How to play Mafia: the MafiaVoice rules

These are the rules of sport mafia — the club game — as we play it. First, the short version for your first game. Below it, the full rules for club players: every number, and every place where we differ, with the reason.

The short version For club players School Try bot practice

The short version

10 players. 7 are red — the town. 3 are black — the mafia. You see only your own card; the 3 black players also know each other.

The town wins when all the black players are out.
The mafia win when there are as many black players as red ones.
Cards stay face down until the game is over — even for players who are out.

The four cards

Civilian (6 cards, red): no night move. Talks, listens, votes.
Sheriff (red): every night checks one seat — red or black. Only the sheriff sees the answer.
Mafia (2 cards, black): shoot at night together with the don.
Don (black, leads the mafia): shoots with them, and every night checks one seat — is it the sheriff?

All four roles →

The night

First night — the agreement. The mafia get 60 seconds to agree on the order of their shots. Nobody is shot.
Every night after that, each of the mafia picks a seat on their own (20 seconds). All on the same seat — that player is killed. Different seats, or someone did not pick — a miss.
Then the don checks one seat (20 seconds), then the sheriff (20 seconds).
In the morning the host says who was killed — or that the mafia missed.

If you have no night move, the screen says so: “You have no move tonight — wait for the morning.”

The day

Everyone speaks in seat order, 60 seconds each. Day one opens with seat 1; each next day, with the seat after the one who opened the day before.
On your minute, use the “Claim”, “Defend” or “Ask” buttons.
Done early? Press “Pass”.
To put a player up for the vote, press “Nominate” in your minute and pick a seat. One nomination a day. The host shows “Accepted: 5” on screen, and the seat gets the mark “nominated”.
Hand signs (the “Hand signs” button) work at anyone's minute: up to 3 sentences per speech. Not during the vote.

What each hand sign means →

The vote and ties

After the last speech the table votes on the nominated players, in the order they were nominated.
Press “Vote” and pick one name (60 seconds). Votes stay hidden until everyone has voted, then all open at once.
No vote in time? It counts against the last name on the list.
Most votes — that player leaves the table.
Day one with only one name nominated: no vote that day.
A tie: each tied player gets 30 more seconds, then the table votes again — only between them.
The same players tie again: one question — “Should all of them leave?” More than half of the table says yes — they all leave. Otherwise all of them stay.

The last word and the best move

Anyone who leaves — by the vote or by a shot — gets a last word: 60 seconds.
The player killed on the first shooting night first gets 20 seconds for the best move: name up to 3 seats you think are black. Then the last word.
If the mafia missed on that night, nobody gets a best move later.

On screen: “Your best move — Name up to 3 seats you think are mafia”.

Fouls

In bot practice, the game follows its turn order without a live microphone.
In sport-Mafia, an insult or profanity directed at a player is a foul. This bot-practice product does not run an automatic speech check or issue speech warnings or fouls.
3rd foul: your next speech is skipped — you can still nominate or press “Pass”.
4th foul: you leave the game, with no last word.

Read the conduct principles for this bot-practice product: Rules of conduct.

How the game ends

The town wins: no black players left.
The mafia win: as many black players as red ones.
A draw: 3 shooting nights in a row and nobody left the table.
Then every card is turned over, and the game review opens.

What is different online

Empty seats are taken by bots, so the table starts on time.
Lost connection: 120 seconds to come back, then a bot plays your seat to the end.
The host is automatic: keeps the clock and the rules, never takes a side.
The app deals the cards, so the sheriff needs no sign on the first night.

Every difference from the club rulebook, with its reason, is in the table at the bottom of this page.

For club players: the full rules

These are the full rules for MafiaVoice bot practice, with every number and the differences from club play. Every number on this page is checked against the game's code by an automatic test.

Table	10 seats, drawn at random. 7 red (6 civilians and the sheriff), 3 black (2 mafia and the don).
Win	Red: no black left. Black: black players equal red ones or outnumber them.
Draw	3 shooting nights in a row with nobody leaving (by a shot, the vote, a lift or a removal). The agreement night does not count. Points for a draw: 0.
Night 1	Agreement, 60 s. The don sets the shooting order — any living seats, own team included. No order in time — an order drawn by lot stands. No shot, no checks.
Shot	Every shooting night, 20 s. Each living black player picks a seat. One seat from all — killed. Different seats or a missing pick — a miss. Any living seat may be shot, a teammate included.
Don's check	Every night, 20 s: sheriff or not. Not a teammate, not himself, not a seat he already checked, living seats only.
Sheriff's check	Every night, 20 s: red or black. Not himself, living seats only.
Waking	The host calls the don and the sheriff every night, even when they are out, so a silence never gives a role away.
Speech	60 s each, in seat order. Day 1 opens with seat 1; each later day with the seat after the previous opener. “Pass” ends the minute.
Nomination	One per player per day, in one's own minute; one's own seat is allowed. Every accepted nomination gets a silent caption from the host, e.g. “Accepted: 5”; a refused second one gets nothing. Nominations close when the vote starts.
Vote	On the nominees in nomination order; one vote each, 60 s, hidden until all have voted. A vote not cast counts against the last nominee — even if that is the voter. Most votes leaves. Day 1 with one nominee, or any day with none: no vote.
Tie	Each tied player speaks 30 s in nomination order, then a re-vote between them. A tie among fewer of them: 30 s each again and another re-vote. The same players tie again: “Should all of them leave?” — more than half of the living players for it, all leave; half or fewer, all stay. Never put to that question: the whole table, or 3 players out of 9.
Last word	60 s for a player who leaves by the vote, by a lift or by a night shot. The card stays hidden to the end. A last word after the result is decided does not change it.
Best move	Only the player killed on the first shooting night: 20 s, up to 3 living seats (not one's own), then the last word. None if 2 or more players left by the vote on day 1, and none at all if the mafia missed that night.
Fouls	Given for a sign sentence beyond 3 in one speech. Sport-Mafia rules also treat an insult or profanity directed at a player as a foul, but bot practice has no player reports or human moderator review and does not automatically check speech; speech-based fouls are not enforced here. 3rd foul: the next ordinary speech is skipped (10 s to nominate or pass); with 4 or fewer players alive it is a 30-second speech instead; a tie speech and a last word are not affected. 4th foul: removal after the current speech, no last word; it cancels the current vote (a running tie included) or the next one — if the day's vote is already over, the next day has none.
Points	Shown on the result screen. Win 1.3, loss 0.3, draw 0. Best move, red players only: 3 black named +0.7, 2 black +0.5. Removal −0.8.

How we differ from the club rulebook — and why

Club rulebook	MafiaVoice — and why
Cards are dealt by hand; on the first night the sheriff shows himself to the host with a sign, then 30 seconds of free seating.	The app deals the cards and already knows every one, so there is no sign and no seating time.
The agreement minute always runs in full.	If there is no other person on the mafia team (the rest are bots), “OK” ends it early — there is nobody to wait for.
Hands go up in the open, name by name.	A hidden vote within 60 seconds, all opened at once: online, hands cannot appear on every screen at the same instant.
The host says “Accepted” aloud after every nomination.	The same answer as a caption on screen, without voice, so it never talks over the speaker’s minute.
The host decides when gesturing is too much.	A fixed number: 3 sign sentences per speech; the next one is a foul. Signs are allowed at anyone's minute.
Fouls mostly punish talking out of turn.	Bot practice follows game turn order but has no live human microphone or speech-turn enforcement.
An insult or swearing removes a player at once.	Sport-Mafia rules treat targeted insults or profanity as a foul. Bot practice has no player reports or human moderator review and does not automatically check speech; speech-based fouls are not enforced here.
A violation during one's own last word is a removal and −0.8.	Bot practice does not automatically review speech during the last word; the last word does not change a result already decided.
A 4th foul removes the player at once.	Removal comes right after the current speech, so the person speaking is never cut off.
A removal cancels the nearest vote.	If the day of the removal has no vote anyway (one nominee on day 1, or none), the cancellation is used up on that day.
The rulebook names no time for the shot.	20 seconds, the same as each check.
Repeat checks, checking a teammate or a player who is out are allowed but penalised.	They are simply not possible: the don cannot check a teammate or the same seat twice; nobody can check himself or a player who is out. Such a check would only waste the move.
The best move may name any seats.	Only living seats, not one's own (owner's decision).
A draw is three nights in a row with nobody leaving.	Only shooting nights count; the agreement night has no shot to miss.
A draw pays 0.3 to everyone, minus small penalties.	A draw pays 0 to everyone (owner's decision).
The host may add extra points, penalties and compensation.	Not given: no person watches an online game the way a club host does. The game review can say where a host would have penalised.
A technical pause can stop the game.	No pause: a lost connection has 120 seconds, then a bot keeps the seat so the other nine can play on.
The host speaks the fixed club phrases.	Our host says the same things in the same order, in its own words.
Voting oneself out is penalised.	Nominating and voting against oneself are allowed, with no penalty; a vote not cast goes to the last nominee even if that is the voter — one rule with no exceptions.

Playing Mafia without cards

You do not need a deck: the app deals the cards.
The app already knows every card, so there is no sign for the sheriff and no seating time on the first night.
You see only your own card, and cards stay face down until the game is over, even for players who are out.
Empty seats are taken by bots, so the table starts on time.

Mafia with 10 players

A MafiaVoice table has 10 seats, drawn at random.
7 players are red (6 civilians and the sheriff) and 3 are black (2 mafia and the don).
The black players know each other.
The town wins when all the black players are out; the mafia win when there are as many black players as red ones.

What level one teaches

Level one — “Your first table” — has 39 sessions. 25 teach a new idea; the others give you practice.

Ten people, three on one hidden team — Three players at your table know who their partners are, you and six others know nothing, and every hard thing about this game grows out of that one gap.
Nine bots, and what this table is for — The bot table lets you practise the standard ten-seat game, but it cannot reproduce how a person looks or gestures.
Ten steps, and how one closes — The course is ten steps of short sessions, and each step closes on three things at once — most of its sessions passed, one real game played, and a mixed final check.
Who is actually sitting there — Seven of the ten play for the town and three play against it, and exactly one player on each side gets a private question to ask at night.
What each card can actually do — Only two players at the table are asked a question at night, and each of them learns exactly one thing.
The evening has a rhythm, and it repeats — The first night is an agreement night with no shot or checks; later rounds alternate between a day of talk and voting and a night with role actions.
The first night, before anything has happened — The game opens with one silent night where nobody is removed, followed by the first day’s round of talk.
How each side wins — In ordinary play, town wins when all mafia are eliminated; mafia win when the living black count equals or exceeds the red count.
A name, then a hand — Anybody may put a name up during the day, the table then votes on the names in the order they arrived, and a hand that stays down counts for the last name called.
When the votes split evenly — A tie gives each tied player another half minute and then a second vote between just the two of them, and that half minute is where the tie is won or lost.
A tie that repeats is settled all at once, not name by name — When a re-vote ties again on the exact same names, the table stops voting on individuals and asks one yes-or-no question: does a real majority want every one of them gone at once?
Four fouls, and your game is over — A host can give you a foul: the third one costs you your next minute, the fourth ends your game — and two things end it on the spot with no warning.
The four sentences a new player needs — A first-time player freezes at the table not because mafia is hard, but because the room expects four exact phrases nobody explained — nominate, end your turn, address the host, and hold your vote.
Three questions to ask before your first game — Every club plays a slightly different game, and three short questions remove almost all of the confusion.
Your first game: what to actually do — Name one player and give one reason — that is a complete first game, and it is enough.
Remember the table without a single note — A written record rarely survives a real table, but a seat already known by heart does — hang one fact on each chair, and test the hook a few seconds after every speech.
Reading a player by their normal, not by one quiet round — The same nine kinds of player show up at almost every table, and a quiet round means something different for each one — read the kind before you read the silence.
Leaving the table is still a move — Whoever is voted out or shot gets a full minute to speak. Their role stays hidden when they leave; the result shows all roles after the game ends.
Three names from the player killed on the first shooting night — The player killed on the first shooting night gets twenty seconds to name three players they believe are against the town.
When there are more than four cards — Many clubs add a role or two, and the extras are usually about protecting somebody or acting alone.
Your hands can foul you before you say a word — At a real club table people talk with their hands too, and the rulebook fouls only two things about that: too much gesturing in one turn, and any gesturing once the vote has begun.
Reading a seat number off a hand — In the hand-sign convention taught here, a raised number names a seat: an open palm means five, and numbers above five use the other hand to add on.
Each of the four cards has a hand sign — Each of the four cards has its own hand sign, and a sheriff who comes out often shows the sign as well as saying the word.
Five sentences you can show tonight — A hand sign chains into a short sentence, and five of those sentences cover almost everything worth saying on your first evening.
Some forum-Mafia guides describe a different game format — A guide about forum Mafia may describe text games over several days, so check its procedures before applying them at a live table.

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