Welcome to the Village. We’re glad you decided to relocate. You know, times have been tough lately with rumours of werewolves invading our village. Our population has been dwindling, so we welcome you. Please, come. Stay. Become part of our community. Just.. don’t go out at night. The forest is not safe.
While the game is conceptually simple, there’s a lot happening in a game of Werewolf, and the more players, the more complex the interactions. This guide is meant to provide new players with guidance.
Knowledgable Werewolves
The Werewolves know who each other are because they wake at night together and can see each other. Therefore, the Werewolves also know who the villagers are: they’re the players who are sleeping. If you are a villager, don’t forget that everyone on the Werewolf team knows you are a villager.
The reciprocal is not true: You, as a villager, do not know for certain who is a werewolf and who is a villager. There are some exceptions listed below, see Lycan and Seer.
Your Card is Your Card
Your card assigns you your role. The card is assigned randomly. Never show your card to another player.
The Roles
Your moderator will prepare a game by considering the number of players, their experience with the game and their experience with each other. He can bias the game to the advantage of the Werewolves or the Villagers by adjusting which cards are in the deck. As players become accustomed to each other’s playing, they learn patterns of the other players and are able to more readily identify the Werewolves, which is why a skilled moderator would bias the deck to the advantage of the Werewolves.
For example, if the team-members know each other well, he might give an advantage to the Werewolves by including more Werewolf-Team cards.
If players are new to the game and to each other, he’ll have fewer Team Werewolf cards and more Team Villager cards.
The preparation of the deck takes some amount of time. For this reason, the deck is prepared in advance of the game based on the number of players. When a player doesn’t show up, the start time of the game is often delayed because the moderator must remove a card and then rebalance the deck. Don’t be late.
The following list explains how you might play certain roles. The only role that you’re sure to have in the game is Villager, every other role is included at the discretion of the moderator.
Villager Role
There are regular villager roles and special villager roles. The regular villager roles simply say “Villager” on the card. Don’t be discouraged if you’re “just a villager”, it’s an important role in itself.
Your job is to nominate those whom you suspect are werewolves, and then vote them out of the village. You need to find out who the other Villagers are so you can avoid voting against them. The Seer should eventually contact you, either directly or through another player, to share the list of who’s known to be a villager.
If you know who the Seer is, you should do whatever it takes to ensure the Seer stays active in the game.
Seer Role
The Seer role is powerful Villager-team role because the Seer selects one player each night and learns if that player is a Villager or a Werewolf. Once you learn that another player is a Villager, find a way to tell that villager that you know he is a villager. Now you’ve got an alliance of you and the other villager. Each time you learn another player’s identity, find a way to get that information to your trusted Villagers.
A Seer that keeps information to herself is not helping her team. If that Seer were to die, the information would die with it.
If you are a Werewolf, your team gains a significant advantage if you eat the Seer.
Apprentice Seer
The Apprentice Seer is a member of the Villager team who is inactive in the game while the Seer is alive. If the Seer is eliminated from the game, the Apprentice Seer takes over. The other players aren’t told that this transition has happened. The Apprentice Seer starts gathering information at night the same way the original Seer did.
There is a significant advantage to the Villager Team if the original Seer passed on the list of known villagers to the Apprentice Seer prior to being eliminated. If that information was not shared, then the Apprentice Seer is essentially starting from the beginning.
Twitcher
The Twitcher is a member of the Villager team who has two birds: A Healing Dove and a Pecking Crow. Each night, the Twitcher is asked if she would like to use either of those two birds. The Healing Dove prevents a death, while the Pecking Crow inflicts one, upon the player of the Twitcher’s choice.
As the Twitcher, you walk a delicate balance: Don’t use your birds carelessly at the beginning of the game, but don’t horde them such that you’re banished and the birds are never used. You might use your healing dove to save yourself, or you might use it to save the Seer. If you use it to save your partner (boyfriend, girlfriend, whatnot) just because the partner has sworn that they are also a villager, then you are foolish. (Committing to the fact that you are a Villager is part of the game.)
Your Pecking Crow is effective in knocking out a player that you think is a Werewolf. Usually a Werewolf is eliminated by a vote, but with your Pecking Crow, it’s all you. Careful, though, because if you take out a villager, you’ve put your team one step closer to losing.
Lycan
The Lycan is a regular Villager in every way except for one: A recessive werewolf gene is present in this villager’s DNA. Unfortunately, when the Seer or Apprentice Seer uses her special powers to see the Lycan, the Lycan will be reported incorrectly as being a Werewolf. It’s not true! The Lycan is a Villager but that’s not what the Seer will see.
More tips will be added to this page over time.