The team version is called Coup Reformation and is a big improvement for more players. The important added rule is:
Every player has a loyalty to one of two faction (arbitrarily called Loyalists and Reformists, and indicated with a card in front of you facing up or down)
You cannot attack a person from your own faction
You may change your faction for 1 coin
You may change someone else’s faction for 2 coins
Only if everyone is in the same faction does it revert to the Hobbesian all vs. all of the original
Dialog from coup games is more procedural: “I steal from Dan with my Captain”. Dialog from Coup Reformation tends more theatrical “You dare attack the collective, you revisionist swine! The Empire shall make our revenge! <gets loyalty card flipped> My brother! I see now the error of my ways! Let us band together destroy the evil imperialists! ”. Also more of the game is spent with everyone alive, instead of dead people waiting for the game to finish.
Other games I think are closer to the Pareto frontier:
Cheese Thief
An excellent social deduction game for a la Mafia or Avalon for 4-8 players. It’s so easy to teach I often don’t explain the rules and just narrate the first night
Needs dice (d6), cups to hide the dice, cards to secretly assign a cheese thief, and a piece of pantomime cheese.
Easier to teach than Coup and less friendship destroying
Not as compact as Coup if you need to bring the cups?
Werewords
20 questions “figure out the secret word” game, but with Werewolves trying to get the questions off-track and a Seer trying to help people guess the word while remaining hidden
Can be played with a phone and improvised role assignment cards, no box necessary.
Other social deductive honorable mentions are Time Bomb: Undercover (mostly cooperative in a group, easier on new people to go with the flow), BloodBound (more complex game, less social deduction about who is lying and more logical deduction about who thinks who is on what team), Spaceteam (needs no materials but phones), and of course One Night Ultimate Werewolf.
Good game, but definitely not Pareto optimal!
The team version is called Coup Reformation and is a big improvement for more players. The important added rule is:
Every player has a loyalty to one of two faction (arbitrarily called Loyalists and Reformists, and indicated with a card in front of you facing up or down)
You cannot attack a person from your own faction
You may change your faction for 1 coin
You may change someone else’s faction for 2 coins
Only if everyone is in the same faction does it revert to the Hobbesian all vs. all of the original
Dialog from coup games is more procedural: “I steal from Dan with my Captain”. Dialog from Coup Reformation tends more theatrical “You dare attack the collective, you revisionist swine! The Empire shall make our revenge! <gets loyalty card flipped> My brother! I see now the error of my ways! Let us band together destroy the evil imperialists! ”. Also more of the game is spent with everyone alive, instead of dead people waiting for the game to finish.
Other games I think are closer to the Pareto frontier:
Cheese Thief
An excellent social deduction game for a la Mafia or Avalon for 4-8 players. It’s so easy to teach I often don’t explain the rules and just narrate the first night
Needs dice (d6), cups to hide the dice, cards to secretly assign a cheese thief, and a piece of pantomime cheese.
Easier to teach than Coup and less friendship destroying
Not as compact as Coup if you need to bring the cups?
Werewords
20 questions “figure out the secret word” game, but with Werewolves trying to get the questions off-track and a Seer trying to help people guess the word while remaining hidden
Can be played with a phone and improvised role assignment cards, no box necessary.
Other social deductive honorable mentions are Time Bomb: Undercover (mostly cooperative in a group, easier on new people to go with the flow), BloodBound (more complex game, less social deduction about who is lying and more logical deduction about who thinks who is on what team), Spaceteam (needs no materials but phones), and of course One Night Ultimate Werewolf.