Skip to content

Werewolf Strategy — Attacks and Bussing

Last updated

The Werewolf's rules (the unanimous attack; targets that don't die to a bite) are collected in the role dictionary: Werewolf. This column is about running the attack — and buying credibility with a bus.

Unanimity is heavier than it looks

MAFIA's attack lands only when the wolves choose unanimously. Settle on one target in the night chat before you pick. Break up on "probably them, right?" and the whole night is wasted.

And the village can read this too. Villages jump to "the guard connected" on a no-death morning, but split wolf choices are simply normal in this game. Every failed attack you produce hands the village a false confidence that the Knight is functioning — not fatal in itself, but far too expensive for one night.

A guard, a split, a Fox bite, a revive — all of those cost you "only" the night. A trap costs you a teammate. In a room with a Trapper, biting the same target night after night is dangerous — moving the bite around is the default.

Two things to settle on night one

Under default settings there is no attack on the first night — it's a night for planning, not biting. Settle these two and the rest of the game gets easier:

  • Who gets bitten first — build tomorrow's unanimity in advance. Decide as far as "and if they get executed during the day, then who", and failed attacks all but vanish.
  • Which of you fakes the Seer claim — one claims, the other passes as a villager.

Faking the Seer

The most basic shape: claim Seer on day one yourself. The real Seer claims too, and the village sees "one of these two is a wolf". While five villagers hesitate, two wolves vote as one block.

One MAFIA-specific catch: the real Seer holds an automatic first-night 'Not' (see the Seer's role dictionary). The real one can talk from that footing — so if you fake, decide in advance whom your fake result clears.

Bussing: voting your own teammate

If your partner is the one under suspicion, there's a move: vote them yourself. If they actually get executed you've lost — but if the votes split and someone else falls, what remains is the impression "that player cut their own" and your later words carry.

The move is called Bussing. Villages hunt wolf pairs through vote correlations — a line cut once in public drops out of the search. The earlier and cheaper you cut it, the more freely your two votes move in the endgame.

⚠️ But if the bus actually kills your partner, nothing is left. Bus only on days the votes will split — and after cutting, never protect them again. Re-shield the player you just cut, and the cut itself becomes the evidence.

A scene

A 7-player room (the beginner deck): the two wolves agreed in the night-one chat — "tomorrow we bite #2, the claimed Seer". So far so good.

But the next day, #2 was voted out. The target was gone. Night came; one wolf picked "#5, the strongest speaker left", the other picked "#7, who feels like the Knight".

Failed attack. Nobody died; the village spent the next day celebrating "the guard connected". The wolves lost a night, and the village now moved with confidence that a live Knight was working.

"If #2 gets executed, then #5" — one extra clause in the day, and that night never happens.

Related

Back to top page