#scriptbuilding

??? Tier

Magician / Vizier

If the Vizier is in play, the Magician has no ability but is immune to the Vizier's ability.

I genuinely have no idea what this means. "Immune" doesn't mean anything in BotC — it's not an established word in the glossary ("safe" is). If the Magician is the only good vote, can the Vizier not slam? Or is it just that they're immune to being slammed? I can't rank what I don't understand.

"Not A Jinx" Tier

Al-Hadikhia / Princess

If the Princess nominated & executed a player on their 1st day, no one dies to the Al-Hadikhia tonight.

Banshee / Vortox

If the Vortox is in play and the Demon kills the Banshee, the players still learn that the Banshee has died.

These two are off the screen because they're... just how the interactions work without the jinx. The Al-Had can't kill on a Princess night, all live/all die or not, so the jinx isn't necessary. The Banshee announcement is a mechanical thing, and can't be falsified (think how Minions learning a Damsel is information, or Minions learning the Preacher chose them is information — there's nothing to falsify).

E Tier — These Jinxes Upset Me

Al-Hadikhia / Scarlet Woman

If there would be two Demons, one of which was the Scarlet Woman, the Scarlet Woman becomes the Scarlet Woman again.

This jinx tries solving the issue of having two living Demons (because the new Demon could revive the old one), but doesn't really solve it? Like, you can still revive the old Demon (and then turn back into the Scarlet Woman), and then do revival loops all the way until final 5. It's not particularly fun.

* Strictly as-written, this jinx also fully breaks Scarlet Woman as intended, because it doesn't specify "two living Demons". I assume that's not the intent.

Baron / Heretic, Heretic / Lleech

Only 1 jinxed character can be in play.

The Baron jinx used to be "The Baron might only add 1 Outsider, not 2", and it was really great! You could put both on scripts and evil wouldn't know the Outsider count even if they had a Baron in play, so couldn't guarantee if there was a Heretic or not (as intended). There's seemingly no reason to move this back to a hate jinx when the earlier one worked really well on scripts like Aero's Reptiles.

Delta's Warfare's Foundations, a stormcaught General script featuring the Alchemist-Baron on a Heretic script, also got shot dead in a ditch because of this. Gone before it could be released ;_;

The Lleech jinx used to be "If the Lleech has poisoned the Heretic then the Lleech dies, the Heretic remains poisoned", which helped clarify what the actual win conditions were in a way that was fun for both teams — I have no idea why they'd change something that already worked well on scripts like Manny's Outed Evil.

Boomdandy / Plague Doctor

If the Storyteller would gain the Boomdandy ability, a player becomes the Boomdandy.

This jinx used to allow the Plague Doctor to explode as the Boomdandy would if executed, which, again, was incredibly cool and allowed for a bunch of fun interactions. It made the Plague Doctor an incredibly potent bluff that didn't make a Boomdandy outed evil, and made the Hermit even more deadly if the PD and Boomdandy were on script.

Delta's (hi again) Star's Edge was a key example of the old jinx being incredibly fun — in order to disincentivize executing an Atheist claim immediately, it could be the Hermit Drunk (Atheist) with the PD-Boomdandy ability, immediately bringing an end to the game!

In comparison, the new jinx isn't particularly interesting. If a Minion becomes the Boomdandy, they lose out on an ongoing Minion ability, and if a good player becomes one, they all but confirm the Plague Doctor is real and hasn't added a more dangerous ability into play. I suppose it's a fun bluff?

* I guess you could argue the old interaction is still there if the ST decides to make the just-executed Plague Doctor the Boomdandy? But death happens after execution, so by the time you could, the PD would already be dead. If the intent is to allow this to happen, this jinx jumps up to A tier.

Drunk / Mathematician, Marionette / Mathematician, Lunatic / Mathematician

The Mathematician might learn if the Drunk's/Marionette's ability yielded false info or failed to work properly.

The Mathematician might learn if the Lunatic attacks a different player than the real Demon attacked.

I don't think the word "might" should go anywhere near the Mathematician ability.

I could just end the blurb there, but to expand a little — part of what makes the Mathematician Townsfolky and not an uninterpretable number is the fact that it's solvable. Adding conditions that *might* ping the Mathematician and might not ping it does the opposite of that — it's why in my Script-A-Days on scripts featuring characters like the Mayor, I caution against using those characters to ping the Math. These jinxes effectively make the Mathematician much, much sadder.

Farmer / Riot

Each night*, Riot chooses an alive good player (different to previous nights): a chosen Farmer uses their ability but does not die.

This jinx only has two nights to effectively proc, since a Riot game only lasts three days.

As well as that, it removes a lot of the confirmation behind the Farmer, since the Farmer doesn't know that they've successfully used their ability (they aren't dead). An evil player can just claim to have become the Farmer, and the Farmer has no way of knowing that it's a bluff (whereas if the Farmer dies in a normal game, a good player will have become the Farmer discounting droisoning).

Grandmother / Riot, Innkeeper / Riot, Monk/Riot

If Riot is in play and the Grandchild dies by execution, evil wins.

If Riot nominates and executes an Innkeeper/Monk-protected player, good wins.

All of these jinxes are here for the same reason — they matter exclusively on Day 2, since the day after, the riot happens and no more executions do. In practice, these jinxes effectively have no text, since there's no reason to ever risk the loss for either team. With the Grandmother, you can kill the pair in the riot, and for the Innkeeper and Monk, the Demon just has to not execute a protected player on that one specific day (which is pretty easy).

Heretic / Pit-Hag

Only 1 jinxed character can be in play.

The old jinx was "The Pit-Hag cannot create a Heretic", which was perfectly functional as-is and had the neat interaction of the Pit-Hag accidentally hagging out the Heretic into a bluff, which was pretty delightful. This hatejinx... doesn't really need to exist? The old one worked fine, and this just gives the evil team more information about the Heretic's whereabouts than they really need to have for the character to function.

Also, by a strict interpretation of the rules, the Pit-Hag can turn themselves into the Heretic with this jinx, since they're never both in play at the same time, which is dumb and stupid and stupid and dumb.

Legion / Magician

The Magician wakes with Legion and might register as evil. Legion knows if a Magician is in play, but not which player it is.

This jinx makes it so the Magician starts knowing the composition of the entire evil team. Evil has zero counterplay to this other than counterclaiming the Magician. This is just not fun for anyone involved, and probably results in more screaming matches than anything else.

Legion / Minstrel

If Legion died by execution today, Legion keeps their ability, but the Minstrel might learn they are Legion.

A jinx is very necessary here, because if all the Legion are drunk, they don't have their voting restriction and can just vote good players by force. However, this jinx in particular doesn't solve the issue — it makes the Minstrel something of an Outsider by keeping all good players drunk for most (if not all) of the game, with no tell other than the Minstrel possibly learning it's a Legion game, and who's gonna believe them when all the drunk info suggests the Minstrel is evil?

Lil' Monsta / Marionette

If there would be a Marionette in play, they enter play after the Demon & must start as their neighbor.

The original jinx just specified that the Marionette had to neighbor a Minion, which gave the Storyteller a lot more flexibility with who becomes the Marionette. In practice, this made it a lot stronger of a Minion, since the Marionette could be on the Townsfolk that would be most helpful for evil to have on their side with a fully decided bluff. Instead of having up to 6 options in a 15-player game, this jinx lowers it down to 2 in a best-case scenario, which makes the Marionette a lot weaker.

* This asterisk is a leftover from before Jams's blog post about the jinxes came out, which also came with a reworking of the Marionette's almanac entry to clarify that this jinx, rules as written, didn't completely break the Marionette.

Marionette / Summoner

If there would be a Marionette in play, they enter play after the Demon & must start as their neighbor.

Yeah, no, this is the same as the LM jinx. I didn't group it with that one, though, because the problem is a bit different — mainly, evil is short two extra evil players instead of one until Night 3, which can be absolutely devastating. Earlier, the Marionette just neighbored the Summoner (who learned the Marionette instead of the Demon), which was a perfectly serviceable jinx that still helped the evil team, since there'd be an extra evil player to help. Now, in a 12-player game, the Summoner can be the only evil player until a Demon comes into play — which can be incredibly unbalanced.

Preacher / Vizier

If the Vizier loses their ability, they learn this, and cannot die during the day.

The old jinx added a win condition, such that if the Vizier was executed while they had their ability, their team would win. This made it a much more interesting bluff for evil and also encouraged the good team to consider killing a preached Vizier, since they would actually die. This new jinx removes a lot of the spice and whimsy from the old one — now the Vizier just kinda doesn't have an ability on a Preacher script, since if an evil player is bluffing Preacher, their bluff gets busted as soon as the Vizier slams.

D Tier — Not Upset, Just Disappointed

Alchemist / Spy, Alchemist / Widow, Alchemist / Wraith, Magician / Wraith

An Alchemist-Spy/Widow/Wraith has no Spy/Widow/Wraith ability & a Spy/Widow/Wraith is in play. After each execution, a living Alchemist-Spy/Widow/Wraith may publicly guess a living player as the Spy/Widow/Wraith. If correct, the Demon must choose the Spy/Widow/Wraith tonight.

After each execution, the living Magician may publicly guess a living player as the Wraith. If correct, the Demon must choose the Wraith tonight.

These jinxes are grouped together for basically being the same thing — I think they're just kinda lame? They don't really feel in the spirit of the Alchemist and Magician, and aren't particularly fun to play with or against. The Wraith ones are slightly more interesting, since you can look around at night (and ask other players to do the same) to try and spot the Wraith, but it's still not ideal.

As an extra bonus, I actually thought the old Alch/Spy and Alch/Widow jinxes were pretty cool, maintaining the non-grimpeeking parts of their abilities. Merging them with the Wraith jinx feels a bit sad. You know, the "what could have been"!

Boffin / Drunk

If the Demon would have the Drunk ability, the Boffin chooses a Townsfolk player to have this ability instead.

The fact that the chosen player doesn't register as the Drunk ("having the Drunk's ability" isn't the same as "being the Drunk, the Outsider") is really brutal, since there's no way for the good team to find the Boffin-Drunk the way they would an actual Drunk. It does go away when the Boffin dies, but that's still an untraceable source of misinformation that's super rough to deal with as a good team.

**UPDATE! THIS JINX GOT CHANGED!** On the translation docs I was referencing for the new batch of jinxes, this jinx was still the old one — however, now that they've been out for some time, I missed that this got changed to the following:

The Demon cannot have the Drunk ability.

This makes a lot of sense, and is a very functional jinx. I can't change the image, but post-change C tier.

Cerenovus / Goblin

The Cerenovus may choose to make a player mad that they are the Goblin.

Long, long ago, before Blood on the Clocktower officially released, the Cerenovus used to be able to make players mad they were evil characters. This got removed because it was pretty obvious that they were mad, since people don't really sincerely try to convince town that they are a Minion or Demon.

You see the problem?

Even the Goblin isn't mad they are the Goblin — if anything, they're mad that they are the Demon, so town calls their bluff and executes them. Being cere-mad as the Goblin is socially pretty obvious, and isn't particularly interesting from a misinformation perspective — at best, you're framing someone as a Demon who's trying to convince town they're the Goblin to avoid execution, but in practice it tends to be "everyone knows you're ceremad and you can't do anything about it" which isn't particularly fun.

Clockmaker / Summoner

The Summoner registers as the Demon to the Clockmaker.

The old jinx used to be that the Clockmaker would learn their information when a Demon was created. This was a really cool interaction, since the Clockmaker would know if it was a Summoner game (and could get easily fooled if they were drunk or poisoned, which was incredibly fun) and could pinpoint what night the Demon got summoned — and I even made a script, Land of Oddities, centering around it. It was pretty fun!

On the other hand, this jinx is comparatively way less cool. In a 1-Minion game, the Clockmaker just knows it's a Summoner game (since with no valid information to receive, it just gets a NO), which is still strong, but past that, it's just a bit less interesting.

* Technically, we aren't entirely sure what the Clockmaker should receive in a 1-Minion game. A NO makes the most sense, but we don't reallly have much guidance on that front.

Courtier / Vizier

If the Vizier loses their ability, they learn this, and cannot die during the day.

This is the same as the Preacher jinx from E tier, but a bit higher up because the Courtier has to spend their entire ability to disable the Vizier, which makes it a bit of a more interesting decision on whether to disable the Vizier or try and hit something else in play (though it's still a less cool interaction than the old jinx with the win condition attached if a sober Vizier gets executed).

Engineer / Legion

If Legion is created, all evil players become Legion. If Legion is in play, the Engineer starts knowing this but has no ability.

"All evil players are Legion" is a pretty fun dynamic on its face — you don't have any Minions, but good has to kill every evil player in order to win, since 2 Legion in final 3 is an auto-win for evil (no matter what, 1 Demon will be alive when just 2 live).

However, when attached to the Engineer, it becomes nearly optimal for them to create Legion, removing all Minion abilities from play and making sure town is entirely sober. This isn't a particularly fun balance point for the Engineer — typically, good Engineer scripts have several challenging options to balance instead of one optimal one.

Exorcist / Riot

If Riot nominates and executes the Exorcist-chosen player, good wins.

Okay, I actually do like the dynamic this jinx creates (more on that later when I cover Exorcist / Leviathan) — but the problem here is that it's only relevant on Day 2. When attached to a longer timer, this is pretty cool, but otherwise it's pretty sad.

Farmer / Leviathan, Leviathan / Ravenkeeper, Leviathan / Sage, Ravenkeeper / Riot, Riot / Sage

Each night*, the Leviathan/Riot chooses an alive good player (different to previous nights): a chosen Farmer/Ravenkeeper/Sage uses their ability but does not die.

These jinxes are all pretty similar, so I've grouped them all together. I've talked about the Farmer / Riot jinx in E tier, and these are pretty similar. The bottom line is that I just don't think these jinxes are particularly fun spins on the demonbane dynamic. Farmer/Leviathan has the same confirmation problem as Farmer/Riot, and the Ravenkeeper and Sage jinxes, while functional, are just kinda sad.

* The Leviathan / Ravenkeeper jinx doesn't specify "good player", which doesn't seem to be the intent (since the Levi can just pick their Minions). I'm treating it as if it did, for consistency with the rest of the bait roles.

Goblin / Plague Doctor

If the Storyteller would gain the Goblin ability, a Minion gains it, and learns this.

I usually like these kinds of Plague Doctor jinxes where a Minion gains the ability, but this just doesn't work with the Goblin for one key reason — the Goblin needs to register as the Goblin to be balanced. If a player got seen as the Scarlet Woman, then claims Goblin on the block, you'd want to execute them! The existence of PD-Goblin makes it much, much easier. for evil to just claim Goblin and scare good off ever executing an evil, and also makes it much easier for them to win off a Goblin, because there's basically zero way for good to track down who actually has the Goblin ability.

Innkeeper / Leviathan, Leviathan / Monk

If the Leviathan nominates and executes an Innkeeper/Monk-protected player, good wins.

Again, as per Exorcist / Riot — I do like the dynamic this creates, and I'll talk more about it when I cover Exorcist/Leviathan! However, I don't see why it got attached to the Innkeeper and Monk, especially when the old jinx (where protected players were safe from evil players) thematically fit a lot better.

Kazali / Summoner, Pit-Hag / Summoner

If the Summoner creates a second living Demon, deaths tonight are arbitrary.

These jinxes both have the same text, so I've grouped them. They also share the same problem — it's too optimal to make a Summoner, since it creates an extra evil player and moves the Demon token to someone who started as a good player. Kazalis will always want to make a Summoner, and same with Pit-Hags pre-N3 — so it's not a great fix to the interaction to signal that this has happened. This is just a bad scripting interaction more than anything else.

Legion / Preacher

If the Preacher chooses Legion, Legion keeps their ability, but the Preacher might learn they are Legion.

This is roughly the same jinx as the Legion / Minstrel jinx in E tier, but the Preacher isn't drunking every good player, so it's slightly better. I still don't think the dynamic is particularly interesting, which is why it isn't in C tier.

Lil' Monsta / Magician

If the Magician is alive, the Storyteller chooses which Minion babysits Lil' Monsta.

This jinx used to have the Magician wake to choose which Minion character held Lil' Monsta, which was incredibly interesting in its dynamic, since they could prevent Politicians and evil Townsfolk from doing so and keep the baby on a single Minion character (if LM was in play). With the Storyteller deciding, the dynamic becomes much less interesting for the Magician player — though it's probably less confusing for them, too, since they don't have to wake up each night regardless of which Demon is in play. and only have an effect in LM.

Magician / Marionette

If the Magician is alive, the Demon doesn't know which neighbor is the Marionette.

This is one of those just-for-fun jinxes that doesn't really need to exist? The characters worked fine before, and while this jinx is interesting on its face... it's not particularly fun to have no player know your current alignment. It's not fun to be that player who the Demon turns to and says "okay so you *might* be my Marionette", and it's not fun to be that Demon, either!

Mayor / Riot

The Mayor may choose to stop the riot. If they do so when only 1 Riot is alive, good wins. Otherwise, evil wins.

Okay, this jinx is awesome in terms of theme, but in terms of execution, I personally don't like it all too much — mainly because the Mayor will often just die in the riot and not be able to safely use its ability. The only time a Mayor will get to use it is if they're getting framed by evil — in which case a good player will likely kill the Mayor before they get to use their ability. If an evil player is bluffing Mayor, they can't bluff using the jinx ability, so they just have to die about it.

To some extent, there will never be a perfect jinx between these two characters just because of how different they are, but this interaction is just a little sad.

Ogre / Recluse

If the Recluse registers as evil to the Ogre, the Ogre learns that they are evil.

This is completely functional, but pretty purposeless. If the Recluse registers as evil to the Ogre, it makes the now-evil Ogre feel incredibly bad, since they aren't playing for their friend's team anymore — they're just a lost evil player the same way a BH-turned Townsfolk would be with no built-in mechanism for finding their evil team. If this jinx ever gets used, it takes a lot of the fun out of playing the Ogre.

Recluse / Sage

The Recluse might register as the Demon to the Sage.

Rules as written, the Sage learns the Demon which killed them, so if TPI wants the Recluse to be able to misregister this way, then a jinx is necessary. However... I just don't get why the Recluse has to have this functionality. It feels awful to be a Sage who lies to town, throwing out false information and potentially even causing a misexecution or two to get killed, only to see the Recluse because of misregistration. A Ravenkeeper can just not pick a Recluse claim, but a Sage has no such recourse, which overall just makes this interaction especially unfun for the Sage.

In addition, it also encourages the Recluse to get themselves executed as soon as possible to avoid misregistering to a potential sage, which makes this interaction unfun on both sides. It's not fun to be a policy execution, and the existence of this jinx makes the Recluse closer to one.

Riot / Soldier

If Riot nominates and executes the Soldier, good wins.

Similarly to the Exorcist jinx, I think that this is actually a pretty cool dynamic. The Soldier can get themselves executed to confirm someone as not being the Demon! However, in a Riot game, this matters a whole lot less, since a Minion can nominate and execute the Soldier, then turn into Riot, ultimately taking away a lot of the fun of this jinx.

C Tier — These Jinxes Are Fine

Most of the jinxes here are purely functional jinxes — that is, they work about how you'd expect them to. I won't be listing all of these jinxes here — if I don't mention one, it's because I don't have anything interesting to say about it.

Atheist / Riot

During a riot, if the Storyteller is nominated, players vote. If they are "about to die", the game ends. If not, they nominate again.

This needs some kind of jinx, since the interaction is kinda undefined (as are most things involving Riot) — I know I used to run Atheist votes in Riot like an exile, that way evil couldn't just force a Storyteller execution when only a few players lived. However, I've recently swung around to not minding this method (where it's an actual vote), since it incentivizes players to nominate the Storyteller early in the Riot, so evil can't force a win, making Atheist games more challenging.

Banshee / Leviathan, Banshee / Riot

Each night*, the Leviathan/Riot chooses an alive good player (different to previous nights): a chosen Banshee dies & gains their ability.

I like these jinxes more than the other bait role jinxes, mainly because the Banshee has a level of confirmation by, well, being the Banshee. They're functional for what they do, so C tier.

Boffin / Cult Leader

If the Demon has the Cult Leader ability, they can’t turn good due to this ability.

This jinx adds an interesting dimension to actually voting on Cult Leader claims — whereas on most scripts, you can vote safely if you trust the CL's neighbors, you can't really do that with a Boffin. Neat jinx!

Bounty Hunter / Philosopher

If the Philosopher gains the Bounty Hunter ability, a Townsfolk might turn evil.

Before this jinx got added, this was something of a meme scriptbuilding choice, since Bounty Hunter is an optimal Philo choice when there's no chance of adding an extra evil. Obviously, don't use this to add a second evil Townsfolk if there's already a BH in play

Butler / Cannibal, Cannibal / Zealot

If the Cannibal gains the Butler/Zealot ability, the Cannibal learns this.

As I've mentioned on Script-A-Day before, you can fake these jinxes to a poisoned Cannibal, which is good fun and helps support evil bluffs. I don't have much more to say other than that, though: these jinxes need to exist.

Courtier / Summoner, Preacher / Summoner

If the living Summoner has no ability, the Storyteller has the Summoner ability.

These jinxes got changed from the Summoner choosing the Demon type — instead, the Summoner chooses nothing at all when Courtier-drunk or preached. I think this is fine? I prefer the old jinxes but, like, this works and is probably simpler for the Summoner.

Evil Twin / Plague Doctor

If the Storyteller would gain the Evil Twin ability, a player becomes the Evil Twin.

These just used to be hatejinxed (in the sense that the ST couldn't gain the ET ability), so I'm glad that there's some interaction here instead of none at all. Turning a good player into the ET (or bluffing that this happened as an evil) is a pretty fun bluff as long as you don't show the Demon to the good-aligned Evil Twin.

Hatter / Summoner

If the Summoner creates a second living Demon, deaths tonight are arbitrary.

This jinx is a tier above the Kazali and Pit-Hag jinxes (which have the same text) mainly because I'm not sure if there's a better jinx to make here. With Kazali and Pit-Hag, they create optimal play patterns — since the Hatter is a good character, it doesn't have that same problem.

Fang Gu / Scarlet Woman

If there would be two Demons, one of which was the Scarlet Woman, the Scarlet Woman remains the Scarlet Woman.

This jinx is a bit trickier to parse but hasn't functionally changed.

* Rules as written this still completely breaks the Scarlet Woman ability for the same reason the Al-Had/SW jinx does (not specifying "two living Demons", but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that this wasn't intended.

Fearmonger / Vizier

The Vizier wakes with the Fearmonger, learns who they choose and cannot choose to immediately execute that player.

When in a call with some custom script designers making this tier list, some of them asked for this jinx to be put way lower down — the reasoning being that on a Fearmonger/Vizier script, good should be more careful about how they're voting anyway. My response is that I don't think it's particularly fun to lose single-handedly when the Vizier slams onto the Fearmonger's target, so I appreciate this jinx existing to prevent that from happening.

Kazali / Marionette

If there would be a Marionette in play, they enter play after the Demon & must start as their neighbor.

Okay, real talk? I have no idea what this jinx means. It's not in the ??? tier because I'm assuming it just means the same thing it used to (the Kazali can only choose their neighbors to make a Marionette) and it seems supported by the text, but this is a weird reword.

King / Riot

If Riot is in play, and at least 1 player is dead, the King learns an alive character each night.

I like this jinx and it's nice (and powerful!) that the King gets two nights of info in a Riot game, but I'll have more to say about it when we reach its cool older sibling, King / Leviathan.

Legion / Politician, Legion / Zealot, Politician / Vizier, Vizier / Zealot

The Politician/Zealot might register as evil to Legion/the Vizier.

You still probably shouldn't put these characters in the bag together, since it's not particularly fun to out a whole bunch of Legion players and the Poli/Zealot along with them with a votefail. With Vizier, I'd shy away from scripting them together entirely, for similar reasons.

Lil' Monsta / Psychopath

If the Psychopath is babysitting Lil' Monsta, they die when executed.

FINALLY!!! The community's been begging for these two to get jinxed, and it's so hype that they are. The jinx is very functional, so C tier, but it's amazing that it exists so town doesn't have to deal with the 66% chance they can't execute the Demon every time they try to execute them.

Ogre / Spy

The Spy registers as evil to the Ogre.

I'd just prefer if the Recluse / Ogre jinx matched this one, to be honest, and just had the Recluse register always as good to the ogre. Was letting the Ogre be stranded really that fun where they specifically jinxed it so that it could happen?

Poppy Grower / Widow

If the Poppy Grower has their ability, the Widow does not see the Grimoire.

* I'm not entirely sure if the Widow still sends out its call (or poisons a player) if Poppygrown. I've seen it ruled on scripts like Adrian's Monsters in the Closet that it sends out a call, but doesn't poison a player — I think that's a really cool dynamic. Even if there is a Widow ping, you can't just go and out everyone's roles, since the Widow might not have seen the Grimoire yet! This jinx is A tier if it does send out the ping, C tier if it doesn't because it's just a normal jinx outside of that.

B Tier — These Jinxes Are Cool Beans

Finally, we're at the good stuff! I very much like all of these jinxes.

Alchemist / Marionette, Alchemist / Mastermind

An Alchemist-Marionette has no Marionette ability & the Marionette is in play.

An Alchemist-Mastermind has no Mastermind ability & the Mastermind is not-in-play.

What an elegant way to make these Alchemist abilities work. Are they weak? Yeah, maybe, but they're cool to play, especially in small games, and they're very fun bluffs. You can bluff Alchemist-Marionette and have an evil teammate convince their good neighbors they're a Marionette, which is just great. And a Mastermind will always know Alch-MM is not in play, which can lull town into a false sense of security in the best way.

Cannibal / Juggler

If the Juggler guesses on their first day and dies by execution, tonight the living Cannibal learns how many guesses the Juggler got correct.

I didn't even hate the rules-as-written interaction (the Cannibal gets to juggle, and then if no player is killed by execution the Cannibal gets Juggler info that night), but this jinx just makes it much cooler. As a bonus, it's easy for the Storyteller to run, since you already have the reminder tokens placed correctly from when you were running the Juggler ability!

Cannibal / Princess

If the Cannibal nominated, executed, & killed the Princess today, the Demon doesn’t kill tonight.

I talked to Delta about how he felt about this jinx on The Passage of Time — it's a very strong interaction, since it confirms the Cannibal, Princess, and has the actual Princess ability fire, but requires a lot of coordination, and if there's an evil bluffing at any step of the way it can be kinda devastating.

Damsel / Pit-Hag

If a Pit-Hag creates a Damsel, the Storyteller chooses which player it is.

This is just a jinx that makes me smile — TPI probably could've gotten away with "The Pit-Hag cannot create a Damsel" but they went the extra mile here and that's just great. As the Storyteller, you can balance the game by deciding which player to make the Damsel — if evil's running away with it, you can turn a dead player into the Damsel to not give them an extra win condition, and turn an ongoing Townsfolk into the Damsel if evil's hurting.

Engineer / Summoner

If the living Summoner is removed from play, the Storyteller has the Summoner ability.

I've put this a tier above the other jinxes because it adds an interesting dimension to the Engineer — that is, if they think there isn't a Summoner in play, they can wait until N4 to create one and turn off a Minion, which is a great reward for holding for that long. Outside of that, this jinx is fine.

Exorcist / Leviathan

If the Leviathan nominates and executes the Exorcist-chosen player, good wins.

It's about time! I hyped up this jinx a bit when talking about the other jinxes, so I'll explain myself — with this jinx on-script, the Leviathan is incentivized to be a lot more cagey with their nomination, since executing the wrong player could just lose the game. In response, this creates a cool dynamic where players who are more impulsive with their nominations and voting are less likely to be the Demon. It keeps the spirit of the Exorcist as a Demon-finder and I think that it's *awesome* — if someone's less willing to nominate and vote, they might just be a Demon scared of losing the game! That's great!

Legion / Summoner

If Legion is summoned, all evil players become Legion.

I talked about this in the Engineer / Legion jinx, but I think "all evil players are Legion" is a pretty fun dynamic. You don't have any Minion abilities, but good has to kill every evil player to win, and each living Legion can kill once each night. With the Summoner jinx, it puts that decision in the hands of an evil player instead of a good one — it's an opt-in, which I think is a lot better than the Engineer forcing it on them.

Leviathan / Soldier

If the Leviathan nominates and executes the Soldier, good wins.

Again, talked about this a bit with the Riot / Soldier jinx, but with the limited execution economy of a Leviathan game, this becomes much, *much* more interesting. The Soldier can guarantee that the player who nominates and executes them isn't a Demon at the cost of town's one good execution, and since most good Leviathan scripts don't have much in terms of Demon mobility, this is very useful information!

Lil' Monsta / Poppy Grower

If Lil' Monsta & the Poppy Grower are alive, Minions wake one by one, until one of them chooses to take the Lil' Monsta token.

This jinx is a little complicated to run, but it creates a very fun dynamic. I probably could've put this jinx in C tier, but this is such a game-defining jinx with how it makes evil interact with who the Demon is where I've bumped it up a tier.

Lleech / Slayer

If the Slayer slays the Lleech host, the host dies.

This is just a feels-good jinx. I don't have much to say about it otherwise, it just makes me smile.

Lord of Typhon / Summoner

If a Lord of Typhon is summoned, they must neighbor a Minion & their other neighbor becomes an evil Minion.

On its face, this jinx is pretty cool! It creates an extra evil, yes, which is also what the Lord of Typhon does — but it also has the added downside of creating a Typhon line, allowing the good team to track down that extra evil the same way they would a normal Typhon line.

(?) It's got that question mark because I haven't actually played or run a game with this jinx yet. If you have — please tell me how it went! I want to know!

Plague Doctor / Spy

If the Storyteller would gain the Spy ability, a Minion gains it, and learns this.

This is a clean way to make these two characters work together, and it's reasonably trackable for the good team since a Minion will start registering as good instead of evil! It's a lot of fun and pretty simple to explain.

A Tier — These Jinxes Are Great

Alchemist / Boffin

If the Alchemist has the Boffin ability, the Alchemist does not learn what ability the Demon has.

This jinx is necessary to have the Alch-Boffin be a Townsfolk — that is, for it to grant abilities that hurt the Demon, like the Klutz or Poppy Grower abilities. Otherwise, the Alchemist could just look for who was claiming the role they were granting the Demon, which is a bit sad. This jinx opens up a ton of possibilities with scriptbuilding and has a ton of knock-on effects that are just super cool — Foxx's Even Madder Science and amy's Alchemy 101 are just two examples.

Alchemist / Summoner

The Alchemist-Summoner does not get bluffs, and chooses which Demon but not which player. If they die before this happens, evil wins. [No Demon]

As whimsical as I thought the old Alch-Summoner jinx was (not taking the old Demon out of play & retaining their choice's alignment, letting you have good demon vs battles), this jinx is probably just better while still being a Townsfolk. The Alch-Summoner has a key bit of information in that there isn't a starting Demon, and can inform town as to which Demon is in play, which is incredibly powerful on some scripts. The loss condition is neat with a Heretic, but is more to disincentivize the Alchemist getting themselves executed — it works for what it's trying to do.

Alsaahir / Vizier, Investigator / Vizier

The Storyteller doesn't declare the Vizier is in play.

This makes the Vizier so much scarier while still giving the Investigator and Alsaahir something to do. As is, Vizier is commonly thought of as being one of the weakest Minions in the game, so removing the announcement makes for a much more fun dynamic and game for good and evil.

* It's currently unclear if this is meant to happen if the jinx is just on the script or only when both characters are in play. If it requires the Alsaahir/Investigator to be in play, B tier.

Baron / Plague Doctor

If the Storyteller would gain the Baron ability, up to two players become Outsiders.

This jinx has so much untapped potential that I haven't really seen scripted around. A key note — you can turn evil players into Outsiders, too! Turn a spent Minion into a Sweetheart or Barber or just let them bluff it! I took a punt at scripting this interaction with Heroism Replacement Therapy — there's a bunch of fun stuff to do there. The Banshee release script, SHRIEEEEEEK!, also features this interaction, with a *very* spicy Heretic on top to make things even more uncertain when the Plague Doctor does die.

Boffin / Village Idiot

If there is a spare token, the Boffin can give the Demon the Village Idiot ability.

Outside for the obvious Poppy Grower applications, this jinx is neat in that, at least how I read it, you can throw serious shade on VI info by drunking the only real Village Idiot in play by having this Boffin ability. It's a very neat worldbuilding wrinkle that's just restrained enough to not be overpowered, but can still be incredibly potent for the evil team on scripts like Navean's Leviaxaan.

* It's currently unclear if a Boffin-VI can actually drunk a solo VI (does it count as an "extra"?). C tier if it can't.

Butler / Organ Grinder

If the Organ Grinder is causing eyes closed voting, the Butler may raise their hand to vote but their vote is only counted if their master voted too.

This jinx is a bit more load on the Storyteller, but if the group is okay with keeping their hands up a bit longer after each vote it creates a great, Outsidery dynamic. Evil players who know they've been buttled can seriously mess with the vote count, and good players will have strong incentive to be even more careful with their votes than they otherwise would be in an Organ Grinder game, since their drop might also drop the Butler's hand without them ever knowing!

Damsel / Spy, Damsel / Widow

If the Spy/Widow is (or has been) in play, the Damsel is poisoned.

This used to just be a hatejinx, but I think I prefer this one. While the Damsel can't get guessed if they're poisoned, they will still be lying to town, and will likely take up an execution to defuse themselves at some point. The Damsel is still really Outsidery even when they're poisoned — it's the threat that counts, and that's awesome!

Bonus points for the Widow, because a Minion who learns of a Damsel knows there isn't a Widow in play, and can safely bluff a Widow ping, which is awesome. Not quite S tier, but still awesome.

Grandmother / Leviathan

If the Leviathan is in play and the Grandchild dies by execution, evil wins.

This makes bluffing a Grandmother pair as evil much more interesting and rewarding — effectively giving the Grandchild the Saint ability puts a lot more focus on the two of them, and can really shape games depending on what town decides to do about the pair.

Hatter / Legion

If Legion is created, all evil players become Legion. If Legion is in play, the Hatter has no ability.

You know everything I said about the Summoner / Legion jinx? Throw a Hatter into it. It makes the Hatter a much more devastating kill, since hattering into Legion with few players alive can be *terrifying*, especially if multiple evil players are alive that good needs to kill. It makes the Hatter even more Outsidery and that much better of a bluff, which is an awesome dynamic — I feature it on Sideways Fireplace and it's a cool Hatter choice there.

Lil' Monsta / Scarlet Woman

If Lil' Monsta dies with 5 or more players alive, the Scarlet Woman babysits Lil' Monsta for the rest of the game.

This was a much-needed nerf to the original LM-SW jinx, which only stipulated that the Scarlet Woman needed to babysit for that night alone. Keeping the baby in place aligns with what the Scarlet Woman does for every other Demon, and helps disincentivize the strategies involving passing the baby to a good player every other night to get them killed.

Lleech / Mastermind

If the Mastermind is alive and the Lleech host dies by execution, the Lleech lives but loses their ability.

I'll just say — if this jinx's wording was a bit more clear, it'd be S tier. This jinx creates a whole new dimension for Mastermind scripts, with Quilava's Minuit a Fond La Caisse being a perfect example — if town suspects it's a Mastermind day, doubletapping the previous execution loses the game if it was the Lleech host and skipping exeuction loses the game if the Vortox sank a kill! It's a horrifying dynamic only made possible by the jinx, and it's spawned a bunch of awesome custom scripts.

Marionette / Plague Doctor

If the Storyteller would gain the Marionette ability, one of the Demon's good neighbors becomes the Marionette.

This jinx used to create an extra evil, and it tended to kinda suck, since when the Plague Doctor died everyone got an extra round of paranoia over their own alignment. It worked on some scripts, like Pixlate's Rhetoric [Heroic: Failure], but it was super devastating even there.

Now, the PD essentially just makes a Drunk the Demon neighbors and knows about. It's much less spicy as an interaction, but it's way more balanced and creates a better social dynamic.

Pit-Hag / Village Idiot

If there is a spare token, the Pit-Hag can create an extra Village Idiot. If so, the drunk Village Idiot might change.

I love it when the evil team can subtly mess with good information, and the Pit-Hag / VI jinx is a perfect example of that. If the PH decides to turn an evil player (or I guess a good player, but then that just gives town a lot more info) into the VI, they're not doing something else like turning a Townsfolk into an Outsider, moving the Demonhood, changing the Demon type, or any other set of devastating things — and screwing with the VIs instead. It's awesome and I love it.

Plague Doctor / Scarlet Woman, Plague Doctor / Wraith

If the Storyteller would gain the Scarlet Woman/Wraith ability, a Minion gains it, and learns this.

Like the PD/Spy jinx, except it's up a tier for how applicable and useful it is on a variety of scripts. With PD/SW, it's perfect for when a Barber is too devastating but the Demon would still appreciate some mobility — it's on scripts like vaticidalprophet's Clockwork Cyborg and it creates a really interesting dynamic, especially since a PD-SW who becomes the Demon actually starts registering as the Demon, making it possible for good to find them. (unlike the aforementioned Goblin-PD jinx).

Meanwhile, PD/Wraith is just fun. The Wraith ability is great and giving it to a Minion means it doesn't have the same problem as the Goblin jinx, since good can spot the Minion-Wraith opening their eyes at night. It's awesome and really fun.

Poppy Grower / Summoner

If the Poppy Grower is alive on the 3rd night, the Summoner chooses which Demon but not which player.

For some reason, TPI changed the Courtier and Preacher interactions but kept this one intact. Good, because it was great. The Summoner being able to use as much of its ability as is reasonable (deciding the Demon type) while letting the Poppy Grower do something is great, and is a really fun jinx to be on both sides of. Also, the Poppy Grower can die and let evil know who each other are, meaning they won't be stranded forever (like the other Summoner jinxes).

Summoner / Zombuul

If the Summoner summons a dead player into the Zombuul, the Zombuul has already "died once".

This is just a cool jinx that incentivizes players to make Zombuuls with the Summoner ability. It increases the number of demon candidates in a very cool way, and has the tell of, well, having the Zombuul kill pattern, so you have time to execute all of them. It's a bit weird to script together, since the Summoner doesn't go incredibly well with execution survival (since the Summoner can summon a confirmed player) but there are a number of scripts, like Saliban's Blossoms of Pomegranate, that do a really good job of housing it all.

S Tier — These Jinxes Rule

This is the best of the best.

Alchemist / Organ Grinder

If the Alchemist has the Organ Grinder ability, the Organ Grinder is in play. If both are sober, both are drunk.

Oh my god. This jinx is so much fun. There's a little bit of jank with things like the Engineer taking the OG out of play, but it's awesome to try and outwit and predict what the Organ Grinder is going to be doing in order to nullify their ability. MK's The Certainty Paradox and bhamber's Insider Trading are two awesome scripts that showcase the jinx in unique ways.

Al-Hadikhia / Mastermind

If the Al-Hadikhia dies by execution, and the Mastermind is alive, the Al-Hadikhia chooses 3 good players tonight: if all 3 choose to live, evil wins. Otherwise, good wins.

This used to be a straight hatejinx, and I'm so glad it's not anymore. With this new jinx, the Mastermind turns into a much more deadly safety net that encourages town to sacrifice every night phase — if the Al-Had can get 3 good players to choose life after getting executed, evil wins on the spot, which creates for an especially intense dynamic.

Even when the Mastermind isn't in play, the jinx can cause good players who would otherwise want to live to choose to die instead — that's how threatening its script presence is. Paradox's Ride the Cyclone is an amazing showcase of the Al-Had/MM jinx: almost every good character wants to live, and the Politician adds a new wrinkle since they can very easily flip if they help evil secure their Mastermind win. With the jinx, the Mastermind becomes a devastating Minion that town simply *must* play around.

King / Leviathan

If the Leviathan is in play, and at least 1 player is dead, the King learns an alive character each night.

What a jinx. I already mentioned Navean's Leviaxaan before, but I'm plugging it again as an incredible showcaser of this jinx that really flips Leviathan games on their heads. With a King in play, good will want to execute early to give them some of the strongest info in the game — but it can be a devastating bluff that helps back up the King's evil teammates and get evil halfway across the finish line to their victory. It adds an incredibly cool dimension to many Leviathan scripts and simply must go into S tier.

Mastermind / Vigormortis

A Mastermind that has their ability keeps it if the Vigormortis dies.

Okay, this jinx is mainly S tier for the hype factor, but how could I not? This is another jinx that the community has been begging for for a while, and it's how Jams said the interaction was meant to work, rules-as-intended. Safety nets historically aren't great with the Vigor — most of them, like the Scarlet Woman, Goblin, and Evil Twin, are really bad vigor-kills. The Mastermind being jinxed means that it now becomes an excellent kill, and there's tons of scripting potential to help Vigor teams skate by after Demon executions.

(As just one idea — vigor-killed Minions, by virtue of dying early, have immense sway when it comes to selling different Demon types. Have one bluff Fool and die N2 to sell a Pukka game, so the deathless night after executing the Demon could just be executing the Pukka target and not the Demon!)

Summoner / Pukka

The Summoner may summon a Pukka on the 2nd night instead of the 3rd.

The interaction between these two, unjinxed, while not perfect, was functional. Now, it's exceptional, since it creates a very interesting choice for the Summoner. If they're getting heat right from day one, they may choose to summon early — at the cost of not being able to summon a more powerful Demon. Zets's A Grimm Chorus and (a script I already mentioned) Saliban's Blossoms of Pomegranate are two amazing scripts that feature the jinx prominently, and it really works well on both of them!!

Odds and Ends

Overall, this overhaul was... disappointing. If the sparse S and A tiers and bloated D and E tiers aren't revealing enough, there are many jinxes that have been added or changed that I don't really like. Along with that, some cool jinxes got removed — the Kazali and Marionette lost many of their jinxes that added neat functionality, like Snitch/Marionette giving the Demon 3 extra bluffs or Kazali/Huntsman turning another player into the Damsel. In addition, a number of jinxes the community has been asking for are nowhere to be seen — the Summoner still loses if they accidentally hit the Goon or the puzzledrunk or a dead Gambler, the Lleech can still instantly win if they pass to a Scarlet Woman on final 5, and the Ogre can still end up stranded from their teammate if they pick the Lycanthrope's Faux Paw and flip evil without knowing it.

However, the blog post Jams posted about the jinxes does reveal a bit of their thought process, and I'm grateful for that. I encourage you to read it here: it's genuinely very enlightening, even if I don't agree with all of it. Hopefully, with community playtesting, a lot of the jinxes that I ranked lower down can be tweaked and changed to make them more fun and interesting.

That's it from me. I hope you enjoyed the tier list, and got something out of it. Peace out!

Trouble Brewing

Travellers: Thief, Bureaucrat, Gunslinger, Scapegoat, Beggar

As the script tailored to beginners, Trouble Brewing keeps things relatively vanilla. As a result, the Travellers on script work due to the unique mechanics that Trouble Brewing lacks as opposed to ones it spotlights (with the key exception being misregistration).

Unlike BMR, Trouble Brewing has 1 kill per night at maximum and doesn't feature execution survival, which is relevant for Scapegoat and Gunslinger (whose abilities affect the execution economy).

Unlike the other base scripts, TB doesn't feature extra evil players, which is relevant for Bureaucrat and Thief (whose abilities shift the balance of voting).

Trouble Brewing features misregistration in the Spy and Recluse, which is relevant for the Beggar and Scapegoat whose abilities can get messed with by it.

Sects & Violets

Travellers: Barista, Harlot, Butcher, Deviant, Bone Collector

Sects & Violets is info overload, and has a ton of mechanical info for the good team to puzzle through. It's also the script that does the most with alignment and character changing, and the Travellers reflect this.

Unlike Trouble Brewing's Poisoner, S&V's misinfo is mostly static and less arbitrary with the No Dashii, Vigormortis, and Vortox as the misinfo core, which is relevant for the Barista and its sobering effect.

While the Pit-Hag can cause extra deaths, the script is mostly 1 kill per night with Fang Gu as the extra evil, which is relevant for the Butcher and Harlot whose abilities kill players (the Butcher via an extra execution each day and the Harlot who scores 1 extra kill at maximum with its ability).

Unlike the other base scripts, S&V's Minion abilities have loud effects, which is relevant for the Barista (who can double them) and Bone Collector (who can reintroduce dead Minions' abilities).

As a script that people try to hardsolve, it can get incredibly intense as players go into the weeds — this is relevant for the Deviant, who helps keep the mood light and the game fun.

Bad Moon Rising

Travellers: Apprentice, Matron, Judge, Voudon, Bishop

Bad Moon Rising is incredibly janky with Travellers, to be honest. With multiple deaths each night and execution survival as a primary mechanic, it's where the most game-warping Travellers find their home due to not fitting well anywhere else. (And also the ones that work with the Goon because they can't lock it as their alignment the whole game lol)

Unlike the other base scripts, BMR doesn't have much mechanical info, which is relevant for the Bishop whose ability can help the good team pinpoint evils. (BMR also doesn't have any nomination-based abilities, like a Town Crier, Witch, or Golem, which helps house the Bishop more effectively.)

Due to the execution survival and multideath nature of BMR, each execution is more valuable for town, which is relevant for the Judge and Voudon whose abilities drastically impact nominations and voting.

The only abilities on BMR that work off neighbors all relate to good players (i.e. there's neither No Dashii nor Vigormortis), which is relevant for the Matron, whose ability changes which players neighbor each other. (BMR is also incredibly coordination-heavy for both good and evil players, which provides an interesting dimension for the Matron, who can mess with good and evil communication.)

Okay, to be honest, I tried to fit something about Apprentice, but I can't hide the fact that I don't love it on BMR — it's a weird not-quite-Traveller that massively disrupts the balance of most scripts it's on more than most other Travellers, due to its ability not being public knowledge (unlike every other Traveller) and it having the potential to hardconfirm itself good (e.g. Apprentice-Fool) or lead to unwinnable scenarios (e.g. doubled Apprentice-DA). It needs a very careful script — one where most Townsfolk and Minion abilities are useful for the Traveller's team without being game-breakingly strong.

Experimental Travellers

I don't have much to say about these. Gangster and Gnome, like the Gunslinger, can kill once per day, so have much the same considerations as the Gunslinger, and fit best on scripts that share similarities with Trouble Brewing.

The Cacklejack is an entirely unserious Traveller — if you're putting it in play, you're there for a fun time, not a balanced time. Use at your own risk.

Putting It All Together

In general, when recommending Travellers for custom scripts, identify which characteristics your custom shares with the base scripts, and use that to inform your Traveller recommendations. Some rules of thumb to go by:

If your script has characters that add extra evils, lean toward the S&V/BMR travellers and away from the TB ones. Take care to avoid Bureaucrat and Thief in particular, which can seriously disrupt the balance of voting!

If your script has characters that interact with execution (e.g. Evil Twin, execution survival characters like Sailor and Devil's Advocate), don't use killing travellers like the Gunslinger, Gangster, and Gnome. They can seriously mess with the balance inherent to those roles. I've had a game where the good-aligned Gunslinger was able to shoot both players in an Evil Twin pair, and evil did not have a fun time that game! If you want to have game-accelerating Travellers, consider the ones on S&V/BMR instead, like the Butcher, Harlot, and Judge.

Speaking of — if your script features characters that can end the game instantly on a single nomination (e.g. Saint, Goblin, Atheist), avoid the Judge. It's not fun to lose a game because of the choice of a single Traveller.

If your script has characters that interact with nominations or voting (like the Town Crier and Golem and Flowergirl), take care with Bishop and Voudon, which restrict those mechanics. It's pretty sad to be a Town Crier who gets a NO every day because the Bishop is preventing you from getting info.

If your script has evil-sided neighbor mechanics (e.g. No Dashii, Vigormortis, Lord of Typhon), it's not fun to be a good Matron, good in a Matron game that game, or to have to track all that from the beginning. Stuff like Empath and Tea Lady are fine, since they're good abilities, but if it's coming from the evil team it can be a bit rough.

In general — look at the gamewarping characters on your script, and consider what the base scripts have in common with them. Use that to inform which Travellers you put on!

Case Studies

To wrap up, I'll go over three custom scripts that don't (as of writing) have recommended Travellers, and give some recommendations for what works on them.

Case Study #1: Word Around Town

(Script-A-Day here!)

autumnkitty's Word Around Town is typically what I recommend to Storytellers introducing their group to experimental characters and custom scripts after playing a ton of the base-3. There's a ton of fun characters like the Village Idiot, Mezepheles, and Yaggababble, sure, but also quite a few quieter experimentals between the Knight, Noble, General, and Amnesiac that players will quickly learn to appreciate. Wrapped up with just a little bit of extra death between the Minions, it's a pretty gentle introduction to what a custom script can be with a very unique flavor.

To start assigning Travellers to Word Around Town, I'll first quickly assess what Travellers probably won't work:

There's a Mezepheles to create an extra evil, so Bureaucrat and Thief are out

Multiple deaths a night make Scapegoat a little rough, since town has fewer executions, and also make me cautious about the each-day killing travellers (Gunslinger/Gangster/Gnome)

The only external droisoning on this script comes with the No Dashii and Puzzlemaster, so Barista will probably be too powerful

An evil Bone Collector doesn't have a ton to do here — and BC-ing a Mezepheles is a way to get a second extra evil player, which is a no-go

Apprentice-Godfather is kinda ehh and Apprentice-Mezepheles is a hard no. The Townsfolk are pretty neat, but I'm a little apprehensive about recommending Apprentice here since without any death prevention, an evil Apprentice can be ruinously strong

There's a No Dashii on script, so Matron is out

There's a Town Crier and Witch on script, so Bishop is out

What does that leave us with?

Beggar is pretty interesting here. Word Around Town has no way of checking the alignment of dead players beyond the VI (who will likely have something better to do), and no feedback from executions (think Undertaker/Oracle/Minstrel), making Beggar quite unique in its role — pretty cool!

Harlot's character-learning is unique to itself and the Ravenkeeper (and Amne but that can do everything) — but causing an extra death can be really rough, even if it is just one.

Butcher is great. It shares a homescript with Town Crier and Witch (both on this script) and the Yaggababble being able to fake a Witch-kill means it can do the same thing a Witch can on S&V!

While there's nothing *bad* about the Deviant here, I don't find it particularly interesting or useful for the reason it's on S&V (to get people out of the weeds of hard-solving), especially considering how social this script tends to be.

Judge is spectacular on Word Around Town. It's right at home on a multideath script where each execution matters.

Voudon is a bit of a weird traveller, but I personally really like it here! The Imp is the only source of evil nightkills (contrasting BMR having both Zombuul as well as the Shabaloth killing a Minion to regurgitate them later), so the good team will typically have more control of the vote, but I personally really enjoy the Voudon in a multideath environment, whether that's BMR or this script.

Overall — I'd recommend the Beggar, Butcher, and Judge — and then depending on your group and what they prefer, two of Harlot/Butcher/Voudon.

Case Study #2: China Shop

(Script-A-Day on a previous version here!)

The winner of TPI's Lord of Typhon script competition, China Shop is incredibly iconic. It's got a BMR-like flair with the execution survival on script yet pairs it with enough direct info to keep town going past the science. Being a multideath script with execution survival, Travellers can be a little weird to assign for the same reason that they are on BMR.

Like on Word Around Town, I'll first eliminate the Travellers that won't work:

Lord of Typhon is an extra evil, so Thief and Bureaucrat are out

The script has execution survival, so the day-killing Travellers definitely won't work (Gangster/Gunslinger/Gnome). Funnily enough, the Deviant also interferes with execution survival because of its own ability, making it also a weird traveler here.

Lord of Typhon and Vigormortis are evil-sided neighbor mechanics, so Matron is out

Both Town Crier and Witch are nomination-based characters, so Bishop doesn't fit

The D/A can't protect two people at the same time, which makes Butcher incredibly strong for good regardless of its alignment.

Given the Tea Lady on script, Harlot can be a little weird where you want to blow them up but can't. Fool is similar for the reverse reason.

The droison here is incredibly limited (versus something like S&V which tends to have a lot more), so Barista-sobering anyone can be incredibly, incredibly strong. The double also doesn't do a lot for the science roles (double-protect your neighbors as the barista 2'd tea lady?)

Given that this is a multideath script, the Scapegoat feels a little weird for similar reasons as Word Around Town. It might work, but I'm somewhat apprehensive.

What's left?

Beggar is really cool here. Vigormortis and Lord of Typhon incentivize the Demon to kill evil players at night, and the Beggar can pick up on that.

Bone Collector is... okay, a good BC is kinda stupid for the most part, which is a shame. (At most, you can get a second set of the actual-info roles? A bone collected Gambler or Fool does nothing). An evil Bone Collector has a fair bit to do, though!

Apprentice is... I mean, it's similar to BMR, but I don't love Apprentice on BMR, either! Some of the Townsfolk are cool, but incredibly strong for good, since an Apprentice-TF can't be the Drunk (and there are still weird Townsfolk abilities you just can't give the Apprentice like Fool and Mayor). Most of the Minions are great, but given that China Shop is a Lord of Typhon script, you kinda can't rack an evil Apprentice in those games. Uhhh.... I dunno, to be honest.

Judge is great here for the same reasons it's on BMR. It's pretty cool with execution survival, since you can slam an important science nomination and executions are inherently more valuable on a multideath script.

Voudon is pretty good for the same reasons it is on BMR. Executions are more valuable, putting control of executions in the hands of a handful of players is neat, cool cross-base-script Vigor synergy too.

Overall — China Shop, like BMR, isn't actually that great with Travellers in general? I'd enthusiastically recommend the Beggar, Judge, and Voudon. If you need more, the Harlot, Bone Collector, and Apprentice should usually be okay, but have weird interactions you need to be aware of.

Case Study #3: Night-Vision Goggles

(Script-A-Day here!)

Hey, I'm allowed to talk about my own script here, too, right? Night-Vision Goggles got 2nd place at Final 3 Con's 2025 Alliances script competition, and it fosters an incredibly unique dynamic to consider when putting Travellers on. The Poppy Grower doesn't blind evil Travellers, meaning that the Demon linking up with a Traveller and not their Minions is pretty common. In general, Night-Vision Goggles manifests itself as a high-info script with a bunch of pitfalls for both teams to fall into — which makes the Traveller space very interesting.

Starting first with what doesn't work:

Bounty Hunter is a weaker source of extra evils than Mez and LoT, since the evil Townsfolk won't know who the Demon is immediately, but I still don't love Bureaucrat and Thief with it

Town Crier is a nom-based character and Vigormortis a neighbor-based one, so Bishop and Matron are out

The Damsel is weird here — Gunslinger and Gnome don't work great with it, because the Damsel can beg for death before the evil team gets a chance to guess them, and given the Poppy Grower it's not even a guarantee that a Damsel outing to an evil Traveller will get guessed

The only droison comes from the Vigormortis, Drunk, and Xaan — so Barista is incredibly incredibly strong here

The Apprentice is weird with many of the Townsfolk and Minion abilities here. Apprentice-PG is pretty dumb, as is Nightwatchman, and on the other side Pit-Hag is incredibly strong while the Boomdandy can never proc. On such a high-info script, giving the good team an extra Townsfolk ability swings the balance dramatically in an unfun way, and vice versa for evil.

Many Travellers actually work pretty well here! I'll stick to the ones that, in my assessment, have especially cool interactions on this script. While travellers like the Scapegoat, Beggar, and Voudon probably work fine, I don't think they're especially interesting compared to the following:

The Butcher is awesome. An extra chance to proc a Boomdandy if evil, an extra execution into the high info on the script if good. There's the issue of "Damsel outs to the Butcher and begs for death", but town actually has to vote on it for it to pass, so it's less problematic.

The Judge is awesome for similar reasons as the Butcher! An evil Judge slamming the Boomdandy doesn't end the game immediately, which avoids the feelsbad interaction that the Judge can often have with characters like the Goblin and Saint. A good Judge can slam a Damsel who outs to them, but that's the Judge's whole ability used to defuse the Damsel, which I think is a fair enough trade.

The Harlot is pretty fun on a Poppy Grower script! Like the Bounty Hunter, a Harlot who finds an evil player has an interesting decision to make: out the information and help the evil team coordinate in a Poppy Grower game, or sit on the information and hide it from the evil team? It's a great dynamic that's a lot of fun.

The Bone Collector is fun for both good and evil. An evil Bone Collector collecting the Damsel is brutal while also being cool, and giving the evil team an extra use of the Harpy or Pit-Hag abilities (or another night of the Boffin ability) can be fun, too. Meanwhile, a good Bone Collector has plenty of strong choices they can make — between the four YSK characters (including the Bounty Hunter!), the strong ongoing info, and the potent once-per-game abilities, the Bone Collector is incredibly powerful for both teams — exactly the "all of the power, none of the responsibility" space Travellers love to sit in.

The Deviant fits for similar reasons on S&V. Night-Vision Goggles is high-info and high-chaos, which means that games can be incredibly intense — the Deviant helps people have fun and keeps the mood light!

Bonus — the Gangster is an each-day killing Traveller that works well with the Damsel, since they need to neighbor the Damsel to actually kill them and can't just do it on command (they need permission from the other neighbor).

Overall — Butcher, Judge, Harlot, Bone Collector, and Deviant are enthusiastic recommendations from me. The Gangster, Scapegoat, and Beggar are also pretty fun, but be a little more careful on that front.

Wrap-Up

3000 words later, and we're finally at the end! This post was a couple months in the making, so I hope that you got something out of reading this.

Ojo as an informed sniper, and why that's less good than you might think

The most obvious usecase for why a scriptbuilder might put Ojo on a script is to serve the role a Spy or Widow might have on an evil team: to help the evil team kill powerful good characters, so they don't waste time killing Librarians or Butlers and get straight to killing Empaths and Fortune Tellers. In theory, the Ojo should be more powerful than a typical Demon because they can kill all the info-roles more quickly than most other Demons, preventing them from being framed, because they can "kill-by-character".

Those of you that have played Trouble Brewing more than once might notice the immediate flaw in this reasoning. If you've ever played a Spy game where it was immediately obvious it was Spy when the Monk and Fortune Teller died instantly, you'd know what town tends to do after: out all their info and negate the advantage knowing the Grimoire brought.

(usually, this kind of Spy counterplay can hurt the good team if they get things wrong, due to characters like the Poisoner now knowing who to target... but in a meta where the good team hides more info than is typically helpful, a mis-solved Spy can end up helping the good team! but that's a topic for another time.)

An Ojo outing their presence by killing the inforoles first is doing something similar: encouraging town to be more forthcoming with their info and undoing the Ojo's own advantage. On some scripts, an Ojo making it abundantly clear it's an Ojo game can hurt even more than a Spy making themselves clear, because good solving the Demon type can often be disastrous for evil depending on the script. Confirming that, for example, there's neither No Dashii poison nor a Vortox warping info via kill pattern can end up sinking an evil team suddenly left with no potential misinformation to exploit.

Oh confirming the Demon type is only half the problem btw

The main downside of "kill-by-character", though, outside of outing the characters which let the evil team do that to begin with, is that an evil team killing into information isn't killing into socials, and can end up cornering themselves after killing all the players they could frame. Information can always be framed: that scary Fortune Teller's info doesn't have to mean anything if they're getting framed as the Demon by the evil team, so they can leave the info-roles alive. The more important threat is the Empath-confirmed Librarian and their Butler friend whose abilities are spent, and so often slip through the cracks when evil kills by character. They can't be framed, and even if they don't have as much information, the process of elimination can be more powerful than any one character's info, leading the good team directly to the Demon. An evil team that can kill the most trusted players and leave alive the most suspicious ones is an evil team that has a high chance of winning, because even if they left powerful info-roles alive, that doesn't matter when information can always be framed.

Guess which Demon can't innately kill by socials? That's right!

The Ojo in particular often struggles with killing their frames and being stuck leaving confirmed players alive because of the way they kill by character. The fact the Ojo can't kill a specific player just by pointing at them makes them vulnerable, and can result in them accidentally killing suspicious players while being unable to kill socially trusted players with unknown characters. Their inability to kill by socials can often leave them feeling weaker than a Demon with no special ability (that is, "Each night*, choose a player: they die"), since if they don't have a strong read on which players are which characters, they can end up cornering themselves with suboptimal kills in a quest to kill powerful info roles. So that informs...

Ojo as an intuitive cleric, and why intentionally missing isn't asinine

The Ojo, being a Demon, starts knowing several characters which are out-of-play (both their bluffs and other Demons on the script that they know aren't in play). However, knowing characters which are out of play means that the Ojo can intentionally miss, and let the Storyteller decide who dies. This is where I'll posit my first recommendation for Storytellers:

If the Ojo intentionally misses with the intent to kill a specific player they don't know the character of, strongly consider killing the player they want dead.

As mentioned in the previous section, the Ojo is fighting an uphill battle when it comes to killing by socials, since killing by character can often be a downside if they try and kill the powerful characters first. Allowing the Ojo to kill socially trusted players without knowing their character, especially early in the game when their deaths matter most, can help level the playing field and keep the Ojo in the game instead of getting steamrolled.

This may seem like a reversal of what ought to be done. Shouldn't Ojos try and engage with their unique mechanic and try to find out the character of that player? Why just... let them have what other Demons do? But that's just it: their unique mechanic often manifests itself as a downside, so letting the Ojo kill a player or two without knowing their character can help tip the scales toward evil when they would otherwise be cornered and losing, due to their inability to kill socially trusted players. That's not to say the Ojo should be able to give up their ability to just kill like a normal Demon. Far from it: the Ojo should primarily be killing by character, and an intentional miss to kill a specific player should be honored once, maybe twice a game depending on how it's going.

The Ojo is trusting you as the Storyteller to use part of their special ability (the miss) to get them out of a tight spot. Help them out.

However, there's another way to think about intentionally utilizing the Ojo's miss mechanic:

Ojo as an explosive multikiller, and why your Ojos should sometimes get double deaths

When the Ojo ability says "the Storyteller chooses who dies", they aren't limited to killing 1 player to die. Heck, the almanac even recommends occasionally killing multiple players if the Ojo is on a script with a multi-kill Demon like the Shabaloth to hide the Demon type. However, this can go further than just obscuring the Demon type, and herein lies my next recommendation for Storytellers:

If the Ojo intentionally misses with the intent to kill multiple players to sell a bluff (e.g. Gambler, Gossip) or fake another evil character as being in play (e.g. Godfather when an evil bluffing Outsider just died, Shabaloth), strongly consider giving them 2 kills to help them sell their world (though make them two suboptimal kills, to balance out the tempo increase).

The Ojo being, in essence, a 1.25 kill-per-night Demon via its miss is one of the most interesting parts of its ability and one that gets woefully overlooked by scriptbuilders. The fact that the ST can kill multiple players on a miss is something that most STs don't even realize until pointed to the relevant section of the almanac. But this interaction opens up the Ojo to being on so many more kinds of scripts, like BMR-likes or serving as cover on scripts with lower amounts of multideath.

If the Ojo is killing a fellow evil to sell a bluff (e.g. helping a Minion bluff Gambler), then give them a second kill that's all right. Don't kill a Ravenkeeper or Sage with the second death if you can help it — they're already sacrificing an evil life to sell a bluff. However, if the Ojo is killing 2 good players (when bluffing a Godfather in play, for example), consider making those 2 good players less useful kills: you-start-knowing characters and Outsiders are obvious go-tos, but depending on the state of the game, killing a bait role or even an evil player might be the right move to keep the game fun and balanced.

Okay, but how the hell do I run an unintentional Ojo miss?

tl;dr — be nice to them.

Too many Storytellers seem to have an axe to grind for the Ojo, and I used to be one of them. I used to bounce my Ojo misses into Farmers and Sages on N2 and N3 and then be surprised when they ended up getting overwhelmed by the torrent of information coming their way. To figure out what to do on a real Ojo miss, though, returning to the philosophy of the Ojo miss might be an activity worth pursuing.

The Ojo miss exists to balance the times when the Ojo selects a dead character and misses a kill. It's a kill that's literally "better than nothing", at its core, and helps keep the game moving along if the Ojo doesn't hit an in-play character. It's a part of the ability used to help the Ojo, not to punish them.

With that in mind: the miss shouldn't be worse than sinking a kill. This means that killing a Sage early in the game or a Ravenkeeper on final 5 should be off the cards, and it definitely shouldn't be killing an evil player. Remember, this is not a punishment! It's a part of the ability that should be helping the Ojo and its team. It should be middling, or maybe even good, not a downside for missing the Washerwoman bluffing to the nines and convincing everyone they're the Ravenkeeper. Or, in other words:

If the Ojo unintentionally misses, give them the Lil' Monsta kill — something which moves the game along and doesn't swing the game too hard for either team.

Wait why are we talking abo—

Let's take a tangent into Lil' Monsta for a bit

So, I did just drop a random bit of terminology only I use with "the Lil' Monsta kill", so I might as well talk about it. Experienced Storytellers who have run LM or Yaggababble games before will likely have an intuition for what I mean already, but for clarity, I'll explain all.

Lil' Monsta is a Demon whose ability reads "Each night, Minions choose who babysits Lil' Monsta & "is the Demon". Each night*, a player might die. [+1 Minion]". It's incredibly powerful for introducing an extra Minion ability to the game and trivially allowing the evil team to move the Demon around to hoodwink Fortune Tellers and Flowergirls, as well as keep the Demon on the most trusted member of the evil team without to much trouble. The downsides though, are that a Lil' Monsta team doesn't get Demon bluffs by virtue of skipping Demon info, and does not have agency over who dies at night.

Okay, so I fibbed a bit with how I described Lil' Monsta's lack of kill agency. In reality, while the kills a LM team are getting are suboptimal (mainly because the baby should be killing evil players at night such that only one can be alive to hold the baby on the final day), they shouldn't be used to kick an evil team while they're down. Lil' Monsta's kills should be run such that they keep the game fair, fun, and balanced for both teams: this means sometimes having it snipe once-per-game abilities that haven't used it yet or strong powerful info Townsfolk, but mainly making neutral kills that keep the game game going to an exciting final day for both teams. This usually means killing socially trusted players: killing the evil team's frames is worse than sinking, and should be avoided (unless you really, really, really know what you're doing).

In short, the LM kill should be something which keeps the game chugging along: a decent, but not optimal kill that ensures that the game doesn't suddenly tilt toward good winning or evil winning. This can be a middling kill, like a you-start-knowing character or a spent power role, but can sometimes be an ongoing information character or unspent power role, depending on if good is winning. Rarely, if evil is stomping, it can kill a bait role or sink, and in a Lil' Monsta game, evils should be dying regularly to ensure only 1 evil lives in final 3.

And that's what I meant when I talked about the LM kill. Let's wrap this up.

Odds and Ends

Okay, sorry for lying, but while I was busy not writing this post a couple more ideas about how Ojo ought to be run have sprung up, and I thought I'd talk about them before wrapping up:

Ojo gambling on bait roles and getting rewarded with the best kills if they're not in play: I mean, if an Ojo selected Ravenkeeper, I probably would give them a stronger kill (probably not a YSK, maybe something like the Town Crier), but I'm not killing the Savant if it would severely unbalance the game.

Ojo missing onto a similarly-powered character as the one they missed targeting: Encourages the Ojo to just target Savant 5 times in a row to kill all the in-play power roles and sidestep their dynamic. If the Ojo misses, the kill shouldn't sink them, but it should be middling.

Ojo misses being fooled by Townsfolk bluffs: If the Sage is bluffing Savant and the Ojo chooses Savant, I'm probably not bouncing into that Sage, because the miss should help the Ojo's team (it's a part of their ability, as described above).

Ojo’s role on custom scripts

So, a couple scripts that I think showcase the Ojo well after saying all of this:

Bitter End by Moll: Captures the essence of a "traditional" Ojo script that doesn't lean into multideath pretty well. Some notes:

Has a Spy on it! While the popular opinion seems to be that the two roles don't mesh together, having a Spy basically upgrades the Ojo to "regular Demon" status, which does help its ability by giving it a perfect grim read.

Has a Damsel on it! This (a) makes the Spy an interesting tradeoff to consider when bagbuilding, since it disables the Damsel wincon, (b) makes an "outed-Spy" game a bit more difficult to handle, since it could be Ojo with the Damsel ability still around or Spy and the Damsel ability is poisoned, and (c) highlights the Ojo's ability to kill-by-character in a more social light, since if the Ojo misses on what the Damsel's bluffing, and the Damsel doesn't die... that's a pretty good indication they're the Damsel. Or, like, the Mutant. Or just a Townsfolk bluffing.

Hide and Seek by Narninian & Zaba: Features the Ojo alongside the Godfather as the only source of multideath on the script. It's a really good example of using Ojo as multideath cover, since the Ojo can uniquely help its Minions bluff a Godfather game by missing and killing 2 players when they die.

Okay, now that I've talked about actual good scripts, time to talk about scripts I made instead of ones I didn't, because I'm like that:

Confirmation Unchained is a script I wrote to highlight evil nightkills, and particularly Ojo being able to bluff multikills like Gambler and Godfather to help their team bluff. Vigor and Legion tie in quite well, promoting evil players dying at night in different ways (and, as a bonus, Legion can bluff a Godfather being in play like the Ojo and have two nightkills after an evil bluffing Outsider dies, since each Legion can kill once!)

And to close, Cannons Rip the Sky is a BMR-like I made with Hannah which highlights Ojo's multikill ability on a script where those are more common. Its ability to kill by character is genuinely useful here — it snipes the Poppy Grower, and can dispose of protective characters like the Lycanthrope and Innkeeper more easily than other characters — but still benefits from missing intentionally to create multikills to help their team bluff or help sell another world.

Other bio information:

Call me Axolator! Any (reasonable) shortening of my name's also fine. Just don't take the piss.

I use she/her/hers pronouns.

My profile picture was drawn by Sunquill, and I'd highly encourage you to check out her website and commision her if you're interested. She's incredibly skilled; you won't regret it!

I've been in the BotC community since April of 2023 after getting introduced by a friend who brought the game back with him from college over spring break. I've been hooked since then!

Online, I mainly haunt the Unofficial BotC Discord Server, where I've attained the status of Community-Endorsed Storyteller for both live voice and asynchronous text games.

In-person, I'm involved with running a couple of IRL groups of friends that I helped introduce to Clocktower. We get up to shenanigans: if I ever mention the Philo-Steward incident, that's where it originated.

I play a lot of non-Clocktower games, too, and might post/rb posts about them:

Board games: Spirit Island and Power Grid are among my favorites, but I generally enjoy strategy games!

Video games: The Binding of Isaac (duh), Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling, and Baba Is You are all up there. I really just enjoy anything with a good soundtrack. Well, and Pokémon Showdown.

Tag guide:

#blood on the clocktower: Posts about BotC

#scriptaday: Posts in my Script-A-Day series!

#axowall of text: Longer text posts that aren't Script-A-Day, like my character analyses

#scriptbuilding: Posts about building custom scripts

#storytelling: Posts about STing Clocktower: both mechanical posts (like running discretionary characters well) but also thoughts about running Clocktower across various different mediums (IRL, live voice, livetext, async text) and making sure everyone has fun

#askbox: Posts responding to, well, my askbox!

#silly: Memes and other non-serious posts

#nonbotc: Posts not about BotC (I'll usually tag what they are about)

If I come up with more tags, I'll update this post with them!