and decision-making about who to target and what lies to tell, rather than picking randomly, hoping for the best, and having the game handed to them without any effort on their part. The ability causes chaos, but that's the point of the ability and it's up to the skill of the wielder to maximise that chaos as much as they can in order to win. (Or, in some cases, minimise the chaos - I've seen some Poisoners deliberately not poison the Empath because they correctly believed that the Empath would draw the wrong conclusion from their correct information). The Evil Team has strong tools at its disposal and the Good Team does too. This was a close Evil win, but it perhaps could have been a blow-out Evil win if Brittany picks the Undertaker on the 2nd night, or perhaps a blow-out Good win if Brittany picks the Mayor on the first night. When play-testing BOTC we recorded stats on over 500 games of Trouble Brewing and the win rates came out basically at 50/50 for each team. (The Evil Team's win percentage even dropped a point or two for games when the Poisoner was the only minion, such as in this game.) If the Poisoner was as unbeatable and as chaotic as you surmise, we would have seen stats more heavily tilted towards a positive win-rate for the Poisoner. Giving the Poisoner first-night caveats or other mods would add more complications to a role that is already working great and is in good balance with the rest of the game. All the same, thank you for taking the time to engage and for offering critique and suggestions, and thank you for your kind words. I hope I've done a lot to convince you on the nuts-and-bolts of it that the Poisoner isn't OP and doesn't need to be changed, but perhaps the major point to leave you with is that as a player who lost this game (and has lost many, many other games due to the Poisoner too) I didn't feel hard done by or that the game was unbeatable. (Oh and definitely please read the BTC #1 article by Steven - it was essentially written to help address concerns such as the ones you've raised.)

@@nikhiljohn1841 Wait until you see how a spy game goes XD. Spy is the real OP minion in TB. I think poisoner isn't very OP. Also, I believe if the undertaker in this game would have been straightforward about her data to the mayor, there would have been a trust circle formed among them and she wouldn't have had to come out in public which might have prevented her execution leading her to know that Reggie was indeed the empath and then her data from 2 night could have been used to ultimately figure out the evil duo. I do think that killing the mayor on the first day was pointless though. They should have gone for the investigator which is a dispensable character. @Blood on the Clocktower, I hope you guys upload some more BMR games. I still haven't got my head around on how to go about that. It's very chaotic for the good guy due to excessive drinking and poisoning.

Hey Leon! This is Evin here on the BOTC KZfaq account. We've only filmed five ourselves so far - these two in Vancouver last October, and the three in Sydney during the Kickstarter campaign. We weren't planning on doing any more play-throughs until after the game had delivered, but having everyone together there in Vancouver proved too good an opportunity to pass up so we got some filming together at the last minute. We don't plan to do any more large play-throughs before delivery, but we may do a session of Teensyville games (5-6 players only with a shortened character list) to coincide with delivery.

@@BloodontheClocktower Ah, well, guess I'll have to wait for game release for more. They're very entertaining to watch though, great subtitles to help out the audience get what's going on in the game.

Thanks! It's definitely something I want to do more of, once we get the time to do so. They're fun to do and people seem to really like them. :) We're even looking at bringing in a few extra bells-and-whistles for future if/when we do more. Things like player confessionals, maybe even a 'no spoilers' version of each game so that viewers can choose to stay in suspense until the end (and then watch the full version as well to see our hilaaaaarious jokes during the night phases).

well the Fortune Teller was one of the demon bluffs, so they knew for a fact, that there is no real Fortune Teller

It wasn’t luck, it was strategy