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Can Executioner Wins on Draws

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A seemingly innocent town... turns vicious at night. Only one goal... survive the Town of Salem.

Town of Salem is a web game developed by Blank Media Games set in an alternate reality version of the actual Town of Salem, Massachusetts during the Witch Hunts, with gameplay based on the party game Mafia (better known under its alternate-themed version Werewolf). Three factions are trying to work their way to victory: the Mafia, who are trying to kill anyone who opposes them, the Townies, who are trying to root out evildoers, and the neutral parties, who each have their own agenda. As of now, Town of Salem has thirty roles to play as.

The game is played in two cycles, day and night. During the day players discuss strategy with the townspeople, put together clues, or attempt to lynch someone. It starts pleasantly on Day 1, when everyone greets each other ... until the night phase, where a wolf howls to announce the day is over and everyone goes home, the music gets more intense, picks up the pace, day comes ... and the bodies begin to pile up.

Their Kickstarter can be viewed here, it ended March 21, 2014, reaching their initial goal four days previously. They had a second one to get the game on mobile ports, Steam, and gaming consoles. It finally premired to the public during the summer of 2014.

On June 6, 2017, a new expansion was released called Town of Salem: The Coven, introducing a new faction (the Coven), 15 new roles, and new rotating game modes.

As of November 3, 2018, Town of Salem has moved away from free-to-play, requiring all future players to purchase the game. Anyone who previously owned an account with at least one game played may still play the classic games for free.

You can sign up and purchase the game here here or on its steam page. The Wiki for the game is here.

Tropes associated with Town of Salem Roles:

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    Townies

The Townies are made up of: Bodyguard, Crusader, Doctor, Escort, Investigator, Jailor, Lookout, Mayor, Medium, Psychic, Retributionist, Sheriff, Spy, Tracker, Transporter, Trapper, Vampire Hunter, Veteran, and Vigilante.

  • Back from the Dead: The Retributionist can temporarily revive each dead town member once and use their abilities. They typically tend to revive a town protective role to use on themselves. Initially they could fully resurrect a dead town member, but ultimately it was considered too powerful and unfair, especially in extremely competitive Ranked matches, so the role was Nerfed.
  • Bodyguard Betrayal: When a Bodyguard is Town Traitor and sides with the Mafia, protecting evil roles over good roles.
  • Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: A revealed Mayor can lynch anyone in a one-on-one situation, including Juggernauts, Werewolves and Pestilence itself.
  • Difficult, but Awesome: The Transporter. In order for their switching ability to be helpful, they have to have a pretty good idea who's most likely to be targeted by the bad guys and who not to interfere with. Knowledge of obscure game mechanics makes them even more effective, such as stalling an Arsonist from igniting by switching their target for the night. However, a Transporter who doesn't know what's going on or doesn't think things through can be a huge liability for the town who prevents useful roles from doing their jobs or gets their teammates or themself killed by accident.
  • Distracted by the Sexy: This is what the Escort does. Your role is described as "a beautiful person skilled in distraction."
  • Driven to Suicide: A Vigilante killing a Town will have them eating their gun the next morning, though it gives them another chance to murder with impunity later that night.
  • Face–Heel Turn:
    • In the Town Traitor game mode, a town member will join The Mafia or The Coven against the Town.
  • Heroic Sacrifice:
    • Often a member of the town will have to sacrifice themselves to bring in a win. The Bodyguard role specializes in this, the entire point of the role being to die in defense of a fellow town member, killing an enemy in the process.
    • Town members may also do this by declaring their role, giving vital information to the town even knowing that they are likely to die that night as a result.
    • It is not uncommon, if there is a Vigilante and a Witch, for the Vigilante to ask to be lynched so the Witch can't control them. An important part of playing Town is realizing that dead town members still win if town wins, and knowing when to sacrifice yourself.
    • In ranked play, this (combined with the limited role list) is the basis of a strategy known as "1 for 1": if two unconfirmed players accuse each other, the town agrees to lynch one to confirm their role and deal with the other accordingly. "If [x] is inno, kill [y]" is a common compromise.
    • Averted with the Crusader, who is similar to the Bodyguard but is not killed by any attackers.
  • I See Dead People: The Medium's job is to do this. They can communicate with the dead every night, and relay information back to the town from beyond the grave. They can also invoke this on one person if they die, letting the selected person see them talking to give information to write in a will or say during the day.
  • The Medic: The Doctor can heal (prevent the death of) one other person every night, and can heal themself once.
  • Mind Screw: The Transporter can create very illogical and confusing situations, such as a Forger getting killed and forging themselves or a Janitor getting killed and cleaning themselves.
  • My God, What Have I Done?: A Vigilante killing a Town will drive them to suicide, while a Jailor will be unable to execute anyone afterward, making them a glorified roleblocking role.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The Crusader is a powerful protector, able to defend their target at night without endangering themselves, even from One-Hit Kill roles like the Veteran or Medusa, and they attack one random visitor to their target. However, this can result in the Crusader killing a Townie visitor such as a Doctor or Investigator. Unlike Jailors and Vigilantes, Crusaders don't lose their abilities after killing a Townie, so there is a chance that a Crusader could kill multiple Townies in a single game.
    • Similarly, the Veteran can kill Townies without direct consequence.
  • Properly Paranoid: Every Townie. There are hidden killers about, and a target on your back… the one who takes this to the extreme is the Veteran, who can go on alert at night. Anyone who visits them, friend or foe, will be shot dead on the spot.
  • Purely Aesthetic Gender: Averted for the Escort in an update where the role's description was changed to say "person" instead of "woman", as the role could be given to any player regardless to their current avatar's gender.
  • Shell-Shocked Veteran: The Veteran, naturally, is a classic example of one. If they go on alert and anyone visits them, Basic Defenses be damned, they'll be dead.
  • Stop Hitting Yourself: If the Transporter transports themself with their attacker, the attacker kills themself, in addition to the Transporter. Even Juggernauts. The Steam Achievement namechecks the trope verbatim.
  • Taking You with Me:
    • The Bodyguard can choose to protect someone at night and take the attacker down with them, at the cost of their life.
    • The Transporter can make the Mafioso, Godfather or even Juggernaut kill ''themself' if they transport themself with their attacker. Doubles as Stop Hitting Yourself.
  • Tracking Device: One of the Spy's abilities is to bug a player, which allows the Spy to know of anything that happens to that player, but not anything that player does.
  • Ultimate Authority Mayor: The Mayor is hidden just like the rest of the Townies. But when they do come out of hiding, they're given more authority than most, counting as three votes for both lynching and for verdicts. Unfortunately, the evildoers also know exactly who they are, and while they can be protected, they cannot be healed.
  • Vigilante Man: The Vigilante role, obviously. They're sided with the Townies and can target one player each night and kill them, hoping that they've hit Mafia. Of course, there's no guarantee that they won't shoot a Townie. If they do, they commits suicide out of guilt the following night, leaving the Townies with two fewer allies. In a game with a Witch, Vigilantes become extremely dangerous to the Townies, because the Witch can bring the death count up to three by controlling the Vigilante into two Townies before leaving them to die from guilt. Worse, the Witch can force the Vigilante to shoot someone the first night, which they normally cannot do.
    • The Vampire Hunter is a more specialized version. Every night they are able to investigate a player to learn whether or not they are a Vampire. If the player is found to be such, the Vampire Hunter kills them. They will also kill a Vampire that tries to turn them. If the Vampires are fully exterminated before the game's end, the Vampire Hunter becomes a regular Vigilante.

    Mafia

The Mafia is made up of: Ambusher, Blackmailer, Consigliere, Consort, Disguiser, Framer, Forger, Godfather, Hypnotist, Janitor, and Mafioso.

  • Blackmail: The Blackmailer, natch. The Blackmailed player cannot speak during the next town phase.
  • Cleanup Crew: The Janitor can clean up the body of the Mafia's kill, meaning the town won't know what role they were or what was written in their Last Will.
  • The Consigliere: The Consigliere gives the most accurate investigations.
  • Costume Copycat: The Disguiser role was reworked in the 1.5.9 patch. If a Disguiser targets somebody, they will appear to be that role to an Investigator. A Sheriff, however will not be fooled and still see them as a member of the Mafia. If the Disguiser dies that night, or is lynched during the day they disguised, they will appear to be that role in the graveyard.
  • Dead Person Impersonation: The Disguiser role used to function like this — if the person they selected to swap with dies, they swap with them, taking on their name and avatar. This began a trend of leaving your name in your will (since your will would then appear with a different body, outing the Disguiser), which eventually forced the role to be reworked.
  • Detective Mole: The Consigliere has the ability to see other people's exact roles, unlike the Sheriff or Investigator, and can claim to be a Sheriff or Investigator to keep Townies off their scent and guide the Townies away from suspecting their Mafia friends.
  • The Don: The Godfather does not kill other townspeople, but can have the Mafioso kill a Townie. Like the Serial Killer, they can't die at night. However, they will take matters into their own hands if they have no one to kill for them…
  • The Dragon: The Mafioso, when there's both a Mafioso and a Godfather. The Consigliere can also fill the role of The Lancer to the Godfather, since their role gives them the most information about who to target for murder, framing, distraction, and blackmail.
  • Dressing as the Enemy: The Disguiser can make themselves or a fellow Mafia appear as someone outside the Mafia, fooling any Sheriffs, Investigators, Lookouts and Spies.
  • Evil Counterpart: The Consigliere, Consort, and Ambusher are Mafia counterparts to the Investigator, Escort, and Crusader, respectively. Consiglieres are able to tell roles like investigative Townies, Consorts are able to roleblock others like the Escort, Ambushers will attack a random person who visits the house they ambush like the Crusader. Reinforced by the fact that Investigators are unable to tell the difference between Escort and Consort or Investigator and Consigliere.
  • Fake Memories: The entire point of the Hypnotist role is to frame people or back up Mafia members by planting a memory to somebody each night.
  • False Flag Operation: A Forger may forge someone as a Vampire, and make people fear there are other Vampires in the town ranks, and any confirmed town role may be a Vampire now.
  • Heroic Sacrifice:
    • If a Mafia member has been discovered or is under suspicion, they may ask their fellow members (via night chat or whispers) to lynch them. While this results in the Mafia losing a member, it helps take suspicion off the surviving members. In Ranked play, this is taken a step further, and called "bussing" — a Mafia member who is not under suspicion will agree to be "outed" by a TI claim within the Mafia, "confirming" that claim as town at the expense of one member.
    • A Consigliere with three teammates will sometimes reveal their role when they find an Arsonist or Plaguebearer, stating they don't care if they're hanged the next day — the Plaguebearer or Arsonist are the far bigger danger to everyone else.
    • An Ambusher has the seriously crippling weakness in that they can be spotted, meaning they have to pick and choose their targets very carefully, and not expect to get a second kill.
  • Lost Will and Testament: If the Janitor from the Mafia reaches someone who is killed by them, he will wipe out the target's Last Will and role.
  • Mind Screw:
    • The Hypnotist basically tricks a player into thinking they were interacted with.
    • The Forger as of the latest patch does this by changing the role and will of a player to whatever they want. A clever Forger will, for example, make it seem like a Veteran was killed, making any other claims to the role seem suspicious (since the Veteran is a unique role.)
    • The Transporter or Coven Leader can lead to some really strange deaths, such as a Forger forging themself, a Hypnotist hypnotizing themself, or the ultimate: a Janitor cleaning his own corpse. All of these events reward the player with incredibly rare Steam Achievements ("Impossible!" for the Janitor cleaning themself.)
  • Paranoia Fuel: In-Universe — the Forger can engender this by Forging a town member as a Vampire, making the town worried that at any moment, one of them may have been turned — it's especially useful for the Framer later in the game.
  • That Didn't Happen: The Forger role can completely rewrite up to three people's last wills, and totally make something up that didn't really happen, resulting in the Townies being fed the wrong information. Can go From Bad to Worse if the Medium cannot seance that the will was changed, and the investigative roles are dead. Generally pretty difficult, though, considering you get less than 30 seconds to completely rewrite a will, so most Forgers opt instead to clear the will of relevant evidence and out their own existence rather than try to completely fake a will.
  • Troll: The Forger can be this For the Evulz — such as making someone's will be that of a Survivor and complaining harshly that the other players suck because they killed them night one.

    Neutrals

The Neutrals are made up of: Amnesiac, Arsonist, Executioner, Guardian Angel, Jester, Juggernaut, Pirate, Plaguebearer/Pestilence, Serial Killer, Survivor, Vampire, Werewolf, and Witch.

  • Accidental Truth: One of the worst things a Jester may do is accuse someone of being evil — and it turns out they were evil. Not only does this make Town players less likely to hang him, but Evil characters will assume he's Town and kill him at night.
  • Amnesiacs are Innocent: Amnesiacs can become the role of a person that has died. They are harmless at the start of the game because they can't do anything yet.
  • Criminal Amnesiac: The Amnesiac can choose to do this, if they remember they were a Serial Killer, Mafia member, or Arsonist and wreak havoc.
  • Death Seeker: Zig-Zagged. The Jester wins if they get lynched, and therefore should do stuff that will actively get them lynched. However, they still lose if he's killed during the night.
  • Failure Gambit: Jester strategy revolves around making yourself look as suspicious as possible so the Town will think you're a Mafia, Neutral Killing, or a different Neutral Evil role with a bad cover story. Also, Jesters can be played as so annoying and unhelpful that they lynch you to shut you up, but this carries a significant risk of getting murdered by one or more of the bad guys (or the Vigilante, who won't suicide since the Jester is not Town) instead, and spamming/cheating are formally outlawed as valid Jester plays in the rulebook.
  • Gasoline Dousing: The Arsonist, of course. They can actually get doused themselves, and if they ignite, they will be incinerated as well. (Sometimes getting doused indicates a second Arsonist, so they might deliberately ignite so that they can pull suspicion off the other Arsonist, while reducing the town population at the same time.)
  • Hoist by Their Own Petard: An Arsonist can set fire to themselves if they are doused. (They have to spend a turn cleaning to prevent it.) The Arsonist may do it deliberately if they think there's another Arsonist in the game — or if they just want the Achievement.
  • I Fight for the Strongest Side!: The Survivor attitude. Late in the game, they will often announce they're the Survivor and side with whoever happens to be in the majority, regardless of affliliation. This is one of the reasons they'll be murdered at the drop of a hat, lynched, executed by the Jailor, or shot by a Vigilante.
  • Karma Houdini: The Executioner, once their Town target is killed. They win, and death won't keep them from victory, meaning they become a Wild Card and can vote however they like.
  • Kill It with Fire: The Arsonist's whole shtick. Once a night, he can douse anyone he wants with gas and chooses when to light them up. The scary part? No Basic Defense will protect you, and neither will Doctors or Bodyguards.
  • Knife Nut: The Serial Killer stabs people.
  • Leave No Witnesses: Any attempts to roleblock or jail a Serial Killer will leave the victim not only murdered, but their will will be too blood-splattered to read. (A Serial Killer can opt to be "careful" at night and just allow themselves to be roleblocked.)
  • Magikarp Power: Late game, an Amnesiac can turn into Pestilence, skipping having to play the game as Plaguebearer. A late game Mayor reveal can also turn the tide as well.
  • Miscarriage of Justice: The Executioner's goal is to get a specific person lynched. Their target is always a Town member, and never Jailor or Mayor, since those roles are unique and absurdly easy to confirm.
  • Multiple-Choice Past: The Amnesiac is a literal example, since choosing a role comes in the form of remembering who they used to be.
  • No Saving Throw:
    • Get set on fire by the Arsonist and you're dead, Basic Defense, Bulletproof Vest, or Doctor healing be damned.
    • Once the Jester is lynched, none of the above-mentioned abilities can protect a non-innocent-voting victim from committing suicide.
    • All of the aforementioned deaths can be prevented if you're the Pestilence, which has Invincible defense.
  • No-Sell:
    • Nothing, absolutely nothing can kill Pestilence except for being lynched during the day.
    • If a Transporter makes a vampire bite another vampire, nothing happens.
  • Our Vampires Are Different: They're Daywalking Vampires who can be killed by normal means, such as a bullet.
  • Our Werewolves Are Different: On every full moon night, the Werewolf gains the power to visit someone and kill them and anyone who visits them. Incidentally, they also can target themself to gain the counter-kill ability to kill whoever visits them on the night of a full moon. Since games usually last 4-8 days, "Full Moon" occurs on night 2, night 4, and every night after that.
  • Powers via Possession: The Witch class can do this if they possess someone with a night ability, using it for themself.
  • Serial Killer: Very obvious. The only roles they can't kill are the ones with Basic Defense like they do, but they can be killed by a Veteran if they visit while on alert, or if they visit a Werewolf on a full moon.
  • Suicide by Cop: The Jester's goal is to die via lynching. They lose if they're killed at night. However, being executed by the Jailor or shot by a Vigilante isn't good enough, even though those would fall under this trope otherwise.
  • Taking You with Me: When the Jester is lynched, they choose someone to feel guilty about killing them and commit suicide the following night. While initially they could only target Guilty voters, a buff made them be able to target Abstaining voters as well, due to a strategy where one relatively useless role would "take the hit" on a potential Jester while everyone else abstained. The only way to avoid the Jester now is to vote Innocent.
  • Then Let Me Be Evil: An Amnesiac can decide to be Mafia, Coven, or a neutral evil, even a final form Pestilence. If they suspect there's more than one Arsonist, choosing Arsonist even as they're burning to death later that night will give them a win.
  • Troll: The Jester and the Witch. One acts weirdly to get hanged then kills anyone who guiltied (or abstained), while the Witch employs Mind Screw attacks.
  • Vampire Procreation Limit: Vampires have quite a few restrictions in this game. There can only be a maximum of 4 Vampires at any one time, they can only turn someone into a Vampire every other night, and even then, they can only turn town members into Vampires; Mafia members die when they're bit by a Vampire, and all the other hostile roles are immune.
  • Violation of Common Sense: Where everybody else's role is to evade suspicion so as to avoid getting lynched, the Jester has to act suspiciously in order for it to happen, as getting lynched is their victory condition. Unfortunately, acting suspiciously usually outs the Jester as a Jester, since no other role is consciously doing so. Then they'll be easy prey that night for the Vigilante, Jailor or an evil killer, since they're of no use to anyone, and no one wants to be revenged on.

    Coven

The Coven is made up of: Coven Leader, Hex Master, Medusa, Necromancer, Poisoner, and Potion Master.

  • Action Girl: Canonically, the Coven are all women and all rather powerful.
  • Evil Counterpart: Canonically, Necromancer is the Retributionist's evil counterpart. Mechanically, Medusa is a counterpart of the Veteran. Necromancer resurrects targets as soulless, fragile, and under their control, and Retributionist resurrects a Town member to do the same thing. Medusa kills visitors and makes them impossible to identify, while Veteran can survive some attackers and can't be role blocked.
  • From Nobody to Nightmare: The Coven Leader is a Witch armed with the Necronomicon. While the Witch was a nuisance in Classic matches, in Coven matches the Coven Leader becomes outright lethal with the Necro — and will own the Necronomicon if alive.
  • Jack-of-All-Trades: Potion Master can attack, heal, or investigate their target.
  • Life Drain: Although canonically, this is what the Coven Leader does to targets when holding the Necronomicon, it has no effect on gameplay as there is no life bar.
  • A Lighter Shade of Black: The Hex Master is a little less evil than the Plaguebearer, though their roles are similar.
  • Loners Are Freaks: Every backstory for the Coven roles has them as being originally loners practicing various fields of witchcraft, before being united by the Coven Leader.
  • Master of All: With the Necronomicon, the Potion Master no longer has cooldowns on each potion. This allows them to fully pose as a Doctor or Investigator, provided they haven't killed.
  • Master Poisoner: Obviously, the Poisoner is this… of course, they only use the same 24 hour poison over and over.
  • Necromancer: An obvious trope for the respective role, the Necromancer revives and controls a dead player once. With the Necronomicon, they can also resurrect a generic ghoul.
  • Powers via Possession: Like the Witch, the Coven Leader can take over a player's night action. Upon receiving the Necronomicon on Night 3, they drain their target's life force.
  • Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: A given, due to their original status as loners. They share a common goal of making Town suffer while lacking the cohesion of the Mafia.
  • Taken for Granite: The Medusa's ability allows them to turn visitors to stone, which also makes their victims impossible to identify. With the Necronomicon, they can go out and deliberately turn someone to stone.
  • Total Party Kill: This is the Hex Master's means of killing: hex everyone alive who isn't Coven and they all wipe at once.
  • Unblockable Attack: With the Necronomicon, the Hex Master's attack cannot be blocked by traps or the Bodyguard. It can still be healed or stopped by immunity, and the Crusader can fend it off for obvious reasons.

Tropes associated with Town of Salem as a whole:

  • Acronym and Abbreviation Overload: Fans have abbreviated many of the roles and terms down in order to cut typing time in the chat, so much so that chatspeak can look like a foreign language to people who have never played the game before:
    • Roles
      • Invest = Investigator
      • BG = Bodyguard
      • Trans = Transporter
      • LO = Lookout
      • Ret = Retributionist
      • VH = Vampire Hunter
      • Vig or Vigi = Vigilante
      • Vet = Veteran
      • GF = Godfather
      • BM or BMer = Blackmailer
      • Consig = Consigliere
      • Disg = Disguiser
      • SK = Serial Killer
      • WW = Werewolf
      • Exe = Executioner
      • Arso = Arsonist
      • Amne = Amnesiac
      • Surv = Survivor
    • Terms
      • Sus = Suspicious
      • NS = Non-suspicious, usually found in sheriff wills
      • RB or RB'ed = Getting roleblocked by an escort or consort
      • BMed or BM'd = Getting blackmailed
      • Witched = Being visited by a witch
      • Transed or Trans'd = Getting transported
      • Exe = When used in context for the Jailor, it's when a Jailor uses one of their executes
      • VFR = Voting for role, the process of voting people up one at a time to figure out roles
      • Vetbaiting = A veteran deliberately trying to make evil roles visit them by either saying insanely inflammatory/provocative statements in the chat or making themselves appear to be an important town role like Jailor, Vigilante, or Mayor
      • Jesterbaiting = A jester deliberately trying to get themselves hanged by acting suspicious
      • Medusabaiting = A medusa deliberately trying to get people to visit them
      • Surv Claim = Colloquial for claiming Survivor, a popular choice for a lot of evil roles
      • CC = counter-claim, used to indicate you claim the same role someone else did. If it's a unique role, or a game with a pre-defined list of roles, this means one of the claimers is lying about theirs. It also means "cross check", meaning to see if, say, that is a real Sheriff or an Executioner trying to get his target hanged.
      • Scumreading = lynching someone based off of their behavior rather than investigative results. The Jester relies on this.
      • Many roles also abbreviate their specific functions in their wills, like a Spy writing who they "B" and "MVs" (Bugs and Mafia visits), and a Lookout writing "VB" for "Visited By." This is helpful since wills and chats have character limits.
    • Practically all the roles themselves are abbreviated as well, from Town Investigate (TI), Town Support (TS), Town Protective (TP), Town Killing (TK), Random Town (RT), Mafia (Maf), Neutral Benign (NB), Neutral Evil (NE), and Neutral Killing (NK).
  • Anachronism Stew: The game can't really decide whether it's set in the late seventeenth century (reflected in the costumes for the default avatars) or the modern day (reflected in, most noticeably, the SWAT outfit worn by the bodyguard).
  • And Your Reward Is Clothes: Winning a game gains you in-game coins you can use to spend on different skins.
  • And Your Reward Is Interior Decorating: Including different game backgrounds.
  • Anti-Rage Quitting:
    • The game gives you two free early leaves (leaving before you die), a 5-minute timeout for your third, a 30-minute timeout for your fourth, a 1-hour timeout for your 5th-9th leaves, and a 24-hour timeout on your tenth leave and beyond. This resets each week, and every 10 games takes off a strike. There is no penalty for leaving after your death; however, those who stay until the end of the game will receive merit points even if they lose (40 if they win, 20 if they lose), which can be used to purchase scrolls that boost your chances of getting a specific role along with cosmetics.
    • Ranked games take this to the next level, since there are consequences to your team for winning or losing. In any Ranked game, if you leave before you die, you lose the maximum ELO possible to lose (30). If you leave after death, you lose what your faction would lose if they lost, since presumably with a possible Medium you could still be useful.
    • The May 2021 update now includes one of the Report Player options "Leaving" — mostly for evil teams who are crippled when one of their members quits before or on D1 because they didn't like their role.
  • Anyone Can Die: In this dangerous and paranoid town, where you can get murdered in the night, or lynched in the day, no one is safe. Most games will have a large body count by the end, and if no one dies for 4 days, the game forcibly draws, since it's assumed you've reached a stalemate if people have stopped dying.
  • The Bad Guy Wins: Happens if the Mafia, Coven or a Neutral Killer role gets the victory over the Townies.
  • Beat Them at Their Own Game: In some rounds, the roles that are chosen will effectively shift the odds of winning in one direction. Either there will be a lot of town roles, or the maximum amount of Mafia roles (5) at the beginning of the game.
  • Blood-Stained Letter: The Death Note left behind by a killing role. Additionally, the Will of anyone who visits a Serial Killer at night will be soaked in blood to the point of becoming illegible.
  • Bluff the Impostor: Players will Whisper to a revealed Mayor. If they successfully are able to whisper to them, the jig is up: the Mayor had been turned into a Vampire. note Whispering to a revealed Mayor normally returns a message telling the player they're not allowed to.
  • Bolt of Divine Retribution: Well, Bolt of Town Retribution: One of the many ways you can elect to have yourself executed at the hands of the town.
  • Boring, but Practical:
    • Voting people to get them to claim a role (As a member of the town). It makes Ranked games much, much simpler.
    • Simply claiming your role in Ranked (Again, assuming you are a town member)
  • Camera Centering: The game will center the camera on the dead players when they are revealed each day.
  • Cassandra Truth: Very commonplace, regardless of whether it's invoked or not. More than one townie has gotten lynched over not being able to prove their claimed role, and a hostile role can sometimes slip through by just saying so, and avoiding being lynched for fear of Jesters.
  • Cessation of Existence: Anyone who commits suicide by leaving the game ceases to exist, and cannot communicate with the Medium. Their corpses, however, are fair game for Retributionists, Necromancers and Amnesiacs.
  • Changing Gameplay Priorities: More so for the Mafia and other killing roles than Townies. The Townies' singular goal is to find the killers and lynch them. The killing roles are usually "figure out what everyone is, find out who the threats are, and then remove the threats", and can change on a dime whenever new information is presented.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Mafia are red. Town is green. Coven is purple. Neutral is grey in random role selection. Past the basics, the neutral roles get more specific. note Amnesiac is teal, Arsonist is orange, Executioner is grey, Guardian Angel is white, Jester is pink, Juggernaut is maroon, Pestilence is black and green, Pirate is light orange, Plaguebearer is sea green, Serial Killer is midnight blue, Survivor is yellow, Vampire is tan, Werewolf is brown, and Witch is purple
  • Conviction by Contradiction:
    • Since a Town player (usually) has no reason to lie about what they've been up to, catching someone in a lie is usually how the rest of the town determines whether to lynch them (and how a Jailor decides whether to execute them). It doesn't always work; occasionally it turns out that they were an actual townie who had played poorly and then got defensive about it, or were more worried about evil roles targeting them if they revealed their role and expected the town to trust them on scanty evidence. Other times, they're a Survivor, Amnesiac, Executioner, or Jester who poses no direct threat to the town (apart from being able to vote with the evil factions), but lied about their role and/or gave the town false leads for the sake of staying under the radar, getting their target lynched, or in the case of the Jester, making themself look suspicious on purpose.
  • Criminal Mind Games: All evil killing roles have the ability to leave an anonymous bloody note at the scene of their kills. The villainous ones frequently use this for mind games or to communicate with the town, which is compounded by the fact that they have legitimate reasons to sic the townsfolk on other evil factions, especially the ones that can't be murdered at night.
  • Dating Catwoman: In the Lovers game mode, this can happen when a town member and an evil role get paired up. The two will also win together if the win conditions for either one of them are met, resulting in a case of Face–Heel Turn or Heel–Face Turn depending on which side is winning.
  • Developers' Foresight: There are in fact Consigilere results for Mafia, including the Consigliere himself — under the circumstance that the Witch or Transporter swaps them around, or the Necromancer uses a dead Consigliere to investigate. There's even an achievement for investigating your Godfather.
  • A Dog Named "Dog": Players can find themselves as this when they pick a role as a name, especially if they have a Scroll for that role. For instance, a Coven Leader named Coven Leader.
  • Driven to Suicide: One of the ways to die. It can occur in the following ways:
    • Vigilantes who shoot a town member commit suicide the next day.
    • Jesters who get lynched can kill a live player who voted them guilty. That player will "Die of Guilt over lynching the jester".
    • The player disconnects or leaves.
  • Dying Clue: A player's will is often used to convey important information to the town, such as investigation results, unless a Janitor, Medusa, or Forger is there to wipe the role and will (or in the Forger's case, change it).
  • Emergent Gameplay: Town of Salem is very much a learning game. Players must learn and pay attention through many rounds in order to understand the game.
  • Enemy Mine: Both Townies and Neutral Killing roles want to get rid of the Mafia and/or Coven, and both the Town and the Mafia and/or Coven want to get rid of the Neutral Killers. Sometimes two factions may strike brief alliances near the end of the game to eliminate their mutual enemy (most often the Mafia and the Townies teaming up to lynch a Serial Killer or Arsonist) before turning on each other. And then there are times the Mafia will team up to lynch Jesters so as to have one less Townie to vote against them, and come to a mutual victory.
  • Everyone Is Bi: Escorts and Consorts can distract any player regardless of gender.
  • Everyone Is a Suspect: Occurs in "Any" games, when accusations start flying until someone is hanged or someone reveals their role. Also common in longer games, when multiple people have successfully lied and confused the town.
  • Event Flag: A Full Moon at night will trigger the abilities of the Werewolf.
  • Evil Versus Evil: Mafia vs. Serial Killers vs. Arsonists vs. Werewolves, with Witches having the ability to choose a side. It's not uncommon for games to come down to just those evil roles, especially since the Godfather and Serial Killer are immune to all but the Jailer and lynching.
  • Fake Balance: The former Ranked Rolelist note Jailor, 2x Town Investigative, 2x Town Support, Town Killing, Town Protective, Random Town, Godfather, Mafioso, Random Mafia, Neutral Benign, Neutral Evil, Neutral Killing, Any and the current Ranked Rolelist note Jailor, 2x Town Investigative, Town Support, Town Killing, Town Protective, 3x Random Town, Godfather, Mafioso, 2x Random Mafia, Neutral Evil, Neutral Killing . The former leaves very little claim-space for evils, Town is just barely at a majority, and adds the possibility of spawning the ever so controversial Vampires. The latter, however, requires upmost roles and play from town to win, gives Mafia a tad too much of an advantage with 4 members, and not to mention the Neutral Killing only having one possible ally; the Neutral Evil, who either also wins with Mafia (Witch), doesn't care after their target is lynched (Executioner), or wants to be lynched themselves (Jester) and will play against the majority, whoever it is.
  • Filk Song: Minx and Boyinaband's Town of Salem Rap.

    But when the town goes to sleep,
    You can hear the sound of something devious,
    Of something quite mysterious,
    Lurking in the dark...

  • Friendly Enemy: A common tactic for hostile roles is to play nice on the surface… some take it to its logical conclusion and go on this trope.
  • Flock of Wolves: In the late game, especially if most of the villainous roles are Neutral Killing or Neutral Evil rather than Mafia (since they don't know who's on their side), you can get situations with five or six people claiming Town roles when there are only one or two actual Townies left alive.
  • Foregone Conclusion: What happens when a non-killing role, such as a Medium or Jester, is the last one standing against the Mafia or Serial Killer. The game used to enforce this via Auto-win conditions to end games sooner if one party stood no chance of winning.
  • Gender-Blender Name: Can be Invoked due to the freedom of picking your own name. The game uses your in-game avatar to determine what pronouns to refer you as.
  • Gosh Darn It to Heck!: The swear filter changes things, leading to some rather humorous exchanges of "Flummery", "Child born out of wedlock", "Gee Golly", and "tarnation". The community intentionally keeps their swear filters on because it's funny to see such bizarre words thrown around so casually.
  • He Knows Too Much:
    • Investigative roles are usually the primary targets for the Mafia and Serial Killers, so as to prevent this before it happens. Sheriffs and Psychics are even more dangerous however, as their reads are more precise.
    • Consiglieres can often be the victims of Neutral Killers.
    • If there's a Blackmailer, this is usually averted since they can just silence someone indefinitely, but if Alice discovers that Bob is a Mafia member and is desperately trying to persuade the Townies that it really is him, it's not uncommon for the Mafia to arrange Alice's death to keep her silent. However, this usually arouses even more suspicion on the part of the Townies toward Bob, and then it becomes a mind game of "Did the mafia kill her because she knew too much, or did the Mafia kill her to make us think she knew too much?" Indeed, it's almost a better strategy to leave Alice alive if she's unproven, as her credibility will decrease every night she isn't killed, and the Townies will be less inclined to believe she is telling the truth, and possibly even lynch her for her constant "unproven" accusations.
  • The Hedge of Thorns: The Dark Forest map sums this up, being the darkest of all the maps and surrounded by thorns.
  • His Name Is...: Investigative roles don't learn their target's role until the night is over, which is too late to write it in their will if they get killed. If they decide to search a target but are killed the same night, their will will probably look like this: "Kitten is not afraid to get their hands dirty. They could be Bodyguard, Godfather, or Arsonist. gamingdude may not be what they seem, they are either Framer, Jester, or Vampire. Oscar Mike is" Part of the function of the Medium is to get the results of those final investigations by talking to their ghost.
  • Howling to the Night: A wolf howl signals the coming of the Night Phase.
  • Hyperactive Sprite: The abominable snowman seems to be breathing as if in a cold environment, when the map may clearly shows it is summer. The werewolf sprite is similar, but without the visible breath. Pets will usually stay in motion, especially if they are flying.
  • Instant-Win Condition: Every group has one, even the Neutrals. The Neutrals have more broad win conditions, since most can win with anyone.
  • Joker Jury: If the Mafia outnumbers the other players, they can forego killing at night and simply lynch Townies one by one. This is occasionally the only way they can kill their enemies, if the Mafia Killing player is being roleblocked every night, if they're facing a high defense enemy like a Serial Killer, or if they've already died, and sometimes is just the better play against opponents like the Jailor and Veteran.
  • Kill 'Em All: Can happen at the end of a game, where everybody is dead, and if the Jester or Executioner didn't get their win condition, it actually ends in a draw.
  • Kill It with Fire: The Arsonist, and the stake-burning lynch scene.
  • Kingmaker Scenario:
    • This occurs when the Mafia and the Town are deadlocked into a stalemate, and the person who can break the tie has already lost (or, in the case of an Executioner, already won). Survivors win with any faction, which is why they're often executed by Town — they have Chronic Backstabbing Disorder and will just pick whoever is in the lead, including Plaguebearers, Serial Killers and Arsonists.
    • An especially nasty one is the Godfather, the Serial Killer, and a winning Executioner. All three are immune to Basic attacks, resulting in a complete deadlock where no combination of nighttime action and inaction will result in a win, but any lynching results in someone winning immediately. The Godfather loses to the Serial Killer, so Godfather will never vote the Executioner up. The Executioner, who likely needed the help of both of them to win, now needs to decide which of them loses.
    • Can also happen if the town is reduced to the Godfather, the Serial Killer or Arsonist, and a non-killing Town role such as Lookout or Medium. Since the Godfather and Serial Killer can only kill each other by getting the town to vote with them against the other, and the Arsonist is capable of bypassing the Godfather's defense, the power to decide the winner rests solely with the remaining Townie. Yet no matter who they side with, it's guaranteed that they won't survive the night.
  • Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: The Candy skin is obviously Jessica Rabbit.
  • Lighter and Softer: The original login screen featured a surprisingly lifelike illustration of a crowd of pilgrims burning a shreiking witch alive. This was later changed to a shot of a dark street at night featuring a cartoon shadow hanging from a noose.
  • Loophole Abuse:
    • Blackmailed players can't speak. This means that players will routinely spam votes in order to communicate that they are blackmailed to the rest of the town, or use emotes. These are not silenced.
    • Ain't No Rule saying the Mafia members can't pretend to be Blackmailed to throw suspicion off themselves.
  • Magikarp Power:
    • When the Mayor first reveals, they earn little more than trust, influence, and the inability to be healed by a Doctor. But once there are only five people left, the Mayor effectively becomes a daytime killing role, able to single-handedly lynch anyone of their choosing, opposition be damned.
    • Due to lack of information and a large number of players, the transporter role in the early game can't do anything useful reliably. In the late game, however, a good transporter can win the game almost single-handedly against almost anything else, especially a night killer who lacks defense like the Mafioso.
  • The Many Deaths of You: So many that it has its own page.
  • Mêlée à Trois: Classic mode has Town vs Mafia vs Serial Killer all trying to kill each other, plus the Executioner and Jester interfering with the proceedings. Custom and All Any add two more sides who can't win with any of the others and have the ability to kill their opponents, those being the Arsonist and the Werewolf; not to mention the Vampires who can convert Townies and kill Mafia and more Neutral roles that can team up with various factions. Ranked throws the Town against the Mafia against a Neutral Evil and a Neutral Killing like Werewolf or Arsonist.
    • Up to Eleven with the Coven expansion, where it's possible to have Town vs Mafia vs Coven vs Serial Killer vs Arsonist vs Werewolf vs Juggernaut vs Vampires vs Plaguebearer (Rest assured, Town won't last that long).
    • The game is based on this, so much so that if people stop dying without a single faction's win conditions being triggered, it forcibly draws the game because it assumes you must have hit a stalemate.
  • The Mole: The Town Traitor game mode includes a traitor, a member of the town who's aligned with the evil faction and has the same win conditions as them.
  • No Saving Throw:
    • The Arsonist, Jailor, Jester, and Werewolf can all kill characters with Basic Defense or Bulletproof Vests. The first three can also bypass the healing from a doctor.
    • Pestilence (added in the expansion), however, is completely immune to all of the above. If a Jailor gets them, the Jailor dies and any execution fails. They also can't suicide from a Jester or get burned by an Arsonist. That said, there is one kill in the game that can affect them and any other role without fail — getting lynched, and by the time a Plaguebearer becomes Pestilence, there's usually so few people left that it becomes obvious who they are.
  • Nothing Is Scarier: Multiple nights in which no one dies means that there is probably more than one Neutral Killer role and/or a Hex Master at work, meaning at any time there could be Pestilence, an Arsonist, or a Hex Master getting ready to kill everyone in a single night.
  • Paranoia Fuel: Invoked. In Coven Any All, Doctor claims are met with instant suspicion, since Serial Killers and Potion Masters often claim that role (which is what the Investigator sees them as.) The same goes for the poor Retributionist, whom a Necromancer will usually pose as. Then there's the Survivor, who will be the first lynching when they're Vested and attacked, appearing to be a Neutral Killer who is immune — and since nothing is lost when the Survivor dies, sometimes they're killed even if the Town knows they're probably Survivor — It's the Only Way to Be Sure.
  • Psychic-Assisted Suicide: A few variants can happen at the hands of a Witch or Coven Leader.
    • Forcing a Vigilante to shoot themself.
    • Forcing a Vigilante to shoot another town member. They will die of Guilt next night.
    • Forcing someone to visit a Veteran who is on Alert, which mixes this trope with Suicide by Cop. The Witch even has an achievement for pulling it off three times in the same game.
    • Forcing someone to visit a Medusa using their Stone Gaze, which is also a Suicide by Cop.
  • Purely Aesthetic Era: There are a lot of modern-era (or 19th/20th century, or future) sprites, houses, and maps available both for free and for Town Points, which turns the Puritan-era setting into this.
  • Rasputinian Death: Any time a player has the misfortune of being targeted by three or more killing roles (or other causes of death, such as a Bodyguard being killed in the line of duty) in the same night.
  • Red Herring Mole: The purpose of the Jester role is to make the town believe that they're part of the mafia and lynch them.
  • Running Gag: The community have been known to have some fun while playing.
    • Anyone with the last name of "Stark" tends to die in the first few rounds. Even names like "Tony Stark" aren't safe.
    • Instances Of Pokémon Speak show up rather often, from people using actual Pokémon character names, to people who can only say their name like "Hodor." This will usually get you lynched or executed by the Jailor, since repeating only one word means you aren't roleclaiming or sharing useful information.
  • Sarcastic Confession: Occasionally, a Mafia or Neutral Killer may claim their actual role, hoping that the town dismisses them as a bad Jester. Or maybe they're just gamethrowing. Either way, it's not a good strategy if there's a Jailor or Vigilante in the game (who have no reason not to kill a suspected Jester at night just in case).
  • Shoot the Medic First: Doctors, Bodyguards, and Jailors can protect their targets from the killing roles. Therefore, smart Mafia and Neutral Killers will try to kill them first.
  • Shoot the Mage First: Since the Doctor cannot (Read: WILL NOT) heal the Mayor, this always happens when the Mayor reveals, especially because they can completely turn the tables. However, most Evil roles will bide their time, since a Mayor will have protection and/or Lookouts watching for visitors.
  • Shout-Out:
    • One of the skins released, the Nurse, looks similar to Nurse Akali from League of Legends, which the developers enjoy playing.
    • There's a set of special avatars modeled off of YouTubers Dlive, Entoan, Mangaminx, OhmWrecker, TheTeshTube, and LordMinion777, created by the devs as thanks for their helping draw attention to the game with their videos.
    • Meg Turney got her own skin in the game as thanks for publicizing it so much with her streams.
    • The skin for the Escort/Consort is basically a chibi-fied Jessica Rabbit.
    • The Voxel Town skin is a Minecraft world.
    • The Steam Achievement for winning 5 games as Vampire Hunter is "Abraham Lincoln".
  • Social Deduction Game: The game has three factions: the Townies (who must survive to the end of the game but don't know who the other Townies are), the Mafia (who want to kill everyone and do know who their teammates are), and the Neutral parties (who have their own individual win conditions). Townies and Mafia can only win if the other party all dies. Each day, the townspeople votes on who to lynch.
  • Spotting the Thread: A savvy townie spotting a subtle impossibility in their cover story has been the undoing of many a Mafia, Neutral Killing, or Neutral Evil player. This can be as simple as sending your will a second later than your counterclaim, in the case of a Spy.
  • Springtime for Hitler: This happens when the Jester randomly accuses someone of being Mafia in the hopes of getting caught in a lie and lynched — and that person really does turn out to be Mafia. The Jester is then "confirmed as Townie", but would often not survive the night from a vengeful Mafia due to town protection being on more important roles — or worse, they live to the end un-hanged.
  • Strategy Game: How well can you lie, pick your targets, or discern the guilty, and how quickly can you kill them?
  • Take a Third Option: There are several ways that a role can win, especially if said role holds a pivotal vote in the lynching arena. They can swing evil, choose good, or not vote at all.
  • Too Awesome to Use: Several roles have things they can only use a few times, such as the Veteran's three Alerts, the Bodyguard's one bulletproof vest, and so on; it's not uncommon for roles to die with something that could have saved them still unused. An Arsonist can ignite people anytime they like, but it's unwise to do it until late in the game. The Medium, in particular, can contact a living player using a Seance... but only once. It's not uncommon for Mediums to wait to use it until it's too late in the game for it to help.
  • Unstoppable Force Meets Immovable Object: The Achievement for Pestilence being attacked by a fully evolved Juggernaut. (The Object wins.)
  • Useless Useful Spell: Not a spell, necessarily, but a strategy. The existence of the Disguiser popularized a game meta of creating a will that listed your name and role before anything else… and then Disguiser got changed in response, making the function completely useless, since your will can't be shifted to another person once you die. The meta remains, and is seemingly a good organizational strategy, but there's absolutely no practical use for names in wills anymore.
  • Variable Player Goals: Each role has a different agenda, especially in the "Any" games. This can — and does — lead to internal squabbling inside the game.
  • Villain Team-Up:
    • Some of the neutral evil roles only need to kill those who would oppose them, so they can work with the Mafia or other Neutral Evils. A Witch controlling a Serial Killer is a particularly powerful combo.
    • The Witch can win with anyone except the Town, allowing them to team up with the Mafia, the Serial Killer, the Arsonist, or the Werewolf. Jesters and Executioners' win conditions have nothing to do with who else is alive at the end of the game, so they can team up with anyone. The Neutral Killing roles such as Serial Killer and Arsonist can't win together, though.
  • Weird Moon: The moon is a full moon every second night. With the 1.59 patch, there is a full moon every night from the fourth night on, as a buff for the Werewolf.
  • We ARE Struggling Together: Townies usually are more than a little paranoid about each other, since no one knows who the Mafia are, or if their neighbors are secretly Serial Killers, and the proven roles usually get taken out quickly (unless they're harmless), and this leads to no shortage of distrust between people who should be teammates. A sufficiently paranoid and particularly trigger-happy group of Townies can often wipe themselves out while the Mafia, Serial Killer, and other killing roles just sit back and Pass the Popcorn.
  • Who Will Bell the Cat?: Often, someone who might be a Jester is quickly voted up to the stand and then pardoned 14-0, as no one wanted to vote guilty or abstain and risk dying of guilt the next night.
  • Wild Card:
    • This is why no one likes the Survivor; they can win with Town, Mafia, or Neutral Killers, and has the tendency to flip sides the moment they feel their current allies are at a disadvantage. The unpredictability of Survivors is why some towns decide to lynch or execute Survivor claims on principle. Plus, there's no guarantee that a claimed Survivor is actually a Survivor, since it's a favorite claim for Neutral Killers and Jesters trying to exploit the town's distrust of Survivors to get lynched.
    • Jesters and Executioners are wild cards as well. Once the Executioner has gotten their target lynched, they're free to side with Town, Mafia, or just go AFK since they've already won. And the Jester tends to pull all sorts of crazy antics to get the town to lynch them.
    • An Amnesiac also qualifies. If discovered, though, Town members can threaten him to become a Town member the next day or be lynched.
  • Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing:
    • Sometimes in All Any, the game may end in an instant win by having literally only Town, Neutral Benign, and Neutral Non-Killing roles — resulting in an instant win on day 2.
    • Survivors in theory do this — win by doing absolutely nothing. Their goal is to simply be alive at the end of the game. It's not as easy as it looks, since many Neutral Killing or Evil roles claim Survivor to get the town to look the other way. However, if the town can confirm you as Survivor early enough — a confirmed Guardian Angel whose target has died is incontrovertibly a Survivor — the Survivor can simply relax and enjoy the victory. It's not as easy as it sounds, though (see Wild Card).
    • An Amnesiac is one of the few Neutral-Benign roles. It's possible for them to win by picking the role of a faction who has the majority and then win without actually performing that role's functions.
    • Sometimes, players can win by simply being a "Vote" because their function isn't very useful.
    • Jesters and Executioners might actually end up doing this. Sometimes, a lynch-heavy town might vote up a Jester or the Executioner's target purely by chance without them having to do anything to trick the town.
    • In All Any, a player may be a solo Mafioso, which will usually lead them to claim to be Veteran (as the Investigator will read them as such), and do nothing until late game before attacking. In some rare cases, there will be a single Town left with the Mafioso, wondering why the game hasn't ended yet.
  • Your Days Are Numbered: The scenario with a Town Traitor and all Mafia killed, or Pestilence arising — in both cases, the Traitor or Pestilence must be killed or the Mafia/Pestilence wins.

Can Executioner Wins on Draws

Source: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/TownOfSalem