Vigilante

A vigilante is a town-aligned role which grants the player the ability to kill other players at night. Though solitary killing roles exist on the mafia side in some games, the Vigilante is always a town role.

The role may differ slightly depending on the game. More commonly, the Vigilante role will have a restriction that prevents the kill from being used on consecutive nights. It may also provide only a very limited number of kills. Generally the role is tweaked depending on the other roles in the game, so as not to make it too overpowered.

Alternate Names
Crazy Veteran

Usage and Strategy
The vigilante can be a very effective role if used properly, but it can also be a dangerous one. It tends to be a double-edged sword that can harm the town more than it can help, in some cases. The player submitting the kill action needs to be fairly certain that their target is going to flip mafia or third-party or the damage can be catastrophic to the town victory.

Because of this, it is generally advised to not strike immediately with the vigilante role. The danger is that if the vigilante is killed early, their role never has a positive use either. If the role has uses on alternate nights, some players will wait until at least the second night before activating it. This allows them a fair spectrum of role usage by granting them kills on the second and fourth night, respectively. For most games, provided the player survives the duration, this will allow two kills on the town side with a decent amount of time to allow for information gathering to help identify a viable target.

The existence of bus drivers on either side can cause some serious havoc and confusion in a game with a vigilante. Situations such as the mafia accidentally killing one of their own and the vigilante changing targets to a useful townie can occur. Similarly, the puppet master role can throw a major spanner in the works of a vigilante player.

For cult leaders, the vigilante is one of the most useful recruits they can find. A cult with a turned vigilante will have some semblance of killing capabilities, making them nearly as potent as the mafia, with a means to also expand.

General Reception
The vigilante role tends to be a popular one amongst players, and most will be very satisfied if they pull this role because it means they get to have a major impact on the turnout of the game. Even though the role is not necessarily helpful in some cases, players enjoy it nonetheless.

Care should be taken to avoid buffering the vigilante with additional powers. A bulletproof vigilante is considered to be far too overpowered, and will generally garner negative reception in the post-game. How well receieved the role is by other players largely depends on the balance of other roles in the game, and the limitations that were put in place on the role to begin with.

Featured In

 * EN-ville and the Cult of Fatal Death - Conker (Called Crazy Veteran)

Player Counts
Conker: 1