In Mafia Wars, and also Facebook (or any other Social network site); keep your private information as private and secure as possible. By adding large groups of people you don’t know as your friends, they have access to your private information. Hence tip #1 is to setup a “play” account with limited information as possible, which goes along with this tip in making sure to limit how much information you really want to give to strangers. Trust me, as a Male, I do from time to time get curious and look at profile pictures and info of attractive women; although I don’t use it for anything (like stalking); I’m sure there are thousands of other desperate males (or females) who will see no problem using your personal info for their own interests.
Daily Lotto explained:
The daily lotto is a chance for players to win prizes by submitting a lotto ticket (given by the Godfather for playing each day; or alternatively you can purchase a ticket for 2 Godfather points). You choose 5 numbers (you can select numbers yourself, or randomly select numbers using the button) and submit the ticket. The draw happens at the end of the week, and results are announced the next day!
The prizes if you have a winning ticket are as follows:
If you have 1 matching number on a daily chance lotto ticket you win one random loot item.
If you have 2 matching numbers on a daily chance lotto ticket you win a free daily chance ticket for the next week's draw.
If you have 3 matching numbers on a daily chance lotto ticket you win one daily chance collection item.
If you have 4 matching numbers on a daily chance lotto ticket you win 7 Godfather points (this number seems to change from time to time).
If you have 5 matching numbers on a daily chance lotto ticket you win 500 Godfather points (this number seems to change from time to time).
An advantage to having large (hopefully 5000 members) Mafia is what some like to call "auto-play". When you have a large mafia, you will find many times that you get experience points from no where. These come from your character being automatically drafted to assist in those jobs and fights that the people in your Mafia do from time to time. Each time you automatically help out, you can receive anywhere from 1 - 10 experience points. These points add up, as you can sometimes level up 3 times in one night, while sleeping! Hence, the term "auto-play", because having a big mafia means more chances for your character to join in on other's jobs and fights for money and experience (as well as the chance to level up as you sleep).
- If you don't have at least 501 members in your Mafia and 501 of each weapon, armor and vehicle, then you *should* avoid attacking those on the attack list that have 501 members in their Mafia. If you want to Attack; then try and target those with a smaller Mafia instead. This may be plain a simple tip, but sometimes you're ego may get in the way of rational thinking! Trust me: you want to build up your statistics to have as many fights won, instead of having a disappointing losing record. This serves a dual purpose: one to intimidate those who are thinking about attacking you; and two, to make you a better candidate for “Top Mafia” positions. No one will want to promote you if you lose more than 1/3 of the time!
Once you are on the Hitlist, all limitations of people *NOT* being able to attack you below 20 health points are gone. Typically people cannot attack you if your health meter is less than 20 points. But once you are on the Hitlist, its pretty much anyone's game! It means that they can (and will) keep attacking you until your health meter is 0. So don’t think you can just get on the Hitlist, get below 20 health points and master the “Bulletproof” achievement that easily….
- In the new upgrades, when clicking on a help request, you can also ask for help on behalf of the original requestor. DO NOT click on that button that says "Get Help" after finishing helping the person already! This simply takes away from the quota of others (currently, there is a 25 job per city, per day limit) to get experience and the proper $$$. Likewise, if you see one of these requests for help, ignore it. It simply isn't worth it! Avoid it, and send Zynga the message that it’s not really a bonus feature in anyway.
Remember: when buying weapons, armor and vehicles that you need to have enough income coming from properties in New York to cover their expenses. There is a maintenance fee on most of the more powerful weapons you buy in New York. These fees come out of your pocket each time you go and “collect your take” from the properties you own in New York (this doesn’t really apply to you if you have Rackets). Just remember to keep an eye on the “up keep” of the weapons/armor/vehicles you buy and to make sure you have more than enough income (in the form of properties) to cover them. Typically, if you buy a Mafia Mike’s, it will cover the cost for three of your Mafia to be outfitted with a weapon, armor and vehicle. Hence the reason why we suggest you buy as many Mafia Mike’s as possible.
When adding new friends to your mafia, be sure to wait an hour or so from the time that they are newly added as your friend in Facebook. The connection between Mafia Wars and Facebook seems to lag a lot, and can cause many wasted invites and frustration. Remember, you need those invites, so use patience when sending them out.
When you are starting off, as stated before, it is best to have 501 of the top weapons. Hence, once you have enough money, buy weapons to make sure you have 501 even of the minimal weapons you buy. In the case of a low level starting player; 501 town cars; 501 chain guns and 501 Body armor are essentially the minimal basic equipment you should have to continue on.
If you decided to choose "mogul" for your character; the optimal time to collect your take from your properties is roughly 22 hours from the time you last collected. You have to wait until it hits maximum, and then collect at that precise moment to have the advantage. Hence, being a mogul sucks! Plus that time keeps moving you two hours ahead each day, which makes it a real pain to collect at the optimal time!
- Hitlisting someone is generally a bad idea - unless they are consistently attacking you for no reason. By Hitlisting another player; that person who gets Hitlisted, now knows who Hitlisted them, and has a link to your profile in their news feeder; which further allows them to attack you in the future. Some people are really “poor sports” when it comes to playing this game… so you need to be extra cautious sometimes; and sometimes, it means you have to be the bigger person and let certain things be.
- Currently, there is a "Declare War" feature in Mafia Wars that allows you to declare war on any of your Mafia friends. However, be careful of who you declare war against. Most people probably won't care; but once in a while, there is someone who will “un-friend” you and then will start attacking you relentlessly. Again, there are those “poor sports” you need to think about. Typically I would send out a message first before picking someone to attack out of the blue, just to make sure they are okay with it and that it is all in good fun!
- Be careful when attacking someone on the attack list with a tag like "{WMKP}" (or replace WMKP inside the curly brackets with whatever you want) in front of and/or behind their Mafia Wars names. That means they belong to a group (probably a large one) that can be called upon to theoretically have all their higher level members attack you until the game is no more fun! If that happens… you probably have no choice but to stop playing that character, abandon it, and start fresh with another account.
When doing jobs, sometimes it comes up with "ask friends for help". Click on this as many as possible (typically one a day in each city). The more mafia that come to help you, the more money you will receive and the more experience. Likewise with your friend’s: from time to time you will see (in your Live news feed): Howard (or whatever your friend’s name is, replace it here) needs your help; and typically a logo stating something like “rob your cab driver” beside it. These are job help requests your friends are posting, and not only give your friend a chance at some extra money and experience points, but also give you a chance for extra experience points and money. Of course, keep this in mind: you can only help out 25 times in each city; so you can’t just keep doing these help requests to level up all day.
- If someone is constantly attacking you and is being a poor sport; try joining a "revenge group" and posting their link! YES, Mafia Wars revenge groups do exist in Facebook groups and are filled with some higher level players that go out of their way to distribute revenge to those really nasty and abusive players. For example, there is a group called OKMC; which is a specific group of Mafia Wars players that will help you get revenge on abusive players.
Don't waste money on boosts. The boosts they currently offer are not worth the money; and quite frankly they do nothing for you anyways.
- Some weapons look nice, but have really no ability at all. Still, if you are looking at acquiring weapons, just for the sake of collecting, your best time do so is during sales. Just recently, having seen the 2009 Black Friday sale, there were many heavily discounted items up for grabs. So save your GF points for events such as that to do all of your shopping.
- When doing wall jobs, and you have an over abundance of wall posts; you should actually open the link in a new window/tab using the right-click method on the mouse. When you do this, as the new window you opened loads, you can refresh the original page to see if another job has been posted and also right-click the link on that. This way you can maximize the jobs you get and the $$$ as well the experience.
When sending out a gift from the free gift page, consider what you are sending out and to whom. Try and avoid sending out gifts to higher level players and instead target lower level players. Why? Because I'm sure higher level players have enough cue-balls and King of Spades to help out 300 lower level people who need one. Short story, high level people don't need it, and may choose to ignore the gift; which in the end wastes their time and your gift request.
- Check player updates from time to time on the homepage of your Mafia Wars window. It will publish many jobs and wars that are started that don't get posted on someone's wall. Also, if someone declares (declared) war on you; it will show up here. If you are apart of someone's top Mafia and some declares war on that person; it will also get posted here, so you have a chance to defend your friend. I find many valuable experience points and wars to participate in this way.
Having a bigger Mafia allows you to launder more money. You can launder up to five times a day (before the Feds get suspicious!). However, having a smaller mafia means you may only launder once or twice a day! Also, having a large Mafia means more people can help you launder, which means more money and experience for everyone involved.
Proceed to Chapter 2 - Growing your mafia and choosing the right players
