I. Tags
Tags are mechanical markers of players and abilities. Some tags modify the player or ability they’re on, some are hooks that effects can refer to, and some may just be there for flavor. Players know what tags they have, and what tags their actions have at all times unless otherwise stated.
II. Common Tags
We recommend looking through these at least once!
Most (but not necessarily all) of the following tags are in the game. These will often not be explained in role cards when they appear. Tags may exist that are not on this list, and they will be explained on role cards when they appear.
Player tags:
- Enigmatic — This player cannot claim or soft any role flavor, role tags, role abilities, or any non-public game actions. If they do, they lose all role abilities and tags (You may know this as Scared), and any ongoing effects are canceled (e.g. if the role created an ongoing event, the event would end immediately). The claimed/softed flavor, tags, abilities do not have to be real. Claiming/softing anything mechanical relating to your role at all violates this restriction. You are able to talk about things that everyone has access to or knowledge of e.g. you have a role (no one is vanilla), you have an ITA shot (everyone does), or that you’ve used an event prize (this has nothing to do with your role). YOU MAY CLAIM THAT YOU’RE ENIGMATIC .
- Enigmatic About {Something} — Similar to Engimatic , the player cannot claim or soft anything specifically related to X. As long as it does not imply a relation to the thing you’re Engimatic about, it does not violate the restriction. This has the same consequences as violating a normal Engimatic restriction. YOU MAY CLAIM THAT YOU’RE ENGIMATIC ABOUT SOMETHING .
- Vulnerable — This player cannot be protected from kills (think Macho).
Ability tags:
- Compulsive — This action must be used at every opportunity. Choices and targets will be selected randomly if the action is not submitted.
- Hidden — This action cannot be observed e.g. can’t be tracked, watched, etc. (think Ninja).
- Inactive — The ability’s passive effects do not apply, its triggers do not trigger, and it cannot be used if it’s an action.
- Loud — The players visited by this action are publicly announced at the beginning of the next Phase or after they resolve if Immediate. Example: “Adora visited Catra during the Night.” (Those names are Chloe’s fault. She knows what she did.)
- Multitasking — This action can be used in addition to other actions in the same Phase, Cycle, etc. Items are multitasking by default, unless specified otherwise.
- X-shot — This action can only be used X times per game.
- Overwhelming — The action ignores effects that protect the targeted player, or diversion effects on their target (i.e. a Bus Driver).
- Strong-willed — The action cannot be blocked, and ignores redirection targeting the acting player.
- Unstoppable — The action is both Strong-willed and Overwhelming, and ignores all other effects that would prevent it (e.g. a Commuter).
Player or Ability tags:
- Sealed (Player) — This player cannot be interacted with while dead (this includes all of their abilities and Items). When a dead player becomes Sealed , it is publicly announced at the beginning of the next Phase that they became Sealed during the previous Phase. If a living player is Sealed, it’s never announced, but instead will be noted when their role is revealed. There is an ability tag of the same name that works the same way, but is limited to only the ability it modifies.
- Sealed (Ability) — This ability cannot be interacted with while the player who owns it is dead. When an ability owned by a dead player becomes Sealed , it is publicly announced at the beginning of the next Phase that it became Sealed during the previous Phase. If the ability of a living player is Sealed, it’s never announced, but instead will be noted when their role is revealed. There is a player tag of the same name that works the same way.
- Cycling — The player must use each Cycling ability in their role, or each Cycling mode of a single ability, an even number of times. (For example, if a player must Cycle between abilities A, B, and C, and they have used A and B once but C zero times, they would need to use C before using A or B. If they have used A and B twice, and C once, they would likewise need to use C before using A or B.)
THIS LIST IS NOT EXHAUSTIVE. OTHER TAGS NOT LISTED HERE MAY EXIST .
III. General Details
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Tags may have implicit mechanical effects. Tags may implicitly add other tags, and when it does, effects that care about the tag will resolve as if it had the implicit tags (see Unstoppable).
Tags may have a value. For example, the X-shot tag always has a numerical value that can vary from instance to instance, and X is replaced by whatever the value is e.g. 2-shot and 3-shot are both instances of X-shot, but the former has a value of 2 and the latter has a value of 3. Values are secret by default.
Tags do not stack, and neither players nor abilities can have more than 1 instance of a tag at a time. If an effect would put another instance of a tag on a player, it does nothing instead. If the effect is passive, it is ignored while the player or ability has the same tag. If two or more instances of a tag would be applied to the same player or ability during action resolution with different values, none are applied unless otherwise stated.
Tags of actions only apply to that action. That is, if a player is blocked, all actions would be blocked accept those that are Strong-willed or Unstoppable. If the player has a tag that normally only applies to abilities, like Unstoppable, it is identical to all of their abilities having the tag i.e. effects that care about an action being Unstoppable would see that action as Unstoppable if its player had the Unstoppable tag. For tags that have distinct meaning as both a player tag and an ability tag (e.g. Leader or Sealed), the player tag does not necessarily mean it is the same as all abilities having that tag.
Tags can often be recognized in the construction “becomes [Tag]” e.g. “becomes Overwhelming”. This construction may change to ensure it is proper(ish) English grammar e.g. “becomes a Key ability”. Roles that start with tags will often see it written as “You are [Tag]” e.g. “You are Enigmatic.” Abilities that start with a tag will find them in a space delimited list followed the em dash (“—”) on the tag line (the one that starts with “Day/Night Action”, “Passive” etc.).
IV. Tag-specific Details
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Sealed has a slightly different meaning when on a player instead of an ability in that it does a bit more when on a player than treating all of its abilities as Sealed, but an ability being Sealed is still redundant if its player is Sealed. When a player is Sealed, they cannot be interacted with at all (abilities or otherwise). If an ability is Sealed, it will be ignored by backups even if the rest of the role could be copied. We will update flips if the player or their abilities become Sealed after death (either editing it into the role itself, or making a note somewhere), but we will not make an announcement when this happens.
A Hidden action cannot be observed e.g. can’t be tracked, watched, etc. (think Ninja). The action must be Hidden when it resolves e.g. if an immediate action resolves during the Night and that action later becomes Hidden, observation effects still see the immediate action.
An Overwhelming action ignores effects that protect the targeted player, or diversion effects on their target (i.e. a Bus Driver). However, it can be blocked or redirected by effects targeting the acting player. In other words, it ignores anything that would somehow shield its target (think Strongman but bypasses a few more things). If an effect would cause ITA shots targeting a player to have their damage reduced to 0, Overwhelming would ignore such an effect, but it would not ignore an effect making the player’s shots deal 0 damage.
A Strong-willed action cannot be blocked, and ignores redirection targeting the acting player. However, it would not ignore things such as their target being protected or redirection from a Bus Driver. In other words, it ignores anything that affects the acting player (think Strongwill but bypasses a few more things). If an effect would cause a Strong-willed player’s ITA shots to deal 0 damage, they ignore such an effect. If an effect would cause ITA shots targeting a player to have their damage reduced to 0, it would not ignore that effect, and would deal 0 damage.
While Unstoppable ignores an effect that makes a player un-targetable or otherwise immune, it does not allow the action to ignore its own targeting restrictions. For example, if an action says it can only target members of the Mafia, it cannot ignore that restriction if it becomes Unstoppable. Additionally, anything that references Strong-willed or Overwhelming also applies to Unstoppable e.g. “Assist target player, and copy Key actions they use that are not Strong-willed.” would not copy Unstoppable actions either. Effects may still say things like “Overwhelming or Unstoppable” for the sake of clarity, but simply “Overwhelming” would have sufficed.
V. Charges & X-shot
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Charges are countable mechanical markers. Each Charge has a unique name such as Whatever Charge, and is not interchangeable with Charges of any other name unless otherwise stated.
X-shot is a tag with a positive integer value that replaces X in the name (e.g. 1-shot, 2-shot, etc.). X-shot checks how many times an action has been used, and will prevent a player from using the action further if they’ve used it X or more times. That is, if a 1-shot action has been used one or more times, it cannot be used again.
Click here for a (very) detailed explanation
Abilities may care about how many Charges you have, or require them as a cost to use an action. In this way, they can be similar to the X-shot tag in that the number of times you can use an action is limited (i.e. an action that costs 1 Bullet Charge and you have 3 Bullet Charges with no way to gain more is nearly identical in practice to the same action with a 3-shot tag. However, unlike Charges, X-shot is not a cost. It merely compares the number of times the action has been used that game to its number, and says the action cannot be used if its been used as many or more times than its number. That is, you cannot gain more shots of an X-shot ability. The only way to use an action more times than its X-shot tag says is by removing that tag.
Charge costs and X-shot are checked when the action is submitted, not when the action resolves. For example, you could not steal a Charge and make a player unable to pay a cost for an action they’ve already submitted (the cost was essentially deducted upon submission). Another example would be if an action that has been used on a previous Night, and submitted for the current Night, were to gain a 1-shot tag before resolving, it would resolve normally even though it will now have been used twice. This is similarly true if an action were to somehow gain a cost of Charges; it still resolves if it was already submitted. (An action is “submitted” once the action submission window is closed for that phase. If an Immediate action were to make an action X-shot or have a cost of Charges, this could prevent a non-Immediate action from resolving at the end of the phase.)
Passive abilities with effects based on Charge thresholds are updated as soon as Charges are gained or lost. For example, if a passive made a player Unstoppable if they had 3 or more Bulldoze Charges, and somehow gained a Bulldoze Charge during action resolution before their actions resolved, their actions would be Unstoppable. However, this still cannot fizzle actions that are already submitted. If an action is Inactive unless they have at least 5 Level Charges, it will resolve if it’s already submitted even if that player would dip below the threshold during action resolution (but would still technically be Inactive as it resolved).
If an action with the X-shot tag would be given another instance of the X-shot tag, the tag with the lowest value will be applied and all others are lost (this is not necessarily true of other tags with values).
If an action is copied (the text may say things like “inherit” or “gain”), its state is copied as well, which includes the number of times its been used. That is to say, if a 1-shot action has been used once, it still cannot be used again once copied.
VI. Frequently Asked Questions
Click here for the FAQ
Q. Why did you rename some of these that are in the List of Vanilla Roles?
A. Because notblackorwhite is incredibly opinionated and argumentative and we were tired of arguing with her (this was written by notblackorwhite and does not necessarily reflect the views of other FAM4 hosts). (There actually were not arguments about this.) The real reason is they were changed to have names more evocative of their mechanical effect, and be more flavor neutral/flexible e.g. Macho as an adjective has a lot of implications and doesn’t make sense in all contexts like making someone “macho” doesn’t make as much sense flavor wise as making someone “vulnerable”. Ninja is another example of a modifier that’s overly specific in terms of the flavor it implies, and Hidden evokes a similar meaning without the same flavor connotations.
Q. Aren’t these just modifiers? Why not call them modifiers?
A. They don’t all modify. All modifiers are tags, but not all tags are modifiers. Some have an implicit mechanical effect (they modify), but all of them are useful because they can be cleanly.
There is an example rolecard in the OP.
