I have very little experience to have any say but I think Mafia simply isn't about deducing who is scum and townie based on reads.
It's a lot to do with how you plan your moves and claiming roles simply add confusing into the mix because it's really difficult to ensure who is claiming correctly.
In short, both claiming and non claiming games require a different level of deduction and understand of game mechanics and reads which I think is challenging if you can't live upto it
For a scum you need hell lot of planning . Good town players deduce the mafia players easily .
How ? Its just how you post , if you are familiar with the players activity and know his style of play then really easy .
However , claimimg ruins the esscence of mafia in my opinion i played games with no claim i think thats how it should work . Claimed games bore me out because its danger for Scum to reveal themselves . Now outing town roles on day 1 is misstep in my opinion only thing you can do in claiming game is have invest roles protected they are like life line for town . Outing them is like free message for mafia !! Thats why i never liked TOS particularly invest roles are getting outed easily it should never happen . Another thing i never use Jester , clown roles they tend to ruin the game setup i had long chat with
@Rohan e explained why jester, judas are bad for game he is right .
Few things to note RPG style game have made things interesting for mafia but i dont really see much point . Oro jackson had those i found it really interesting some fo them developed novel storyline but i have seen weak game play with so many immunity power . Very downfall for the game was story driven mafia storyline you have to kill scum manytimes it can get boring .
Conclusion : Traditional mafia with Vanilla is best but people will find this boring haha that is true no one like no claimed games because you need to read entire thread to understand what mafia game actually is !
TOS is like apple juice and True mafia game with vanilla role is hard on beer .