Cop

Cop, or Detective, is one of the most common mafia roles in use. A cop will typically have the ability to scan a player each night phase, though the types of result they get differ from game to game and depending on the exact nature of the role. It can be both town or mafia aligned.

It is generally considered a very useful role that can turn the tide of a game on any side it falls on. Because of this, outed cop players don't tend to last very long once their power is revealed.

The results of the scan can be tainted if the cop has a hidden role limiter.

Alternate Names
Detective

Role Variants
Because cops are so powerful in general, hosts may limit the power of their scanning to specific aspects if the balance requires it. A role cop will get the role title and/or description of their target player, but won't know the player alignment. Alignment cops on the other hand will get just the player alignment. There are also flavor cops who just receive the flavor of the player's role without a title or any specifics.

Cops tend to have some, or all of the attributes above. Cops don't get results not pertaining to a player role, other roles obtain this information instead. Of the above attributes, the flavor cop is one of the most controversial and difficult to balance because sometimes the flavor is just as condemning as the alignment, depending on the game.

In addition to this, cops will sometimes have role limiters. These are hidden to the player and will only be realized upon their role flip. A paranoid cop will always get scum results for their alignment scans, whereas a naive cop will always get town results. An insane cop always gets the opposite results for their alignment scans, so will scan a town player as mafia.

Both the paranoid and naive cop are functionally useless. Nothing can be ascertained from their role results, and as such the roles should only be used in a game which can afford to have a couple of mis-lynches based on misleading role results. The insane cop is useful, however. Though their outing a player's alignment may cause them to be lynched for giving out wrong information, once their role flips, the information the insane cop provided can just be inverted to find the real player alignments.

Usage and Strategy
There is a trade-off to be had when playing with a cop role. Sitting on information for a long period of time is dangerous, because the longer the game goes on, the more chance the player has of being killed in some fashion. The information will then go with the player, thus never having a functional use at all. At the same time, revealing a cop role early may result in the player being killed or roleblocked by the mafia to prevent further uses of the ability.

Thus a player should typically only ever reveal information if they have a known mafia or third party target. That way, their role in the game isn't wasted. Some cops may choose to withhold until they have a couple of targets, but this is still dangerous. A cop might choose to lurk in the shadows, avoiding too much discussion to keep any night kill targets off their backs whilst they make a case.

Upon being forced to role reveal, a cop may choose to reveal all of the information gathered so far, in the hopes that once their role flips the remaining players can use the information to clear and condemn wherever appropriate. Another common strategy is for players to soft-hint at their findings. This can be done by pushing hard for lynching a specific player based on no real given reason. Upon dying and having their role revealed, players will look at who the cop was targetting and can make a guess as to their results based on that aspect.

Featured In

 * EN-ville and the Cult of Fatal Death - Judge Doom (Town), Roos, Korr (Mafia)
 * A Fistful of Dollars: the Story of EN Town - AttleboroTaco, TLG (Town), Curtis (Mafia)
 * ENything Goes: A Mafia Extravaganza - Ari (Flavor), TLG (Town), Curtis (Mafia)
 * ENglish Mob - Drr, Helios Garabandia (Town), Curtis (Mafia)

Player Counts

 * Curtis: 3
 * TLG: 2
 * Ari: 1
 * AttleboroTaco: 1
 * Drr: 1
 * Helios Garabandia: 1
 * Judge Doom: 1


 * Korr: 1


 * Roos: 1