Minvitational 8 - OVER before 611

[BillyTwilight]

Vote: curiouskarmadog

.

A good OMGUS to get me started in the morning.

[BillyTwilight]

Sorry guys, I was getting caught up in my other games tonight. I'll give this game a read and post content tomorrow.

[BillyTwilight]

Sorry guys; wife just had our first daughter last Sunday, and I haven't had a chance to devote to a readthrough until now. I'm back at work though, where I get most of my mafia posting in.

Looking through the game so far the only thing that really strikes me is Simenon's back-off of cicero.

Unvote, vote: Simenon

. I haven't played with a lot of you guys so I'm not going to have much of a meta here. I've played with Simenon (shortly) and Fonz in Mafia 64 (cries). I don't think I've played with the rest of you. So my meta is mostly with Fonzy (Sim wasn't in 64 for very long), who doesn't seem to be doing anything out of the ordinary right now.

Note: I thought that cicero's reaction to the bandwagon was interesting. He tried to approach it both flippantly and logically, and the latter seemed much more strained than I would have expected. I don't know his meta, so I'm not sure what it means though.

[BillyTwilight]

TL;DR = "too long; didn't read"

[BillyTwilight]

Okay, so this game has picked up considerably since the last time I had a chance to read through it. First thing of note is that the meta-guessing seems to have died down quite a bit in the last 5 pages or so; good to see. There are a lot of suspicions being thrown around here as well, which is making the read confusing.

Unvote, vote: Jitsu

. I don't like how he disappeared as soon as people started to question his waffling. Unvoting Simenon because I haven't seen anything else particularly scummy from him recently, and the game has moved on beyond a wagon hop vote.

FoS: CKD

. Post #288 smells like doggy-doo.

I'd like everyone simply to list where there current major suspicions lie; I'm not asking for you to back those up with reasons at this moment, but I would like a more concrete record on how people feel about this game so far. The suspicion-jumping by multiple players throughout this game has made it difficult without spending a couple of hours with pen and paper rereading to follow exactly everyone's thought process.

I want Jitsu's reaction to the accusations brought against him as well.

[BillyTwilight]

I'm extremely interested to hear Sim's thoughts on CKD's original response to Adel.

[BillyTwilight]

I'm extremely interested to hear Sim's thoughts on CKD's original response to Adel.

Nah already posted it. Sorry.

In case you missed it: I think it was a stupid thing to do, but there is a pressure on townies to be as "inquisitive as possible", and to pursue every option. I am constantly under this pressure and make idiotic posts too. I believe "why didn't cicero include me" to be genuine here.

Sim, I was looking for a specific response to post #344, and I don't see that anywhere. The reason I ask is that you once told me one of your favorite scumtells is someone getting belligerent and rude in the face of an accusation, so I expected you to have something to say about CKD's post #344.

Jitsu responded fairly well to my vote; I hoped that if he was scum for the first time on this site in an invitational game a little pressure might get him to make a nervous mistake.

Unvote

. Don't see anything from him that screams scum to me.

On reading the thread from a forest-instead-of-trees point of view, I completely agree with Adel's case against CKD, particularly how CKD changed the subject to Adel's "tunnel-vision, narrow-minded" approach. The way I see it is CKD voted for Shanba, and jumped off inexplicably. Logic goes "Shanba not posting, vote shanba to get him to post, oh, others voted Shanba?, well, he's not around so what good does the vote do here if he isn't posting, unvote Shanba, but consider my vote to still be there."

Pretty sure there's a bunch of craplogic there, and when Adel pointed it out CKD gets belligerent and tries to shift the focus of the discussion to Adel being narrow-minded.

I think the interaction between cicero and ckd is interesting, as well. It's just not something I've ever seen before. Adel's play seems genuinely frustrated in that she feels she sees something that others aren't seeing and no one else is buying. Adel seems to be more interested in finding scum and ckd seems to be more interested in destroying Adel's credibility to keep any case from forming against him.

Vote: CKD

.

[BillyTwilight]

someone getting belligerent and rude in the face of an accusation

is a terrible scumtell in my opinion.

Not my idea of a scumtell either, but I asked Sim's opinion on the post because I expected him to have a bigger reaction (or a reaction at all) to that post because of past experience with him.

[BillyTwilight]

The reason I ask is that you once told me one of your favorite scumtells is someone getting belligerent and rude in the face of an accusation,

Did I say that? I'm wrong.

I

get rude and belligerent in the face of an accusation.

HaHa. Was probably the main thing that made me NK you in Mafia64 - saying you found people getting belligerent to be a scumtell and then getting belligerent with me when I pushed you. I'm fine with your answer here, though.

[BillyTwilight]

Logic goes "Shanba not posting, vote shanba to get him to post, oh, others voted Shanba?, well, he's not around so what good does the vote do here if he isn't posting, unvote Shanba, but consider my vote to still be there."

BT, can you please quote a post that I said I was voting Shanba to get him talking. Also, can you please quote Adel where she said I voted Shanba to get him talking.


When you cant find it, plesae tell me again why you are voting for me.

My contact with Adel (2-3 games)...she always plays different and I always tend to think she is scummy. Dont know why. I have played in two games with cierco and if I recall, he does vote hop quite frequently...

also still waiting,

vote shanba

I took the "still waiting part" to be waiting on Shanba to contribute.

so after no posting from shanba for four days ckd voted for him. two days later ckd unvotes him. four days of no voting ='s a vote, but six days of no voting ='s an unvote?

I'd say that pretty much answers your questions, CKD.

Still voting you for the same reasons as before. Kthnxbai.

[BillyTwilight]

Jitsu, it's quite obvious and your question doesn't make sense. Either he's lying and they are a scumteam or he's not and they aren't. If he's not then Adel is quite aware that they aren't teamscum together.

---

Question: Do you feel CKD adequately addressed Adel's arguments? (it's irrelevant here whether or not he actually shot down Adel's attack; I just want to know whether or not you think he made sufficient effort to respond to them).

This is part of my problem with CKD's play. I think he attempted to discredit the attack on him; obviously he has tried very hard to do that. However, I think that had he merely left his discussion to explaining his vote then he wouldn't stand out so much to me. Instead I feel that he really tried to attack Adel's person above and beyond what was called for in that situation.

This game is very difficult for me. Here is how I see the play so far day 1:

Attempted approach:

Random phase, quick bandwagon, gauge reactions to the bandwagon, better bandwagon, observe play, proceed into regular day 1 with a lynch later.

Actual results:

Random phase, quick bandwagon, gauge reactions with meta, bandwagon slows down, multiple bandwagons form and dissipate quickly, mass confusion and lurking (myself included), deadline lynch that is little more than random in nature.

In the course of the day many, many minor points have been brought up to be pursued shortly and then forgotten when someone points out that there is very little meaning to be had from them. To be totally honest, the only thing that stuck out to me on rereading is Adel's case against CKD and CKD's reaction. Perhaps that was because it lasted longer and took up a more significant chunk of the game and I was trying to overview in a less details and more overall feel approach in this case, or perhaps it's because CKD's defense was the first truly raw and emotional response from an attacked player in the game; whatever the reason, it sticks out to me as some of the only "real" information that we have to deal with so far in the game. The rest seems mostly speculation and nitpicking.

I have to disagree with CKD's assertion that discrediting a player is a legitimate tactic in the game. There is a big difference between discrediting a persons attack against you and in discrediting the player themselves. I feel that CKD was mixing in the latter with the former; he spent a non trivial amount of time referencing past games and getting conversation turned to Adel's "narrow-mindedness", etc, which I don't feel was very valid at the time. On rereading without paying extreme attention to detail and simply trying to gauge the state of mind of the players as they were posting, I feel that CKD reads like someone who wasn't comfortable with his defense of the unvote and turned to other means to try to relieve pressure on himself.

I am unequivocally against lynching a lurker. I think it's completely useless and gives us no information on the connections between the players alive currently. Suppose we lynch a lurker today and scum kill one tonight? We will be in almost the exact same boat as today, with no resolution to be drawn from day 1 info. Furthermore, lynching a lurker is as bad as random lynching - we are unlikely to hit scum. All things being equal, we need to lynch someone that will give us not only a better chance of hitting scum based on actual game content but also someone who's reveal will help us piece together the information from day 1. My vote is still for CKD.

[BillyTwilight]

This is the same old argument. Simple fact is that if you let lurkers coast you get stuck with them in the end game instead, with no more information than you have now. If you get rid of them early and push forward a contributory game, you get more information as the game goes along leading to a better end game situation.

Of course I would expect you to oppose lynching a lurker, you lurked through all of day one. But Erg0 doesn't have the excuse of a brand new baby.

I have had this same argument many times. No one has ever convinced me to your side. I don't agree with allowing lurking. Lynching them simply isn't the correct approach to the problem.

I'm of the opinion that all lynches are important; some players believe early game lynches are throw-away lynches that can be wasted on lurkers. Simply put, cicero, the only thing that lynching Erg0 would accomplish is removing a lurker, barring Erg0 being scum, which is not better than random chances at this point. You say it gets rid of a lurker, but what's to say that Erg0 won't be much more active in later game? What's to say that one of the heavy posters in the early game won't lurk heavily later on? It accomplishes nothing and doesn't help us thresh the wheat of todays conversations. If the lurking continues then he (they) need to be replaced. Sucks, but that's the best solution to help; taking lurking into your own hands will bite you more than help you.

This is more of MD topic though. I'll just stick with saying I won't participate in and discourage a lurker hunt.

[BillyTwilight]

Simply put, cicero, the only thing that lynching Erg0 would accomplish is removing a lurker, barring Erg0 being scum, which is not better than random chances at this point.

This game be an idea.

It relies upon three basic assumptions which I feel are valid:

Assumption 1:

At this point, and in this game, lurking players are slightly more likely than average to be scum.

Assumption 2:

Any compromise lynch we reach, because of Guardian's deadline lynch rules and the pace of the game thus far, will be a lynch of very low informational value.

Assumption 3:

A random lynch is better than a no-lynch

Who are the lurker? Oman, Erg0, The Fonz, and Shanba. BT has redeemed himself in recent pages (and has a good excuse).

I say we use the dice tags to pick one of the four, and we lynch that person.

If three other people agree I'll post the list and post the dice tags.

I'd like you to justify Assumption 1. Honestly. Like, actually justify it, don't feed me any "I just feel this way for this game" crap. I'd love for you to explain how you can differentiate town lurkers from scum lurkers.

I completely disagree with Assumption 2. A CKD lynch should give YOU of all people more information than you could hope for today. He's listed in about half of your possible scum-pairings right? There has been a preponderance of players commenting on, attacking, and defending CKD. Knowing his alignment would go a long way to unraveling day 1 info. Plus, you CLAIM TO THINK HE IS SCUM.

As for assumption 3, I'm not so sure. No lynching at this point would be kinda like having a night head start in the game, just with a full day's worth of information to go on already. Anyway, this doesn't really matter at this point because I'm not arguing for a no lynch.

I'm becoming increasingly nervous about Adel's lack of belief in her own attack against CKD. She certainly seemed pretty adamant about it several pages ago and now she seems to want to ignore him altogether.

[BillyTwilight]

...says the man who has been lurking a good portion of the game. SO if you are scum and your partner was lurking, wouldnt you be pushing the same thing? This is why many lurkerscum win...I hope you dont plan on having this theory all game. For if you are not scum, you just game them a game plan to avoid your vote. Just for the record, BT, who do you feel should be put in a lurker category today?

This being said, I think that people should vote for who they think is scum. Not a lurker, unless you think that their lurking in this game is scummy or the few posts they have posted are scummy...

...BT, Have not been impressed (until the past couple of pages) and I am not sure what he is doing in this game. We are 20 pages into this game, and he has only posted 10 posts. (make that 12 as I am putting this together), though he has a reason. Also against lynching a lurker(I think this REALLY needs to be noted for later). I would be interested to see if this is a common argument he makes as town in other games…if I have time I might do a meta. Most of his posts which are comments and votes on the hot wagon of the hour. This isn’t completely accurate though as of late, he is still pushing my wagon, and that has died off, but just got support again from Adel...

Feel free to look at all of my games. I have never pushed for a lurker lynch, although the only time I specifically remember getting into a debate about lurker lynching was in Mafia 64 and I was scum.

The whole argument comes down to are scum more likely to lurk than town, and I don't think the answer there is yes. I've been lurky town; I've been lurky scum. I've seen lurky town lynched. I've seen lurky scum lynched. Never in any case have I seen any verifiable way of getting good info on a lurker to have confidence in the lynch, regardless of how they've flipped. Therefore those lynches are bad. The mod should replace lurkers; the players simply don't have the information needed to legitimately know that they have a good lynch going.

My one exception to the above is when a player lurks but picks up prods and constantly asks to stay in the game. When it becomes obvious that a players strategy is to lurk, and not RL circumstances that make it difficult for the player to play, then they should be lynched. I am COMPLETELY opposed to lurking-as-strategy; when a player is posting in other games and ignoring the game you are in with them, yet answers all prods and tries to do just enough to stay in the game, then by all means lynch them. Strategical lurking must be stopped at all cost. But for the most part, it's the mod's job (IMO) to make sure the players in his/her game are active.

[BillyTwilight]

Unvote. Vote Adel

I'd rather vote the person pushing this dumb CKD wagon than CKD.

I think at this point you should be voting for me then, cicero.

[BillyTwilight]

Vig or SK got Adel, obv. Thanks for clearing that up for us, at least.

I'll have a look through to see what reasons there might be for a Sim kill. No suspicions right now, clean slate till I get a read-through.

[BillyTwilight]

All right, I'm getting back into the reread here. Sorry for the absence.

Things I'm looking for:

1.) Adel-NK was bad for scum. They could really have used her for a mislynch today or later in the game. Going to look carefully at those throwing around suspicion of Adel, especially toward the end of day 1. Also, the vig/SK probably posted against Adel as well.

2.) This game is VERY difficult for me to interpret. Looking for players who seem more confident in there assertions that I feel town should really be at this point in the game. Scum are more likely to have a "game-plan" of sorts, and that should show somewhat in their posts.

1:

CKD and cicero were the only players who were actually voting Adel at deadline. Very interesting considering players were supposedly "taking sides" between Adel and CKD. On quick readthrough, those expressing suspicion of Adel towards the end of the day:

Fonz, Oman, shaft.ed, volkan, plus cicero, obviously.

Of these, Fonz and cicero were the players most upfront about their distaste for Adel. One thing I would note about cicero's play is that he seemed to waver somewhat on the Adel vs. CKD fight when I chimed in falling in on Adel's side against CKD. Cicero commented that my post was the most articulate point against CKD, and asked others what they thought about it. However, later, cicero was again adamant that the wagon against CKD was sloppy and dumb.

Oman, shaft.ed, and volkan were much less forward about finding Adel scummy, but allowed for suspicion of Adel to be in their play and something they could return to later.

I'd say there is probably at least one mafioso in the above group. Right now my bet is Oman. I'll give a more thorough analysis of each of these players later this weekend/early next week.

Oman, can you reiterate why you think I'm scum? Other than the lurking, which puts me in the same boat with multiple players so far in the game. Looking through your play you seem to be confident in other players scuminess (see cicero as well) but unable to back it up when push comes to shove. This also goes into my point #2.

As for point #2, that's going to take a much more careful player PBP analysis that I don't have time for right now. I'll get into that when I reread each of the players from #1 in isolation later this weekend.

As a side note, if we have a Vig they are probably in the above list. I don't see a Vig killing someone (Adel) that they hadn't expressed suspicion of before. Much less confident if a SK killed Adel; they might or might not have expressed suspicion of her at any point day 1.

Cicero, you asked me which of volkan/Oman I would find scummiest, my answer right now is Oman. Volkan's player analysis from the end of day 1 were confused enough that I feel he is probably town in the same boat I'm in. Again, a more careful read will help me understand this better, but I don't have time this evening.

[BillyTwilight]

First thing I should note is that the number of games I am in has dropped from 4 to 2 since this game started, and the other game I'm in is practically dead at this point, so I will finally get to concentrate on this game more than any other. I told Guardian my posting will pick up, and it will. Didn't get a chance to look at the forums this weekend, though. I'll make it a point to post at least once a day from here on out, except for perhaps on the weekends.

Why are you commenting on who you think the potential Vig is? It may be that the scum have already concluded what you did above, but then again, it may not. If they haven't, you may have just improved their chances at targeting the Vig, especially since what you said can be interpreted as an assertion that you are not the Vig.

The fact that no town power roles have been eliminated is probably one of the only bright spots from Day 1. If we do have a Vig, the Vig needs to be protected, because he could potentially save us from defeat, especially if Day 2 goes like Day 1 did.

Meh. I'm completely intrigued by your take on this, Jitsu. Especially the fact that you're latching on to the vig side of things instead of the SK side of things. I don't think there is anything in the game that can differentiate one from the other, so I would make the argument that pointing out potential SK suspects would give mafia a good target to go after that helps town.

Secondly, I'm not a big believer in a vig being a huge help to town anyway. If we do have a vig, I'd much prefer they avoid making kills at night. We need this game to go as long as possible. Any misfires from an overzealous vig could put us even further behind the eight ball. If there is a vig in the game and he/she happens to be a forced vig I want them out of the game ASAP. The chances of a vig saving us are very slim, and if we let the game get to a point where we need a vig to save us then we probably deserve to lose anyway.

What exactly about me pointing this out do you find to be scummy? You've recently stated that I've jumped to the top of your scumlist over shaft.ed. It looks to me like you are trying to get as far away from a crappy case on shaft.ed as quickly as possible, especially considering no one in the game really seems to be buying your "preview vs. send" theories.

cicero, I'm also wandering why you are asking which of the people I mentioned do I think is most likely to be the vig. I wouldn't expect two players in the same game to come at me from the "your discussing a vig"-standpoint when as far as I recall I never stated that I found Adel's killer to be more likely a vig than a SK. I'm not exactly sure what to think of it. However, I'd REALLY like to know why Jitsu latched onto me for throwing out the possibility of a vig amongst several players, but never batted an eye when cicero asked me to narrow that group of players down to the one I most likely thought was the vig. As far as that question goes, I might have a look later and see what I think, but I probably won't be answering it.

I'd still like Oman to comment on my thoughts in my last post. I don't have a whole lot left to comment on right now, but I still need a more thorough read of day one before I'm ready to push for any one player's lynch before deadline. Oh, and I have an interesting proposition that I might ask the rest of you about tomorrow. More later.

[BillyTwilight]

It depends on what you mean by "bad play". Certainly mafia would have liked to have Adel around as a possible mislynch and to add confusion to the game. So

if

the Adel kill was via vigging then the vig saved us that... but at what cost? Clearly the game has been shortened now; we are one player closer to mafia having a majority status. Furthermore, it's very hard to quantify how well Adel's play could have been; I could certainly see her convincing the rest of us that she was town. If we have a cop in the game, I'd say that there was a significant chance that Adel was investigated last night and she could have been cleared that way, giving us a confirmed player on down the line, which could be key in winning the game. I think there is a good possibility that we now have a wasted investigation from Night 1, again clearly bad for us. Even if none of the above had happened, if mafia had had to push hard for her lynch then once lynched we would have more information to tackle wrt the people on her wagon. I think Adel's kill added short term clarity to the game that has turned out to have minimal benefit and removed the opportunity for better information from her play and the consequences of her play down the line. In that case, yeah, I'd say that if Adel was vigged at least it kept us from going down the wrong rabbit hole today, but at the same time the cost of that kill certainly has the potential to do us more harm down the line than good.

[BillyTwilight]

cicero asked me to narrow that group of players down to the one I most likely thought was the vig.

I did?

Scratch that. I misread your post #706. In my mind I saw, "Billy Twilight, Wanna tryna narrow down who the vig might be?" My apologies.

[BillyTwilight]

Several people in the game pegged Adel as potential scum, so she wasn't a bad target, and her death last night as opposed to today may have saved the town from talking all day about her and really getting down the wrong track.

Already given my thoughts on this above

We know that there are 2-3 mafia, and there is strong evidence of a Vig/SK. Given that the town seems to have *at least* 2 power roles (and possibly as many as 5), I tend to doubt that we only have 2 scum. If we have a Vig, the ratio right now is likely to be 6 town:3 mafia (or maybe 5 town:3 mafia:1 independent). If we mislynch the Vig today and the mafia kill succeeds, we are almost certainly in LYLO then. Of course, you are right that if we mislynch today and don't hit the Vig, that we would be in a very bad place (the scum could win tonight if the Vig hits town and the Mafia kill succeeds).

If we have an SK instead, then the choice is a tough one, but it would be understandable to go after an SK to avoid unpleasant endgame scenarios (we, the town in Vollkan's game, came to exactly this conclusion when we lynched Guardian, who claimed SK).

I understand why you want to lengthen the game, but identifying and lynching a (possibly forced) vig seems wrong when we should be identifying and lynching the scum instead. If the town collectively agrees that we should out the vig and lynch him, that's a different matter, but I don't like how you seem to have taken the choice to expose the vig into your own hands here.

Whoa, what? I've NEVER said that I want to lynch a vig. You again are completely ignoring the SK possibility here. I find that the best way to win a game of mafia is to identify and catalogue everyone in the game as much as possible. The fewer wildcards you have the harder it is for scum to hide. I saw a piece of relevant information that might point out a potentially anti-town faction, or at least help us clarify who and what wrt the players involved. Jitsu, if there is an SK and he/she is one of the players I mentioned above, would you not agree that it's very important that I point that out?

I also don't like how you've insinuated here that I am attacking you to distance myself from my Shaft.ed debacle. If you look back and reread the thread, you'll see that I attacked you in 696, well before things started going bad with my attack on Shaft.ed.

Post 696 is is EQUIVOCALLY NOT an attack against me, and that you are trying to spin it as such is telling. The tone, the content, all point to you reprimanding me for what you think is bad play. There is NO HINT in that post that you find me scummy because of my play. As people start to question you on your shaft.ed stance you begin to distance away from that stance by pointing more at me, first in post #705, then in post #713, culminating in your vote of me above.. Post #713 is the first post where you actually imply that my "reasoning out who the vig might be" as scummy. You've yet to actually explain to me why you think my points are scummy. You've made a leap from originally implying that my play was bad play for town but not inherently scummy, to scummy play from your top mafia suspect. Please explain this thought progression and how you came to it. Furthermore, this thought progression coincides with you trying to get off of the shaft.ed attack while saving as much face as possible. I don't think the two are unconnected. Players were starting to question you for your stance on shaft.ed, and the harder the questions came the more you backed off and started pointing instead at me.

Vote: BillyTwilight

To answer Fonz's question, my top 3 right now are BillyTwilight and Shaft.ed, with Oman as a distant third. I'm also kind of disappointed that Erg0 and Vollkan haven't contributed more content.

You basically apologized earlier in this post for your "shortsightedness" wrt shaft.ed. Yet you still have him as your second most likely scum. Please explain; if you have more misgivings about shaft.ed than the "Preview/Send" debacle, enough so that he is still your second highest suspect, why haven't you been focusing on those other things as well in your recent back and forth with him. Very rare to see a player basically admit a mistake about another player in a post and in that same post still have him listed as high on his scumlist as you do with shaft.ed.

[BillyTwilight]

Whoa, what? I've NEVER said that I want to lynch a vig. You again are completely ignoring the SK possibility here. I find that the best way to win a game of mafia is to identify and catalogue everyone in the game as much as possible. The fewer wildcards you have the harder it is for scum to hide. I saw a piece of relevant information that might point out a potentially anti-town faction, or at least help us clarify who and what wrt the players involved. Jitsu, if there is an SK and he/she is one of the players I mentioned above, would you not agree that it's very important that I point that out?

Jitsu's clearly reaching here, but also, that list you made only makes sense for town vigs; SKs aren't any more likely to take out people they've expressed suspicion of (except in so far as they might want to claim vig). So, unless someone was terrified of the might of Adel's omgus, then it doesn't actually help narrow down sk possibilities. AT ALL.

I disagree. I think a lot of players playing as a SK would try to kill mafia in the early game, as more often than not town is lynched. A SK has to keep the numbers even. Furthermore, a SK in the day phase needs to look like a good townie, which means good scumhunting. I don't think it beyond reason to believe that a SK might actually point out who they really think are mafia in the day phase, and then might actually kill a person they really think are mafia in the night phase. It would take a lot of self control for an SK to feel that a player is mafia in the day phase, completely ignore their play, and then kill them at night, all at the same time managing to maintain a good day-image. The main point I was trying to make was that if we have a Vig claim down the line I am more likely to believe it from someone inside the group of players I mentioned and less likely to believe from outside that group, for the very reasons above. A SK could be trying to be crafty to keep his/her distance away from his'her nightkills; I think a Vig would be more likely to kill someone that they had expressed much suspicion of throughout the day.

I also don't like how you've insinuated here that I am attacking you to distance myself from my Shaft.ed debacle. If you look back and reread the thread, you'll see that I attacked you in 696, well before things started going bad with my attack on Shaft.ed.

Post 696 is is EQUIVOCALLY NOT an attack against me, and that you are trying to spin it as such is telling.

Actually, I read it as one. So, uh, yeah.

Clarify what you consider an attack.

The tone, the content, all point to you reprimanding me for what you think is bad play. There is NO HINT in that post that you find me scummy because of my play.

Scolding you for doing something anti-town... yeah, that's an attack.

BT does make a good point though: Jitsu, 'may not have realised-gate' aside, what do you think of shaft.ed's play?

I consider attacking a player as calling into question their alignment. Rebuking a player for bad play, even anti-town play, doesn't fall into this if there is no mention of finding the "bad" player scummy because of it. Jitsu's "attack" against me read like so many newbie-game IC comments, where the IC is trying to explain a principle and how a newbie's play was "bad", but the IC doesn't find the newbie to be more likely scum because of his "bad" play; he's merely pointing out what to avoid doing from then on. I'd like for you (Fonzy) to look over post #696 and explain to me where Jitsu looks like he's calling my alignment into question. I'd argue just the opposite. His post makes the implicit assumption that I am town by going down the logic path of "why mention something in the thread that mafia might not have thought about yet? You might be stupidly leading them into something that could give them an advantage."

Again, there is no way you can spin that post into an "attack" against me, at least not if your definition of attack is the same as mine.

[BillyTwilight]

Yes, but an SK in the day phase has also got to avoid appearing too big a threat to scum, so as not to get crosskilled.

Your last two sentences just read like you're agreeing with me, actually. But seriously: why would a town player NEED to give a list of people he would believe a vig claim from? That can only help the scum.

The list was of where I thought a Vig/SK might come from. If I had only reason to believe that Adel's death was via vigging then I would have been more tactful in my approach. And yes, I'm agreeing with you to a certain extent. If you'll notice in my original post I plainly stated that if Adel's death was via SK then the SK might or might not be from that group of people. I read your argument to mean that you felt there was no chance that the SK would be in that group of people ("So, unless someone was terrified of the might of Adel's omgus, then it doesn't actually help narrow down sk possibilities. AT ALL.") I don't believe that. I believe that it gives us a piece of the puzzle, nothing concrete, but certainly something to think about if we decide there is an SK in the game and we need to lynch them. And I think that mentioning it is a good thing. I'm a big believer in getting as much info on the table as possible; really the only times I think I would keep completely quiet about something is if I suspect a player of being a cop or a doc.

Any post where a player casts doubts or aspersions over another's behaviour. To keep this post short, i've omitted the end of the quote, but the answer to that is the same: Jitsu does not need to append 'AND-I-THINK-THIS-MIGHT-MAKE-HIM-SCUM' to the end of each of his statements, elementary-school like, for it to be an attack.

Yes, but your ignoring the rest of his tone. Of course you don't have to say "And I think this makes him scummy" at the end of every "attack" to make your point, but your tone from the rest of the post will certainly send that exact message. I don't get that tone from his post; in fact, as I argued above, I get the tone that he is implying he feels I am town from that post.

[BillyTwilight]

You said "If there is a vig in the game and he/she happens to be a forced vig I want them out of the game ASAP." How was I supposed to interpret that? I interpreted that sentence using the most straightforward, obvious meaning of the words. If you intended that sentence to mean something else due to context, then I think you could have worded that MUCH, MUCH better than you did.

I will give you this; if there is a FORCED vig in the game I want them out of the game ASAP, wither by lynching or nightkill, I don't care. I think forced-vig is one of if not the worst power role for town to have in a game. I don't see how you could extrapolate this to mean we should go vig hunting. Again, I have NO WAY of knowing if there is a vig, forced vig, or SK in the game. I never stated who I thought the vig/SK was specifically, and never pushed for a lynch on any of those players, at least not on the premise that they were a SK or vig. I still think it's stretching on your part to try to paint my statements as an attempt to get town to go SK or vig hunting.

I'm not ignoring the SK possibility, but I think that an Adel Vig-kill is also plausible. It would definitely make a lot of sense for a Vig to target her -- Adel looked scummy to a number of players (decent chance of hitting scum), and vigging her last night would be beneficial and generate a lot of information either way she flipped (due to the large number of players that commented on the Adel's CKD wagon). If she flipped town, it would certainly save the town from going way off track and mislynching her on D2. If she flipped scum, then the town would have its first scum revealed and could start to reread and look at connections to other players.

Pointing out who could be the SK is one thing -- I can't argue that the information isn't potentially useful, but if we need to risk outing a Vig to do it, I'd rather get a lot more return on that investment. Unless the information given provides a decent chance of catching the SK, I think it's a very poor play not to protect a potential Vig this early. The game is still fairly closed right now, with no scum or power roles revealed yet. I think attempting to speculate about game setup and who an SK may be from that information can lead to premature conclusions.

I have a really hard time seeing why a townie would intentionally want to mention who they thought the vig would be at this point in time. Potentially outing the Vig to the scum in exchange for a list of people you would believe Vig/SK claims from, but that may or may not even be the Vig/SK is an AWFUL trade in my book. I would rather not rely on a Vig either, but we are *already* in a fairly bad position. If we mislynch today, there is a high probability we will be in LYLO tomorrow even if the Vig does nothing tonight (assuming there is one). If that does happen, and if we do have a Vig, I want them around (unexposed, if possible) to attempt a game-saving kill should we need it. Talking about the who the Vig is doesn't help us lynch scum today and that's what we need to focus on.

You simply have more respect for the vig role than I do. I think forced-vig is awful and normal vig is generally unhelpful for town. I think it's a completely good trade off to point out possible SK/vig suspects at this point in the game. If mafia does decide to vig/SK hunt tonight then that means they aren't specifically looking for other power roles that I would consider to be much more helpful to us than a vig (cop, doc, masons, etc.). I'd trade a vig for a cop or even a good townie any day of the week.

Why did I need to hint to you that I found it scummy? I like to ask questions without the recipient knowing where I'm going. That may be different from your normal experience, but I think it worked pretty well for me in my first two games as vanilla townie. I was thinking your post looked scummy, but I decided to wait and see what your response was. If you had made a mistake and owned up to it, I probably would have dropped it. Post 705 was hardly much different than 696 in tone. Post 713 did reflect more what I was really thinking -- Shaft.ed had accused me of not putting weight on my suspects, and I did slip up a bit and let out some of my actual thoughts about your post when I responded to him to explain why I wasn't voting. I'd like to point out that the harsh criticism of my attack on Shaft.ed didn't come until after Post 713 -- so I think this shows I started pointing at you before I started taking any serious heat for the Shaft.ed attack.

I don't buy it. I understand your logic, but I don't believe that this is what you were actually doing. Again, you expect me to believe that you "attacked" me without giving a hint that you actually found my play scummy, while I had actually moved ahead of shaft.ed on your scum-list. You hid this while you continued to attack shaft.ed, but then you accidently let it "slip" that I had moved ahead of shaft.ed on your scumlist at nearly the same time as you began to back off of your shaft.ed attack. All without me having posted in the interim. Could you have been laying a bit of a trap to gauge how I reacted to things? It's possible. It's also possible that you merely pointed out something you found to be bad play from me, and later when you needed it you tried to turn it from bad play to scummy play.

I think your play was scummy because outing a potential vig is an awful play right now -- especially for what I see is a meager benefit for town (but a pretty nice benefit for scum). Speculating about the setup at this point is not very reliable and could distract us from lynching scum (which we really need at this point). I see your post as a potential attempt to fish for reactions relating to power roles and/or distract the town from focusing on the Mafia.

Really? You really think I was trying to guide town down some road away from mafia? Then you think there is no chance that the group of players I pointed out contain any mafia members? You're now decoupling my vig/SK speculation away from my mafia speculation. I think I could make a rather large argument that the post in question attempts to point just as much at who I thought was mafia as at who I thought was vig/SK. I'd argue that I concentrated MORE on who was mafia in that post, and simply speculated on the possibility of a vig/SK being in that group as well. Now you are forgetting the original context of my post to fit your current theory that I am scum trying to distract from mafia hunting. Oops.

To be fair to you though, can you point me to a previous game of yours where you have expressed a desire to talk about power roles early to gain information?

Can't think of any of the top of my head. I can point at plenty of games where I was scum and I didn't "express a desire to talk about power roles early". Check my wiki; I think pretty much all of those games would suffice. Again, power role speculation is not something I usually engage in as scum or town. Here, the role in question and the possibility that that role could be either town- or self-aligned seemed a conversation worthy of having in thread, instead of keeping thoughts to myself.

I apologized for making a mistake about *that particular attack* on Shaft.ed, not about Shaft.ed himself. After rereading due the harsh criticism from Vollkan, Kison, and Fonz, I felt that they were probably right and that I reached on it way too far. Why should I exonerate him just for that? It doesn't invalidate my other concerns. I haven't mentioned the other concerns recently because I was focused on his hammer at the time. I was looking for a reaction from him and not making a general case on him at that point. If you think I should knock Shaft.ed a few slots down on my list, I'd listen to what you have to say.

Meh. I stand by the statement that when I read someone who basically apologizes to another player because they are admitting there attack was fallacious, I find it very odd that they continue to have that player near the top of the their list, especially when said fallacious attack was the main focus of there case.

[BillyTwilight]

If shaft.ed died via vigging then someone is going to give me hell for my stance on vigs not being all that useful for town.

C'est la vie

.

Remaining players:

cicero
Erg0
Jitsu
Oman
Kison (replacing Shanba)
The Fonz

Time for some role speculation (gasp! have at me, Jitsu!). We have either a 2 or three player mafia, and perhaps an independent. I highly doubt that we have a "normal" SK (see Guardian's Setup post), so the "peaceful" deaths are either a vig or a SK with some unusual characteristics. This might be something we need to keep in mind when dealing with this endgame. The presence of a GF indicates a cop in the game; the lack of a nightkill means either a doc or that shaft.ed had to submit the NK for scum, and his death resulted in mafia missing their target.

It appears that town has a fairly large amount of power. I can't see there being a 2-person mafia in this setup and still maintain balance. So I'm going on the assumption that at least 2 of the above are scum.

Fonz, Oman, and cicero had expressed a some suspicion of Adel back on day 1, something I still contend mafia would have been doing (shaft.ed was as well).

Unlike Kison I don't really find Fonzy scummy at this point. His back-off of shaft.ed yesterday feels real to me. Oman has been a scum-suspect of mine for quite some time, but I'm a little bit nervous about his play, which I consider to be fairly sloppy. I have no meta on Oman; I feel that if he is scum he hasn't put a lot of effort into trying to win this game, and it makes my scum read on him shaky. Cicero needs my reread; there might have been something to his hard reaction to the early day 1 bandwagon after all.

Erg0, Jitsu, and Kison: Erg0 is town. I have no read on Kison whatsoever; he also needs my reread. Jitsu is sending me all kinds of mixed signals. I'll get to his late day 2 posts shortly.

I apologize for missing the deadline. I'm used to deadlines happening at night in my timezone. I was at work and logged on to post and vote that evening, and was surprised to find the thread already closed. I would have voted Jitsu, btw.

I'll go back and reread shaft.ed in isolation to see if I can pick up on his partner(s). I will also get in a reread of cicero and Kison, who I have little read on currently. And I'll answer Jitsu's questions from yesterday.

[BillyTwilight]

I just got through a brief reread of shaft.ed. I'm getting ready to go on vacation, so I'll have LA for the next week (I should have some access, though, as long as my father in law brings his comp).

Looking over shaft.ed's play my list would look like this, ranked first to last as likely mafia:

1.) cicero
2.) Kison
3.) Oman
4.) Jitsu
5.) Fonzy
6.) Erg0

Cicero has the least amount of headbutting with shaft.ed of anyone in the game. And I don't buy that shaft.ed had to put one of his mafia members in his suspect list, which cicero has taken from Fonzy and ran with a little on this page.

shaft.ed continual pining about shanba's absence reads off to me, so there might be something there. I will say that Kison's interaction with shaft.ed reads a lot more genuinely, but isn't as strong as shaft.ed's interaction with others.

Basically I feel that Oman, Jitsu, Fonz, and Erg0 were all attacked by shaft.ed in this game in a genuine manner. I'm coming under the impression that shaft.ed did no bussing/distancing for the sake of bussing/distancing in this game.

This list is tentative, as I only had time to read shaft.ed in isolation. Will try to get to the rest of the players later this week, and things may change with further reading, but right now I feel pretty good about cicero.

[BillyTwilight]

I had a brief read, but not a lot of time now to post (on my father-in-law's comp). Quick answer for Jitsu's question in post #912: the reason I singled out cicero was for post #893. The fact that he finds Oman's lynch to be inevitable, or dumb to avoid, or whatever, based mostly on being the "one in three" and that he was shaft.ed's random vote seems rediculously artificial to me; something scum might post without really thinking about it and then wishing they hadn't (he's never tried to back up that argument since).

I'll try to get back on later this week; will be on Sunday if I don't get a chance to before.

[BillyTwilight]

Incidentally,

I'm not ready to vote yet

, but I

think

it

might

be dumb NOT to lynch Oman at this point. He's in the three suspicions of Shaft.ed, he was Shaft.ed's random vote and small focus at the beginning of day one (scum like to do that),

his case on me was thoroughly artificial and he hasn't really demonstrated any hunger to scumhunt. Just the opposite.

Maybe

I've been thinking past the obvious too much in this game.

Might

be time to stop.

I'd like other people's thoughts on this plz.

Hey Billy, I've used pretty colors to make the parts of that post that you ignored stand out for you.

First pay attention to the dark red which is an intrical part of the point. Then look at the red.

The dark red is a lame reason to find someone's lynch inevitable, and the light red is hedging. What exactly about this am I supposed to find less scummy?

[BillyTwilight]

1. I'm sorry. Why exactly is that a lame reason? I'd like your reasoning.

It's not a lame reason to find someone scummy. It's a lame reason to find their lynch inevitable. When someone posts a plea making the claim that we would be "dumb" not to lynch another player at this point, I expect that to be backed up with major reasons, from their play or from a mathematical analysis, for why that players lynch

should

happen at some point in the game. Being lazy at scumhunting and not backing up accusations thoroughly doesn't fall into that category for me. Thus, "lame".

2. The point of my post was to demonstrate that BT was misrepresenting what I said and the way that I said it. He can now come back and say "oh no. you were scummy for different reasons but what it looks like to me is tautology of scumminess when in fact in the first place BT misrepresented my words. That was my point.

?? Not sure where the close quote-mark is supposed to be so not sure what thought process you are attributing to me. My thought process was "cicero thinks we'd be dumb to not lynch Oman because 1.) He was on shaft.ed's list of possible scum and no one else on the list looks likely, 2.) He was shaft.ed's random vote, and 3.) He's exhibited lazy scumhunting. Valid reasons to find someone scummy, not valid reasons to find that person's lynch inevitable."

3. Sometimes I act definitively. Sometimes I muse. This was musing because my focus on Vollkan and desire to put pressure on people like him who have a reputation as being truly exemplary players who are hard to see as scum was making me ignore some of the more obvious scummy behavior. Oman's behavior has been scummy. Just because I listed it all in a short post doesn't make it any less true. We might be stupid not to lynch Oman after he has scumtell connections to Shaft.ed, hasn't scumhunted much at all and when he did bother to do any work he cobbled together a case on me that most others thought was crap. How exactly is me saying this problematic? I really don't get it but I would LOVE for someone to explain it to me. Seriously. Asserting that its "lame" doesn't cut the Dijon mustard.

The problematic part, for me, is that those reasons are reaching for someone to think that another player should be lynched, not in the "I think he's scum" sort of way, but in the "this game state really requires the lynch of this player" sort of way. Your post looks like you think his lynch would fall into the latter category. "I'm not ready to vote yet, but I think it might be dumb NOT to lynch Oman at this point." Capatalizing the not; consider it dumb to not lynch Oman; these things feel like you are almost asking for a policy lynch of Oman, in my reading. The reasons you give for that kind of lynch don't cut the mustard, imo.

I'll get to your next post later.

[BillyTwilight]

I'll read and post when I get to work today. I think I'd prefer a cicero lynch. Will post soon.

[BillyTwilight]

Confirming Erg0; we're masons, and we can daytalk. Should answer cicero's question on why I've basically defended Erg0 and called him town straight up all this game.

I'm rather confused about this game... it all seems too easy.

We need to hear from Kison and Jitsu to make sure there are no counterclaims; what is bothering me right now is Jitsu's interaction with shaft.ed yesterday. Jitsu pursued a rather terrible case attacking of all things his godfather, if he's scum. Terrible bussing/distancing strategy, but it might have been simply his lack of experience as scum. On the other hand, this might explain shaft.ed attacking Jitsu harshly on day 1 (post #217). I've found when playing scum myself that one of the easiest things to do is overreact to one of my scumpartners saying something that I felt was a dead-giveaway that they were scum and wanting to immediately attack them for it. Sometimes knowing your partner is scum can amplify the degree of scuminess that their posting actually has, and can cause you to overact to something a town player might see as a tell but nothing damning (see my overreaction to YogurtBandit day 1 in Mafia 64). Could certainly be what happened with shaft.ed in #217.

I've felt that shaft.ed's interest in shanba's lurking on day 1 to be the most likely connection with shaft.ed throughout the game, so I'm all for lynching Kison. Kison and shaft.ed did go at it some when Kison replaced in, but it looks like too little too late, imo. I simply can't see there being less than a three person scum group in this game, so that means that both Jitsu and Kison are scum, unless the mod gave multiple players in the scum group godfather status, which also doesn't make sense.

Fonz, can you claim, please?

The setup here seems overbalanced:

What I know -

4 vanilla townies (Adel, Simenon, CKD, volkan)

2 masons (Erg0, BT)

1 mafia gf (shaft.ed)

What I believe -

Vig/SK - (Oman) For the most part I believe Oman's claim as vig; the setup indicates that if there is a third party they won't be "normal", and that there win condition is "You win when you have assured that you will never be lynched or killed," indicating that they aren't night kill immune. If Oman is a SK then he probably isn't "normal"; maybe he has 1 nightkill self-protection? that doesn't really fall outside of a "normal" SK, though.

Cop - (cicero) I almost have to believe his cop claim. Scum must believe that there is a cop in the game (why have a gf, otherwise), and for him to claim cop before being forced to seems suicidal. The only way I see him lying is if he somehow knows there isn't a cop in the game.

doc/rb/nkimmune - There has to have been a way for the night 2 mafia kill to have been blocked. This could fall under a role (the ones I have listed - add more if you can think of any) or that Guardian didn't have night kills happen simultaneously and shaft.ed's death stopped the mafia kill from happening.

goons/rb/mafiadoc, etc. - There HAS to be 2 mafia left. As much power as town apparently has would make a 2 person mafia completely unbalanced and almost broken.

So tally: Town is 8/9 players: 4 vanilla, 2 masons, 1 cop, 1 vig, 1 doc/rb; vig/doc/rb could be SK, or other self-aligned, but nothing in the play seems to indicate it.

3 mafia, 1 godfather, the other 2 unknown (balancing seems to require there is at least a mafia RBer... I can't see a mafiadoc as the mafiadoc would almost have to protect the GF, and the GF was killed).

Balance is very precarious here, and is making me second guess what should be a simple decision on lynching Kison or Jitsu.

I'd like to hear cicero's night 1 investigation (he might have all ready given it, need to go back and look but want to get this in as I see a flurry of posting happening now). Also want Fonz's claim.

[BillyTwilight]

All right, checked again and got cicero's other investigation. Still want a claim from Fonz.

7 players, 2 mafia (?), 1 self-aligned (?). Not exactly sure where to go from here, but it looks like we have to decide if there is a self-aligned and lynch them today. Waiting for claim from Fonzy and to hear from Jitsu and Kison.

[BillyTwilight]

I got it, went and checked (post #1019).

What exactly is your reason to avoid claiming at this point, Fonzy? I'm a big proponent of getting everything out on the table so scum can't try and manipulate their roleclaim to their advantage later in the game.

In fact, I think we need to get claims from all remaining players - Jitsu, Kison, and Fonzy. No more going back and trying to manipulate events/roles to anyone's liking as we approach endgame. My opinion, of course.

[BillyTwilight]

Just quickly read cicero with regard to Fonz on day 2 and 3. If he's faking a cop claim and innocent on Fonz he's doing a better job of it than I've seen before. Back that with cicero would be crazy to claim cop when he did as scum clears him, imo. Can't see him being a naive cop in this case either, so Fonz is either town or self-aligned.

Must hears from Jitsu and Kison soon.

[BillyTwilight]

Hehehe. I like fighting with you Fonzy. Didn't get to do it enough in Mafia 64.

I'm fairly confident that mafia has lost this game. Only thing that needs clarification is a third party possibility. Fonz has managed to move himself into that category with lightening speed.

[BillyTwilight]

BT, no offence, but you're acting like a moron.

Quite clearly, if I'm by some stretch of the imagination not town, it's safe enough for me to claim vanilla townie.

Therefore, there is absolutely no possibility, as you put it, of me 'manipulating roles/events' since it would be unnecessary. What kind of antitown faction do you think I could be? We have a vig claim, which means that all kills are accounted for. If you say cult, I will nail you to the wall.

No, I don't think I'm acting like a moron.

As far as I am concerned there are 2 wildcards left in this game: you and Oman. Yes, the non-mafia kills are Oman's. Does that make you town aligned? No.

We have three lynches to work with, probably. We have 4 players that aren't confirmed as anything. We know that if there is a self-aligned player they have an "above average chance of not being normal"... i.e., they aren't a stereotypical serial killer. I don't see Oman being a serial killer here - if he is then he has a power that we don't know of yet. I don't think a 1 shot night-kill immunity would make him more than a "normal" SK. I don't think he is night kill immune (see the win condition for self-aligned player). The only thing I can see is that he might have the ability to daykill. That I think would qualify as "not being normal".

I'm simply trying to understand what in this game is balancing for the town power here. 9 town, 4 vanilla, 5 power roles (assuming you in some way prevented a night kill) seems too much for a 3 person scumgroup to handle. 8 town, 4 vanilla, 4 power roles (assuming you in some way prevented a night kill) balancing OmanSK plus three mafia is a little better, but doesn't meet the requirement for the self aligned player to be something other than normal. 8 town, 5 vanilla, 3 power roles balancing night kill immune or 1 shot night kill immune OmanSK plus three mafia also doesn't really meat the requirement for the self aligned player to be something other than normal, though that seems the most balanced setup from game-start.

Most likely I guess is that the second/third scenario is the setup and the lucky break of only losing vanilla players for the first 4 deaths in the game makes the game seem more unbalanced than it really is, but it doesn't sit right with me. Throw in Jitsu's inexplicable attack on shaft.ed day 2, my belief that there doesn't seem to be a lot of reason for scum to want to night kill Oman night 2, and your reticence to claim when, if you are town, there are really only about 3 "normal" roles that you could be and everyone can already guess at what they are has me nervous about charging through the rest of the game as though we already have everything figured out.

[BillyTwilight]

If we lynch Oman and he's a SK, then we still have a problem. Kison's plan requires that Oman is lynched, that cicero is nked, and that Fonz has to choose between Erg0/BT and Jitsu/Kison tomorrow. If either of Jitsu/Kison are a roleblocker, than he can guarantee this approach. I don't particularly want the game to rest on a choice like that for Fonz, so there has to be a better approach.

Question: if we lynch Jistu or Kison today, and Oman is in fact a SK, then are we really in a prisoner's dilemma? There would presumably be 4 players left. Oman can't kill scum in the night phase or he autoloses, so tomorrow would have to be 2-1-1, normally a prisoner's dilemma. The only difference is we will know all the roles already. Oman will be revealed as an SK from his townNK and Kison or Jitsu would be the other obvious scum. In that situation a no lynch nearly forces the scum to kill each other. They can't kill town for fear of being the NK of the other player, and if they both kill different townies it leaves both alive for the final day (never actually had this happen, so I don't know who the win defaults to; I would think it would be the SK...

Mod, can you answer this question please?

). If the SK wins by default in that situation then mafia obviously has to kill the SK, and the SK would basically get to decide if he'd rather town win (kill mafia) or mafia win (kill town). If the remaining mafia is a roleblocker, however, then mafia almost win by default.

Fonz, the reason I want you to claim so much is that it helps me decide about Oman. If you prevented the night kill then that probably means that Oman is a vig. His play seems viggish to me all around. However, if you didn't prevent the night kill then someone is lying now or has a NK immunity. The obvious answer then is that Oman has at least 1 NK immunity and since NK immunity doesn't fit a vig role, he's probably a SK. I don't see how claiming hurts here. If you are a doc/rb, etc., then you are either going to be rbed tonight and cicero will die, or you are going to be killed tonight and cicero will be roleblocked.

I pretty much have to assume there is a mafia roleblocker. Balance seems impossible without it. If there weren't then lynching Oman would win the game; scum would want to kill cicero but couldn't because they wouldn't be sure that Fonz couldn't prevent the kill. They'd have to kill Fonz, and cicero would have an investigation to clear myself/Erg0 or condemn Jitsu/Kison. We can't count on this happening though, too high a chance that there is a mafia rber.

No lynching would give us some options, perhaps. Oman would be forced to kill mafia; as SK he can't go into a 5 player 2-2-1 day and expect to survive. That would leave us with 3-1-1 and nearly guaranteed victory. If Oman made a mistake and it was 2-2-1, we still have a shot; Oman would be forced to vote for mafia, townies would vote mafia, we'd go into night with a 2-1-1 game, and we're back in prisoner's dilemma territory, again with everyone already knowing everyone's role in the game.

Bah, I keep talking myself in circles. I'll probably be voting for Oman before the deadline hits; the only thing Fonzy could reasonably be to be a third party faction is a cult leader or a surviver. Cult leader seems too outlandish for the rest of this game and surviver doesn't hurt us any.

[BillyTwilight]

Go ahead, I came on to hammer, myself.

[BillyTwilight]

I'm scum and I don't really have any way of defending myself. Ugh. Let's get this over with.

Ok.

Vote: Jitsu

[BillyTwilight]

I figure I'll go ahead and throw in my mason tells as well.

Post #490: Although I am in general against lynching lurkers, the main impetus for throwing my hat in against lynching a lurker was that I felt the most likely lurker to get lynched at the time was Erg0. Both cicero and Adel at the time were pushing for a lurker lynch, and Erg0 was at or near the top of their "best candidates" list. Knowing that Erg0 was town was a strong reason for me to push against a lurker lynch, even when it could have gotten me in trouble (I lurked much of day 1).

Post #493: Same as above, but a blatant defense of not lynching Erg0.

Post #724: The last couple of lines: "Oh, and I have an interesting proposition that I might ask the rest of you about tomorrow. More later." At the time was beginning to feel desperate; scum looked to be coasting towards an easy win. I had no confidence that we were going to make a good lynch, and I felt that scum were well within their comfort zone, which would make finding them very, very difficult. I had an idea of a way to possibly shake things up, to put scum off their comfort zone and force them to do something they wouldn't have planned for or thought about, something different than you see in a typical mafia game. I wasn't sure how sound my plan was, or if it was even any good, so I wanted to talk to Erg0 about it before posting. Thus I said something about a proposition and that I would have something more to say about it the next day (RL, not game day). I talked with Erg0 in our forum about it, and he agreed that it might be something good to try, but it was late in the day (near deadline) and we should probably wait until the following day before trying it. This is a breadcrumb that we have daytalking ability. I wont say what my plan was; I'll let Erg0 post it to confirm that it was something we discussed and should confirm our daytalking ability.

Post #886: I blatantly state that Erg0 is town. For no reasons. Also note, as an aside to Jitsu's recent attack against me, that this post is an exercise in theory and setup speculation, and happened well before the claims yesterday. More on this later.

Post #897: I list the players in order of scummiest to least scummy. Erg0 is at the bottom. Again, no reasons given whatsoever.

As for Jitsu recent calling into question my desire to see Fonzy claim yesterday, if you look back throughout the game you will see a lot of setup speculation throughout (my early talk about a vig/SK possibility, my post #886 discussing possible setups, etc.). This is typical for my town play. I'm a very mathematical player; I prefer using process of elimination, pinning down roles, and doing as much math work as I can before coming to a decision on who the scum in the game are. It's one of the reasons why I was so confused through day 2 (the only thing I could say was there were 2 killing entities in the game, one of them mafia, obv., and one of them vig/SK). With all vanilla townies dead up to that point, mathematical analysis was almost impossible, and I was out of my element as far as scumhunting goes. Day 3, with shaft.ed's death, opened up many new possibilities, and I started trying to break down the game. The biggest problem I had was Jitsu's attack on shaft.ed, and that I really felt Oman was a vig (he showed no real since of urgency or craftiness in his play, which I feel a SK usually has, considering they have to out-survive everyone in the game). I wanted Fonz to claim because that helps with my math; analysis becomes easier the more claims there are on the table. I felt that if Oman

was

a vig then his lynch would hand the game to Fonz or mafia, if Fonz was an anti-town third party. Fonz's refusal to claim made me that much more uncomfortable. In the end I was OK way Oman's lynch, in part because of his post #1034, which was really quite rediculous (no way mafia forgets to send in a NK in an invitational), but mostly because Occam's Razor ruled the day. Too difficult to see a cult leader or some other weird third party element in this game without a NK ability.

On top of all of this Fonz has played with me as scum before, and should recognize the differences between my play in this game and my scumplay. I have one of the worst meta's on the site right now; it's because I've been scum in something like 80% of the games I'm in. I'm quite good at playing scum; much worse at town. I'm much more manipulative and in control as scum; I break apart the play of the townies and capitalize on even the smallest mistakes. I am not good at that as town - I've done it so much as scum that I feel I can find and make a good case on just about any town player, and it paralyzes me when I'm town, because I'm forced to constantly second-guess myself as to whither or not I'm just honing in on a townie making a minor mistake that I would normally take advantage of as scum, or that what the player is doing is genuinely scummy. This is the reason I'm much more comfortable playing mathematically as town, and a big reason why my contributions in the first couple of days was so lackluster.

[BillyTwilight]

Nice catch Fonz. Wish I had seen that and wouldn't have had to bother posting all those mason tells.

Yay.

[BillyTwilight]

Kison, wants suicide??? KThxbai.

[BillyTwilight]

Vote: Kison


Wanted to hammah

[BillyTwilight]

bah

Vote: Kison

[BillyTwilight]

I feel bad for scum in this game.... never seen a game swing quite that much before, and all because somehow we managed to only kill vanilla all the way up to night 2. Oman, did you have a night protection?