Karma

Karma is the ranking system in place at EpicMafia. Users with lower than 6 karma cannot comment on any part of the game or post in the forums. Karma may also be used to rank individual setups up and down. Contrary to user karma, setup karma is extremely important and plays a critical role in the community.

User Karma

User Karma Ranking

A user's karma ranking may be checked in two spots, on their profile or as a pop-up when clicking a player's username during a game. A player's karma may go into negatives if they are ranked down when they are at zero. Karma rankings have ranged from less than -100 to greater than 200. A user may not change their own karma unless they use alternate accounts.

Any user that has accrued at least 2000 points may alter a user's karma.

To change a user's karma, find their profile and click one of the arrows underneath their name. Click the down arrow to rank them down by one point or the up arrow to rank them up by one point. You may change the karma ranking you give someone at any time by clicking the opposite arrow, or clicking the same arrow you previously clicked to return the karma to have no effect on their ranking at all. The changes are immediate and will be seen the next time you encounter the user. You may only give negative karma to players whom are currently in the same game as you.

Ideally, your karma score is intended to be an indicator of the type of player you are. Karma is not intended to be representative of a player's skill level or popularity, but rather their propensity to be a thoughtful, helpful, and respectful player during the game.

Setup Karma

Setup Karma Ranking

Contrary to user karma, setup karma is quite a popular addition to EpicMafia. Ideally, the setup karma score is intended to be an indicator of how balanced and fun a setup is.

A setup's karma ranking may be checked in two spots, on the page itself or on the "Find Setups" page. Just like user karma, setup karma may go into negatives if they are ranked below zero. Unlike user karma, however, if a setup is ranked at zero or below for more than 24 hours, the setup is deleted. If you create your own setup, this can be counteracted by simply ranking your setup up once you save it. In general, karma rankings have ranged from less than -10 to greater than 65. A user may only change a setup's karma once. Users must have a minimum of 500 points and no more than a 10% suicide rate to change a setup's karma.

To change a setup's karma, find the setup page (each new setup is assigned a setup number) and click one of the arrows beside the setup. Click the down arrow to rank it down by one point or the up arrow to rank it up by one point. You may change the karma ranking you give someone at any time by clicking the opposite arrow, or clicking the same arrow you previously clicked to return the karma to have no effect on their ranking at all. It's common courtesy to leave a comment about how you feel the setup is or isn't deserving of karma before assigning karma.

Setups are listed according to their karma ranking on the find setup page. This is why setup karma plays a key role in the activity that goes on in EpicMafia throughout the day and night.

User Karma Controversy

User karma is an oft-maligned target of the community and its validity is frequently called into question. Users generally tend to fall into four different stances on the issue:

• Karma is a valid system that democratically allows users to express their satisfaction or dissatisfaction with other players. Although there have been problems with the implementation, it's generally a good indicator and needs to continue to be expanded upon with sensitivity. Karma can't be reset because it punishes those who have acted with civility and patience, and it rewards those who deservedly have been ranked down. Karma certainly can't be thrown out because we need some sort of system in order to identify bad users and express our own opinions about the experience we've had with other users.

• Karma wasn't adequately explained to the user base and therefore must be reset if it were to be fair to the community at all. Some users may have thought that karma was always going to be a completely useless device and purposefully lowered their karma for the fun of it. Karma cannot be allowed to continue at the status quo because it unfairly affects some players, and it cannot be thrown out because there are some merits to using it as one indicator of the type of player we're going to be playing with.

• Karma is completely broken and often represents a user's popularity in the community more than anything else. It unfairly cuts against those who have an aggressive personality and it casts some users in a negative light when they don't deserve it. The karma system should be scrapped altogether. Just resetting karma is putting off the real problem: karma doesn't do anything. It causes drama and it gives users an excuse to treat others unfairly in games. Karma certainly cannot be retained the way it is because it will (and does) split the community into classes.

• Karma is a meaningless, imaginary number on an online game. The only time it ever becomes a problem is when someone considers their karma score important to them. The karma system does not matter unless you want it to.

Ethics of Giving Karma

No one can dictate how you do or don't use karma, but bear in mind that the intention of the system only to show if the user is or is not an acceptable player.

In general, it is good practice to express your dissatisfaction with a user before ranking a user down. Given that this is the Internet, there are going to be instances where a person is intentionally disrupting games and/or being abusive, in which cases civil discussion is often futile.

Here are just some bullet points that should cover most general scenarios where you may consider lowering another user's karma.

Karma shouldn't be ranked down if:

• A player on your side made an accidental error in judgment
• A new player made a mistake with his night action
• A player argues with you about the way the game works
• A player's Internet connection causes him to drop from the game
• A player hammered incorrectly
• A player doesn't agree with you or one of your opinions
• A player annoys you in real life
• A player lowers your karma for a viable reason

Karma should be ranked down if:

• A player intentionally suicides or kicks himself
• A town-sided player intentionally misleads the town without any real strategy for doing so
• A mafia-sided player intentionally outs his fellow mafia without any real strategy for doing so
• A player is unfairly abusive to you or someone else
• A player spamming or otherwise disrupting normal game procedures without justifiable reason for doing so
• A player is cheating

As you play the game, you will likely run across a wide variety of different people with different personalities, please use your own judgment and try to act as reasonable as possible when deciding whether or not to change someone's karma.

Karmabombing

Karmabombing is the act of either one user using alternate accounts to rank another user/setup down multiple times, and/or several users having a collective effect of ranking another user/setup down multiple times. Karmabombing has a negative connotation to it, but the same effect may be justifiable if the user being "bombed" actually caused a real problem or if the setup being bombed is provably unbalanced.