Ultimate Werewolf was the first game we played in class. It is a social deduction game where players don’t know the other players roles and the villager players need to find and kill the werewolves hidden in the village. I have played the game before and my opinion about the game did not change in the least. The biggest problem the game has is the first person to talk or the one leading the discussion early on is ALWAYS assumed to be the werewolf and is killed. This is super frustrating to me because it encourages everyone to just sit in silence and basically do a vote for who the village is going to kill based on purely random grounds. This also ties into the hardest part about the game which is the fact that you need to communicate but also not dominate the discussion. As soon as someone dominates the discussion, such as Dan did when we played in class, they are usually immediately killed. The leadership skills needed are solid group communication skills, strategy, and problem-solving skills. You will need to carefully keep track of what other players are saying and doing, including their body language, in order to try and deduce the werewolves. You need to communicate your ideas with the group effectively while not being overpowering, and you will need a strategy based on the card you got and the group of people you are playing with. I think my friend Macaila would like this game because she enjoys lighter party games such as Coup.

~ Ryan Estep