Doctor
The only reason anyone survives the night.
- Side
- Town — wins when every mafioso is gone.
- Appears at
- In every game, at every size from five to twelve.
- At night
- Picks who to protect from the kill. In a big game that is two different people; in a small one, a single choice.
- During the day
- Nobody knows he exists until he claims, and claiming makes him the next night's target. Most of his value is spent deciding when that trade is worth it.
The thing people get wrong
The number of saves scales with the table, and it is recalculated every night against the living count — not the starting one. While ten or more players are alive he protects two; the night that count falls to nine he is down to one. A twelve-player game therefore tightens as it thins.
Self-healing, and its one limit
The Doctor may include himself. What he cannot do is protect himself two nights running — the game remembers he did it and refuses the repeat. So a Doctor who has just saved his own life is exposed on the following night, which is exactly when a mafia team that suspects him will come back.
Where it turns up
Games with this role: 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 players. See the exact composition at each size in setups by player count, or read the full rules.