It's a Horde Mentality.
and the basics must be known
Legion is probably my favorite character in Blood on the Clocktower. The concept of “most players are evil” in a social deduction game is very cool. Heck, it’s even how I learned to storytell effectively. There are 2 main things about Legion.
The Amount of Legion
The Bluffs
Bluffability of Minions/Demons
Legion count
Legion is literally defined in the setup text as [Most Players are Legion.]
What does this mean? it means over half of the players by a legal reading of the text.
There are multiple factors to how far you can rules lawyer this, such as:
At least 2 good players must be in play, otherwise good cannot win(bar the Truman show setup with Alsaahir)
Town’s info/Good players legion needs to kill and Legion’s ability to force votes through is a careful balancing act.
What The Pandemonium Institute(The Creators of BOTC) Recommend is a reversed count of Good players to Evil Players. I mostly agree, except in games which would normally have 2 outsiders. This is because it tends to have very little progress for the Legion, and if good ever messes up they lose, which is more likely to happen the longer a game goes(which more players tends to cause). My recommended counts are the following in a legion game(at base)
7:2/5
8:2/6
9:3/6
10:3/7
11:3/8
12:4/8
13:4/9
14:4/10
15:5/10
There are… a ton of characters that change this. Most scripts with Legion have some of these characters simply because there aren’t enough characters in the game that avoid it(and work with their script). These do not matter for now.
Let’s talk about Outsiders in Legion for a bit.
Outsiders
So you want to put outsiders in a legion game? Sure, you can. Add a Townsfolk! This is usually fine unless the bag has a lot of goods already, in which case, do nothing. You really, really, need to be willing to do this. Otherwise, this exact scenario happens:
I’m an outsider!
Must not be a Legion game.
Which isn’t exactly great for a legion script (Where’s the Paranoia?)
Bluffs:
The 3 strategies
No Bluffs(can be helpful to legion, tends to be less double claims between legion)
All Legion gain the same 3 bluffs(Tends to cause double claims/Legion players to not use their bluffs)
Groups of 3 legion get the same 3 bluffs. These groups are unique. (Legion will not double claim under these conditions, best for new players)
Each strategy does something different. No Bluffs forces legion to coordinate and figure out what is in play, Same 3 bluffs makes them do No Bluffs, but try to make 3 legion look good, and the third strategy only requires Legion to work with their group. Each of these causes different social dynamics, so choose which one you deem is the most interesting.
Bluffable Evils
Legion needs to pretend something else is in play, 90% of the time. As a consequence of this, your evils that are not Legion need to be bluffable by Legion. If the ST says there’s a Leviathan in play, you can be 100% sure there is no Legion, and in a Legion game, Leviathan is not a demon you can bluff. This also applies to minions, unless there is an alchemist(but that is not always… good enough)
There’s 4 Types of evil loudness, for Legion.
Quiet: So quiet they aren’t detectable even in a normal game.
Bluffable: Has a noticeable effect in a normal game, but Legion is very suited to bluffing noticeable but not hard confirmed effects. Pithags,Evil Twins, Widows, Vortoxes, Wizards, et cetera.
Frameable: Legion can frame a good player as this. (Alchemist makes all Minion Loud characters frameable) The Characters in this category are Devil’s Advocate for Tea Lady,Pacifist,Sailor, and Fool, and Cerenovus for Mutant.
Loud: Legion cannot frame a world where this is in play. Think Vizier, Psychopath, Alhad, and Leviathan.
As a rule, Have at max, 1 frameable character on script with Legion, preferably with multiple ways to bluff it. Loud evils are off limits. Some people think Bluffable characters are more fun in Legion, because they have something to do. They might be correct, but both Quiet and Bluffable evils are going to be at least possible for Legion to be creative with.
Welp, cool. We’re done here. I’ll be going on a rant on bad/unbalanced Legion interactions with Good characters next time.