I didn’t know about Blood on the Clocktower when I started making Swords at Dusk. Actually, I never played Blood on the Clocktower until like, this summer. However, very much like that game, I started out twisting the original Werewolf formula the way many designers start modifying that style of game– making a whole lotta roles with special powers and watching them bounce off each other.
Role reference card from an earlier version of SaD
While brainstorming all these cool roles and seeing them in action was fun, it was hard to keep track of them all, Even for me, and I made the thing. Obviously, something needed to change; So in the next iteration, I cherrypicked the best performing (and personal favorite) mechanics from all these roles, and ended mixing them together into the three roles you see today:
The Killer has more or less stayed the same since the game was made.
The Admirer took the Storyteller's Shame, but otherwise has remained the same.
The Noble has the "Dramatic reveal" that the Coward had, and I added the Wallflower's win condition. A lot of times, the Fool role often stuck players in that "Critical decision" scenario I wanted to play out with The Detective, and I figured it would be easier and more flexible just to make
I chose these three because the most interesting stories often involved certain roles over others. Over time, I would see many different ways to play each role, and start weeding out mechanics or roles that felt like they weren't adding anything. At the end, cutting and combining these roles allowed my game to be easier to pick up, and that having a bunch of "special" roles wasn't needed to keep a social deduction game interesting.
SaD being played at Come out and Play After Dark 2019, notice how everyone is struggling to read all the roles in the dark
However, early on in playtesting I discovered why I should cut back on "special" roles in the game, and it's the main reason there’s only three special roles in the game, what do you think that reason might be?
Curious about what "Stars" and "Clovers" the prototype card mentions? Think I should've kept one of my original roles? Let me know in the comments!
If you don't want to wait until next week for the answer, backers get the answer right away...
