A detailed description of the discussion mechanics of Gnosia. Intermediate to advanced dive into the workings of an individual loop and surviving discussions.
Daily Discussion Mechanics Guide
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Introduction
This game fascinates me. I’ve done 4 complete playthroughs on the Switch, am working on my first PC playthrough, and I am still learning new things about the game and its mechanics. The AI is cunning and resourceful – I’ve thought to myself a number of times, “If I was in that situation, I would do __,” only to watch the AI do that very thing later.
My goal is to explore and break down the stats, turn (round) structure, commands and strategy in a way that is useful for seasoned and new players alike, with as few spoilers as possible. I hope you can come to appreciate how thoughtful the design of this game is.
Role Breakdown
In order of introduction, the roles are:
Crew
No special perks; just humans trying to suss out the Gnosia and send them all into cold sleep. Win when all Gnosia are put into cold sleep. At the start of the loop, have no information about anybody else.
Gnosia
The ‘bad guys’, who seek to eliminate enough humans so that they can’t be voted out. Win when Gnosia numbers are greater than or equal to crew. Can lie to claim other roles to misinform crew. Can pick one crew member to eliminate at night. Know who other Gnosia are at the start of the loop. Can start a loop with 1 to 6 Gnosia.
Engineer
Can scan one person at night to detect whether they’re Gnosia – can report their findings in the next morning’s discussion. This role can be claimed by liars. The Engineer can also destroy a Bug by scanning it. Posing as an Engineer gives you the same screen as the real Engineer at night, but after picking your target, you get to choose whether you want to claim them as Human or Gnosia. If a liar (the AI or you) claims Engineer after Day 1, their previous nights’ claims are randomly generated, which could lead to a logical fallacy and being spotted immediately.
Guardian Angel
Can choose a single crew member (other than themselves) to protect at night to prevent the Gnosia from eliminating them. This role is secret, never revealed to anyone.
AC Follower
A human sympathetic to the Gnosia cause; their win conditions are with the Gnosia. Like the Gnosia, can lie to claim roles. Like other crew, have no information about who is Gnosia at the start of a loop and must quickly figure out who is Gnosia to misdirect the crew.
Doctor
At night, will scan crew members sent to cold sleep to see whether they were Human or Gnosia, and report their findings the following morning. Just like with the engineer, liars get to choose how they want to report the person in cold sleep the following morning – and the game will randomly backfill any previous nights if the role is claimed after day 1.
Guard Duty
2 crew members can be classified as Guard Duty; as they never left the ship, they are guaranteed to not be Gnosia. The 2 Guard Duty crew know who each other are at the start, and will only step forward together (as the other Guard is the only one who can vouch for them being human). This role cannot be claimed by any liars.
Bug
Aptly represented by a bomb, the Bug is an enemy to all. If left alive at the end of a loop when either the crew or Gnosia would have claimed victory, the victory instead goes to the Bug and the universe disintegrates. Whoops! The Bug can lie to claim roles. The bug cannot be killed by Gnosia but can be killed by an Engineer who scans it.
Lying
Gnosia, Bugs, and AC Followers are able – and often required – to lie, in order to win. It is always a calculated risk, however – every time a lie is spoken, every other person who doesn’t realize they’re lying rolls their intuition stat against the liar’s performance stat. If caught in a lie, the liar’s credibility with the person who caught them drops to zero for the remainder of the loop. Once that happens, crew who know someone is lying will often immediately turn on the liar. Oftentimes, this looks like a vote to put someone in cold sleep that came out of nowhere when the person in question was never the source of another crew member’s Doubt.
This is the reason “Say You’re Human” is such a potent skill for crew. This is also why you should always check the discussion log after the loop ends. You can see every instance of someone getting caught in a lie – and it’s comical when half the crew catches someone lying and immediately votes them out (Shigemichi).
*ahem*. Anyway.
There are two main types of lies the game considers: ones where you know the truth but claim the opposite is true, and lies where you don’t know what’s true but claim it as fact anyway. The How To Play section in the game covers this, as does Comet when she discusses “the meat of the lie”.
Here are situations the game considers lying (thus triggering an intuition check), and what those situations include:
A liar claiming a role that isn’t theirs is a lie.
They know they aren’t and are saying the opposite.
A Gnosia suspecting a crew member is Gnosia is a lie.
This includes outright doubting a crew member or agreeing with someone who doubts a crew member.
A Gnosia claiming another Gnosia is not a Gnosia
This includes covering a fellow Gnosia directly or agreeing with someone defending/covering another. Note: Doing this is an extremely risky move. If you get busted lying about this you’ve exposed not only yourself, but the gnosia you were defending as well.
Gnosia in a role claiming a human is Gnosia or a Gnosia is human
This one is pretty straightforward; they know the truth but are claiming the opposite. Getting caught lying here doesn’t usually have as harsh of consequences that getting caught lying in a discussion does; but you need to watch out for logical fallacies because high logic characters (including Otome, Raqio, Yuriko and Stella) can immediately bust you with “Definite Enemy” whether they caught you lying or not.
Bugs or AC Followers in a role making any claim
This is the second type of lie; where the person lying doesn’t know what’s true but is pretending it is. Every claim is a lie. However, as noted by a couple characters in game, it can take some work to figure out whether the liar is Gnosia, a Bug, or an AC Follower.
Say You’re Human
Gnosia and Bugs are considered lying when they claim themselves as human. AC Followers are not.
Important notes:
Bugs are considered “human” in engineer/doctor scans, even though they’re considered “not human” under the Say You’re Human skill. It helps to think of Engi/Doc scans as determining “Gnosia/NOT Gnosia” and Say You’re Human determining “Human/Not Human”. Bugs are neither Human nor Gnosia, which is why it falls this way.
Gnosia can spot the lies of AC Followers and Bugs.
AC Followers and Bugs benefit the most from high Performance if claiming roles since every claim is an automatic lie.
AC Followers also benefit greatly from high intuition to figure out who the Gnosia are.
It is unclear at this time whether it counts as a lie if an AC Follower defends/covers a Gnosia who they previously caught lying (They “know” what the truth is and say the opposite anyway).
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