A game I love is Secret Hitler. One of the primary mechanics of the game involves one player (the president) drawing three cards and passing two cards to another player (the chancellor) who plays one of those two cards. While this mechanic is really very simple, it gives rise to fascinating dynamics that set Secret Hitler apart from other social deduction games. The cards represent fascist and liberal policies, which align with the game’s two teams. When a fascist card is passed it’s unclear whether the player passed that card because they were forced to or if it’s because it aligns with their interests. The fact that two players are involved in deciding which card is played plays a key role in players’ attempts to deduce who is on the fascist team. However, since their roles are not symmetrical (as they are in The Resistance, for example), the dynamics regarding which card the players pass are fundamentally changed, which changes how other players will reason about their roles. This supports the fellowship and challenge aesthetics of Secret Hitler. The simple mechanics of how a policy is passed give rise to interesting dynamics for how players choose to pass policies which introduce the challenge of untangling who could be lying and why, who might have reason to lie, etc. These social dynamics are, to the player, the heart of Secret Hitler.
